Which is His Body - Meaning, Part 2

Recap: The Context of Paul's Prayer and the Church as Christ's Body

0:05 We turn again to Ephesians chapter 1.

0:11 This profound prayer, bounded by verses 15 and 23, continues to be the focus of our careful study and meditation these Lord's Day mornings. The gist of Paul's prayer, I trust at least a few of you will remember,

0:32 if not many of you, is that God the Father would give to the Ephesian believers an increased measure of the Spirit's ministry to their hearts, particularly as the spirit of wisdom and revelation of knowledge of God, that they might come to more accurate, inward spiritual comprehension of three great things. Their hope, rooted in their calling. The inheritance, towards which the hope looks, so glorious that he calls it the riches of the glory of that inheritance. And then the third thing, the exceeding greatness of the power of God towards all believers, power exercised towards them and in them so that they may come to the inheritance and realize the fulfillment of their deepest hopes. And in the course of dealing with that third commodity, the exceeding greatness of God's power, the apostle goes, goes to great lengths to show that the measure of that power is nothing less than the power that God exercised in his son when he did four things with him as the appointed mediator. When he raised him from the dead, verse 20, when he sat him at his own right hand in the heavenlies,

1:59 far above all principalities, powers, might and dominion and every name that is named in this world and in the world to come, and then when he put all things beneath his feet, and then when he gave him as head over all to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all. Having expounded the substance of the prayer, which brings us to verse 22, we notice that in verse 23, Paul having mentioned the church, which is the recipient of the gift of the exalted Christ, he says two things about the church in verse 23. He says it is the body of Christ, and secondly, it is the fullness of Christ. It's as though Paul could sense the reaction of the Ephesians when they would read and hear for the first time these words that God has given Christ as the exalted head over the universe to his church, as though someone would ask the question, one, one, one, one, what in the world is the church to deserve such a gift? And he says, my answer is, it is his body, it is his fullness. And so if we are to understand why it is that God should give such a gift to his people, made up of the likes of you and me,

3:28 we must understand what the church is in the purpose of God and in the mighty working of his grace. It is the body of Christ, it is the fullness of Christ. Now our attention is presently focused upon the first of these two things which he says about the church. It is his body.

The Church as Christ's Body: A Profound Figure of Speech

3:51 And when one begins to examine what was in the mind of the apostle from what he writes elsewhere about the church as the body of Christ, one realizes that we've come to something analogous, something parallel to the experience of an explorer, who comes to the mouth of what looks to be just a little cave. But once he enters in, he finds there opens up to him this panoramic vision of subterranean caverns just magnificent in the sights that are there. We can read through Ephesians 1 and we say, and he gave him his head over all things to the church which is his body, and that looks like a very insignificant thing. But when we begin to enter into the meaning, the significance, that tremendous concept, we come to things that dazzle the eyes and take the breath away, the church as the body of Christ. Last week all we did was show the relationship of this concept to the context which I've already done for you, and then we began to open up the meaning of this phrase. We saw negatively it does not mean that the church is actually an extension of the physical form, of the glorified God-man, Christ Jesus. That is pure stupidity as well as bad theology.

5:14 He has a true human body that is glorified. It's somewhere in the universe of God, and when you've come to the last hair on the top of his head and the last nail on the bottom of his foot, there is no more body of Christ. Rather, this is a figure of speech, divine, designed to convey great and sublime, substantial spiritual realities. And as we seek to open up the figure, we must remember these two principles.

5:45 A figure is given to elucidate a reality. It is not a mirage. A figure is given to display, to demonstrate, to explain, to make clear something that is substantial and real. And secondly, everything we discover about this figure, the church is the body of Christ, though, it's speaking essentially of what the people of God are in a universal sense.

6:13 We saw that from 1 Corinthians 12 and verse 27, we are absolutely warranted in making the structure of the church universal, the principles of the church universal, applicatory to the church local and to the church in its particular manifestation in any given place. For Paul says to the church, at Corinth, ye are a body of Christ, and members in particular one of another. Well, with that framework before us, what did we discover last week? And I'll just touch on the three things, mention them, and then we'll move to our study this morning.

Review of Previous Points: Organic, Subordinate, and Coordinated Relationships

6:52 We saw that this concept, the church as the body of Christ, speaks of an organic relationship. The relationship of the members of a body to the head is a living relationship. There is sharedness, there is shared life. And so the body of Christ conveys this tremendous concept that the church is vitally united to her living head, the Lord Jesus, and the members are vitally, not merely organizationally, geographically, but vitally related one to another.

