Re-learning the ABCs (Assembly, Body, Church)

[YP0534]

The so-called vision of the so-called "universal church" is the EXACT problem with the Local Church.
It is also, not coincidentally, the unique fundamental problem of Catholicism and every descendant denomination.
Probably 99% of the independent and free groups as well.

How can there be hierarchy and ambition?
How can there be neglect and abuse of the local saints?
How can there be issues regarding finances spanning the globe?
Indeed, how can there even be the divisions and denominations?

These things ALL exist because of a heretical teaching called "universal church".

Thinking back to the earliest days among the Local Church saints.
My, how wonderful those meetings were!
We still hear the word concerning the glorious meetings at Elden Hall.
Here were a people who were FULLY focused on being absolute for Christ and having nothing BUT Christ in their meetings and He was there.
And they knew all the verses and lots of good practices. He manifests among them regularly, constantly.
They truly have the reality of "the local churches" among them in those days. Christ is there!

What happens?

Well, even at Elden Hall, there's been a creeping problem among them for a long time, each particular issue tracing its roots back to this same source.
The saints pass through all sorts of smaller issues together, all sacrificing their opinions and objections, even all of themselves, toward a larger goal.
I think you see what I mean.
What is that larger goal?
What do they call it? What do they intend it to be?

The Church!

At least at a certain point, Lee decides it's time to expressly focus on the increase. The numbers are too low after too many years.
His focus is on what?

According to his great vision, building up the "universal aspect of The Church," of course!

The elders and co-workers all sign on for this thing. All the saints get very excited, too.
Let's all work to gospelize and truthize first Taiwan, then the US, and then the rest of the world!
We will bring the Lord back because He will have His builded Bride, The Great Universal Church!
Hallelujah! Too GLORIOUS!

But something went wrong.
Nothing got gospelized or truthized.
A lot of activity, some small gains in numbers that don't remain, and right back down to no growth, no increase.

Lee died and things are seriously off kilter among them now.
They've built a seminary and we can perceive grave errors regarding oneness in the Body among them.
The stories come out about all the side effects of these efforts over the years.
The responsible parties cannot even see where they erred and if they do they are unrepentant.
Perhaps not incorrectly, when cornered they take the blood and move on, but they make no adjustments to their course.
The casualties continue to mount and they become even more concerned about uniformity and control of dissent.
If we are not one, we could never have the builded Church!
If you are not one with us, just shut up or get out, preferably both!
We will not look back like Lot's wife to mourn your loss and be under a curse!

How did they come to a place where they could throw the saints themselves under the bus of the Local Church?

They were focused on building up The Church.
They believe that God desires a builded Universal Church.

But what God really wants is only a little builded assembly, here, there and everywhere, where He can be manifest upon the earth.

Surely the Lord desires to see the Body built!
But the way that happens is very simply and practically through the glorious and small meetings of the saints.

The use of this devilish word "universal church" brings up the possibility for ALL the other issues to come in.

And they never STOPPED using this term.
It has been there from the very beginning, from Constantine at least.

The assembly is just(!) a practical manifestation of the very God in the meeting believers.
"The Church" is something of organization and religion that eventually manifests nothing but fallen humanity.

If somewhere lurking in the back of our minds is a concept of a larger purpose, that's just going to frustrate the Lord.
And we are almost genetically predisposed to look for a larger purpose in all that we do.
But the Lord's purpose is a very small purpose, writ large only from a certain, practically meaningless point of view.
Not to say that the BODY is meaningless, of course! But the Body is only manifest because of and in the assembly.
If you want to really know what is the universal Body of Christ, you need to get to know what is the reality of the local assembly.

And the problem with "blending" we can recognize now is that this is a just human-sized version of the Universal Church idea.

I think I may have even seen this vision of the assembly before 20 years ago but the Universal Church idea covered it over in time.

The problem with the elders' letter in 1986 was not precisely that it established a denomination, per se.
The problem is that it manifested their allegiance to the Universal Church notion, this time as expressed by Witness Lee.
Probably the best expression of that doctrine to date, but still fundamentally off and unsound.

