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In this chapter I would like to say something further concerning our experiences from the past years until today. We surely have learned much from our past history. I was with the Brethren assembly for seven and a half years, and I was a very faithful attendant of their meetings. They always centered on typology, prophecy, dispensations, and exhortations for good conduct. I took down notes and studied all their publications. I also put many points into my old Chinese Bibles, which are full of notes. Undoubtedly, I received something from them.
Then the Lord brought me from that Brethren situation into the Lord’s recovery. At that time our church life was wholly dependent upon Brother Nee’s messages. He first published twenty-four volumes of his paper, which was called The Christian. That became a great help for us — the honest and sincere learners. We all treasured those twenty-four volumes, and to some extent the messages conveyed in those twenty-four volumes got into our being. I can testify that this was so with me. I was able to present these messages in a doctrinal way in any place, at any time, and to any person who needed the truth. I could present them, not in a common way but in a way of teaching them to pass on to others.
Brother Nee was very busy in those days, and he was not so healthy. He always needed some kind of rest year round because he had a heart problem. It was very hard for him to give us conferences often. From 1932 through 1949, in the eighteen years that I was with him, he gave not more than ten conferences. It was from 1940 through 1942 that Brother Nee carried out his burden to have a long training. He did his best to hold conferences during those two to three years, mainly for the trainees’ sake. Those conferences were part of his training given to us. During those two or three years he would have a few days for a conference about every two months, but most of those messages were not printed.
Also, the atmosphere among the saints in the Lord’s recovery in those days was that the general attendants came merely to listen to messages to get inspiration. Very few of the saints took notes. The messages that Brother Nee gave were good messages and were very touching, rich, uplifting, living, and refreshing. Of course, there was much inspiration in these messages, so all who attended these meetings were excited. They received the help, and they were happy, but they retained only inspiration. When there was a need to present the truths in Brother Nee’s messages to others, very few were capable of doing this. This has caused me to consider our situation very much. I realize the need to release the truth for the producing of the churches, for the bringing up, for the edifying, and for the building up of the churches. I surely have been cautioned by the situation in Brother Nee’s time. As far as the attendants of his meetings were concerned, his messages were good for inspiration and the ministry of life to help the saints to grow in life, but the saints did not have the view of being built up in the truth so that they could continue to present the same truths to the needy ones.
Even among the co-workers at that time, only a few out of five hundred co-workers could present a truth in a doctrinal way. For example, Brother Nee shared a number of times on the truth of sanctification, and he made this truth very doctrinally clear. We all received the help in life through the inspiration of these particular messages. After we received the help in life, however, we did not retain much of the truth in our memory. Actually, we were not trained to present this truth to others, so most of the co-workers were not capable of teaching others by presenting the truth in an adequate way. This was the reason that, among us, only the works of three brothers were printed: Brother Nee’s books; Dr. Yu’s translations of the mystical books, such as the autobiography of Madame Guyon; and a small portion of my books. This was the extent of the publishing work in China. Of course, I always preached what Brother Nee preached and taught. I was also very much occupied with the churches, so I had no thought of publishing books. I was fully occupied with the work, with the burden to take care of the churches.
When we came to Taiwan, this afforded us a new environment to reconsider how to meet the need. First, I gave a series of messages on crucial truths in 1949. (See Crucial Truths in the Holy Scriptures, vols. 1—6.) That laid a very good foundation for the work in Taiwan. Some of you are still using these lessons. Through that I learned that to give messages for conferences could help the saints to grow in life very much, but that would not help the saints to be built up in the full knowledge of the truth. In 1 Timothy 2:4 Paul tells Timothy that God desires all men to be saved and to come to the full knowledge of the truth. I realized that to have conferences or messages given on the Lord’s Day would surely not be adequate enough to build up the saints in the full knowledge of the truth.
From 1950 through 1961 we had three to four months of training every year. In every period of training there was always an item of the study of the Bible. The first book that we studied in this kind of training was Ephesians. In 1953 a book in Chinese was published with these messages on the book of Ephesians. Since 1954 I began to use the term life-study. I used this word the first time for a general study of the entire Bible. We had a long period of training for about six months in which we received a general view of the New Testament and also a part of the Old Testament. Many saints became excited about this. These messages laid a very good foundation on the island of Taiwan.