7:28 Secondly, it speaks of a subordinate relationship. Christ is given to the church not to be an arm, to be a finger, to be a foot, or even a neck, but he's given as head over all things to the church. Therefore, the church is subject to Christ. Ephesians chapter 5.

7:47 As the church is subject unto Christ, members of his body, but only related in that subordinate sense, he is the head, the executive head, the ruling head, the administrative head, and we are to be in subjection to him. And then we closed our study last week by considering that the church as the body of Christ not only speaks of an organic relationship, of a subordinate relationship, but of a coordinated relationship. We are members one of another. A body is not a collection of a hand and a finger stuck together anyway.

8:30 It is a beautiful, cohesive, coordinated, living organism. And the Apocalypse, the Apostle Paul we saw in several passages, makes this thought dominant when treating the subject of the body of Christ. Now I have two more points. I only had four last week, but in meditation and preparation, I felt there was another aspect that perhaps could be a sub-point under one, but since I can't go back and re-preach one and stick it in, I'm going to make it a separate point.

The Church as Christ's Body: A Sympathetic Relationship (Head to Members)

8:58 Two more points to make this morning. As you read through every portion in the New Testament where the phrase, the body of Christ occurs, and this is what I've sought to do and study the passages in their context, meditate upon them, you will find there are at least two other dominant thoughts in this imagery of the church as the body of Christ of which He is head. It is not only organic, it is not only subordinate, it is not only coordinated relationship, it is a sympathetic relationship. Because it is a vital relationship, it is a sympathetic relationship.

9:40 In other words, there is living feeling communicated in two directions. From the members of the body to the head and from the members of the body to each other.

9:54 In order to set sharply in your minds this first aspect of the sympathetic relationship, I want to ask three simple questions and then answer them with a number of scriptures. When Saul of Canaan, Tarsus was persecuting the people of God, what was he doing? Open your Bibles please to 1 Corinthians 15, 9 and you will see the Apostle's confession of his past behavior prior to his conversion on the road to Damascus. And he says in verse 9 of 1 Corinthians 15, something he never forgot, it came out again and again, for I am the least of the apostles, and am not meet to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. He says whenever I sit down to write in a letter and I address myself or address myself to people as Paul, an apostle, I can never forget that I was once Saul, persecutor of the church of God. When he is speaking of his past life as a Pharisee in Philippians 3, he says, touching zeal, persecuting the church. Now notice, twice he says persecuting the church.

11:16 Well, when he was persecuting the church, that is the visible people of God, what was he doing? Well, let's turn to three passages in the book of the Acts and let the Lord himself answer that question.

11:31 Acts chapter 9, the chapter which begins with the historical account of Paul's persecution of the church, but Saul, yet breathing threatenings and slaughters against the disciples of the Lord, that's why I said it was the church visible, the people of God tangibly before him, discernible by their coming together at stated times for explicit acts of worship and attendance to the word of God. No such thing as invisible disciples.

12:07 He was breathing out threatenings and slaughters against the disciples of the Lord. He was breathing out threatenings and slaughters against the disciples of the Lord. He went to the high priest and asked of him letters to Damascus and to the synagogues that if he found any that were of the way, you could tell who they were. He could find them.

12:23 He could tell them they were people of the way. There was a total lifestyle to which they had subjected themselves and you could find them. I'm just emphasizing that to show this whole idea of the invisible church. There's the church universal and there's the church local, but I don't know anything in the Bible about the invisible.

12:41 There are visible saints in heaven, the church of the firstborn who are glorified and there are saints down here. But the concept of an invisible church, I think it lends itself to an unbiblical concept. There is the church universal known only to God, made up of only the regenerate and only God knows who they all are. But that church comes to expression in churches local and visible.

13:08 Visible saints. Well, just that little bit of ecclesiology on the side. All right? Now, what did he do if he found them?

13:15 Well, he would take them bound and bring them to Jerusalem. And as he journeyed, it came to pass that he drew nigh unto Damascus and suddenly there shone round about him a light from heaven and he fell upon the earth and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou my people?

13:40 Why persecutest thou the church? Why persecutest thou the disciples? No, no. Something far more intimate.

13:50 Something far more drastic in its implications. Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?

14:03 As zeal, persecuting the church, Jesus says to persecute my people is to persecute me. Why? Because His church is His body. And because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, and because His church is His body, Between the members of the body and the head, there is a sympathetic, a feeling, a felt relationship.

