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<title>Church in Oklahoma City--Concerning the Christian Life</title>
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<p align="center"><img src="graphics/chOKCnam.gif"
alt="The church in Oklahoma City, a Bible-believing and genuine Christian believer-receiving church. (3480 bytes)"
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<img src="graphics/harvline.gif" alt="line of leaves" WIDTH="492" HEIGHT="19"></p>
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<td valign="top"><a href="index.asp"><img src="graphics/okcHome.gif" border="0" alt="Home Page"
WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCOB.asp"><img src="graphics/okcPADS.gif" border="0" alt="Parenthood--A Divine Stewardship" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCOB.asp"><img src="graphics/okcOB.gif" border="0" alt="Our Belief"
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCOM.asp"><img src="graphics/okcOM.gif" border="0" alt="Our Mission"
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCOS.asp"><img src="graphics/okcOS.gif" border="0" alt="Our Standing"
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCOH.asp"><img src="graphics/okcOH.gif" border="0" alt="Our Hope"
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCgGPL.asp"><img src="graphics/okcOG.gif" border="0"
alt="Our Gospel Work" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCCCL.asp"><img src="graphics/okcCCL.gif" border="0"
alt="Concerning the Christian Life" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCCChL.asp"><img src="graphics/okcCChL.gif" border="0"
alt="Concerning the Church Life" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCCS.asp"><img src="graphics/okcCS.gif" border="0"
alt="Concerning Salvation" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCCtR.asp"><img src="graphics/okcCtR.gif" border="0"
alt="Concerning the Recovery" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCCW.asp"><img src="graphics/okcCW.gif" border="0"
alt="Children's Work" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCYW.asp"><img src="graphics/okcYW.gif" border="0" alt="Youth Work"
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCClg.asp"><img src="graphics/okcColW.gif" border="0"
alt="Campus Work" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCAFW.asp"><img src="graphics/okcAFW.gif" border="0"
alt="Adults and Family Work" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCMSCC.asp"><img src="graphics/okcMC.gif" border="0"
alt="Meetings and Conferences Schedule" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCBT.asp"><img src="graphics/okcBRTL.gif" border="0"
alt="Book Room and Tape Library" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCRS.asp"><img src="graphics/okcRS.gif" border="0"
alt="Reading Schedule through the Recovery Version New Testament and Footnotes"
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCMR.asp"><img src="graphics/okcMRA.gif" border="0"
alt="Announcements and Morning Revival Schedule" WIDTH="119" HEIGHT="34"></a></td>
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<td valign="top"><a href="chOKCLL.asp"><img src="graphics/okcLL.gif" border="0" alt="Life Links"
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<td valign="top"><p align="center"><font face="Arial" color="#000099" size="4"><b>Concerning the
Christian Life...</b></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>REGENERATION:</b> The Christian life begins with
regeneration. To be regenerated is to be born of the Spirit in our spirit (John 3:6)
through the redemption of Christ and thereby to have the life and nature of God imparted
into our spirit. This makes our spirit alive with the very life of God.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>SEPARATION:</b> The true Christian life requires
a proper separation from this corrupt and evil world. This separation is not according to
legalistic, man-made rules; it is according to the life and nature of the holy One who
dwells within us. We are separated unto God by the redeeming blood of Christ, by the Holy
Spirit, and in the name of the Lord Jesus. In order to live a proper Christian life; we
must maintain such a separated position. Although we are not of the world, we nevertheless
live a godly life in the world.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>CONSECRATION:</b> The Christian life is a life of
consecration. To be consecrated to the Lord, means that we are utterly given to the Lord,
not do something for Him nor to become something, but to make ourselves available to Him
as a living sacrifice so that He may work on us and in us according to His good pleasure.
We consecrate to the Lord because we love him and delight to belong to Him. We also
recognize that we already belong to Him because He has purchased us with His precious
blood. We in the local churches are living not for ourselves, but for God and for the
fulfillment of His eternal purpose.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>LOVING THE LORD:</b> In our Christian life we
emphasize loving the Lord. Above all else, God desires that we love Him. We testify that
our Lord Jesus Christ is the altogether lovely One, that He has won our hearts, and that
we love Him, not with a love of our own, but with the very love with which He first loved
us.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>THE WORD OF GOD:</b> The Bible occupies a very
important place in our Christian life. All those in the local churches are encouraged to
read the Word in a regular way even to read it through once a year. We read the Word, we
study the Word, and we take the Word by prayer as spiritual food. All teachings,
inspirations, and guidance, which claim the Holy Spirit as their source, must be checked
by God's revelation in His Word. Although the Bible reveals the mind of God concerning so
many matters, to us the Bible is not primarily a book of doctrine; instead, it is mainly a
book of life. We come to the Word not merely for knowledge, but through a prayerful
reading of the Scripture, to contact the Lord Jesus, who is Himself the living Word.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>PRAYER:</b> The Christian life is also a life of
prayer. In prayer we enjoy sweet, intimate personal communion with the Lord. By prayer we
declare our dependence on God, our submission to Him, and our desire to cooperate with Him
in the fulfillment of His purpose. All those in the local churches are encouraged to have
a time of personal prayer every day.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>THE EXPERIENCE OF CHRIST:</b> We have seen from
God's revelation in the Bible that the Christian life is actually Christ Himself living in
us. For this reason, we lay great emphasis on the experience of Christ. According to the
new Testament Epistles, Christ is revealed in us, is living in us, is being formed in us,
is making His home in us, is being magnified in us, and is becoming all in all to us.
