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Another thing that I want to make clear is our burden to have trainings to train the saints. Brother Nee conducted regular trainings for the saints in mainland China. I came out of mainland China to Taiwan in 1949. We started a formal training there for four months in 1953. From that year on, I set aside a few months nearly every year for the training of the saints.
We practice this matter of training to follow what the apostle Paul did, to follow in his footsteps. Acts 19:9-10 says, “When some were hardened and would not be persuaded, speaking evil of the Way before the multitude, he withdrew from them and separated the disciples, reasoning daily in the school of Tyrannus. And this took place for two years, so that all those dwelling in Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.” At that time Paul was in Ephesus, and there was already a church there. However, he did some work apart from the church there but related to and for the church. He did his preaching and teaching in a school, the school of Tyrannus. Tyrannus might have been a teacher, and Paul might have rented his school and used it as a meeting hall to preach and teach the word of the Lord. Paul’s work was not within the church but was something apart from the church there yet still for the churches. Paul felt that there was a need to have such a work to preach to and teach many people. He carried out this work in the school of Tyrannus for two years, and the result was that all those dwelling in Asia heard the word of the Lord.
Acts 28:30-31 says, “He remained two whole years in his own rented dwelling and welcomed all those who came to him, proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness, unhindered.” This tells us clearly that Paul rented a place to teach in Rome, and at that time there was a church in Rome. He did a work in his own rented dwelling to proclaim the kingdom of God and to teach the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. No doubt, his proclaiming, his teaching, and his preaching went out to reach a good number of people.
We had our trainings mainly based upon Paul’s example in the two passages in Acts that we quoted above. We have a burden to train some seeking saints and some young saints with the word of the Lord. We have seen much blessing upon this work of training. I began to have formal trainings in the United States in 1974. Through these semiannual trainings, I put out all the Life-studies on the entire New Testament. From 1974 to the present time, approximately three hundred churches, mostly in Mexico, Puerto Rico, Central America, and South America, were raised up through the Life-study publications. One brother who was sent by the Lord to Brazil used the one hundred twenty messages of the Life-study of Genesis to raise up close to one hundred churches there. Hundreds of churches were raised up and continually fed with these publications. If you ask me to stop the training work and stop the publications, I cannot do it. I must obey my Lord who sent me, who charged me, who gave me this commission to help His recovery, and who gave me this burden of the ministry of His word to release His word. At my age I could go to be with the Lord at any time. Therefore, I am very concerned before the Lord as to how I should use my time. I feel that the first place I should use my time is in doing everything I can to finish the Life-study of the Old Testament. Please bear the burden to pray about this.
When the Lord sent me to the United States, I endeavored to help the church in Los Angeles, but my primary burden was to release the truth to propagate and gain the increase for the church. In 1970 many saints migrated to spread the church life, and in 1974 I moved to Anaheim. At that juncture I was clear that I should put out the Lord’s word. Brother Nee had many direct talks with me about this matter of teaching the Lord’s word; he inherited a great amount of truth from all the teachings in the past centuries. I received much help from him because he told me many things. Brother Nee had so much of the truth deposited in him that was never put into print. Piles and piles of his manuscripts were destroyed by the Communists when they took over mainland China. I would say that less than one-third of what Brother Nee spoke was put into print. With so little of what Brother Nee saw and spoke in print, how could the church be built up? This is why by 1974 I was burdened to have the formal training in order to put out the proper understanding of the New Testament according to the top expositions of the top teachers throughout the past nineteen centuries. I still have the same burden to put out the Life-study of the Old Testament. I have even received many letters from the saints encouraging and charging me to do this. This is my burden. I must finish my responsibility before the Lord to make the Lord’s revelation in the holy Word as clear as I can to all of us. I must continue to present what the Lord has shown us from the beginning of the Lord’s recovery in mainland China through Brother Nee until the present time.
I am also burdened to train some young saints, not with the expectation that they all will become lifelong full-timers to serve the Lord. But we do have an expectation that many of the young college graduates among us will spend either one or two years of time to learn something of the Lord, that is, to learn the Word and to learn the lessons in life. After such a training they may decide to go back to continue their schooling, or they may go back to get a job. Of course, by having such a training some will be tested out and approved to be lifelong full-time servants of the Lord. Without this kind of training, how could we have these persons tested out? We feel that the trainings are the best way to get these persons tested out. I also have a burden to see the completion of the evangelization of the island of Taiwan. I believe that this can be accomplished in about two years through 1990.
