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Awaken the Inner Life • Jul 01st 1997

The ONLY WAY To Move Forward In Christ – Authority, Humility & the Church

Eternal Purpose New Testament The Epistles

What is the true nature of the church according to the New Testament? In this profound teaching from the Swiss Conference, Gene Edwards explores Ephesians 1 and the spiritual authority given to the body of Christ—not to institutions, denominations, or individuals seeking power, but to a living local body of believers centered on Jesus Christ Himself.

This message challenges modern ideas about church structure, spiritual ambition, and religious identity. Gene explains that Christ’s authority, dominion, and heavenly position were given to the ecclesia—the gathered body of believers who live in humility, brokenness, love, and dependence on the Holy Spirit.

Drawing deeply from Ephesians 1 and Ephesians 2, this teaching emphasizes that believers have been seated with Christ in heavenly places, not for self-exaltation or spiritual performance, but so that the mercy, grace, and kindness of God might be revealed through the church.

Throughout the message, Gene warns against:

  • seeking spiritual power for personal gain
  • trying to “harness” God through formulas or religious systems
  • institutional control and spiritual elitism
  • replacing Christ-centered life with doctrine-centered identity

Instead, he points listeners back to the simplicity of Christ, genuine fellowship, and the corporate life of the church as the true expression of Jesus on earth.

This teaching is especially meaningful for believers seeking:

  • deeper spiritual reality
  • understanding of the local church
  • New Testament church life
  • Christ-centered fellowship
  • practical insight into Ephesians 1
  • spiritual humility and maturity

Key Scriptures and Themes:

  • Ephesians 1:3
  • Ephesians 1:19–23
  • Ephesians 2:6
  • The body of Christ
  • Spiritual authority
  • Heavenly places in Christ
  • Grace, mercy, and humility
  • Corporate spiritual life

 

Final thoughts – Swiss Conference July 1997 Message #6

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If you will just please see the eyes of God, and not your own, that the Lord back there before, where He was so rich in all these things, and He made these decisions, such as the decision to seat us with Christ in heavenly places above all things, that He did this to simply demonstrate the riches of His mercy and His grace and His love toward you. When you fall on your knees as a body of believers, remember that your motive ought to be that ultimately the riches of the glory of the mercies and the graces of God in Christ Jesus should be displayed to the world through the church. It is to magnify His mercy, His grace, His kind intention that we come to take our place. I’ll say it: that rule and dominion upon this earth belongs to the church of Jesus Christ, just that His grace and mercy might be displayed. May that, and that alone, ever be in our hearts.

Now I’m going to turn around and say to you, brothers and sisters—and I’m talking now to the brothers and sisters in Constance, and we’ll come to this tomorrow—may you be built up in Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus, from time to time, needs a body of believers, a local gathering, through whom to work His will over principalities and powers, and to execute, administer, and dispense His ongoing will, accomplishing His eternal purpose as He goes along. When it’s done, you will say, “Oh, that happened because it was simply according to His desire as He works out His eternal purpose.” And it is a glory to Him who wishes to show His glory and His kindness and His mercy to the ecclesia.

If you did not understand everything I said, it’s not important. The Holy Spirit will prompt you with things that are not words, and you will know. Brothers and sisters, may you become part of a body of believers. May that body of believers be a real breathing experience. May she have an exceeding experiential knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe everything else will take care of itself.

Five people I’m talking to. The churches must together and pray for five woe-begotten Germans, Italians, and Swiss, that the Lord will make these things real in the body of believers who meet in the city where John Hus was burned to ashes. Amen. Do you want to ask anything? You want to talk to me? You want to say anything? Okay, you’re not going to leave here until you’ve divided up again, and you’re going to get together sometime this afternoon, and you’re going to talk about what you’re going to do. You’re going to decide on which part of the Ephesians…

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