In the New Testament there is such a thing as, “the ministry”, which is unique and at the same time it is corporate, and this ministry has as result the building up of the Body of Christ.
Paul realized that God had mercy on him and put him into the ministry, and he speaks of this ministry in 2 Cor. 3 as, the ministry of the new covenant, and, the ministry of the Spirit. In 2 Cor. 5 we see that this ministry is also the ministry of reconciliation, firstly to reconcile us to God initially from sins, and then a further reconciliation to be reconciled to God in full.
In the Lord’s recovery as we practice the church life, we receive all the believers in Christ who hold the common faith, who are justified by grace, who are cleansed by the blood of Christ, and who are regenerated by the Spirit. We simply receive all believers just as God and Christ receives them (see Rom. 16).
But although we receive all the believers, we cannot receive all the so-called “ministries” in the Christianity today. Paul clearly says that there is only one ministry that builds up the Body. Any ministry that builds up a sect, a denomination, and doesn’t build up the Body of Christ in reality, is not THE ministry.
These coming weeks we will study in depth the Completing Ministry of Paul, and we will see how the ministry of the Lord’s recovery is the completing ministry of Paul and the mending ministry of John.
The Ministry in the Lord’s Recovery
The ministry brings us the Lord’s up-to-date vision based on His word revealed to us, gives us God’s grace for our supply, shepherds us and cherishes us in an all-inclusive way, and builds up the Body of Christ. In the Lord’s recovery we are NOT “the churches of the ministry” but, as the Bible reveals, the local churches are the church of God, the church of Christ, and the churches of the saints.
The Lord has ordained and the New Testament clearly reveals that there is THE MINISTRY, and based on the divine truth in the Bible, this ministry dispenses the Triune God into the believers as their experience, enjoyment, and enlightenment, for the building up of the Body of Christ.
The Lord has a recovery which has been going on for centuries, starting at least with Martin Luther. “Recovery” means that there was something there in the beginning, something ordained by God, but it was lost, misunderstood, or damaged, and so for the past more than 500 years the Lord has been recovering the revealed things in the Bible that have been lost or misunderstood.
Today we stand on the shoulders of many great men of God who have recovered the truth as it is revealed in the Bible, and especially in the past century God has, in His own way, recovered THE MINISTRY.
Today, the ministry of the new covenant is in the Lord’s recovery, and this ministry – which is the recovered ministry in the New Testament – is the completing ministry of Paul and the mending ministry of John. This ministry is uniquely one, yet it is corporate.
The Completing Ministry of Paul
There are three accounts of Paul’s conversion in the book of Acts, and in all three we see that God called him and gave him a commission. In Col. 2:15-16 we see that Paul was commissioned to complete the word of God according to the stewardship given to him from God, which is also for him to us.
The Word of God is the divine revelation in the Bible, which was not yet completed at the time of Paul. The gospels were partially written, the Old Testament was there, and there were some other epistles, but Paul was commissioned by God to complete the word of God especially in the mystery of God, which is Christ, and the mystery of Christ, which is the church.
Who speaks of this today? Where in Christianity – in all the denominations, churches, ministries, sects, free groups, independent groups, organic churches, etc can you hear about Christ as the mystery of God and the church as the mystery of Christ? Who preaches the unsearchable riches of Christ as the gospel? Who speaks about the church as the Body of Christ, the organism of the Triune God, the fullness of God?
The mystery which has been hidden from the ages and from generations, which was not even revealed to the Old Testament prophets, was now revealed to Paul and to us as the saints in spirit – this mystery is Christ and the church, the great mystery (Col. 1:26; Eph. 3:3-13; 5:32).
Paul was put by the Lord in the ministry, and he was what he was not by his natural life but by the grace of God. His specific commission was to complete the word of God, to complete the divine revelation by receiving revelation directly from God.
Paul’s completing ministry is to present to us the revelation concerning Christ and the church. Christ is the mystery of God (Col. 2:2), the expression and definition of God (John 1:18). The church is the mystery of Christ (Eph. 3), the corporate expression of Christ (who is the personal expression of God).
This is the core of the New Testament ministry, the core of God’s economy, and the center of what is referred to in the Bible as, THE MINISTRY. The new covenant ministry is centered on the all-inclusive Christ and the church as the Body of Christ.
God’s Economy
We really need the Lord to enlighten the eyes of our heart so that we may see the mysteries contained in the Bible, especially in the completing ministry of Paul. As Peter himself admitted, there are some things in Paul’s writings that are “hard to understand” (2 Pet. 3:16), which many who are unable and unstable today twist to their own destruction.
