The Organic Church II
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Important messages
“You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual
house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
through Jesus Christ.” 1
Peter 2:5
Oh, Supreme Moving Cause
"Who has
cleft a channel for the torrents of rain and a way for the thunderbolt, to
bring rain on a land where no man is, on the desert in which there is no man,
to satisfy the waste and desolate land, and to make the ground sprout with
grass? Job 38:25-27
Synchronized water ballet
Years ago during the
Olympic Games, I walked into the room of someone watching a performance of
synchronized water ballet on TV. Sitting next to him, he expressed to me that
he didn’t like the individual efforts of the various athletes, because they
tended to exalt one person, but he enjoyed the perfect unity of the team
events, such as water ballet. It didn’t take much discernment to see that he
was spiritualizing what he was watching, comparing it to the intentions of
believers to carry out the will of God.
I didn’t respond to
the comment at the time, but that rather poor example gave me much to think
about and I really have meditated over the matter. I would like to share the view
that I have of Christians involved in fulfilling God’s purposes on earth. In
doing so, I am considering Christ’s Church, which He said that He would build
(Mt.16:18) and, according to Paul, Christ would give gifts to men to equip the
saints for the work of the ministry and to build His body (Eph.4:8,12). I will
make use of the same water ballet analogy.
“I will build My Church”
First we must see what
we are dealing with. We are taking into account the Bride, the Body, the Church
of Christ, whom He elected and is preparing for heavenly marriage, after which
she will reign with Him. It is a body, in which each member has been born from
above and has received power from above, in order to function in a heavenly and
supernatural way, preparing himself for eternity. No wonder Jesus said, “I
will build MY church”, in perfect harmony with the inspired Psalmist, who
stated, “Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in
vain.” (Ps.127:1). Men may be very capable of any kind of earthly construction,
but for this work… who is sufficient? Jesus removes any doubt about human
capability, giving it a mortal blow in John 15:5: “Apart from me you
can do nothing.”
Before the discovery
of electricity or any kind of combustion engines were invented, there were
those who knew about motors… the Puritans knew God as the one who empowered and
moved lives, and their prayers, such as the following, express this dependency:
O Supreme Moving Cause,
May I always be subordinate to thee,
be dependent upon thee,
be found in the path where thou dost walk,
and where thy Spirit moves,
take heed of estrangement from thee,
of becoming insensible to thy love.
In these days, I have
repeated stories that I arranged in the last chapter of the book, God
Made the Country, trying to illustrate how members function in the Body
of Christ… about a man in Wisconsin, praying for a church in North Dakota, of
which he knew nothing… about a American soldier in Germany, who I had just met
for the first time, speaking about his home in Wisconsin, in the exact rural
area, where this first man I mentioned lived, and where his father had had
wonderful fellowship with an uncle of mine, who lived there also, before he
died of cancer… about how a man broke through the ice in winter and how his
friends, totally unaware of his danger, spent the night in prayer for him… and
there were other stories.
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| Young Spurgeon |
Now I add one more: On
January 6, 1850, a great snowstorm paralyzed the city of Colchester, England,
and a teenager could not go to Sunday worship in the church that he normally
attended. Near to his house, he entered a Primitive Methodist Church, where a
common layman, not very educated, was substituting for the pastor, giving the
Sunday morning message. His text was Isaiah 45:22… “Look unto me, and be ye
saved, all the ends of the earth.” For months this young man had been
miserable, under a tremendous conviction for his sin. Although he had been
raised in church (both his father and grandfather were preachers), he had no
assurance of salvation.
The layman, as Peter
and John “unlearned and ignorant”, was not a skilled preacher and
therefore repeated the text time and again. He said, “A man doesn’t have to go
to college to look… anybody can look… a child can look!” Then
he gazed directly at this visiting teenager, by himself at one side of the
church, and pointed his finger at him, saying, “Young man, you look miserable. Look
to Jesus Christ!” The young man did look in faith and that is how
the great preacher, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, was converted… not in his own
church, but among believers that he did not know.
A supernatural, spiritual work
Allow me to insert an
allegory: Let’s just suppose that in some part of Europe, God would choose an
individual in Christ to serve in His Body… in this “synchronized ballet” that I
wrote about earlier. He gives that person His Spirit, who is perfectly united
with His purpose, as His personal Coach. This one learns movements never before
demonstrated on earth, which are part of the supernatural, supreme “routine”
for the glory of the Father. That same Spirit incorporates Himself in the
participant to give him the capability to do, what he otherwise could never be
able to perform in a human body. Then, the Spirit is sent to South America to
begin to train another person in the same way, so that this one can coordinate
perfectly with the first person, whom he has never met. By the Spirit, it is
not necessary to bring them together to practice (1 Co.5:4).
