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History has clearly shown us that the existence of a denomination, free group, or the genuine church life all depends on solid doctrines. If there are no solid doctrines, there is no church. Since the Lord’s recovery has come to the United States, we have stressed very much that the building up of the church depends upon the experience of Christ, upon the life-giving Spirit, and upon the matters of life. Seemingly, I am saying something different now, but in the past I occasionally indicated that the Pentecostal movement could never have anything built up. The Assembly of God, the solid and big denomination built up by the Pentecostal movement, was established in 1914. After fifty years of their existence, in 1965 I heard that through their practice they had learned to charge their theological students not to go out with the expectation that the so-called Pentecostal gifts could build up the church. They charged their students to realize that the way to build up the church is to put out doctrines or teachings. Therefore, in the Assembly of God meetings, they do not practice speaking in tongues. Mainly, they preach the gospel and teach the doctrines for edifying the saints. This does not mean that they have given up speaking in tongues but that they exercise these gifts in their private lives.
I say this to show you that even in the past I occasionally indicated strongly that the so-called “Spirit” cannot build up the church, but the solid truth or the solid doctrines can. Certainly, what kind of church you will build up depends upon what kind of truth you teach. Since 1962 here in the United States, we have stressed greatly that the churches are built up not by mere doctrines but by Christ, by the Spirit, and by life. Since this time a great many messages have been put out on the truth. If we had not put out any messages on the truth since the recovery came to this country, and we had merely learned to pray and to exercise the gifts such as tongues and healings, today’s situation would be very poor. In the past we practiced in this way for a short time, and we found out that the issue was poor. Through the years, however, we have stressed Christ, the Spirit, and life. In all the messages what we condemned was the empty, dead doctrines of dead letters. However, we fully realized that to produce the church, to have the church exist, and to build up the church we needed to put out the solid, living truths full of Christ, full of the Spirit, and full of life. God’s way to carry out His economy is to use His holy Word.
Suppose that on this earth among the human race there had never been such a book as the Bible. If we had not had a Bible in our hands during the past two thousand years since the Lord Jesus resurrected and ascended to the heavens, everything would be in the air, and nothing could be solid. Even the things concerning the Spirit could not be solid. The Spirit depends upon the Word. This is why the Lord said that the words that He has spoken to us are spirit (John 6:63). The words that the Lord speaks are the solid spirit. Without the Word the Spirit is not so solid. Without the Word the Spirit might be just “a phantom.” Today, however, we have the Bible. In innumerable instances we have seen that whenever people contact the holy Word, many times they get the Spirit, but it is hard to give an instance where people touch the Spirit and then get the Word. There are a great many instances, however, that show us that when you touch the Word, you get the Spirit. This is history. A principle has been set up through history that there is the desperate need of the living truth to produce the church, to help the church exist, and to build up the church.
Through the past ten years up to the present time, it has been fully proven among us that the most profitable writings and publications are the Life-study messages with the footnotes of the Recovery Version. I wrote these things not for scholarly study for people to get a degree but for life ministering, for truth releasing, and for opening up the books of the Bible. We do not need scholarly writings or any kind of books that build up people’s degrees. That is not our purpose. To some extent we would not agree with this. We are not for theology, but we are for “theos,” for God. Our publications are not for any kind of “ology” but just for God, the Triune God, the processed Triune God, and the Lord, Christ, Jesus, the Spirit, life, and the church. Our publications are for a living person, not for any “ology.” We are not for the ology of God, the ology of Christ, the ology of the church, or the ology of the divine things. However, I do have a burden to publish things full of Christ, full of the processed Triune God, full of the life-giving Spirit, full of life, and full of the church. The Lord’s recovery is just for the processed Triune God to be dispensed into us, and the living Christ, the Spirit, life, and the church are the crucial contents of the Lord’s recovery. There is no other place to pick up other books that are so rich, so enlightening, and so nourishing concerning the recovery of Christ, the Spirit, life, and the church. Since this is the real situation and the real condition, I feel that we have no choice but to use the Life-studies, because we realize that this is the best way to bring people into the holy Word.
The holy Word itself says in Psalm 119:130: “The opening of Your words gives light.” Millions of copies of the Bible have been distributed. They have been placed in hotels, in homes, and in many places. Nearly everywhere you go today, you find a Bible, but who has entered into the Bible? There has been nearly no entrance. Many have a copy of the Bible, but the Bible has been closed and nearly never opened. Now the Lord has given us a key, an opener. I consider our writings as the opener to open the holy Word. I believe that those of you who have read the Life-study messages can testify honestly that these messages with the footnotes of the Recovery Version have opened up a certain chapter or a certain book of the Bible to you. This is not to replace the Bible but to bring people into the Bible.
