The Unity of the Church of God, an Address
Table of Contents
The Unity of the Church of God: Part 4
Part 4
That raises a point on the negative side of this question. Suppose one is not entitled to a letter of commendation. Such a case comes before us at Corinth. The Corinthians were exhorted to put away from among them "that wicked person.”
About ten miles away at the seaside was a little port town called Cenchrea (where Phebe lived about which we have just been speaking). In obedience to the apostle's exhortation in the 5th chapter of 1 Corinthians, they had put away a man living in sin; they had cleared themselves by putting him out. Suppose he had taken a stroll of ten miles down to Cenchrea. He might say, "Well, they put me out here, I think I will go down to Cenchrea; there is a church there," and so he goes down and breaks bread there. That shows the necessity of these letters. What a breach of the unity of the Spirit such a thing would have been. The folly and inconsistency of it is apparent on the face of it. Such cannot be of God.
“Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit." This unity is not a unity man-formed; it is the unity of the Spirit. The Spirit of God has a unity down here. What are its limits? Most of us here have heard it said that the unity of the Spirit is that oneness into which the Spirit of God leads us according to the truth of God. I believe, brethren, that that is right. The Spirit has a unity, but it is limited by the truth of God.
In the 2nd of the Acts, you read that the disciples in the beginning "continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers.”
What was the apostles' fellowship? It was that which was established on the ground of the truth of the apostles' doctrine. That was the fellowship owned at Jerusalem, based upon the truth of the Word of God; and the only fellowship that can have the sanction of the Spirit of God is the fellowship according to the Word of God.
We have been speaking at length of this unity of the Church as established by God, but the Spirit of God anticipated the fact that that unity would be broken.
If I had come to Chicago today after nineteen hundred years of the Church's, history on earth, and found all believers going on happily together, all meeting together, all of one mind, we could just take this book and say to the man preaching from it, your book isn't true; I can't trust that book. Why can't you? Because that book says that this testimony would go all to pieces, and that this unity would be broken, and that men were going to arise speaking perverse things, and draw away disciples after them; that there would be evil men, trouble makers, defilers and antichrists who would work havoc in the outward unity of that Church here on earth, but here you are going on after nineteen hundred years.
No! the enemy got in his work; it has come to pass as was prophesied over and over again. Paul lived to see it. Before he was beheaded, he bowed his head in sorrow and wrote, "All they which are in Asia be turned away from me." He lived to see the unity broken. It grieved his heart that the saints were not going on in that unity established by the Spirit of God.
Now the question arises, does the fact that men were to arise and draw away disciples after them, does that negative the fact that the unity still exists-render the unity powerless-non-existant? Has that unity completely disappeared? Is there no unity left that we can keep?
When we read the 4th of Ephesians, it still reads as it read the day Paul penned it, "There is one body," and it also reads as it read then, "endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bonds of peace.”
The obligation and privilege lies before you and me today, just as real and precious as it did when those words were penned, that we too may recognize that there is one body, and it is our privilege and our obligation to endeavor to keep that unity.
That necessarily is going to mean separation. Separation is a word people do not like, but God's Word all down through the dealings of God with man has insisted upon it; it is not peculiar to Christianity; to be in the mind of God has always involved a path of separation. Back in the days of Jeremiah, 15th chapter, 16th verse, we read:
“Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and Thy Word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart; for I am called by Thy name, O LORD GOD of hosts.”
Note this for a moment; here is a soul in communion with God. "Thy words were found and I did eat them." Feeding upon the Word of God; it is sweet to him; the name of God is precious to his soul. He is rejoicing in the fact that that name had been placed upon him.
That state of soul is followed further on in the chapter by a path of action; 19th verse:
“Therefore thus saith the LORD, If thou return, then will I bring thee again, and thou shalt stand before Me: and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as My mouth; let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them.”
That man, feeding upon the Word of God, and going on in communion with God, receives the power of discernment in divine things; and beloved, to discern the path of godly separation, is dependent upon state of soul. That is exemplified beautifully in this case of Jeremiah.
