Search
In the past our church life has been too dead, and not many people have functioned. Even when some did function, they functioned in a formal, religious, and organizational way. The church life has not been a part of our daily life. For example, in the past when a person wanted to be baptized, we arranged for a baptismal meeting, set up a formal façade, prepared the baptistery, and baptized the person in a formal way. All our meetings were conducted in a proper order. There were definite ones assigned to call a hymn, sing, pray, or preach. Everything was in order, yet when such meetings were dismissed and the saints returned to their daily life, there was no change in their behavior. There seemed to be no connection between the church life and their daily life. However, everything is changed now. If there are two hundred people meeting in a hall, all two hundred people need to function. One can be baptized anywhere and at any time. The church life has become a common “everyday affair” and is easily within everyone’s reach. Such a practice vitalizes the church life and increases its impact.
Recently, Sister Lee said to me, “After dinner tonight I will go and watch my old classmate be baptized. She was saved, and tonight she will be baptized at hall six.” I asked, “Is there a baptismal meeting?” She answered, “No.” This is very different from what we used to have. However, this is still not sufficient. We need to be more spontaneous and normal so that our church life is a part of our daily life. I hope that every day the saints will see people baptized into the Lord in their own bathtubs. This will bring a great revival into the church.
We have spoken about the burden for the home meetings. Now we will go one step further to consider the practical steps to carry out the home meetings. First, I would recommend that the elders, the co-workers, and the full-timers conduct a survey in their area this week. They must gather up all the records on file for the saints and take a “census” of the saints. Every year the number in the church fluctuates. Some saints have moved away, and others have moved in. Some dropped out of the church life because of their circumstances or their physical weaknesses. Some have not been able to stay abreast with the church life because of their work or schedule. Many have lost contact with the brothers and sisters. We must consider these situations one by one.
These saints have all been baptized into Christ, and they once met with us in the Lord’s recovery. It is easier and more profitable to contact these than to contact new ones. Although they may have drawn back or become cold because of their weaknesses or other reasons, they are nevertheless the Lord’s children. As far as responsibility goes, we have no excuse; we must take care of them. In the past it was our lack of concern or shortage of care that brought them to their poor condition. This is a shortage on our part. Now the Lord is leading us to recover the organic function of all the members. This is the business not only of the elders, the co-workers, and the full-timers but also of every child of God. The new way that the Lord is leading us to take today is a way in which everyone functions organically, every member operates effectively, and every home serves fervently. If we do this, we will nourish and care for more people, and the church will increase and spread.
After such a “census,” the elders should announce in the meetings that they intend to create a file of all the saints who reside in their area, whether or not they have been meeting regularly with us. Even those believers who no longer live like believers, but live like heathens, should have their names in this file. If we do this, a hall with two hundred members may suddenly find itself with more than five or six hundred names. After this, the elders, co-workers, and full-timers should take the lead to divide up the regular attendants into groups to make a “grand sweep.” This may be compared to conducting a spring cleaning, where lost stationery and other items are found one by one. Then the saints must visit the homes one by one to find and recover the lost saints who were saved many years ago.
After such an initial visitation, the elders should assign the saints to care for and revisit the lost ones based on the strength and capacity of the saints and the practical needs. The elders should call a meeting, gather the brothers and sisters together, and present the real situation to them. They should be charged to pick up the burden to seek the lost sheep. If all the brothers and sisters do this, even though we may not witness a complete success, the results will be decisive. If there are too many names and the assignments cannot be completed in one meeting, they can be distributed gradually at other opportune times.
We may take hall sixteen as an example. At present there are about two hundred saints meeting in fifty homes. If there are two hundred fifty dormant ones, every home will need to take care of only five names. Such a burden will not be too heavy on any one home. If every home is faithful to rise up, in a short time more than half of these dormant ones will be recovered. If the one thousand homes in the church in Taipei will all do this, recovering one person per week, one thousand people will be recovered every week. I believe if we work faithfully and diligently in this way, in three months we will recover at least a third of these dormant ones. This is not a small matter. Hence, this is the first thing that we need to practice.
I hope that the elders will practice this immediately. Gather the records of the saints together, classify them, and convey the burden of the care for these dormant ones to the brothers and sisters through local conferences. The elders should consider each home as a unit and in the meetings should solemnly charge the head of each household to take care of these names. They should charge the head of each household to pick up the burden to lead the entire family to pray for these names. To be sure, as long as that home will pray for these people, every spirit in that home will be revived and rekindled. I believe the Lord’s grace will accompany this work, and the Spirit of the Lord will join us in our labor. If we do this, in three months we may recover three thousand people.
