Ohio Independent Baptist, February 1968

The Church by 8. F. Cate Tallmadge, Ohio D Hl B DY AR "For one, and hath man m mb r , and all the members f that one body being many, are ne b d : al o i hri t. Now ye are the bod of Chri t, and member in particular." (I Car. 12: 12, 27) A per on and hi body are one and the a.me thing. Therefore, wherever ou find the body of Christ you find Chri t. 11his i true whether the re– ference is to His universal body, as een in I Car. 12: 12, or His local body as seen in I Car. 12:27. If we belong to Chri t we are Christ - Abraham's SEED (Ga,l. 3:29a, 16). God said to Abraham, "In thy SEED shall all the nations of the earth be b!essed" (Gen. 22 : 18). We, in Christ, are that seed, and the niaJtion oan only be blessed as we, the seed , go to them with the mes– sage of salvation. If we are in Christ (saved) we are in His body - the un.ivernal church (Eph. 2:10, 15, 16). Verse 16 shows t!iat all who are reconciled to God are in His body. Note: (1) Who is reconciled? "Both" Jews and Gentiles . (2) Unto whom are they reconciled? "Unto God." This is salvation. (3) Where are they reconciled? "In one body." See verses 10, 15. (4) How are they reconciled? "By the cross." This shows that all who have been reconciled unto God by the cross are in His body - the church. This body of necessity must be a universal body because it includes all Jews and Gentiles wbo have 1been ireconciled to God by the dea,th of Chrisit on the cross. When Christians suffer it is Christ (His body) suffering (Acts 9:4; Col. 1 :24). CHRIST'S BODY AND HIS CHURCH ARE THE SAME "Who now rejoice in my sufforing for you, and fill up that which is be– hind of the afflic~ions of Christ in my fie h for his body's sake, whioh is the church:" (Col. 1: 24). ince Paul was suffer,ing on behalf of Christ "for His body's sake, which FEBRUARY, 1968 PAGE 4 i ,the church ," he must have been suffering for the universal church of Chri t. Otherwi e, he would have only been uffering for those in Christ w!-io had united with the local church. Since Christ, Hi body and His church are one and the same thing, addi ng to Chriist (Acts 5:14) and adding to His church (Aots 2:41 , 47) are one -and the sa,me ithing. This, it eems .to me, is abundaillt:ly clear from what we have seen and from the record of the early church. "Then they tbat gladly received hi word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about 3,000 soul ." (Aots 2:41) "And the Lord added to the church daily. .." (Ac·ts 2 :47) "And believers wer,e the more added ,to the Lord..." (Acts 5: 14) In all three of these venses the word added is used. T.he believers were added to e10se who were al– ready believers. They were added to the church. And they were added to bhe Lord. Rev. 8. F. Cate As we have already seen, Christ is one body and believe.rs are the member in Chri t's body. 'there– fore, ito be added to the members of Christ's body is to be added to Chri st. H is ju t that simple. And , of course, rto be added to Christ's body is to be added to His church . (CQI. 1:24) Jt i believed by many that 000 avcd on the day of Pentec were added tio a local church. B where wa thi looal ohurch locate The Bible does not say they we added to the church a,t J erusale To ay that the local church was t 120 won't work either because th were all from GaliJee (Acts 2: and no doubt the majoriity of th returned home after the day of P tecost. Consider for a moment w kind of ,a local ohurch that wo have been if the 3000 saved on t day of Penteco t would have join t,he 120 as a local church. The 1 were from Galilee and the 3000 w from many paflts of Palestine a many foreign counitries. To say t they all belonged ,to one 1ocal chur is stretching the word local a lit out of proportion, to say the lea But to say the 3000 were added the Lord's people, which is His bo i in keeping with Rom. 12:5; I 12 : 12 ; Gal. 3 :29a, 16; and Col. 1 : When that great crowd of sa people left Jerusalem after the d of Pentecost, no doubt they form looal churches in their respective calities. And ,those left in Jerus,al became the church in Jerusalem. CHRIST'S CHURCH AND HIS FLOCK ARE THE SAME "Take !'ieed therefore unto yo1 selves, and to all the flock, over which the Holy Ghost haith made Y. overseers, to feed the church of G which he hath purchased with own blood." (Act 20:28) Other Scriptures show that t flock and the church ar,e tJhe san There is one universal flock (co posed of Jews and Gentiles) w one shepherd (John 10:16; I P. 5:4). Christ is that shepherd. There is one univer al church so composed of Jews and Gentilf with one head (Eph . 1 :22, 23; 2: 16). Christ is that head. Notice thait both the flock the church 1 are made up of Jews a Gentiles, thus showing that the fl<i and the church are one and the s thing. Thi flock, or church, is brol down into many flocks (many chilli e ) wi1th many shepherds (I Pet. 4). Christ is the chief Shepherd o the one flock; ,the elders are the der shepherds over the many floo Chni t is pastor of the unive1 churoh, but He ,performs His pasto dutie .t!-irough Hi pastors of churches. The under hepherd of flocks are working under order f the chief Shepherd . THE OHIO INDEPENDENT BAP