THERE was certainly an assembly or congregation in the wilderness, as mentioned by Stephen. Acts vii. 38; but this congregation or assembly in the wilderness was the nation, or the national assembly of Israel—fleshly Israel. It consisted of the fleshly descendants of Abraham, as described in the language of God to Abraham, “Those born in thy house,” or the Jews. This congregation or assembly, the nation of Israel, or the Jews, was not the church, or body of Christ, but, as a body, it rejected Christ, persecuted him and instigated putting him to death, persecuted his followers and the church he established. Those of whom the church on Pentecost was composed came out of that old persecuting church, abandoned it and “were added to them”—to the apostles and the one hundred and twenty brethren—the new church—the one the Lord said (Matt. xvi. 18), “I will build.” “On this rock I will build my church”—the “one new man” (Eph. ii. 15), “to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace.” “Man” here is used figuratively, and stands for church, and one new man is one new church. It is not the perpetuation of an old church, Adamic, Abrahamic, Mosaic or any other, but to build one new church was what the Lord intended and accomplished.
The matter now is, not to be a descendant of Abel, nor of Abraham, nor Jacob, or Israel; nor to be of any particular line of flesh and blood, but to be born again—born from above, born of God. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh; that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” This new church has a new basis of membership, not in the flesh but in the Spirit, not in being born in the family of Abraham, but in the family of God, not in the first birth, but the second birth, not in a birth of the flesh, but a birth of the Spirit, not founded in natural generation, but in regeneration, not children of God by blood, but “all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.”
This church in which we are “all the children of God by faith in Christ”—by virtue of a new creation, a birth of water and of the Spirit, is not the one in the wilderness, nor any other church, congregation or assembly found before Pentecost, but it is the one the Lord said, “I will build,” but which was not built when the Lord said this; the one new man, or new church which the Lord made of the twain, or the two, the Jews and the Gentiles. This is the “one body” into which all were immersed in the time of the apostles—the body of Christ—the “temple of God,” in which God and Christ and the Holy Spirit dwell. To be “in Christ” is to be in this one body, to be “in the kingdom of God,” “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” to be in union with the Father and with the Son, with the whole family in heaven and on earth. To be in this one body brings us to all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. This is the body or the church that Jesus loved, and for which he gave himself, that “he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word”—“the church of the living God, the pillar and support of the truth.” It is “the building of God,” established “according to his eternal purpose” to “the intent” that “to the principalities and powers in heavenly places may be made known by the church the manifold wisdom of God.” See Eph. iii. 10.