Brothers and sisters, if we take the Lord as life and live by Him, the result will be that we will be built by the Lord to be His church. It is not doctrine that builds us together. Doctrines cannot cause us to be built up together as the church. If we truly desire to be built up as the church, we must take the Lord as life and live by Him. If we have truly learned this lesson in a serious way, living not by ourselves but by the Lord and taking not ourselves but the Lord as life, then spontaneously we will be built together with all the saints to be the Lord’s church. This is why we say that the church is our living. Such a living is the issue of Christ’s being lived out of us. Such a living is altogether the result of our living by Christ, taking Christ as our life, and allowing Christ to live in us.
Therefore, the basic lesson we have to learn is to strictly deny ourselves and live by Christ. When you take Christ as life, allow Christ to live in you, and allow Him to live out through you, the issue will be the church. When you allow Christ to live out through you, this is the building, the coordination. Anyone who takes Christ as life and lives by Him will not be individualistic but in coordination, and he will not only be horizontal but vertical. When we live in this way, our living is the church.
Therefore, if we want to know whether a person is taking Christ as life and whether he is living by Christ, we just have to see whether or not the church is the issue of his living. If in his living and work he is not coordinated with the brothers and sisters but rather is individualistic, this is proof that he is not living by Christ and not taking Christ as his life. If you live by Christ and take Christ as life, the result will be that you will be coordinated with the brothers and sisters and that you will not be able to be independent. Furthermore, the relationship between you and the brothers and sisters will not only be horizontal but vertical, having the authority and the order.
Hence, in the Epistles there are many verses telling us how the apostles took Christ as their life and how they lived by Christ. There are also many verses telling us how they lived in the Body. What they lived out was the Body of Christ and the house of God. They were coordinated together in one Body and built up into one dwelling place. Therefore, they were not horizontal but vertical, not individualistic but coordinated.
Romans 12:5 says that we are one Body in Christ and individually members one of another. Being members one of another is the living of the church. In such a living, there are some who teach, some who exhort, some who lead, some who serve, some who show mercy, and some who give. Whatever you do, however, you have to be coordinated with the brothers and sisters as members one with another.
In the previous message we said that Romans 12 is a continuation of Romans 8. It is only by passing through the experience of Romans 8 and living absolutely according to the spirit that a person can come to Romans 12 to be a member of the Body of Christ. Therefore, this also shows us that the church life is based upon our experience of taking Christ as life. If we take Christ as our life, living by Christ and allowing Christ to live out of us, the issue will definitely be a living in which we are members one of another.
The living referred to in Romans 12 is altogether a living of the brothers’ and sisters’ experience of being members one of another as one Body. Whether or not this one Body can be realized, whether or not it can be practical, and whether or not it can manifest its functions altogether depend upon our being members one of another. If the brothers’ and sisters’ experience of being members one of another is insufficient, improper, or problematic, then the Body cannot be realized and the functions of the Body cannot be manifested. The reason for this insufficiency is that the brothers and sisters do not adequately take Christ as life or live by Christ. If we still live in ourselves and by ourselves, there is no way for us to be joined together.
Since we live by Christ and thereby have the church life, we cannot be separated from one another and cannot be independent. First Corinthians 12 tells us that the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor the head to the feet, “I have no need of you” (v. 21). In the church today we often quote these verses, yet in our heart we still may say, “I can do everything by myself; I do not need you.” This shows that we are not taking Christ as life nor living out the church life. If our life is not Christ, then our living is not the church. If I live in Christ and take Christ as my life, I cannot help but live out the church life, and I cannot help but say to the brothers and sisters, “I need you.” I will surely say that I need all the brothers and sisters. I am just an eye, so I need the ears, the nose, the mouth, the hands, and the feet. I need every brother and every sister, and they all need me too. I know that just as I cannot live apart from the Lord, so also I cannot live apart from the brothers and sisters. If as a member I leave the Head, I will become a detached member, a dead member. Likewise, if as a member I leave the Body, I will also become a detached member, a dead member. Christ is my life, and the life of Christ is a corporate life. He came not to be life to a single member, to an individual, but to be life to the Body. Therefore, I cannot take Him as life nor live by Him independently and not live in the Body. I cannot live only an individual member’s life and not the Body life. If I take Christ as life and live by Him, what is lived out will be the church.
