In the last two messages we saw that the church is the corporate Christ, and we saw also that in order to know the Body of Christ, we have to deal with our natural life.
What is the Body of Christ? The Body of Christ is the continuation of Christ's life on earth. When He came to the earth and lived on earth, He expressed Himself through a body. Today He still requires a body to express Himself. Just as a man needs a body to express all that he is, Christ needs a body to express Himself. The function of the Body is to be the full expression of Christ. We cannot manifest our personality through any one member of our body—the ears, mouth, eyes, hands, or feet—alone. Similarly, Christ cannot manifest His personality through any one member of His Body. It takes His whole Body to manifest Him. We must see that everything of Christ is expressed through His Body. This is not all. The Body of Christ is the extension and continuation of Christ on earth. He spent more than thirty years on earth to reveal Himself. He did this as the individual Christ. Today He is revealing Himself through the church. This is the corporate Christ. Formerly, Christ was expressed individually; now He is expressed corporately.
God is after a corporate vessel, not individual vessels. He is not choosing a few zealous, consecrated ones to work for Him individually. Individual vessels cannot fulfill God's goal and plan. God has chosen the church, and He is after the church. Only the church as the corporate Christ can fulfill God's goal and plan.
Consider our human body. No member of our body can act independently. It is impossible for a body to depend on one hand or one leg. However, if the body loses a member, it will not be complete. The Body of Christ is composed of all the believers. Every believer is a member in the Body of Christ, and every believer is indispensable.
The Body of Christ is a reality. The church life is also a reality. The Word of God does not say the church is like the Body of Christ; it says the church is the Body of Christ. Nothing external can become part of our physical bodies. We may clothe our bodies, but the clothes do not become part of our bodies. Nothing that is of us can ever become part of the Body of Christ, because "Christ is all and in all" in the Body (Col. 3:11). Anything in us that is not a part of Christ frustrates our inward knowledge of the Body of Christ. Sin hinders us from seeing Christ, and the natural life hinders us from seeing the Body. We all must see our position in the Body of Christ. If we truly see our position in the Body, it will be as though we were saved a second time.
The Adamic life is individualistic and independent. Even though everyone in Adam shares the same life, there is no fellowship among them. We all commit sin, yet we each take our own way. Everyone in Adam lives as separate individuals. In Christ everything that is individualistic is ruled out. If we want to know the Body life, we need deliverance not only from our sinful life and our natural life, but also from our individualistic life. All individual elements must go because nothing that is individualistic can reach God's goal.