We are Headed up in Christ through the Divine Dispensing which is Sweet and Intimate

In the church life we are being headed up through the divine dispensing in the divine economy, for God is working Himself into us through an administration that is a sweet dispensing, an intimate stewardship, and a comfortable household arrangement.

When most Christians hear about the fact that God wants to head up all things in Christ, and He starts by first heading up the church, they may think that God comes in with His divine administration and government and imposes His authority, and we all need to listen to Him to be in order and under proper leadership.

But the way God heads up all things in Christ is not by organisation or by outward order and rule, not by setting things in order or by correcting or adjusting things.

The divine concept of heading up all things in Christ in the church is through the divine dispensing. This is the way that we are slowly and gradually being headed up in Him.

In Eph. 3:15-17 Paul prays that we would be strengthened with power through the Spirit into our inner man, so that Christ may make His home in our heart.

This prayer is not an isolated prayer of a spiritual person seeking the Lord to be strengthened in his spirit; it is the prayer that we as members of the Body would be headed up in Christ through the divine dispensing in the divine economy.

God is manifesting His wisdom through the church, and the mystery of His will is being unveiled to us; therefore, we as the church – not as merely individual Christians seeking the Lord – need to be strengthened with power into our inner man so that Christ would work Himself into us for the heading up of all things in Christ.

The power that we need to be strengthened with into our inner man is the same power that operated in Christ to raise Him from the dead, seat Him on the throne in the heavenlies, subject all things under His feet, and make Him to be Head over things to the church.

Christ as the Head is constantly transmitting, dispensing, and transfusing us with Himself; as the Body, we need to be strengthened with the raising up power, enthroning power, subjecting-of-all-things power, and heading up power, so that Christ may make His home in our heart through faith.

As Christ is making His home in our heart, we are being headed up in Him. The Christ who makes His home in our heart is the Head of the Body; as the church, we are His Body, being strengthened into our inner man, and the power that operated in Christ also operates in us to transmit the Head to the church, so that we all may be headed up in Christ.

How wonderful it is that in the church life we are being headed up through the divine dispensing in the divine economy!

Christ as the Divine Economy has Come into us, and He puts Everything in Order

God’s economy is not an objective economy, something outside of us; His economy is a subjective economy, and this divine economy has come into us (1 Tim. 1:4). Christ is the divine economy; thus, when we received Christ, we received the divine economy into us (John 1:12-13).

Our Father God has a great house with a vast store of the unsearchable riches of Christ, and He has an administration, and arrangement, to dispense all these riches into His people for the producing of the church to be His corporate expression.

God’s economy is His household administration to dispense Himself in Christ with all His riches into us, His chosen people, so that He may have a household to express Himself; this household is the church, the Body of Christ.

Christ is all-inclusive, and all that He is in what He is and what He has accomplished and attained is to the church. As the church, we can enjoy Him as our all-inclusive allotted portion; He is God’s anointed, the One having the preeminence in all things, the Head of all things, the center of all things, the One who fills all in all, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, the Alpha and the Omega.

He is our portion for us to enjoy and partake of in our daily life. All the aspects of Christ in the divine economy are meaningful in our daily life and are applicable to our daily living, and they all should become our subjective experience and enjoyment.

When we received Christ into our being, we received the divine economy into is; He is the economy of God, He is the household arrangement, and when we received Him, He administrates, manages, and sets up all things in order in our being.

The divine economy has come into us as an administration, arrangement, and plan, that puts everything in order. We don’t have to try our best to balance our work life, family life, and church life; what we need to do is to receive and enjoy more of Christ, the divine economy.

The more we enjoy the divine economy, the divine dispensing of God in Christ for our enjoyment, the more everything will fall into place, and we will have time both for our family, the church life, and work.

When we have Christ as God’s economy and allow this economy to become the center of our being, it will align everything in our life, and our whole being will be governed, arranged, by the divine economy in our being.

We simply need to enjoy the divine economy, that is, enjoy the divine dispensing of God in Christ, and He will put in order all things in our being and in our life – He will make His home in our heart through faith.

