We humans cannot join two dry bones together or cover the joined bones with sinew and flesh and skin. Neither can we breathe life into them. But the Lord God can make dry bones into an army.

We cannot form the Christian churches into the unblemished Bride of the Lamb. But we can and do prophesy and proclaim what God will perform. We behold in vision a glorious Church without spot or wrinkle, filled with the fullness of the Father and the Son, serving as the manifestation and vehicle of the Holy Spirit, the revelation of God in Christ throughout the heavens and the earth.

Notice the expression, "that the world may believe."

When we grasp this expression we have a better understanding of the Church of Christ. All mankind has been divided into two Divinely ordained groups—the Church and the world. The Church has been called out from the world. The meaning of the term church is "called-out."

The world is not of the Church and the Church is not of the world. The Spirit of God dwells within the Church but not within the world. Christ is married to the Church but not to the world. The world is not the Temple of God. The Church is the Temple of God.

The world hates the Church because the Church is not of the world but of Christ. The seventeenth chapter of the Gospel of John separates the Church from the world with terrible authority and power. The wall between the Church and the world is the highest, thickest, sturdiest wall in the creation of God. It is impenetrable and indestructible.

Notice in the following expressions the wall of separation and distinction between the world and the Church:

I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word (John 17:6).

I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me;. . . . (John 17:9).

. . . I am glorified in them (John 17:10).

. . . these are in the world, . . . . (John 17:11).

. . . keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are (John 17:11).

. . . those that thou gavest me I have kept, . . . . (John 17:12).

. . . the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world (John 17:14).

I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, . . . . (John 17:15).

They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world (John 17:16).

As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world (John 17:18).

That they all may be one; . . . that the world may believe . . . . (John 17:21).

. . . the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; . . . .(John 17:22).

... that they may be made perfect in one;... that the world may know that thou... hast loved them, as thou hast loved me (John 17:23).

. . . I will that they... be with me where I am; . . . . (John 17:24).

. . . the world hath not known thee: . . . these have known that thou hast sent me (John 17:25).

. . . I have declared unto them thy name, . . . . (John 17:26).

. . . that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them (John 17:26).

To be continued.