A third person
is chosen in North America and that one must go through the same process and
training. In the Far East of Asia, a fourth person enters the school of the
Holy Spirit to carry out divine purposes, and by the thousands from all parts of
the planet, the participants are chosen and trained. Some are in solitary
confinement in prisons, some are in exile on islands; other are among
multitudes, but no one understands them or knows why they are going through so
many rigorous trials.
Once the Spirit-led
training and practices have been completed, the day comes for the performance.
God takes His place on the throne and the participants arrive from all parts of
the world, uniting and synchronizing for His glory in one great event. Beings,
who are more worthy than human beings, observe those who “have obtained an
inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works
all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we… might be to the
praise of his glory… so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God
might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.
This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus
our Lord” (Eph.1:11,12; 3:10-11).
God does as He pleases
The Lord has eternal
plans and all of His works corroborate in order to carry out those purposes and
no other. He does it all through the instruction and power of His Spirit, above
any training or programs that men might try to enforce, joining together in
human effort. In this work of grace, no one may consider himself to be the
teacher or the father; no one is anything more than a brother. One is the
Teacher, Christ, and One is the Father, the heavenly Father (Mt.23:8-9).
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| Ants begin to build their nest |
The brothers, who He
places in His positions, have observed the ant, have learned her ways and have
acquired her wisdom. “Without having any chief, officer, or ruler, she
prepares her bread in summer and gathers her food in harvest” (Pro.6:6-8).
God unites, where there is no captain to order. He takes the individual
efforts, done in the Holy Spirit, without man being aware of it, and unites
them. The result is the same as in the case of the three Hebrew boys: “The
king spoke with them, and among all of them none was found like Daniel,
Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Therefore they stood before the king. And in
every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king inquired of them,
he found them ten times better than all the magicians and enchanters
that were in all his kingdom” (Dn.1:19-20).
I want to point out
that we know well both the Hebrew and the Babylonian names of these young men.
We also know the names of almost all the Psalmists and those who form part of
this great plan of God in the Bible, from the Old Testament, as well as the
New. The one, who surrenders everything to Christ, also gives his name over to
Him, so that God can use it, or not use it, as He sees fit. A proud person can
remain anonymous, but he continues to be proud; a humble person can have his
name publicized and yet he remains humble, just as Jesus, meek and lowly,
though He had a name, which is above every name. It all depends on the
condition of the heart. (please read the note below the article)
God does all for His
own pleasure and receives glory from beings, who are much worthier than men. He
does not need praise or worship, nor does he need the people who offer it.
However, He does receive it all, because He is worthy. There is no celebration,
in which men and angels are involved, that gives created beings more joy and
satisfaction, as there is in giving God that, for which He is worthy. The Lord
rejoices in the pleasure that we receive in giving it.
We see an example in
the woman… the apostle John reveals that it is Mary, the sister of Martha and
Lazarus (Jn.12:3)… who benefitted by giving her all to Christ. She poured out
her expensive perfume and asked nothing in return. She only worshipped, while
her joyful tears fell, and considered it a privilege to give to Jesus the honor
and glory that He deserved. As in the case of Rahab in the Old Testament, she
was given universal, eternal fame: “Truly, I say to you, wherever this
gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in
memory of her" (Mt.26:13).
God is God and He does
whatsoever He pleases. “All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as
nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among
the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, ‘What
have you done?’” (Dn.4:35). What He has done in love for mankind is
revealed in sublime beauty in the gospel, yet it goes far beyond what human
tongues can express. God does unspeakable wonders for men and also, as He
showed to Job, he does wonders unseen by men, working in uninhabited places,
where no one can observe Him. What I am trying to say is that God in no way
subjects himself to the wisdom and knowledge of human beings. He takes pleasure
in all His creation, in plants and animals. The growth of the lowliest grass is
important to Him and He supplies its needs. No one can limit God in any of His
works; no one can corral Him inside the confines of the ideas and understanding
of men.
NOTATION: I want to clarify a certain theme, about which
there might be confusion in the minds of some. I think that it is not correct
to conclude that all Christians should consider themselves “eunuchs”, of which
Jesus spoke in Matthew 19. If you read from verse one to twelve, you will see
that the context has to do with matrimony. The disciples have just commented, "If
such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry."
It is at this point that Christ spoke of a special calling and limited it: "Not
everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given”
(v.10-11). He is speaking of becoming a eunuch in the literal sense of
remaining unmarried. Paul, for example, had this calling, but as we know, Peter
did not. Perhaps we all know some people, who did have the same calling as
Paul, but this is not a rule for all Christians to follow. Every one of
the commentators that I have are in agreement over this issue.
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