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In Ephesians 1:19-23 we see that we may experience and enjoy Christ as the means of the divine power. This divine power is God Himself. When God is our enjoyment, He is grace. Grace refers to an aspect of God as our enjoyment. Yet there is another aspect concerning God’s being: He is the divine power for His move within us. God is not only grace, the enjoyment within us; He is the divine power, a motivating factor within us. Through regeneration God came into us, and from that time He has always motivated us from within. We the believers are active and aggressive because we have God as the divine power motivating us and strengthening us. Before we were saved, we were, spiritually speaking, dead, but when we believed in the Lord Jesus, God as the divine power came into us through Christ, just as electricity comes to a building by means of an electrical wire. Our God is the divine power, the heavenly electricity, who came into us, and Christ is the means of the divine power, that is, the means through which God as the divine power is conveyed to us.
In Ephesians 1:19 Paul speaks of “what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the operation of the might of His strength.” The power that is toward us is the Triune God. This power is not only the creating power but the power that has passed through incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. After all these steps, the Triune God comes to us as such a power. Within this power, therefore, there is the power of creation, incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. Hence, it is an all-inclusive power. The power toward us who believe is the Triune God, the Creator of the universe, who was incarnated, passed through crucifixion, entered into resurrection and ascension, and has come down to us. This power has been installed in us, just as electricity is installed in a building. The surpassing greatness of God’s power toward us is very subjective and experiential to us today. God’s power toward us is surpassingly great. We need to know it and experience it.
The surpassingly great power of God toward us is according to the operation of the might of His strength, which He caused to operate in Christ. God’s power toward us is the same as the power that He caused to operate in Christ. Christ is the Head, and we are the Body. The Body participates in the power that operates in the Head.
In verse 20 Paul tells us that God caused the divine power to operate in Christ in raising Him from the dead. To raise a dead person from Hades and the grave requires much power. The divine power has overcome death, the grave, and Hades, where the dead are held. Death and Hades could not hold Christ (Acts 2:24) because of God’s resurrection power.
Apart from Christ, no one has overcome death and come out from the dead. For Christ to be raised up out of death indicates that nothing can hold Him down. When death comes to visit us, we cannot refuse it, for death has power to hold us, but it did not have the power to hold Christ. Although death did everything to hold Him, after visiting the realm of the dead for three days, Christ came forth in resurrection. Just as nothing can hold Christ down, so nothing negative can hold us down, because we have Christ in us.
In order to experience God’s resurrection power, we must not tolerate death within us and must have a strong desire to reject death. If we are indifferent toward death, we can never realize the power of resurrection. Conversely, if we hate death and are desperate to be delivered from death, the resurrection power within us will be manifested.
According to Ephesians 1:20-21, God’s power not only raised Christ from the depths of Hades and the grave but also seated Him at the right hand of God in the heavenlies, far above all rule and authority and power and lordship and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. God’s right hand, where Christ was seated by the surpassingly great power of God, is the most honorable place, the place with supreme authority. The heavenlies refers not only to the third heaven, the highest place in the universe, where God dwells, but also to the state and atmosphere of the heavens, in which Christ was seated by God’s power.
In verse 21 Paul says that Christ has been seated above all rule, authority, power, and lordship and above every name that is named. Rule refers to the highest office, authority to every kind of official power (Matt. 8:9), power to the mere might of authority, and lordship to the preeminence that power establishes. Subsequently, we see that what is listed here includes not only the angelic, heavenly authorities, whether good or evil, but also the human, earthly ones. The ascended Christ was seated by the great power of God far above all rule, authority, power, and lordship in the universe. Every name that is named refers not only to titles of honor but also to every name. Christ was seated far above every name that is named not only in this age but also in that which is to come.
We all need to see the vision that Christ has ascended and is now in the third heaven and that Christ as our Head has lifted us off the earth; hence, we are in the heavens in Him. All the negative things on the earth create a poor environment, but we are sitting in the third heaven looking down at them all. We need a vision to see that since we are attached to the exalted Christ as the ascended Head, we are not on the earth but in the third heaven and are thereby far above all the negative things. This heavenly position is our triumphant victory.
