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First, we will speak something concerning the matter of fellowship. If we know the principle of God’s work, we will see clearly that a basic principle for God to bestow grace is fellowship. Whether it is God’s salvation of man or His edification or raising up of a man, He does it in the principle of fellowship. Rarely can you find an example where God does a work of grace for man apart from the principle of fellowship. You cannot find a person who is saved by God directly. Although every person receives his salvation from God, he receives it indirectly, at least through one person. This receiving through man speaks of a principle of fellowship.
If you read the history of the church or the autobiographies of spiritual men, you can find that the same is true in God’s calling of men. On the one hand, you can say that God calls men directly, but within this calling there is always the element of fellowship. The called one always has some contact first with those who are serving the Lord. This contact is the fellowship, and it becomes a factor for that person to be called by God. Even God’s edification, His raising up and equipping of a person, and His giving of gifts to us are bound up with the principle of fellowship. The apostle Paul told Timothy in his letter that the gift Timothy received came from the laying on of hands of Paul and the elders. This is fully a matter of fellowship. Timothy received the gift because of the fellowship and through the fellowship. In God’s administration of grace, there is a very basic principle, which is fellowship. Where there is no fellowship, grace stops. Where there is no fellowship, the flow of the Holy Spirit is cut off. Fellowship is a great principle.
Hence, if the elders want to bring the management of a church up to a strong, shining, fresh, and rich condition, they must be persons of fellowship. If the elders in any place lack fellowship, they will surely be in darkness, dryness, weakness, and mistakes. Without fellowship, there is no balance. Without fellowship, you will surely dry up, and when you are dried up, you will be poor and weak. Moreover, when there is no balance, you will be biased, and you will be stuck in minor matters or will go to an extreme. This is unavoidable. If the elders will take every opportunity to fellowship, they will surely be nourishing, rich, shining, fresh, and balanced. They will not be dry and will not be driven to extremes. Hence, in speaking about the elders’ administration, we cannot talk about the coordination of the elders without talking about their fellowship.
During these years the brothers in all the places have realized the need of coordination for the management of the elders. Nevertheless, their feeling for the need of fellowship is not strong enough. I wish that the elders in every locality would have a strong feeling from now on that in order to be an elder there is the need for fellowship. If there is no fellowship, they will not be proper elders. Not only in spiritual matters but in the worldly matters also, there is the need for fellowship with those outside your own sphere. This is why there is the need to have cultural exchanges and scientific exchanges. If you try to close your door and be a reclusive person, in the end you will have only a very narrow view; you will know only a limited amount. Others may have advanced in many ways already, but you are still dragging the oxcart and are still quite contented. Today in politics, military developments, finance, science, and many forms of literature, there is the need for exchanges. Once there is an exchange, there are the riches. You do not necessarily only receive from others; in receiving something from others, you also supply others as well. Fellowship is one of the great principles in the universe. This principle is of God and is ordained by God.
Fellowship is all the more indispensable in the Body of Christ. This can be clearly seen when we look at the human body. The body is fully a matter of fellowship. Whenever the body lacks fellowship and the blood stops circulating, the person is finished. We know that exercise increases the circulation of the blood. In other words, it increases the fellowship. All the sicknesses of the body are dealt with through the fellowship of the blood circulation; all the supply is received through the fellowship of the blood circulation. In the same principle, in the Body of Christ and in the church, all the problems are solved through fellowship, and all the supply is received through the fellowship. For the elders to manage the church, they cannot depart from the principle of fellowship at all. If they do, they will immediately suffer great loss.
In some localities, although the elders have never said that they do not need fellowship, what they do and the way they act is telling others that they do not need fellowship. Such churches are all in a condition of dryness and deadness many times. In the church and in the Body of Christ, there is such a thing called fellowship. Whether you like it or not, you have to fellowship. All those who think they can manage by themselves and can do without fellowship are most foolish and proud. No matter how fat and strong a tree is, it needs water for irrigation. Otherwise, it will wilt and die. Even if we were to become as rich as Paul, we could not do without fellowship. I hope the elders would have this strong feeling. Now let us consider the persons to fellowship with.
