The Bible emphatically tells us that Christ is the Head. One day God will head up everything in the universe under Christ. Today the universe has not come under the headship of Christ yet, and everything is in a state of confusion. But one day God will head up everything under the headship of Christ. God ordained that Christ should exercise headship over all things, but today that headship must first be exercised in the church, and then through the church the headship will be exercised over all things. Today Christ is the Head of the church. Eventually, He will be the Head over all things. The church is God's means of enlarging Christ, and this enlargement will go on until He fills the entire universe. The church is "the fullness of the One who fills all in all" (Eph. 1:23). If the headship of Christ is not established in the church, it cannot be established in the universe.
What do Christ being the Head of the church and the church being the Body of Christ mean? They mean that all authority is in Him. All authority is in Him because all life is in Him. The whole Body is consummated in Him; He is the fountainhead of the life of the Body. The Body has no life of its own. "God gave to us eternal life and this life is in His Son" (1 John 5:11). Even after eternal life is given to us, it still rests in His Son. The Son does not part with it; He retains it in Himself. "He who has the Son has the life" (v. 12). This verse does not say, "He who has the life has the life." We do not possess life as life; only by possessing the Son do we have life. A Christian receives his life from the Lord. Yet this life can never be separated from the Lord. A believer is related not just to life. By being related to this life, a believer is related to the Son of God. This life makes us members of the Body of Christ. This life relationship rules out the possibility of being separated from the Head, because our life is derived from the Head. The flow of life in us continually depends upon our relationship to the Son. As soon as there is any obstruction in our fellowship with Him, the life in us is immediately blocked. He is the Head of the Body, and life can flow freely to us only when He is in full control.
The power of our existence is derived from Christ. This is why we cannot do anything independently. Only the Lord is our Head, and only He has the authority to direct the moves of the members of His Body. In this age of lawlessness, any suggestion of the need of authority is unwelcome; but if we are to understand and enter into the life of the Body, we must know the authority of the Head. My hand can do nothing without direction from the head. The head must command if the members are to move. Christ is the life of the Body, and Christ is also the authority in the Body. All the moves of the members of His Body must be under the direction of the Head. For Christ to be the Head means that He has the authority in the Body. We are not the head, and we do not have the authority. The only thing we should do is submit to the authority of the Lord. If we seek to know the life of the Body, a question will immediately arise: Do we bow to the absolute authority of the Lord? We will be challenged at the outset by the headship of Christ. We cannot say, "But..." We cannot say, "I think..." We can only bow to His sovereignty. We need to realize that if we are going to be members of the Body, we cannot be the Head. We cannot dictate, choose, or even desire. The Bible says that we should follow the Lord. What does it mean to follow the Lord? Following means coming after. The Lord is the One who decides our pathway. We do not have any ground for our own choice. The Body's only duty toward the Head is obedience and submission without any opinion, idea, or proposal. In the Body of Christ, no individual's idea or proposal counts; all these have to be cast down. We should only submit to the authority of the Head. We should just listen to His command and do as He says.
An acceptance of Christ as Head involves a repudiation of all other heads. Christ alone is the Head of the Body; no one else can be the head. You cannot be the head, nor can anyone in the church be the head, because there can only be one Head in the Body; there cannot be two heads. Only Christ is the Head. Therefore, all of us have to obey Christ. Today we see many human methods and ordinances abounding in the church. How wrong this is! Human plans and human decisions are against the headship of Christ. If Christ is my Head, then I will not dare to please myself or others; I must seek to please Him alone. "God has made Him both Lord and Christ" (Acts 2:36). Note that God has not set up Christ as Savior but as Lord. Paul first saw Christ as Lord and then as Savior. When he was apprehended on the road to Damascus, his first question was, "Who are You, Lord?" (9:5). Only Christ is the Head in the church; there is no other head. If we desire to live in the Body of Christ, we have to learn to submit to the authority of our Lord Jesus. Anyone who cannot submit, who always expresses his opinions and proposals, and who insists on being the head has never seen the Body. Once a man realizes that he is a member in the Body, there will surely be a feeling of submission in him because submission is a law of the Body.