14:24 What touches the members, touches the head. And though there are various aspects of Paul's account of his conversion in Acts 22 and in Acts 26 that are different, this note he sounds in both of the accounts. Acts chapter 22, verses 7 and 8. And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest.

14:57 The Jesus who had been crucified, buried, risen, had gone back to the right hand of the Father. He says, It is though I am still here, and you're persecuting me. Where? You're persecuting me in my people.

15:10 The sympathetic relationship between the members of the body and the head. Acts 26. The third example, Acts chapter 26, beginning with verse 11. And punishing them, punishing them, that's the saints that he mentions in verse 10.

15:31 Punishing them, oft times in synagogues, I strove to make them blaspheme, and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them, even unto foreign cities. Four times the object of his venom was the visible people. Whereupon, as I journeyed to Damascus, to the authorities and commission of the chief priest, at midday, O King, I saw on the way a light from heaven above the brightness of the sun shining round about me and them that journeyed with me. When we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice saying unto me in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?

16:12 You see, that emphasis comes through in all three accounts. Why? Because, for among other reasons, the apostle Paul learned at the very threshold of the Christian life that to come amongst the visible people of God, to be brought into the body of Christ, was to be brought into a relationship with the Lord Jesus that involved not only an organic tie, a subordinate position, and a coordinate relationship with his people, but a sympathetic relationship. So that attachment to Jesus Christ was not merely the attachment of a follower to a leader, of a disciple to his teacher, a servant to his master, but it's one that goes beyond this into the very shared life of sympathetic feeling between the head and all the members of the body. And so I say the concept of the body of Christ was taught, Paul, in German, form at the very outset of God's dealings with him in terms of his effectual calling and God is teaching him that it is a sympathetic relationship so that from henceforth as he approached any body of God's people he could not think of them as detached from their head there was this sympathetic

The Church as Christ's Body: A Sympathetic Relationship (Members to Members)

17:39 bond I persecuted them and in so doing I was persecuting him sympathy second question I asked to underscore this principle first one was when Saul of Tarsus was persecuting the church what was he doing second question when men minister to the least of God's saints what do they do well turn to Matthew 25 for the answer in Matthew chapter 25 the scene before us is the judgment at the last day when all the nations of mankind shall stand before the Lord the parallel of Revelation 2011 to 15 may I say any other attempt to place this in some other framework falls into a hopeless exegetical and biblical problems the result of this separation is eternity and in this day what do we find verse 40 reaction and God is sent to the very end of the sin towards the heart of a different life andкую cooked up and the King shall answer and say unto them barely I say unto you in as much as you did

18:54 it unto one of these my brethren even the least he did it into me the right just yet amazed that the Lord says you have demonstrated your vital attachment to me and love and in faith by your you in that state, he says, when you saw but one, even the most insignificant, you see the thought? No matter how insignificant a member of the body may be, there is a sympathetic relationship with it and the head. You may take the last eighth of an inch of the smallest member of your body, which is probably your little toe on your foot, and stick a needle into it half an inch and see how much of a sympathetic relationship there is between that least member and your head. That's what Jesus has said. He said, inasmuch as you ministered to the last eighth of an inch of the pinky in my body, you ministered to me. And then you have the contrary dealing with the wicked, verse 45. Then shall he answer them, saying,

20:05 Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least, ye did it not unto me. Now is this just poetic imagery? I think not. There is no grounds to consider it that. The concept of the body of Christ is given to reflect the reality of this sympathetic relationship between the Lord and his people. Third question that underscores it, when a Christian offends a weak brother, what does he do? And by offend is not merely cut across the grain of the weak brother. When a Christian offends a weak brother, what does he do? When a Christian offends a weak brother, what does he do? When a Christian offends a weak brother, what does he do? When a Christian offends a weak brother, he likes and dislikes. There is a lot of confusion here. I am the weak brother and I don't like the color of your suit, therefore you can't wear it because you offend me. You

20:51 know, that mentality. I am the weak brother and I don't see how anyone can be a Christian and have a television and you have one, therefore you ought to get rid of one because I can't have one. I don't see why you should. Brethren, that is heresy. That is heresy. That is the week brother, not only judging the strong brother, but lording it over him and saying, you have got to bend to my pattern. of life. That's not the doctrine of the Word of God. To offend means that the weak brother is so affected by the example of the strong that he moves into a course that to him is sin, and the strong brother becomes aware of it. What does he do? Does he say, look, I have liberty to wear this suit, even if when you wear it, you're sinning before God in your own? No, no. He says, all right, brother, if because I wear this color suit, you're going to wear it, and in wearing it, you defile your conscience, and you're doing what to you is sin, I will not wear that suit, rather than cause you to sin. That's what it means to offend the weaker brother. If the weak brother says, well, I think my having

