THE THIRD PART: 24 CRUCIAL LINES IN THE BIBLE

Christ and the Church
Message Four—The Vision and Commission of Paul’s Completing
Ministry—Christ and the Church

Scripture Reading: Col. 1:25-26; Acts. 9:4-6; 22:14; 26:16, 18-19

I. “I became a minister…to complete the word of God”—Col. 1:25:

A. The word of God is the divine revelation, which had not been completed before the New Testament was written.

B. In the New Testament the apostles, especially the apostle Paul, completed the word of God in regard to the mystery of God, which is Christ, and the mystery of Christ, which is the church—v. 25; 2:2; Eph. 3:3-4.

C. Concerning the revelation of Christ as the mystery of God and the church as the mystery of Christ, Paul completed the word of God and revealed to us God’s economy in a full way—Eph. 1:10; 3:9; 1 Tim. 1:4.

D. In our experience today, to complete the word of God is to experience Christ subjectively in our daily living so that the proper church life may come forth for the expression of the Triune God in Christ—Gal. 2:20; Eph. 3:17a; 1:22-23.

E. If we would be those who complete the word of God, we must minister Christ as the life-giving Spirit and stand with the church as the living expression of Christ on the proper ground of locality; this is our burden, our ministry, and our warfare—1 Cor. 15:45b; 1:2; 12:12-13, 27.

II. “Who are You, Lord?”—Acts 22:8:

A. “When it pleased God…to reveal His Son in me”—Gal. 1:15b-16a:

1. The desire of God’s heart is to reveal His Son in us so that we may know Him, receive Him as our life, and become the sons of God —John 17:3; 3:16; 1:12; Gal. 4:5-6.

2. Nothing is more pleasing to God than the unveiling, the revelation, of the living person of the Son of God in us—1:15a, 16a; 2 Cor. 3:14-18; 4:3-6.

3. The focal point of the Bible is the living person of the Son of God, who is the embodiment of the Triune God realized as the all-inclusive Spirit in our spirit for us to enjoy Him, partake of His riches, and live Him—1 Cor. 15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:17; Phil. 1:19; Gal. 6:18.

B. “Why are you persecuting Me? …I am Jesus, whom you persecute”—Acts 9:4b, 5b:

1. This “Me” is corporate, comprising Jesus the Lord and all His believers.

2. This was a unique revelation in the universe, for by it Saul began to see that the Lord Jesus and His believers are one great person—the wonderful “Me.”

3. The revelation of the corporate “Me” must have impressed and affected Saul for his future ministry concerning Christ and the church as the great mystery of God and laid a solid foundation for his future ministry—Eph. 5:32.

C. “I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you as a minister and a wit-ness both of the things in which you have seen Me and of the things in which I will appear to you”—Acts 26:16.

D. “The God of our fathers has previously appointed you to know His will”; the will of God is to obtain a Body for Christ to be His fullness, His expression—Acts 22:1; Rom. 12:2, 5; Eph. 1:5, 9, 11, 22-23.

III. “What shall I do, Lord?”—Acts 22:10:

A. “Rise up and enter into the city, and it will be told to you what you must do” (9:6); this is related to Saul’s knowledge concerning the Body of Christ—Col. 1:24.

B. “To open their eyes, to turn them from darkness to light and from the authority of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me”—Acts 26:18:

1. To turn from darkness to light is to have a transfer from darkness into light, and to turn from the authority of Satan to God is to be transferred out of the authority of Satan into God—v. 18a; Col. 1:13.

2. Forgiveness of sins is the base of all the blessings of the New Testament jubilee—Acts 26:18b.

3. As the result of having our eyes opened and of being transferred from the authority of Satan to God, we receive an inheritance; this inheritance is the Triune God with all that He has, all that He has done, and all that He will do for His redeemed people—v. 18c; Col. 1:12; Eph. 1:13-14; 1 Pet. 1:4.

4. The divine inheritance is among those who have been sanctified by faith in Christ; this sanctification is both positional and dispositional—Acts 26:18b; Matt. 23:17, 19; Rom. 6:19, 22.

IV. “I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision”; this was a vision in which the apostle saw the divine things concerning the dispensing of the Triune God into His chosen, redeemed, and transformed people for the building up of the Body of Christ according to God’s eternal economy—Acts 26:19; Rom. 8:11; Eph. 4:16; 1:10; 3:9.

 

Ministry Excerpts:

We should not have unrealistic spiritual longings, but we should live and serve with a vision. Our vision is the central line of the Bible—Christ and the church.

