In the previous message, we saw that the divine economy is the issue of God's will, purpose, good pleasure, and counsel; hence, God's will, purpose, good pleasure, and counsel are all for the divine dispensing. The intention of God's economy is to dispense God Himself into His chosen people, making Himself one with them. God's intention in His economy is to dispense Christ with all His riches to His believers chosen by God for the constitution of the Body of Christ, the church, to express the processed Triune God (Eph. 3:8-10). First, the divine dispensing dispenses Christ with all that the processed Triune God is, has, and has achieved. Second, this dispensing constitutes the organic Body of Christ. The church as the Body of Christ is not only built up but also constituted. Constitution takes place by the gradual dispensing of a life element.
A house is built up by adding pieces of inorganic material together, but the human body is built up by growth. A baby grows by taking in food as an organic element. Only organic things can be taken in as food to constitute our body. A typical American is the composition of all the rich foodstuffs of America. In order to be constituted with these riches, one must eat and digest them. Digestion plus assimilation issues in growth. For the constitution of the Body of Christ, we must take Christ in more and more. In this way the element of Christ, which is something altogether organic, will grow within us. The intention of God's economy is to dispense the element of Christ into us for our organic constitution and growth.
God's intention in His economy is also to head up all things in Christ. Christ is the Head not only of the church but also of all things (Eph. 1:10, 22). God gave Him as a gift to be Head over all things to the church, His Body. He is the Head of the Body. Our own body is a picture of this. Every part of our body is related in some way to the head organically through the nerves. Christ's heading up of all things takes place organically by the growth of the Body.
In the previous message, we also pointed out the relationship between God's economy and the apostle's stewardship. The stewardship of the apostle is just the carrying out of God's economy. Whatever God planned needs to be carried out. The real apostleship is to carry out God's economy.
The book of Ephesians unveils the dispensing of God as no other book in the whole Bible. In the first four chapters especially, the most crucial thing is the divine dispensing. In order to study the book of Ephesians in a thorough way, we need to study and understand the divine dispensing. In the entire book, the word dispensing is not used, but the fact of dispensing is there.
I use the word dispensing in the sense of food being eaten, digested, and assimilated into our being. Eventually, when the element of the food we have eaten is assimilated into our being, that food becomes us. Dispensing is not just to distribute. It means that the things we take in have been assimilated into us to become us.
The divine dispensing is the consummation of the divine economy. In other words, God's plan is accomplished through His dispensing. The divine dispensing consummates God's economy, God's plan. In Ephesians 3:8-9 Paul said, "To me, less than the least of all saints, was this grace given to announce to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ as the gospel and to enlighten all that they may see what the economy of the mystery is, which throughout the ages has been hidden in God, who created all things." These verses reveal God's dispensing. Paul received grace to announce the unsearchable riches of Christ as the gospel. "To announce" means to distribute. Paul's distributing of the riches of Christ to the believers was according to God's economy. This is the apostleship to carry out God's economy.