21:58 a television would be wrong, but because you're a mature Christian and you have one, even though I think it's wrong for me, I'll have one on the basis of your example, then Paul says, all right, if that's what you're going to do, I'll relinquish my television. Now why will you justify having one? Now you'll have to say, I deliberately want to sin, or you'll have to say, it is proper for me to have one. That's what Paul's talking about. And I think we just need that little word of explanation. There is some kooky thinking on this whole matter of who the weaker brother is and what it means to offend him. But now in the biblical sense of offending, if I offend my weak brother, my example causes him to sin, what am I really doing? Well, look at 1 Corinthians 8, 12. We read it a few weeks ago. What am I doing?

22:43 1 Corinthians 8, 12. Well, the apostle tells us in terms that are so shocking that it ought to make everyone who understands the doctrine of Christian liberty to tremble lest he should abuse his liberty. Look, verse 11, for through thy knowledge he that is weak perisheth the brother for whose sake Christ died, and thus sinning against the brethren and wounding their conscience when it is weak. See, sin against Christ. Does that mean we sin against Christ in the sense that all sin is against God? No. No, the thought is much stronger than that. That will not do justice to the concept. Granted, all sin against anyone is sin against God ultimately. But you notice

23:33 he doesn't say God as the moral governor of the universe, but he says it is sin against Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one who has head over all. And head of his body is identified with his people in this sympathetic relationship. What a terrible thing to sin against Christ. Oh, think of it, dear child of God. Believers in a yet imperfect state, yet so united to Christ as members of the body to the head that all that affects them affects him. A sympathetic relationship. 1 Corinthians 8, 12. And this grips us how careful we will be of our walk, how careful we will be to consider one another, how careful we will be to be tender and gracious and gentle with one another.

24:29 For what I do in my treatment of my brother is felt by the head, the Lord Jesus, even the least of the brethren. But not only is this a sympathetic relationship, of the body to the head, but of the members of the body each to the other. You see, there may be a coordinated relationship without sympathetic relationship. When you get out at the end of this service and stick your key in the car and turn the crank, there is a wonderfully operating coordinated relationship between rings, pistons, bearings, nuts, bolts, screws, and a lot of other mechanical things. And if it isn't coordinated, I have the problem this past week that Mr. Price did, when a piece of the valve broke off and went in the wrong place and the engine went kaput. You see, it only functions as an engine so long as it is a coordinated relationship, functioning harmoniously. But you see, there

25:33 is no sympathy between all the parts. There are no nerves tying the bearings to one another. There are no nerves tying the rods to one another. No nerves tying the piston rings to one another. There are no nerves tying the rods to one another. No nerves tying the pistons to one another. None of that. There can be coordinated relationship without sympathy. Only that which has life has sympathy. And so Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 12, these profound words, when he used the term body of Christ in Ephesians, though this may not have been consciously present in his mind at that time in the general concept of the body of Christ, it is a very dominant thought. It is a very dominant thought in the apostles' thinking. Verse 24, whereas our comely parts have no need, but God tempered the body together, giving the more abundant honor to that part which lacked, that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have, and here's the phrase, the same care one for another. And whether one member suffereth,

26:42 all the members suffer with it. Or one member suffereth, all the members suffer with it. Or one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it. Now ye at Corinth are the body of Christ, and severally members thereof. You see that sympathetic relationship emphasized so that what happens to one becomes the experience of all, whether pain or whether delight. Let me illustrate from the human body. If my hand is caught in the door inadvertently, carelessly, a message goes to the brain. The brain sends out a signal to the other hand to pull the door open, to get the finger out. And if I can't pull it open, it sends a message to the foot to kick the door in.

27:26 But the whole body is engaged in the plight of that finger. When one member suffers, the whole body suffers with it. Such then is the sympathetic relationship between the members of the body, each to the other. And whenever in the human experience this ceases, as it does in certain forms of leprosy.

27:49 The nerves die so that a man can place his hand on a hot stove and have his flesh being seared, and no messages go from the head to the other members and to the other muscles to remove the hand. What a tragedy. What a tragedy. And yet isn't it a shame that within many a body of Christ, a visible church, is accounted the mark of spirituality that we can live and let live, and not be involved with one another.

