n is allotted to each, and it is only by communicating with
others that all enjoy what is sufficient for maintaining their
respective places in the body[8].' This is the principle of mutual
dependence, the fundamental principle of corporate life. Thus 'He gave
{148} some as apostles, some prophets,' others in other varying
capacities to fulfil varying functions; the principle of the bestowal
being the same throughout. Each 'gifted' individual becomes himself a
gift to the Church. He is 'gifted' not for his own sake but for the
Church's sake--'with a view to the perfecting of the saints,' or 'the
complete equipment of the consecrated body,' for the manifold 'work of
ministry' entrusted to it; or to look at the matter from a rather
different point of view, 'for the purpose of completing the structure
of the body of Christ'--that living company of men in whom Christ
expresses Himself and through whom He acts upon the world. And that
structure is not complete till all together attain what is impossible
to any isolated Christian individual, the unity not only of a common
faith, but also of a common knowledge of what is revealed in the Son of
God; or, in other words, to the full-grown manhood; which, once again,
means that complete developement in which the fulness of the
Christ--all the complete array of His attributes and qualities--finds
harmonious exhibition over again in His people, His body.

But the possibility of this completeness on the part of the Church as a
whole, depends on the {149} stability of the individual members in the
common faith. Thus it is Christ's purpose that His members should
cease to be as children, stirred up like the waves of the sea, or
carried about like feathers, by every wind of false teaching. There
is, it must be remembered, a kingdom of deception, an organized attempt
to seduce souls, of which wicked men make themselves the instruments.
In view of this hostile kingdom of error, the Christians must abide in
the truth revealed to them in love, and so grow up into the completed
life of Christ. For He is the head, and in Him they are the body. And
the body is a unit of many parts fitted and held together in one life
by a supply from the head, which circulates through every joint, and
for the full and unimpeded communication of which each several limb
must do its proper work, so that the whole body may grow into completed
life in that mutual coherence which is Christian love.

This