Date: April 27, 1948Place: Hardoon Road, Shanghai
The Bible assigns mammon a very important position. Mammon stands in opposition to God. Today more people are gained by mammon than those gained by God. Of a hundred people, perhaps eighty are gained by mammon. Of the remaining twenty, eighteen to nineteen serve both God and mammon. It is difficult to find one in a hundred who truly serves God. Mammon gains more souls than God does.
Originally, we had no intention during this time to speak about mammon. We were going to look at the matter of the Body life. Later, the fellowship about the Body life led to a second problem. The first problem is individualism, and the second problem is mammon. Individualism frustrates man from serving God. Mammon also frustrates man from serving God. If a man serves mammon, not only will there be no service to God corporately, but individually he will not be able to serve God either. We can say that deliverance from mammon is the first and foremost condition for one to serve God. If a man is not delivered from mammon, he cannot serve God.
All things are created by God. God is the unique source of all things; He is above all things. When men see all things, they should be moved to worship God. The human mind invented atheism, and it is obviously wrong. The heavens move men to know God. "All things'' are diverse and complicated. Satan wants to unify all things. There is no way to add up all things. For example, a chair and a table cannot be added together to make one unit. What is an adult plus a child plus a piece of luggage plus a bar of gold plus a piece of land? They do not add up to one unit. However, if all these things are converted into money, we can add them up. If all things cannot be unified, how can the businessmen do their accounting? With so many different units, how can one reckon their respective value? Money is the only means by which we can reckon all things. For example, a piece of land no longer becomes just a piece of land; it becomes money. Rice no longer becomes just rice; it becomes money. When we add together all things, we end up with a certain amount of money. Revelation 18 tells us that even the human soul can be reckoned with money. When a man sells his time to work for others, he is selling his soul. For example, when I hire a laborer, I agree ahead of time how much I will pay him for working eight hours. This is to buy the human soul with money. Money can buy us the human soul, and money can buy us all things. God created the earth, yet man divided it up into pieces and reckoned the value of every piece with money. If man could occupy the land on the moon, he would sell it for money also. Even for airplanes that fly over the earth, man charges people for access to the air space. Perhaps some people think that this is nothing unusual. But to us and to the Bible, this is very strange. In six days God created all things. Can we find out how much money "all things'' are worth? There are all sorts of things in all fashions and colors. Yet Satan has simplified these things and unified them under money. This is why money is called "the common goods'' in Chinese.
At the same time, money takes hold of all things. On the one end, God produced all things through creation. On the other end, Satan converted all things into money, thus unifying all things. If a man has money, he can buy anything. He can buy gold. He can even buy the whole of Shanghai or the whole of China. There is not one thing that money cannot buy. Mammon is opposed to God. This is the reason the Bible tells us not only that the love of money is a root of all evils (1 Tim. 6:10), but that covetousness and idolatry go together (Eph. 5:5; Col. 3:5). Covetousness is the only idol. When one worships money, he is not worshipping money itself, but the created things behind the money. Because man wants goods, he spends the "common goods,'' that is, the money, to buy the particular goods. This means that man wants God's things and does not want God Himself. This is the reason that man either serves God or mammon. Those who have a heart for mammon can never love God.
God's things come from God; this is grace. The things that come from God are not for sale. The sunlight is not metered, and there is no charge for it. But there is a charge for electric light. In order to get anything from Satan, man has to buy it. Even the carob pods of the prodigal son had to be bought. If a person truly wants to serve the Lord, he must be delivered from money. Once a person's thoughts are turned to money, he cannot serve God. It is wrong for a man to view all things from the side of money; he should view all things from the side of God.
Another thing which we must see is the relationship between ministry and authority. The eyes have the ministry of the eyes; they control the seeing function. In order for any member in the body to see, it has to rely on the ministry of the eyes. The meaning of coordination is that we give to others what we have, and others give to us what they have. The first condition to coordination is that we accept our own limitation. We have to acknowledge that we are only a member, and that we are not the Body. If we were capable in everything, then we would be the whole Body, and we would not need coordination any longer. However, as long as we are only a member, we cannot think that we have everything. The one-talented ones cannot pretend to be rich. Even if the eyes are important, they cannot replace the ears. One can see colors only with the eyes, and one can hear sounds only with the ears. Perhaps I can only speak, not walk. In that case, someone will have to do the walking. If we see this, we will realize that what one individual can do is actually very limited.
During these days the Lord has shown us that too few brothers and sisters know what real coordination is. A brother said once, "I do not think that this thing should be done this way.'' I said to him, "Who is asking you to think?'' If you are an ear, you do not have to say, "I think this matter should be done this way.'' If the eyes see that something is white, then it is white. There is no need for the ear to think about whether it is white.
The sisters cover their heads with respect to the brothers. Christ says that He does not speak from Himself (John 12:49). The word from is ek in the original language. It means "out from.'' This means that the Son can speak nothing out from Himself. In other words Christ's head is covered before God. Today the church also has its head covered before Christ. The fact of the covering is demonstrated through the sisters' covering of their heads. Whenever we are in the coordination of the Body, all our heads have to be removed. For many to think about what to do and to express the opinions that they have is quite inappropriate. Someone asked me once, "If I cannot say amen to a certain thing, what should I do?'' The Bible never says that a servant of God should do something "when he feels an amen to do it,'' and should not do something "when he does not feel an amen to do it.'' Man's head needs to be cut off. When some brothers and sisters talk to me, I have the feeling that my head should be cut off. Only the unique Head is qualified to think. Today man's mind is full of the thought of being the head. A person has to learn to reject proposals and opinions.
