This week we will finish our chapter-by-chapter review of the book, Two Manners of Life by Titus Chu.
Chapter 4: A New Beginning
This chapter introduces Genesis 5, a “new beginning,” in which God seems to forget everything from Genesis 4. Cain and Abel are not mentioned, and Seth is described as if he is Adam’s firstborn. Praise the Lord that He can “delete” our past and we can have a new beginning on the line of life! This is the line that matters, as their years are recorded and thus have value before God.
Seth represents the resurrected Christ. Therefore, he is not a step on our experience, but the source of the whole line. In the line of life, we are “in” Seth, just as we are in the resurrected Christ as the divine and mystical realm. This is the beginning of our life. Yet the first step is not strong or victorious. Rather, Enosh (“mortality”) is our realization of our mortality and weaknesses. Cain had tried to please God, and he eventually produced Lamech, a proud and boastful man. Enosh has no boast, no ability to be proud. However such revelation of ourselves should cause us to cry out to the Lord that we need Him and depend on Him. This is the beginning of all our spiritual growth.
Chapter 5: Mortality Leading to Possession
This chapter focuses more on our experience of Enosh (meaning “mortality)”, as well as the path to Cainan. Both lines have an “acquisition/acquirer”–Cain (on the line of knowledge) and Cainan (on the line of life). Cain quickly acquired, even building a city for his son. Achievement seemed easy. Yet on the line of life, true gain comes only by realizing how weak, mortal, and frail we really are. It seems there are three steps–
- Realizing our weakness and calling upon the Lord.
- The Lord revealing something to us of Christ.
- This revelation becoming our subjective possession.
Without the third step, Cainan, we may hear many truths and riches yet never have them for ourselves.The only way to possess them is for the Lord Himself to reveal it to us, which in turn requires us to know our weakness. Pride and boasting only hinders this process, and it plays out during a long period of time. The three steps happen simultaneously, but it may take many years to touch it in a certain area. We may produce many things in the meantime, yet when what is of life is produced, God takes notice and declares, “This is valuable in My sight.”
Chapter 6: Praising and Descending
This chapter considers the next two names, and their associated stages, on the line of life–Mahalalel and Jared. Mahalalel, meaning “praising God,” is a deep and profound praise of who God is. Without the previous steps, our praise can remain based on shallow things (like our happiness), or we may even appreciate ourselves as much as we appreciate God! Yet through our experiences of Enosh and Canaan, we grow to realize who we are, who God really is, and thus we become a deep praiser of God alone.
Yet all of these are tested by Jared (meaning “descending”). Will we remain high in the clouds, praising God, and in the process leave everyone else behind? Or will all that we have gained be displayed through our humanity, in a way that causes people to feel we are lovable and approachable? For this, we must learn to “descend” (Jared), following the example of the Lord Jesus. We must not give up a proper stand or violate our conscience, but we should be able to be with all kinds of people, whether weak, ungodly, or even unbelievers.
Chapter 7: Learning and Walking with God
This chapter focuses only on the generation/experience/stage of Enoch (“learning”). Each line has a generation named Enoch, yet how they are arrived at is very different. On the line of knowledge, Enoch is acquired quickly–the first generation after Cain. On the line of life, Enoch is acquired only after four generations/stages. True learning on the line of life is slower, harder, and requires a price. This is the difference between learning doctrine (the Enoch on Cain’s line) and learning experientially (the Enoch on Seth’s line).
On the line of life, as one who is learned, Enoch bore some responsibility before God. He truly was mature–even walking with God. This walk had two sides:
- Normal–he had sons and daughters
- Special–he was taken by God
May our lives be the same–people would look at us outwardly and feel we are so normal, yet inwardly, our walk with God makes our lives taste different, special, even mysterious to others around us.
Chapter 8: Seven Stages of Spiritual Learning
This chapter does three things:
- Emphasize the need to experience truth, not just know it. Actually, if we only know doctrine, we are probably like the Laodiceans who thought they were rich, yet they were poor. It is only the experience of truth that will set us free.
- Recap the five generations–we are in a realm of resurrection, experiencing the riches of the triune God, yet descending to be with man and bearing responsibility as we learn.
- Quickly address the remaining three generations. Methuselah and Lamech represent two sides of one generation–on the one hand restfully waiting for the Lord to return; on the other hand being bold and crazy for Christ and the church. Noah, the pinnacle of the seven stages, is a man who labored hard, yet who was restful in the assurance that God was the one truly working. This is a man God could truly accomplish His will in.
The book ends abruptly, but with the following thought–may these seven stages and the riches of each stage be for our experience. These experiences substantiate the realm we have been brought into.