The first one with whom the elders should have fellowship is God. All the elders must be those who have fellowship with God. If their fellowship with God is cut off, they should not be elders any longer. Not only should the elders have fellowship with God, but they must also bring all the matters that fall into their hands to God and fellowship with God about these things. While the elders are bearing the responsibilities of the church, they should bring all the matters within their responsibility to God and fellowship with God about them. They should bring all the responsibilities, all the matters, and all the problems before God and fellowship with God about them. Not only should the elders themselves live in fellowship all the time and have dealings before God, but in serving together as elders, when they are confronted with problems in the church that require their handling, their solving, or their facilitating, they need to bring these matters corporately before God and have fellowship with God. They have to deal with them like a business, and they should ask God, “Can this be done? Is this right? How should we do it?” They must fellowship thoroughly with God in everything before they act. The elders must never cut off their fellowship with God. Any decision made apart from fellowship is wrong. All the management in the church, all the decisions, work, promotions, and leading in the church, and everything that passes through the hands of the elders must be brought before God and carried out through fellowship with God. Individually, the elders should have fellowship with God, and, as a whole, every time a decision is made or a matter promoted, the elders must first fellowship with God.
The elders must also fellowship with each other. This mutual fellowship must be a one hundred percent, undiscounted fellowship. In the chapter on coordination we have mentioned that to coordinate together there must be openness. This openness is the fellowship. When we serve as elders together, you cannot fellowship only ninety percent, while holding back ten percent. Anything that is held back will cause problems. When the elders serve together, they must fellowship to such an extent that not one brother is holding back anything from the other elders.
I want to tell the brothers and sisters that the guidance and burden of the elders comes from their fellowship. Likewise, their handling of matters and their solutions to problems come out of fellowship. The elders’ ability, light, and foresight also come out of fellowship. Even the elders’ management comes out of fellowship. Where the elders hold back a little, reserve a little, or close themselves up a little, there the wisdom and light are lacking a little. Anytime you detect something or see something, you have to fellowship the matter over with the elders one hundred percent, fully, and completely. If you do not do this, the management of the elders will never be carried out properly.
In order to manage a church, the elders must have thorough fellowship. If there are five elders, they are like five lumps of clay. They must be mingled together in water until the five lumps become one lump, and they become indistinguishable one from another. This mingling is the fellowship. The five elders should be seeking the Lord’s leading together. The thing to fear in the management of the church is not the ignorance of the elders in handling affairs but their unwillingness to fellowship. If the five brothers are willing to be mingled together and are willing to fellowship together, morning and evening, today, tomorrow, and every day, you will see the Lord’s leading there, and you will see God’s way, God’s wisdom, light, revelation, and burden all there. Through the fellowship, the burden for the gospel will come, the burden to edify the saints will come, the light from the Bible will come, and the gifts will also come. If the elders are willing to fellowship this way, at the right time some will receive the gifts.
I can guarantee all of you here that the best way to be a proper elder is to fellowship every day. Perhaps you may say that you do not have much to fellowship about. It is precisely because of this that you need to come together for fellowship. Suppose you would simply come together to talk, then pray, then talk again, about your problems, my problems, your condition before God, and my condition before God. After you have talked through everything about yourselves as the elders, you would talk about the condition of the brothers and sisters, the condition of the church, the number of sinners in your place, and the way to preach the gospel. If the elders would fellowship in this way, something will surely come out of this kind of fellowship.
The worst thing that can happen is for these five elders to meet together only once a week, while on other occasions they merely shake hands, nod their heads, exchange greetings, and talk about the weather. Whenever there is a meeting, they would come together. After the meeting they would say goodbye to one another. Everything is done merely to maintain outward harmony. Actually, they hide everything and close themselves to the others. Even their prayers issue merely from their throats. If this is the case with the elders, they will not receive guidance a single time, from the beginning of the year to the end; they will not have any burden or any light.
