In 1984, I went back to Taiwan to introduce the new way. The first three years there were spent testing and experimenting. One may say that we were researching in the laboratory. We spent a lot of time and effort investigating. During the last year or more, the Lord has opened to us vision after vision.
The first vision that the Lord has shown us is that the church is an organism produced by the processed Triune God. Fifty years ago we had the term organism. But the light then was not as clear. Now we see that the church is the Body of Christ. This organism is the outflow of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit in His processes. This is the greatest light in the first chapter of Ephesians. It shows that the Body of Christ is an organism of God.
John 1:1 says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Verse 14 says, “And the Word became flesh.” The Father was God who was in the beginning. One day He passed through a process to become the flesh. Originally, He was in eternity having nothing to do with creation. But one day, He was conceived in a creature’s womb and after nine months was born as a man. However, this Son is both God and man. He is a God-man. This is not all. He lived a human life for thirty-three and a half years. In His childhood He experienced the life of an exile, escaping to Egypt with His parents. At the age of twelve, He went with His parents to Jerusalem to attend the feast. The wisdom of His words at the temple amazed the listeners (Luke 2:41-47). Gradually He grew up. From the age of twelve to thirty, He was a carpenter (Mark 6:3). This was not a comfortable process. It was not until He was thirty years of age that He came out to fulfill His ministry of preaching the gospel and saving sinners, which He did for three and a half years.
Eventually, He was crucified on the cross. From man’s point of view, He was killed by man; but from God’s point of view, He went voluntarily into death. He gave up His own body and soul-life. He said, “No one takes it away from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it again” (John 10:18). He walked into death in great stride and descended into Hades, thus destroying death. Then He came out of death, entered into resurrection, and ascended from earth to heaven. More than ten disciples saw this ascension (Acts 1:9). On the day of Pentecost, He as the Spirit was poured out from heaven (Acts 2:1-4).
The Triune God went through all these processes. The end result of these processes is the Body of Christ. This is like a grain of wheat that falls into the ground and dies producing many grains. Eventually, the many grains become a loaf of bread. We all know that among all the things created by God in the universe, the most wonderful thing is our body. It is wonderful in that it is organic. For example, man sees with his eyes, hears with his ears, and speaks with his mouth. All these show that the body is organic. These are symbols of the Body of Christ. This Body is an organism of the Triune God. It does not come about by the Triune God through creation; neither does it come about by the Triune God calling it into being all of a sudden. It is produced by the Triune God through many processes.
There are twenty-three verses in the first chapter of Ephesians. Verses 3 through 6 speak of the Father’s selection and predestination. Verses 7 through 12 speak of the Son’s redemption and our becoming the predestinated inheritance in Him (v. 11). Verses 13 through 14 speak of the Spirit’s sealing and pledging for our foretaste of the rich inheritance of God. The conclusion of chapter one says that the Son rose from among the dead, ascended into the heavenlies, transcended above all, had all things subjected under His feet, and became Head over all things to the church (1:20-22). The words “to the church” denote a kind of transmission. All that Christ the Head has attained and obtained are now transmitted to His Body, the church. Paul did not stop there. He continued in verse 23, “[The church] which is His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.” This verse is a footnote to chapter one, explaining how the processed Triune God produced a result which is the church. This church is the embodiment of the Triune God. It is also the Body of Christ.
We see that the church as an organism is the expression of the processed Triune God. Anything concerning the church must be in an organic sphere. Anything that is a deviation from this organism or an addition to it is not the church. The church is an organism as the mingling of God and man produced through the processed Triune God in His divine Trinity.