First Corinthians 12:12 says, “For even as the body is one and has many members, yet all the members of the body, being many, are one body, so also is the Christ.” So also is the Christ is a great and mysterious statement in the Bible.
First Corinthians 12:12 begins, “For even as the body is one and has many members, yet all the members of the body, being many, are one body.” Bible expositors all admit that this verse refers to the church. The church is the Body of Christ, and in this Body there are many members. Moreover, all the members of the Body, being many, are one Body. Undoubtedly, this verse is speaking about the church. The strange thing, however, is that the conclusion to this word refers not to the church but to Christ-“so also is the Christ.” We may think it would be more logical to change Christ to church. But when the Holy Spirit inspired man to write the Bible, He did not say, “So also is the church,” but “so also is the Christ.” From this we see a mystery. This mystery shows that not only is the Head of the church Christ but that the church as the Body of Christ is also Christ.
Based on this we can determine that in God’s eyes, not only is the Head of the church Christ, but the church is also Christ. Christ Himself is the essence of the church. On the surface the sum total of all those who are saved is the church, the Body of Christ. However, according to the intrinsic, genuine nature of the church, the church is not merely the sum of all those who are saved; rather, the church is the total of all those who are saved who have Christ in them as their life and spiritual reality.
On the surface the church is a group of saved ones who have been added together, but on the inside the church is the Christ who is in these ones who are added together. You have Christ in you, I have Christ in me, and others have Christ in them. The aggregate of all of us who belong to Christ is “the Christ.” The totality of the Christ in us is still Christ. Thus, the church is not simply a group of people added together. Only when a group of people who have Christ in them are added together are they the church. Strictly speaking, it is the Christ in all of us added together that is the church.
What is the church? The church is Christ Himself, and Christ Himself is the church. Because the church is something spiritual, without Christ there is no church, and without Christ there is no reality of the church. The essence and the content of the church are just Christ. We can say that the reality of Christ is Christ Himself, the reality of spiritual matters is Christ Himself, and the reality of the church is also Christ Himself. Every genuine spiritual experience is an experience of Christ Himself and is Christ Himself. No Christian experience is something other than Christ Himself. If we have an experience that is not Christ Himself, this experience is religious and behavioral but not spiritual. Hence, any “Christian” experience that is not derived from the experience of Christ is something of religion, ethics, and good behavior. It is definitely not of the Spirit nor of Christ, because it is void of Christ’s nature.
Everything that we do in spiritual service-whether it be prayer, preaching the gospel, visiting the believers, or anything else-the inward element should always be Christ Himself, because the spiritual reality is Christ Himself. Christ is in you, Christ is in me, and Christ is in many others. The aggregate of the Christ in all of us is the church, and the church is Christ.
The church is not a building, a chapel, or a meeting hall. Moreover, strictly speaking, the church is not merely a group of people. The gathering of a group of people is not necessarily the church. If we gather a group of people together on the street and put up a “church” signboard next to them, they still are not the church. The church is the totality of the Christ in those who are saved. The church is Christ Himself.
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