Preface

  The content of The Glorious Church in The Collected Works differs in several respects from the American Edition, first published in 1968. In the process of preparing this volume, Mrs. Beth Rademacher presented the Living Stream Ministry with a set of handwritten notes of the messages that formed the basis of The Glorious Church. The appendix, "The Overcomers and God's Dispensational Moves," based on these notes, is a significant and previously unpublished portion of a message given by Watchman Nee during this conference. According to K. H. Weigh's notes, the original titles of the conference messages were as follows:

1. Introduction
2. Introduction (cont.)
3. The Relationship between God's Plan and the Church
4. The Types of the Church in God's Plan
5. The Body of Christ and the Bride of Christ
6. The Church and the Kingdom of God
7. The Relationship between the Overcomers and the Church
8. The Relationship between the Overcomers and the Kingdom
9. The Overcomers and God's Dispensational Moves
10. The Basic Qualifications and Attitude of the Overcomers
11. The Wife of the Lamb
12. The Ushering In of the Kingdom and Eternity
13. Characteristics of the Bride of Christ
14. Characteristics of the Bride of Christ (cont.)

  Scripture references have been updated to reflect the contents of the Recovery Version, published by Living Stream Ministry.

  The foreword that follows was originally written as a preface for the American Edition of The Glorious Church, first published in 1968.

  A separate section is also included at the end of this book. This section, entitled "The Vision of the Glorious Christ," is an independent message by Watchman Nee on Revelation 1:9-20. It shows who Christ is and how He reigns in the church. Much of the content is similar to "Meditations on Revelation," published in Volume 4 of The Collected Works. Since this message was originally published separately from "Meditations on Revelation," we have included it in this volume of The Collected Works.