The Glory That Makes The Church as GLORIOUS As GOD Himself

Saints, this is extremely difficult to explain, but it was true, and it will be true that all of God is in every part of God. All of Christ is in every part of Christ, and that’s because there is no measure. I’m going to repeat that. All of Christ is in every part of Christ. All of Christ is in every part of Christ, and all of God is in every part of God. If that were not true, we could not have fellowship with Him. He would be too busy fellowshipping with millions of people and listening to millions of prayers on a switchboard that was totally overloaded. The all of God and the fullness of God is in that part of Christ that He marks off, and He predetermines that this unique part of Christ, unlike any other part of Christ, shall be Christ’s own inheritance. Now, how can Christ inherit Christ? I have no idea, but I just want you to know that God marked off, predestined—they are the same word—He marked off in Christ, He predestined in Christ, and this took place inside of Christ, that Christ—this portion of Christ—be predetermined. And He gave that part of Christ a name. He marked off another, and He marked off another, and He marked off another, and another, and another, but brothers and sisters, when He marked off the individual, He also marked off the ecclesia. I want to drive this home to you, and boy, sometimes I just want to get all the brothers and sisters together and talk about this one thing, because it would profoundly affect the way you meet.

The Christians took a word out of the Greek language called “ecclesia.” Do you understand what that word means? Forget anybody who tells you it’s the called-out ones. I don’t care how many scholars say that. That word was over 200 years old when it came into being, and it had greatly changed since it was called the “called-out ones”. The word meant, in the time of Paul of Tarsus, to assemble.

When Jesus Christ marked out the brothers and sisters in Constance, those who are and those who shall be, those who are and those who shall be, those who are and those who shall be, He marked out the individuals, but He also marked out the entire body. He marked out the bride of that city. He had in mind not an individual, but one person, of whom you are a part. As surely as you are part of Christ, you are part of her. It is important for you to know that you are part of Christ.

In eternity past, at this moment of grand choice, as surely as He called His Son, He calls you forth out of Christ. Marks you off, gives you a name, but He also has in mind something grander. He has in mind a body, and He has in mind a beautiful girl. I am only part of her, and you are only part of her, and this brings us to the matter of things spiritual, things we cannot understand.

Would you please come here, and I will try to illustrate it. Come, brother. Sister, could I have you for just one moment, and I’ll let you go back. Part. No assembly. Come. Would you get right over there beside your hubby? Come, Danielle. Would you just lock arms? Come here. Okay. Is Evelyn here? Regina. Okay. Mike, could you come here for just a minute? Come, Mike, here with your sister there. Take her arm. Yeah, there you go. Gene, yes. Can I make one observation? Yes. There are more than five people. Okay, how many are there? Thank you. Okay, that’s all right. I understand. Thank you, doctor.

Here’s a part. Here’s a part. Here’s a part. Here’s a part, but something very holy has happened. Something unbelievable and incredible. How in the world we ever got off on the thing we call the church today is beyond me. You know what we got back here? We’ve got parts that have been assembled. We have parts that have been assembled, and when you put the parts together, what do you have? A whole. A whole. What is that whole? The body. The body of Christ. But, oh, saints, listen to me. In 1 Corinthians, it says, ” a member is this, and a member is that, a member of this, and you put the members together, and he doesn’t say, and such is the church. Do you know what he says? He says, and such is Christ. You got more than parts, assembled parts. You got parts assembled that make up this part of Christ, and what you have here is an assemblage, literally parts joined, parts assembled. Can you understand that? Parts assembled, presenting Jesus Christ, and that is what happened when Jesus Christ chose these brothers and sisters before the foundation of the world. He chose parts that are to be assembled so that the body of Christ might be seen, and that Jesus Christ Himself is assembled. He can be put back together again.

On this earth, when a people meet in spirit together, the parts become one, and they become Christ. That is a foretaste of what is to come when every part gets together, and that’s going to be some assembly. Praise the Lord. Yeah, clap. Do something. Now, wait a minute. Wait a minute. This is what you have been called to. You are one person, and when you read these glorious things in Ephesians, the early parts, and 2nd Colossians, you are reading your destiny. This is who you used to be, and this is where you’re headed to be, right here on this earth in this town called Constance.

Now, there is nobody… How old is Constance? How old? Guess. Nobody knows? In round numbers, give or take a couple of centuries, 1,000 years. Okay. In 1,000 years, you’re the first people who lived in that city to know this. You’ve got to trust me on this. The only person who ever came to this town who might have understood this…they burned him at the stake.  I am saying to you, I am calling you to your calling, and that is to be that assembly. That means a relationship here that far, far exceeds anything else that anyone else in the city knows. A unity, a oneness, a wholeness, a completeness, an interdependence in everything. But more than that…not more than that, but also…when you come together, that you yourself, you see yourselves as one person, that you move as one person, that you act as one person. Do you think you understand a little bit now? Is this wonderful? Is this wonderful? It’s nothing compared to what you’re going to hear. Praise the Lord. Thank you. Sit down, brothers and sisters.

Let’s read it again. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ, just as He has chosen you in Constance in Him. This is a plural you, not in Colossae, but in Constance. He has chosen you in Him before the foundations of the world. You are here by Calvinistic, predetermined, predestined predestination. You were predestined as a people to be in Colossae together as one. You are predestined to be here in this city together. It is your destiny. Just as sure as it is, all these little things that happen on Clybourne Street—a bunch of kids passing out tracts, a bunch of kids getting saved, a bunch of kids sitting together with the guitars, singing together, a bunch of kids listening to Alex telling them they have to pray three hours a day. You Puerto Ricans in Chicago were pre-ordained, predetermined, and predestined to be ecclesia, the assembly of God in Chicago. It is your destiny.

It is the destiny of every believer. Don’t pass up your destiny, brother. Daniel, why are you here? An Italian. Yes. When did your…do you know when your people came to Switzerland? This was like 30 years ago. 30 years ago. It was predetermined by God, for your sake.

Spidell, where were you born? Tübingen? When did you come here? You were predetermined to be here, brother. There were people in Colossae who weren’t born in Colossae, but they were there, and when they found Jesus Christ, they were fulfilling a predetermination. Well, now, Gene, does this mean you are a Calvinist? No, it means I have read chapter 1 of Ephesians.

My goodness, I think maybe we’d better go to Colossae for a moment. I think we’d better sit down in Philemon’s home. Are you with me? You know, brother, all you need is faith and inner eyes. Thank you, Daniel. Let us just look at these people. If the pattern is typical, let’s say there are 50 people in there. I don’t think there are a hundred. The town’s too small. If there are 50 people in that room, five can read, and probably one can write. Oh, a third to half of them are slaves, and another third of them used to be. One or two merchants. Praise the Lord. Epaphras probably led one or two Jews to the Lord. Maybe three or four. They would be the ones most apt—the Greeks and the Jews would be the ones most apt—to read. The rest of them live on nine cents a day, work from daylight to dark, and crawl into their hovels. As I told you, many of them crawl into doorways, and many crawl into tents. Some of them work outside the town, in the villas. The villas are built outside of the town because it stinks. The town stinks so terribly. That’s first-century Christianity. Reality.