Two Epistles in the Bible especially speak about the church: Ephesians and Colossians. Everyone who studies the Bible knows that the church spoken of in Ephesians and Colossians is the “one church,” which is the unique church of God. This church not only refers to the church on the earth, because even though the church on the earth is broad enough to include everyone according to space, it can only include a section of the church according to time. Suppose five hundred million people are saved on the earth today. The church in the books of Ephesians and Colossians includes more than these five hundred million people. These five hundred million are only the believers in 1951. Before this, in 1950, there were believers who had died. Even in 1951, some believers died before the counting took place. There were also believers who died before 1950, say in 1051. The brothers and sisters in the apostle Paul’s time no longer live on this earth today. In other words, the church of Christ in Ephesians and Colossians includes all the saved ones throughout the whole world, in every nation and at all times, both past and present. It covers time as well as space. This is called the Body of Christ. Today, even if all the Christians throughout the whole world are united together, they would still not be the Body of Christ. Although we are living, many have already died; although we are living, many more will be born. Many brothers and sisters will be saved tomorrow. They are in the Body of Christ; we cannot say that they should not be counted. Therefore, the church in any particular period of time on the earth is not the Body of Christ. Even if all the children of God who are on this earth were gathered together, they would not be sufficient to become the Body of Christ. Spacewise it would be sufficient, but timewise it would be wrong to say that it is the Body, because many generations have passed away. All the believers of past generations, all the believers of the present, and all the believers of the future are the Body of Christ.
Ephesians and Colossians speak of the church in this context. This unity is the right spiritual unity. It is impossible to maintain a church with Paul as an elder and Peter as a pastor, because they have passed away. Hence, this unity is spiritual, and this all-encompassing unity is correct. As long as a person is a brother in the Lord, we have fellowship with him. Even though some brothers have passed away, we are still one with them. We are one with any brother or sister. This is the genuine spiritual unity, which is universal both in time and space.
Although we acknowledge the fellowship and unity of Ephesians and Colossians before the Lord, we must remember that this kind of fellowship and unity can easily become idealistic. It is quite possible that we can advocate the unity of the Body on the one hand, yet actually be for the second kind of unity, whereby both denominations and unity are advocated at the same time, on the other hand. Before the Lord, we need to see that the unity of Christians in the Bible is not spoken of in just the Epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians but also in two other Epistles: 1 Corinthians and Philippians. The unity of Christians in these last two Epistles also refers to the unity of the Body.
The unity spoken of in 1 Corinthians clearly does not refer to unity that is universal both in space and in time but to unity of the church in Corinth. I think this word is clear enough. There were contentions among the brothers at Corinth, not the whole Body of Christ. It only concerned a few brothers who were in Corinth. So when Paul exhorted them to be one, he was merely exhorting them to be one with the brothers in their locality. It was as if he was saying, “All the brothers living in Corinth are the church in Corinth; you must express the oneness of the Body in the locality of Corinth. You must not be divided in Corinth.”
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