I still discovered that even by that way not many saints in Taiwan could present the truth as it should be presented. I left Taiwan at the end of 1961, and I stayed in the United States for four years. From 1965 I went back to Taiwan about once every two years to hold a conference. Since 1961 in Taiwan, there has not been this kind of training based upon the biblical truths, so this has left a situation of a lack of training in Taiwan.
During my first ten years in the United States I held only conferences plus summer trainings. I did not have the time to train the saints in the biblical knowledge. Then I realized that this was not adequate. The conferences were mainly to pick up a certain burden or an item and give anywhere from seven to ten messages. The messages in the conferences impressed people mainly with the point of life and rendered them some inspiration. However, this never performed an adequate job of building up the saints in the biblical education concerning Christ, the Spirit, life, and the church. Due to this I began to consider that we needed annual trainings to go through the entire New Testament. Eventually, I intended not only to go through the New Testament but also in the meantime to go through the Old Testament. As a result, we began with the two lines of the Old and New Testaments.
I am very happy about these annual trainings because many truths were not put out according to inspiration but according to the books of the Bible. The speaking in a conference just depends upon the speaker’s burden. A series of messages is given to release that burden, and all these messages cover certain points. They do not, however, serve the purpose of educating the saints or building up the saints in the full knowledge of the truth. To study our way through the books of the Bible, however, does not allow us to pick up our burden to put out something in the way of inspiration. Rather, it forces us and even regulates us in the line of the truth according to the divine revelation. For instance, in Matthew there is the basic truth of the kingdom of the heavens. I do not believe that any conference speaker would pick up a burden with an inspiration to speak about the truth of the kingdom of the heavens. This would be very rare. When you make a decision to cover all the books of the New Testament, though, you cannot avoid covering the truth in its entirety.
I must truthfully testify that if I had not been writing the footnotes on the books of the Bible, I would never have had an inspiration to give messages on the book of Mark. I do not believe that any burden would have come to me to give a conference concerning the books of Mark or James. In the first eleven years that I was in the United States, all the messages that I gave were concerning Christ, the Spirit, the human spirit, the ground of the church, and the Trinity. I very rarely quoted anything from the book of Mark. When we came to Mark in the life-study of the Bible, I was wondering what I was going to write. I had no choice, and I was forced to write something. According to my realization, however, the trainings on the Epistles of Peter, the Epistles of John, and the books of Mark and James were in the heavens. The best trainings were these trainings. The light came just by my being forced to write the footnotes on these books.
I was never so clear about 1 John as I was during the training on this book. I still have a clear bird’s-eye view of 1 John. The subject of this book is the fellowship of the divine life. It is divided into three parts: the fellowship of the divine life (1:1—2:11), the teaching of the divine anointing (vv. 12-27), and the virtues of the divine birth (v. 28—5:21). The virtues of the divine birth comprise three items: to practice the divine righteousness (2:28—3:10a), to practice the divine love (v. 10b—5:3), and to overcome the world, death, sin, the devil, and idols (vv. 4-21). This is a bird’s-eye view of the wonderful book of 1 John.
According to my consideration, the best of all the trainings we have had was the one on the book of Mark. This exceeded all the others. If I was not compelled to get into Mark, I would have never touched it. This shows that we are partial in our studying of the Bible. We are not balanced, but by studying the books of the Bible in a definite way, we have no choice. Every book is God-breathed, so we must study them all.
Despite all the trainings we have given covering the entire New Testament, I realize that still the saints in the Lord’s recovery in the United States have not been helped to be so knowledgeable of the truth. In other words, they have not been helped to come to the full knowledge of the truth. I discovered that even many of the positive ones in the Lord’s recovery cannot present the truth. For example, many of the saints in the Lord’s recovery are not able to present the matter of sanctification clearly to people in a doctrinal way. All the saints in the Lord’s recovery need to be those who preach the gospel, teach the truth, and minister life to others. I discovered that so many dear saints have the heart to do this, yet when they begin to preach, teach, or minister life, they have nothing to say. They have nothing as the gospel, the good news, to impart something to others. They have the desire to teach the truth, but they do not have the materials constituted into their being to talk about. Many saints treasure the ground of the church. They would tell people, “We are standing on the church ground. If you do not have this, you will be divisive.” When people ask what the church ground is, many of the saints have little to say. The outsiders do not know what the ground of the church is, and neither do many of us.
