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Scripture Reading: Eph. 4:3-6
I. The issue of the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of the believers is the building up of the Body of Christ.
II. The building up of the Body of Christ is not of human work, nor is it the forming together of a group of people by man’s natural way; hence, it has absolutely nothing to do with man’s work, effort, ways, ideas, moral teachings, philosophy, or any religious system or activities.
III. The building up of the Body of Christ is the constitution, in the aforementioned two spirits, of the processed and consummated Triune God with a group of tripartite men whom He has redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, transformed, and conformed to His image.
IV. This constitution is constituted with:
А. The believers who are redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed by God as its outward framework.
B. The processed and consummated Triune God as its inward element:
1. The Father of the Triune God is the source of the inward element.
2. The Son of the Triune God is the inward element itself.
3. The Spirit of the Triune God is the essence of the inward element — Eph. 4:4-6.
4. All three are dispensed, transfused, and built into God’s redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed believers.
5. That they and the redeeming and transforming God may be constituted into one entity as the organic Body of Christ, being God yet man and man yet God — vv. 3-4a.
C. Such a constitution of divinity with humanity is uniquely one in the universe; it should not and cannot be divided.
V. This constitution is the union and mingling of God and man: divinity constituted into humanity to be man’s dwelling place and humanity built into divinity to be God’s dwelling place.
VI. This is the harvest of the Triune God’s selection in eternity and of the works of His old creation, redemption, and new creation in time.
VII. In such a great achievement, the operating Triune God is the Benefactor, and the tripartite men who respond to His operation are the beneficiaries; both are also the satisfied enjoyers.
VIII. This is God’s eternal heart’s desire and His ultimate purpose; this is also something that the tripartite men can never think of nor hope and ask for.
IX. This is the Triune God’s anticipated multiplication and His expected increase.
X. This is something beyond the imagination of all the religionists and philosophers, yet we who are graced by God can actually taste it and participate in it for eternity.
Prayer: Lord, we worship You from deep within. In this meeting it is not man speaking human words but God speaking the words of God. Hence, Lord, we need You. We are men. How can men listen to God’s words? We are men. How can we men understand the words of God? Both our listening and our understanding depend on You. Lord, we thank You that You have made us gods. Today we are no longer merely men; we are God-men. Therefore, we have the qualification and the capacity to listen to and understand the word of God. We are gods able to listen to the word of God. We are also gods learning to speak the word of God. Lord, cleanse us and cover us. The release of this word is really hated by the enemy. Lord, may You fight for us because You are the Overcomer; You have already overcome the enemy. The cross has already dealt with the enemy. This is the place where God is speaking to the gods. It is also the place where we know the God-man in the word of God. Lord, the time has come. May You glorify Yourself. Amen.
In the previous three chapters we have seen the Spirit of God, the spirit of man, and also the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of man. In this chapter we will see the issue of the union of these two spirits.
In eternity God is without beginning and without ending, and He is ever unchanging. After He created the heavens, the earth, and man, for a period of four thousand years He did many things, but these things had nothing to do with the accomplishing of His economy. Hence, in the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament, from Genesis to Malachi, what is recorded are superficial matters that are on the surface. This is like the fig tree that had only leaves and was fruitless, on which the Lord Jesus could not find any fruit (Matt. 21:18-19). Nevertheless, when we come to the New Testament, things are no longer superficial, just on the surface; the New Testament is full of fruit.
The Bible has been in the believers’ hands for many years, but not many really know the Bible. Even if there are some who profess to know the Bible, I am afraid that their understanding of the Bible is superficial, just on the surface. For many years I have had a hidden concern as to whether or not the saints have taken in the messages released by the Lord in our midst. Thank the Lord that there are at least some who have taken them in. The Lord has gained some people who are skilled in the word of God. In this conference I am really rejoicing and happy to see that although they have come from different places, all the brothers and sisters prophesy with the same “tone” and speak the same words to present very clearly what the Lord has revealed to us. This is what the enemy cannot annul.
The Lord’s work does not take account of the outward number of people but of how many are actually saturated by the truths and have become mingled with the truths. Concerning myself, although I am not highly educated, I have slowly advanced. Some are more capable and better educated than I, yet they do not see much of the revelation in the Bible. For many years, by the Lord’s mercy, I may say that I have seen much in the Lord’s Word. I have advanced slowly, step by step. Consider the Life-studies as an example. Over the past twenty-one years, every six months, under the blessing of the Lord whom I serve, I have covered all sixty-six books of the Bible except Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs. The Lord’s blood cover me; this is not my boasting or bragging. I am boasting of the Lord, exalting the Lord Himself. I have nothing, I can do nothing, and I am nothing. I am altogether not; only the Lord is. This is not all that the Lord has; He will speak still more among us.