We praise the Lord for raising up people like the British Brethren, Andrew Murray, Watchman Nee, and Witness Lee, who opened up the Word of God and especially the writings of Paul.
Brother Lee especially spoke extensively concerning the economy of God, mentioned by Paul in 1 Tim. 1:4, Eph. 1:10, 3:9. God has a will, according to which He created all things (Rev. 4:11), and He has a good pleasure of His will (Eph. 1:5, 9) which issues in God’s eternal purpose (Eph. 3:10; Rom. 8:29). For God to fulfill His purpose, He made an arrangement – God’s economy, which allows Him to dispense Himself into people.
Just as the Lord Jesus made an arrangement for the 5000 to receive the bread and the fish (He arranged them by 50’s, etc), so God today, in order to dispense all His riches into man, He has an arrangement, an economy.
God’s economy is His good pleasure to carry out His will according to His purpose by dispensing Himself into us to produce a corporate expression.
This economy is indeed a mystery, and it involves Christ and the church. This mystery is revealed in the writings of Paul, and the word of God has been completed – but do we see this? How much of this revelation has been completed in us? To what extent has Paul’s revelation of the all-inclusive Christ and the Body of Christ become real to us in our daily life?
Lord, unveil us to see Your economy, Your purpose, Your good pleasure, and Your will. Remove any veils of religion, doctrines, previous spiritual knowledge, and anything that would cloud our seeing of the mystery of God and the mystery of Christ. Open up the completing ministry of Paul to us, and complete this ministry in our being. May we see Christ as the personal expression of the bountiful God, and may we see the church as the corporate expression of Christ!
References and Further Reading
- This article is inspired from brother Ron Kangas’ sharing in this message and portions in, Life-study of Colossians (msg. 11) as quoted in, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, “The Completing Ministry of Paul“, week 1 entitled, The Vision and the Commission.
- Further reading:
# The book, The Economy of God (by Witness Lee), available for free via Rhema or Bibles for America;
# Msg. 31 in Life-Study of Job.
# Footnotes on God’s economy in 1 Tim. 1:4 (note 3), Eph. 1:10 (note 1).
# More on God’s Economy via, godseconomy.org and, an-open-letter.org. - Hymns on this topic:
# O glorious Christ, Savior mine, / Thou art truly radiance divine; / God infinite, in eternity, / Yet man in time, finite to be.
# The Church is Christ’s own Body, / The Father’s dwelling-place, / The gathering of the called ones, / God blended with man’s race.
# The Church the image has of Christ, / She is His increase and His spread; / Christ’s very self is found in her / The Body, she, to Christ the Head. - Pictures source: edited instagrams by me here and here.
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How much of this revelation has been completed in us? To what extent has Paul’s revelation of the all-inclusive Christ and the Body of Christ become real to us in our daily life?
I like this question, as a Catholiek I was only thaught about the human living of Christ in an objective way and week after week we looked at the pictures on the walls of buildings that portrayed this aspect of the truth. I never discovered the fact that Christ not only died for our sins but also rose and became the life giving Spirit, even the seven fold Spirit as it is revealed in the book of Revelation. There it says that the Spirit speaks to the believers, the churches. The churches are the believers who have been baptized into One Spirit and one Body.
I Corinthians 15:45 tells us that the last Adam became a life giving Spirit and Paul told us in his epistles that the Lord is the Spirit within us and indwells us. The believers under Martin Luther believed in salvation by Faith and were therefore severely persecuted that I read in some books on church history.
To some extend Paul's revelation became a reality in a corporate way and it is clear to me that some of the protestant churches throughout Christianity maintained the real testimony for Christ and the Church as Paul taught us from his epistles.
The divine Spirit and Life of Christ was sown into the hearts of many faithful ones who endeavored to not only know these truths but lived them in a corporate way. Today we still stand on the shoulders of those believers and are thankful for the truths that have prevailed throughout the ages.
I am so glad to see that today in my lifetime or especially in the last century the completing ministry of Paul is being taught and practiced in the local churches Truly it is the Spirit of Christ that is building up all the believers who have become gifted ones. such as the apostles, evangelists, shepherds and teachers to perfect the Saints or the believers unto the work of ministry so that the revelation of Paul is not only a teaching but a reality, a practical expression of Christ and His Body, all the regenerated believers who are baptized, immersed into the One Spirit, One Body, the Church.
AMEN! What a mercy to see this practiced in the local churches today in the Lord's recovery. The Lord is recovering both the truth (which was lost or misunderstood throughout the ages) and the practice of this truth, especially the completing ministry of Paul!
To be honest with you, brother, this week by getting into this topic is my first time to hear of the "completing the word of God in us". Such a rich expression, and so applicable to our daily life and church life!