Based upon this, I feel that for the long run for the Lord’s recovery in such a top country as the United States, which is full of culture, education, scientific knowledge, and biblical knowledge, the greatest need we must meet is to bring the saints in the Lord’s recovery into the truth to carry on the Lord’s recovery. For a country to be strong, there is the need to bring its people into the proper education. If the people are behind in education, that country is also behind. The reason the United States is a top country is because of its highest education. When President Nixon was in office, he encouraged the young people to study at the universities, because many young Americans at that time did not want to study further after high school. However, the trend in the United States has changed. Such a big country needs many more people to receive the highest, up-to-date education. Otherwise, there is no way for a country to be among the top countries in today’s world.
Today we are here for the Lord’s recovery. For the long run we surely have to help the saints in the Lord’s recovery to get into the top spiritual education. You must remember that we still uplift the living Christ, the life-giving Spirit, life itself and its riches, and the church in a living way. To promote these things, to carry these things out, and to bring people into these things so that they remain there, we need the Word, and we need the truth. The standard of the Lord’s recovery depends upon the standard of the truth that we put out. The truths will be the measure and the standard.
Some may think that I am “selling my cargo.” They may also think that I am controlling so that no other teaching would come into the Lord’s recovery. I want to make the real situation clear to all of you. After four or five years some better things may come out. I cannot predict, and only the Lord knows. If that would happen, we had better go to take these better things. I would take the lead to take them. While I am writing the footnotes and putting out the messages, I am always on the alert to see if anything new has come out. Many Christian publications are produced in the United States; in other countries, however, there has been nearly nothing produced. What spiritual publications have come out in the past twenty years in France or Russia? What spiritual publications have come out of Britain in recent times? Britain was used by the Lord greatly in the last century. The saints there really saw something, and groups of great Bible teachers were produced in Britain up to the first third of this century. After the first third of this century, however, Britain has produced nearly nothing in the way of top spiritual publications. From my observation nearly nothing has come out of Germany in recent years. In the past twenty years since the Lord’s recovery came to the United States, the only things that I can see that have been produced by Christians of some worth and value have been from the United States. In the past twenty years the Christians in the United States have put out a number of books, such as lexicons, Greek concordances, and word studies of the Scriptures. These books are very good, and I encourage you all to buy them. However, there has been nothing published in the way of exposition that is worthwhile. It is good for us to purchase the books on the Greek and Hebrew languages since these are very useful. The best choice for exposition, however, is to use our publications.
We need to find a way to bring all the saints in the Lord’s recovery into a proper education of the truth concerning God’s New Testament economy. We need to consider this matter in two aspects — the personal aspect and the meeting aspect. We must have a personal way laid as a foundation for us to stand on and then go on to take care of the meeting way.
The Lord’s recovery has been in the United States for over twenty years. During this time all those who left the church and who caused trouble and became a failure never received a solid foundation in the Word. Everyone in the past twenty years who has passed through all kinds of tests and who was not only never shaken but also never affected is a real benefit to the Lord’s recovery. Whatever the storm was, they remained steadfast, and they went on with the Lord and are still here. They have not been a damage or a problem. Everyone like this is one who loves the Word and has a sound foundation in the truth. There is not an exception to this either on the positive side or on the negative side. All those who became a problem never had a solid foundation in the Word.
Over the last ten years we have published approximately twelve hundred Life-studies. I have the assurance to say that whoever has read through five hundred Life-study messages properly has been an excellent believer. You elders who are shepherding the local churches know the real situation of most of the saints. If a saint in your locality is not that “proper,” and he would begin from tomorrow morning to read the Life-study messages until he reaches five hundred, he will become another person. Medicine, nourishment, and all kinds of vitamins are included in these messages. This is why I said earlier that I had some realization that some of the saints who contacted me had not read many of the Life-studies. I realized that they had not taken the “medicine and nourishment.” In their talk there were symptoms and signs of sickness. For example, a doctor may prescribe certain drugs for his patient. When the patient comes back to him after two months, the doctor can tell whether or not the patient took the drugs. The patient’s breathing, color, and entire being tell the doctor that the patient did not take the prescription. If you would begin to study the Life-studies every day starting tomorrow morning, you will become a different person even after fifty days.
By the Lord’s mercy I am quite healthy. I am doing much more than what I did in the past. When I was in Shanghai, I never spoke twice a day. I only spoke once a day at the most, and I did not do as much writing work as I do today. My wife always reminds me that I am eighty years old now, and that sixty-five is the age of retirement. She tells me that I am doubling my work instead of retiring. My point is this — the reason that I am quite healthy is because I eat the healthy food. After speaking for two sessions in one of the morning meetings of this training, I was tired. I went back home, ate lunch, and laid down. I then rested until five and became refreshed. Then I ate another meal and came to the evening meeting to minister the Word. In the evening I spoke until nine-thirty. After the evening meeting I went home, ate a snack, and slept well. After eating in the morning, I was refreshed and invigorated. The reason for this is a good diet full of the proper nourishment.
I have the assurance that if you would get into the Life-study messages continually, you will be different after fifty days. Any message from any book, such as Genesis, Exodus, Matthew, or Revelation, is good for your study. Just go to the Life-study messages. I hope that the Lord would really have mercy upon us so that we would not hold any kind of personal feeling or individualistic opinion. We must be those who solely take care of the interest of the Lord’s recovery and the benefit of all the dear saints who have come into the Lord’s recovery. We care only for this.