Moreover, we must realize that all our problems are opportunities for us to experience God’s transcending power. In a very real sense, we need all the troublesome situations, including our mistakes and sufferings, for God’s transcending power to be manifested. In the midst of all our problems, we should declare that deep within us is the transcending power that seated Christ at the right hand of God, far above all. As a result, although others may oppose us or bother us, we will sit together with Christ in the heavenlies and thereby be transcendent in Him (Eph. 2:6). If we experience God’s transcending power in all our circumstances, the proper church life as the Body of Christ will be manifested.
In chapter 1 verse 22 Paul indicates that after seating Christ at the right hand of God, God as the divine power subjected all things under His feet. Christ’s being far above all is one thing; His having all things subjected under His feet is another. The former is Christ’s transcendency; the latter, the subjection of all things to Him.
In order to experience the subjecting power, we need to pray, “Lord, all things have been subjected under Your feet. Now all things must be under me, for You are the subjecting power within me.” The more that things are subdued under our feet, the more the church comes into being. Some of us may be subdued by evil or unclean habits, or by the fashions and styles of the present age. In contrast, Paul declared, “All things are lawful to me, but not all things are profitable; all things are lawful to me, but I will not be brought under the power of anything” (1 Cor. 6:12). This indicates that although Paul had the real freedom, he was not subdued by anything. We need to experience the subjecting power to live such a subduing life; then all things will be under our feet. If we fully experience God’s subjecting power, the Body of Christ will be fully manifested.
In Ephesians 1:22 Paul goes on to say that God’s power which He caused to operate in Christ gave Christ to be Head over all things to the church. Christ’s headship over all things is a gift from God to Him. It was through God’s surpassingly great power that Christ received the headship in the universe. It was as a man, in His humanity with His divinity, that Christ was raised from the dead, was seated in the heavenlies, had all things subjected to Him, and was given to be Head over all things.
In Ephesians 1:22-23 Paul tells us that God gave Christ to be Head over all things to the church, which is His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all. There are four aspects of the power that operated in Christ: resurrection power (v. 20a), ascending power (v. 20b), subjecting power (v. 22a), and heading-up power (v. 22b). This fourfold power is transmitted to the church, the Body of the Head.
The expression to the church implies a kind of transmission. This transmission connects Christ in the heavens with the believers on the earth, just as an electrical current connects a power plant with electrical appliances in a building. This transmission connects the Head in the heavens with His Body on the earth.
Whatever Christ, the Head, has attained and obtained is transmitted to the church, His Body. In this transmission the church shares with Christ in all His attainments: the resurrection from the dead, His being seated in His transcendency, the subjection of all things under His feet, and the headship over all things.
Toward us who believe (v. 19) and to the church indicate that the divine power, which includes all that the Triune God has passed through, has been installed into us once for all and is being transmitted into us continually, causing us to enjoy Christ richly and to have the proper church life as His Body, His fullness, the issue of God’s blessing revealed in Ephesians 1.
The transmission of this fourfold power is to those who believe. We must believe that the divine power motivated Jesus, a genuine man who died and was buried, to rise from Hades, to come out of the grave, and to ascend into heaven as witnessed by the disciples, seating Him at the right hand of God in the third heaven, subjecting all things under His feet and ultimately giving Him to be Head over all things to the church. This is the revelation in the holy Word. We should forget our feelings, our condition, and our situation. Rather, we should take the word concerning the fourfold power, believe the word, and declare the word. By believing we are positioned and qualified to receive the power of God. We need to not only believe God’s speaking regarding the power but also echo this again and again by speaking it continually. The more we speak of the fourfold power, the more we will experience this power being transmitted into us. Eventually, through our faith in this transmission and through our speaking it forth, the church will come forth in a practical way.