28:19 This visible involvement leads to problems. Yes it does. Sure it does. It's a problem.

28:25 Regardless of what I may have been purposing to do when that finger gets stuck in the door, all the other members of my body have to stop in whatever they're doing and focus themselves upon the restoration of that one member. That's inconvenient, but thank God it's therapeutic and it's in the well-being and best interest of the body. Need I be more specific? Let me just say that we need desperately to pray for a well-developed nerve system throughout the body. To pray for the grace to feel what our brethren feel. How long has it been since you prayed anything that even was akin to a prayer like that? Oh God, give me a sensitized and quickened and intensified ability to feel with my brethren. Not feel for yourself. But feel for the other. Feel for the other. Feel for the other. Feel

29:26 for the self. Some of you have got altogether too many nerves when it comes to your self. Get within 10 feet of you and some nerve is bristling and is pinched. Hypersensitivity.

29:36 Cursed thing. Wrapped up in your own little world of what's happening to me? To me? To me? To me? To me? To me? To me? To me? To me? To me? What a petulant, abominable attitude.

29:51 When I'm speaking to you and it sounds harsh, I mean it to be harsh. You need soundly to be rebuked. If you've been under good teaching and in a church where people love you and receive you and you're still going around licking your wounds and nursing your raw nerves of self-centeredness, it's time some of you grew up and stopped being babies.

30:16 I'm not talking about that kind of sensitivity. I'm talking about the kind in which I can feel for my brother, my sisters, in which I can appreciate how a harsh word might affect them. And so if I've spoken it, I have no peace until I've gone and asked them to forgive me. I can appreciate what it would be like to come to church and have nobody to come up and greet you and say, How are you doing?

30:40 And so I'm going to go out of my way to find those that perhaps can get lost in the crowd. The ability to feel. You see, there is this sympathetic relationship. And we need desperately, I say, to pray for a well-developed nerve system in the body.

30:59 In the body of Christ. This will perhaps help you to understand why there is this pervasive emphasis in the New Testament on such things as in honor preferring one another. Seek not every man his own, but the things of his brother. Receive one another to the glory of God.

31:19 If a man be overtaken, ye that are spiritual, restore such an one. I say the New Testament knows nothing of this cursed isolationism where we pray, merely come and sit in the same pew and hear the same message and go our way without this sympathetic relationship to the members of the body. It's far into the biblical concept of the church. The church is his body.

31:48 Now you see why we need one who's head over all things to live together?

31:53 With all those nerve endings and all those signals going back and forth, nothing but an omnipotent, exalted Christ can ever give us grace. To dwell together in unity and in the bond of peace.

32:06 Nothing but an exalted Christ who is God's gift to the church in the plentitude of his grace. Nothing but that provision is adequate for the demands made upon us. In order to attain this goal, we must do all within our power to know each other if we're to feel with each other. May I descend to some very nitty gritty specifics?

32:31 This is why we so desperately, desperately yearn that all of you who would in any way consider this body of God's people, that into which the Lord has sovereignly placed you, would be with us when we gather for our sharing time on a Wednesday night. This is where we enter into one another's joys, into one another's concerns. This is where we can rejoice together and we can keep together. And if you're providentially hindered from gathering thus, with us, why it's a delight for us that you should ask, what about this one, what about that one?

33:09 This is why there's the necessity for heeding Peter's admonition, showing hospitality one to another, being in one another's homes, in one another's presence. This is why we must be open enough to communicate our joys and our sorrows that those who want to share them can receive, as it were, the nerve signal saying, time to rejoice with me, time to grieve. And I submit to you that when Paul used the concept of the body of Christ, there was in his mind this understanding of this sympathetic relationship, the members with the head and the members one to another. Now, let me move on in the second place to the second main thrust of our study this morning. This concept of the body of Christ is not only setting before us, before them, things mentioned, but there is a fifth. It is a necessary and a functional relationship. Not only organic, subordinate, coordinated, sympathetic, but also it is a necessary and a functional relationship. Let me ask you kids a question this morning. When you got up this morning,

The Church as Christ's Body: A Necessary and Functional Relationship

34:27 maybe mama had to tumble you out of bed, or maybe you went in and tumbled her out of bed, whichever way it was, when you got up this morning, and your head said, uh-oh, Sunday morning, got to put my Sunday go-to-meeting vest on. When your head thought those thoughts,

34:43 if you sit in a chair and just think those thoughts real hard, and see the clothes jump right off the clothes rack in the closet, and jump right up over your arm and on you, huh? Did it work that way for you? If so, let me know your secret. I'd love to lie in bed a few more minutes and just have it work that way. No, no.