A person may be attending a denomination for twenty years. Eventually, he is not able to preach even a little of the gospel, because he was not trained or raised up in that way. Many have been sitting in the pews of denominations for every Sunday morning service for over twenty years. Eventually, after twenty years they cannot teach people about one spiritual subject. When we were there in the denominations, our concept was that it was not our obligation to teach. That was not our duty, but that was the duty of the preachers or of the pastors. We never had the thought of being able to teach others. Even in our homes we could not teach our own children. We just encouraged them to go to the service. This principle is nearly the same with us. Most of the saints have been sitting with us for years appreciating all the messages as a treasure. Through all the ministry of the Word they received the help point by point, but they are not capable in presenting the items of the truth to others. We must admit that here we have a great lack and a failure.
I did say in the past that everyone can be an apostle, but if you do not have the knowledge of the biblical truths, how could you be an apostle? Also, to be an elder you must be appointed by the divine truth. Until you have the knowledge of the divine truth, you are not adequate or qualified to be an elder. Even the elders in most of the churches cannot present the truth adequately. We must see that we are short in this matter. If all the approximately eight thousand saints in the Lord’s recovery in the United States would be educated in this way, we would have eight thousand apostles preaching, teaching, and ministering the divine truths. The actual situation, however, is not like this today, so I think we have to wake up.
I am not fellowshipping in a legal way, but in principle I beg the elders to reconsider the way to carry out the meetings. We must have a very available way to carry out God’s purpose. We cannot go the religious way. Even today our way of meeting is still very much governed and influenced by the religious way. We come together to pray, read some verses of the Bible, and give some messages, and the people who have been sitting in our meetings for years eventually get only some kind of inspiration. This is better than nothing, but for the long run the Lord could not carry out His purpose in this way.
We cannot take the old way of our meeting life. If we continue to take our old way, I am afraid that after another ten years we will be in the same condition. We are just giving people a little injection to help them grow in life mainly by inspiration, but no solid truth has been constituted into their being that can remain in their memory and that can be presented to others in a proper doctrinal way. By taking the way that we have taken, we have lost the nature of the testimony of Jesus, which must be a constitution of the proper truth that produces a proper daily living. If the saints are not properly constituted with the truth, they cannot live a proper life. If they live only by inspiration and not by the constitution of the truth, I do not trust in that kind of living to be a testimony of the Lord.
I feel that we must endeavor to make all the church meetings educational centers to build the saints up with the proper knowledge. Our meetings should not be merely a restaurant to feed the children or a hospital to heal people. If the parents of a child would not care for the education of their children until they become ten years old, their children would grow up to be persons who are not very useful to society. Proper parents must take care of bringing their children up through elementary, junior high, high school, and college. In like manner, we must educate our spiritual children. We should not only help them grow in life but should also help them to be educated and built up in the proper knowledge of the truth. To carry out this educational work we must come to the Life-study messages with the Recovery Version and the footnotes. If all the saints could go through the entire New Testament and the Life-studies with the Recovery Version and the footnotes in five years, I would worship the Lord. This would be wonderful.
There is also a need among us for many young people to dedicate two years to the Lord after graduation from college. These young people who are full time should spend four hours in the morning to study the Word. Every morning for five days a week they must get into the New Testament from Matthew through Revelation. They should study book after book and chapter after chapter with no choice for a particular book of their preference. They should go directly to the book of Matthew and study their way through the entire New Testament to the end of the book of Revelation with the help of the Recovery Version with its footnotes and the Life-studies. Hopefully within two years they could finish their study of the entire New Testament. In addition to these four hours of study in the morning, in the afternoon they could pray and have some fellowship, and in the evening they could go to meetings or go to the campus for the work there. This would be wonderful if many of our young people could give two years to the Lord in this kind of way. It would be wonderful if there would be a number of young saints in each locality who were fully educated in the basic truths of the entire New Testament. They will be the foundation, and they will teach others. After they are married, they will teach their children.