God has reserved for Himself teachers who can make decisions concerning the interpretation of the Bible and judgments on the Scriptures. The reason that there are so many sects and strange doctrines is that everyone wants to be a teacher. However, not everyone is a teacher in reality. It is useless for the ear to say that something is white. Whether or not a thing is white is not determined by what the ear says, but by what the eyes see. Today there are many heresies that have developed from the church because of this very reason.
There is one thing that is very strange in 1 Corinthians 12: Although the eyes and the ears are on the head, they are not the head. In the body the controlling organ is the head, whereas the working organs are the members. The organ that actually sees is not the eyes, but the optical nerves within the head. Outwardly speaking, the whole body moves by the seeing of the eyes. Actually it moves by the head. Even if you are a great gift or a strong member, you are useless if you are not in coordination, and if you are not the eyes, you surely need coordination all the more. Today we need to see our own limitation.
There are many things that do not require our consideration. Once we see the limitation of the members, the matter of authority will be settled. If we are at odds with the members appointed by God, we are at odds with the Head. If we are omnipotent and omniscient, we will not need any coordination. In the church we are not afraid of the seemingly foolish ones who know nothing; we are only afraid of those who know everything and who can do everything. In coordination we should not be the head. Rather, we should learn to listen and not have too many of our own thoughts.
Witness Lee: How does a person know what kind of ministry he has?
Watchman Nee: It is better that he does not know. Whether or not one has a ministry is up to the Head to know; it is not up to you to know. This is the reason we have to accept the judgment of the whole Body. Only the knowledge of the Body is reliable. Whether we think we have a ministry or not does not count.
It is useless for a brother or a sister to tell others in the meeting that he or she has a ministry. If you have a ministry, you have it, and it will be manifested through your exercising if it. Concerning the ascertaining of ministry, we have to realize that the judgment of the whole Body is more accurate than the judgment of an individual.
Weigh Kwang-hsi: What kind of attitude should we take concerning the pursuit of the gifts?
Watchman Nee: First and Second Corinthians tell us the difference between gifts and ministry. First Corinthians is on gifts, whereas 2 Corinthians is on ministry. The basis of ministry is the death and life of Christ. A gift is merely a power that the Holy Spirit bestows outside of us. The word death in 2 Corinthians 4 is a special word in the original language. There is more than one word for death in Greek. One of them means the opposite of life. It is used to describe a person as being dead, as opposed to being alive. This is the word that is commonly used. Another word means a kind of killing. It is used in the sense of killing a person, as opposed to begetting a person. The death in 2 Corinthians 4 has the sense of killing in the Greek language. Hence, it can be translated as the killing or the slaying of Jesus. While I was in London, I told the Western brothers and sisters that we can use a new word, deathize, for death in 2 Corinthians 4. This death is a death that kills us. What this means is that the positive death of Jesus is being wrought into us. It refers to the death which issues from Jesus and which causes us to die. A ministry of life comes from God and is produced through repeated dealings. Spiritual gifts, however, are but elementary matters in the church. What the Lord cares for today is that we serve the church with the ministry, and not with the gifts.
As soon as a brother stands up to speak, one can tell immediately whether he is a brother with a gift or a brother with a ministry. In Southeast Asia men cut the rubber tree with a knife. The life of the tree flows out through the scar of the knife-wound. This is a picture of one who serves with a ministry. When a man passes through fiery trials, he can give life to others. This is very different from merely giving gifts to others. In order to have a strong church, we need the ministry of life, not gifts. When one walks into an immature church, there may be much activity, but there is not much life. However, we may see a brother who is not eloquent; we may even be concerned for him and wonder if we should do his job for him. Yet with him, there is the ministry. What is manifested in him is not the gifts. When a church is mature, many ministries will be produced, and there will be much life supply. Every brother should learn to touch the difference between gift and ministry. The church needs more ministries to be raised up. An immature church requires the presence of gifted brothers. But we cannot allow such a situation to go on forever. Gifts are temporary, whereas ministries last forever.
Brother Yu: The life of Christ is His deposit within the believers. This life is a real entity from Christ. It is a reality from heaven. A gift is only a thing; one can borrow it and use it for a while, but the user may not know what it is. It is like Balaam's donkey speaking human words; one cannot say that the donkey has become human because of this. Those who exercise gifts are like children speaking grown-up words. God has raised up some people with a ministry. On the one hand, they have to have the gifts, because they otherwise could not do the work of perfecting. On the other hand, those who speak merely according to their gifts are entirely different from those who speak according to a ministry that is produced in the course of twenty years or more. Some say, "If others can speak, why can I not speak?'' The problem is that even though a child can speak grown-up words, he does not become a grown-up as a consequence. This is like the donkey speaking human words; it does not mean that the donkey can consider itself a human being just because it speaks human words. Outwardly, the speaking of those with gifts and the speaking of those with a ministry are the same. But inwardly, they are different.
When a church is strong, the spirit of the saints is clear. Although there may not be many outward activities, men will learn the proper lessons before the Lord. When a church is young, there may be gifts, but there will not be the ministry. If we know God, we will see that a person may say something, but this does not mean that he is what he says. Some gifted ones fall much faster and easier than those who have no gifts.
