the more we enjoy Christ, the more we become Body-conscious and the more we love the church life!

The more we enjoy Christ, the more we become Body-conscious. In the Body of Christ, Christ is the Head and we are the Body – and Christ is both the Head and the Body, since the Body is of Christ.

When we enjoy Christ, when we touch Him in the morning, we actually enjoy Christ as the Head – and He gives us a feeling and a consciousness of the Body. We enjoy the Lord in the morning in our morning revival time with Him, and in the evening we meet with the saints to enjoy Him corporately in the church meetings.

This is normal – enjoying the Lord all day long!

Even though sometimes the environment, our family situation, the school/university schedule, or the job we have does not allow us to attend every meeting of the church – but inwardly we have the sense that our whole being is there with the saints in the meeting!

This is the result and the proper issue of our real enjoyment of Christ – we love the church and we love to meet with the saints! All we need to do is to have a consistent and regular life of enjoying the Lord! Enjoy Christ in the morning, enjoy Him all throughout the day, and enjoy Him in the evening. Turn to Him and enjoy Him even at night – the more we enjoy Him, the more we grow up into Him and the more we hold Him as the Head!

Col. 2:19 says,

… holding the Head, out from whom all the Body, being richly supplied and knit together by means of the joints and sinews, grows with the growth of God.

We may hear about Christ being the Head of the Body and we may understand mentally what this means – but the way for us to hold Christ as the Head is to enjoy Christ in a regular way! The more we enjoy Christ, the more we realize in an experiential way that the very Christ we enjoy is the Head of the Body!

We are becoming conscious of the other saints in the church life and we will love all the members of the Body by enjoying Christ! The more we enjoy Christ, the more intense is our desire for the Body.

But when we fail to contact the Lord for a period of time, or when we neglect our personal time with the Lord for several days, we automatically neglect the church life or lose interest in the meetings. The less we contact the Lord the more we tend to be critical of the church, the saints, or the way the meetings take place…

The shortage of the enjoyment of Christ, just as we see in the book of 1 Corinthians, opens the door for the enemy, Satan, to come in and make us critical of other members of the Body of Christ! But we can close this door by beginning again to enjoy Christ in a regular way – and our attitude will change.

There is NO PROBLEM with the church life or with the saints – the problem is with us, our attitude towards the saints and the church life changes to being negative if we don’t enjoy the Lord! When we enjoy the Lord, even those whom we find difficult to love – they become dear and precious to us.

If we don’t continue to enjoy the Lord though, our attitude towards the saints may change in a negative way… We need to learn to enjoy the Lord continually so that we may have a consciousness of the Body of Christ – we love the saints and the church life when we enjoy the Lord! As members of the Body enjoying Christ, we love all the other members of the Body!

[sharing inspired from the Conclusion of the New Testament msg. 356, as quoted in the HWMR on The Central Line of the Bible]

Lord Jesus, we love You! We love to enjoy You! Keep us enjoying You all the time. Save us, Lord, from not enjoying You. We want to be those who regularly and consistently enjoy Christ. Be our enjoyment in the morning, all throughout the day, and also at night! We want to enjoy You as the Head of the Body! In ourselves we don’t have a feeling for the Body – but You in us have! Remind us again and again, dear Lord Jesus, to come to You and enjoy You!