God Intends to have the Church as the One New Man to Express Him and Represent Him

This week is our sixth and last on the topic of, The Genuine Church Life, and we are focusing on, Practicing the Church Life in the Consciousness of the One New Man. We need to see the church as the one new man and practice the church life with this consciousness.

When we realize that the church is the one new man, we will touch the desire of God’s heart for the fulfillment of His purpose to have on the earth in this age the church not only as the Body of Christ but simultaneously the one new man, a corporate God-man.

God wants to gain the church as the one new man composed of a vast number of believers from every part of the earth who take Christ as their person and life, so that Christ alone would be the life, constituent, and everything in the new man.

In the church as the one new man Christ is the person; we all need to allow Christ to be our person, the One who is expressed through us.

Because there’s one person in the new man, there should only be one mouth, that is, only one speaking all over the earth; there may be many vessels speaking, but only one speaking – the speaking of Christ as the person in the church as the one new man.

The enemy hates for us to see the church as the one new man, for when we become the one new man, the enemy is defeated and subdued, and Christ is expressed corporately.

The enemy is terrified of the fact that, on the cross Christ created the Jews and the Gentiles in Himself as the one new man. So he fights to blind the thoughts of the believers, to veil them and give them at best the natural understanding that the one new man is a gathering of believers from many nations (something like the United Nations).

We need to be awakened by the Lord, enlightened by His light, and determined before Him that we would waste no more time but practice the church life in the consciousness of the one new man, for we realize that the church is the one new man!

It is wonderful to see that today we have the scriptural way to meet and serve, and we all learn to function in our measure, but we need to go on and be brought into the realization that the church is the one new man.

God Intends to have the Church as the One New Man to Express Him and Represent Him

God’s intention in His creation of man was to have a corporate man that would express Him and represent Him.

According to Col. 1:15 and 2 Cor. 4:4, Christ Himself is the image of God; God is invisible, but His image is Christ, for Christ embodies Him, defines Him, and expresses Him. When God created man in His image in Gen. 1:26, He created man in the image of Christ to be the corporate expression of Christ on earth.

Furthermore, man was given to be God’s representative to exercise the authority of God to cause the enemy to suffer loss on earth, so that the kingdom of God would come on earth.

However, the first man failed God, so Christ came as the second man and, in His resurrection, produced the church; now the church as the one new man fulfills God’s purpose in creating man.

Eventually, the church as the one new man is the corporate man in God’s intention, and this new man will fulfill the twofold purpose of expressing God and dealing with God’s enemy.

The church, the Body of Christ, is the one new man to accomplish God’s eternal purpose – a universal, corporate God-man (see Eph. 1:9, 11; 3:9; Rom. 8:29; 2 Tim. 1:9; Eph. 2:15-16; 4:22-24). The goal that God has with the church is not merely the church itself; the goal of the church is the reality of the Body of Christ and the bringing in of the one new man for the fulfillment of God’s purpose.

The local churches are God’s procedure to reach God’s goal. We need to practice the church life with our whole being, but we make a serious mistake if we consider the local church an end in itself. The church life, as precious as it is, is a procedure ordained by God to enable Him to reach His goal.

On one hand, the church is the Body of Christ (and the emphasis is on life, Christ being the life of the Body), and on the other, the church is the one new man (and the emphasis is on person – Christ is our person).

As the Body of Christ, we need to take Christ as our life; as the one new man, we need to take Christ as our person.

The church is not only the church of God, the Body of Christ, as the fullness, the expression, of the all-filling One (Eph. 1:23); the church is not only the household of God, the house of God, the temple of God, and the dwelling place of God (Eph. 2:19, 21-22); the church is also the one new man!

The church as the one new man is a corporate and universal man created of two peoples – the Jews and the Gentiles – on the cross, and it is composed of all the believers who, though they are many, are one new man in the universe (see Eph. 2:15, footnote 8 in the Recovery Version Bible).

Christ is the Head of the Body, and we are the Body of the Head; we and Christ, the Body and the Head, form a universal man – the one new man. Christ as the Head is in the heavens, and we as the Body are on earth; as we take Christ as our life and person, we are the Body of Christ and the one new man.