CHRIST AND THE CHURCH BEING THE CENTRAL LINE OF THE BIBL

The Church Being the New Man Created by God in the Image of Christ

Ephesians 5:32 says that Christ and the church are a great mystery. The central line and the key to the revelation of the Bible are Christ and the church. Genesis 1:26 and 27 say that God made man in His image and according to His likeness. These verses imply Christ and the church. God made man in His image. Colossians 1:15 says that the Son “is the image of the invisible God.” Since the Son, Christ, is the image of God, when God made man in His image, He made man in the image of Christ. Christ was the model, the image, according to which God made man.

In Ephesians the man created by God is no longer Adam of the old creation but the new man of the new creation. God’s work in creating man did not stop with the old creation because God’s work was not completed in the old creation. God continues to work in man in order to produce the new creation out of the old creation. When the new creation is produced, God’s work in man will be completed.

Ephesians 2:10 says that the believers are God’s masterpiece. Verse 15 says that the believers are the new man. Verse 24 of chapter 4 says that the new man was created according to God in righteousness and holiness of the reality. This word corresponds to Genesis 1:26, which says that God made man in His image. When we compare Genesis 1:26 with Ephesians 2:15 and 4:24, we see that the man created in Genesis ultimately refers to the church. The creation of man points to God’s central desire, which is for Christ to be the model for producing the church.

The Revelation of Christ and the Church in the Epistles

Many verses in the New Testament refer to God’s work of new creation. Romans 8:28-29 says, “We know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. Because those whom He foreknew, He also predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers.” God causes all things to work together so that we may be conformed to the image of His Son.

Colossians 3:10-11 says that the believers “have put on the new man, which is being renewed unto full knowledge according to the image of Him who created him, where there cannot be Greek and Jew…but Christ is all and in all.” The new man is created in God’s image. In the new man there is no room for the old creation, for Christ is everything. God desires to work Christ into the believers so that they will have the image of Christ. The new man is the church.

According to the above verses, Christ and the church are the central thought behind God’s creation of man in His image. Christ is the model, and the church is a corporate man, a new man, created by God according to Christ and in Christ. This new man, which is not of the old creation but of the new creation, is the church, the Body of Christ. n the beginning of Revelation God has the appearance of a jasper stone (4:3). At the end of Revelation the New Jerusalem has the glory of God; her light is like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone, as clear as crystal (21:11). The New Jerusalem, the ultimate expression of the church, is like a jasper stone, which is the appearance of God.

HAVING A CLEAR VISION OF CHRIST AND THE CHURCH

The center and goal of God’s work in the universe is to create a new man in Christ, according to Christ, and with Christ as the model. This new man is not man in the old creation but the man in the new creation. The new creation is the church of Christ, and the church is the central meaning of God’s creation of man in His own image. God created man in His image, that is, in the image of Christ, for the new creation, not the old creation. God desires that we put off the old man of the old creation and be transformed into the new man of the new creation. This new man is not an individual but a corporate man. This corporate man is the church, the counterpart of Christ. This corporate man is also a city, the dwelling place of God, the habitation of God. This is what God intends to accomplish in us.

Genesis 1 speaks of man being created in the image of God. Chapter 2 speaks of the need for man to let God come into him to be his life. Hence, chapter 2 shows the tree of life (v. 9), which indicates that God must be received as food into man to be man’s life so that man can become God’s counterpart, the church. Chapter 1 presents God’s purpose and His image, but chapter 2 presents life. At the end of chapter 2 there is a couple (vv. 18-25). This picture points to Christ with the church. This is the vision of the entire Bible.

The rest of the Old Testament presents the relationships between husband and wife, between the priests and the tabernacle, between the kings and the people, and between the prophets and the people. These relationships point to Christ and the church. In the beginning of the New Testament God was conceived in the womb of a virgin and born of her through the Holy Spirit. People called this child Emmanuel, which means “God with us” (Matt. 1:23). Later, chapter 16 says that this Emmanuel-God will build His church on the rock, which is the revelation concerning Himself (v. 18). Christ and the church are a great vision in the Bible. I hope that we will spend time to study this item of the truth in the Bible and that we would have a clear and thorough view and understanding of this vision—Christ and the church. Then we will drop our spiritual longings and live and serve according to the central revelation of the Bible. (The Sufficiency, Pursuit, and Learning of the Lord’s Serving Ones, msg. 2)