“Then shalt thou stand before Me: and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as My mouth.”
(To Be Continued)
The Unity of the Church of God.: Part 5
Part 5.
In the 1St of Philippians we read, "increasing in the full knowledge of God," we are enabled to distinguish the things that differ. That is only found and had by going on in communion with God, seeking His mind as revealed in His Word. Discerning the path of separation is dependent upon a state of soul.
Look at Mal. 3. Malachi was written at a time when the returned remnant of Judah who came back under Ezra and Nehemiah had fallen into confusion and sin and worldliness; they were even saying, as we see in the 1St chapter and the 7th verse:
“Ye offer polluted bread upon Mine altar; and ye say, Wherein have we polluted Thee? In that ye say, The table of the Lord is contemptible." And further down in the 12Th verse.
“But ye have profaned it in that ye say, The table of the Lord is polluted; and the fruit thereof, even His meat is contemptible.”
They had sunk so low that they even despised the table of the Lord. That was the condition in which the returned remnant found themselves at the time Malachi prophesied.
Now in the 3rd chapter, notice this precious little remnant:
“Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another; and the Lord hearkened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon His name. And they shall be Mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up My jewels; and I will spare them as a man spareth his own son that serveth him. Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God, and him that serveth Him not.”
It takes state of soul to be able to discern what is of God and what is of man. No question but that the great bulk of those in Malachi's day despised that little remnant; they were small and weak, but what characterized them was, that they feared the Lord and thought upon His name. When the Lord Jesus was born into this world that little remnant were not surprised. They were still going on, a poor remnant, but when the Lord was born in Bethlehem, and when He was presented in Jerusalem in the temple as a little babe, you will find the remnant knew about it. They had that discernment that came from going on with the mind of God.
Dear friends, is this worth while? is it worth while in a day of confusion and brokenness to try to find the mind of God?
In closing I want to call your attention to a scripture in the 28th of Job, 7th verse:
“There is a path which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture's eye hath not seen: The lion's whelps have not trodden it, nor the fierce lion passed by it." Job 28:7, 8.
There is that path, no fowl knows it; the keenest eye or intelligence cannot see it. The vulture (unclean bird) cannot find it-discern it-and the fierce lion doesn't know it. Strength and energy of nature can never find it. Look down at the end of the chapter, 23rd verse:
“God understandeth the way thereof, and He knoweth the place thereof. For He looketh to the ends of the earth, and seeth under the whole heaven; To make the weight for the winds; and He weigheth the waters by measure. When He made a decree for the rain, and a way for the lightning of the thunder: Then did He see it, and declare it; He prepared it, yea, and seached it out. And unto man He said, Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding." Job 28:23-28. There is the secret of discerning that pathway.
Most of you here this afternoon are younger folks. Some of us who are older, have the greater part of the journey behind us. With you, if our Lord tarries, and you are spared, the greater part of your journey lies ahead. Your life is going to be seriously affected by what value, or lack of it, you place on the line of truth we are having this afternoon: the truth of Christ and the Church. Are you going to drift with the tide? fall in and resign yourself to a path of denial of the precious truth revealed in connection with the Church of God?
Dear young people, let me exhort you in closing, it is worth the sacrifice, worth real effort and purpose of heart to get the mind of Christ as to that path through the confusion of christendom. There is that path; there must be that path. God wouldn't leave us without a path through. The 6th of Jeremiah tells us how to find that path; 16th verse:
“Thus saith the Lord, stand ye in the way, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls." Jer. 6:16.
Young Christian, notice that verse; don't forget it. Memorize it now, where it is in your Bible, so that if I ask you at the close, where is that last verse we read, you can tell me,-Jer. 6:16,
“Ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.”
There is a path through the confusion. The Church is dear to the heart of Christ; the truth never changes.
“Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today and forever." Heb. 13:8.