We must do our best to get ourselves into these truths and to get these truths constituted into our being. This cannot be done within a short time, but this must be our practice. I also am burdened that all the leading ones, either the elders or the serving ones taking some kind of lead, should have a real burden to pray for the saints in your locality that the Lord may stir up their interest, their seeking heart, and their spirit to seek after the Lord in His truth. The truth is nowhere but in the Bible, yet the Bible needs an opener. We need to lead the saints into the real, right, and proper realization of the need of the Bible and also of the help of the Life-study messages and the Recovery Version.
We should help the saints to build up a practice or a habit that every day they would spend at least thirty minutes in the Word. This can be done by taking ten minutes in the morning, ten minutes in the evening, and another ten minutes before going to bed. We all need to build up such a practice to spend at least thirty minutes a day to get into God’s Word. The best way is to charge the saints to study a book of the New Testament according to their choice. They should get into this book continually and every day. Some saints may decide to study the book of Romans or the book of Hebrews. They should study every day either three times for ten minutes each or one time for thirty minutes. We should charge them to pray-read two or three verses of this book every day. Then they have to study the accompanying message. We have messages on all the verses. The saints do not need to pray-read the Life-study messages, but they have to pray-read the biblical verses in order to get the help to enter into the truth conveyed in these few verses. They also need the help of the footnotes and the Life-study messages to enter into the truth. The saints need to take this way every day to get into the truth. After one year of studying the Bible in this way, there will be a solid change in the saints’ home life, private life, and church life. A few verses seems very slow, but we must realize that breathing is a slow thing. We breathe only a little at a time, but this continual practice accumulates and keeps us living. We may think that this is too slow, but even if it took us ten years to finish the entire New Testament, that would be wonderful. To pick up the truth contained in half of the New Testament after five years would be marvelous. We do not encourage the saints to be greedy and attempt to finish one book in one day. Then “their stomach will burst.” We should not encourage them in this way. Rather, we should slow them down. It is not a matter of quantity but a matter of endurance. You must endure this kind of Bible study. I think that we need to remind them week after week, and sometimes the elders need to give the saints some direction, some encouragement, and some incentive.
Many of you leading ones have never encouraged the saints in the last five years to get into the truths in the way of using the Life-studies. You leave the matter of the saints’ getting into the Life-studies altogether up to them. You do not seem to care whether this is a dying matter or a living matter. This way of getting into the truth has become an orphan with no father and no mother, with no fostering. This has been the situation, and in some of the local churches your problems all have been due to this one thing. As a family, you did not feed your folks, your children, with the proper diet. How do you expect your family to be healthy? If your family does not have the proper diet, be prepared for disease, sickness, and trouble. Do not try to solve the problems by any other way. That will not work. The only way that works is to come back to the proper diet, to feed your family with the proper food.
Some of you had the feeling that the attendance of the meetings using the Life-study messages was reducing. Then you changed the content of the meeting to the so-called new beginners’ lessons. When I heard that this was your practice, I was anticipating that you would eventually have some trouble. I realized that the saints would starve. I was the first one who got charged to carry meetings with the new beginners’ lessons in 1948, and I tasted the real situation. It was absolutely not suitable to carry a meeting. Every time we practiced using the new beginners’ lessons for the meeting, we failed. Since we have tasted failure time after time, why would we go back to this? When this report came to me, I was really bothered, but I did not say a word.
The church in your locality is your family. Even if I am your grandfather, that is still your family. I did not like to say anything, but I was waiting for news that you would come to me for help. I anticipated this, and now you have the trouble as a result of your diet. I cannot cure or heal you by just one visit. No visit can heal you. You must come back to the proper diet and charge your children to take the proper diet. Do not only ask them, but charge them. All the mothers in a family charge their little ones to eat properly. At every meal a proper mother charges her children to eat sufficiently and properly. In like manner, you should charge the saints to have a proper diet. You will see whether they will be healthy or not. We must realize that to shepherd a church is to take care of a big family with many folks who are young, old, and middle-aged. We must feed them properly, and we must consider what is the most nourishing, healing, and germ-killing diet. We have to make a choice.
Please do not think that I am “selling my cargo.” I beg you to forget this thought, which comes from the devil. I am not selling my cargo, but I am ministering the divine truth to God’s people. Therefore, as leading brothers, try your best in your locality to stir up an atmosphere and to create a hunger and thirst in the saints for the Lord’s truth. Tell them that the truth is in the unique holy Word and that the best help to usher them into the Word is the Recovery Version with the footnotes and all the Life-studies. Of course, we should not practice anything legal. We should not make these things a legal matter that the saints are required to do. However, if the saints do love the Lord’s recovery, they must get themselves fed all the time with the healthy food so that they may be strong. As a result of eating a proper, regular diet, the saints will be strong, and the Lord will have a strong testimony.
