Church Membership
l[Eph. 4:4-5]---'There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism.' What St. Paul here calls the body we call the Church. What is the Church? It is the whole body of Christian people everywhere. In the fullest sense it takes in all Christian people that have ever lived, though most of them have been dead and forgotten for hundreds of years. It takes in all Christian people that are now living in every land on the face of the earth, speaking all manner of languages, worshipping God through Christ with all manner of differences. Unlike as they may be in the eyes of men, before God they are all one body, bearing the one name of His only begotten Son. This is a great thought---one that may well lift up the heart of every single Christian. Poor or weak or despised as he may be, he is an equal citizen of the mighty heavenly commonwealth; he is a member of Christ's own Body. ' We being many are one body in Christ and every one members one of another,' says Paul in Rom. xii. He repeats the same more strongly in 1 Cor. xii., as in these words: ' As the body is one, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.' ' Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.' And so all through the chapter. But St. Paul's doctrine on this subject may be seen best in his Epistle to the Ephesians, from which the text is taken, and which is all more or less written about the Church, even where the word itself does not appear. All through it he strives to make us understand that we, many though we be, are one body, filled with one Spirit, and that the true life which God gives us is one which we share together. If once the true feeling of being members of one body took possession of our religion, what a change it would make in the spirit of our every-day lives! Not only would it make us happier and better men, because it would give strength and purity to our religion---that of course is true---but much more than that is true. Think how all our dealings with each other would be changed, if we kept steadily before our minds that all our neighbors are members of Christ's Body like ourselves. Think of the things which hold us apart from each other now. Think how we are jealous of this man because he has got something which we have not, how we hate another because perhaps he has done us once some trifling harm, and how perhaps we hate all his family for his sake. Think how often we look on most those around us as rivals, almost as enemies, against whom we fancy ourselves obliged to keep up a struggle. Think how we secretly rejoice in the misfortune or mortifications of others, how ready we are to think the worst when their conduct is in question, how slow to put in a kindly word or lend a helping hand, unless it be for some particular friend. We know the temptations, to all these things. How natural it is to indulge in them. These temptations would remain still, would still trouble us and distract us. But how much easier it would be to resist them if we could learn to drown all our favorite reasons for separation in the one feeling that we are all alike members of the same Church, bound to forgive and forget, bound to help and cherish, bound, in one word, to love. In Christ, timothy. maranatha
Issue Oriented Discussion Newsletter
Index | Search This Site | The Latter Rain | Babylon the Great | The Kingdom | The Nicolaitans | Jezebel
As One Body
Help To Prepare A Holy Bride!
The Baptism With the Holy Ghost | The Grand Delusion | World Trade Org | Alphabetical Index