Maurice Roberts

Not the least reason why we should love Jesus Christ is that he has united us to himself forever if we are true believers. It is an unspeakable blessing to have our guilt removed by the blood of the Redeemer. But to have him eternally as our Head and Husband, united to us both in grace and glory, is a favour no less wonderful and mysterious.

This union with Christ is represented in Scripture by a variety of illustra-tions. In some passages it is compared to the relationship of the head to the body. The church is a living organism in which all the members have a particular part to play in promoting the health and prosperity of the whole.

But, more importantly still, all the members are united to Christ as their controlling intelligence. Christ's headship over the church is to be total and complete. The constant care of the church must be to be subject to Christ in all things (Eph. 5:24). The church does not make up her own articles of belief, nor does she lay down her own principles of worship or government. In everything she is bound by the Word of Christ. It is inherent in the relationship which believers have to Christ that they must have no other doctrines, practices or agendas but such as he has laid down for them as their Head.

A second illustration of Scripture to depict this union of believers with Christ is that of a temple (Eph. 2:21, 1 Pet. 2:5). Christ is the chief corner-stone, and believers are living and spiritual stones fitted into the building. The Spirit of God indwells the vast edifice and fills it with his presence. In the course of history this building is 'growing' (Eph. 2:21) and will not be complete till all the elect are gathered in and Christ returns.

This portrait of the church's union with her Lord draws attention to the holiness and spirituality of the people of God. The great characteristics of the church in this world are her moral excellence and likeness to Christ. God will ensure that she 'grows'; she must ensure that she maintains and safeguards her own holiness and spiritual dignity. For as the Lord Jesus Christ is, so is she in this world (1 John 4:17). A temple is not just a building, but a sacred place consecrated to the worship of God. No influence must induce the people of God to forget what they are. A third picture found in the Bible to explain the union of Christ with believers is that of the vine and its branches (John 15:1ff). Our souls are as completely dependent on the supply of grace from Christ as is the vine on the rising of its sap to bring life and growth. The church's mission is to 'bring forth fruit' to the glory of God. Christians are to be visible saints, and their life is to be devoted to one ambition, glorifying God and spreading the knowledge of his truth among men. If we are to become more fruitful we must expect God to 'prune' our lives with the sharp knife of sanctifying experiences. Sin must be dealt with, our hearts become more pure in their affection for God, our fruitfulness in-creased by the constant daily attention to these ministrations of the heavenly Gardener.

All this is implied in the familiar illustration given by our Lord himself, who repeatedly urges us to 'abide in him' and to 'abide in his love', the condition of which is that we must keep his commandments (John 15:10). The above portrait of our union with Christ makes it clear that the Christian life is one of experience of God's gracious dealings. The gardener's knife is intrusive. It cuts away part of what we love and cling to. But all such humbling and chastening experiences are beneficial. God takes nothing away from the Christian without giving something better. We lose in order to gain. There cannot be much fruitfulness without much experience of God's sanctifying, and sometimes sharp, dealings. The false Christian may appear as good as others for a time, but he has no real union with Christ, and sooner or later he will drop off and fall away. This, sadly, is not confined to the single case of Judas Iscariot. The Saviour's words come as a wholesome warning to us all: 'Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away . . . If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned' (John 15:2, 6). We shall see these dead branches removed if we keep our eyes open.

The most amazing picture of all used by God to depict the believer's union with Jesus Christ is that of marriage. It is a figure which occurs again and again in the Word of God, notably in the Song of Solomon, in Psalm 45, in Hosea, in Ephesians 5 and in Revelation 21, where the church is referred to as 'the Lamb's wife' (Rev. 21:9).

No greater honour could be given to us as believers than to be referred to as the 'wife' of the glorious Son of God. It is a term implying a thousand comforting and reassuring thoughts to those who love Jesus. He and we are 'one'. This is true of our body and of our soul. 'Your bodies are the members of Christ' (1 Cor. 615). 'He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit' (1 Cor. 6:17).

Christ will never divorce his spouse nor cast her out of house and home. He will never repent of his choice of us to be his Bride. He has taken us 'for better, for worse'. Best of all, we need not say of this marriage that it is good only 'till death us do part'. 'Thy Maker is thy husband' (Isa. 54:5). Christ will be our Head and Husband long after the mountains and hills about us shall have been removed forever (Isa. 54:10). The relationship of union between the church and Christ is 'a great mystery' (Eph. 5:32). It is certain that we shall never grasp perfectly in this life what is meant by the statement: 'We are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones' (Eph. 5:30). The Last Adam had his Eve in his mind's eye before the first Adam was created. In the course of time, Christ, who 'loved the church', 'gave himself for it' (Eph. 5:25). His intention was, in time, to sanctify her 'by the word', that in eternity 'he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing' (Eph. 5:26, 27).

There is a day coming when the church will be worthy of her Christ and when she shall appear to all the universe 'as a bride adorned for her husband' (Rev. 21:2). The church has often gone through pain and suffering here below, but on her wedding day all her sorrow will be forgotten. One moment in the presence of the Bridegroom will more than recompense her for many thousand years of persecution and misrepresentation. The union which we have with Christ is the closest of all unions and is in some mysterious ways similar to that sublime union between the persons of the great Godhead. So Christ says to his Father: 'And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one; I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me' (John 17:22-23).

The Lord Jesus will be to us not just a Saviour, but also a Husband. As a Saviour he has delivered us from all our sins and miseries. As a Husband he has lifted us up to the highest privilege conceivable to any creature: to be united in conjugal love eternally to One who is God. The prayer of Christ above quoted will surely not be fulfilled until the church is all made up and every elect member gathered in. Then the God-hating, Christ-rejecting world will see with its own astonished eyes that Christ is indeed the true Messiah and that the church is indeed his chosen Bride. The prayer of our great Husband is daily coming closer to its fulfilment. 'The voice of the archangel' and 'the trump of God' (1 Thess. 4:16) will summon the righteous from their graves to put on their wedding garments. Christ and his people will then have their union publicly con-summated in the presence of God and all angels. No disappointment could ever match that of the foolish virgins who will miss the joys of that heavenly marriage because they have no oil of grace and so find the 'door shut' (Matt. 25:10). The warning is good for us all. As Christians we are on a journey in this life that leads to our wedding day, and we would do well to remind ourselves of it frequently. This view of life will compensate us for the losses and crosses which are part of our present earthly experience. But we shall not much care about the occasional rainy day if we keep in view the warmth of Christ's embrace when the day of his espousals is come. If we suffer for and with him now we shall sit with him on his throne at last. It is easy to bear with the reproaches of men if we remember that all our detractors and persecutors will give an account to our Lord in the end. Christ is not the husband to let his Bride lie under unkind aspersions for ever. Those who speak evil of Christ's church will answer for it, whoever they are. 'He shall strike through kings in the day of his wrath' (Psa. 110:5).

We make a distinction between our union with Christ and our com-munion with him. The union is always there and cannot be broken. But the communion which we have with Christ in this life is our felt, conscious enjoyment of his love. This is by no means constant, but varies from day to day and from hour to hour. The mature believer's supreme desire is, as was George Whitefield's, to have the enjoyment of a 'felt Christ'.