Search
God’s eternal plan is to obtain a Body as a vessel for Christ. Most people do not have the concept that the Body of Christ is His vessel. In Ephesians 1:23 Paul says that the church is “His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.” This verse indicates that the church is the Body of Christ and also His fullness. Our natural concept is that the church is simply the church. We lack the deep understanding that the church is the Body of Christ. The Body is a particular expression. If Paul had not received the revelation that the church is the Body of Christ, I doubt that anyone would have had such an understanding. It is easy for us to understand the church as an assembly, a group of people gathering together. However, we cannot imagine that the church is a Body. Even though we have read in the Bible that the church is the Body of Christ, and we often talk about the church being the Body of Christ, we still do not have much feeling concerning the Body of Christ. What is the church? The most important answer to this question is given to us in the Bible by Paul: “the church, which is His Body” (vv. 22-23).
As soon as we speak of the human body, two matters immediately come to mind. First, a person’s body has life. A chair or a desk has nothing to do with life. When we speak of a person’s body, we know that it has life. Brother So-and-so’s body has his life; we can even say that this brother is in his body. Second, a person’s body is his main part. A person’s body not only has life but is also his main part. Moreover, a person cannot be separated from his body. Likewise, the church being the Body of Christ means that the church has the life of Christ and is a part of Christ. Hence, the church cannot be separated from Christ. We must see that the church is a part of Christ. The church is not formed by gathering natural people together; it is formed by those who are full of Christ. The church is the aggregate of those who allow Christ to fully occupy them.
Apparently, Brother A and Sister B are in the church. However, strictly speaking, there are no such persons in the church. We can say this because anyone who comes into the church must not only die but also be buried. According to the Bible, the primary meaning of baptism is burial, that is, termination on the cross. The first thing that happens to a person who believes in the Lord is that he dies and is buried. Any saved person who is part of the church has been put into water and buried. No natural person can enter into the church, because every natural person is buried in the water before coming into the church. “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ” (Gal. 2:20). I have already died and been buried, and now it is Christ who lives in me. In the church as the new man, there cannot be Jew and Greek (Col. 3:10-11). It is disastrous to bring our natural man into the church. In the church as the new man, there are neither Americans nor Chinese; there is only Christ. If there were Jews, Greeks, Americans, or Chinese, it would be a social group, not the church. In the church there is only Christ, because the church is a part of Christ. Moreover, only Christ is all and in all in the new man. The church is the Body of Christ, and every part of the church is Christ. This is the same as saying that every member of my body is part of me. A false tooth may look exactly like a real tooth, but it is not part of a person’s body. We must see that the church is Christ Himself; as such, the church does not have room for the natural man, which is outside of Christ. Just as dentures are not a part of a person’s body, any natural element cannot become a part of the church.
Christians lack the reality of the church because there is too much of the human element and too little of Christ’s element. A Western missionary once asked me, “Why are you so old-fashioned, following the ancient Chinese way of having men sit on one side of a room and women on the other side?” He said that we should copy the Western way of letting the men and the women sit together. I replied that we do not have an Eastern concept or a Western concept; it is acceptable among us for men and women to sit together or for them to sit on separate sides of the room. If we have seen that everything natural has been thoroughly terminated, we would not have feelings concerning such matters. Furthermore, we would not insist on any practice, because to insist is to give the human element a place in the church.
A brother from the West once said to me that our meetings are good in every respect except that often everyone prays at the same time. He considered this to be the way Chinese people study in school and, hence, a Chinese custom. He also said that people in the West pray one at a time and, hence, not many people pray. I told him that we cannot require the church to follow either the East or the West, because in the prayer of the church there is neither East nor West; there is only Christ and the Spirit. We all are the one Body of Christ. We must rid ourselves of our natural concepts and natural feelings.
A newly baptized brother who was quite knowledgeable once said to me that it is not proper for everyone to say Amen when a person prays, because such noisy worship forces God to leave our meetings. On another occasion a brother was critical and asked why Christians have so many different postures when they pray; some sway and others shake. I said that our personal opinion, insight, or feeling is not the criterion in the church. We must remember that we have been buried. Hence, we should never rashly criticize the actions of any brother or sister in their service to the Lord. We should never think that the church should follow our considerations in its practice. The church is neither you nor I, and it is neither the East nor the West. Hence, the church does not follow our feelings or our views. The church is the Body of Christ, and Christ wants to fill everyone who belongs to Him in the church. In matters related to our service and in other things as well, we must not forget that we have already been buried and that Christ is everything in the church.