From now on, we cannot take care of our work in a general way. We must work according to a schedule with a proper budget. Our goal is that in three months we will recover one-third of the dormant ones. If we do this three times, we will need only nine months to recover most of the saints. Where there is a will, there is a way. It all depends on whether we are willing to do this. To be sure, if we do not clean up our house, the house will be a mess. If no one “sweeps,” surely we will find trash everywhere. However, if I sweep a little, you sweep a little, and every person and every household takes care of its sweeping, the cumulative result will be a clean neighborhood.
In everything, the most difficult step is the first one. If we are to do this, the responsible brothers must take the lead. This is our responsibility. We must go back to our halls to stir up the spirits of the saints. Do not speak in a general way; that will not work. Instead, we need to plan out a definite course of action and work out a schedule. For example, we can set a goal of recovering one-third of the dormant ones in the first three months, the next third in the second three months, and finally the last third in the last three months. The elders and the co-workers must be definite and “scientific” in the way they work. We must pass out the records to the saints, take the lead in the practice, and supervise the work every step of the way.
We must not merely give orders; that will not work. Learn to fellowship with the brothers and sisters and offer some practical suggestions and proposals. These dormant saints were baptized by us. They are our responsibility, but for many years we have neglected them. This was our lack. Now the Lord has given us a new leading and a new practice to make up our lack. We should all rise up to respond to this. Of course, this does not mean that we should ignore the big meetings. We should still take care of the Lord’s Day morning meetings. For the sake of those who need such a meeting, we should not dismantle this structure. However, we should pay attention to the small groups. The small groups are our life pulse. We must give our all and be desperate for the small groups. Although it is not easy to overturn tradition, we should look to the Lord’s blessing, and we should pray that the home meetings will bring in a success in the near future.
The principle of the New Testament is the principle of incarnation. In the New Testament, God cannot do anything without the cooperation of the “flesh.” I have never heard of anyone being saved through an angel alone; the preaching of the gospel must come through human beings. In Acts 10 the angel could only tell Cornelius to invite Peter to preach. If I were Cornelius, I would have said to the angel, “Since you are here already, why not preach the gospel to me directly? Are you not more qualified than Peter? Why don’t you preach to me?” The interesting thing is that the gospel must be preached through human beings. It must be preached in the principle of incarnation.
What I fear the most is our “spiritual” teachings. I cannot tolerate such “spiritual” teachings. These teachings say that we should not do anything in an artificial way. We should not promote anything, but we should look to the leading of the Holy Spirit and the prompting of the Lord. I would ask the ones who have taught such teachings, “Where is the result of your looking and waiting?” Thirty years have passed. Where is the result? If we are to meet the practical needs, we cannot settle for mere theories. If we continue to wait, Taiwan will not be evangelized in another thirty years. The dormant ones will remain dormant.
We need to wake up. The older elders and co-workers among us have been “waiting” and “seeking” for the Lord’s leading for more than thirty years. Some of our sons have become elders during this time, but what has become of the church? I hope that we will all wake up and realize that this is a dead-end street. We should not be stuck in a blind alley. We should not wait to die. Even if we were to wait until the Lord comes back, our “waiting” and “seeking” would result in a dead end. We must take another way. We are frustrating the Lord’s leading. The timing is not in the Lord’s hand but in our hand. Any time we rise up to work, the Lord’s leading is there. What is the Lord’s timing? It is whatever time we stand up to do something for the Lord.
My fellowship today is not meant to be a yoke. Everyone can practice this. It is not a burdensome yoke for each family to take five names and joyfully visit them as believers in the Lord. It is a light burden. In practice, when the saints go out to visit, we can tell them that they do not need to make all five visits in one evening. They can visit these families one at a time. Neither is it necessary to knock on their doors; they can first call them on the telephone. As long as we persist steadfastly, we will surely see the result. This is the principle of spiritual blessing. All living things grow in small increments, yet eventually such growth fills the earth. Now the Lord has shown us a clear picture. We need to overturn our old practices and habits. This is not merely a “diversification” movement but a turn to make everyone grow and function. I hope that we will take this advice and carry it out in a practical way.
Although such a practice is not a burden, it requires much labor. In farming, for example, one must work with his two hands. Removing stones, digging, plowing, tunneling, and irrigation require one to work with his two hands. Every day the farmer needs to do some work. When I was young, the older generation told me, “The size of the harvest depends not only on the land but also on the hand.” Even when we were snowbound in winter and no one could work in the fields, we were not idle at home. The entire family worked in preparation for the spring. The Chinese divide the year into twenty-four “seasons” with certain tasks for each season. This reflects the cumulative experience of their labor throughout the centuries.