35:03 What did you have to do? What did you have to do? Well, you had to make your hands and your feet and everything in you carry out what your head was telling you, didn't you? Right? And when you thought, oh, I like that dress, then a message went out from your head and told your hand to go and take that dress off the rack, you see? What is the body in relationship to the head? The body is the necessary means by which the designs and purposes of the body are realized. The body is the necessary means by which the designs and purposes of the body are realized. The body is the necessary means by which the designs and purposes of the head are brought into realization. You don't get things done by sending out strong signals from your head. We've got lots of people like that. They're great theorists, and boy, they can send out their signals 23 hours a day, and they never get a thing done. They're great

35:50 heads. They can think, but they never do anything. They're dreamers. Now, we need our dreamers, but if the world were made up of dreamers, we'd be in an awful mess. No, you see, the signals of the head must be implemented by the mind. The mind must be implemented by the mind. The mind must be by the body, by its energies, by its faculties. Let's take an illustration again. It'll help also to give a prayer request. I have two reasons for doing it. Mr. Rotman will be leaving tomorrow for Vienna to take part in the All-Beethoven Festival there, an international competition, and we do want to be remembering in our prayers. But now, can you imagine Mr. Rotman on the day, if he gets through the preliminaries, and it comes to the final three men, and he comes to the final three men, and he comes out all dressed in his tails or whatever else he's going to have on, and he sits down at his piano, and he thinks in his mind, he has that particular composition of Beethoven that's in his mind, and he thinks of all the subtle nuances and all of the shading and where he wants to come down with a triple forte that's real boom-ba-dee-boom loud, you kids, you see, or when he wants to have it very, very soft, and all those signals go around his head. Can you imagine him sitting there at the piano and folding his arms? Now, at this point, what happens? You get the picture, don't you? It's not enough that all this

37:14 should be there. It needs to be there first and never come out in the fingers. The artistry doesn't begin in the fingers. It begins here, but it doesn't end there. It's only when there is the uninterrupted flow of the signals here and the full cooperation of all the hands. If he's so nervous that he freezes, the signals may be very real here, but what comes out here will only frustrate him and will be pulled apart from what he has up here. As it comes back into his ear, the only satisfaction he can have as a musician is if what comes back here perfectly parallels what was sent out up here. You say, what in the world does this have to do with Ephesians 1.23? It has everything

38:00 in the world to do with it. Christ is giving his head to the church. Think of the concept. Which is his body?

38:11 Whose body? Whose body? Christ's body. The appointed mediator, the appointed head of the mediatorial kingdom, into whose hands the redemption of a multitude of sinners has been entrusted. And where is he? He was once amongst us, anointed with the Holy Ghost, went about doing good, healed the sick, raised the dead, lived a perfect life, died upon the cross, was raised up and now he's at the right hand of the Father. But now does he have much more work to do? Many for whom he died have not yet been gathered in. Those who have been gathered in, he has much more work to do in them, in perfecting them after his own image. And he's like this. How is this work to be carried

39:03 out? Well, we have the answer in seed form in Acts chapter 1 and verse 2. The former treatise I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach, Acts 1-1, until the day in which he was received up. After that he had given commandment through the Holy Spirit unto the apostles whom he had chosen. Luke makes reference to his gospel record and he says, Theophilus, what I have written to you was a record of that which Jesus began both to do and to teach. And he says, O Theophilus, what I have written to you was a record of that which Jesus began both to do and to teach. Yet, the gospel record ends with Jesus going back to heaven. And Luke says this was simply a record of what he began to do and began to teach. Well, where is the record of what he continued to do and continued to teach?

40:10 I say it is the record of the book of the Acts and of the epistles, in which the Lord Jesus as the head, sending the Spirit in copiousness, measures upon his people. Acts chapter 2, he being by the right hand of God exalted, hath shed forth this. He has given life and energy and in some augmented sense constituted his people, his body, though his people are one in every age, something entered at Pentecost that raised his people to a new and to a distinct level of privilege and experience. And from that, point on, the church in this fullest sense is constituted the body of Christ. What he did perfectly, sinlessly and powerfully while here in the days of his flesh, he carries on now imperfectly, tainted by sin, but thank God, powerfully through his body, the church. Now, when that truth grips you, all low views of the visible, organized church will forever leave you. What is the church? His body.