The ASSEMBLY is the goal of the Lord's heart's desire.

It is so simple and so clear.


The assembly is the practical manifestation of the very God in the meetings of the believers.
Or, more precisely, the assembly exists wherever there is a meeting of the believers with the practical manifestation of the very God.

Turned around one more way - that kind of meeting is the \ekklesia\ - nothing more and nothing less.

Most of us here can immediately identify with the meetings where the room seemed brighter as God's glory shined upon and among us, but those were the special times. Except that that should be the ordinary experience of our assembling. Just exactly WHO do you think that shining was? Christ is THERE in those meetings. The assembly is the very house of the Living God, you see. This is how we are built together into God's dwelling place. Our job isn't to worry about the universal Body. We have a wonderful Head for that. We just need to focus on our little assembly and make sure He always appears and that we do not run Him off by our foolishness.

When we come together with our individual portions to testify of and share our experiences of Christ in practical oneness as the assembled saints, Christ Himself is manifest among us in the shining glory that can actually be seen by ourselves, any visitors, and even the principalities and rulers in the heavenlies.

I would say it this way: there are lots of Christian meetings in the world, but they are NOT the assembly and mostly cannot be the assembly for a variety of reasons. But to have the assembly really isn't difficult at all and it happens all over the place in small little places and ways all the time. Truly, when two or more are gathered in the right atmosphere, He is there and can be seen in His shining manifestation. The thing is we cannot establish the assembly by means of anything at all. The assembly exists in the practical manifestation of Christ in the gathered believers and in an abiding fashion in those believers who are constantly meeting in little ways all the time. The divisions are bad because they hinder the practical manifestation.

The reason there is no "universal aspect" is because for there to be a Body useful to the Head, there needs to be a "local aspect." The entire purpose of the universe is to have this "local aspect" because that is where you can actually see the very God of the universe manifested on the earth.

The Triune God is going to work to nourish and cherish the assemblies of the believers, or more particularly, the assembly in the particular place, because His purpose in the entire universe is to be manifest in it and through it.

In a sense, we see our small meetings as some pitiful little gathering in an obscure place. But in reality, God has been very satisfied in it because THAT is all He is looking for. He got manifested that day and, as it turns out, it's not so easy for Him to accomplish that. This is the reason we also have to share His burden. He can create the vastness of the universe with billions of galaxies into infinity but He cannot force even two believers to come together in oneness to give expression to Himself. And to be clear, it is NOT merely the gathering of Christians as believers in oneness that is His goal. It is the manifestation of Himself, as we have all seen, which might happen from time to time in gatherings of believers who don't really understand what they are doing and why, but which needs to happen in a continuing way by believers who share God's goal.

Here is the thing: in the Local Church, we took The Church and even the local church as our goal. We knew all the verses. We learned some good practices. We had some revelation. And truly Christ was manifest sometimes. But somehow, none of us ever saw that the practical meetings with the other saints where Christ was manifest as the real and present shining One was what we were actually talking about.

But that's it.

THAT'S what we're talking about.

The assembly is just the meetings where the Shining One visits with us.
Our goal is to figure out how to never have a meeting where He isn't clearly seen.

The ones who meet this way might be referred to as "the assembly" while not assembled but only because they will assemble again.
Ones who no longer assemble could not be referred to as "the assembly," could they?

It's not a club you can join or quit.
It's a living activity.

The incorporeal reality of divinity perceptibly displayed in the gathered redeemed humanity.

Think about that.

Think of the knucklehead atheist professors at the university.

They want to be able to see God before they will believe.
Well, guess what?

That's the plan.

And especially in the early stages ("early" after 2000 years!) it's still somewhat laughable.
But it's not funny.
It's serious and it's real.
Just as real as anything else in the universe.
And they will certainly one day see it.

The builded Body as the One New Man will cast the enemy into the Lake of Fire and remain the manifestation of God in eternity.
And it all started from that one little meeting in Jerusalem where the Lord began building it with Peter and his revelation...