I composed the first discourse, O Theophilus, concerning all things which Jesus began both to do and to teach,
until that day in which, having by the Holy Spirit charged the apostles whom He had chosen, He was taken up;
to whom also He presented Himself living after He had suffered, with many proofs, being seen by them during forty days, and speaking of the things which concerned the kingdom of God.
And being assembled with them, commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to await the promise of the Father, which, said He, ye have heard of Me.
For John indeed baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days hence.
For this reason I, Paul, prisoner of the Christ Jesus for you nations,
if indeed ye have heard of the administration of the grace of God which has been given to me towards you,
that by revelation the mystery has been made known to me, according as I have written before briefly;
by which, in reading it, ye can understand my intelligence in the mystery of the Christ,
which in other generations has not been made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the power of the Spirit:
that they who are of the nations should be joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of His promise in Christ Jesus by the glad tidings;
of which I am become minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me according to the working of His power.
To me, less than the least of all saints, has this grace been given, to announce among the nations the glad tidings of the unsearchable riches of the Christ,
and to enlighten all with the knowledge of what is the administration of the mystery hidden throughout the ages in God, Who has created all things;
in order that now, to the principalities and authorities in the heavenlies, might be made known through the church the all-various wisdom of God,
according to the purpose of the ages, which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Let us have a word of prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, our hearts do rejoice in the fact that through Thy beloved Son we can approach Thee and call Thee our God, our Father. What a privilege; what a glory this is.
And, Father, as we continue in Thy presence, we ask that Thy Holy Spirit will breathe again upon Thy Word and make it living and operative to each one of us, that we may receive light, we may receive life, to the praise of Thy glory. In the name of our Lord Jesus, amen.
We have considered for some time the life of Christ. And now, God willing, we will meditate together on the life of the church, the body of Christ.
In the beginning of the book of Acts, the beloved physician Luke said, “I composed the first discourse, O Theophilus, lover of God, concerning all things which Jesus began both to do and to teach, until that day in which, having by the Holy Spirit charged the apostles whom He had chosen, He was taken up.”
In his first discourse, which is the Gospel according to Luke, he composed that first discourse concerning all things which Jesus began both to do and to teach.
In other words, in the Gospel of Luke, we find that he relates to us all that our Lord Jesus did and taught, from the time of His incarnation up to the time when He ascended up to heaven. That is the first discourse.
And now he is going to compose the second discourse. The second discourse is this book of Acts.
Now, in the original, we do not have the title The Acts of the Apostles. It is just Acts. Now, whose acts are recorded in this second discourse?
If the first discourse is concerned with what our Lord Jesus both began to do and to teach, then naturally the second discourse will be what our Lord Jesus continued to do and to teach.
When our Lord Jesus began to do and to teach, He did it in that incarnate body, in the body that He received from Mary.
Now, in the second discourse, He continued to do and to teach. In what body does He continue to do and to teach? It is very evident that it is in the church, the body of Christ.
After He rose from the dead, ascended up to heaven, and sent the Holy Spirit to this earth, through His finished work on the cross and the coming of the Holy Spirit, a new body was formed. It is a mystical, corporate body. It is the body of Christ, the church.
It is in this corporate body that our Lord Jesus continues to do and to teach.
You know, our Lord Jesus is not only the foundation of the church; He is also the very life of the church.
You remember in 1 Corinthians 12:12, it is said:
For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body; so also is the Christ.
Now, of course, we know this verse describes the church, because the church is one body with many members. Even though we have many members, yet there is only one body. So also is the church, the body of Christ.
But strangely, we find the Holy Spirit, instead of using the words, “So also is the church, the body of Christ,” says, “So also is the Christ.”
Why? Because in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Gentiles, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
The church is the Christ—the extension of Christ, the corporate expression of Christ. It is Christ Himself being a corporate body. It is in that body that our Lord Jesus continues to do and to teach.
