We have seen that the believers experience the dispensing of the divine Trinity corporately by entering into the kingdom of God, by living in the church, and by living in the Body of Christ. In this message we shall see that, in the progressing stage of God’s full salvation, the believers experience this dispensing also by putting on the new man.
The believers experience the dispensing of the processed Triune God corporately by putting on the new man (Eph. 4:22-24). The new man is of Christ. It is His Body, created in Him on the cross (2:15-16). It is not individual but corporate (Col. 3:10-11).
The book of Ephesians first reveals that the church is the Body of Christ (1:22-23), the kingdom of God, the household of God (2:19), and the temple, the dwelling place of God (2:21-22). Then in 4:24 this book reveals further that the church is the new man. The Greek word for church, ekklesia, means those called out for a gathering; hence, an assembly. This is the initial aspect of the church. From this, Paul goes on to the aspects of fellow citizens of the kingdom of God and members of the household of God. These are higher than the initial aspect, but not as high as the aspect of the church as the Body of Christ. Yet the new man is still higher than the Body of Christ. Thus, the church is not just an assembly of believers, a kingdom of heavenly citizens, a household of God’s children, nor even a Body for Christ. In an even higher aspect the church is a new man to accomplish God’s eternal purpose. As the Body of Christ, the church needs Christ as its life, but as the new man the church needs Christ as its person. This new corporate person should live a life as Jesus lived on earth, that is, a life of truth, expressing God and causing God to be realized as the reality by man.
We need to put on the new man who has already been created in Christ (Eph. 2:15). Christ created the one new man, the church, with God’s nature wrought into humanity. This action was something new. In the old creation God did not work His nature into any of His creatures, not even into man. In the creation of the one new man, however, God’s nature has been wrought into man to make His nature one entity with humanity.
The phrase “in Himself” in Ephesians 2:15 is very significant. It indicates that Christ was not only the Creator of the one new man, the church, but also the sphere in which and the essence with which the one new man was created. Christ is the very element of the new man. Nothing of our old man was good for the creation of the new man, for our former essence was sinful. But in Christ there is a wonderful essence, in which the one new man has been created. This new man, which is the church, is corporate and universal. There are many believers, but there is only one new man in the universe. All the believers are components of this one corporate and universal new man.
As those who have been saved and regenerated, we now must put off the old man and put on the new man. Although the new man has already been created, we still need to put him on. However, few believers know how to put off the old man, much less how to put on the new man. We may think that to put off the old man is to put off the old nature or the old self and that to put on the new man is to put on the new nature. This concept is utterly mistaken. Since the new man in 2:15 is a corporate man, the new man in 4:24 must also be corporate. According to 4:24, we need to put on the very new man that has already been created in Christ.
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