Advancing from the Individual Experience of God to the Corporate Experience of God

Gen. 35:6-7 And Jacob came to Luz (that is, Bethel), which is in the land of Canaan, he and all the people who were with him. And he built an altar there and called the place El-bethel, because there God had revealed Himself to him when he fled from his brother.

In Genesis 35 Jacob had a radical turn from the individual experience of God to the corporate experience of God. As a result of being dealt with, broken, and transformed, Jacob experienced God as the God of Bethel, El-Bethel, the God of the house of God (Gen. 35:7; Eph. 3:17-21; 4:4-6).

Outwardly you may think that Jacob had a nostalgic feeling at Bethel where God appeared to him and gave him that marvelous dream in Gen. 28, but there’s something much deeper than that in Gen. 35. We need to have some understanding of what happened at Jacob’s second coming to Bethel, and then the Spirit of reality can guide us into all the reality of what we are understanding.

In our experience of Christ we will, at one point, have a turn from the individual experience of God to the corporate experience of God, the experience of God as the God of the house of God. We will not merely “go to church” or “go to meetings” to see the saints and hear the word of God, neither will we be in the “sphere” of the church life. We will depend on the Body and realize that without the Body we cannot live our Christian life.

In Himself, God is unchangeable, but in our experience He is becoming bigger and greater as we open to Him and go on with Him. At one point in our experience of Him, God will be to us not only our God but “the God of the Body”, the God of the house of God.

The Apostle Paul experienced God in this aspect, and he testified while in prison, “I know that this will turn out salvation through your petition and the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:19).

He didn’t depend ONLY on the bountiful supply of the Spirit (as if he were a spiritual giant tapping directly into the great supply of the Triune God) but he firstly depended on the petition and the prayer of the saints; his supply, his salvation, and his going on, was contingent on the prayers of the saints, and he depended on the Body in a real way.

When we come to Bethel the second time we realize that we cannot live without the Body, and apart from the supply of the Body we cannot pray, serve, and even be a Christian. At Bethel we see beyond the dealings, breaking, and transformation – we see the house of God and experience God as the God of the house of God, the El-Bethel!

Experiencing God at Bethel as the God of the House of God

Just like Jacob did in Genesis 35, we need to have a crucial and radical turn in our being, a turn that goes to the very root of our being. We need to have a radical turn from our individual experience of God to the corporate experience of God, the experience of God as the God of the house of God.

In Genesis 35 Jacob had become a corporate person, having God built and wrought into his being through transformation, and he realized that he is part of God’s building.

We need to realize that our spirituality is a Body matter; our transformation issues in God’s building. When we become corporate, builded with the saints in God’s building, a limitation is removed from God (imposed by the human situation) so that He may reveal Himself in an altogether new way as the God of the house of God, the El-Bethel.

We will realize that our God is not only “the God of Abraham”, “the God of Isaac”, and “the God of Jacob”, but El-Bethel, the God of the house of God, the God of a corporate people. To most believers, God is their God, the God of individuals; but He wants to be El-Bethel to us, the God of a corporate Body.

Just like Paul in Philippians 1, we need to realize that we depend on the prayer and petition of the Body for our very Christian existence. The God we have is the God of the house of God, the Triune God of the Body of Christ, and He is flowing in all the members of the Body, being released through the saints’ prayers.

When we touch this reality, we feel as if we’re in another universe, as if we’re meeting a different God in our experience – wow, the God of the house of God!

The God of the house of God can move as His people remove the limitations they place on Him, and they allow God to do whatever He wants. It is only in His house that God can do whatever He wills and can be all that He is. It is only in the mystical Body of Christ that Christ can express Himself fully.

In a real sense, we as members of the Body determine to what extent God is expressed and His will is released. He is willing to be limited by our capacity as He works on dealing with us, breaking us, and transforming us. God wants us to remove any limitation so that we as His Body would pray,

Father, Your will be done! Whatever You want to do, do it! We are here for Your purpose. Our life is in Your hands. We live for You. Lord, whatever You desire to do in our life, do it! We want to limit You no more. Move in us and through us without hindrance. Lord, supply us with what You are in and through the Body. Your will be done on earth as it is being done in the heavens!