Today we are in the scientific age. Everything is done by machines, yet labor is still necessary. Science and machinery can reduce only the work but not the labor. If the owner of a business does not labor day and night, he cannot compete with others and cannot make money. If we are managers but work only as much as our employees do — eight hours a day for five and a half days a week — our business will soon shut down. There is only one way to succeed — laboring and endeavoring with all our time.
We must not think that the Jews are much more capable than others. Their success lies not in their capability but in their endeavoring spirit. In New York there are more than three million Jews. They have become what they are through their hard labor. While others work eight hours a day, some of them work more than ten hours a day. A Jewish friend of mine told me these things. Now some of the Chinese are taking this same way in the United States; they give themselves to work, and they are making progress quickly. Some Chinese were not this way when they were in their home country, but once they migrated to the United States, they realized that the circumstances did not allow them to relax anymore. When they relax, others move ahead of them. Today many Chinese students are ranked at the top not only at the college level but also at the high-school level. They are forced into such achievements by their circumstances.
Many times I have considered before the Lord how to present this matter to the brothers and sisters. I have considered how to convince all the saints to labor diligently and practically. To be sure, if we take this way, the churches in Taiwan will have a breakthrough. I cannot pray, “Lord, grant all the saints sufferings and persecutions so that they will be forced to strive and labor.” I can only exhort and bother everyone patiently. We must take the actual steps one by one. Do not try to take any shortcuts. Do not try to be quick, and do not expect too much. Never think that as long as the elders come together to fast and pray for a week, the church will have a great revival. This will not work. Do not take this way. Of course, we need to pray, and I hope that the elders would spend more time praying. But I also would like to see us spending the time every day to work while we pray. Do not merely tell the brothers and sisters to work; we have to work ourselves, and we should bring others into the work and labor with them side by side.
I hope that the co-workers will labor in the same way. I have been a co-worker for many years. I know what you are thinking. Every worker desires to have power and a gift. He likes to see dozens, even hundreds, listening to his preaching. However, today we must go to every home. We need to visit the weak, strengthen the sick, and recover the dormant ones. Is this beneath you? This is not beneath us. This is what the co-workers should be doing in the first place. There are all manner of burdens upon me that prevent me from doing this, but if I were not so burdened, I would happily engage in this work and contact the saints one by one. I hope that from today onward, the co-workers would not crave the big meetings but would love the home meetings. Do not despise the home meetings. Their results last forever, and they increase and multiply. Perhaps we serve one home today. When the relatives of this home are touched, we may end up with a fivefold multiplication. This is the genuine way for the church to increase and spread.
In the past we spoke, shouted, and labored from the podium for many years. What was the result? Every so-called Christian worker has the secret desire of becoming a spiritual giant. Even if a co-worker among us cannot be a Peter, one who now is dead and gone, he at least wants to be a Billy Graham or a Witness Lee. This is a terrible thought. The young brothers and sisters among us should not have this concept. This will kill our spiritual life. We should not have this kind of concept. I have said before that when I first began to serve the Lord, I did not dream of any great success. I was ready to take my Bible to all the villages and hamlets to preach the gospel, drinking from the mountain streams and filling my hunger with roots and the bark of trees. I hope that we will have a right motive, a clean heart, and a proper spirit. Even if we have a doctorate degree, we should still serve the Lord in this way.
Since my youth I have admired the missionaries very much. In my hometown the missionaries were all highly educated scholars. They came from England and the United States. Many of them were more than sixty years of age, yet they still had a spirit of sacrifice, a willingness to suffer, and a heart to give up everything. I was very touched by them. Even though every one of them was a scholar in his own field, they were all willing to go to a backward country like China to preach the gospel and contact people in the rural countryside. One of the most elderly among them was Mr. Corbett. He was ninety years of age, but he nonetheless went to the streets to contact people. He also gave away a great deal of money to the poor and used this as a means to contact people. His work was very effective. When the Boxer Rebellion broke out in 1900, the unbelievers called the missionaries the “First Devils” and the Chinese Christians the “Second Devils.” At the height of the rebellion, the unbelievers had a slogan: “Among the Second Devils spare Chao Tu-nan; among the First Devils spare Mr. Corbett.” Why did they say this? These two were especially kind to people. I saw all these things with my own eyes, and I have to admit that they produced a deep impression on me.