In order for the elders to have the light, the guidance, the wisdom, and the dealings, they must be together daily. Whenever they can, they must come together without too much regard for time. Perhaps they need to fellowship from seven in the evening until midnight, and perhaps they need to come together again for fellowship the next day. If you can fellowship in this manner for a whole month without any results — I will put it crudely — you can then come to cut off my head! Surely the burden will come, and the guidance, the light, the wisdom, the power, and the authority will all come. By that time if you suggest at the meeting that we should preach the gospel, everyone would respond. This is quite amazing. If you have not fellowshipped this way, you may propose, “Well, we have not preached the gospel for three years already. We really need to preach the gospel.” While you are making this proposal, others may be dozing off; there will be no response. This is a lifeless proposal; it is not a living proposal, because you as an elder are not enlivened within. While you are making the proposal, you are pouring cold water on the others; there is no way for you to warm the others up. Suppose the elders are first enlivened by the fellowship and are burning within, and they feel that in two weeks they should preach the gospel. When they speak to the brothers, the word will become living; there will be authority in the word, and the Holy Spirit will put His seal upon it. When others listen to it, they will feel the power and authority of the Holy Spirit in the word. This is not negotiation or a decision but a fellowship.
More than ten years ago when we were serving the Lord in northern China, every Monday from 8 a.m. until 2 or 3 p.m., for six or seven hours, over ten of the elders and leading brothers and sisters would always come together for fellowship. We fellowshipped about the brothers and sisters, the matters related to the church, the Lord’s table meeting the night before, or the gospel meeting on the Lord’s Day. That was not superficial fellowship but serious fellowship. Sometimes the sisters would mention the names of quite a number of sisters, stating their condition. They might mention that a certain sister had much progress and much function, that she might even have some gifts. However, she seemed to lack something, and there seemed to be the need for someone to come in to fill up that lack. Some would bring out some problems, and some would bring out some lacks. The extent of fellowship was quite broad, and hence the time quite long. It was through that kind of fellowship that the church in that place became alive, and the responsible ones became transparent.
By 1943 the church in that place had a great revival. We then felt that it was not enough to fellowship once a week but that we must hold meetings every evening and gather for fellowship each afternoon. At those fellowship meetings we always discussed such things as the direction of the flow of the Holy Spirit, the manner in which different ones had a spiritual turn, the meeting the night before, the feeling for the meeting that evening, and the persons we must look for and contact. That fellowship was truly living. Up to a certain point, a brother would suggest that we contact a certain brother again. Another one might feel that the time was not yet ripe and that we should wait. After such a fellowship, when we went out to visit again, we truly saw the Lord’s blessing. All these things came from the fellowship. If the elders can fellowship continually, there is no way for the church in that place to fail to be revived. There is no need to ask for the apostles’ or the workers’ help any longer. As long as the elders would fellowship from morning till evening, and from evening till morning for thirty days in a row, the church will surely be revived. Please pardon me for saying what I am saying. I know what I am talking about. Wherever such fellowship is lacking, it will be difficult for the Holy Spirit to do His work.
For this reason I hope that the brothers would not discuss business as the first thing but would open themselves up first for fellowship. It is one thing to discuss, and it is another thing to fellowship. When the elders come together to discuss matters, I do know that sometimes everyone is closed. In the end, although there is a conclusion, there is no fellowship among the brothers. Strictly speaking, all the decisions should come out of fellowship.
There is very much to the matter of fellowship. When the brothers come together for fellowship, the Holy Spirit will operate among us apart from our consciousness, and everyone will see his own failure, weakness, or shortcomings. Each one will see his unfaithfulness toward the church and his shortage in learning the lessons before the Lord. If everyone would fellowship his condition before everyone else, let me repeat, some gifts will come out in this way. Through this kind of fellowship some will receive the ministry of the word. Others will receive the gift of healing. I surely know that through this kind of fellowship the minds of some people are turned around. From that day on, they become an opened person; they become wise, and everything presented to them is judged in a wise way. This wisdom, according to 1 Corinthians 12, comes out of fellowship.
Therefore, I would like the brothers to go to try this. In order for the responsibility of the elders to be strengthened in your place, not only do you have to fellowship with God individually, and not only do you have to bring the corporate matters before the Lord and fellowship thoroughly over them, but more important than these things, the elders themselves have to fellowship with one another. The few of you have to be like lumps of clay that are mingled as one lump; there should be no way for you to be separated from one another any longer. When a few brothers fellowship together and are mingled as one, the guidance will come and so will the light, the burden, the revelation, the authority, the power, and the wisdom. This is truly the case.
