The Church is not a Material Body
Ephesians 4:4
There is one body, and one Spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling;


In contemplating this Body you must divest yourselves of a material idea. What we call matter is by no means essential to living organisms. On the contrary, it is essential to the reality, unity, and permanence of a body that it be not material. "There are celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial." But the celestial is much more strictly a body than the terrestrial. For a celestial body is incapable of decay, but an earthly body soon collapses, and falls into an inorganic mass. A body may be material, or psychical, or spiritual. The material is the lowest, and least worthy of being called a body. Strictly speaking, matter is an apparition. It is essentially deficient of the higher qualities of being, and consequently cannot maintain its integrity. It is a dense vapour that "appeareth for a little time, and then vanishes away." As our own material body is a veil hiding another body, in like manner, the material universe is a covering upon a more glorious universe. The sanctuary, which was so constructed as to be a figure of creation, had for its outmost covering rough animal skins; but by lifting a series of coverings, you came to gold, and within all was the Divine Presence. Peter, James, and John were permitted to see that our Lord had, within His material body, a divinely luminous one, which was His true body. We are called to become citizens of the kingdom which is the inner and true body of the universe. This is the kingdom of heaven, which our Lord preached and opened to men. Our souls live, move, and have their being in this inner sphere. We are a part of it.

(J. Pulsford.)



Parallel Verses
KJV: There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

WEB: There is one body, and one Spirit, even as you also were called in one hope of your calling;




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