A person’s body cannot convey the thoughts and ideas of another person. A person’s body is his manifestation; that is, a person is expressed through his body. A person is manifested not only through his face; he is manifested through every move of his body. Hence, it is often possible to recognize someone by the way he walks or even when we can see only his back. Similarly, the church is the Body of Christ, the expression of Christ; hence, the church can manifest only Christ. Christ lives in the church and is expressed through the church. Man cannot find God apart from Christ, nor can man find Christ apart from the church. In the universe there is a God, and this God is in Christ; in the universe there is Christ, and this Christ is in the church. When the God of the heavens came to be among men, He was in Christ, but today when Christ appears to the world, He is in the church. The church is the Body of Christ, and Christ lives in the church. Wherever the church is, there should be the expression of Christ.
A few years ago I was in London, and a friend took me to see the Queen’s vine, which grows in a huge glass house. He told me that the Queen’s vine is the largest vine in the world. The Queen’s vine, however, is not the largest vine in the world. There is a vine on the earth that is much larger than the Queen’s vine. The Queen’s vine can be contained in a huge glass house, but the globe is not large enough for the vine that is revealed in the Bible. This great vine is Christ and the church. The Lord is the vine, and the believers are the branches (John 15:5). The church is Christ’s vine, and the branches of this vine are spreading throughout the earth. Wherever there is a proper church, there is the manifestation of Christ. May we all see this vision: the church is not a social group; the church is the Body of Christ, the church is filled with Christ, and the church is the embodiment of Christ. The church is filled with the element of Christ and expresses Christ.
When we were saved and entered into the church, we were buried. The church did not bury us after we had been saved for a long period of time. Rather, we were buried the very moment that we entered into the church. Hence, the church does not express something of our self; the church expresses only Christ. The church does not allow the self to occupy any place. The church lets Christ have the first place in all things. In the church there is no room for human opinions, views, propositions, or actions. This is the only way that the church can be full of the divine life. To be full of the divine life is to be full of Christ. The church is the expression of Christ, the Body of Christ, and the fullness of Christ.
The church being the Body of Christ is not easy to understand, and the church being the fullness of Christ is even more difficult to understand. When I was young, I failed to understand how the church could be the fullness of Christ, the One who fills all in all (Eph. 1:23). One day I asked an experienced brother why the church is the fullness of Christ. This brother used the Lord’s Word to show me that God created Adam and then took a rib from Adam’s side and built it into Eve (Gen. 2:21-22). A part of Adam became Eve. Eve was a part of Adam, so Eve was Adam’s fullness. Adam needed Eve as his fullness. Adam was not full without Eve, just as a man without a wife does not have a fullness. Hence, the church being the fullness of Christ means that without the church Christ does not have a fullness.
In the Epistle to the Ephesians Paul says that the church is the Body of Christ and that the church is the fullness of Christ (1:23). A man with a big head but a small body does not have a fullness. A person’s fullness depends on whether he has a proper body. The church should be the Body of Christ, the fullness of Christ, but during the past two thousand years the church has lost its proper expression. For example, it is not easy to see a proper church in Japan, and it is also not easy to find proper churches in the so-called Christian countries, such as the United States and Great Britain. The church is the Body of Christ, the fullness of Christ.
The expression of Christ that we see in the Gospels becomes fuller in the book of Acts. The church at the time of Pentecost, at the time of the apostles, was truly the expression of Christ. When the church was spreading to many localities, Christ was spreading, because the expression of Christ was appearing in many localities. The church is not a social organization, nor is it a group of people who are pursuing individual spirituality. Rather, the church is composed of saved persons who are full of Christ and who have become the mysterious Body of Christ as the fullness of Christ. The individual Christ in the Gospels is the corporate Christ in Acts. The Head lives and is expressed through the Body. The Head and the Body share the same life and the same element. If we would read Acts from the viewpoint of the fullness of Christ, we will see what the true condition of the church should be.
Acts does not merely show us how the believers preached the gospel and received the Holy Spirit. Acts shows us the Body of Christ, the fullness of Christ. After His resurrection and ascension Christ came as life to those who belonged to Him. These ones, who belonged to Christ, had died through the cross and had been buried. When they came together in the Spirit, they were the Body of Christ, the fullness of Christ. They had God’s presence, authority, power, and blessing. Hence, it was easy for them to lead people to be saved. Moreover, it was easy for the early believers to be spiritual and to meet God, because they were full of Christ, and they let Christ gain the ground in them. God desires to have such a church, a church that is the embodiment of Christ and the fullness of Christ.
