Note: These are the notes I wrote down as I read through this book. Sometimes the notes are a word-for-word transcription from the book. Other times it’s my paraphrase of what was written. These notes are not intended to fully explain what Watchman Nee wrote. If something is confusing or requires more clarity, you can reference this book for more information.
As our covenant representative, all that is true of Christ is reckoned to be true of us. Christ’s judgment on the cross is our judgment. Christ’s crucifixion, death, burial, and resurrection is ours as well. In God’s eyes, it would not be any more true if we had experienced it in person.
Positionally, we have died; we wait now for the Holy Spirit to translate this feat into our experience.
Regeneration Happens in Our Spirits
Titus 3:5 states, “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.”
We have been united with Him in His death; consequently, it is in our spirits where we first reap the realization of His resurrection life.
New birth happens to our spirits. There is no initial effect on the soul or body.
We can only communicate, commune, and connect with God by our spirit.
To be penitent, to feel sorry for sin, to shed tears, to even make decisions does not bring in salvation.
Confession, decision, and religious acts are not new birth. Rational judgment, intelligent understanding, mental acceptance, and pursuit of morality are soulical if not beginning in the spirit.
The soul and body are great servants but terrible leaders.
The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord (Proverbs 20:27).
The dead, old spirit is quickened into life when the Holy Spirit infuses it with God’s uncreated life.
Before regeneration, the soul has become the life of the body. His own self rules in the soul and passions govern the body.
At regeneration, we receive God’s own life into our spirits, and we are born of God. The Holy Spirit becomes the life of man’s spirit and the life of man’s whole being.
United to the Lord’s Death and Resurrection
We must reckon the death of the Lord Jesus as our own death and the resurrection of the Lord Jesus as our own resurrection.
Substitutionary death and co-death (our death in Christ) should be distinguished but never separated.
If we believe in the death of the Lord Jesus as our substitute, then we have already been united with Jesus in His death.
To say that He died for me is to say that I already have been penalized and have died in Him.
Everyone who believes in this fact shall experience its reality.
In believing, one is united with Him. To be united with Him means to experience everything He has experienced.
Our regeneration is our union with the Lord in His death and resurrection.
Position Versus Experience
Do not confuse position with experience.
When we believe, we are placed in the perfect position of being considered dead, raised, and ascended with the Lord.
He who is accepted in Christ is as acceptable as Christ.
This is position. All that Christ has experienced is ours. And position causes us to experience new birth, because it hinges on whether we have believed in Him—not on how deep he has experienced the death, the resurrection, and ascension of the Lord Jesus.
We Possess Eternal Life
A child born inherits his father’s life; we are born of God; therefore, we have His life (2 Peter 1:4).
Regeneration retrieves, out of chaotic darkness, the order of man’s spirit and soul. It separates light from darkness, as in the creation of the earth.
All who have God’s life possess eternal life.
What a believer receives at new birth is not contingent upon a progressive, spiritual, and holy pursuit but is the pure gift of God.
Those who do not possess this life in the sight of God are dead, no matter how religious, moral, learned, or zealous.
The new life we received is perfect. But it waits to be matured. New birth is like a fruit newly formed. The life is perfect, but it is still unripe.
Two Kinds of Christians
A spiritual Christian is one in whom the Holy Spirit dwells in his spirit and controls his entire being.
A carnal Christian has been born anew and has God’s life, but instead of overcoming his flesh, he is overcome by the flesh. They have been quickened in their spirit but still follow their soul and body.
Carnal Christians hinder God’s salvation from realizing its full potential and manifestation.
Only when he is constantly governed by the spirit can salvation be fully worked out in him.
