Scripture Reading: John 15:4-5; Rom. 12:4-5; 8:4; 1 Cor. 6:17; 12:12-13, 27; Phil. 3:10
Ⅰ
We enter into the reality of the Body of Christ by living in the organic union with Christ—John 15:4-5; 1 Cor. 1:30; Rom. 12:4-5:
A
The relationship that God desires to have with man is that He and man be grafted together and thus become one in an organic union—6:3-5:
１
God desires that the divine life and the human life be joined together to become one life; this oneness is an organic union, a union in life—a grafted life—vv. 3-5; 11:17-24.
２
To believe into Christ is to receive Him as the divine life into us that we may have an organic union with Him in the divine life—John 3:15; 15:4-5.
B
Romans 12 speaks of the Body from the angle of the organic union, from the uniting life, from a life that unites us together, not only with Christ but with all the other members of Christ—vv. 4-5:
１
The focus, the center, of the Christian life is the Body, which is the high point of God's revelation and the ultimate item of God's continual working—1 Cor. 12:12, 27; Eph. 1:22-23; 4:4, 12, 16; 5:23, 30; Col. 2:19.
２
We are one Body in Christ, having an organic union with Him—Rom. 12:4-5:
ａ
In Christ always implies the fact of being organically one with Christ.
ｂ
This union makes us one in life with Christ and with all the other members of His Body.
ｃ
The Body is not an organization or a society but is altogether an organism produced by the union in life that we have with Christ—1 Cor. 6:17; 12:27.
３
To be properly organic in the Body is to be organically united with Christ—Rom. 12:4-5:
ａ
The Body is something that is held together in the organic union with Christ.
ｂ
The actuality of the Body is the remaining in the organic union with Christ—John 15:4-5.
Ⅱ
We live in the reality of the Body of Christ by living in the mingled Spirit—Rom. 8:4; 1 Cor. 6:17:
A
God's unique purpose is to mingle Himself with us so that He becomes our life, our nature, and our content, and we become His expression—John 14:20; 15:4-5; Eph. 3:16-21; 4:4-6.
B
The Body of Christ is the enlargement of Christ, the God-man, the One who is the mingling of God and man—Luke 1:31-35; Eph. 1:22-23; 4:16:
１
We need to understand the Body of Christ from the perspective of the mingling of God and man—1 Cor. 6:17.
２
In the Gospels the mingling of God and man produced the Head; in Acts the enlargement of the mingling of God and man produced the Body of Christ—Eph. 1:22-23; 4:15-16.
３
The processed and consummated Triune God mingles Himself with His chosen people in their humanity, and the mingling is the genuine oneness of the Body of Christ—v. 3; John 17:21-23.
４
The church as the Body of Christ is a group of people who allow God to be mingled with them and who are mingled with God—Eph. 3:16-21.
５
The reality of the Body of Christ is a living by the God-men, who are united, mingled, and constituted together with God by the mingling of humanity with divinity and divinity with humanity—4:1-6, 15-16.
C
The Body of Christ is absolutely a matter in the mingled spirit; thus, to be in the reality of the Body of Christ is to live in the mingled spirit—Rom. 8:4; 12:4-5; 1 Cor. 6:17; 12:12-13, 27; Eph. 2:22; 4:16, 23:
１
The union of God and man is a union of the two spirits, the Spirit of God and the spirit of man (1 Cor. 2:11-16); the union of these two spirits is the deepest mystery in the Bible.
２
The focus of God's economy is the mingled spirit, the divine Spirit mingled with the human spirit; whatever God intends to do or accomplish is related to this focus—Eph. 3:9, 5; 1:17; 2:22; 4:23; 5:18; 6:18.
３
The implications of 1 Corinthians 6:17 are marvelous and far-reaching.
４
To be one spirit with the Lord implies that we are in Him and that He is in us—John 15:4-5.
５
We and He have been organically mingled, blended, to become one in life; we and Christ are one wonderful, living entity—1 Cor. 12:12.
６
The divine Spirit and the human spirit are mingled as one within us so that we can live the life of a God-man, a life that is God yet man and man yet God; this is the reality of the Body of Christ—Gal. 2:20; Phil. 1:19-21a.
Ⅲ
The reality of the Body of Christ is a corporate living of conformity to the death of Christ—3:10; Rom. 12:4-5; 1 Cor. 12:12-13, 27:
A
To be conformed to Christ's death is to take Christ's death as a mold—Phil. 3:10:
１
The mold of Christ's death refers to Christ's experience of continually putting to death His human life that He might live by the life of the Father—John 6:57; 5:19; 4:34; 5:30; 7:18; 17:4.
２
The life of Jesus is a model for us, and we should be the mass reproduction of this model—1 Pet. 2:21; Rom. 8:29.
３
Our life should be conformed to the mold of Christ's death by our dying daily to our human life to live the divine life—Luke 9:23; John 12:25-26.
B
In order to be in the reality of the Body of Christ, we need to be conformed to the death of Christ through the cross—Phil. 3:10:
１
The cross—the death of Christ—is the centrality and universality of our way to live the Christian life in order to fulfill God's purpose.
２
In our experience the turning point in living a life with Christ is the cross.
３
As Christ's continuation, we should live a crucified life every day—1 Cor. 15:31; 2 Cor. 4:10-11.
C
Such a life of dying to ourselves and living to God is for Christ, the first God-man, to be formed in His many members, the many God-men, for the building up of His organic Body—Gal. 4:19; Eph. 4:12, 16.
D
We must be those who live a crucified life by continually taking Christ's death as the mold of our life; it is only by this kind of corporate living that we can have the reality of the Body of Christ—Phil. 3:10; Rom. 12:5; 1 Cor. 2:2; 12:27.