From the time of His ascension until the time when He shall return again to this earth, He has been, and He is still, doing, working, and teaching—but not in that incarnate body, but in a corporate, mystical body, which is the church.
For this reason, we cannot consider the life of Christ without considering also the life of the church, because that completes that life.
So, God willing, we are going to begin on this: the life of the church, the body of Christ.
Now, the life of the church, the body of Christ, of course, begins on the day of Pentecost, because that is the time when the church is born.
But that does not mean that the church really begins at that time. Because if we read the Word of God, we will find that even though the church is born on the day of Pentecost, yet the concept of the church was conceived in the heart of God even before the foundation of the world.
You know, this is just the same as the life of our Lord Jesus. We considered the life of the Lord Jesus for some time, and we began with His incarnation, because that is His birth, the beginning of the life of Christ.
But, as a matter of fact, the concept of Christ begins before the foundation of the world. Even before God created all things, God conceived in His mind, in His very heart, the concept of Christ.
You know, Christ is not a human invention. No one can invent a Christ as is recorded in the Scripture, because that is something that eyes have not seen, ears have not heard, and has never come into anyone’s mind.
The concept of Christ is a divine concept. Christ has its origin in God, not in the thought of man.
Even before the creation of the world, according to the eternal purpose of God, God had a purpose concerning His beloved Son. That purpose is to make Him heir of all things, as Hebrews 1:2 says. That is God’s purpose.
With that purpose, He created all things. He created all things in His Son, by His Son, and for His Son, as we find in Colossians 1.
But unfortunately, because of rebellion and sin, both the celestial and the terrestrial beings that He created began to disintegrate, to scatter, and to become purposeless.
God, in His foreknowledge, knew that such a thing would happen. So there in eternity past, according to that purpose which He purposed for His Son, He conceived the concept of Christ, the Anointed One, Who would come with a mission.
His mission is to recover and reconcile all things back to His fullness. So you find in Ephesians 1 that, at the fullness of time, He will sum up, gather up, all things in Christ—things in the heavens and things upon this earth.
So the concept of Christ is from eternity past, even though the life of Christ begins at His incarnation.
But, brothers and sisters, one thing that really should bring us into worship is this: when you read the life of Christ, you find that the life of Christ is in perfect agreement, perfect harmony, one hundred percent oneness, with the concept of Christ that God conceived in His thought.
There is a perfect oneness. The life is according to the concept, and the concept is fully fulfilled in that life. That is the glory of Christ, and that is something that really brings us into worship.
Now, brothers and sisters, just as with Christ, so it is with the church. The life of the church begins on the day of Pentecost in Jerusalem, but the concept of the church was conceived in the mind of God before the world’s foundation.
There you find in Ephesians 3 that it is called the mystery of the Christ. This mystery of the Christ was purposed in God, in His Son, before the ages.
It is by this church that God is to manifest, to make known, His wisdom to the principalities and authorities, both in this age and in the ages to come.
In the concept of God, He decided to give His beloved Son a life companion, His life, His counterpart, to be His body, to contain all His riches, and to manifest His glory.
He desires to have that body so matured that it can be joined to Him, to be His bride for eternity.
He wants to have a people, a people that are also one with His beloved Son, having His life, joined together with Him, to share in His sufferings and to share in His glory; to follow Him in that age-long battle; and to assist Him in bringing all things back to God.
That is the glorious concept of the church, the body of Christ. It is to be made up of many members, and yet it is only one body—the fullness of Christ, Who filleth all in all.
Now, this is a wonderful concept of the church, the body of Christ. So the question with us today is this: How close, how one, is the life of the church to the concept of the church?
The success or failure of the church is not to be measured by what you see or hear, by the outward appearance. The success or failure of the church is to be measured by its closeness or its distance from the divine concept of the church.
Why? Because the church is not a human invention; it is not just a historical event. The church has its origin in God. It is conceived in the heart of God.
