(Extracts from Correspondence, slightly altered.)
I meet with others on the principle of “One body and one Spirit.” We “endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace,” and we seek thus to be in the “fellowship of the Holy Ghost” who maintains the unity of the body of Christ. Consequently, we find ourselves apart from those who are not in this blessed path, even though they may be perfectly sound in doctrine and godly in life, but who are, perhaps, unwittingly associated with a party which has for its principle neutrality and indifference to Christ’s glory.
We meet on a ground wide enough to embrace every member of His body to the exclusion of none. If those who come are knowingly in connection or association with that which cares not for His truth and glory, it would exclude them from fellowship at the Lord’s table. If they are unwittingly mixed up with it, I should be glad to meet with them, but I should feel bound to tell them the ground we take with reference to Christ, and the position they occupy in reference to Christ. This would leave it on their own responsibility to be with us or against us. We could not return to them, while we are told “Let them return to thee.”
Consequently, I could not join with them in Gospel work, because they have not God’s end in view. God’s end is not salvation merely, but that His people should be on earth a living witness for Christ in His rejection and absence with other members of His body, walking in unity and peace. The Church of God is the witness on earth that God is light, God is love, and God is one. The Holy Ghost on earth answers to and reveals Christ on high. He is the Holy and the True; the Holy Ghost is the Spirit of Holiness and the Spirit of Truth.
One member cannot be said to represent the body, or to be the body, because he eats of the one loaf. If he comes together in any place to eat the Lord’s Supper, according to God’s mind, with other members of the body of Christ, they would be collectively a true expression of Christ’s body on earth in that place. A number of members of Christ may be together and not in the unity of the Spirit at all (as I doubt not is often the case). It is not that Christ does not sustain them as members of His body, but they may be together on independent ground, or linked with the wide spread (and widening) principle of neutrality to Christ. The Holy Ghost, consequently, would be hindered, and though much that is true, as open ministry and the like, be owned in principle, I could not own it as an assembly of God, because Scripture would not recognize it. There is but “one Spirit,” and if I am seeking with others to maintain the unity of the Spirit, there can be no antagonistic principle which I could own.
The Holy Ghost has not left God’s house (now “a great house,” or Christendom), although many corruptions are there; while at the same time Scripture does not own the claims put forward by many in it to be an assembly of God.
The Book of Ezra gives the account of the return of a remnant from Babylon to a divine position and city. They did not pretend to the former greatness without that which would answer to those pretensions, but they sought to walk in faithfulness before God with an empty temple—no Urim and Thummim—no Ark of the Covenant—no glory; but God’s Spirit with them (Hag. 2:55According to the word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not. (Haggai 2:5)), and separation from all that was contrary to Him, characterizing their course. (See Ezra 1:5-9; 4:15Then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests, and the Levites, with all them whose spirit God had raised, to go up to build the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem. 6And all they that were about them strengthened their hands with vessels of silver, with gold, with goods, and with beasts, and with precious things, beside all that was willingly offered. 7Also Cyrus the king brought forth the vessels of the house of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had brought forth out of Jerusalem, and had put them in the house of his gods; 8Even those did Cyrus king of Persia bring forth by the hand of Mithredath the treasurer, and numbered them unto Sheshbazzar, the prince of Judah. 9And this is the number of them: thirty chargers of gold, a thousand chargers of silver, nine and twenty knives, (Ezra 1:5‑9)
1Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity builded the temple unto the Lord God of Israel; (Ezra 4:1); and 10:1-9.)
Analogously there is now a remnant separated to God from the corruptions around—back on divine ground before Him, pretending to nothing but to be together in the fellowship of His Spirit on earth, and waiting for Christ’s return. They are glad to give the right hand of fellowship to every member of His body who desires to walk in the truth with them in like separation from all that is evil around.
I believe it is a day when we must gird up our loins through His grace, and fix our eye upon Christ alone; we shall then be able to judge of what is due to Him, and not form our judgment by looking at our brethren. We shall be able, then, through His grace to escape the master-corruptions of the day—the enemy’s imitation of the true—the principle of Jannes and Jambres withstanding Moses by a counterfeit.
As to ——’s question—The expression “One body” is used with reference to all the saints upon earth at any given time. “Ye are the body,” to Corinth, as the assembly in that place; i.e., on the ground and principle of their gathering together they were the” body; a most important passage. It shows that the assembly anywhere is ever on the ground and principle of the body. Those who now meet in one place and partake of one loaf on this principle are no more the body of Christ at that moment than at any other time. But they have faith in the truth of it, as seen in their practice, which others who talk of it without practice do not seem to have. The former can show their faith by thee works—the only way in which such can be done.
The “body” is not used to express union with Christ in any passage that I am aware of. The body is united to Christ by the Holy Ghost. Those who are together in the practice of this truth are “endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” The Holy Ghost constitutes the unity of the body. They are walking in the fellowship of the Holy Ghost—a Divine Person who will not bend His ways to us—we must bend our ways in the truth to Him. People suppose that because they are members of Christ they must consequently have the practice of such a truth. We cannot have the practice of it (although absolutely of it) unless in the unity of the Spirit, and with those who have been there before us; it is impossible to have it avowedly apart from such. The effort is to take divine principles apart from their practice. Scripture is too strong for this.
The Lord lead all our hearts into that love of the truth, and love in the truth, and for the truth’s sake, that we may be enabled to escape the vortex into which so many are falling!