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Scripture Reading: Eph. 1:22b-23; 4:7-12, 16, 15; 1 Cor. 3:2, 6; 1 Pet. 2:2
The fellowship in this book concerning the building up of the Body of Christ may be considered as a continuation of our fellowship in the book entitled The Organism of the Triune God in the Organic Union of His Divine Trinity. In the New Testament there are many teachings concerning the building up of the church, which is the Body of Christ. In Matthew 16:18 the Lord Jesus referred to the building up of the church for the first time. In Paul’s writings there are many portions related to this matter. The most crucial passage is Ephesians 4:11-16. Verse 16 in particular is a crucial verse in the New Testament concerning the Lord’s desire to build up His Body. After much study and consideration of the Greek text, we feel that a better translation of this verse is as follows: “Out from whom all the Body, being joined together and being knit together through every joint of the rich supply and through the operation in the measure of each one part, causes the growth of the Body unto the building up of itself in love.” All the Body causes the growth of the Body through two categories of things: through every joint of the rich supply and through the operation in the measure of each one part.
The building up of the Body of Christ is the building up of the one organism. An organism is different from an organization. A table is something organized; pieces of wood have been organized together to become an item of furniture. It is lifeless and has nothing to do with life. But our human body is altogether organic. Therefore, it is an organism. The parts of our body are not organized together. Each part is organically related to the others in life, and each part participates in the one circulation of the same blood. Our physical body is organic because it is full of life.
It is true that the church is a congregation, an assembly, of God’s called-out people. But if this is all that we see concerning the church, we may be led to believe that the church is a human organization like other social bodies. In Ephesians Paul shows us that the church was something in God’s heart in eternity past since God chose us before the foundation of the world, predestinating us unto sonship (1:4-5). To carry out His heart’s desire, God was incarnated to be a man living on this earth. He died on the cross for our sins, was raised up from the dead, and ascended to the heavens. According to Ephesians 1, God’s great power was caused to operate in Christ to raise Him from the dead (v. 20a), to seat Him at His right hand in the heavenlies (v. 20b), to subject all things under His feet (v. 22a), and to give Him to be Head over all things to the church (v. 22b). What God caused to operate in Christ with His great power is transmitted to the church.
If I had written the Epistle to the Ephesians, I might have stopped with verse 22. However, Paul continued with one more verse to describe what the church is. Verse 23 does not say that the church is a congregation or the assembly of God’s chosen people. Rather, Paul says that the church is Christ’s Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all. This should cause us to realize that the church is something organic. It is not something organizational without life, but it is organic and full of life.
The Body of Christ is particular and special because it is the fullness of the Triune God (3:19). The Christ who fills all in all is the embodiment of the very Triune God. The Body of Christ, the organism of the resurrected and ascended Christ, is the organism of the One who fills all in all. Ephesians 3:18 speaks of “the breadth and length and height and depth” of Christ. These are the measureless dimensions of Christ. The One who fills all in all is measureless. His dimensions have no end. They are the dimensions of the universe. The church is the Body, the organism, of such a One. When we speak of the church rather than the Body, our thinking may become narrow. We may consider the church to be merely the assembly of the called-out ones, the congregation, or an organization of saved human beings. According to the Bible, however, the church is much greater and much higher than a congregation. It is an organism, the Body of Christ, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.
It is difficult to comprehend the Body of Christ, but God in creation made our human body as a figure of the Body. Consider how wonderful our body is. The eyes, the ears, and every part are marvelous. Every part of my body participates when I am speaking. My speaking does not come only from my vocal chords, tongue, and lips. My eyes, my ears, my nose, and every part help me when I speak. Our body is not like that of a robot. It is living, full of life, and organic. Likewise, the church is organic. If we desire to know what the church life is, we must have a clear vision from the heavens that the church which God redeemed is not an organization but an organism. The church is a matter of life, not of organization. Over ninety percent of the problems and troubles that arise in the church life are due to the understanding that the church is an organization. If we drop the thought of organization and receive a heavenly vision of the church as an organism, most of our problems in the church will be solved. The church is an organism. It is altogether organic and full of life.
