Perfection of the Body of Christ

Jesus Christ, the Head of the Church is perfect and He desires His Body to be perfect, fully grown up, mature, complete and lacking in nothing.

I believe before a perfect Church can be materialised there are two areas of perfection we need to look into - perfection in ministries and Christian's personal perfection. We have discussed the last one in my last posting (25th. July 2005).

Perfection in Christian ministries to others

As I mentioned in my previous posting one of the objectives of Paul's ministries is to "present every man perfect in Christ Jesus".

Paul was speaking about the revelation of the mystery of God to the saints:

"To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus" (Col. 1:27,28, NKJV, emphasis added).

In other words, there are three related ministries used by Paul in his plan to "present every man perfect in Christ Jesus". These are preaching (proclaiming) Christ, warning (admonishing or counselling) and teaching of Scriptures. These are the basic three ministries of the Word.

Now, let us see what Paul said about Epaphras:

"Epaphras, who is one of you, a bondservant of Christ, greets you, always laboring fervently for you in prayers, that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God" (Col. 4:12, emphasis added).

If we put the above two passages of Scripture in Colossians together the four basic ministries for the perfection of every Christian believer are - Preaching, counselling, teaching and prayers. Therefore, the most basic activities/programs of any Local Church must include these four basic ministries!

Perfection of Christ's Body

Jesus said, ".... and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it" (Matthew 16:18).

Clearly, the builder of the Church is Jesus and He is the Architect who supplies the perfect blue-print for the building of His Church. He uses human materials. The fact is, the best architect can give the best blue-print but very often it is difficult to find the right type of human materials for the New Testament Church. Any Bible teacher can write about "Purpose Driven Church" or "Purpose Driven Life", the fact remains that good materials make a good and strong Church. But, inferior materials make a weak and inferior Church. In other words, godly believers make a true Church and ungodly believers make an ungodly church. Homosexual believers make a "harlot" church. Christ's Church is only as good as the believers who are the Body.

I believe this is the reason why God's first emphasis is on the character of the believers. Paul understood God's way and he began Chapter 4 of Ephesians with the primary emphasis on believers' character:

Paul said, "I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Ephe. 4:1,2,3, NKJV).

In other words, those who are called (chosen) by God as Christian believers must at all times walk with the right character - in humility, meekness, unselfishness, gentleness and mildness. Be patient with one another and making allowances for one another's faults because of the agape love for one another. Do the best to ensure walking in unity and harmony and in peace in the power of the Holy Spirit.

The Church Building Ministry

Let us look closely at the first 16 verses of Ephesians 4 which I believe, lay the basic principles and purposes of the Church building ministry.

Verses 1 and 2 describe the basic character requirments of Christians with emphasis on humility - "lowliness and gentleness". It is interesting to note that Paul also emphasized on the humility of Jesus as an example in verses 9 and 10, "Now this, 'He ascended' - what does it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all thing". Notice that these two verses are in parentheses, signifying additional phases included in the original language.

The principle of humility was given by Jesus Himself, "For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted" (Luke 14:12).

Peter said, "Yes, all of you be submissive to one another, and be clothed with humility, ..." (1 Peter 5:5).

Solomon said, "... And before honor is humility" (Proverbs 15:33). In fact this was precisely what Paul said about Jesus in Philippians 2:5 to 11. He was exalted because He humbled Himself first, not only because He is the Son of God.

Verses 4, 5 and 6 are the 7 basic unities of the Church. Believers are united as one because there is one Body, one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and one Father of all.

Verses 7, 8 and 11 are the diversity of Christ's gifts to men. These are the so-called five-fold ministry gifts - apostles, prophets, evangelists pastors (shepherds) and teachers. Notice that unity comes first before diversity. In these ministry gifts Christ gave Himself back to His Church by the Holy Spirit according to His will. In other words, what makes a man a pastor is not Seminary training, is not Bible School graduation or because he wants to be a pastor. It is because Christ the perfect Shepherd is in that man. For without Him a self-appointed pastor can do nothing. The truth is that many Christians fail to understand that Christ is the perfect embodiment in all the mininstry gifts - He is the perfect apostle, perfect prophet, evangelist, perfect pastor and perfect teacher.

Verses 12, 13 and 14 give us the functions and goals for which these ministries are set in the Church. Notice that these ministries are needed until all Christian believers (all the existing denominations) come into the unity of faith and full knowledge (and full acknowlegement) of Christ. Until the Church becomes a "perfect man" with the fullness of Christ.

In my opinion, the Chuch has a long way to grow into a "perfect man". Therefore we still need all these ministries. Many Local Churches have no apostles and prophets and the leadership assume that the days of the apostles and prophets are over - a very sad situation! The outcome of this ignorance is, members of the congregation "are like chrildren, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting" (Eph. 4:14). Is our Lord, Jesus Christ coming back for the Church under this condition?

Verses 15 and 16 give us the climax to the Church building process. The spiritual truth is, there is no competition in the Body of Christ. The whole Body "joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love" (verse 16).

In other words, the Church is never in a static condition. Every member of the Body does his part according to the measure of Christ's gift to enable a progressive growth into a climax - a perfect Bride for Christ!