The brothers and sisters must be led to know that they themselves are the members and that they are fellow members with other saints in the Body of Christ. This is different from their being in the house of God. In the house of God, you yourself are a single unit, because you are a brother or a sister. But in the Body of Christ, you cannot be isolated; you cannot become a unit, for you are just a member. A child in a family may go away for three months. He may not be able to live properly, but he can survive. But can your eyes go away for three months? Suppose your eyes say that they do not like to be in the body, in the same way that children say that they do not like to stay at home. It is impossible for your eyes to go away for three seconds, much less three months. Once a member goes away from the body, it is finished. We have to show the brothers and sisters that we are members, and that we cannot be isolated. Hence, we have to learn to coordinate with others and to be members one of another.
The feeling of the Body is a very fine feeling. It is a feeling that comes from the operation of the Holy Spirit in the Body of Christ. In our physical body there are the nerve fibers. All the feelings in the body are derived from the nerve fibers. Once the nerve fibers are cut off, the feelings will be stopped and gone. The Holy Spirit is the nerve fiber in the Body of Christ. The more we give the Holy Spirit the ground, the more sensitive will the feeling of the Body become.
The living in the Body means to bring the brothers and sisters to live in the Body. A person should not be individualistic in his work and his service. But even more, he should not be individualistic in his living. He has to keep the principle of the Body. Not only do we work and serve with the brothers and sisters in coordination, but we live in coordination as well.
If you can do a good job in both aspects, the knowledge of the church and the knowledge of the Body, the church where you are will be a built-up habitation to God. To Christ, it will be a coordinated Body. In other words, you will have made the brothers and sisters the habitation of God and the Body of Christ. Of course, this requires much time for such a management.
Let me repeat. It is not so simple a thing to manage a church. You have to learn everything. For example, if you want to manage a home, not only do you have to learn to wash your clothes and cook your meals; strictly speaking, you even have to learn the way to put flowers in a vase. Sometimes we spend a considerable amount of money to buy some flowers, only to arrange them in a disorderly way. Moreover, we do not know how to keep them alive, and in two days they all wilt. But a person who has learned to arrange flowers will need to spend only a little money for flowers. They may not even need to spend any money, but cut some flowers from their yard and arrange them in a vase, and the flowers will look quite nice and will stay alive for a long time. Never think that anybody can arrange some flowers. It is not so simple. Never think that anybody can manage a church either. No, there is a difference between one kind of managing and another kind of managing. There are too many things to learn here.