Deeper Life #204

That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.

—Ephesians 5:27

OUR LORD IS GOD’S TRUTH incarnate, God’s ideal in the flesh. God gave His final revelation in Christ and then set processes at work to make His ideal a reality in the lives of many more people—in the character of Christians, who are His truth incorporated in flesh and blood.

You see, in pursuits such as art, music, and literature, the ideal is a great vague end toward which all the artisans evolve their work more or less blindly. But in spiritual pursuits, we have the ideal manifested in flesh and blood; and we can measure certainly our growing up into Him in all things (Ephesians 4:12–13).

Being “in Christ” does not mean that somehow God pretends we are all right. It means that we are recreated by the Spirit of God, in regeneration and the mighty baptism with the Holy Spirit. In this way that glorious Spirit-baptized community is created, which is often called “the church.”

I believe, however, that such a usage of the term church is a misleading limitation of our Lord’s meaning. When He refers to the church in Matthew 16:18, for instance, we would be much nearer His meaning if we translated ekklçsia as “my new humanity,” against which death and time have no power.

Being “in Christ” means proclaiming, by my bodily life, what is easily discerned to be the life of Jesus. It means that I am undeserving of censure before God. It means that I am part of an innumerable host of the ekklçsia, the new people in Christ (Ephesians 5:25–27).

Prayer Thought: Jesus, I am determined to live each day in Your fullness.

SUGGESTED READING: ²⁵Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; ²⁶That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, ²⁷That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. ²⁸So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. ²⁹For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church: ³⁰For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. ³¹For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. ³²This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church. ³³Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband.

—Ephesians 5:25–33