Date: November 20, 1935, morningPlace: Chuenchow
As believers, we live by the Holy Spirit, not by the law. Many people do not know what the law is. As a result, they do not know the Holy Spirit either. They do not know what it means to live by the law and what it means to live by the Spirit. The failure in our work is due to the fact that we work by the law and not by the Spirit. If we trust in the law, we will not have the power or the fruit because the law is something that the Lord has judged.
The law is not just the Ten Commandments or the few hundred ordinances of the Old Testament. These are the Old Testament laws, but there are also New Testament laws. The Israelites in the Old Testament had their laws, and the church in the New Testament also has its laws. What is the principle of the law? When God has a will, and this will is written down on tablets of stone or on paper, including anything from one item to a thousand items of ordinances, we have the law. By walking according to these hundreds and thousands of items of the law, a man becomes clear what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil. He also becomes clear concerning the way he should take. This is the law. It is lifeless. Once a man begins to walk according to this dead law, he can put God aside and ignore Him. This is like saying that a student can ignore the principal of his school as long as he abides by the school rules. This is the law. Good and evil, right and wrong, are known through the written code. The path that one has to follow comes entirely from his knowledge and not from the inner leading of God. When this happens we have the law.
Many people can tell the difference between right and wrong, good and evil, without ever fellowshipping with God. This knowledge, however, is useless. Those who live this way are still living under the law. If you measure everything according to this rule, you will find that many things are still under the law. Man is naturally inclined to the law because he can easily tell from the law what is right and what is wrong. Most people are afraid of living by the Spirit. They would rather live according to some prescribed rules. Keeping the law is both legal and dead, but it is also something convenient. One can know how many laws he has kept and which ones he has come short of. The law turns man away from God. With the law, man does not need to contact God; he can put Him aside. After you have passed the gate of victory, you should no longer live under the law, but live by the Spirit (Rom. 7:6).
Let us consider the meaning of walking according to the law. I did not know what it meant to live according to the law until a few years ago, that is, until 1928. I had been a preacher for many years, but I did not know what it meant to keep the law. It is true that I could explain the law to others according to my theological knowledge. But in my practical experience I never understood this matter. There was a time when I was gravely ill. The Lord healed me. After I was healed, I rested and recuperated by the seaside. There I met Brother Simon Meek and stayed with him for a while. His health was not good either, and he wanted me to give him some advice. I asked, "What do you want me to help you with?" He answered, "Please tell me if it is scriptural to ask for healing." I said, "God does heal people. But Timothy had to use some wine, and Epaphroditus was not healed. Paul's eyes were not good and could not read small handwriting." I went on to tell him the experience of many people who were healed. Brother Simon Meek said, "Your answer is no answer at all." At that time, I realized what the law is. If the Bible tells us what to do step by step, all we have to do is to act accordingly in a simple way. This is keeping the law. However, God wants direct fellowship with us. He wants us to receive His revelation and then act according to His revelation. If we do not fellowship with Him, the Spirit will have no outlet for His work.
Man likes to have clear instructions from the Bible concerning everything he does. For example, in the matter of divine healing, he wants a clear yes or no from the Bible. However the Bible shows us that some sicknesses were healed and some sicknesses were not healed. The Bible does not have any rule regarding this matter. God has no intention for the church to hold on to some dead letters and forsake Him. He wants to see men seeking, praying, and waiting quietly on Him. He does not want us to have any trust in something apart from Him.
The law speaks of God's past will; it is not God's present will. However, man always wants to know God's present will according to His past will. God wants man to fellowship with Him and understand His present desire through the Holy Spirit. He does not want us to merely keep the law. This is why we need to have fresh fellowship with God every day. Only then we can know His will.
The second aspect of the law is that it dictates how we should live. God does not want to decide how the church should live from day to day. He wants the church to fellowship with Him moment by moment so that the church can know His desire. If I prescribe everything that one of my employees should do and the way he should live, he can abide by my prescriptions for a day, a week, or even a month without fellowshipping with me or asking me anything. This is the principle of the law. The law is doing God's will without communicating with Him.
