CHAPTER TWO

THE MYSTERY OF CHRIST—THE CHURCH

Scripture Reading: Eph. 4:4-6, 9-10; 1:3-14, 19-23; 2:5-6, 15, 19-22; Rom. 5:17b; 1 Tim. 3:15-16; Eph. 4:16; 3:2, 7-11, 15-19; 5:32; Rev. 21:2-3, 22, 11-14; 22:1-2

1. The church being mysteriously chosen and predestinated in Christ by God the Father before the foundation of the world—Eph. 1:3-5:
1. Being chosen to be holy—v. 4.
2. Being predestinated unto sonship through Jesus Christ to God the Father—v. 5.
2. The church being mysteriously redeemed in the Beloved after the foundation of the world—Eph. 1:6-12:
1. This being the grace with which God graced the church in the Beloved according to the riches of God's abounding grace—vv. 6-8.
2. According to the dispensation of the mysterious economy in God's will, which is according to His good pleasure, to head up the church and all things—vv. 9-10.
3. That in Christ as the Head and according to God's counsel and predestination, which are according to His will, the church may be made a chosen possession as those who have before hoped in Christ—vv. 11-12.
3. The church mysteriously being sealed with the Holy Spirit and receiving the Holy Spirit as the pledge at the time of its redemption—Eph. 1:13-14:
1. The redeemed church becoming God's acquired possession and, at the time of its redemption, being sealed with the Holy Spirit unto its full redemption.
2. The redeemed church not only becoming God's possession but also obtaining God as its inheritance with the Holy Spirit as the pledge.
4. The church mysteriously participating in the resurrection power of Christ and in everything that He has attained and obtained in ascension, thereby becoming the Body of Christ—Eph. 1:19-23:
1. Being the fullness of the One who fills all in all—v. 23.
2. Becoming the corporate expression of the embodiment of the processed Triune God.
3. Mysteriously being made alive together with Christ (regenerated—John 3:5-6), being raised up together (taking Christ as life and living together with Him—Col. 3:4a; John 14:19b), and being seated in the heavenlies together (participating in all that Christ has attained and obtained in His ascension—Eph. 2:5-6).
5. The church mysteriously becoming the universal new man as God's kingdom and God's house, and being built up as the habitation of God—Eph. 2:15, 19-22:
1. Being the universal new man to replace the old man in God's creation for the expression of God and the accomplishing of His economy.
2. Being God's kingdom to be ruled by God and to rule for God—Rom. 5:17b.
3. Being God's house to enjoy God's riches and to express the glory of God's riches—1 Tim. 3:15-16.
4. Being built up as the habitation of God, which is the issue of submitting to the authority in God's kingdom and enjoying the riches in God's house—Eph. 4:16.
5. In the organic Body of Christ, in the living in the universal new man, which is constituted with God as life, and in the living in God's house of life and in God's kingdom of life, there being no lifeless organizations such as a universal federation or local autonomies:
1. There obviously being the need in the churches in all the localities to have some administrative arrangements for the business affairs; these administrative arrangements seemingly being non-organic.
2. Actually, the administrative arrangements for these business affairs needing also to be under the ruling of the Holy Spirit and according to His leading (for example, when the apostles set up elders in a locality, they must do so under the Holy Spirit's leading)—Acts 20:28a.
6. The church mysteriously enjoying the unsearchable riches of Christ—Eph. 3:2, 7-11:
1. Through the stewardship of grace given by God—v. 2.
2. According to the dispensation of the mysterious economy of God—v. 9.
3. To make known through the church the multifarious wisdom of God—v. 10.
7. The church being strengthened into the inner man with power by God through His Spirit, that Christ may mysteriously make home in the believers' hearts, that the church may be filled with the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth of what Christ is, to become all the fullness of God—Eph. 3:15-19:
1. Christ's making His home in the believers' hearts being His spreading in the hearts of the believers, who constitute the church.
2. The breadth, length, height, and depth of what Christ is being His boundless and immeasurable riches.
3. The church becoming all the fullness of God as all the expression of God.
8. The mysterious life union of Christ and the church being the great mystery in the universe—Eph. 5:32:
1. Christ and the church being a universal couple produced through the union and mingling of the processed Triune God with the regenerated and transformed tripartite man.
2. God being the principal character, and man being His counterpart; the two sharing the same nature and living and walking together.
3. Divinity living in humanity to become the reality of humanity; the human virtues living out the divine glory and beauty to become the expression of divinity.
9. The mysterious ultimate consummation in God's economy—the New Jerusalem—Rev. 21:2:
1. The peak, the climax, of the union and mingling of the processed Triune God with the transformed tripartite man.
2. Becoming the tabernacle where God dwells and where He lives with man, and becoming the temple where man dwells and where he serves God; both being the mutual habitation of the redeeming God and the redeemed man—Rev. 21:3, 22.
3. The Triune God being the life supply therein, and the tripartite man being the outward appearance for the expression of God—Rev. 21:12, 14:
1. The Triune God on the throne, as the center of the holy city, flowing out the river of life, with the tree of life growing alongside, to be the supply of the whole city—Rev. 22:1-2.
2. The redeemed nation of Israel (indicated by the names of the twelve tribes) being the gates of the city; the redeemed church (indicated by the names of the twelve apostles) being the walls of the city; and both being the outward appearance of the city for the expression of the effulgence of God's glory—Rev. 21:11-14.
4. The church, which is joined and mingled mysteriously with the Triune God today, being a miniature of this New Jerusalem and needing to take the holy city as its highest standard and matchless hope in everything.