We are
going, as the Lord enables us, to meditate afresh on the
Body of Christ. We know, when we want to have the larger
unfoldings of this "Mystery" where to turn; we
instinctively turn to the Ephesian letter. In this letter
we note, first of all, the simple preliminary fact, that
the Church is designated "The Body of Christ,"
it is "the Church which is His Body." That
distinguishes the Church in this letter from other
designations which we find elsewhere. There is the
Temple, there is the House of God, and other such-like
designations, but in this letter it is particularly The
Body of Christ that is basic to all that the letter
unfolds, and what is contained in the letter is in line
with the conception of a body. Now the word which seems
to predominate through this letter in connection with
that designation is the word translated
"Together." It is impressive to note how
frequently that word occurs. Here we are said to have
been "quickened together" in Him. That does not
only mean that our togetherness individually was with the
Lord Jesus in His rising, but it means that we
corporately were quickened, we were together quickened in
Him, not only with Him but in Him corporately quickened.
The Eternal Oneness Of The Body
In the
resurrection of the Lord Jesus the whole Church was
included together. And then in the same verse, 2:6, we
are said to be "raised together" in Him.
Further, in the same place, we are said to be
"seated together" in Him. Coming back a step
into 1:10, we are "gathered together into one"
and then on again to 2:21, we are "framed
together." In verse 22 we are "builded
together." So this word "together" brings
into view in a very simple way the fact of the corporate
nature of the Church, the Body of Christ. We want to get
the full force of that as far as it is possible, because
this letter undoubtedly emphasizes the fact that the
Church is a corporate Body; not that it one day will be
when the work of grace is completed; not that it is
merely that in the mind and thought of God, the will of
God, the intention of God; not that it was intended to be
when the Lord started it; but that it IS; that in spite
of what is seen here on the earth; in spite of the
ever-increasing number of divisions and separations, all
the unhappy schisms which have entered into the
fellowships of God's people on the earth, in spite of
everything that ever has been and ever is or will be
along that line, the Church is still a corporate whole.
It is that, not as to the people as on the
earth, but it is true as to the essential nature of the
Church, the Body of Christ, and the sooner we get that
rooted and settled in our spiritual acceptance and
consciousness the better. No schism, beloved, that is
incidental to the relationships of Christian people on
the earth can alter that fact. The differences which
exist or which come about by the different mentalities,
choices and preferences, likes and dislikes, intellectual
acceptances or rejections; all those differences do not
touch this ultimate fact that there is a realm in which
there is a togetherness, a oneness, a corporateness which
is unaffected by anything that is of man in himself
religiously or theologically.
There is a realm of course in which there
may be a breach of fellowship, that is where it enters
into the realm of the spirit and where the spirit is
affected. There you may very definitely strike a blow at
the Body of Christ, but ultimately this Body is one;
which, of course, clearly indicates that this is
something other than an earthly thing and that it is a
heavenly Body, unaffected and untouched by earth.
We are inclined to accept what we see, to
be affected by the divisions that are here, and are
almost in despair because of what we see. The sooner we
sweep that whole thing aside the better, and let there be
fifty thousand earthly departments of Christian people,
the Body of Christ remains one. It is a seamless robe, it
is a Body which cannot be divided, it remains one. That
is the basic fact to which we must come back, that is
where we begin.
This letter, in which there is the
unveiling of the mystery of Christ and His members, the
Church, the one Body, states most emphatically the fact
of the corporate nature of the Body. It does not argue
about it, or discuss it, it takes it for granted, it is a
settled thing. Of course there are degrees of enjoyment
of it, and there are degrees of the fruitfulness of it as
here, but there are no degrees of the fact of it. The
fact remains as solid and settled. Our business is to
enter into the settled fact and come into the meaning of
it: but our not having come into the full meaning of it
does not mean that it does not exist. The trouble is that
we do not come into what God has established from the
beginning; that is, we have to know what it is that makes
the Body one, and that is our business. The unity exists;
our business is to apprehend it, not make it. We go on to
that almost immediately, but note, the Letter to the
Ephesians is still alive, it is still applicable, it is
still true for today. After all these centuries when we
have all that we have on the earth, the departments and
divisions of Christian people, all of whom may be members
of the Body of Christ, still after all these centuries
the Ephesian letter remains where it was at the
beginning, and it represents the Body as a solid whole, a
corporate unity.
A Heavenly Position Necessary To Apprehending
The Oneness
It is only as we get up into the
heavenlies and away from the earthlies that we begin to
enter into that fact and realize what that fact means to
God, to the heavenlies, to hell, and to this world. So,
in order that we should enter into the fact with all that
that fact contains of effective vocation and life, we
have to introduce the whole matter by our position in
Christ in the heavenlies, and see exactly where we are
placed spiritually: for not until we come to recognize
that and to enter into our heavenly position in Christ
can we see, appreciate, or come into the meaning of this
heavenly reality the Church, which is His Body. We cannot
see the Church from the earthlies, we can only see it
from the heavenlies.
Our Attitude Towards Differences
I do not want to pass away from that as
having merely stated something. I do want that we should
get the benefit of it. You and I may have a disagreement,
but it makes no difference to our relationship in the
Lord Jesus. The fact that you and I fall out or disagree
does not tear us as limbs out of the Body of Christ. No,
that is our loss, that is our shame, that is incidental
in our Christian life, that is a breakdown somewhere in
grace in us, but we shall recover ourselves from that if
we yield to the movements of the Spirit in us, and come
back to find that we have not to be rejoined in Christ in
His Body, that fact remains.
You see the working principle is this:
that there may be much amongst believers on this earth of
division, but we have not to accept that as ultimate, we
have not to take that as meaning that some are in Christ
and some are out of Christ, that we are in Christ and
others are not, and that the Body has altogether
collapsed and disintegrated. The only hope of enjoying
the fact is that we repudiate what looks like another
fact, and we seek to get above that which, being earthly,
brings these things about, and discover we are in the
heavenlies, and fellowship abides. That is a working
principle and we should recognize that is the meaning of
the fact. We have got to accept the fact, and we have to
seek to overcome or repudiate the other things which come
in against the ultimate fact.