When I was in Shanghai, I had a servant who also was a brother. One day I considered how the Lord wants us to exercise our spirit and not follow the law when working for Him. I wanted to see if it would work if I were to deal with my servant by the Spirit and not by the law. It is convenient to lay down laws in our daily life. If I laid down some laws, it would be easy for my servant to work for me. Of course I have to abide by the same laws as well. I began to talk with my servant and told him that he should check with me in everything and not make any proposals of his own. Neither would I give him any prescribed rules. While I was talking with a friend, the servant came in a few times and asked each time, "What do you want to eat? What do you want to drink?" I said, "Just wait a while." Later, the servant confessed that it was easier to work according to some laws than to ask for instructions in everything. From this we see that it is easy to keep the law, but it is not easy to work according to the leading of the Spirit. Easy or hard, however, this is God's desire, and we cannot take the easy way. We have to take the God-ordained way, which is not being under the law but under the Spirit.
A living that is according to the Spirit does not follow any fixed rule. All dead rules are set aside, and one seeks after God's will directly. After my servant finished cleaning the floor, he did not know what to do next. When twelve o'clock came, he did not know if I wanted to eat. This is the way one lives when he is in the Spirit. He moves when he has the revelation of the Spirit and waits on the Lord otherwise. How do we know if a person is saved and ready for baptism? We can quiz him about the truth concerning salvation and baptism, and he may answer everything correctly. If we then say that he is eligible for baptism, we are acting according to the law. Suppose there is an old lady from the countryside who cannot read or say any of the biblical terms. She cannot answer any question concerning regeneration, repentance, or forgiveness. Yet she has the peace in her heart. Should we baptize her? The issue is not whether the candidate for baptism will pass our test and answer our questions. The issue is whether or not she is regenerated. Many village folks do not know any terminology, yet they have peace and joy inwardly. Such ones may not understand anything in their mind, but they are genuinely saved.
At our Lord's table meeting in Shanghai, we often have visitors joining us unannounced. How long should we ask them to wait before we invite them to break bread with us? Should they wait a week or a month? Actually, if we know that a person is saved, we can invite him to break bread with us immediately. There is no need to wait.
The co-workers must never lay down any laws. We have to allow the Holy Spirit to operate and work within each person separately. Everything in the Bible is living, but it is living only when it is in the Spirit. If we make a thing an ordinance, it immediately becomes dead. The truth of the Bible must be realized in the Spirit; only then will it be living. In conducting conferences, we sometimes receive a message from the Lord and speak it. This may result in the salvation of many people. However, the next time we conduct another conference, we may think that we should do the same since so many were saved last time. We may then proceed to deliver the same message, and to our surprise no one is saved. We think that if a message saves people one time, it will save people all the time. But the result is not what we expect. A message saves people when it is delivered in the Spirit. The same message repeated according to the law will not save anyone. Here lies the difference between walking according to the Spirit and walking according to the law.
Everything that is not done according to the living guidance of the Spirit is a kind of law. We often take yesterday's leading as today's guidance. But applying yesterday's guidance to today is to walk according to the law. We should not think that just because the Spirit was leading us a certain way in the past that He will lead us the same way today. Imitating the leading of yesterday is being in the law. It is even possible to walk according to the law in obeying the biblical truth. If we want to be baptized just because the Bible says so rather than as a result of the leading of the Spirit within, we are following the law. We must walk according to the Scripture, but our leading is only proper when this walk is confirmed by the inner guidance. If anyone says that something is right because the Bible has never said that it is wrong, he is completely in the realm of the law. Many people write to me to ask if this or that is right. I write back and ask whether they have the Holy Spirit within. If they do, they should learn to follow the inner guidance of the Holy Spirit. I am not a fortune-teller or a diviner; I cannot know God's will for you. You have to learn to know the inner guidance of the Spirit yourself.
