In this message we shall cover several other aspects of Christ’s work in His heavenly ministry.
In His heavenly ministry Christ is building the church (Matt. 16:18). As the ascended One in the heavens, Christ is directing, managing, the building up of His church on earth. Christ does not build the church by Himself directly, but through His gifted members, the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the shepherd-teachers, as revealed in Ephesians 4:11-12. To have these gifted members, He firstly produced the first group of believers and apostles through His earthly ministry, and through this first group of believers and apostles the gospel was preached and the truths were taught to multiply the number of His believers and gifted members. It is through these multiplied believers and gifted members that the church has been built up under His heavenly ministry. Such a building work is still going on under His heavenly ministry until the completion of this divine work.
In His heavenly ministry Christ is also doing the work of sanctifying, cleansing, nourishing, and cherishing the church (Eph. 5:26, 29). To be sanctified is not only to be separated from what is common but also to be saturated with the element of Christ. Hence, one aspect of sanctification is to be separated positionally, to undergo a change of position. Another aspect of sanctification is to become holy dispositionally by having Christ dispensed into us. Christ’s purpose in giving Himself to the church is to sanctify her, separating her to Himself and saturating her with Himself that she may be His counterpart.
Christ’s work of sanctifying the church is accomplished by cleansing her with the washing of the water in the Word. According to the divine concept, the water in Ephesians 5:26 refers to the flowing life of God typified by flowing water (Exo. 17:6; 1 Cor. 10:4; John 7:38-39; Rev. 21:6; 22:1, 17). The washing of such water is different from the washing of the redeeming blood of Christ. The redeeming blood washes away our sins (1 John 1:7; Rev. 7:14), whereas the water of life washes away the blemishes of the natural life of our old man, such as “spot or wrinkle or any such things” (Eph. 5:27). In sanctifying the church, the Lord first washes away our sins with His blood and then washes away our natural blemishes with His life. Spots are something out of the natural life, and wrinkles are signs of oldness. Only the water of life can metabolically wash away such defects. All the spots and wrinkles in the church will be washed away through the inner cleansing of the water in the Word. We all need such an organic, metabolic washing to take away our defects and the marks of our oldness. As the church is washed organically and metabolically in this way, the church is renewed and without blemish. We are now in such a washing process in order that the church may be holy and without blemish.
As the Lord Jesus sanctifies and cleanses the church, He also nourishes and cherishes her. To nourish is to feed. For Christ to nourish us means that He supplies us with His riches.
This nourishment causes transformation. Since we are what we eat, the more we eat Christ, the more we are constituted of Christ. Then we shall be transformed by the element of Christ that has been dispensed into us. Therefore, through Christ’s work of nourishing the church we are transformed; we become new persons with a new element and substance.
Along with Christ’s nourishing we have His cherishing. To cherish is to nurture with tender love and foster with tender care. To cherish is also to soften by warming. As a mother cherishes a child by holding the child close to her breast, the Lord Jesus cherishes us by holding us close to Him. In this way we are warmed and softened. The Lord warms us and softens us as we enjoy His tenderness, sweetness, and lovingness. How tender, sweet, and warm the Lord Jesus is! In His work in His heavenly ministry He is the cherishing One.
Home | First | Prev | Next