In the church, in addition to the elders, there are some serving ones who are the deacons. For example, in Taipei there are the responsible ones for the districts, the business-office serving ones, the group-meeting responsible ones, those who are responsible for visitation, for cleaning, for chair and hall arranging, for ushering, and for clerical work. With all these serving ones, the elders need to maintain continual fellowship. This is why I said that the elders should spend all their time with these positive things and should not spend too much time to do what the deacons should do. Never think that if the elders do not watch over the arrangement of the chairs and the hall, they will have nothing more to do. No. There are too many things that they should do. They need to visit and to fellowship with the serving ones. The elders have to fellowship with the serving ones individually one by one. The fellowship needs to be thorough, and they need to do this again and again. If they would do this, there will be many great results.
Do not say that the deacons are doing a good job already, that some are taking care of the windows, the floors, and the chairs, and some are responsible for the ushering, and that things are more or less all right. No. They are not all right. It is like a pot of flowers that is growing. If you give it fertilizer regularly and water it every day, it will grow in one kind of way. If you do not give it fertilizer and do not water it, it can still barely survive, but the appearance will be different. In order for the church service to be full of life, with few problems, and with much perfecting of people that takes them onward and upward, there is the need for the elders to have continual fellowship with the serving ones. I cannot relate to you all the things involved in this kind of fellowship. But when you practice it, you will see the amount of blessing it brings.
Some elders feel that when the church is divided into districts and all the meetings are handed over to the district responsible ones, the elders will be out of a job. It is true that if the elders do not take the proper way of eldership and are still serving as elders in a natural way, the day will come when the church becomes too big and the districts so large that they are divided, and they will find themselves out of a job. But if you would learn and would not serve as an elder in the natural way but would serve as an elder under the Lord’s leading, you will see that there are too many things to do. It is true that the work is handed over to the district responsible ones. But you have to fellowship with them to see how these responsible ones are doing. In Taipei there are over thirty districts, with about one hundred sixty to one hundred seventy district responsible ones. It is a tedious job for the elders to fellowship thoroughly with these ones. How great a responsibility this is! Yet how great is this blessing! Suppose the ten elders can fellowship thoroughly with these one hundred sixty to one hundred seventy district responsible ones, and they can maintain a regular fellowship with them. How great an achievement that will be! Yet how glorious it will be also!
For example, here are two elders who are particularly good at administration. The two of them should coordinate together to fellowship with the responsible ones of the thirty-five districts on administration alone. Perhaps one or two among the elders are particularly good at helping others to read the Bible. They should go out to fellowship with the responsible ones of the thirty-five districts concerning Bible study alone, until all the one hundred sixty or one hundred seventy are able to lead others in their districts to have a Bible study. Perhaps one or two among the elders have learned some particular lessons in fellowship and prayer. They should then fellowship with these one hundred sixty to one hundred seventy on how to live before the Lord. Perhaps one or two among the elders are good at preaching the gospel. They should concentrate on blowing the gospel trumpet, and they should fellowship with the responsible ones in these thirty-five districts concerning the matter of gospel preaching. Brothers, please imagine how beautiful the result would be. The result of this fellowship will bring all the riches of the elders into the district meetings.
Not only should the elders fellowship with the serving ones; they have to find out what the result of this fellowship is. For example, after the elders who are good at administration have fellowshipped about administration, they should go back to see how the others have practiced administration. They may want to supply them a little more. In the end they will find that the others can go on much better than they can. By that time they have to come back to learn from the others. If you would study and investigate in this way, there will be no limit to the administration of the church.
I often condemn myself for one thing: In front of my house is a neglected little garden. I never water, fertilize, or trim the plants. Occasionally, someone would say that my garden looks good, and all is well. My answer would be, “True, nothing is dead yet; everything is still alive.” But look, those plants that should have grown up have not grown up, and those that should have blossomed have not blossomed. If I could water them, fertilize them, and trim them, and if I could move the pots around a little, sometimes under the rain, sometimes under the sun, and sometimes with the dew, I am sure that the flowers would grow even better. A person as lazy as I am concerning flowers, who plants the flowers there but who never moves them around a bit all year round, can only find the flowers half dead; there is no way I can make them look good.