The Church as Christ's Body: Accomplishing Christ's Purposes

41:32 How is the will of the head accomplished? Through the body, counsels and plans and purposes of God to be accomplished through the body. Let me give you but two examples of how the scripture supports this perspective or forces it upon us. Take John 10 in verse 16.

41:58 One of the great passages on the Lord Jesus as the savior of his people, the shepherd sheep analogy carried into a number of avenues of thought. But in the 16th verse, notice the words of our Lord, John 10, 16, and other sheep I have, not I hope to have, I shall eventually have them. They're already my sheep. In the purposes of my father, in the donation of the father to the son of a people for whom he was pledged in surety, on whose behalf he was the appointed mediator, he says, I have them. And them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice, and they shall become one flock, one shepherd. Notice he says, I have them. I must bring them.

43:02 shall hear my voice. Now let me ask a very simple question this morning of everyone who claims to be one of Christ's sheep. Where and when did you hear the voice of Christ? He says none are in his fold but those who have heard his voice. Have you heard the voice of Christ? I have heard his voice. Yet I have heard his voice. What's he talking about?

43:32 He says they shall hear my voice. It is the hearing of his voice by which he brings them and constitutes them part of that one fold under one shepherd. How then do men hear the voice of Christ? He's gone back to heaven. They hear his voice. May I say it reverently through the mouth of his body? Turn to Romans chapter 10 where this is the explicit teaching of the Apostle Paul. Romans chapter 10. He's given that great gospel promise in verse 13.

44:08 Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord. The Lord shall be saved. And then that line of simple logic beginning with verse 14. How shall they call on him in whom they've not believed? Now notice the next verse as it's rendered in the American Standard, a more accurate translation from the original. How shall they believe in him? Not of whom, but how shall they believe in him whom they have not heard? It is the Lord who is the object of their call.

44:42 Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. But how can they call in him whom they have not heard? Well, how do they hear him? Notice. And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent? Even as is written how beautiful are the feet of them that bring glad tidings of good things. When a humble servant of Christ speaking in the name of Christ.

45:13 The gospel of Christ. God by his sovereign power opens deaf ears, takes the scales from off blinded eyes. The sinner repents and embraces the Savior. He's heard the voice of Christ speaking through his body. And I'm not about to say that the Lord Jesus under no circumstances can or will save a man without that voice being heard through the church. I am not about to say that the Lord Jesus under no circumstances can or will save a man without that voice being heard through the church. I am here to say what the Lord may do in his own secret ways. But I am here to say there is no revealed way in scripture of any man hearing the voice of Christ except that voice is heard through his body, the church. That's why Paul can

46:14 say as he does in Ephesians 2.17. Look at that text. We might expound it this morning.

46:19 Just quote it as a supportive text of the point we're making. God willing, when we come to that section, we'll open it up. But Paul, speaking of God incorporating Jews and Gentiles into one body, speaking first of all of the actual experience of the Ephesians, who did not hear Christ in the flesh. You read the account in the book of the Acts. They were converted essentially through the ministry of the Apostle Paul. But speaking now of Jew and Gentile being brought into one body, even there at Ephesus, how did this come to pass? Look at verse 17. And he came and preached peace to you that were afar off, and peace to them that were nigh. For through him we both have our access in one spirit unto the Father. So you are

47:13 no more strangers and sojourners, but fellow citizens with the saints and the household of God. When did Jesus come and preach peace to these far-off Gentiles? When a humble, hook-nosed Jew came to them. He came to the city of Ephesus and began to go into the synagogue and into the marketplace and ultimately into the school of Tyrannus and opened up the scriptures and proved that Jesus was the Christ, the only Savior of sinners. Jesus was coming and preaching peace through this member of his body. Well, what about the edification of the body, the upbuilding of the body through the virtue of Christ? Well, the same thought is clearly taught. John 17, 17, sanctify them in the truth. Thy word is truth. But how is that sanctifying

48:04 process to go on? He said to his own, you are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Ephesians 4 says, he's given gifts to his church, pastors, teachers, evangelists, etc. To what end? That they, speaking the truth in love, together we may grow up into him in all things. Christian, when this principle is given to you, you are not alone. You are not alone. You are not alone. You are not alone. You are not alone. You are not alone. You are not That the concept of the body of Christ is a concept underscoring the necessity and functional aspect of the church as Christ's body. It has radical implications and overpowering weight in one's heart and life. How much of the beauty of Christ would the world know? Only the beauty which it sees in his body, the church.

