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"The unity of the Spirit is that oneness into which the Spirit of God leads us according to the truth of God." (page 20)
Eph. 4:4—"There is one body." That was not always true, but it is true now. It was true when Paul wrote it 1900 years ago, and it is true tonight. "There is one body."
We are accustomed to thinking in terms of what exists today. It is difficult, for instance, for those in the audience here tonight to think of a time when there was no such thing as the Dominion of Canada. It is hard to force your mind back to think of a time when such a great country was unknown-when it did not exist. And yet there was such a time. Now, we are living in a day when we are very familiar with the truth that there is an institution here on this earth called the Church. "There is one body." That was not always true. Some of you remember your history that you learned in high school, and you read a lot about a man called Julius Caesar, about his Gallic wars, crossing the Rubicon, and coming into Rome. Well, when those things were going on this truth of the church was not yet true. It came into existence at a certain time and under certain conditions, and since then things have been entirely different to what they were before.
You get the first announcement of this truth in Matt. 16. On a certain occasion our Lord Jesus Christ said to Peter, "Upon this rock I will build My church." Now that is the first announcement in the Word of God of the coming into being of what the Lord Jesus was pleased to call His church. "I will build My church." Not, "I have built it," nor "I am building it," but "I will build it." You find it announced also, not so specifically, but in principle, in John's Gospel, John 10:16. It does not say, "There is," but "There shall be, one flock and one shepherd." Now John 11:49-52: "He should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad." There you get anticipation again but, in what we are starting with tonight in Eph. 4, it is not anticipation, it is realization—"There is one body." Evidently then, something must have transpired in between. In Matthew and in John we read the announcement of something that is to be, and in Ephesians we read that the thing is, and that is what we want to trace tonight.
The idea that I am to go on alone is all wrong. There are two things we are to maintain—the apostles' doctrine, and the apostles' fellowship, and the two go together. They are twins, and one is based on the other. That path is kept open for us by the grace of God until our Lord shall come, and if any of us ever listen to the insinuations of the evil one and leave that path and strike out alone, we do not have the sanction of the Word of God nor the Spirit of God. Brethren, we are to go on with those that call on the Lord out of a pure heart—that means out of an honest and sincere heart. We are to go on with them, not apart from them. There is no such thing as a path for the child of God apart from his brethren. We are to go on with our brethren—with those that call on the Lord out of a pure heart. "For where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them."