In learning to follow the guidance of the Spirit, we have to ask what the Spirit is saying before we ask what the Bible is saying. The first thing we should ask is what the inner registration is telling us. However, most people today first ask what the Bible says and do not ask what the Spirit within says. This is not normal. A New Testament believer has the Holy Spirit residing within. This is a precious thing. We have to learn to know the inner leading of the Holy Spirit within us. There is a difference between the principles and commandments in the Bible. A believer must not only obey the commandments in the Bible, but also walk according to the principles that are behind the commandments. Consider the matter of the head covering. If you cover your head merely because 1 Corinthians 11 says so, you have not covered your head in reality. Unless a man obeys the Bible according to the leading of the Spirit, his obedience is the same as his disobedience. The main thing is what the Lord is saying within a person. If the Lord is leading you to obey a certain truth in the Bible, and you act accordingly, this is true obedience to God.
In the Old Testament there was the dispensation of the law, but today we are in the New Testament dispensation. Yet there are still too many "Jews" in the church today. They keep the law and make the Bible a book of laws. Many people ask others what they think of this or that. This means that they do not know how to ask the Spirit within them. This is not normal.
Every sheep knows its shepherd's voice. Many people think that if they do not know the letter of the Bible, they will not know how to live. Does this mean that they will sin every day? In actuality, if we follow the leading of the Spirit, we will experience just the opposite. It is much better to follow the leading of the Spirit than to follow the Bible alone. We can forget, but the Holy Spirit will not forget. We may ask, "If the work of the Holy Spirit is so crucial, does this mean that we do not need the Bible anymore?" Theoretically, the leading of the Holy Spirit within is good enough, but in following this inner leading, it is possible for us to make mistakes. Therefore, we still need the Bible. In other words, we are not following the leading of the Bible; we are following the leading of the Spirit within. However, we are checking this daily inner leading with the Bible. Only when we obey both the inner leading and the outward leading are we truly obeying God. We cannot obey only the teaching of the Bible. We must follow the leading of the Spirit within and then compare it with the Bible. If the leading cannot be confirmed by the Bible, it is not a leading from the Spirit but a work of the emotion. The real issue is the inward registration.
In Chefoo two people asked me if they should leave the denominations. I answered, "I do not know." They said, "Does this mean that you are opposed to us leaving the denominations?" Then I asked them, "How does the life in you feel when you are in the denominations? Do you feel that the life within is blossoming when you stay in the denominations? If you feel that way, you should stay in the denominations. If not, you should leave." It is absolutely not a question of right or wrong but a question of life.
There was a famous Western missionary in Chefoo who came three times to discuss the question of sects with me. The first two times I avoided her and did not talk with her about the subject. The last time she came she insisted on talking about it. I felt that there was the leading of the Spirit, and I talked with her for five minutes. After our talk we sat down for tea. I told her that I was in a big circle, but that she was in a small circle within the big circle. After our talk, I escorted her out. Two days later, she came to me early in the morning and said, "Last night I sent out three letters of resignation." I told her, "You should not be influenced by me. Such a matter can only be decided by God alone. Only God can call you out of a denomination." She said, "I inquired of God last night and saw that the small circle within the big circle is man's choice and that man's choice is a sin. I felt that it is God's will that I should leave my denomination. That is why I got up last night and wrote the letters of resignation." I shook her hand. From that point on, she began to go on positively in the way of the Lord and was not bothered by any negative element.
As workers for the Lord we should be careful not to lead others merely according to the Bible. We should allow the Holy Spirit to personally guide them from within. We do not need to make all the saints identical according to some outward standards or to maintain some outward order. If we do this, the Holy Spirit will not have the ground or the freedom to work. We must not be a Moses, dispensing letters and the law to others. Our law is just the Holy Spirit. He is our absolute guidance. We have to learn to follow the guidance of the Spirit within. If a man keeps the law, he can go on without God. But if a man lives by the Spirit, he will not be able to leave God for a moment. Once he leaves God, he will die.
