JANUARY 30TH, 1896

JANUARY 30TH, 1896

It is, I think, clear that the church is viewed in two lights — as identified with Christ in the presence of the Father (all of one), He being Firstborn of many brethren, and as the vessel in which God sets forth the riches of His grace; and I think it is in this latter line that the thought of the body and the bride comes in. The church is Christ’s fulness, and the vessel (in Him) in which God shows the exceeding riches of His grace. Jew and gentile are reconciled to God in one body, but they are also one new man created in Christ Jesus. Christianity, as in the thought of God, becomes increasingly wonderful to me, and I can fully echo the thought that one is only in the infancy of it. Had it been maintained according to God, what a wonderful thing it would have been in the world! Certainly it was wiser on the part of the enemy to corrupt rather than to oppose it.