The messages in this book should be considered as lessons of a training. We have a training in addition to the church meetings because in the past we learned that most believers who attend a church meeting only listen to the message and do not practice it. We should take the lessons presented here, put them into practice, and have further study. Then we will gain the real profit.
In the previous chapter we considered the way to grow in a simple but practical way. First, we must love the Lord. In order to grow in the Lord, we can never neglect our love toward the Lord. If there is no love, there is no growth in life. Second, we must make a thorough confession. Along with our real love toward the Lord, our conscience needs to be exercised. We have to confess all our failures, weaknesses, and trespasses to make a thorough clearance of the past before the Lord. Third, we need to exercise our spirit, and fourth, we need to always contact the Lord.
If we read the New Testament carefully, we can see that the real growth in life eventually brings us to the point that we are built together with others. Growth in life is for building. As we have pointed out concerning the spiritual life, we first have birth, then growth, and finally maturity. Maturity in life is practically equivalent to building. If we are not built together with others as a corporate Body, we will never arrive at the maturity of life; we will be more or less childish in certain aspects. Regardless of how much we may consider ourselves to be mature, we will not actually be mature, because real maturity equals building. Whether or not we are mature depends on one thing-the building.
In the Gospels the Lord Jesus Himself clearly mentioned building (Matt. 16:18). In the Epistles, the apostle Paul was very strong concerning the building. However, I am sorry to say that many Christians today study the book of Ephesians, and many teachers use the things in Ephesians, but it is hard to find one that speaks about the building in this book. The building is the ultimate point of Ephesians.
Without the building, how can we have the church life? How can we have the church in a practical way, and where is the church? We may have many building materials, but this does not mean that we have the building. Many people argue that as long as we are Christians, we are the church. However, we cannot say that as long as there are materials, there is a house. We may have only a pile of materials, but that is not the building. We still have to deal with the materials in order to build them together. The meeting hall we are in has many materials, but the materials are built up, not piled up. In the same way, the church is not a “lumber yard”; it is a building.
A large group of Christians may only be the piled up materials. This is why I have stressed many times that to meet together is one thing, but to have the building is another. We may meet year after year and still be a meeting, not a building. Strictly speaking, if we are not a building, we are not a church in practice; we are only a church in name with meetings. We do not have the reality of the church, because the reality of the church is the building. We cannot say that since we have many pieces of good, wonderful, beautiful materials, we have a building, a house. No, the house is something that is built up with the materials.
At this time we are speaking much about the church life. I have to testify to you in fellowship that if it were not for the church life, there would be no need for us to meet together. If it were not for the church, I would say that you should go to whichever so-called Christian “body” you think is good. There is no need for us to come together to meet if we do not intend to have the church life. Why are we coming together here? Why among so many so-called Christian churches, groups, and meetings today, do we meet in this way? If it is not for the purpose of having the church life, there is no reason for us to have this kind of meeting. We had better go back to those so-called churches. However, we realize that the present testimony of the Lord is the recovery of the church life. The church life is the only goal, the only reason, for us to meet together.
We further need to realize that if we are not built up, we cannot have the church life; we will have the church in term only, not in practice. The church life in practice depends on the building, and the building depends on the growth. I say again, therefore, that if there is no growth, there is no possibility for the building up of the church. We need to grow.
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