The building up of the Body of Christ is through the gifts produced by the Head of the Body in His resurrection (4:7-8,11). The gifts in Ephesians 4:8 are the apostles, prophets, evangelists, and shepherds and teachers in verse 11. These are the gifted persons. These gifted persons were produced not by a seminary or a Bible institute but by the Head of the Body in His resurrection. In this regard, Ephesians 4 describes a wonderful process. Christ first descended, not only from the heavens to the earth but also from the earth to Hades (v. 9). Then He resurrected and ascended from Hades, not only to the earth but also to the third heaven (vv. 8-10). When He was doing this, He was like a victorious, overcoming general. By His death and resurrection He saved those who had been taken captive by Satan. In His ascension He rescued them from Satan’s captivity and made them His own captives. Then He brought all these captives to the heavens in His ascension to present them to God as presents. God was pleased and returned these captives to Him as gifts. Through this procedure of the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ, Christ’s presentation of the captives to God, and God’s returning them to Christ, all the captives became gifts. Paul was such a gift. He was a captive of Satan but was rescued out of the hand of Satan by Christ’s death and resurrection. Through Christ’s ascension and presentation of him to God the Father and through God’s returning of him to Christ, this captive became a top gift.
Do you realize that you are a gift given by God to Christ for the building up of His Body? Before you were saved, you were a captive in the hand of Satan. However, through His death and resurrection, Christ has rescued you, saving you out of the hand of Satan. Furthermore, He has brought you to the heavens and presented you to His Father to please the Father, and the Father has returned you to Christ. By this process you, who were a sinner and a captive of Satan, became not only a member of Christ but also a gift. Each of us is a gift from the Triune God to the church (vv. 7-8). You are so precious to the Body, and the Body cannot be built up without you.
We are not gifts in an organizational way. If a person loses his teeth, a dentist may supply a denture to replace them in an organizational way. This denture is inorganic, but every part of our physical body is organic and indispensable. The little finger, the hand, the arm, and the shoulder are all gifts to our physical body. What could I do without my shoulders, arms, or hands? Even to be without the little finger would be awkward. While we have it, we may not feel that it is useful, but if we lost it, we would feel that we lacked something. In like manner, we are members of the Body of Christ. If any of us were not here, the church would miss us. Each of us is a gift to the Body.
The gifts are produced by the Head, Christ, in His resurrection. We have been crucified with Him (Rom. 6:6a; Gal. 2:20a). We were raised up from the dead, and we have also ascended in Him and with Him to the heavens (Eph. 2:6). We have been made gifts full of life in His resurrection. As gifts to the Body, we are altogether organic. All of our natural ability and strength mean nothing because being gifts given by God to Christ for His Body is something in Christ’s resurrection, not something in the natural life by our first birth. What we do by our natural life results in death, but what we do in resurrection is organic. We should act, move, and do things in the church life organically in the resurrection of Christ, not in our natural life.
If we do things in the church life by our natural life and strength, we are moving and acting in an organizational way. To clean the meeting hall in our natural life according to an outward arrangement is to act in an organizational way. But if we are living in the spirit, in the organic way, contacting God in resurrection, we may have the inner feeling and leading to come to the hall to clean in resurrection by life and not by organization. The proper way to clean the hall is to do it organically. Under the organizational way, sometimes those who are charged to clean the hall become offended. Those who serve in the organic way will never be offended. Whatever we do — whether we clean the hall, preach the gospel, take care of home meetings, or come to the meetings to function — must be altogether organic, not organizational. The way to have the proper church life is to move and act in an organic way.
In the past we charged the saints to open their mouths to say something for the Lord. Some felt that it was too hard to speak for the Lord, so we fellowshipped with them in order to help them. However, much of our fellowship may not have been organic; it may have been organizational. The right way to help the saints get into this practice is to bring them into an organic realization. We should teach them, that is, feed them, with some spiritual nourishment so that they can be strengthened and realize they have another life, the life of resurrection. They need to realize that they can live, walk, and have their being in this life every day and all day. If they live such a life, they will come to the meeting and open up their mouths organically. Organically they will utter something. You will not need to teach them to say Hallelujah. They will say Hallelujah organically, in the way that comes out of life, not out of arrangement or organization. The perfecting by the gifted persons is altogether not something organizational but organic.