I hope that the young full-timers would have the understanding that it is a joy to consecrate ourselves to the Lord. Yet we must not think that we have consecrated ourselves to be a spiritual giant with a great name and a large following. The Lord may be gracious to us, and He may make us such a person one day. But surely that is not the way for us to take today. If we want to serve the Lord and work for Him, we should begin from the homes. We should go to people’s homes and meet with them in their homes. Since the church is led by the Lord to practice the home meetings, we need to consider the homes as the goal of our work. We must work on the homes. We must not wait for the elders to make the arrangements, nor should we wait for the senior co-workers to take the initiative. Simply pray, “Lord, I have to work on the home meetings. I must work on the home meetings.” We must not choose only the good homes to work on. The good homes do not need us; to work on them is merely to add more icing on the cake. We need to work on the homes that are not so good, on those who are weak, backslidden, lacking in nourishment, dormant, and even at the brink of denying the Lord’s name. We must squeeze our way into these homes. We may not succeed in getting into every one of these homes, but I believe that at the very least we can succeed in getting into one home.
If we work on the home meetings conscientiously, we will learn many lessons. The period in which I learned the most lessons in preaching the gospel and contacting people was during the years around 1940. I spent more time in those years than in other years preaching the gospel. From 1938 to 1943 I preached the gospel very often. In my hometown of Chefoo, on my bicycle I visited both the saints and the unbelievers every day. During these visits I met people who were possessed by demons, people who were sick, and people who were in all manner of strange conditions, and I dealt with them one by one. From these experiences I learned many lessons. There is nothing wrong with being trained and receiving spiritual education. But we still should enter into the practice, and we must learn how to deal with people one by one.
If the elders, co-workers, and full-timers in the Lord’s recovery will pick up this burden, and if all the churches and all the halls will practice this, that is, to sort out the records and charge the brothers and sisters to take action together, the impact will be tremendous. If we do this, I believe that in three months one-third of the dormant saints will be recovered. If the saints pick up the burden to recover the dormant ones, they themselves will be firmly established and rooted. There will no longer be the need to worry about the saints. We must be clear and firm about this point. We need to labor and strive diligently, and we must be thorough in our endeavor.
Do not despise this kind of practice. Do not think that lofty spiritual theories and deep spiritual principles can be easily applied in practice. Do not think that all we need to do is to go to the homes and stir up people, and that there is not much to this work. If we have these kinds of thoughts, we are very wrong. Do not think that it is a simple thing to stir people up. With some people, we simply cannot do anything with them, yet when another person comes along, he is stirred up. There are secrets, keys, and skills to this. The key is the truth. We must study the truth very much. If we are rich in the truth, our labor will not be in vain, and the chance of failure will be minimized. When others hear our speaking, they will know that we have a high standard of spiritual education. We cannot fake this. Some jobs cannot be done by people with only a junior-high education; they require someone with a higher education. In order to carry out our present practice, we need the equipping of the truth.
Before I dropped my job to serve the Lord full time, I was working in a foreign firm. Sometimes the young courier working there could not deliver packages to the customs office or the post office, and he would come back and report this to me. I would rebuke the courier for his inefficiency. Then, since I was the only senior staff member in the office who could speak Chinese, I had to take the courier with me and make the trip again. When I got to the post office, I had to say only a few words, and the matter was done. The courier was furious, yet he could not lose his temper in front of the postal clerk. The same was true at the customs office — what the courier could not accomplish, I was able to complete with only a few words. Why was there a difference? The young courier did not have enough constitution. When others asked him a question, he could not give an answer that was to the point. When he asked others a question, he also could not make his point. However, when I answered people, everything I said was to the point, and things were handled efficiently and properly according to the correct procedure. This was the reason that I could accomplish the task and he could not. I can say the same thing concerning our home meetings. We must be properly equipped. The more we are equipped, the richer the meetings will be.
There are two sides to the present leading in the churches. On the one side, we need to take care of the big meetings. This will take care of those who come only for messages. On the other side, we need to send the meetings to people’s homes. We must care for and nourish the dormant ones and the newly saved ones. On the one hand, we need to apply diligence toward people; on the other hand, we need to have the church meetings. With our present church life we have both sides. We have the big meetings on the Lord’s Day, the bread-breaking meetings, and the prayer meetings. We also have the small group meetings and the home meetings. All these will take care of the needs of the saints as well as bring in the increase and spread of the church.
To have the home meetings is not simply to break up the big meetings into the homes. We have spent much time to study this topic because the home meetings are the life pulse of the church life. They are the key to the increase and spread of the church. When we promote this matter, I hope we will take it seriously. We must pick up the burden from the Lord and work on it in a practical way. On the one hand, we must pass out the records to the saints and charge them to work on the names. On the other hand, we must encourage them to pray much and to persevere in the patience and love of Christ. As long as we do not lose heart, become discouraged, or beaten down, and as long as we continue to seek out and visit these ones, we will see an abundant harvest.