Unless the life of the church on earth agrees with the divine concept of the church, we have to say it is a failure. No matter how it appears to men, it is a failure. Only when the life of the church is one with the divine concept of the church, then God’s purpose is done.
For this reason, brothers and sisters, it is extremely important that we have a vision of what the church is.
By vision, we simply mean: What is the church in the thought of God? What has God planned for the church? What is it that God is really after in His church?
Unless we have this vision, it is very difficult for us to really enter into the life of the church that will please God.
So, brothers and sisters, again we want to emphasize this: we really need to ask the Lord to give us revelation as to what the church is in God’s mind, that by His grace we may be one in our life with that concept.
That concept, or that vision, determines what that life will be, and it is that important.
You know, the church was conceived in the mind of God even before the foundation of the world. It is so sacred that God hid it in Himself. It is called a mystery.
A mystery is not something mysterious. A mystery simply means it is a secret that needs to be opened up.
May we say that the church is a top secret to God? It is so sacred that it takes a very long time for Him to reveal it to man.
Because it is beyond man’s comprehension, unless God reveals it, we will never know it. Our condition is such that God is not able to reveal that all at once to us. It takes a long, long time—long preparation—before God is able to fully reveal what the church is to us.
It is a top secret. Yet we thank God, through the ages, God drops things here and there to us. They are just hints, but you can see how God desires to reveal that top secret to us because it is so dear to Him.
For instance, in the creation of man, Genesis 1:26-27 says:
And God said, Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness.
And God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them.
Now here you find something very strange. According to His image and likeness, He made man; and yet immediately it follows, “Male and female created He them.”
So here you find the man that God created is two yet one: him and them, male and female. That is the man.
Now, in the process of creation, in Genesis 2, you find God used the red earth and formed the body of a man. Then God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul. Now that is Adam, the male.
Then later on, you find He put Adam to sleep, opened up his side, and took out something. Now, our Bible says a rib; in the original, it is something out of him. God took something out of him, and then He built, with that something out of man, a woman.
Ishah out of Ish—woman out of man. Therefore, when Adam woke up and God led the woman to Adam, Adam looked at Eve and said, “Now this is me: bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.” Therefore, they are united into one flesh.
Now, brothers and sisters, we know that this picture, or this fact—because this is the beginning of mankind—is a type of that eternal reality of Christ and His church.
Christ came into this world to find a bride, but nowhere could He find her. Because of this, God put Him to death.
With Adam it was just sleep, but with our Lord Jesus it was death. Why? Because sin had entered into this world.
With Adam, it was a bloodless surgery, a painless one. But with our Lord Jesus, it was a bloody death, very painful. It is because sin had entered into this world.
But in the same way, you find that God opened up His side. A soldier thrust a spear into His side, reaching to His heart, and out of it came forth blood and water—something out of Him.
Blood and water. You remember in John 19, the Apostle John said, “I saw it. I am a witness to it. I bear witness to it that this is true.” Why does he emphasize so much on this point?
Because in 1 John 5:6 he said, “He came by water and blood.”
In other words, blood is for the remission of our sins, to wash our sins away—the precious blood. Water is His life poured forth, that we may receive life, life eternal.
These become the material for the building of the church—the woman, the Ishah.
It is because the church comes out of Christ, and it is built with the very life of Christ, that it is His like, His counterpart. It can be joined together with Him in one Spirit.
Brothers and sisters, God gives us some hint there that we may understand.
Now, of course, throughout the Old Testament you can pick up things here and there, everywhere. But probably let us use another illustration, and that is the history of the children of Israel.
We know that the history of the children of Israel begins with Abraham. God called Abraham. The God of glory appeared to Abraham, and God called him out. God separated him.
Because of his obedience, of his faith in God, God made a covenant with him. God promised him seed, a nation out of him, and even the whole world would be blessed by that seed.
