Seeing the Church as the Mystery of Christ in Paul’s Completing Ministry

In the Old Testament most of what God did in relation to His people was outwardly and even supernaturally, and the people of Israel knew they had God’s presence with them as He was protecting them, guiding them, speaking to them, and doing all kinds of things for them.

But today in the New Testament age we are in another age, the age of the church, which is the age of mystery. In this age God is a mystery, Christ as the mystery of God mysteriously expressed and declared God while on earth, and the church as the mystery of Christ is mysteriously filled with God, strengthened in God, and expresses God in the world.

The mysterious God was expressed in full individually in Christ and is now fully manifested in the church. Paul in his Epistles spoke a lot about Christ as the mystery of God and the church as the mystery of Christ, and he also spoke of the great mystery – Christ and the church.

Today we want to see the church as the mystery of Christ point by point as we go through the New Testament, especially in the completing ministry of Paul. May the Lord shine on us and show us more concerning the mystery of Christ, the church!

Aspects of the Church as the Mystery of Christ

The church was mysteriously chosen and predestinated by God the Father even before the foundation of the world (see Eph. 1:3-5). We were chosen to be holy and we were predestinated unto sonship before the foundation of the world. We were merely creatures of God, but He wanted us to be His sons, according to the good pleasure of His will.

The church was mysteriously redeemed in the Beloved (Eph. 1:6-12). In Christ we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins through His blood, according to the riches of His grace. We were not just redeemed, but we were redeemed according to the riches of God’s abounding grace and according to the dispensation of the mysterious economy in God’s will.

We were mysteriously sealed with the Holy Spirit and we received the Spirit as a pledge (Eph. 1:13-14). At the time of our regeneration, we received the Holy Spirit as a seal. This means that the element of the Holy Spirit gets into us and is mingled with us, the mark and the image of the Spirit is imprinted on us, and we sense that we belong to God: He is our owner! When God seals us (and He is continually sealing us), we have the divine element sealing us, the divine image spreading in us, and the divine ownership is on us! Also, He is the pledge of our inheritance – the Spirit is the foretaste of the full taste of God as our enjoyment!

The church participates mysteriously in the resurrection power of Christ and in everything that He has attained and obtained in His ascension (see Eph. 1:19-23). The church as the Body of Christ was produced in Christ’s resurrection and ascension when Christ became the life-giving Spirit and He was outpoured on the church to be everything to the church. Now we as the church mysteriously participate in Christ’s resurrecting power, enthroning power, subjecting power, and heading up power! Wow!

The church mysteriously becomes the universal new man as God’s kingdom and God’s house, and is built up as the habitation of God (see Eph. 2:15, 19-22). The old man is being replaced with the universal new man as the new creation, the church, and the new man expresses God and accomplishes His economy. The church is also the kingdom of God, where God rules (Rom. 5:17) and the house of God where we enjoy God’s riches to express the glory of His riches (1 Tim. 3:15-16).

How can we enjoy and experience all this? As Ephesians reveals in every chapter, we need to exercise our spirit! In Eph. 1:17 we need a spirit of wisdom and revelation, in 2:22 our spirit is the dwelling place of God, in 3:5 the mystery of God is made know to us in spirit, in 4:23 we are being renewed in the spirit of our mind, in 5:18 we are filled in spirit, and in 6:18 we pray at every time in spirit.

To know God’s economy, to receive God’s dispensing, and to participate in His divine transmission from the heavenlies, we believers need to know, use, and exercise our mingled spirit!

The church mysteriously enjoys the unsearchable riches of Christ (Eph. 3:2, 7-11). Paul was entrusted the stewardship of God to dispense the riches of Christ to the believers as the gospel. Somehow, mysteriously, as we pray over the word of God and experience Christ daily, we enjoy the unsearchable riches of Christ and we become God’s fullness as a display of God’s multifarious wisdom! How much we need the Spirit of reality to guide us into all the reality of the unsearchable riches of Christ (John 16:12-13)!

The church has Christ mysteriously making His home in the believers’ hearts – as they are strengthened into their inner man with power by God through His Spirit – so that the church may be filled with the universal dimensions of Christ and become the fullness of God (see Eph. 3:15-19). Our whole being needs to be strengthened by God with power into our spirit (our inner man), so that Christ may have a way to occupy and make His home in all the different parts of our heart. The result is that Christ fills every part of our being and we are filled unto all the fullness of God!

The church expresses the mysterious life-union of Christ and His Body (Eph. 5:32). Christ loved the church, gave Himself up for her, and just as a husband is one flesh with the wife, so Christ is one spirit with the church. This mystery is great – Christ and the church. This means that the processed Triune God is joined and mingled with the transformed tripartite man to become a universal couple. Now God lives in man and man lives in God; divinity is expressed in humanity and humanity lives out the divine glory and beauty to become the expression of divinity. What a mystery!

The church ultimately and mysteriously consummates God’s economy in the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:2). The two – the consummated God and the transformed man – will live a life in the divine romance for eternity, as a married couple, and God dwells and lives in man as man dwells and lives in God. The Triune God is on the throne and He is the life supply of the city as the tree of life and the river of life, and the consummated church is the outward appearance and expression of the Triune God to the entire universe!

Lord, come as the Spirit of reality to guide us into all the reality of what You are to the church. We want to see, enjoy, partake of, be filled with, and express the unsearchable riches of Christ! Cause us to have an uplifted view of the church as revealed in the completing ministry of Paul. We just open to You to enjoy You, contact You, be filled with You, and be saturated with You every day! Gain what You are after, the church as Your habitation, Your dwelling place, the new man, the kingdom of God, the Body of Christ, the bride of Christ, and the New Jerusalem!

References and Further Reading

• Inspiration: portions in, The Mysteries in God’s New Testament Economy (by Witness Lee, ch. 2), and brother Ed Marks’ sharing in this message, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, “The Completing Ministry of Paul“, week 2 entitled, The Central Vision.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # The Church the myst’ry is of Christ, / For He is now to man unshown; / No man on earth may see Him now, / But thru the Church He is made known.
  # The Holy Spirit is the seal, / The foretaste, earnest, and the pledge. / He designates us as God’s own / And guarantees our heritage.
  # God’s economy is His plan to dispense Himself / Into His chosen, predestinated, and redeemed people / As their life (as their life), their life supply, (their life supply) / And their everything / To produce (to produce), constitute (constitute), / And build up the organic Body of Christ, / Which consummates the New Jerusalem.