Also, the elders have to endeavor to get into the truth. Do not excuse yourself by saying that you are too old. Even at the age of eighty I spend a certain time every day in the Word. If I can make it, so can you. It all depends upon whether or not we have the heart. We all know the universal proverb that says, “If there is the will, there is the way.” All of us elder brothers need to get ourselves saturated, soaked, and constituted with this basic knowledge of God’s Word. I must testify that I love God’s Word. God is Spirit, and God is life. The Spirit is in the Word, and the Word is life.
It is not too much for me to propose such a thing strongly. I propose that you study the Bible with an opener, with a help. All of us who have some experience with the Life-study messages know that they may be considered as the best help. They are the most availing and prevailing key to open up the New Testament to all of us. We must remember that at the beginning of any endeavor we always feel awkward and not so successful. However, we must realize that the beginning is the experimental stage, and if we keep endeavoring to get into the truth, I believe the result that will issue will be very promising.
We should encourage the saints to have a private time in the Lord’s Word and that they should do this as a proper rule of their daily life. Regardless of how busy or how tired we are, we can reserve thirty minutes a day for a time with the Lord in the Word. It all depends upon our will. If there is the will, there is the way. To save half an hour among twenty-four hours is not a hard thing. If the saints could practice spending one hour or more in the Lord’s Word, this would be wonderful, but at least we should encourage them to give half an hour to the Lord every day. The saints should be encouraged to separate or sanctify thirty minutes every day to the Lord. We all can realize what a blessing this will be, and I believe that this will make the Lord very pleased. Then every local church needs to find a way to carry out the meetings in the principle of giving the saints the proper education in the full knowledge of the truth.
The truth concerning the salvation of the soul is contained in a book that we have published entitled God’s Full Salvation. Over sixty years ago Brother Nee taught the things concerning the salvation of the soul. I received this teaching, and I believed in it, but I could not teach it adequately, because I did not know much about it. As a result, I began to study. At that time there were no other books from which I could get any help in this matter. Just by studying the Bible, I had no key to help me to understand what the salvation of the soul was. When I was with the Brethren for seven and a half years, I never had this kind of concept. I could not find any books to help me in this matter, so I had to go back to Brothers Nee’s books. Even in his books there were not that many messages, so I had to endeavor. Eventually, I learned how to present this matter. Very few of the Chinese saints who received a great amount of help through Brother Nee’s ministry could present a message on the salvation of the soul. We have covered the salvation of the soul quite often and have published many pages on this matter with many points. We must ask ourselves, though, if we are able to present an adequate message on the salvation of the soul. It seems that we all heard this and probably we all know this, but when we try to present it, we cannot do it.
I believe that the book entitled God’s Full Salvation will be useful not only for the Summer School of Truth with the junior-high and high-school students but also for a weekly church training. There is no need for us to add another meeting for the truth. We have a sufficient number of meetings. It is preferable to have two meetings on the Lord’s Day. The Lord’s Day morning is the time for us to come together around the Lord’s Word for the preaching of the gospel, the teaching of the truth, or for the ministry of life. The Lord’s Day evening is always the right time for us to have the Lord’s table. One evening a week should be used for the prayer meeting and another evening to gather together around the Lord’s Word again. For the long run we should keep such a principle. To have less meetings than this would not be adequate and to have more than this would be quite heavy. In addition to these main meetings, there are also small meetings such as the young people’s meeting and children’s meeting.
It is possible for us to reserve thirty minutes in both the prayer meeting and the Lord’s table meeting to train the saints in the truth. For example, we could pray from 7:30 to 8:30 in the evening, and then from 8:30 to 9:00 P.M. we could have a lesson in the truth. I believe that one hour of prayer is adequate. It would be good if we could use the last half hour of the prayer meeting for a regular church training, which could be called a church family training. We need approximately one hour and fifteen minutes for the Lord’s table and then about thirty minutes for the saints to share. The last half hour of the Lord’s table should be devoted to another training, which could be called a church family training. We could spend half an hour twice a week using the materials from God’s Full Salvation. We can train our family just like mothers who daily read some books to their children.