I have a burden to stay in one place for at least nine months out of the year in order to directly help build up the local church there with some elders. In 1922 Brother Nee raised up a local church in his city. Sixty-six years have passed, and we have not seen a model of a local church built up entirely according to what we have seen from the Lord. Brother Nee did not have the time to do this. Until now I have not had the time to do this either. After leaving mainland China, I was in Taiwan for about ten years. But I spent most of my time to train the saints, and I spent more than one-third of my time in other countries. We trained many new believers who were saved through our preaching of the gospel when we came to Taiwan. Many brothers who were saved through our preaching became elders. We trained them and built them up. Then many of them became useful ones to bear responsibility in the church or in the work. Some brothers who are now elders in Taiwan are the sons of these useful ones who were raised up. Because I was so busy training the saints, I did not have the opportunity to build up a local church according to what I teach and according to what I have seen of the Lord.
Many brothers came to me asking for certain ways to do things, but I did not give them a way. I told them to bring this matter to the Lord in prayer and seek the Lord’s leading. I did this because I learned a lot in my earlier ministry. In my earlier ministry I could give people many instructions. Eventually, I discovered that very few of these instructions worked well. We can illustrate this by the teaching of driving a car. A driving teacher can impart the principles of driving to his students and even some details, but his teaching is not the application. When the driving teacher actually drives the car, his driving may be absolutely different from what he taught. He taught only some principles with some details. But quite often these principles do not fit in with the real situation of the road. When he taught driving, he did not realize there would be a big dip on a certain road. He did not anticipate that the roads would be flooded due to heavy rains. He never dreamed that two cars would crash right in front of his car. Some of the brothers may say, “I drive according to Brother Lee’s teaching. Brother Lee told me this.” But Brother Lee never spoke about “two cars crashing in front of you.” My point is this: if the steering wheel of the church were in my hand, I might drive it in an absolutely different way from what I taught you. This driving would be according to the present situation and condition of the church in order to bring the church safely to its destination.
Thus far, according to my observation, many of the leading ones are still building up the local churches in a “probing way.” They heard something and they received some teaching, but in their practice they are not so clear what to do or how to do it. This is why I have the burden to be involved in the direct building of a local church in a certain place if the Lord would give me time. I must be before the Lord as to whether or not I should do this and where I should do this. Please pray for me concerning this matter.
About four years ago, in October of 1984, I went to Taipei to have some new things tested out as an experiment for our practice of the church life. Before I went, I told some of the brothers that I was going to Taipei to try to do something new. I also said that in those three to five years I would not be able to do much to help the churches in the United States. What I would do was to come back two times a year for the trainings on the Life-study of the Bible. Then what I would do in Taipei would be tested out, and I would have a finished model to bring back to the United States. The churches in the United States would be able to follow this model and do something according to it. When I went to Taipei, I told the brothers there that I came back to have a new start and that I would call this a new way. But I did not have the assurance how much this way would succeed or work out. I told them that what I was going to do would be a trial, a test, an experiment. At that time close to eighty new elders were established. I told these elders that their being appointed as elders was not something permanent. Their appointment was also subject to experiment. Maybe after a short time some would find out that they were not suitable persons for the eldership, and they would feel to resign. Or maybe I would find out that some were not so fitting in this responsibility. I repeated this word again and again — we are conducting an experiment. I said that the training center in Taipei was a laboratory.
Regretfully, I was not strict in keeping my word to raise up a model in Taipei and then return to the United States with the finished product. When the saints in the United States heard about this, many of them wanted to go there to attend the training. I hesitated, but I gave in to their request. Now I regret this. At that time I should have kept my principle strictly to say no to the saints. I should have asked all the saints to please stay in the United States while I tested and experimented various things. Then I could have properly found out whether or not those things worked. I should have kept this principle, but I did not. That was my negligence, and I feel regretful for this.
Many saints from the United States went to the training in Taipei. In principle, the training should have fit the situation of the saints who came from the United States. But I did not have the time to oversee the training that much. I was occupied to the uttermost with the work on the Chinese Recovery Version. I could not even be involved that much with the training. If I had had the time, I would have considered the particular need of the saints from the United States. The training was planned and formed just to fit in with the need of the island of Taiwan. It was not designed to meet the need of saints coming from other countries. My negligence was in accepting these saints to be trained and not doing anything to prepare the training to fit in with their situation.
Within such a short time of training, we baptized over thirty thousand new believers. If I were able to repeat that time of training again, I would not have let the trainees baptize so many. We discovered that we could baptize many people, but then we realized that we did not have the manpower to take care of the new ones.