Now we need to see the issue of the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of the believers. We have already seen the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of man in the six great matters of regeneration, sanctification, renewing, transformation, conformation, and glorification. God is united with us to regenerate, sanctify, renew, transform, conform, and eventually glorify us that we may be the same as God in life and nature, without sharing in His Godhead. These six matters — regeneration, sanctification, renewing, transformation, conformation, and glorification — are the cream and crystallization of my more than sixty years of studying the Bible. All of you, whether you are elders, co-workers, or ordinary brothers and sisters, must study the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of man in these six matters. The issue of this union is the building up of the Body of Christ.
According to Ephesians 4, the issue of the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of the believers is the building up of the Body of Christ. This building is not of human work, nor is it the forming together of a group of people by man’s natural way. Hence, it has nothing to do with man’s work, effort, ways, ideas, moral teachings, philosophy, or any religious system or activities. God’s eternal economy is to obtain the Body of Christ. Any work outside of this is not on the central lane of God’s eternal economy.
Most of the work in today’s Christianity is human work, is natural, and has nothing to do with the building up of the Body of Christ. Some people may say that Christianity also preaches the gospel and saves sinners. However, preaching the gospel and saving sinners are not simple matters; they involve many important matters. Christianity preaches the gospel by human work, human effort, human doing; but Paul preached the gospel by supplying the person being saved by him with the Spirit of God so that within him he might have God, the life of God, and also Christ. After that, Paul immediately told the person that his first life had already been crucified with Christ; now he needed to be buried, which is to be baptized. Not only so, Paul also told him that he was already resurrected with Christ, and his every move and action needed to have the newness of life (Rom. 6:4). Nevertheless, today people’s preaching of the gospel and saving of sinners are not like Paul’s. Today in their preaching of the gospel, people preach mainly that man must have something to rely on, that man must have religion, and that among the many religions, the best is Christianity. They also preach that Christians living on the earth have consolation and hope, and that after they die, they will go to heaven. The religionists like to go to heaven, but our God likes to tabernacle among men on the earth (John 1:14; Rev. 21:3). At the end of the Bible we are told that the New Jerusalem will descend from heaven to the earth (Rev. 21:2). Hence, we can see that what Christianity preaches today is according to man’s thought, morality, and philosophy and differs greatly from what Paul preached. The gospel that Paul preached was according to the revelation of God for the building up of the Body of Christ. We are not merely preaching the gospel and saving sinners; we are saving sinners to become members of Christ, living members of the Body of Christ.
In the first eight chapters of Romans, Paul tells us that once a person believes in the Lord, he is justified by God (3:24); after he is justified, he is sanctified (6:19, 22); and after he is sanctified, he lives in Christ (8:1). In chapter 12 Paul says that all those who live in Christ are members of Christ. All the members combined are the Body of Christ (vv. 4-5). This Body of Christ is God’s ultimate desire. The building up of the Body of Christ is a constitution, in the two spirits, the Spirit of God and the spirit of man, of the processed and consummated Triune God with the tripartite men whom He has redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, transformed, and conformed to His image.
The Body of Christ is the constitution of the processed Triune God with the transformed human beings. It is constituted by the union of God and man. The Triune God has passed through the processes of incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. The Body of Christ is the constitution of such a processed God with His redeemed people. This constitution has the believers who are redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed by God as its outward framework. In other words, the constitution of such a building of God and man has man as its outward framework. However, it is not ordinary men who are the framework, but the believers whom God has redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed.
The constitution of the Body of Christ has not only the believers whom God has redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed as its outward framework, but it also has the processed and consummated Triune God as its inward element. Our human body has an outward framework and an inward element. The outward framework plus the inward element are a living and organic body. It is the same with the Body of Christ. The redeemed people are the outward framework; the redeeming God is the inward element.
The Father of the Triune God is the source of the inward element of the constitution of the Body of Christ. The Son of the Triune God is the inward element itself. The Spirit of the Triune God is the essence of the inward element. From Ephesians 4:4-6 we can see the source, element, and essence of the Body of Christ. Verse 4 speaks of one Body and one Spirit, verse 5, of one Lord, and verse 6, of one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. The one Body is the framework; the inward element is the Father as the source, the Son as the element from the Father, and the Spirit as the essence of the element. The Body of Christ is constituted with the Triune God and His redeemed people, with His redeemed people as the outward framework and the Triune God Himself as the inward element.
Most Christians today do not speak concerning the Body of Christ. Even if they do, they do not speak of it very clearly. Even among us, our way of presentation in the past has not been very clear. We commonly say that the Body of Christ is universal, whereas the church is local. However, the Body of Christ is not a matter of being universal or local but a matter of the outward framework and the inward element. If there were only the outward framework without the inward element, the Body would be a dead corpse. With the outward framework, there must also be the inward element; then it is a living and organic Body. Today God has made those whom He redeemed, regenerated, and transformed to be the outward framework. God Himself, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, is the inward element. The Father is the source, the Son is the element, and the Spirit is the essence. These four — the Father, the Son, the Spirit, and man — blended and built together become the Body of Christ.