Lord Jesus, thank You for coming into us as the divine economy for us to enjoy the divine dispensing of God in Christ for our supply and enjoyment. Cause us to be strengthened with power into our inner man so that Christ may make His home in our heart through faith, putting everything in order and causing us to live a life worthy of God’s eternal purpose. Amen, Lord, we just want to enjoy You as the divine economy that has come into us as an administration, arrangement, and plan that puts everything in order!

We are Headed up in Christ through the Divine Dispensing which is Sweet, Intimate, and Comfortable

The way God heads up the members of the Body of Christ, the church, is by working Himself into His chosen ones through an administration that is a sweet dispensing, an intimate stewardship, and a comfortable household arrangement (see Eph. 1:10; 3:2; 1 Tim. 1:4; 3:15).

The economy of God that has come into us in the person of the Lord Jesus is a sweet dispensing, an intimate stewardship, and a comfortable household arrangement. When God comes into us He is not a “general” ordering us what to do, where to go, and how to improve ourselves.

The church is not a military barrack, a police station, or a law court to order people what to do, arrest people, or condemn them; the church is God’s house, His household, His family, and His garden, where God dispenses Himself graciously and intimately, enjoyably, and sweetly to us.

In the church as the Body of Christ we are headed up through the divine dispensing. This is a stewardship of the grace of God, a dispensation of the grace of God (Eph. 3:2).

Satan subtly injected himself into us, after he deceived us, but God attracts us with His beauty and loveliness, and He is working Himself into us by a sweet and intimate stewardship.

By the dispensation of grace – the dispensing of God Himself into us as our enjoyment – the factor of life is ministered into us, and this life factor causes us to be raised up, delivered from the heap of collapse, and be attached to Christ in the Body.

This is what the apostle Paul practiced: he had a stewardship of the grace of God, and he was constantly dispensing Christ as life into the believers.

Paul’s ministry was a sweet and intimate stewardship, a pleasant household arrangement; he even taught Timothy how to behave in the house of God (1 Tim. 3:15) by having this intimate stewardship to dispense Christ to all the members of God’s household.

The way we should behave in the household of God is not by controlling others or imposing our authority on them, nor by trying to organise things so that they would be “headed up”.

Rather, we need to enjoy the divine dispensing and be in the intimate stewardship of the life supply, to minister life into the other members of the Body, so that they would receive the factor of life which will cause them to be delivered from the heap of collapse and be attached to the Body, being headed up in Christ.

The Lord Jesus practiced this also; after His resurrection, He came to Peter, the one who denied Him three times and now went back to his old profession of fishing. The Lord prepared breakfast for Peter and the other disciples with him; He didn’t condemn him or reprimand him, but he made a meal for him and ministered life to him.

Instead of rebuking him for what he has done, the Lord asked Peter, Do you love Me more than these? This is the Lord’s way to bring Peter into the divine dispensing to head him up.

The heading up of all things in Christ takes place by an intimate stewardship, by a comfortable household arrangement (Eph. 3:2).

As the Lord appears to us, we respond to Him; this is faith, and in faith we are infused with Him, we enjoy Him, and we are headed up in Him.

Lord Jesus, thank You for coming to us not to rule us outwardly but to dispense Yourself into us in a sweet, intimate, and comfortable way. Thank You for working to head us up in You not through outward correction and adjustment but through an administration that is a sweet dispensing, an intimate stewardship, a comfortable household arrangement. Lord Jesus, we love You and we open to Your divine dispensing! We want to learn how to behave in the church as the household of God to minister Christ to others, so that the factor of life would be imparted into them to cause them to be headed up in Christ and attached to the Body!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by James Lee for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Ephesians, msgs. 9-10 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Genuine Church Life (2017 Thanksgiving Conference), week 2, The Church Life — a Life of Being Headed Up in Christ.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Christ has come, Himself imparting / Into man as life to save, / That the pow’r of death and darkness / May no more all things enslave. (Hymns #981)
  # It is our destiny, / To live a normal life in the divine dispensing, / It is a blessing, / To be satisfied with ordinary days / in the divine dispensing. (Song on, Ordinary Days)
  # The divine Trinity spreads through our soul, / To saturate our whole being, life’s goal; / We become members, the Body of Christ, / Built up together by Christ’s saving life. (Song on, Being Saved in His Life)