I also hope that the co-workers, elders, and full-time serving ones will take the initiative to labor and work with the brothers and sisters and not allow them to do whatever they want. We cannot merely conduct a survey and then invite those who are “willing” to open their homes to come to meet, but we need to take the initiative to gather the saints and bring the meeting to their homes. Otherwise, some time later the effect will be weakened, and fewer saints will be willing to cooperate. This is an exhausting and laborious job that requires the co-workers and elders to pay undivided attention to promote this.
A year and a half ago, we spoke about the matter of producing full-time serving ones. At that time, based on our experience and through our observation and study of the ways in which Christians have served throughout the centuries, we were convinced that we could not take the way of organization. Instead, we had to follow the Lord’s leading. In Taiwan we have a particular situation with its particular needs and particular means of supply. We felt that we could produce almost a hundred full-timers a year. It is right, of course, not to trust in any organization. But it is not proper to be floundering around without any definite leading. For this reason I suggested that we should produce one full-timer out of every twenty saints. His or her needs would be taken care of and covered by the other nineteen saints. This is a basic principle. In practice, if a church or a hall produces a full-timer, that church or hall should take care of that full-timer. All the elders and co-workers should be clear about this.
However, until now this arrangement has not been implemented in a practical way. Some full-time sisters have given birth to babies. Other full-time saints are sick. How should we take care of these special cases? These are details, but I would like to cover them in a clear way. In principle, when a full-timer is produced by a church or a hall, that church or that hall has the responsibility to take care of him in a good way. This means that the elders should contact those who have a desire to serve full time. We should try to find out if such ones should actually serve full time and, if so, for how long and how they should be cared for. With those who are already serving full time, the elders should look into their living. Some may serve for only one or two years, after which they will take up a job again. Furthermore, some may be supported by their family or their own savings and do not need any support from the church. With others, the church must take care not only of the serving ones but of their families as well. We need to fellowship these matters with the full-timers in a thorough way. We should know their real situation and find out their real need. Then we must take care of them according to their condition and their present circumstances.
It is easy for us to take the way of organization. But if we do not take the organizational way and instead take the way of following the Lord absolutely, we must be watchful moment by moment, and we need to exercise diligent care and oversight. Actually, we do not have a choice; we can take the Lord’s way only. This is the genuine way of those who love the Lord and who have consecrated themselves to Him. Nevertheless, the elders have the responsibility to fully know the condition of the full-timers. In this way we can supply them according to their need. In practice, the elders should not be too legal or set. We should have much fellowship and should try to understand the real situation. We should render the proper supply with full consideration of the overall economic situation of the community. In this way there will neither be an overabundance nor a lack in their care.
The elders must put their heart and mind to this matter. We should care for the full-timers like caring for our own children. We should be flexible and address the needs as they arise. This will cover all the needs in a good way. All parents know that even though all their children are their own offspring, they cannot treat them all in the same way. There are differences in condition, need, character, and disposition, and each must be treated properly according to his or her situation.
The full-timers themselves need to have a clean living. They should not be lavish but should take care of their conscience before the Lord, not being greedy or covetous and not exhibiting their secret needs before men with the hope of getting more help. This is wrong. They must do their best to have a clean living before the Lord and to maintain a proper conscience. If they receive more from the Lord, they should learn to give away some of what they have. The Lord Jesus taught us that it is more blessed to give than to receive (Acts 20:35). We do not like to have outward regulations, control, and restrictions. Rather, we want to give everyone the opportunity to learn to live before the Lord and to fear Him.
Some have asked me, “If this is the case, will not some take advantage and receive more?” My answer has been, “We must trust in the Lord.” Such selfishness can happen in the world, but it cannot happen in the church, because we all take care of our conscience to have a clean living before the Lord. Everything is in the Lord’s hand; the Lord will uphold His own testimony. To be sure, if we take care of others, the Lord will take care of us. If a co-worker or full-timer is faithful to the Lord, he will truly find excess in his hands; then he must learn to give it away — the more the better. We must exercise not to waste anything, spend little on ourselves, and save as much as we can so that we can care for others.
There are two sides to this matter. On the one hand, the brothers and sisters along with the whole church should care for the full-time serving ones before the Lord faithfully in love. On the other hand, the full-time serving ones should take care to maintain a clean living and an unfeigned conscience. If by the Lord’s grace we do our best to give to others, the Lord will richly bless us and place us in abundance. If we practice this, the Lord will have a way among us. Those who receive much will not be in excess, and those who receive little will have no lack.