It is because of Abraham that God chose the children of Israel. The children of Israel were not chosen because of their righteousness. They were stiff-necked, rebellious people, and God told them so.
They were chosen because of their father Abraham. God delivered them out of Egypt and brought them into the promised land, Canaan—not because they were many in number. They were actually the fewest in number.
God did it because He kept His promise, His covenant to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
God set this people apart to make them His possession, His peculiar possession. God committed His name to them, entrusted His name to them, and tested them for forty years in the wilderness to prove what was in their heart.
Unfortunately, they were unfaithful to God.
Now, in 1 Corinthians 10, we are told that all these things were recorded for our admonition. These were types and shadows. They were recorded there to instruct us, we who live at the end of time.
Brothers and sisters, do you not see again there is a similarity? We are chosen not because of what we are. We are a rebellious, stiff-necked people. We are chosen because of Christ.
It is not because of our righteousness that God has delivered us out of the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love. It is because God is faithful.
Out of His love, He used the history of the children of Israel to instruct us, to warn us, that we will not go the way that they went. We should learn lessons from that.
Our Lord Jesus came to this earth. We know that deep in His heart, He came for one purpose: He came to seek for His body, His bride.
But strangely, you find that in the record of His life in the four Gospels, He did not mention even the word “church” but only twice.
Throughout His thirty-three years or so on earth, He mentioned the church only twice. Actually, the church is what is in His heart. The church is what He came for. Yet you find He kept it within His heart. Why? Because it was not yet time to reveal it.
It could not be revealed fully until He had accomplished the work of redemption.
But even so, when Peter confessed Him as the Christ, the Son of the living God, the Father had revealed the Son to Peter. When this happened, our Lord Jesus could no longer keep that secret from us.
So He said:
I say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
When our Lord was on earth, He did not build the church. He was gathering materials for the church.
It is almost like David, you know. David’s desire was to build God a temple, and God was pleased with that. David, in his life, did not build the temple. The only thing he did was prepare the materials.
That is what our Lord Jesus did when He was on earth. He desired to build the church, yet all He could do while He was on earth was prepare materials.
Here was a little stone—Peter. A material was ready. When that happened, He revealed a little bit of what was upon His heart. He said, “Upon this rock I will build My church.”
Of course, we know today the rock is Christ Himself. It is Peter’s confession of Christ: “He is the Christ, the Son of the living God.” There is the rock, the Rock of Ages—not Peter.
Peter is just a little stone. You cannot build a house on a little stone. Christ is the rock, and He will build the church upon Himself.
With stones—living stones, precious stones, stones that come out of Him—many Peters. He will build upon Himself.
Who is the builder? Not Peter, but Christ Himself. He said, “I will build My church.”
Whose church is it? Not Peter’s church—Christ’s church. It is His.
In building the church, you find there will be a spiritual conflict. Because when the spiritual reality comes in, then you find the whole spiritual world is stirred, and the gates of Hades will all be opened, trying to destroy, frustrate, and hinder the building of the church.
There is a spiritual battle going on in the spiritual realm, because this church is in the heart of God; it is the heart of Christ.
But the Lord said, even though all the gates of Hades shall be opened, they shall not prevail against it. The church shall overcome, because it is the Lord Who builds, and He builds upon Himself and with His own life.
So here you find our Lord revealed a little bit of what the church is. Then later on, in Matthew 18, He said that because human beings are involved, whenever we are involved, there will be problems.
Sometimes we say, “You are looking for a perfect church.” Well, as long as you are there, it cannot be perfect.
So here you find our Lord Jesus says, “That is true. I will build My church upon this rock, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.” Even all the power of darkness cannot prevail against it.
But unfortunately, you find there are you and me here. Whenever there are brothers—male brothers and female brothers—you find there will be problems.
So if your brother sins against you, now what will you do? Eye for an eye, tooth for tooth? Or you say, “Well, I will endure. Let it go, but I will remember it.”