If the elders would give these types of lessons twice a week, this would impress the saints and build them up in the knowledge of the truth. We could possibly cover the entire textbook of God’s Full Salvation within one year. Of course, if we are going to carry out this proposal, all the elders need to be “reduced.” The best way for the elders to get reduced is to carry out the Lord’s work in this way. You must labor. Do not think that it is enough to take the Summer School of Truth book and read it to the saints. That does not work. You must get into it.
I believe the issue of this kind of training will be quite promising. Through this kind of training, most of the saints would be filled with the knowledge of the truth. When they need to talk to people about the gospel, they will have the utterance, the expression, and the material. They will not need to prepare anything. When the need comes, they will be able to teach the truth to the saved ones. When the time comes, they will also be able to minister life to the seeking Christians who do not meet with us. They will also be enabled to preach the gospel to the unsaved. Then it will be easy for the church to encourage all the saints in the offices, in the schools, in the neighborhoods, and among their relatives to either preach the gospel, teach the truth, or minister life. This will be the living testimony of the Lord Jesus.
We do not need to be concerned about the number of people we bring in. I would say a strong word — do not proselyte. We need to be those preaching the gospel, teaching the truth, and ministering life to people. The way that others would take as far as the church is concerned is according to their own choice. However, we will show to all the people and especially to the Christian community that we are a group of people full of the knowledge of the divine truths. This will be a strong testimony.
I believe that this is what is on the Lord’s heart for His up-to-date recovery. Just for us to meet properly, to stand on the unique ground, and to have a so-called church life without such a prevailing testimony shining out from within us would not make the Lord happy concerning His recovery. We must give the Lord a way to have a recovery full of life and full of the knowledge of the truth so that we can be those preaching the gospel, teaching the truth, and ministering life. If we become constituted with the truth, when we open up our mouth, our preaching will be rich. It will not be rich in stories, jokes, or even so-called biblical doctrines but rich in Christ, in the Spirit, in life, and in the church. We do have the way to carry this out, because we have the Word. The Word is the conveyer that conveys the gospel, the truth, and life.
Do not be concerned with the spreading of the churches. I do not mean that we should not migrate to other localities. We must migrate, not in the religious, natural way but by the way of the growth in life and in the truth. We all need to grow in life and in truth gradually. This seems very slow, but actually it will not be slow. This is a propagation, a multiplication, of life. We need something to grow with, so we are growing in life, and we are growing with the truth. Then we will be the kind of people who live in the way of preaching, teaching, and ministering to others wherever we are. Whether we have one hundred meeting in our locality or one thousand, it is about the same. Whether there are ten churches in our area or just five, we do not need to be bothered. Be assured, however, that if we live such a life, there will surely be an increase, not by human doings or by human effort but by the growth in life and the knowledge of the truth.
In the past ten years what the ministry has done is to produce the groceries for the churches and the saints. We must realize that the quantity of the groceries will always be much greater than the eating capability. If this were not the case, a morning might come when you would have nothing to eat. Years ago we probably went to our “refrigerator,” and there was nothing there, and we went to our “shelves,” and they were empty. This is not the case today. Today on our church shelves there are many groceries. The only problem is that some of these groceries have been frozen in your freezer for five years. We should not be bothered by the quantity of the groceries. We need to measure and weigh what our present need is to decide what particular groceries can meet the need in our locality.
A diligent seeker of the Lord could possibly finish the entire New Testament by studying two hours a day for two and a half years. If the church, however, took seven and a half years to get through the entire New Testament, this would still be wonderful. Never forget the race between the hare and the tortoise. The tortoise wins the race. If we keep going slowly, we will win the race. All the “running ones” will be defeated, but the working ones will win the race. We need to eat regularly, continuously, and slowly. I advise you not to go too fast but to go slowly. You will then reach the goal. If we had started this practice ten years ago, we would have finished the entire New Testament already. Even if you get through half of the New Testament, you will see that you are different. Also, if the entire church could get through half of the New Testament, the church would be different.