The Living Stream Ministry office is only a business office to serve my ministry for two things: to publish the messages in book form and to distribute these messages in both video and audio tapes. That is all the ministry office should do and nothing else. I did not have much time to check on everything related to the office in the past, but the ministry office has always had this specific function and no other function. This little office is a Levitical service, serving my ministry to put out the word of God in print and through video and audio tapes.
Our going on should be according to what we have seen from the Word. There should not be any control, and the leadership is not in one controlling person. The teaching of the apostles must be the very leadership among us. We all must be under the teaching of the apostles. When I came to the United States, many brothers can testify that I never showed myself as a leader. The leading ones in the churches can testify that I never controlled any church or any saint. I never controlled anything, and I would never control anything. Rather, I would do as much as I can to withdraw from the so-called leadership. I do not mean that I am withdrawing from the Lord’s recovery. I have a burden from the Lord, and I must be faithful to Him and to His commission, His charge. But be assured that I will try the best to stay away from the leadership.
We all need to endeavor to speak the same thing by the Lord’s mercy and grace (1 Cor. 1:10). There is absolutely no heresy among us. We do not have any basic problems among us, so it should be easy for us to avoid speaking different things and speak the same thing. Also, by His mercy we do not have any organization. No one can control the local churches. No one can control anything, because we do not have organization among us. I do not control, and the Living Stream Ministry office does not control. Mistakes may have been made in the past. But let us live in today and forget about yesterday. We do not even have tomorrow. We have only today in which to live. What happened yesterday is over. If anything was wrong in the past, we need the cleansing blood of Christ as the trespass offering. Past mistakes that have been confessed to the Lord are under the cleansing blood. We need to forget the past and go on. We should not even have any expectation about what will happen tomorrow. We do not need to worry about tomorrow. We live today. No one controls you. All the local churches have the full freedom to go on. As long as you do not do anything against our New Testament constitution, no one would bother you. Among us in the Lord’s recovery there is nothing worth worrying about because basically we do not have any heresy or any kind of organizational control. Everyone in every church has the full freedom to go on. I hope that we would be so faithful and loyal to the Lord’s recovery. We should mean business with the Lord that the Lord’s recovery will be prevailing and even flourishing on the earth for the Lord’s purpose.
Concerning practices among us such as head covering, baptism, or preaching the gospel, we should let these things be as they are among the saints. If some of the sisters want to wear a head covering, let them do it. If others do not, give them the liberty. We should have this attitude with all the practices in the church life that are outside our common faith. If some feel that they are burdened to visit people for the gospel, let them do it. Those saints who are burdened to visit people for the gospel should not insist on this practice. We should try to avoid different kinds of terms, slogans, and sayings and try our best to keep the oneness in the Lord’s recovery. We must avoid anything that damages the freedom of the saints or the oneness of the Body of Christ.
It is altogether wise and profitable that we do not expect all the churches to be the same. This is impossible. Even twelve brothers within a local church cannot be the same in everything. If a local church has a burden to visit people in their homes for the preaching of the gospel, they should carry out this commission. They do not need to say that others do not preach the gospel in this way. If others do not feel to preach the gospel by visiting people in their homes, that is not your business. Do not talk about who is for this or who is for that. We should not talk in this way. We should not label ourselves or label others. If we want to practice a certain thing, we can do it. If others do not want to practice it, they have the liberty not to practice it. We should not question who is for a certain thing and who is not for a certain thing. This does not help you or anyone else. We all must endeavor to keep the oneness of the Spirit so that the Body of Christ can build up itself in love (Eph. 4:3, 16).
Question: Many times you reach a point in your experience where you have genuine concerns. How can you have fellowship about these genuine concerns without being considered by others as negative and thereby causing another problem? This is a concern to me, and this is related to the freedom of seeking the Lord and the truth.
Answer: First, let us try to avoid any kind of trouble. Second, we must try our best to make everything open. If I see something in you that would not be so good for the recovery, I must pray for you and seek the Lord’s leading to go to you and open up the matters of concern. I should be able to do this without any kind of fear, because we are brothers in the recovery, and we can fellowship about these things. I believe that all things have a way to be resolved by thorough and frank fellowship. Please do not do things behind anyone. If I did anything behind you, that would mean that I am not faithful to you or to the recovery. Actually, if I am faithful to you, I am faithful to the recovery. I would never do anything behind you. If there is some problem, I need to go to you to have some open fellowship.
Today there are many people in the Lord’s recovery. There are also a great number of co-workers and elders. We come from different countries with different backgrounds, and we have different kinds of understanding and thinking. To think that we would never have any trouble is a dream. Even between a husband and wife problems cannot be avoided. What is the way to solve the problems in a family of only two persons? There must be a proper way and a wise way that does not damage their marriage life or hurt their feelings. But we have to be open. I should not do something behind my wife, nor should she do something behind me. If we do not avoid this, we will kill the oneness.
