Ephesians 1:22-23 says, “The church, which is His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.” John 1:16 says, “For of His fullness we have all received.” Fullness in these two verses is the same word. Since the church is the fullness of Christ, the church can be the Body of Christ. Ephesians 4:12-13 says, “For the perfecting of the saints unto the work of the ministry, unto the building up of the Body of Christ, until we all arrive at the oneness of the faith and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” Here fullness refers to the fullness of Christ and is the same Greek word for fullness in John 1.
These verses show that Ephesians speaks concerning the fullness of Christ twice—at the end of chapter 1, where it speaks of the church being the fullness of Christ, and in 4:13, where it speaks of the church growing to the point of reaching the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. The fullness of Christ has a stature.
Ephesians 3:17 says, “That Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith.” Here make home and hearts are very emphatic words. In the entire New Testament, only Ephesians 3 points out clearly that the Lord is making His home in our hearts; it does not say that the Lord “is in our hearts” but that the Lord is making His home in our hearts. Verse 17 continues, saying that we are “being rooted and grounded in love.” Our love and our hearts do not have much value; consequently, we should be rooted and grounded in His love so that we may apprehend with all the saints what the breadth, length, height, and depth are and so that we may know the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ (vv. 17-19).
In the universe, there is a breadth, length, height, and depth; however, it is difficult for man to describe these. Exactly how broad is the breadth? How long is the length? How high is the height? How deep is the depth? We cannot explain these. However, when the apostle speaks concerning the fullness of Christ, he describes it with these four immeasurable words. What is the length? The length is Christ. What is the breadth? The breadth is Christ. What is the height? The height is Christ. What is the depth? The depth is Christ. The love in which we are being rooted and grounded (v. 17) is God and Christ; the breadth, length, height, and depth in verse 18 are also God and Christ. Therefore, verse 19 speaks of the “knowledge-surpassing love of Christ.” We can say that the love of Christ in verse 19 is the same love that is spoken of in the phrase being rooted and grounded in love in verse 17. We can also say that the love of Christ is the breadth, length, height, and depth, because the love of Christ is God, just as Christ is God. The result of the breadth, length, height, and depth is that we are filled unto all the fullness of God.
In Ephesians 3:17-19 there are four items: love in verse 17, the breadth and length and height and depth in verse 18, the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ, and all the fullness of God in verse 19. The first three items issue in the fourth, the fullness of God. The love is the love of Christ, and the love of Christ is the breadth, length, height, and depth of the universe. This is a figurative expression. What is the breadth of the universe? It is the love of Christ. What is the length of the universe? It is the love of Christ. What is the height of the universe? It is the love of Christ. What is the depth of the universe? It is the love of Christ. When this love fills us inwardly, we will be rooted and grounded in love. When this happens, Christ, the embodiment of love, makes His home in our hearts. This ultimately results in our being filled unto all the fullness of God.
We all know that the church is the Body of Christ, and that the Body is filled with Christ Himself. Christ fills this Body to the extent that it becomes the fullness of Christ. In the Bible the phrase the fullness of Christ is very mysterious. Many of us have seen this phrase when we read the Bible, but we neither know nor understand what the fullness of Christ is in actuality.
There are at least three places in the Bible that speak of the fullness of Christ. John 1:16 says, “For of His fullness we have all received.” Ephesians 1:23 refers to the church as the fullness of Christ. Then Ephesians 4:13 says that the fullness of Christ has a measure of stature. The Greek word for fullness is a very emphatic word, but regrettably, many Bible translators do not have this realization.
There are two other places in the Bible that speak of the fullness of God. Ephesians 3:19 says, “That you may be filled unto all the fullness of God,” and Colossians 2:9 refers to “all the fullness of the Godhead.” The Chinese Union Version is a good translation of the Bible; however, it lacks spiritual revelation in the translation of these verses. As a consequence, the true meaning of the original text is overlooked. The Bible speaks of the fullness of Christ three times and the fullness of God two times. Both references to the fullness of God are related to Christ.
The Bible first speaks of the fullness of God in Ephesians 3, which says that when Christ makes His home in our hearts, we will be able to apprehend the dimensions of the fullness of Christ. Furthermore, when we know the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ, we will be filled unto all the fullness of God. This shows that the fullness of God and the fullness of Christ are inseparable. Colossians 2:9 says, “For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” This clearly shows that the fullness in Christ is the fullness of God. The fullness of Christ is not separate from the fullness of God. The fullness that is in Christ is the fullness of God; the fullness of God is in Christ.
The book of Ephesians speaks of something in the universe that is called the fullness of Christ and that the fullness of Christ is the church. The church is the fullness of Christ; hence, the church is the Body. Without this fullness, there is no Body; the Body is the fullness. In other words, the church is the overflow of Christ.
We are all the descendants of Adam. If someone were to ask us concerning the size of Adam’s family, we would say that Adam’s family is very large, because every person comes out of Adam and is Adam. We can say that mankind is the fullness of Adam, the overflow of Adam; all human beings are the children of Adam, the descendants of Adam. Adam was a man who lived in the garden of Eden six thousand years ago, yet he has a fullness. This fullness is his descendants.
Perhaps someone would call himself a Chinese or an American; however, whether he is a Chinese or an American, he is a man in the world. If we know the truth, we would acknowledge that we are the descendants of Adam, a small part of the fullness of Adam, the overflow of Adam. If we have offspring, our offspring are our fullness, just as the descendants of Adam are the fullness of Adam. We are not only the same as Adam, we are Adam. So strictly speaking, it is wrong for us to take Chang, Wang, Lee, or Liu as our last names; we should take Adam as our last name since every one of us is Adam and we are all the overflow of Adam. All people throughout the generations are the overflow of Adam; this Adam is great.
However, Adam was but a type, a miniature, of Christ. Christ is the reality of the type of Adam. If the created life of Adam has an overflow of so many descendants and such a fullness, how much more will the uncreated life of Christ be unlimited and immeasurable in His fullness!