The gifted persons perfect the saints by nourishing them. Just as we love and care for every member of our physical body, the Lord loves and cares for every member of His Body, the church. Ephesians 5:29 says, “For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ also the church.” The Body is altogether organic and needs to be cared for in an organic way by being nourished. The church as the organism of Christ is built up with nourishment, the life supply, for the growth in life (4:16, 15; 1 Cor. 3:2, 6; 1 Pet. 2:2). Nourishment and growth result in the building up of the Body of Christ.
It may seem strange that the Bible uses the word build to describe what transpires with this organism (Eph. 4:12, 16). The Body is an organism that can be built up. The building up of our human body may be used as an illustration of the building up of the Body of Christ. Every time we eat, we build up our body. A newly delivered baby may weigh seven pounds and be twenty inches long, but after twenty years this baby may grow to be over two hundred pounds and over six feet tall. He becomes so big by growth, and this growth of his body is a building up.
This building takes place by the addition of certain things to our body to nourish it. The addition of inorganic things to our body does not build it up, but the addition of eggs, apples, beef, chicken, and fish builds up our body by nourishing it. Day after day, at least three times a day, we add something to our body by eating. This is the building up. Our body has been built up with many organic things. The addition of organic things to our organic body causes the growth, which is the building up.
We may have the concept that teaching and organizing build up the church. The New Testament does say that we must teach others, but in the biblical sense teaching means feeding. In Hebrews 5:12 Paul says, “When because of the time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you what the rudiments of the beginning of the oracles of God are and have become those who have need of milk and not of solid food.” In this verse Paul refers to teaching in the sense of feeding. In our teaching to the churches and the saints there must be an organic element that can be taken in as nourishment. Any teaching that does not convey nourishment is not the biblical teaching, the teaching of the New Testament. According to the New Testament way, all teaching should be organic and very rich in life and the life supply. It should be with life and full of life. After listening to this teaching, we will be nourished, and this nourishment will result in the growth in life. The organic element we receive will be digested and assimilated into our being.
The building up of the Body of Christ is through the gifts’ perfecting of the saints. Ephesians 4:11 and 12 say, “He Himself gave some as apostles and some as prophets and some as evangelists and some as shepherds and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints unto the work of the ministry, unto the building up of the Body of Christ.” The apostles, prophets, evangelists, and shepherds and teachers should perfect the saints.
Much is implied by the apostles’ perfecting of the saints. Apostles are ones who preach the gospel to save sinners, bring them together to establish a church, and then appoint elders. We may think that after the apostles appoint the elders, they should leave and have nothing more to do with the church. But how could the apostles perfect the saints if they had nothing more to do with the church and the elders that they had established? The perfecting of the saints by the apostles would be impossible.
There were elders in Jerusalem (Acts 15:2), but the Bible does not tell us how they were established. The first instance of the appointment of elders in the New Testament is in Acts 14. Paul and Barnabas preached the gospel in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra in Asia Minor. After preaching elsewhere, they returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch and established elders in every church (vv. 21-23). These were young churches, and the elders were babes. After appointing elders in these churches, the apostles returned to Antioch in Syria where they confronted the problem of the heresy of circumcision, and they went to Jerusalem to deal with this problem. Following this, Acts 15:36 says, “Now after some days Paul said to Barnabas, Let us return now and visit the brothers in every city in which we announced the word of the Lord, and see how they are doing.” Within a short period of time, the apostles preached the gospel, set up churches, appointed elders, and then went back to visit the churches and elders they had established.
All the Epistles were written to the established churches with the elders, not just to teach them but to charge and instruct them to deal with certain problems, to do certain things, and to take care of certain matters. Paul said to the Corinthians, “What do you want? Should I come to you with a rod or in love and a spirit of meekness?” (1 Cor. 4:21), and in 1 Corinthians 11:34 he said, “And the rest I will set in order when I come.” Paul intended to return to Corinth to set matters in order. According to the record of the Bible, after appointing the elders in a church, the apostles did not stay away from the church to let it go on by itself.