Instead of imitating Christ according to an outward pattern, we seek to live out Christ
and to live by Christ by allowing the indwelling Christ to occupy our whole inward being
and to express Himself through us in our daily living.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>A CRUCIFIED LIFE:</b> As genuine Christians, we
are to live a crucified life. We are not ashamed of the cross of Christ, and we do not
shrink back from following the Lord along the narrow pathway of the cross. If we would
truly experience Christ and live by Him, we need to experience daily the subjective work
of the cross in our lives. We have seen something of the ugliness of man's fallen flesh in
the eyes of God, and we agree with God's judgment upon it. Moreover, we have seen that
both the self and the natural man are opposed to God. Therefore, we welcome the inward
working of the death of Christ so that we may experience Christ and live by Him in the
riches of His resurrection life.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>NOURISHMENT:</b> If we would live a normal
Christian life, we need to be nourished daily with spiritual food and spiritual drink. For
this reason, we emphasize the partaking of Christ as our spiritual food and drink. In the
Spirit and through the Word, we enjoy Him as our life supply. As He Himself said, &quot;He
that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me&quot; (John 6:57). The Lord is the living bread,
the bread of life, and the bread of God who came down from heaven to give life to the word
(John 6:33, 35, 51), and we are nourished by Him day by day.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>THE GROWTH IN LIFE:</b> In the local churches we
emphasize the fact that in the Christian life we should grow normally in life. We are not
content to remain spiritual infants. The divine life, like the human life, must have a
normal development leading to maturity. Therefore, as seekers of the Lord, we pursue the
growth in life. We desire to be a full-grown man to express the Lord, to represent Him
with His authority, and to engage in spiritual warfare to defeat His enemy.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>HUMAN LIVING:</b> As Christians, we also live a
normal human life, free from extremes and balanced in every way. We desire that our entire
being, spirit, soul, and body be maintained for the glory of God. We seek to express the
humanity of Jesus in all our relationships and bear a worthy testimony of Him in all walks
of human life: at home, at school, in our neighborhoods, and at our places of employment.
To us, the Christian life cannot be divorced from our daily human life. We find that the
more we grow in Christ, the more truly human we become, and the more we enjoy in a
practical way the uplifted, transformed humanity of Jesus.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>THE SPIRIT:</b> The Christian life is a life of
walking according to the Spirit. To walk in the sprit is to have our living and our being
according to the Spirit. Therefore, we need to set our mind on the Spirit and put to death
the practices of the body (Romans 8:6,13). When we walk according to the Spirit, all the
righteous requirements of God are fulfilled in us spontaneously. Only by living in the
Spirit and walking according to the Spirit will the divine things revealed in the
Scriptures become real to us. Hence, to be a normal Christian we must know the Spirit,
live in the Spirit, and walk according to the Spirit. </font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>TRANSFORMATION:</b> Many Christians know of the
regeneration of the spirit and the transfiguration of the body, but they neglect the
crucial matter of the transformation of the soul. Nevertheless the Bible says, &quot;Be
transformed by the renewing of the mind&quot; (Romans 12:2). Therefore, we recognize the
need to be dispositionally transformed in our souls by the inward working of the Spirit of
life. As we are transformed, an inward change takes place in our very being. As our soul
is permeated with the element of God, it is purified and sanctified. It can thereby
fulfill its God-created function to express the Lord who dwells in our regenerated spirit.
This transformation of the soul is intimately related to our readiness to meet the Lord at
His coming. Those who wold dwell in His holy and glorious presence must not merely be
positionally sanctified, but be dispositionally transformed. This transformation requires
the operation of the cross negatively and the working of the Spirit of life positively.</font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" color="#000099"><b>TRANSFIGURATION:</b> Finally, at the culmination
of the Christian experience in life, our body will be transfigured and made like the
Lord's glorious body (Philippians 3:21). In the Bible this is called the redemption of the
body, the fullness of sonship. Therefore, the Christian life begins with regeneration,
passes through transformation, and consummates with the transfiguration of the body.</font></p>
<p align="center"><font size="2" face="Arial" color="#000099"><i>Quoted from </i>The
Beliefs and Practices of the Local Churches <br>
<i>© 1978 Living Stream Ministry. Used by permission.</i></font></td>
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<p>&nbsp;</p>
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<td align="right" valign="top"><a href="mailto:letters@churchinokc.org"><img src="graphics/email1.gif" alt="Click to send email to the church in Oklahoma City" border="0" height="34" width="119"></a></td>
<td align="center" width="400"><img src="graphics/bulletL.gif" alt="left arrow (887 bytes)"><img src="graphics/bulletL.gif" alt="left arrow (887 bytes)"><img src="graphics/bulletL.gif" alt="left arrow (887 bytes)">&nbsp; <font face="Arial" color="#006600"><big><a href="mailto:letters@churchinokc.org">Write us!</a> We welcome all inquiries that spring
from a sincere desire to know the truth.</big><br>
<i>Website comments? Email the <a href="mailto:webmaster@churchinokc.org">Webmaster</a>.</i></font></td>
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<blockquote>
<p align="center"><font face="Arial" color="#990000" size="2"><i>This page and all
contents are Copyright © 1998-2000 The Church in Oklahoma City (unless otherwise
indicated). All Rights Reserved.</i></font></p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p align="center"><font color="#000099" size="2" face="Arial"><i>Scripture quoted from </i>The
New Testament<i>, Recovery Version © 1985, 1991 Living Stream Ministry and Witness Lee.
Used by permission.</i></font></p>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<p align="center"><font color="#800040" face="Arial" size="1"><i>Online design by <a href="mailto:webmaster@churchinokc.org">E. C. Gruhler III,</a> --Copyright © 1998-2000--All
Rights Reserved.</i></font></p>
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