On the day we repented, the divine power was installed in us. When we open ourselves to the Lord, this power functions to saturate us with the divine essence transmitted into us from the heavens. Because we are not always open or because we may have problems in our conscience, mind, emotion, or will, the transmission may temporarily be restricted. If we would experience a continual transmission, we need to repent, confess, and make a clearance of all hindrances. Then the transmission will be restored and will continue to saturate our being. To enjoy the transmission, we need a sober mind, a fervent emotion, a submissive will, and a pure conscience. Through the experience of this transmission, we become the Body of Christ.
The Body of Christ is not an organization but an organism constituted of all the regenerated believers for the expression and activities of the Head. The Body of Christ is the issue of the incarnated, crucified, resurrected, and ascended Christ, who has come into the church. By means of the ascended Christ’s heavenly transmission, we are made one with Him, and thus His Body is produced.
On the day of Pentecost all that Christ had passed through, obtained, and attained was transmitted from the third heaven to the church. If we would experience the Body, we must have a personal experience of the heavenly transmission. Many genuine Christians neither have the experience of the Body nor sense that they are in the Body, because they do not have the vision of the transmission that has taken place from the Head to the Body. They have not seen that whatever Christ is, possesses, and has accomplished have been transmitted to the Body.
The Body of Christ is nothing of the natural man; the Body comes from the transmission of the ascended Christ. It is the transmission of the transcending Christ that issues in the church as the Body of Christ. Everything we speak in the church life, in the ministry, or in fellowship must issue from this transmission. If our speaking is of the transmission, then our speaking is of the Body. If it is not of the transmission, it is not of the Body. It is in the transmission that we have the church life and that the Body functions. By means of the heavenly transmission, the Body is real, genuine, living, and aggressive.
It is in the transmission that the Body of Christ is the fullness of the One who fills all in all, because the Christ who fills all in all is in the transmission. The transmission connects us to the all-filling Christ. In this way the church becomes the fullness of the all-filling Christ.
The One who fills all in all is the unlimited, unsearchable, all-inclusive, and omnipresent Christ — the Christ whose dimensions are those of the universe (3:18). On the one hand, the phrase all in all in Ephesians 1:23 is similar to the phrase all and in all in Colossians 3:11. In Colossians 3, Christ is all the members who comprise the new man and is in all the members. In Ephesians 1, the church is the Body of Christ, the fullness of the One who is in all the believers and who is all the believers. Christ is the One who fills all the believers and is in all the believers, and the Body of Christ is the issue of such a filling.
On the other hand, Christ’s filling all in all in Ephesians 1:23 surpasses His being all and in all in Colossians 3:11. Colossians 3:11 refers to the sphere of the new man, whereas Ephesians 1:23 refers not only to the Body of Christ but also the universe which includes time and space. Christ is not only all and in all with respect to the new man, but He fills all in all with respect to the universe. Christ is so universally vast that He fills all things. Universally, Christ is above all and fills all in all. The Body of Christ is the fullness of this great, universal Christ.
Christ today is the One who fills all things in the universe. This universal Christ, the Christ who fills all things and who is both in the heavens and on the earth, needs a Body to be His fullness. When Jesus the Nazarene was on the earth, prior to His resurrection He as a man was not omnipresent, for He was a small man limited by His flesh. Yet He descended into the lower parts of the earth, rose from the dead, and ascended far above all the heavens that He might fill all things (4:9-10). Now He can be in the heavens and on the earth simultaneously. Because He is such a One who fills all things, He needs a great Body as His fullness. The Body of Christ is His universal fullness. Christ, who is the infinite God without any limitation, is so great that He fills all things in all things. Such a great Christ needs the church to be His fullness for His complete expression.
The church as the Body of Christ is His fullness. The fullness of Christ issues from the enjoyment of the riches of Christ (3:8). Through the enjoyment of Christ’s riches, we become His fullness to express Him. The fullness of Christ comes into being by our receiving the riches of Christ to be experienced and enjoyed by us and assimilated and constituted into our entire being.
