God’s intention in the whole universe is to gain a Body for Christ. In the Scriptures this Body is also called a spiritual house and a priesthood (1 Cor. 12:27; 1 Pet. 2:5, 9). These different terms signify that we, the believers, have been regenerated into the Body, and now we need to be tempered together and built up as one Body to fulfill God’s intention. When we come to the matter of serving the Lord, we all need to be very clear that we need the Body, and we need a heavenly vision concerning the Body. May the Lord grant us all such a vision that will bring us into a full realization that we need to be in the reality of the Body, even that we cannot serve without the Body, and, in fact, that we cannot live, we cannot exist spiritually in life, outside the Body. Only by such a heavenly vision of the Body can we be brought into the genuine service of the Lord.
Strictly speaking, in the New Testament the service is not touched clearly and definitely until Romans 12. In this chapter both the words service and serving are used. In Romans 12:1 Paul exhorts us to present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, well-pleasing to God, which is our most reasonable service. In verse 7 he mentions the service, and in verse 11 he speaks of serving the Lord as a slave. It is not until Romans 12 that the matter of service is so definitely revealed to us. From this chapter we can realize that, as Christians, our service to the Lord must be in the Body. The Christian service is not something individual; it is something corporate. The Christian service is something of the Body, in the Body, with the Body, and for the Body.
If we are going to serve the Lord, our service must be in the Body. We are burdened that all of us may be brought into this heavenly vision, the vision that no one can serve the Lord without the Body. All of our service must be in the Body because, as Christians, we all have been regenerated to be members of the Body. Each one of us is one member of the Body. Not one of us is a complete unit, a complete person, a complete being—not one of us alone is the Body. All of us have been re-created, regenerated, to be members of the Body.
The members of our physical body give us an illustration of how much every member needs the Body. It is impossible for the finger to be a complete unit by itself. Likewise, the eyes and the ears are not complete units. Every member needs the body, and every member needs to be attached to the body. The very part of the body we may consider the most beautiful would become terrifying if it were separated from the body. We appreciate the beauty of the human eyes, but if we saw some human eyes outside the body, we would be terrified. If they were detached from the body, not only would their beauty be gone, but their function also would be gone, and they would be useless.
Today there are many dear Christians who should have a genuine beauty in the Body. However, they do not have this beauty simply because they have been detached from the reality of the Body. Due to this one thing, the separation from the reality of the Body, certain members that should be beautiful and useful become terrifying and useless instead. This is the subtle work of the enemy.
God’s intention in the universe is to have a Body. You may use different words to express this one thing—the Body, the house, or the priesthood—but they signify one thing, that we, the regenerated ones, need to be tempered together and built up as one Body. This is God’s intention. If we are going to serve the Lord, we need to be very clear about this one point.
First of all, we need the heavenly vision concerning the Body. In these days may our eyes be opened that we all may be brought into a full realization of our need to be in the reality of the Body. May we realize that we cannot serve without the Body, and that we cannot even have a spiritual life outside the Body. Such a vision will capture us, wreck us, and spoil us for all the individualistic works, for all the independent services. We will be brought into a genuine service by the heavenly vision, by what we see of the Body. We all need to pray that we may see this vision.
For the Christian service, we need the Body, and we need to see the Body. This is the first point we need to cover if we are going to speak about the service. I do believe that a good number among us have seen that there is no way, no base, no foundation, no ground for any one of us to serve the Lord without the Body. We need the Body, and we praise the Lord that we have already been regenerated into the Body. The only thing we need today is the heavenly vision that will cause us to realize that we are already in the Body. We are in the Body, but we are short of the realization. We cannot gain such a realization of the Body by being taught. I do not trust in my teaching, and I do not believe that my teaching will work in this matter. However, I do look to the Lord, the Head of the Body, that He would grant you even a little glimpse, that your eyes would be opened to see the fact that you are in the Body. You are in the Body! When you see this vision, it will seem so foolish that you could have been a Christian for years without realizing that you are in the Body. You have been regenerated into the Body, and by a single glimpse of the vision, you will have the clear realization that you are in the Body.
Some of us immigrated to the United States from other countries and obtained United States citizenship. After we obtained the citizenship, we received congratulations from the President and from a number of government officials. However, we need to celebrate the fact that we are members of the Body much more than we celebrated the fact that we became citizens of the United States. We need to celebrate the “Body-ship,” and rejoice that we have seen the Body and that we are in the Body.
It was a number of years after I was regenerated that I came into the realization that I was in the Body and began to appreciate the “Body-ship.” I was regenerated in 1925, but nearly seventeen years passed before my eyes were opened to see the Body. Between 1940 and 1942 I came into the realization that I was in the Body. For nearly seventeen years I had been a genuine seeking Christian, and I studied, searched, and even researched the Bible. Nevertheless, I did not have the realization that I was in the Body. When I saw the vision of the Body, the whole universe became a new heaven and a new earth to me. I had been in the Body already for some time, but I did not have the realization of the Body. We all need to see the reality that each one of us is a member of the Body. We are in the Body. Once you have seen the vision of the Body, you can never deny that you have seen it, just as once you have seen the city of Los Angeles, you cannot say that you have not seen it. We all need to see the vision of the Body.