Do we actually have the church as our living? This is a real test. Many times we think that we are not wrong, but we realize that we are individualistic. Although we are not wrong, we are in ourselves—we neither live by Christ nor live in the church. The reason we are individualistic, acting as if we do not need the brothers and sisters, is that we feel that we are quite right and quite good. The result is that we are very individualistic. We have individuals but not the church. We do not have the church as our living, because we do not have Christ as our life. He who does not take Christ as life cannot live out the church life. That kind of living is not a coordinated church but an independent individual.
The apostle Paul shows us in Ephesians 4 that when Christ lives and grows in us, eventually we will become a full-grown man (v. 13). The original text of this portion of the Scriptures does not refer to many full-grown men but to one full-grown man. We think that as we are in Christ individually and Christ is in us individually, gradually each one of us will become a full-grown person. You become a full-grown person, he becomes a full-grown person, and I also become a full-grown person. There is not such a thing. The apostle said that we all become a full-grown man. Therefore, if we truly have grown up, although we are many, we become one man. This one man is a great man of mystery, which is Christ and the church.
Perhaps some will ask, “In John 12 did the Lord Jesus not say that if a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it will bear many grains? Are these many grains not individual grains?” Please do not forget, however, that when we come to 1 Corinthians 10, there it tells us that “there is one bread,” and that “we who are many are one Body” (v. 17). Previously there were many grains, but now these grains have become one bread. In other words, every one of the grains has to be ground; there is not one grain that is preserved whole. The grains are not only ground to powder but also blended as one dough and made into one bread. Hence, although individual grains were produced, eventually they become one bread. Therefore, although we are many, we are one bread, one Body.
This is Christ in us as our life and the church outside of us as our living. We cannot look at only one aspect. We cannot say, “As long as I stay away from sin, do not love the world, and act according to the will of the Lord in all things, that is good enough.” Neither can we say, “As long as I live in the presence of God every day, and as long as everything I do is spiritual and pleasing to God, that is enough.” We cannot look at just this one aspect. We still have to ask whether what we live out is one bread and whether it is one Body. Do we live out the church? Or do we live out our individualism—our individual victory, individual spirituality, and individual holiness? Are we members one of another with the brothers and sisters to the extent that we cannot live without one another? Or do we say in our heart to the brothers and sisters, “I do not need you”? If we feel that we cannot live without the brothers and sisters, that we need the brothers and sisters, then our living is the church. If I am an eye, then I need the feet, the hands, the ears, and the mouth. I need every part of the body. This is a builded situation. This is oneness, and this is harmony. This is what it means for us all to arrive at a full-grown man.
We often say that we all are likeone man, but this is not enough. We should say that we all are one. Do we have one thousand brothers and sisters? These one thousand brothers and sisters are just one. Do we have two thousand brothers and sisters? These two thousand brothers and sisters are still one. Regardless of how many brothers and sisters there are, they are just one. If we all live by Christ and allow Christ to grow in us, the result will be that we all will become a full-grown man. This man is the church.
Now we need to apply these words to ourselves. Please consider: How much of the element of coordination do we have among us? What is the degree of coordination among us? Or we may ask, How much of the element of the church life do we have in us? And how high is the degree? I believe that by asking ourselves in this way, immediately we will discover that although it seems that we are not wrong and we love the Lord very much, the weight of the church life is very light and the measure is very little. In fact, there is almost no measure. It seems that basically we do not know what a coordinated life is, what the church life is, and what the Body life is. Since we do not know these matters, we do not know what authority and order are. This is why we are poor, weak, dull, and stale. Although I dare not say that we are in darkness, I do dare to say we are not bright; instead, we are dim within, having shadows and veils. We lack power in our prayer, in our ministering of the word, and in our preaching of the gospel. Furthermore, our meetings are neither fresh nor living. People cannot sense the Lord’s presence when they come into our meetings. All these conditions show that we lack Christ as our life and the church as our living. We do not have enough Christ as life, so we do not adequately have the church as our living. The reason for this is that we always remain in ourselves and always try to preserve our wholeness, being unwilling to be broken. We always try to keep ourselves as a grain of wheat and are not willing to be ground. Hence, we cannot get along with others, be in coordination with others, and be built up together with others.
Brothers and sisters, the vision concerning Christ and the church is not a doctrine; rather, it is God’s central purpose in the universe. By His mercy may all of us who serve the Lord see this vision that in all things we may take Christ as life and live by Christ, so that the church can become our living and our testimony.