Let us consider the type of Adam and Eve in more detail. According to the book of Genesis, God did not create man and woman at the same time and in the same way. First, God formed man’s body from the dust of the ground. Then He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul (Gen. 2:7). After God created man, He said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a help meet for him” (Gen. 2:18). The animals and the fowl were brought to Adam, and Adam named them. But for Adam “there was not found a help meet for him” (Gen. 2:20). Within Adam there was the desire to have a counterpart, to have someone to match him. Among the cattle, the beasts, and the fowl, there was no counterpart to Adam. In order to produce such a counterpart, “the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam” (Gen. 2:21). While Adam slept, the Lord took one of Adam’s ribs and used it for the building of a woman (Gen. 2:22, lit.). In life, nature, and form the woman was the same as the man. Therefore, when God brought the woman to Adam, Adam exclaimed, “This time it is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh” (Gen. 2:23, lit.). Adam knew that at last he had found his counterpart.

Because there was no counterpart for Christ in the created universe, God caused Christ to die on the cross. As He “slept” there, His side was opened, and blood and water came forth (John 19:34). Because in Genesis 2 the problem of sin had not come in, that chapter mentions only the rib that was taken out of Adam; it says nothing about blood. But John 19:34 speaks of blood, which solves the problem of sin. The water signifies the flowing life of Christ, the eternal life, which produces the church. This life is also typified by the rib. According to John 19, not one of the Lord’s bones was broken when He was on the cross. This was a fulfillment of the Scripture which said, “Not a bone of Him shall be broken” (Psa. 34:20). The unbroken bone of Christ typifies Christ’s unbreakable eternal life. Hence, Adam’s rib typifies the unbreakable eternal life of Christ. It is with this eternal life that the church is built up as the counterpart prepared for Christ. In this way Christ gains the church as a match for Himself.

Just as Eve had the same life and nature that Adam had, the church has the same life and nature that Christ has. Therefore, the church is part of Christ.

The church has come into existence by the flowing out of the life of the crucified Christ. This life is the source and the substance of the church’s being. Whenever we talk about living the church life, we need to have a clear vision of how the church is produced. The church is produced by the outflow of the divine life. Now we should live this life, a life that is Christ Himself. Christ is the element that constitutes us into a proper church to match Him. Therefore, if we would have the church life, Christ must be our life and our living.

We need to see the vision of the church produced from the element of Christ and then have a spiritual experience that corresponds to this vision. We also need to present this vision to others so that they too may see it. When the believers see this vision, the Triune God in His all-inclusive riches will be dispensed into them. If the believers cooperate with the Triune God, more and more of the rich essence and holy element of the Triune God will be transmitted into them. Spontaneously this transmission, which is actually the divine dispensing, will issue in the living of the church life. This is not merely a matter of teaching. It is a matter of seeing a divine vision that brings us into the divine dispensing.

In these messages on the conclusion of the New Testament, we have emphasized the dispensing of the processed Triune God again and again. We need to participate in this dispensing and enjoy it. We need to experience more and more of the dispensing of the processed Triune God, whose embodiment is Christ and whose ultimate consummation is the all-inclusive, sevenfold, life-giving Spirit. Today we have the processed Triune God with Christ as the embodiment and the Spirit as the consummation. Day by day we need to open to Him, call on Him, stay in His presence, fellowship with Him, and allow Him to work within us to dispense all that He is, all that He has, all that He has done, and all that He is doing into our being. As the spontaneous issue of this dispensing, we shall have the kingdom life, and this kingdom life will be our church life.

The individual Christian life and the corporate church life both issue spontaneously from the dispensing of the processed Triune God into us. Here in this divine dispensing we are holy, spiritual, and victorious. Here we grow until we reach maturity. To experience and enjoy this dispensing of the processed Triune God is to live the reality of the kingdom in the church life. We all need to see this vision.
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