The bride of Christ

1. The bride of Christ – 5th
April 2016
“Let us rejoice and be gladand givehim glory!For the weddingof the Lamb has come, andhis bride
has madeherself ready” (Revelation19:7).
The Bride of Christ isa symbolictermusedtodesignate the ChristianchurchinitsrelationtoChrist. We
can read in Revelation 21:9 s, "Andone of the seven angels whohad the seven bowlsfull of the seven
last plagues,cameand spoke withme, saying,"Comehere, I shall showyou the bride, the wife of the
Lamb." What doesit meanwhenwe become the Bride of Christ?Are we alreadyaBride whenwe
believeand whenwe are bornagain?Revelationspeaksof ChristcomingforHisBride? Therefore we
wishto discusshere more aboutBride of Christ forour Christianunderstanding.
The ideaof beingthe “bride of Christ”is*symbolic*of our relationshipwithChrist. We canlearnwhen
Paul statesin Romans 7:4, “So,my brothers andsisters, you alsodiedto the lawthrough the bodyof
Christ,that you mightbelongto another, to himwho was raisedfrom the dead, in order that we
mightbear fruit for God.” Paul wasusingthe conceptof marriage as an illustrationthatChristiansare
no longerunderthe OldLawof Moses.By becomingaChristian,we diedtothe Law of Moses andhave
committedourselvestoChrist. Therefore devoutChristianscansay that theyare “married,”
symbolically,toChrist.
The relationshipbetweenthe ChristianandChrist hasto be a strong relationship,asstrongas a wife toa
husband,if notstronger.The church is made upof individual Christians,andso,the churchis also,by
analogy,the bride of Christ. Ephesians5:23-33 has much to say regardingthe relationshipof Christand
the church by wayof the relationshipbetweenahusbandandwife. Inthe same passage we canlearna
keyteachingof Jesusandthe Church:. “Afterall,no one ever hated their own body,but they feed and
care for their body, justas Christ doesthe church— 30
forwe are members of hisbody”( Ephesians
5:29-30). Paul saysthat justas the husbandisthe headof the wife,soalsoisChristthe headof the
church. The church is to submittoChristas the head/authority.The churchisto understandthatwe,as
Christians,are membersof the bodyof Christ.Paul says that itis a “great mystery”butwhenhe speaks
aboutthe husband/wife relationship,he alsospeaksaboutthe relationshipbetweenChristandthe
church: “Thisis a profoundmystery—butI amtalkingabout Christand the church” (Ephesians5:32).
Therefore earlyChristiansreferred tothe church as the bride of Christ whichcontinueseventoday.
We can learnwhenthe apostle Paul commentsuponthe ideaof the churchbeingthe bride of Christin 2
Corinthians11:2 “ForI am jealousover you with godlyjealousy:forI haveespoused youto one
husband,thatI maypresent youas a chaste virginto Christ.” Our one “husband”isChrist;the “chaste
virgin”isthe church, and here referred particularly tothe churchat Corinth.However,the same
principle couldbe appliedtowardall the churches of thisday. We can alsoreadof anotherreference to
the bride of Christin Revelation21:2 “Isaw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem,comingdown out of
heaven fromGod,prepared as a bride beautifullydressedfor her husband.”

2. “Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has
come, and his bride has made herself ready” (Revelation 19:7).