Advancing from the Individual Experience of God to the Corporate Experience of God

Phil. 1:19 For I know that for me this will turn out to salvation through your petition and the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.

Many believers know that the church is the house of God (1 Tim. 3:15), but where is the practical church life today? Many millions of Christians go to church every Sunday, but how many know the genuine church life? Many believers love the Lord and seek Him, but how many are built up together as the church in their locality?

There are many genuine believers all over the earth, but how many live Christ and function in their measure in the Body? In the church life today, do we just “go to meetings” and then live our life the way we want? Do we actually live Christ for the church life daily? Do we function as living members of the Body of Christ?

Every genuine believer in Christ is a living member of the Body of Christ and he must function in his measure. We need to be brought on from experiencing God in an individual way, for our personal experience and enjoyment, to the corporate experience of God, the experience of God as the God of the Body of Christ.

First of all, we need to put away and leave behind everything that is related to the world and to idols, and we need to be cleansed from anything unclean and of idolatry (as Jacob commanded his house to do before they went up to Bethel). God demands that we would have a clean living individually and corporately; in Bethel God does not tolerate anything unclean.

We need to advance from the individual experience of God to the corporate experience of God (1 Cor. 12:12). On His side, God is working through our environment and everyone around us to deal with us, break us, and transform us, and on our side we need to be open and willing to go on with Him and experience Him as the God of the house of God, the God of Bethel.

Here, at Bethel, we are persons who are no longer individualistic and independent, but we realize from the depths of our being that we cannot live without the Body, we cannot serve or even pray apart from the Body, and we cannot be a Christian without the Body. For us to go on with the Lord and to be a normal believer in Christ, we need the Body of Christ, the whole house of God, and we need the God of the house of God.

At this point we are no longer unturned, raw, or whole, but we are touched by the Lord after we struggle with Him and the Lord got through in us, and we are now in another realm – the realm of the Body of Christ.

At Bethel we experience God being unlimited not only in Himself but in His house, and here He is able to do what He wants. At Bethel we experience God as the unlimited One, and in meeting after meeting we release Him to do whatever He wants to do.

At Bethel we are no longer isolated stones but a built-up corporate church that expresses God and represents Him with His authority.

Lord Jesus, cause us to advance from the personal experience of God to the corporate experience of God. Bring us to Bethel the second time. We reject anything unclean and we refuse anything that would replace You. Lord, we look to You and depend on You. We no longer want to hinder You or limit You in what You want to do. We need You and we desperately need the Body. Lord, how we need the petition of the saints and the bountiful supply of the Spirit for our going on with You! Lord, bring us into the experience of the God of the house, the unlimited God who does everything He wants and is what He is in His house!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. Ron Kangas’s sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (by Watchman Nee, see Collected Works, vol. 35), ch. 10, as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Genesis (3), week 4 / msg 4, The Reality of Bethel and the Bringing forth of Christ as the Son of Affliction and the Son of the Right Hand.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # I’m thankful that God has placed me / With you to build up His Body. / Christ in you is the hope for me! / You also need Christ lived in me. / I live, if you stand firm in the Lord. / You live, if I stand firm in the Lord. / My going on is for you, / Your going on is for me, / Not sep’rate entities, / I need you saints desp’rately! (Song on Depending on the Body)
  # As members of the Body / Christ we would manifest, / Each learning how to function / His fulness to express; / We would not be spectators / But each as members move, / None bringing death or damage / But each our profit prove. (Hymns #867)
  # Limit, Lord, my independence, / Let me to Thy Body turn; / Not just seeking light from heaven, / But the church’s sense to learn. / May we be the stones for building / Not the formless, useless clay, / Gain in us Thy heart’s desire / Corporately Thyself display. (Hymns #1225)