The Building, the Body, the Bride

Ephesians, writes J. I. Packer, uses “three basic images, or analogies, each illustrating some ongoing aspect” of the church: the building, the body, and the bride.

The Building

On the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with the Lord Jesus as the cornerstone, Gentile and Jewish believers are being built together, as so many building blocks or shapes stones laid side by side, to become “a holy temple in the Lord … a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (2:20-22). As in Old Testament times the temple was where God made people most vividly aware of his self-revealed reality and teaching, and where they in turn knew themselves closest to him (see the Psalms), so it is and will ever be in the church. That is a fact that all Christians should face, and celebrate joyfully from the heart. 

The Body

The church

which is one body under Christ its Head, grows and upbuilds itself in faith and love through the harmonious operation of each particular body part. That is to say, as each believer seeks to attain total Christlikeness, and as the Holy Spirit of Christ prompts each to cooperative work and service out of love to God, to neighbors, and to the body of Christ as such, the church moves forward into “the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God … to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” 4:1-16, esp. 13). The vision is of divinely managed coordination of the body, and of developing discernment of the truth and wisdom of God by the body corporately.

The Bride

As the bride is prepared by willing helpers for her wedding day, so Christ himself, the church’s Bridegroom, works to prepare the church, the object of his love, for the glory that he has in view for her—“that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle of any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (5:25-27). Ongoing sanctification for all Christians, separately and together, through a vast variety of events, circumstances, and conflicts, is accordingly the church’s present experience, while the approaching consummation of fellowship with Jesus is the church’s abiding hope, and the assurance of Jesus’s unfailing love remains its constant support. That is an outlook, and an upward and forward look, that all Christians should cherish and keep intact. 

Quoting from Taking God Seriously: Vital Things We Need to Know (pages 90-91).