When it comes to spiritual things, we need to not only mentally know the spiritual principles and the word of God but we need to have a clear spiritual seeing of the spiritual things.
Eph. 1:17-18 says, That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of Him, the eyes of your heart having been enlightened…
In the church life and also in the history of the church, all the problems come from not seeing the Body and not caring for the Body. We need a spirit of wisdom and revelation with the enlightening of the eyes of our heart to see and apprehend the Body of Christ.
The way we behave ourselves in the church depends upon the degree of our seeing the Body (Acts 22:10; 26:18-19)
The need for sight and light
In order for us to see something in the spiritual realm, we need to have the Lord’s light shining on us. We need to pray, Lord, remove our covering that we may see Your light. We want to be deceived no more, but all things see aright!
We need to pray for one another that the Lord would, again and again, remove any covering that we may see some further light, that we would be no longer deceived, but that we would really see. We need to see all things in a proper way, in a balanced way.
We may have seen the church as being the desire of God’s heart, but have we really seen the Body of Christ? We may think we see something, when actually we may not really see much…
On the one hand, we need the Lord’s light to expose and shine on us that we may see our self, our flesh, our darkness, our selfishness, our individualism, etc. On the other hand, the exposing of all the negative factors in our being by the Lord’s light is not just for our individual spiritual growth but so that we may have a full entrance into the reality of the Body of Christ.
All the spiritual dealings and all the spiritual light we receive from the Lord are not only to help us grow in the Lord but so that we may really live a life in the Body of Christ, we would live and serve in the Body. Lord, may Your living light scatter all our night and everything make bright!
We need to see the Body and know the Body
If you look at the history of the church and also at the history in the Lord’s recovery, there have been turmoil after turmoil and division after division because of saints not knowing the Body.
We need to not only enjoy the Lord, get into the Word, love the Lord, minister life to the saints, and prophesy for the building up of the Body, but we also need to have a clear vision of the Body of Christ.
When we do something, we need to consider how would the other members of the Body feel about it. We need to consider how the Body would feel about what we are doing, what we are about to purchase, what practices we’re involved into, what we are speaking, etc.
When we do something we shouldn’t forget the fact that we are not individual Christians who live their individual Christian life “before the Lord”, but we are also members of the Body of Christ. We are not only members of the local church, and the local church is not “the local Body”. We are members of the Body of Christ as the universal organism of the Triune God mingled with man.
What we do as members of the Body affects the entire Body of Christ, either ministering life to the Body or damaging the Body. This is why we need to see the Body, care for the Body, and know the principles of the Body of Christ, so that we may depend on the Body and truly care for the Body.
We need to know the Body in life
We need to know the Body of Christ in life – the Body is formed by Christ as life in us (1 John 5:11-12; Col. 3:4). The divine life of God in us mingles with us to become and make us the Body of Christ. Every saved believer is a member of the Body of Christ. The divine life in us makes us the members of the Body.
This divine life in us is NOT “a member life” but “the Body life“. Just as the life in our ear is the life in our whole body, so the divine life in us is not a member life but the Body life. We as members of the Body of Christ share the same divine life flowing in and out of us, among us, and through us, making us one in the Body and joining us together to be the Body of Christ!
When we see that in us we have the divine life which is the life of the Body of Christ, we will no longer be individualistic and we will no longer seek to be secluded, separated, or left alone. We may tend toward seclusion, but as the Lord’s light shines on us to show us that we are members of the Body of Christ, we will realize that no member of the Body can be by himself or secluded.
When we see the Body in life we will realize that a member of the Body is one who is open to the Lord, is open to the light, and is open to the other members of the Body of Christ. Our seeing of the Body is a matter of degree – we need to be open to the Lord continually to see the Body more and care for the Body more.
Lord Jesus, remove any covering that we may see Your light and be deceived no more. Lord, save us from having a mere mental apprehension of the concept of the church and the concept of the Body of Christ. Lord, we want to see a vision of the Body. Help us see the vision of the Body, and help us to truly know Your Body. May Your living light scatter all our night and make Your Body clear to us more and more.
References and Further Reading
- Sharing inspired from brother Minoru Chen’s speaking in the message, and, The Problems Causing the Turmoils in the Church Life (chs. 3-4, by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Taking the Lead as Elders and Responsible Ones, week 6.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Lord, to know Thee as the Body, / Is my desperate need today, / Oh, to see Thee in Thy members, / ‘Tis for this I long and pray.
# As for the church, I need / Thy revelation more, / The Body-life to know, / Thy wisdom to explore.
# If we would love the Lord / And care for His unique Body.
amen!