This is what God intends to obtain – the church as the one new man to express Him with His image and represent Him with His dominion.

Lord Jesus, enlighten us to realize that God’s intention is to have the church as the one new man to express Him and represent Him. Hallelujah, we were not only created in God’s image and likeness to express God, but we were regenerated with God’s life to be the church, the Body of Christ and the one new man, to express God and represent God corporately! Amen, Lord, gain what You are after! Gain the church as the one new man all over the earth so that this new man would express You and deal with Your enemy to bring in Your kingdom!

The one New Man was Created by Christ on the Cross with the Redeemed Humanity and the Divine Element

When God created man in Gen. 1:26 He didn’t create just one individual man – He created a corporate man, for in Gen. 5:1 it says, He called their name, Adam.

The corporate man that God created was to express God and represent Him, but, due to Satan’s injecting his rebellious nature into man, he became the old man. Now all the seven billion plus people on earth are various exhibitions of the old man.

However, the Son of God came by incarnation, and He was designated the second man who personally fulfilled Gen. 1:26 in a complete and absolute way. He was the first God-man to fulfill God’s intention in creating man.

He died on the cross for our redemption and terminated the old man, and in Himself – while on the cross, while the enemy was swarming around Him to stop God’s work – He created the one new man.

Hallelujah, Christ created the one new man on the cross in Himself, tearing down the middle wall of partition, thus making peace (see Eph. 2:15). We can declare to the whole universe, to the fallen angels, to the enemy, and to all the evil spirits, that there’s one new man in this universe, and this corporate new man will fulfill God’s eternal purpose!

In the Lord’s resurrection, the one new man that was created on the cross was now born; the Son of Man became the firstborn Son of God in His humanity, and we all were regenerated to be His brothers, members of the Body of Christ and part of the one new man.

In the sight of God this corporate universal God-man exists; this vision of the church as the one new man needs to penetrate our hearts and minds! The one new man was created by Christ on the cross with two kinds of materials – the redeemed created man and the divine element.

On the cross, Christ put the redeemed man and the divine element together to produce a new man. First, He crucified the natural man, and then – through the crossing out of the old man, Christ imparted the divine element into us, causing us to become a new entity (Rom. 6:6; 2 Cor. 5:17).

To be the one new man doesn’t involve merely repenting and feeling sorry for the past; the one new man involves our old man being crossed out and Christ imparting His life into us.

On the cross Christ did not only crucify us and terminate every negative thing, but He also created something positive – the one new man. After we were terminated, in Christ we received a new essence to become the one new man.

Nothing of our old man was good for the creation of the new man; the new man is not “an improved old man” – the church as the one new man is of the divine essence mingled with the redeemed created human nature, mingling together to produce a corporate person, the one new man.

The new man was created in Christ on the cross; Christ Himself is not only the Creator of the new man but also the sphere in which and the essence with which the one new man was created.

Lord, thank You for terminating our old man on the cross and adding Your divine element to our redeemed created man to produce the one new man, a corporate God-man! Hallelujah, our old man has been terminated on the cross, and in Christ both Jews and Gentiles were created into one new man with the divine element! We declare to the whole universe that the church is the one new man, the corporate God-man created on the cross by Christ, and this one new man will fulfill God’s purpose to express God in His image and represent Him with His authority!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Ron Kangas for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Ephesians, msg. 24 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Genuine Church Life (2017 Thanksgiving Conference), week 6, Practicing the Church Life in the Consciousness of the One New Man.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # New man of new creation, / Born through her risen Lord, / Baptized in God the Spirit, / Made holy by His Word; / Christ is her life and content, / Himself her glorious Head; / She has ascended with Him / O’er all her foes to tread. (Hymns #824)
  # One new man is the Father’s plan; / He redeemed us from the sons of men. / Every kindred, tribe and tongue, / In Himself He called us to be one. / God’s expression on the earth / Now reveals His glorious worth. / One new man is the Father’s plan; / He redeemed us from the sons of men. (Hymns #1230)
  # Through Thee we receive salvation, / And, together built by Thee, / Jews and Gentiles are Thy dwelling, / One new man, in harmony. (Hymns #834)