Peter was an apostle, but he stayed in Jerusalem as an elder (1 Pet. 5:1). His example shows us that an apostle may remain in a church as an elder to help the church. After the appointment of the elders, the apostles always helped the churches either by remaining with them, by visiting them, or by writing epistles to them to charge them, instruct them, and correct them. Even the Epistles to Timothy and Titus were written in the principle of helping those who had been established by the apostles. Paul instructed these brothers how to behave themselves in the church.
In The Normal Christian Church Life Brother Watchman Nee said that after the apostles appointed the elders, the apostles would not take care of the church in its business affairs. In the business affairs the apostles should keep their hands off of the churches. This word by Brother Nee was misunderstood and misused by some of the saints, even the co-workers. Eleven years later in 1948 he put out a set of messages that were printed in the book Church Affairs. In chapter 9 of this book he says, “After the meeting in Hangkow [where the messages in The Normal Christian Church Life were given], some brothers misunderstood. They thought that though the elders are appointed by the apostles, they did not have to listen to the apostles. This is impossible.” The apostles should never keep their hands off of the churches in the work of the ministry to build them up. Chapter 1 of Church Affairs contains a long section telling us how, after establishing the elders, the apostles have to train them by teaching them how to be elders and how to take care of the church affairs.
By the apostles’ returning to or staying in a church to help the elders after they are established, they have the opportunity to perfect the saints. The New Testament shows us that the apostles’ practice was to preach the gospel, teach the truth, set up a church with the saved ones, establish the elders among them, and then train the elders how to be elders. Then they would stay with the elders for some time to perfect the saints. The apostles perfected the saints to do what they themselves did. They preached the gospel, and no doubt they perfected the saints to do the same thing. They taught the truth and also perfected the saints to learn the truth, know the truth, and teach the truth. The apostles set up churches and perfected the saints to do this also. Today we need this kind of perfecting so that we can preach the gospel to sinners, teach the truth to the saved ones, and establish these ones as a church.
If we are those who preach the gospel in the proper way, teach the truth in an adequate way, and set up churches, we are qualified to appoint elders. However, we must not set up elders and go away to rest or retire, leaving them without any perfecting. We must stay to train the elders how to shepherd the flock, the church. As an elder, Peter said, “Shepherd the flock of God among you...nor as lording it over your allotments but by becoming patterns of the flock” (1 Pet. 5:2-3). The elders should not control but should shepherd and nourish the saints that they may grow. We must train the elders to do this. Then we have to cooperate with these elders to perfect the saints to do what we do. As we have been perfected, we will produce a number of saints like ourselves. This will cause us to be productive and will result in the duplication of the churches.
The apostles should perfect the saints in the things that they themselves do. A professor of mathematics teaches his students mathematics. After their graduation, the students of the professor will do the same things that he does. This is the professor’s perfecting of the students. In the same way the apostles must stay with a church, first to train the elders and then, with the elders, to perfect the saints. In recent years we have been short of the training of the elders and the perfecting of the saints. We have not had adequate time for this. Perhaps many of our problems have been due to this shortage. What can we expect of a local church in which the elders are not trained and the saints are not perfected? To train the elders is not simply to have a conference. The apostles must stay with the elders to train and teach them.
There has not been an adequate situation of training and perfecting among us. We have had meetings in which only general messages have been given week after week. The saints have received only a general perfection, not a particular perfection. However, Ephesians 4:11-12 implies that the perfecting by the apostles, prophets, evangelists, and shepherds and teachers is particular. We are short of this perfection. Our goal is to endeavor to attain it.
Ephesians 4:11-16 has not been properly touched by the Lord’s children. The need for the perfecting of the saints revealed in these verses has not been fulfilled. Where is the apostles’, the prophets’, and the evangelists’ perfecting of the saints? There may be a certain amount of the perfecting by the elders as the shepherds and teachers, but it is only in part and not in a particular way. In a college one must study many courses before he can graduate. In the same way, in the church life we need the perfecting by the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the shepherds and teachers. Because Ephesians 4:11-16 is the word of the Lord in the Bible, it will not only be touched but also fulfilled. Perhaps this fulfillment has already begun among us. We now desire to see what these verses mean for us. We are not satisfied or contented with our present practice of the church life, with the general meetings, the general messages, and the general rather than particular perfection. We want to cooperate with the Lord for the fulfillment of His word in Ephesians 4:11-16.