One of these days we are going to hear that assembling shout, and we are going to find ourselves in His presence, and how glad we will be,-how thankful we shall be-that we sought to walk in that path of separation; that we were in the secret of Christ; that we had the mind of Christ; that we sought with a pure heart, a sincere heart, to find that path that pleased Him. It is worth while dear young soul. It has its difficulties. It is a trying path in many ways, but it has compensation; remember that. I can say for one, that I sought, through God's grace, to find that pathway, for over thirty years. I want to tell you, I have never regretted for five minutes that I sought grace to go on in it. I thank Him for it, for His keeping power, and I need it for the rest of the journey; and we all need it. Who knows that before we come together again as we are here, if another year rolls by and we come together again, who knows how many of us may have missed the path, been thrown into confusion, drawn away from that precious place: Christ the Center in the midst of the two or three gathered to His blessed name.
"Head of the Church, Thy body,
O Christ, the great Salvation!
Sweet to the saints It is to think
Of all Thine exaltation!
All power's to Thee committed,
All power on earth, in heaven;
To Thee a name
Of widest fame
Above all glory's given.
With Thee, believers raised, In
Thee on high are seated;
All guilty once,
But cleared by Thee;
Redemption-toil's completed.
And when Thou, Lord and Savior,
Shalt come again in glory,
There, by Thy side,
Thy spotless bride
Shall crown the wondrous story.
At length-the final kingdom
No bound, no end possessing;
When heaven and earth,-
God all in all
Shall fill with largest blessing.
All root of evil banished,
No breath of sin to wither,
On earth-on high-
Naught else but joy,
And blissful peace forever!”
(Concluded)
The Unity of the Church of God: Part 2
Part 2
Why, here is a peculiar thing: on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended and baptized a hundred and twenty immediately into one body. After this, persecution arises and the Church is scattered from Jerusalem. One of the evangelists, Philip, goes to Samaria, a distance of perhaps thirty miles from Jerusalem, and starts to preach the gospel and many get saved. Why don't they get the Holy Spirit the way those at Jerusalem did on the day of Pentecost? There must be a reason; there was a reason.
God, from the very beginning, had been very jealous that there should be no schism or division in this Church which had been established here to the honor and glory of Christ. Read a verse in 1 Cor. 12:25,
“That there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another.”
That is God's ideal, and all the splendid energy of the Spirit of God is directed towards maintaining the unity of that testimony here below.
Why was not the Holy Spirit given immediately after these believers accepted Christ? Because hundreds of years before there had come in an estrangement between Samaria and Jerusalem. That is brought out in the 4th of John's gospel when the woman is surprised that the Lord Jesus being a jew, will have any dealings with her. It was an age-old feud, a bitter one too.
Suppose Philip had gone down to Samaria and preached and they had received the Holy Spirit totally independent of the work begun in Jerusalem; how natural it would have been for them to have risen up and said, "We now have a Samaritan Church; you at Jerusalem have a Jewish Church." The old feud, the old time bitterness would still be there. No; the Spirit of God is going to see to that. You can see how careful the Spirit of God was from the very beginning, to guard against division. That should be instructive to us in seeking to maintain the unity of the Spirit in this day of confusion that exists in the house of God.
So Peter and John go down from Jerusalem and lend their sanction to the work of God. They lay their hands on those believers and in response to that, they receive the Holy Ghost, and the moment they received the Holy Ghost they were just as much members of the one body as the one hundred and twenty that received Him on the glorious day of Pentecost. They were not second-rate. They had all the dignity and privileges of that original group. Was there now a Samaritan Church and a Jerusalem Church? No; they are all related; bound together by that same bond; baptized into one body by the Spirit of God.
If, afterward, there should arise a time when the Samaritans would seek to establish their independence, and say, God gave us the Holy Spirit the same as He did Jerusalem, they would have to acknowledge that God didn't give them the Holy Spirit until the apostles from Jerusalem came down and laid their hands on them.
