the mystery that has been kept hidden
for ages and generations,
but is now disclosed to the saints.
To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles
To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles
the glorious riches of this mystery,
which is Christ in you,
the hope of glory. Colossians 1:26-27
And let me make it quite clear when Christians say the
Christ-life is in them, they do not mean simply something mental or moral. When
they speak of being 'in Christ' or of Christ being 'in them', this is not
simply a way of saying that they are thinking about Christ or copying Him. They
mean that Christ is actually operating through them; that the whole mass of
Christians are the physical organism through which Christ acts—that we are His
fingers and muscles, the cells of His body. And perhaps that explains one or
two things. It explains why this new life is spread not only by purely mental
acts like belief, but by bodily acts like baptism and Holy Communion. It is not
merely the spreading of an idea; it is more like evolution—a biological or
superbiological fact. There is no good trying to be more spiritual than God.
God never meant man to be a purely spiritual creature. That is why He uses
material things like bread and wine to put the new life into us. We may think
this rather crude and unspiritual. God does not: He invented eating. He likes
matter. He invented it.
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