Sit, Walk, Stand

Sit, Walk, Stand by Watchman Nee

Watchman Nee in his book, Sit, Walk, Stand concludes with “The Christian life consists of sitting with Christ, walking by him and standing in him. We begin our spiritual life by resting in the finished work of the Lord Jesus. That rest is the source of our strength for a consistent and unfaltering walk in the world. And at the end of a grueling warfare with the hosts of darkness we are found standing with him at least in triumphant possession of the field.

‘Unto him…be the glory…forever.’”

   This book, only 78 pages long, is a concise, brief study of Ephesians demonstrating the Exchanged Life message. May I suggest, that before studying this book, read entirely the book of Ephesians in one sitting?

   Using the key words of sit, walk and stand, Mr. Nee writes: 

•  Our Position in Christ “Sit” 2:6 
•  Our Life in the World “Walk” 4:1  
• Our Attitude to the Enemy “Stand” 6:11

   Please note the order and the connection in which these words are used.

  SIT  Our Christian life begins with the discovery of what God has provided…Christianity begins not with a big DO, but with a big DONE…we are invited at the very outset to sit down and enjoy what God has done for us…

   What does it really mean to sit down? When we walk or stand we bear on our legs all the weight of our own body, but when we sit down our entire weight rests upon the chair or couch on which we sit. We grow weary when we walk or stand, but we feel rested when we have sat down for a while. In walking or standing we expend a great deal of energy, but when we are seated we relax at once, because the strain no longer falls upon our muscles and nerves but upon something outside ourselves. So also in the spiritual realm, to sit down is simply to rest our whole weight-our load, ourselves, our future, everything-upon the Lord. We let him bear the responsibility and cease to carry it ourselves.

 WALK  Though the Christian life begins with sitting, sitting is always followed by walking. When once we have been well and truly seated and have found our strength in sitting down, then we do in fact begin to walk. Sitting describes our position with Christ in the heavenlies. Walking is the practical outworking of that heavenly position here on earth…Eight times in Ephesians the word ‘walk’ is used…It brings immediately before us the subject of Christian conduct…’Walk in love, even as Christ also loved you...’5:2, ‘Walk as children of the light…proving what is well-pleasing unto the Lord’ 5:8, 10.

STAND ‘Stand against the wiles of the devil…’6:10,11,13-18

We war against Satan to maintain and consolidate the victory which Christ has already gained. By the resurrection God proclaimed his Son victor over the whole realm of darkness, and the ground Christ won he has given to us.

   God never asks us to do anything we can do. He asks us to live a life which we can never live and to do a work which we can never do. Yet, by his grace, we are living it and doing it. The life we live is the life of Christ lived in the power of God, and the work we do is the work of Christ carried on through us by his Spirit whom we obey. Self is the only obstruction to that life and to that work…the end and object of all work to which God can commit himself must be his glory. This means that we get nothing out of it for ourselves. It is a divine principle that the less we get of personal gratification out of such a work the greater is its true value to God. There is no room for glory to man in the work of God. True, there is a deep, precious joy in any service that brings him pleasure and that opens the door to his working, but the ground of that joy is his glory and not man’s. Everything is ‘to praise of the glory of his grace’ 1:6, 12, 14.”