Now, how do you solve the problems in the church? The problems in the church ought to be solved by love and prayer.
Through love and through prayer, every problem in the church can be solved.
For where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.
Well, that is about all that our Lord Jesus revealed concerning the church. Then He went to the cross.
“It is finished.” He rose from the dead, ascended on high, and sent the Holy Spirit to this earth.
Brothers and sisters, it is by the Holy Spirit that the mystery of the church—that is, the mystery of the Christ—is now fully revealed to the apostles and the prophets. That is Ephesians 3.
After the ascension of our Lord Jesus, with the coming of the Holy Spirit, the whole secret is out. By the Holy Spirit, revelation is given to the apostles and the prophets.
The Apostle Paul, on the road to Damascus, received that heavenly vision. He saw it.
Peter, on the rooftop in Joppa, saw a sheet coming down with all unclean animals. The voice said, “Peter, rise, kill, and eat.”
Peter said, “Not so, Lord. I have never eaten anything unclean.” The voice said, “What God has cleansed, let no man call unclean.” Three times. Peter was very stubborn, and the sheet went up.
A revelation of the church: the church is something that comes down from heaven, that touches the earth, and will return to heaven, because it is heavenly.
Yet there you find all these unclean animals. There we are. Yet God has cleansed us, and what God has cleansed, let no man say is unclean.
God said, “Eat.” You know, eating in the Scripture means fellowship. Peter said, “Oh, no, I cannot fellowship with the Gentiles.” But the Lord says, “No—neither Jew nor Gentile; all are one in Christ.”
Revelation.
The Apostle John, on the island of Patmos, was exiled there for the Word of God and for the testimony of Jesus. There, on the island of Patmos, on the Lord’s Day, he might have been sitting on a rock, looking across the Aegean.
On a clear day, you can see the outline of the other side, Asia Minor, where the seven churches of Asia were located. Before he was exiled, he ministered to these churches. Now he was in exile.
So, on the Lord’s Day, no doubt he must have been sitting there, looking across the water, and thinking about these churches, because these churches were in his heart.
Then he heard a voice. He turned back, and he saw a vision: seven golden lampstands, with the Son of Man in the midst of the lampstands. It is a vision.
God showed him what the churches are. The churches are golden lampstands.
The churches are made of gold. You know, in the temple, in the tabernacle, things are made of wood overlaid with gold. But the lampstand is made of pure gold. No wood there.
Wood represents humanity. Gold represents divine life. In other words, in the concept of God, the church is made purely of the divine life of Christ.
No human flesh is to intervene as foreign particles in that body. All our flesh has to be dealt with.
It is made of pure gold, beaten after much work of the cross. It is to be a lampstand. A lampstand is not an end; it is a means to an end.
The church is not the end; it is only a means to an end. It is to lift up light, and the light is Christ.
You find our Lord Jesus walking in the midst of the seven lampstands. He is the High Priest, the kingly High Priest, ministering to the churches, restoring the churches back to Himself.
There is a vision of the church.
So, brothers and sisters, here you find that after the Holy Spirit has come, the concept of what the church is is fully revealed. Now we have the full revelation of God’s concept of the church in the Bible.
What we need is to read it, to see it, and to obey it.
Now, this is just the introduction to the life of the church, the body of Christ. God willing, later on, if He should tarry and we are still here, then we will continue with the life of the church, the body of Christ.
Let us pray.
Dear Heavenly Father, we do praise and thank Thee that as Christ was conceived in Thy heart even before the foundation of the world, Thou hast also conceived the full Christ, the church, the body of Christ.
Our Father, as we think of how faithfully Thy Christ fully fulfilled Thy concept, our prayer is that we may not fail what Thou hast planned for us.
Lord, do pray that Thou wilt continue to open our understanding, that we may know what the church really is and what its life should be, that we may please Thy heart and Thy will may be done in the church as it is in Christ.
We ask in Thy precious name. Amen.