48:59 Now do you see why it's such a grotesque thing for the church to be marked by fleshiness, by carnality, by prejudice, by pride? Because it obscures the beauty that it's to reflect, even the beauty of its head, the Lord Jesus. What will the world know of the message of Christ? That message which is conveyed through the body and no more. What will it know of the grace of Christ? In receiving sinners, it will only know what it sees of the church reflecting that grace, receiving within its pale all kinds of sinners of every rank and every description as it preaches the gospel of sovereign grace. Since then, the church is necessary and functional as the body of Christ. Do you see why the church is so essential to the realization of God's purposes?

Implications and Applications of the Church as Christ's Body

50:01 This is why God is so concerned about such things as church order. That's why Paul would take an evangelist like Timothy off the field and plunk him down in Ephesus where he himself had labored for three and a half years and say, I put you there to set in order the things that are wanting. I'm sorry, that's a reference to Titus at Crete. But then he says to Timothy, I want you to instruct men how to behave themselves in the church. Why the concern? Because as the body of Christ, it is the body of Christ. There's a necessary and functional relationship. Then we need to see not only the necessity then of concern for the church, but rejoice in the invincibility of the church. It is permeated with the life of God because it's joined to the head who is indestructible and it shall be indestructible until his purposes are accomplished. I will build my church and

50:58 the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Any given specific local church he may remove, Revelation chapters 2 and 3, I'll remove the candlestick here, but not his church. The people of God, his body is indestructible. Well, I had hoped to draw out some lines of practical application. Maybe we'll just have to leave that for the next message. Let me just give you the head so if I don't, you'll at least know what I'd hoped to say. In the light then of this concept, the church as the body of Christ. Do you see why there must be a guarded membership? Do you see why? Do you see why we must be careful that we admit none to membership but those who give evidence that God has incorporated them into the body? You destroy the imagery of the body of Christ without a guarded membership. Secondly, do you see why there must be a disciplined membership? If the church reflects him, any member that stubbornly refuses to reflect him must be disciplined.

52:07 Honor of the head and for the good of the body, Paul says, a little leaven leavens the whole lump. If gangrene sets into the finger, it must be cut off lest it poison the whole body. Third question, do you see the necessity of a careful walk before God? We are the body of Christ, members of that head. Do you see the great resources that are ours? Unlike the physical body in which certain powers are resident in each of the members. The Bible says in the body of Christ all the power flows down from the head, for without me ye can do nothing. The last question, do you see the necessity of dogged faithfulness in scriptural duties at all costs? The church's body functions only from the nerve impulses that come from the head, and where are they found? In every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God.

53:07 That's why there must be dogged obedience to all the light God gives from the sacred book at any cost. For then and only then does the body function to the pleasure and delight of its living head. And then my last question by way of application would be, do you see the absolute necessity of being in the body? If you're to be saved, there's no salvation out of the body of Christ.

53:34 Now I didn't say there's no salvation out of a specific body of Christ, but there's no salvation outside the body of Christ. If you're not joined? If you're not joined to Christ, you're not a Christian. If you're not in the body of Christ, you're not a Christian. For Paul says in Ephesians 5, Christ himself is the head and the savior of the body. Oh my friend, if you're not in Christ, you're not a Christian.

54:07 If you're not in the body, you're none of his. And there's no way to get into the body, but by the mighty operation of his spirit. And that spirit always operates. It operates in connection with the gospel. Hence our cry to you is repent and believe the gospel. And all who repent and believe the gospel are baptized by the one spirit into the one body and are made to drink of that one spirit. They enter into that organic relationship, that subordinate relationship, that coordinated relationship with all the other members of the body. They enter into that sympathetic relationship.

54:50 They become part of that necessary and functional relationship. Oh, may God through the spirit give us enlarged views of the glory and the grandeur of the church as the body of Christ. And blessed be God, we have as God's gift to us our exalted, enthroned, head over all things, the Lord Jesus, to whom we are joined in indissoluble bonds of life. And therefore we know that our hope will not be frustrated. The inheritance will not be a mirage.

55:27 For the exceeding greatness of his power to usward is exercised through the virtue that flows from the head into all the members of the body. And no member of that body can perish any more than the head can perish. Blessed be God for such provision for such sinners. Let us pray.