God desires to obtain a counterpart, someone who would match Him in every possible way and who loves Him to the uttermost. In order for God to produce such a complement for Himself, He did certain things.
First of all, He created the heavens and the earth, the plants, the animals, and man. We see this in Genesis 1-2. Then, God brought all the animals to Adam to name them and to see if there’s any one of them that would match him. Adam as a type of Christ saw all the animals, named them, but none of them was found as his complement, his counterpart.
Then God “put man to sleep” and took one of his ribs and built a woman, which He brought to the man (see Gen. 2:19-22). This time she was bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh – she matched him and became his complement, his wife! Only what comes out of man can come back to man to match man as his counterpart.
It is the same with God: God in Christ became a man through incarnation (typified by God’s creation of Adam), and He “looked around” in His human life on earth to see who would match Him. He didn’t find anyone to match Him, so He went to the cross and died (typified by Adam falling in a deep sleep), and He released the divine life in resurrection to produce the church (typified by Eve, who was produced out of Adam).
Today it is the church that can fully match Christ and be His counterpart, His complement, His wife because the church is “bone of His bones and flesh of His flesh”. The believers in Christ as the church are Christ’s counterpart and His bride to be His wife to match Him for eternity in a loving marriage life forever!
What Did God Do to Obtain His Counterpart?
God is a bachelor – He is like “a single man”, seeking to find a wife, someone who would match Him in life, nature, and expression. Throughout the universe, there is no such person who can match the God who created the universe itself.
But God created time, and on the bridge of time, He created the heavens, the earth, the plant life, the animal life, and eventually man. All creation simply gives the setting for man to come into being and be sustained since God’s heart’s desire is centered on man.
God loves man and wants man to be His counterpart. Just as no plant, bird, fish, or animal can match man to be his counterpart, so nothing and no one else except man can match God to be His counterpart. God loved man even when man fell and didn’t take from the tree of life.
To gain man as His counterpart, God Himself became a man (John 1:14). This was typified by God’s creation of Adam (see Rom. 5:14). Then, Christ died on the cross to produce the church as His counterpart (Eph. 5:15-27). This was also typified by Adam being put to sleep and God taking out a rib to build Eve and bring her to him to be his counterpart.
When Christ died, His divine life was released, and through His resurrection, this divine life was imparted into all His believers to constitute them into the church, His bride (see John 19:34 and footnote 1 there). In this way, God wrought Himself into man, mingled Himself with man, and made Himself one with man, so that He may make man the same as He is in life, nature, and expression – but not in His Godhead – so that man would match God in every possible way and be His counterpart!
Now the believers in Christ constitute the church and are in the process of renewing, sanctification, transformation, conformation, and glorification so that they would be filled and saturated with Christ and be His counterpart corporately for eternity! This is what God did, is doing, and will be doing so that He may gain His counterpart, His bride.
Only that which Comes Out of Christ can be the Church to Match Him
What matches Christ to be His wife is only that which comes out of Christ – the church. The natural man cannot match Christ to be His counterpart. Only that which comes out of Christ can return to Christ to be the church, His counterpart, matching Him in every possible way.
This is typified in Genesis 1:26 where God said, Let us make man (singular) in Our image, according to Our likeness, and let them (plural) have dominion…God created only one man, Adam, but Eve was in Adam and so man was a corporate man! In verse 27 we see this again, “And God created man (singular) in His own image; in the image of God He created him (singular); male and female He created them (plural).” God didn’t create many men; He created only Adam, one man, but this man is corporate, plural, because Eve was in Adam.
Only what came out of Adam and was built with the element of Adam could return to Adam to match him. Only what comes out of Christ through His death and resurrection can return to Christ as the church to match Him as His counterpart. Nothing else can match Christ except that which comes out of Christ and is mingled with man.
God wants many sons who are just like His Firstborn Son Christ, and for this He sent the Son to go through a process and produce the many sons of God, who are the many members of Christ and the components of the church as the bride of Christ.
The church today is just like Christ, since it comes out of Christ – it has God’s life, God’s nature, and God’s expression. In other words, the church is Christ in another form (just as Eve was Adam in another form).
Whenever we as believers in Christ are in our mingled spirit, one with the Lord, we are the church, God’s heart desire, His counterpart. Whenever we experience Christ in His death and resurrection, being built up with the other saints in the local churches and in the Body of Christ, we are Christ’s bride, His counterpart and help meet.
Lord, we praise You for what You have done and are doing to obtain Your bride, Your counterpart. Thank You for becoming a man, dying for us, and resurrecting to regenerate us with Your divine life. Lord, we now are not merely men created by God in His image and with His likeness, but we are God-men regenerated by God with His life and nature. Take us all the way through the process of renewing, transformation, conformation, and glorification, so that we may become Your glorious bride, matching You in every possible way as Your counterpart, Your help meet!
References and Further Reading
- Inspiration: chapter 2 from the Collected Works of Watchman Nee, vol. 34, “The Glorious Church“, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on the Crystallization Study of Genesis (1), week/msg 8, The Type of Eve as the Counterpart of Adam.
- Further reading: recommending footnote 1 in Genesis 2:21, and footnote 1 in John 19:34 (in the Recovery Version).
- Similar sharing online: What is the Church? Only What is Out of Christ (via holdingtotruth.com)
- Hymns on this topic:
# It was for her, the church—His bride / It was for her, willingly He died / She is the joy deep in His heart / His masterpiece— / His counterpart.
# We believers have been renewed, / Must grow in life and be matured, / Perfected as overcomers / So that we as the builded church, / The corporate Bride, will consummate / All in the New Jerusalem— / Fulfilling God’s, fulfilling God’s / Eternal plan! Eternal plan!
# As a stream of love, how His life flows in! / Motivating us to just love Him. / So we give ourselves; Lord, do grow in us / May we know You in Your preciousness. / O Lord, do make us one as we run toward You, / Pursuing corporately in everything we do / With the saints until full maturity / As Your loving counterpart eternally.
