God's Purpose for His Church
Chapter 1

God's Purpose for His Church

The church is God's appointed agency for the salvation of men. It was
organized for service, and its mission is to carry the gospel to the
world. From the beginning it has been God's plan that through His
church shall be reflected to the world His fullness and His sufficiency.
The members of the church, those whom He has called out of
darkness into His marvelous light, are to show forth His glory. The
church is the repository of the riches of the grace of Christ; and
through the church will eventually be made manifest, even to "the
principalities and powers in heavenly places," the final and full display
of the love of God. Ephesians 3:10.

Many and wonderful are the promises recorded in the Scriptures
regarding the church. "Mine house shall be called an house of prayer
for all people." Isaiah 56:7. "I will make them and the places round
about My hill a blessing; and I will cause the shower to come down in
his season;

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there shall be showers of blessing." "And I will raise up for them a
plant of renown, and they shall be no more consumed with hunger in
the land, neither bear the shame of the heathen any more. Thus shall
they know that I the Lord their God am with them, and that they,
even the house of Israel, are My people, saith the Lord God. And ye
My flock, the flock of My pasture, are men, and I am your God, saith
the Lord God." Ezekiel 34:26, 29-31.
"Ye are My witnesses, saith the Lord, and My servant whom I have
chosen: that ye may know and believe Me, and understand that I am
He: before Me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after
Me. I, even I, am the Lord; and beside Me there is no Saviour. I have
declared, and have saved, and I have showed, when there was no
strange god among you: therefore ye are My witnesses." "I the Lord
have called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and will
keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of
the Gentiles; to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from
the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house."
Isaiah 43:10-12; 42:6, 7.

"In an acceptable time have I heard thee, and in a day of salvation
have I helped thee: and I will preserve thee, and give thee for a
covenant of the people, to establish the earth, to cause to inherit the
desolate heritages; that thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth; to
them that are in darkness, Show yourselves. They shall feed in the
ways, and their pastures shall be in all high places. They shall not
hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun smite them: for

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He that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of
water shall He guide them. And I will make all My mountains a way,
and My highways shall be exalted. . . .
"Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; and break forth into
singing, O mountains: for the Lord hath comforted His people, and
will have mercy upon His afflicted. But Zion said, The Lord hath
forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me. Can a woman forget
her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of
her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I
have graven thee upon the palms of My hands; thy walls are
continually before Me." Isaiah 49:8-16.

The church is God's fortress. His city of refuge, which He holds in a
revolted world. Any betrayal of the church is treachery to Him who
has bought mankind with the blood of His only-begotten Son. From the
beginning, faithful souls have constituted the church on earth. In
every age the Lord has had His watchmen, who have borne a faithful
testimony to the generation in which they lived. These sentinels gave
the message of warning; and when they were called to lay off their
armor, others took up the work. God brought these witnesses into
covenant relation with Himself, uniting the church on earth with the
church in heaven. He has sent forth His angels to minister to His
church, and the gates of hell have not been able to prevail against His
people.

Through centuries of persecution, conflict, and darkness, God has
sustained His church. Not one cloud has fallen upon it that He has not
prepared for; not one opposing

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force has risen to counterwork His work, that He has not foreseen.
All has taken place as He predicted. He has not left His church
forsaken, but has traced in prophetic declarations what would occur,
and that which His Spirit inspired the prophets to foretell has been
brought about. All His purposes will be fulfilled. His law is linked with
His throne, and no power of evil can destroy it. Truth is inspired and
guarded by God; and it will triumph over all opposition.
During ages of spiritual darkness the church of God has been as a city
set on a hill. From age to age, through successive generations, the
pure doctrines of heaven have been unfolding within its borders.
Enfeebled and defective as it may appear, the church is the one object
upon which God bestows in a special sense His supreme regard. It is
the theater of His grace, in which He delights to reveal His power to
transform hearts.

