The Experience of the Body of Christ.
Every genuine Christian is a member of the Body of Christ. If Christ dwells in
you, then you are membered to His Body. But there is something that I
call the experience of the Body of Christ.
The experience of the Body of Christ is
the experience of Christian community. By “community,” I do not have in mind a
commune or communal living. I’m rather speaking of a group of Christians who
see themselves as genuine family, who are intensely involved with one another’s
lives, and who are pursuing their Lord together all throughout the week. I’m
speaking of a face-to-face, shared-life community.
Ray Stedman called this experience “Body
life.” Watchman Nee called it “church life.” I often refer to it as the experience
of the Body of Christ, where a believer encounters in living color the
interdependence, the mutual participation, the diverse-but-unified giftings,
the oneness, and the shared life of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ on this
earth.
For more see Frank Viola Author