We all need to see what the Body of Christ is. The Body of Christ is not the totality of all the churches added together. Verses 3 through 6 in Ephesians 4 first speak of the basic nature of the Body, with the redeemed people as the outward framework and the redeeming God as the inward element. Verses 7 through 16 speak of the building up of this Body. The Body of Christ is similar to the human body. It is not produced by assembling pieces together as in the building of a house. A house is built by first laying the foundation, then setting up the frame, and then putting pieces of stone on the frame. But our body is not like that. As soon as a person is born, he possesses a complete set of members. What is needed is growth. I often use my grandson as an illustration. When he was born, he weighed only six pounds and was kept in an incubator. However, because he received proper nourishment, today he is not only grown up but has also become very strong. Hence, the building up of the Body is through feeding. When the Body receives the feeding, it will grow gradually; this growth is the building up of the Body.
The Body is not built up from the outside, but it is grown up from the inside. Growth comes from birth. First, there must be birth before there can be growth. Hence, the first step in the producing of the Body of Christ is our regeneration. From God’s viewpoint, we were all regenerated through the resurrection of the Lord Jesus on the day of His resurrection (1 Pet. 1:3). Although many individual believers were brought forth, in God’s eyes they are a corporate Body. After the regeneration of the many believers in the resurrection of Christ, what follows in sanctification, renewing, transformation, and conformation is a matter of nourishment.
When the Spirit of God regenerates people from within, it is not He Himself who preaches the gospel directly to men to regenerate them. For people to be regenerated, you and I must go to knock on their doors and speak to them. When we speak to people, we must also have a certain skill, like that of a nurse who goes to someone’s home to give him an injection. It does not depend on much speaking but on whether you can inject the person at an appropriate time. In our speaking with people, we need to supply people with the riches of Christ at an appropriate time so that the spirit within them becomes operative, that the unsaved ones may be regenerated and the saved ones may be enlightened. The building up of the Body of Christ hinges on this kind of supply in the spirit. Through the mutual supply in the spirit the members of Christ grow together, resulting in the building up of the Body of Christ.
The building up of the Body of Christ is the growing up of the Body of Christ. Ephesians 4:13 shows us that this growth requires that everyone arrive at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Verse 15 says that we need to grow up into Christ, the Head, in all things. Verse 16 says that the Body will grow gradually unto the building up of itself in love. The growth is the building up. Today, generally speaking, Christianity lacks feeding; hence, it also lacks the growth. This is the reason that there is no building up of the Body of Christ.
The building up of the Body of Christ is the issue of the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of man. It is a constitution in these two spirits. This constitution, this building, has the saved people as its framework and the saving God — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit — as its inward element. All three, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, are dispensed, transfused, and built into God’s redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed believers. This dispensing within us is a daily matter. The Triune God — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit — is dispensed and transfused into us day by day and thereby is built into us day by day. This is similar to the foods that we eat. Through digestion the nutrients of the foods are dispensed into us, are transfused into our whole being, and are even built into us to become our element, even to become us. Similarly, the Triune God through His dispensing, transfusing, and building becomes us and is built up together with us. Thus we are growing gradually for the accomplishing of the building up of the Body of Christ.
The Triune God — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit — is dispensing, transfusing, and building Himself into the believers whom He has redeemed, regenerated, sanctified, renewed, and transformed, so that they and the God who redeemed and transformed them can be constituted into a corporate entity, which is the organic Body of Christ. This entity is God yet man, man yet God (vv. 3-4a). This constitution of divinity and humanity is unique in the universe. It should not and cannot be divided.
The building up of the Body of Christ is the constitution of the Triune God and the tripartite man in the Spirit of God and the spirit of man. This constitution is the union and mingling of God and man. It is divinity constituted into humanity to be man’s dwelling place, and it is humanity built into divinity to be God’s dwelling place.
What is presented above is the harvest of the Triune God’s selection in eternity and of the works of the old creation, redemption, and new creation in time. All these works of God in eternity and in time result in the building up of the Body of Christ. This is His harvest.
In such a great achievement, the operating Triune God is the Benefactor, and the tripartite men who respond to His operation are the beneficiaries. One is the Benefactor, and the others are the beneficiaries. Both are also the satisfied enjoyers. God enjoys man, and man enjoys God. How wonderful this is!
In conclusion, the Body of Christ is the Triune God’s eternal heart’s desire and His ultimate purpose. It is also something that the tripartite men can never think of or hope and ask for. However, this is the Triune God’s anticipated multiplication and His expected increase. This multiplication and increase are God and Christ multiplying and increasing within us, the redeemed people. This is something beyond the imagination of all the religionists and philosophers, yet we who have been graced by God can actually taste it and participate in it for eternity.