"Whereunto," asked Christ, "shall we liken the kingdom of God? or
with what comparison shall we compare it?" Mark 4:30. He could not
employ the kingdoms of the world as a similitude. In society He found
nothing with which to compare it. Earthly kingdoms rule by the
ascendancy of physical power; but from Christ's kingdom every
carnal weapon, every instrument of coercion, is banished. This
kingdom is to uplift and ennoble humanity. God's church is the court
of Holy life, filled with varied gifts and endowed with the Holy Spirit.
The members are to find their happiness in the happiness of those
whom they help and bless.

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Wonderful is the work which the Lord designs to accomplish through
His church, that His name may be glorified. A picture of this work is
given in Ezekiel's vision of the river of healing: "These waters issue
out toward the east country, and go down into the desert, and go into
the sea: which being brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be
healed. And it shall come to pass, that everything that liveth, which
moveth, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live: . . . and by the
river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow
all trees for meat, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit
thereof be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to his
months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and
the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine."
Ezekiel 47:8-12.

From the beginning God has wrought through His people to bring
blessing to the world. To the ancient Egyptian nation God made
Joseph a fountain of life. Through the integrity of Joseph the life of
that whole people was preserved. Through Daniel God saved the life
of all the wise men of Babylon. And these deliverances are as object
lessons; they illustrate the spiritual blessings offered to the world
through connection with the God whom Joseph and Daniel worshiped.
Everyone in whose heart Christ abides, everyone who will show forth
His love to the world, is a worker together with God for the blessing
of humanity. As he receives from the Saviour grace to impart to
others, from his whole being flows forth the tide of spiritual life.

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God chose Israel to reveal His character to men. He desired them to
be as wells of salvation in the world. To them were committed the
oracles of heaven, the revelation of God's will. In the early days of
Israel the nations of the world, through corrupt practices, had lost the
knowledge of God. They had once known Him; but because "they
glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in
their imaginations, . . . their foolish heart was darkened." Romans
1:21. Yet in His mercy God did not blot them out of existence. He
purposed to give them an opportunity of again becoming acquainted
with Him through His chosen people. Through the teachings of the
sacrificial service, Christ was to be uplifted before all nations, and all
who would look to Him should live. Christ was the foundation of the
Jewish economy. The whole system of types and symbols was a
compacted prophecy of the gospel, a presentation in which were
bound up the promises of redemption.

But the people of Israel lost sight of their high privileges as God's
representatives. They forgot God and failed to fulfill their holy
mission. The blessings they received brought no blessing to the world.
All their advantages they appropriated for their own glorification.
They shut themselves away from the world in order to escape
temptation. The restrictions that God had placed upon their
association with idolaters as a means of preventing them from
conforming to the practices of the heathen, they used to build up a
wall of separation between themselves and all other nations. They

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robbed God of the service He required of them, and they robbed their
fellow men of religious guidance and a holy example.
Priests and rulers became fixed in a rut of ceremonialism. They were
satisfied with a legal religion, and it was impossible for them to give to
others the living truths of heaven. They thought their own
righteousness all-sufficient, and did not desire that a new element
should be brought into their religion. The good will of God to men they
did not accept as something apart from themselves, but connected it
with their own merit because of their good works. The faith that
works by love and purifies the soul could find no place for union with
the religion of the Pharisees, made up of ceremonies and the
injunctions of men.

Of Israel God declared: "I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a
right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a
strange vine unto Me?" Jeremiah 2:21. "Israel is an empty vine, he
bringeth forth fruit unto himself." Hosea 10:1. "And now, O
inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt
Me and My vineyard. What could have been done more to My
vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it
should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?

"And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to My vineyard: I will
take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break
down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down: and I will lay it
waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up
briers and

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thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.
For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the
men of Judah His pleasant plant: and He looked for judgment, but
behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry." Isaiah 5:3-7.
"The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that
which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken,
neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither
have ye sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty
have ye ruled them." Ezekiel 34:4.

The Jewish leaders thought themselves too wise to need instruction,
too righteous to need salvation, too highly honored to need the honor
that comes from Christ. The Saviour turned from them to entrust to
others the privileges they had abused and the work they had slighted.
God's glory must be revealed, His word established. Christ's kingdom
must be set up in the world. The salvation of God must be made
known in the cities of the wilderness; and the disciples were called to
do the work that the Jewish leaders had failed to do.

[Chapter 2]