This is the condition that some churches are in. The elders in those places think there is nothing to do. If a person has to be busy all day long simply to take care of a garden and if even by doing that, the work cannot be finished, how much more work is there in the church? Oh, there are too many things to do in the church. There are so many of God’s children there. If the elders would pick up the burden to fellowship with them, they will find too many people to guide, to contact, to open up, to lead, to raise up, and to perfect. This is why I say again, the elders have to fellowship with God, with each other, and with the other serving ones. Only then will the church be managed in a proper way.
The elders should also do their best to contact and fellowship with all the brothers and sisters. They should fellowship with the solid ones, and they should fellowship with the backslidden ones. They should fellowship with the weak ones, and they should fellowship with the strong ones. They should fellowship with the ones who are not gifted, and they should fellowship with the gifted ones. An elder has too many things to do. Some sisters who are sitting here are housewives. Everyone knows that in a family, no matter how many children there are, there is no end to the chores. You can leave your house alone day after day, or you can put work into it day after day. The same is true with the church. You can leave it to desolation, and let it grow by itself. The elders can come once a week to discuss a little, make some decisions, and then make some announcements in the prayer meetings. You can do this. But if you want to be another kind of elder, you will see that every day there are burdens, and every day you can be so busy. If the elders have a lot of free time, it will surely mean that the church in that place has no blessing. The more blessing there is, the more the church will be busy, like a marketplace. If you make a brother alive, imagine how many people he can bring into the church life. If you do not want to be busy, you can make the church dead. One will be cold, another will be backslidden. A third will be dried up, and a fourth will be dead. In the end only you will be left, and you will not be busy at all. If you want to bring in the blessing, you will see that every day you are busy.
Brothers, I do not encourage others to lightly give up their occupations to serve the Lord full time. But I want to tell the brothers and sisters that if all of you here would receive the burden to work for the Lord this way, even if every one of us would become full time, we would still not meet the needs. If you make one brother alive, he will bring in three or five. If you make these ones alive, they may bring in twenty. Please consider, how can you handle this work?
Some have come to me for fellowship concerning the matter of serving full time. They said that they have the heart and the burden, but they did not see the need. I told them that if they did not see the need, they did not have to force themselves to make the decision. But within me I said to myself that whether or not there is a need depends fully on yourself. If you work toward it, there will be a need. If you do not work, there will be no need. I believe the brothers and sisters understand what I mean. Try to work this way and see. If you serve the Lord by this way of fellowship, not only will one person be inadequate; even ten persons will not be adequate to meet today’s need. When you get through with every brother and sister, eventually, not only will they be raised up, but you will find out the feeling of the saints and will know where their needs are. The case of every brother and sister is thoroughly worked on by the elders. In this way, when the elders come together for fellowship, the sense will come, and the leading will come; everyone will know what to do about the church. The elders’ leading and arrangement of the church is surely produced by this kind of fellowship. If the elders do not fellowship with each other, nor with the serving ones, and if they lack the fellowship with the brothers and sisters, it will be useless to have an elders’ meeting once in a while.
Hence, in order to receive guidance, the elders have to fellowship with God, with each other, with the serving ones, and with all the saints as well. Only after the fellowship in these few aspects becomes thorough should they come together to seek God’s guidance. This is the principle of the judgment of the breastplate by the priests. The elders must bring all of God’s people before Him before they can receive God’s guidance.
Although the churches in all the localities are administered locally, and although the authority of oversight and administration is vested in the hands of the local elders, in their normal condition the elders should do their best to fellowship with all the other places. Taipei should fellowship with New York, Tokyo, Manila, Singapore, London, France, and Tainan. If the elders can do this, they will find that the benefits fellowship brings are very great. Your view will be expanded, and your isolation will be balanced. If you are better than others already, your fellowship will make you even better. You will receive a boost from the other places, and your time will not be wasted. Do not say that you have no time and that as an elder in Taipei, you already do not have enough time to take care of the problems in Taipei, let alone take care of the fellowship with other places. Please remember, however, that if you do not have this fellowship, you will surely suffer. Hence, no matter how busy you are, you have to fellowship.
