The Lord's Move in the Body

These days I have been under the Lord’s speaking in the Full-timers' Training. Point by point, the Lord has been blessing me with His speaking.

“The purpose of migration is to spread the church life as the completion of the Lord's recovery…this includes all the items with all its aspects of what Christ is to His Body”

From Acts 8, 11, and 13, it is evident that the move of the Lord is in the Body. In fact, this began from the very beginning when God created man to multiply and fill the whole earth.

Genesis 1:22

And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth. 

The burden continued in the New restament.

Acts 1:8

But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and unto the uttermost part of the earth. 

This spread continues throughout the New Testament, and throughout the church history, till today. Yet this move is in the Body, with the Body, and for the Body. Two excellent examples of the Lord’s move in the Body are found in Acts.

In Acts 8, the laying of hands by Peter and John on the believers in Samaria were to identify the believers there with the rest of the members of the Body and also brought them into the fellowship and oneness of the Body of Christ. This incident also saved Philip from the danger of his evangelist works from being independent and individualistic, and also saved the churches in Samaria from being different or aloof from the rest of the churches. God was sovereign in allowing only the essential Spirit to fall upon the saints in Samaria and waited for the the economical Spirit to fall only upon the laying of hands of the apostles. By this way, the move of the Lord was preserved in the Body.

Acts 8:14-17

14. Now when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, 15. Who went down and prayed for them so that they might receive the Holy Spirit; 16. For He had not yet fallen upon any of them, but they had only been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. 17. Then they laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit. 

The same case applied to the church in Antioch, a gentile region.

Acts 11:22

And the account concerning them was heard in the ears of the church which was in Jerusalem, and they sent out Barnabas to pass through as far as Antioch, 

In fact, due to the contamination and mixture in the church in Jerusalem because of the strong Judaism background and influence, the Lord even took a new turn from Antioch for His continual move. All the moves were in the Body and for the Body.

Acts 13:1-3

1. Now there were in Antioch, in the local church, prophets and teachers: Barnabas and Simeon, who was called Niger, and Lucius the Cyrenian, and Manaen, the foster brother of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. 2. And as they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, Set apart for Me now Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. 3. Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them, they sent them away.