If you feel or observe something concerning the Lord’s recovery related to a certain person, you should pray for him. Do not come to him in a rushed way. He is still human, and you are still in the natural life. We should be afraid of ourselves more than anything else. We should be afraid that we would do something in a rush to damage someone’s feeling and close the door for open fellowship. After praying for a period of time, we will feel led at the right time to go see this brother. Before we go to see him, we should not say anything to anyone, because this kind of “pre-talk” opens the door for the devil to come in. If I have seen something about you that is not so fitting in the Lord’s recovery, I should not talk about this to anyone. I should pray to the Lord until He leads me to see you. Then we can open up to one another in love and in mutual understanding. We all have a heart for the Lord, and we all have the same goal to see that the Lord’s recovery would be properly going on. Thus, we should have and can have the mutual confidence. I can come to you with the confidence that you would fellowship with me to find a way to get the trouble resolved. I believe that all the troubles can be taken care of by this kind of open, frank fellowship in love. If someone comes to me in this way, I am grateful for this kind of openness.
Even with three brothers taking the lead in a certain locality, there might be some troubles. How can these troubles be resolved? The only way is to have open, frank fellowship in love without fear. I do not feel that anyone is doing anything against me, and I am not against anyone, so we can have open, frank fellowship in love. Even though I was so busy in Taipei, I believe that if some of the brothers had come to me to let me know about some of their problems, I might have rendered some help to the situation. This may have required only two or three minutes. If you come to me, you should come without fear. I am not a tiger. I am just your brother. Some may feel that they are afraid of disturbing me and taking away my time. But when the troubles come as a result of not having the proper fellowship, my time is consumed with them. To deal with the troubles takes at least tenfold more of my time than if you would come to me. Your coming to me would save trouble, and to save trouble is to save time. When troubles like this arise, I receive many letters and phone calls. All the questions are concerning the past or the future. This is why I want to stress that the Christian life is not in yesterday or in tomorrow. The past is over, and we do not know what will happen in the future. The Christian life is today.
We should be frank and open, but we may feel in wisdom that we should not touch certain matters. If I need to say something, I say it openly to the person whom it concerns. If I realize that more troubles will result from my touching a certain matter, then I exercise my wisdom not to touch it. If I have the real concern, I will pray concerning it. I would not even tell my wife. I have always kept this principle. I exercised myself in this way with Brother Nee. I was with him for eighteen years. Everyone who knows about our relationship can testify that we did not have the slightest problem. Because I practiced this principle, I have avoided becoming involved in troubles throughout the years.
I hope that all of us would practice this principle. If we have a real concern about a certain matter involving a certain person, we should first pray. Then we may have some frank, open fellowship in love. If we realize that the by-product, the result, of our touching this matter will not be profitable, then we should exercise our wisdom not to touch it. We can leave this matter to the sovereignty of the Lord. If we have a burden, we can simply pray. Then we will never create any problems or any different speaking in the churches. I may have the best heart for the Lord’s recovery, but I may come with the best heart to a brother and say something that can still be misunderstood by him. We all have to learn from now on to say things carefully and to do things carefully in every way.
Question: When the leading brothers come together to pray for the church, am I understanding correctly that you do not bring up any of the problems that you see in the saints?
Answer: Even with what we say to our wives, we must exercise our wisdom in order to have a marriage life with a peaceful and sweet feeling. We must exercise our wisdom concerning what to say and what not to say to our wives. We also have to be careful about how much we say. If we are a little careless in talking to our wives, we can create trouble. I know of some cases where a careless word from the husband to the wife resulted in a problem for their entire marriage life. We need to exercise our wisdom.
If there are three elders in a certain locality, these brothers also need to exercise their wisdom in what they say to one another. If you, as one of the three elders, see some problems with the saints, do not talk to the other two brothers right away. You have to bring this matter to the Lord and pray for it. You can ask the Lord, “Lord, what I feel about this matter may be wrong. Show me the real situation.” In prayer you can follow the Lord step by step. Then you will have the leading of the Lord with some amount of assurance that the Lord is with you. In this kind of spirit and with this kind of atmosphere, you can go to the other two brothers. You also may ask the Lord, “Should I go to both brothers, or should I go to just one? Which one should I go to?” Maybe the Lord would tell you to go to a certain brother and not to the other one. Wait for a while. This is wisdom, this will help the situation, and this will never create any kind of trouble.