We must now consider how the prophets perfect the saints. This perfecting is not merely by prophesying in the sense of predicting. In 1 Corinthians 14 the word prophesy is used not mainly in the sense of predicting but rather with the meaning of speaking forth. We have to learn how to speak forth the Lord. Among us there is a great shortage in this matter. We do have certain gifted persons who speak to us, but speaking forth the Lord has not become a custom among us.
When we consider the meetings in mutuality according to 1 Corinthians 14, we usually stress that everyone has to speak in the meetings. However, this chapter stresses the speaking of the prophets in particular. This speaking is not mainly to predict, but it is to speak for God and speak forth God. To prophesy is to minister, to dispense, the Triune God into the audience. Acts 13:1 says, “Now there were in Antioch, in the local church, prophets and teachers.” When we come together for a church meeting, there should be a number of the saints who can speak Christ and speak forth Christ. To speak Christ and speak forth Christ is to dispense Christ into the needy saints that they can be nourished and have the growth in life. This growth is the building up of the Body of Christ.
If there are some evangelists among us, they must do their duty to perfect the saints. They must stir up the spirit of gospel preaching among the saints. We are all short of the spirit of preaching. We are short of a spirit that is so burning for the gospel. If an evangelist spoke to us, we would be “burned” by his word. Then he would take the lead to bring others to go out with him to visit people door after door. He could demonstrate how to talk to people.
An evangelist would also teach the saints the content of the practical and prevailing gospel. We may have heard much concerning God, Christ, Christ’s death and resurrection, and regeneration. However, we may not know how to present a prevailing and practical ten-minute message to people. In the past I did much preaching in north China. After almost every preaching meeting, a number of saints who did not know how to preach the gospel or felt that their preaching was not very prevailing would bring their friends to me. All those dear saints had a heart to preach, but they were not trained, or perfected, in how to preach the gospel.
We need the evangelists to stir up our spirit of preaching and take us with them at least once a week to visit our relatives, neighbors, close friends, classmates, and colleagues. There are many people whom we should visit. If we have an evangelist, a proper atmosphere will be brought in and built up among us. He will demonstrate how to talk to people about sin, redemption, Christ, resurrection, and regeneration. After being trained, nearly all the saints will have the spirit of preaching and the way to preach. We need the evangelists to perfect us.
We also need the shepherds’ and teachers’ perfecting. We need the teachers, not merely to teach the Bible but to teach the saints as shepherds. According to the grammar of Ephesians 4:11, shepherds and teachers are one class of people. We all know that we have to visit people and shepherd them, but we may not know how to shepherd. We need some experienced shepherds and teachers to perfect us.
If we would have these four kinds of gifted persons — the apostles, prophets, evangelists, and shepherds and teachers — among us for half a year, the church would be different. There is not yet such a situation of perfecting among us.
In 1940 I went to Brother Watchman Nee’s training. One day when I was walking with him, he said, “Brother, we have the blueprint in our hand for the building up of the local church.” Brother Nee was building the church according to this blueprint, and I also desired to have this blueprint. For a short while I observed how he built. After I returned to my hometown, and the Second World War broke out, we were separated for a number of years. I had to stay in Chefoo because of the invading Japanese army.
From 1940 to 1942 I followed the pattern that I had learned from Brother Nee. I took the lead among the elders in Chefoo to be an elder and to train them, and they all learned from me. Because I was serving full time, I also took the lead among the deacons and deaconesses to be a deacon to serve the saints. I did the job of an elder, a deacon, an apostle, a prophet, an evangelist, and a shepherd. I took the lead in everything. Every Monday the serving ones — the co-workers, the elders, and the deacons — came together with me from eight o’clock in the morning to three-thirty in the afternoon to fellowship, learn, discuss, and be trained in the eldership, the service of the deacons, and the visiting of different kinds of people for the gospel preaching and the care of the saints. At the end of 1942, a great revival broke forth in Chefoo, not by conferences, preaching, or teaching about revival but as the result of the building up of the local church. The entire church was revived. Today we are short of such a perfecting work for the building up of the Body of Christ.