Sometimes it is good even to have some ordinary fellowship. For example, you can write to another church to tell them about the blessings you have, or about your weaknesses, with the hope that they can render some help. This is also good fellowship. Sometimes when problems arise, they cannot be solved locally. At such times you can write to the brothers in other localities and tell them that there is such a problem and ask for their feeling. You can ask if they have encountered similar problems in the past. Sometimes you can fellowship a little in the matter of burden for prayer; you can tell the others the items that need prayer. Sometimes you can share a little concerning the light you have received. These are all excellent things to do, and they can render tremendous help to all the places.
The last time I went to the Philippines, the heaviest burden I felt was that for a long time the churches in Southeast Asia have suffered greatly because of the lack of fellowship with the churches in China. Thank the Lord that during these years there is some recovery, but it is still far from enough. Some unnecessary news spreads very fast, yet the necessary fellowship is very lacking. Some have a wrong concept about The News of the Churches; they think that to write something there is to make a display of themselves. I think that those who think this way should condemn themselves first. Whether or not you are making a display of yourself is absolutely a matter of your intention. But whether or not you are making a display of yourself, one thing is certain — you need others’ fellowship, and others need to fellowship with you. You cannot do without this.
Brothers, the apostle Paul did expose himself considerably. Particularly in 2 Corinthians, he opened himself up completely without any reservation. If he had closed himself up, how much would the churches throughout the ages have suffered! For this reason we have to do our best to open up ourselves. If you want to condemn yourselves for making a display of yourself, you can do that. But you have to see that at the same time you need your brothers’ supply, and your brothers need your supply. If the brothers from Shilin had closed themselves up, where would the church in Shilin be today? If Peitou had cut itself off completely from outside influence, would there be a church in Peitou today? We have to admit that we are living a life of fellowshipping with others. We are living under the shade of the umbrella of others; we are carried along by others’ current. We cannot be proud, and we cannot be foolish.
The church is the Body of Christ, and all of us have to learn not to lose any blessing from any part of the Body. We must be willing to live in the Body and receive the supply from it. The elders in every locality should have this Body-consciousness. They must learn to fellowship with the churches in all the localities. They must supply others, and they must receive the supply from others. Even when others are lower, weaker, and poorer than you are, when you fellowship with them, you will discover that you can still be helped by the weak and supplied by the poor.
The Lord’s children should see that fellowship is a great need here. I must say solemnly that the reason many local churches cannot go on today is that they lack fellowship with the other churches. It is an extremely valuable thing for you to try your best to fellowship with the churches in the other localities. This will not only supply the churches in the other places, but it will supply you yourself and your church. Of course, this requires that our heart be broad and our view be large. We have to see something universal, and we have to take care of the needs in all the places.
Of course, there is much to consider about the fellowship between the churches. You cannot write a letter of recommendation in a loose way. There must be many boundaries. Concerning some things, you can fellowship with one place but not with another place. Concerning some other things, you can fellowship about them now but not later. There is the boundary in time, and there is the boundary in place. There are also some things that you cannot fellowship with another locality at all. You have to learn all these lessons.
The elders should also do their best to have fellowship with the workers whom the Lord uses. Although the churches in the localities are independent before the Lord, they have to maintain continual fellowship with the workers. This is also a very blessed thing to do.
In order to fellowship with God, there are many things to learn. In order to fellowship with each other, there are also many things to learn. For everything, you have to learn. How can the church in a place profit from the workers with whom it has fellowship? How can the workers receive help from the church? All of these require much learning. The fellowship between the elders and the workers is a great lesson to learn.
We have to know that someone who has received an elementary-school education is better than one who is illiterate, and someone who has graduated from junior high school is better than one who has graduated only from elementary school. Someone who has graduated from high school is better than one who has graduated from junior high school, someone who has gone to college is better than one who has graduated only from high school, and someone who is studying in graduate school is better than one who is in college. Although you can live whether or not you study, the way you live is different. If an elder learns the lessons, he can be an elder. If he does not learn the lessons, he can still be an elder. However, the problem is that the kind of elder he is will determine the kind of church he leads. Those who have learned the lessons lead the church on in one way, and those who have not learned the lessons lead the church in another way. If we want to have real management and building in the church, we have to learn many lessons properly. No carpenter could saw, cut, and chop from the day he was born; he has to practice daily. Those who are natural do things in one way, and those who have been trained do things another way. For this reason the elders must practice and must learn.
