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Scripture Reading: 1 Pet. 1:23; Rom. 12:2; 2 Cor. 3:18; 1 Cor. 14:26; Heb. 10:25; 2 Pet. 1:3-8; Eph. 4:15-16; 1 Cor. 14:5, 12
In the previous chapters we have seen various aspects of the building up of the Body of Christ. In this chapter we want to see a comparison between the building up of the “church” as an organization and the building up of the church as an organism. Organization refers to Christianity, including Catholicism and all the denominations, which constitute “the church.” Organism refers to the proper church on the way of God’s economy.
The “church” as an organization is built first with the gospel. Many so-called denominational “churches” build themselves up by preaching the gospel to, as they would say, “win souls.” This point is good, right, and absolutely scriptural. The “church” as an organization is also built up with the teachings of the Scriptures. Many of the fundamental denominations use scriptural teachings. This is also good and right. But they also attempt to build up their situation by meetings according to the traditional way. Here is a problem that we are still fighting today.
The denominations render spiritual help to people in their salvation and edification, but they annul, instead of develop, the organic functions of the believers as the living members of the Body of Christ. This problem is altogether due to the traditional way of meeting, which renders spiritual help but at the same time annuls and kills the organic function of the members of Christ. This traditional way of meeting renders the help for people to be saved and edified, but then it kills those who have been edified. Here is the subtlety of the traditional way. Millions of Christians have been helped to receive Christ as their Savior, and some spiritual help has been rendered to them. But while this help is being rendered, their organic function is being hiddenly annulled. The believers do receive some edification, but the traditional way of meeting unconsciously and hiddenly annuls and nullifies all the spiritual organs. Many believers attend these traditional services for years; the longer they remain there, the more they are killed, robbed, and stripped of their organic ability to function. Therefore, out of millions of Christians, only a small percentage are useful; most of these are members of the so-called clergy.
I was in that traditional way for about the first seven years of my Christian life, and I received some help. But the more help I received, the more I was annulled and disabled. Then I began to know the church as an organism, and I was brought into the church. From that year in 1932, I began to be equipped in the Lord’s ministry in His recovery. The longer a believer stays under the traditional way of meeting of one speaking and the rest listening, the more he is disabled and his spiritual ability and organic function are annulled.
In the traditional way of meeting, not only are the functions of the believers nullified, but also the living members of the Body of Christ are bound even to the extent of spiritual death. When we were in that way, we did not sense this because along with the spiritual help we received, we were unconsciously drugged. We lost our organic function, yet we had no consciousness, no awareness, of it. We did not become aware of this until we came out of that drugging situation.
The “church” as an organization does not fully care for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ with the adequate growth in life of the living members. They care for the building up of the church to some degree but not fully. Thus, their care becomes a tearing down and a frustration to the real building. Eventually, what is built up is not an organism in life but a religious organization. Look at today’s denominations. Which one is not an organization? If organization were taken away from the Christian groups in Christianity, they would collapse. In contrast, the churches in the Lord’s recovery are not dependent upon organization. Without organization the churches in the Lord’s recovery would still stand because they are not built upon organization. They are built upon Christ as the very life that produces an organism. We have to come fully out of the old, traditional way because this way leads in the direction of organization.
If one speaker is always assigned to take care of the meetings of the church, this is a strong organization. We must take away this old way of meeting. To do this is to tear down that particular organization. If this organization is replaced by the many members of Christ coming together without any arrangement or assignment but with the living Christ in them and having the freedom to follow Christ to speak something, this is an organism. To change from the traditional way to the scriptural way is to change from an organization to an organism, to have something organic replace something organized. As the living, functioning members of the living Body of Christ, we should be happy about this.
Sometimes when I attended a church meeting, I had a burden to speak for about fifteen minutes, but the speaking was altogether occupied by the assigned speaker. The situation would not allow me to release my burden. The organizational way not only annuls the functions of the members but also kills the opportunities for the saints to function by annulling the time.
The church is built up with Christ as life, which produces an organism rather than an organization. The church as an organism preaches the gospel so that people may be regenerated (1 Pet. 1:23). Our way of preaching the gospel is different from the organizational way. The way of the denominations is to invite people to come to their meetings. The new way is to go to people’s homes with the gospel. We visit them with Christ as grace, life, forgiveness of sins, and salvation and with all the truths in the Bible.
The building up of the church as an organism includes ministering Christ as the life-giving Spirit through the word of the Scriptures that the believers may be transformed (Rom. 12:2; 2 Cor. 3:18). The teaching concerning transformation is an item that is unique to the Lord’s recovery. I began to speak on this matter in the United States in 1963. Second Corinthians 3:18 tells us that we need to be transformed into the Lord’s image, and Romans 12:2 says that we need to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. Transformation is clearly mentioned in the Bible and is a crucial point in the Lord’s recovery. Some are even opposed to the truth of Christ as the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:17). But if this item is taken away from the Lord’s recovery, we have no ministry. We must keep Christ as the life-giving Spirit since this reality is the basis of the New Testament ministry.
The church as an organism is built up by meetings in mutuality according to the biblical way (1 Cor. 14:26; Heb. 10:25). Mutuality will bring us out of the “church” as an organization and into the church as an organism. The church meeting should be an exhibition of Christ in all His riches and a mutual enjoyment of Christ shared by all the attendants with one another before God and with God for the building up of the saints and the church.
The church not only renders spiritual help to people in their salvation and edification but also develops the organic functions of the believers as the living members of the Body of Christ through the growth in life by the dispensing of the divine life to them (2 Pet. 1:3-8). Dispensing is a particular expression in the Lord’s recovery. Joseph’s ministry in Egypt was to dispense the food to all the starving people (Gen. 41:56-57), and Paul’s ministry in the New Testament dispenses the riches of Christ to all the believers (Eph. 3:8). The goal and issue of the divine dispensing are Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God to be our life that we may live Him and have one living with Him.
The church ministers life to the living members of the Body of Christ, helping them to grow in the divine life into Christ, the Head, in all things that the Body of Christ may be built up by itself through the functions of its members (4:15-16). The church as an organism also fully emphasizes the building up of the church as the Body of Christ through the development of the organic functions of its living members, who receive the supply of life mainly through the church meetings (1 Cor. 14:5, 12).