Supposing the Church in Jerusalem should arise in its dignity and should attempt to disown this Samaritan Church because of the old feud that existed, those prejudices that were so deep-rooted? They couldn't do that, because Peter and John could say, "No, you can't disown them, because when we put our hands on them, immediately God put His sanction on them in filling them with the Holy Ghost." All that antagonism was gone and gone forever; what a unity to swallow up an old hatred, an old feud that had been ripening down through the ages. In one moment it was all gone, and wiped out by the indwelling power of the Spirit of God.
In the next chapter we find a chosen instrument, the apostle Paul is converted-is brought to God. When presenting his apostleship in Galatians, he says,
“For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
So he had, yet there is one thing Paul could never say, and that is that he got into fellowship of the Church of God independent of all human instrumentality. Though greatest of all apostles, and greatest of all the servants that God had in the dispensation, in the ways of God, he had to come into fellowship of the Church of God on earth just like any other believer. Through the humble ministry of a simple child of God, he had to be introduced into that which already existed before he was ever converted. We see that in the following,
“And there was a certain disciple in Damascus, named Ananias; and to him said the Lord in a vision, Ananias. And he said, Behold, I am here, Lord. And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the street which is called Straight, and inquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth, and hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hand on him, that he might receive his sight.”
“And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost. And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales: and he received sight forthwith, and arose, and was baptized. And when he had received meat, he was strengthened. Then was Saul certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus." Chapter 9:10-12, 17-19.
Why did not God give Saul of Tarsus the Holy Spirit the moment Christ struck him down on the way to Damascus? He appeared to him in that marvelous glory cloud, smiting him to the earth and converting his dark heart and letting the light stream in, showing him his condition and causing him to own the Lordship of Christ. Why didn't God finish the work? God has His own ways. God was mindful of the fact that this man, though he was to be the greatest of all servants, needed to have brought home to his own soul in a practical way the unity of the Church of God here on earth.
We are to endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit. God was giving what we might call laboratory lessons; demonstrations of what the unity of the Spirit is. Saul must learn that others were there before him, and he is linked with what already existed through the ministry of a simple humble disciple of whom we know nothing, other than the fact that God picked him up and used him to introduce Saul of Tarsus.
Having thus come into what already existed, he finds himself in fellowship with the disciples of that place. He identifies himself with what God had previously done by His Spirit in that city of Damascus.
(To be continued)
The Unity of the Church of God: Part 3
Part 3
Not long after this we find Saul down at Jerusalem. When he gets there he tries to join himself to the disciples (Acts 9:26).
“And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself to the disciples; but they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in the way, and that He had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the Name of Jesus. And he was with them coming in and going out at Jerusalem.”
They were under no obligations to receive him in Jerusalem on his own testimony. They could reject him and be justified in doing so. But dear old Barnabas, well known to them, takes Saul and brings him to the saints, and says, "Brethren, you don't understand," and then he told them how God had wondrously converted this man, and how he had been used of God in preaching the gospel around Damascus; then the brethren most happily received him. Paul, as he is now called, is getting some demonstrations of the practical working out of the unity of the Church of God.
In the next chapter we find a new epoch in the history of the Church. Up to this time we have had the Jews at Jerusalem, and the Samaritans who were a kind of hybrid Jew. These latter maintained the Jewish religion; they went by the Septuagint, the five books of Moses, and they were proud of it too. They were not Gentiles, but when we come to the next chapter, we find a man of the name of Cornelius living by the seaside in a town called Caesarea. God had been working in his soul. The Word of God calls him a "devout man"; he had not heard the gospel, but he longed to know more; and may I just make this remark in passing: there is never a hungering heart anywhere on the face of the earth-one who longs to know more of God-but what God is going to meet that soul. If there is any real soul hunger in your heart to know the truth of God, and to know more of the things of God, according to the mind of God, God knows the desire is there and He is going to see to it that it is met, and He will meet it abundantly. It matters not if it be a heathen Chinese on the continent of 500,000,000, if the heart yearns for the knowledge of the truth as to God and His claims, He will send someone there to meet it.