The elders should also be careful about letting their wives know the things concerning the church. This is risky and dangerous. Some saints told me things in confidence and charged me not to tell anyone. One dear saint opened up something to me and charged me not to let anyone know. He has gone to be with the Lord, but I have kept what he told me in confidence for over thirty years. I never made this matter known to my wife. Someday all of us will give an account to the Lord, so we must not be loose in what we say or tell others. Whatever we say and do really concerns the Lord’s recovery, the Lord’s interest, and it is not a small thing. If we would exercise this kind of wisdom, many troubles would be and could be avoided.
We must do our best to avoid trouble and do our best to say the same thing. All of us are assured that there is no heresy among us, and I do not believe that any one of us has a bad feeling toward another brother. We should not form parties among ourselves or join any parties. We should not have a different attitude toward some brothers. To one brother you may be nice, but to another brother you are a different person. This is not proper. We should be the same toward everyone. We are in the Lord’s recovery and in the church life. To have any preference for certain saints is wrong.
Question: Some of the saints may hear some rumors or some gossip. They may not become negative themselves or cause some trouble, but the symptom in many cases is that they become discouraged. They lose their heart for the church life. They lose their confidence in the Lord’s recovery. There are many cases where this causes them to question the leadership in their church or the ministry among us. This last training on Leviticus was a real medicine, a real balm, and a real help. But I am concerned that many of us may have certain cases in our church where brothers or sisters are not negative, but they heard some gossip or rumor, which may be totally unfounded. There may be some element in what they heard that causes them to question. They themselves are not opposing, and they do not form a party. But they lose all their enjoyment, they lose all their heart, and they lose all their confidence. In many cases they do not even express what they heard, but there is a kind of withdrawing from the church life and a withdrawing from the service. This is a real weakening to these saints. How can we help this kind of brother or sister either in a public way or a personal way?
Answer: In 1942 there was a big turmoil in the church in Shanghai. That caused the church in Shanghai to close its doors and also caused Brother Nee to stop his ministry for six years. When that turmoil occurred, I was not in Shanghai. After the war in 1946, I went back to Shanghai, and the church there opened its doors. But there was a very small number of saints meeting together compared to their number before 1942. There were only about eighty or ninety saints at the Lord’s table. Many saints were offended in this turmoil, and all the arrows were being shot at Brother Nee. He was the target of the attacks. Because I was not there and I am not a person who wants to hear negative things, I am still not fully clear concerning all the problems in the church in Shanghai at that time. When I returned to the church in Shanghai in 1946, I had just recovered from a very serious illness. During the two and a half years of my sickness and recovery, I learned a lot. Mainly, I learned about the two trees: the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Some of the saints in Shanghai had been very dear to me in the Lord for years. They came to me and checked with me in this way: “Brother Lee, do you believe that Brother Watchman Nee has never made any mistake?” What should my answer have been? Yes or no?
I was not bothered about this question because I learned in my sickness some lessons concerning the two trees. I checked with the saints who came to me in this way: “Before you condemned Brother Nee as being wrong in certain things, how was your spiritual life?” They responded in a very positive way that their spiritual life was wonderful. They were living and absolutely for the church. Then I asked, “How about now?” Many times they would weep and tell me that they felt lost and that they had lost their heart. They said that the Lord was still with them but that they had lost interest. In other words, their experience after condemning Brother Nee was altogether negative. Then I responded, “Brother, if your saying that Brother Nee is wrong and your condemning of him are something proper, your spiritual life should be better than it was before. Why is it that after condemning him and saying negative things about him, your spiritual life has become so poor?” This kind of fellowship was able to rescue a great number of saints in Shanghai. The saints there came to me one by one in this way. I simply checked with them how their spiritual life was before this negative speaking and how it was afterward. They all saw that there was a great difference, and they repented.
I think that we can help the saints in the same way. We can ask them if what they heard helped them in their spiritual life. If it helps them, they should take it. If it does not help them, it must be something of the enemy. Whether the thing you heard is true or not, as long as your hearing has a negative influence on your spiritual life, you should not take it. It was not the saints’ business to judge whether Brother Nee was wrong or not wrong. Even if what they did was right, what was the result of their doing? The result was to deaden people. Even a little talk about something negative will deaden you. We must help the saints to go along with their inner life and to keep their spiritual life from becoming deadened, hurt, or poisoned by anything. We should help the saints to avoid anything that would deaden, hurt, or poison their spiritual life. This kind of fellowship that I had with the saints in Shanghai from 1946 to 1948 issued in the repentance of hundreds of saints. Hundreds repented and came back to the church life. Many went to Brother Nee and repented to him directly.
