The Living Head

And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

Ephesians 1:22-23

The Church is a living organism, a body, and we all belong to it, equally with one another. If three Christians meet together one afternoon, and one is a Baptist, one is a Methodist, and one is a Presbyterian, you would still have the church. The church exists entirely apart from denomination distinction. There, for that moment and that purpose, is the body of Christ. Where two or three are gathered together, Jesus said, there I am in the midst (Matthew 18:20). That is the body.

But a body also involves a unified authority; that is, there is a government in our body and there is a government in the church. In the body, all of the members are under the single directions from the head. The overall direction, the unifying authority of the body, is the mind, the brain; and that is why nothing really takes place in our body without the authority and the order of the head. So it is with the church. I've often illustrated it this way: If you accidentally put your finger on a hot stove, the finger feels the heat in a sense, but all it really does is transmit a message up to the head, and the message travels right up your arm and up the nerves to the brain. And when it gets up there it says, It is hot down here! Now the finger just stays right there, it never moves, even though it is hot, until the message comes flying back from the brain that says, Well, get out of there!, and then you move, so that the whole control of the body is vested in the head.

This is very essential to remember because it is so eminently true of the church. The church is not a headless body left here to struggle on through this world. If it were, it would behave exactly like a chicken with its head cut off — aimless, flopping about, doing nothing; but it is not. It may appear to do that sometimes, but it is not. It is under direction of a living head, who is present, who is united to the body, who is perfectly able to express himself through it and direct its activities, and he is doing it. And that head of course, is the Lord Jesus, operating through the body by means of the Holy Spirit who dwells within.

Lord, we would be lost without your authority over the church. Thank you for guiding us.