Here is a man; there is already a work begun in his soul, but he needs to know something yet. God tells him to send to Joppa and there he would find a man called Peter who would tell him what he wanted to know. Why did not God finish the work apart from any human instrument? Was He dependent upon Peter? Not at all. But this man was a Gentile, and up to this moment there was no Gentile in the Church of God; they had not come in thus far.
In the 16th of Matthew our Lord had given to Peter the administrative "keys of the kingdom of heaven." Not one key; at least two, for it is, plural-"keys"; Perhaps he gave him three. He uses one in the second of the Acts when he points out to the Jews the way of salvation, and opens the door for them to come into the Church of God. In the 8th of the Acts Peter is one of those who laid his hands on the Samaritans, and they received the Holy Ghost. Now, he has use for the third key. He goes up to Caesarea, perhaps thirty miles from where he was staying at Joppa, and preaches the gospel there to Cornelius and those he had gathered into his house. When they hear the gospel from the lips of Peter, the whole company find themselves indwelt by the Spirit of God, and Peter, in response to that act, immediately orders them to be baptized, and they, too, are received into the fellowship of the body of Christ.
Now see what we have! We have Jews, Samaritans, Gentiles, all united in that body, and how careful the Spirit of God has been that it shall all be done in a consistent manner. If the Jews tried to raise objection to the Gentiles coming in, God had already seen to that. He knew that objection would arise, and when Peter is challenged as he returns to Jerusalem, as to having admitted the Gentiles into all the privileges of the house of God, he replies with dignity and fearlessness,
“This thing is of God, and beware, lest ye be found fighting against God. What could we do? God had received them; we must receive them.”
Peter's testimony is accepted. Now the questions are all nicely adjusted, and you have the Church formed of Jews and Gentiles going on in unity here below! How wonderful! how blessed that is!
After we have the unity established, now the practical responsibility lies at the door of the saints to maintain that unity. It wasn't left as a haphazard kind of affair-not just a free-for-all. There is divine order in maintaining that unity.
If you look at Acts 18:24, 28, there is another object lesson:
“And a certain Jew named Apollos, born at Alexandria, an eloquent man, and mighty in the Scriptures, came to Ephesus. This man was instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in the Spirit, he spake and taught diligently the things of the Lord, knowing only the baptism of John. And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue: whom when Acquila and Priscilla had heard, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly. And when he was disposed to pass into Achaia, the brethren wrote, exhorting the disciples to receive him: who, when he was come, helped them much which had believed through grace: for he mightily convinced the Jews, and that publicly, showing by the Scriptures that Jesus was Christ.”
There is a practical object lesson in maintaining the unity of the Spirit.
Here is a man mighty in the Scriptures; he is an eloquent, gifted man, but he couldn't walk into a company of saints unknown, unannounced and just begin to minister on his own recommendation. He may be a great man, and he may be able to go to Achaia and tell those simple ones a lot of things, but before he goes he finds it necessary and orderly that he carry with him a commendation from the brethren where he was at Ephesus.
Why does the Spirit of God put these things in the Word? That we, upon whom the end of the ages are come, might learn from the Word what is the mind of God as to these practical questions. There is nothing too small for God to take note of that has to do with the welfare of the Church of God. It is very dear to His heart. As we learn more of the Church of God, its preciousness to Christ, we are learning that which will put us in tune with the mind of God.
Take another example in the 16th of Romans-a woman going from Cenchrea to Rome. It is a long journey so the apostle writes a letter for her:
“I commend unto you Phebe, our sister, which is a servant of the Church which is at Cenchrea: that ye receive her in the Lord, as becometh saints, and that ye assist her in whatsoever business she hath need of you: for she hath been a succorer of many, and of myself also.”
She came from Cenchrea, going to Rome: the saints do not know her, so she goes in possession of a letter signed by the apostle and other brethren giving witness to her faithfulness, and her services in the Church of God. So as she came in among the saints at Rome, she not only came in, introduced as one entitled to fellowship among them, but as one valuable in the Church of God-helpful-a succorer of many, etc. That shows, does it not, how anxious the Spirit of God was that that unity He established should be thus maintained? So the need for letters of commendation.
“Do we begin again to commend ourselves? or need we as some others, epistles of commendation to you, or letters of commendation from you?" 2 Cor. 3:1.
That shows, does it not, that it was the custom at that time for believers passing from one assembly to another, to carry with them letters of commendation?
(To Be Continued)
The Unity Of The Church Of God An Address: Part 1
Part 1.
“And hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be the head over all things to the Church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all." Eph. 1:22, 23.
“There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling." Eph. 4:4.
Whence came that Church? It must be a wonderful Church if He is Head of it, and it is His body. What was its origin? The only place we learn about these things is in the Word of God. Suppose we read a well-known verse in the 16th of Matthew:
“Upon this rock I will build My Church.”
Here is something that must be very precious to Christ, because it is "My Church", and He says, "I will build it." If it is His, and He is the builder, surely He has all right, authority and title as to all that concerns that Church;-"My Church.”
In Matt. 18:20 there is a little verse that links on with this, "For where two or three are gathered together in My Name, there am I in the midst of them.”
This Church is so precious to Christ; it is His; He is Head of it, that He, Himself, as it were, takes personal charge of it: "there am I in the midst." If the Church only realized that that blessed One is there, claiming that position, the Head of the Church, the One in their midst, how that ought to inspire us with reverence and awe-all that concerns the welfare and destiny of Christ's Church in this world. That Church means much to God, whether it means anything to you or not. It means much to Christ, though perhaps there might be those here, to whom it means nothing.
There is a verse in Eph. 3:21, "Unto Him be glory in the Church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.”
All that accrues to God in the nature of glory at this present time, is wrapped up with the interests and welfare and destiny of that Church. I wonder if you ever stopped to think how much the Church means to God. We cannot think rightly in divine things at all if the Church has no part in our thinking.
“Head of the Church which is His body." He is the builder; He brought it into existence; it belongs to Him.
Perhaps it would be well to see historically when this Church began. Evidently it did not exist in Matt. 16, for He did not say, "I am building" but "I will build." It was still a future thing. If we look at the first of the Acts it will bring us closer to its genesis.
“And being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith He, ye have heard of Me" (1:4).
There is a promise He makes-a very important promise-a physical promise. How much hinges on that promise. Look at the next chapter, and we will see that promise fulfilled,
“And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance" (2:1-4).
There, beloved brethren, as is well-known to most of us here, is the beginning of that thing that Christ announced in the 16th of Matthew-"My Church.”
There were perhaps one hundred and twenty in that upper room; most of them had believed on the Lord Jesus Christ for some time; they knew Him and loved Him, but they were not members of the body of Christ. There was not that union with Him in the power of the Holy Spirit that is so familiar to us now; just a hundred and twenty believers. Suddenly there came down from heaven that promise of the Father, that Spirit of God, instantaneously uniting them into one body. That was a union never to be dissolved-a unity formed for eternity. That act which took place there in the 2nd of Acts, abides forever.
If we turn to 1 Cor. 12:13, we find these words: "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.”
From the 2nd of the Acts on, we have in existence the Church of God, but up to this time we find the material is Jewish. God has in mind to baptize both Jews and Gentiles into one body. God is not going to be satisfied that His Church be composed only of Jews. They were the ones who had the oracles of God and the promises of the Old Testament, but now the vine is going to run over the wall. God is going to blast that middle wall, and bring both into the best place that His own divine wisdom and divine counsels could bring into being. He is going to bring Jews and Gentiles into one body, uniting them to a glorified Christ, giving them a heavenly destiny and a heavenly calling. Up to this time the material is Jewish. Turn to the 8th of the Acts, and you will find the thing broadening out.
“Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and preached Christ unto them" (ver. 5).
“But when they believed Philip preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God, and the Name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women" (ver. 12).
“Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the Word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John, who, when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost: (for as yet He was fallen upon none of them: only they were baptized in the Name of the Lord Jesus). Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit" (vers. 14-17).
(To Be Continued)