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Before we start to move, start to work, start to take action, in the preaching of the gospel, I have a heavy burden with a heavy word to fellowship with you all.
Some may wonder why we use the term vital groups. This is a special term. The reason that we need to have this kind of training with these groups is that for centuries the Lord’s church on this earth has become degraded. Then the Lord raised up the recovery. To go down is easy. To go up is not so easy. Even to stand where you are and where you should be is also quite hard. The recovery has been with us for seventy years, but regretfully we have been gradually going down and down to a situation that cannot be considered normal. Rather, it has become abnormal.
When I made the decision to return to Taiwan in 1984, I realized that our rate of increase in the Lord’s recovery had become quite low. The real situation in the recovery on the earth by that time was not fully exposed to me. Eventually, my going to Taiwan to carry out the God-ordained way to build up the church stirred up much opposition. Ambition became prevailing among certain ones. These ones had a real conspiracy with a plan concerning how to take over the recovery. The speaking of these rebellious ones devastated the truth.
Because of this background, I have a real burden to carry out this training for the vital groups. Besides the full-time training, we need this training. The full-time training is our common church training, but this training for the vital groups is very special. This training is for the rescue of the recovery from degradation.
We need to see that the degradation of Christianity is completely and absolutely due to the absence, the shortage, of the divine revelation. Proverbs 29:18 says that without a vision, the people cast off restraint. This verse can be applied to today’s Christianity. Church history shows us that many of those in Christianity are wild, without restriction and without control. The situation in Christianity may be likened to the period of time spoken of in the book of Judges. Judges tells us that during that time everyone did what was right in his own eyes (21:25). We need to be rescued from this situation of degradation.
In this chapter I would like to speak a brief and clear word to you all, hoping that this could be a real vision to you. What I want to share with you is the extract, the very essence, of all the messages given in Atlanta in the Thanksgiving Day conference of 1992. The title of these messages was The Constitution and the Building Up of the Body of Christ. Then I want to share the extract of the two messages given to the elders after the winter training of 1992 on the book of Job. These two messages were entitled The Ministry of the New Testament and The Teaching and the Fellowship of the Apostles.
In the Thanksgiving Day conference I gave six messages concerning the Body of Christ. These six messages cover four points: the constitution of the Body of Christ, the growth of Christ in His Body so that the Body can grow, the transformation of the saints in the Body of Christ, and the building up of the Body of Christ. Constitution, growth, transformation, and building up are all either by life or with life. The messages I gave to the elders after the winter training of 1992 cover three more crucial points: the ministry of the New Testament, the teaching of the apostles, and the fellowship of the apostles. We all need to see a vision of these seven points.
The constitution of the Body of Christ is with life. The Body of Christ as the church has been constituted, not with by-laws or by a charter but with Christ Himself as the element of life. The Triune God in eternity came in incarnation to become a sower to sow Himself as the seed into the human heart (Matt. 13:3, 19-23). This shows the way that the Body of Christ was brought forth or how the Body of Christ was produced. It was produced by a kind of constitution with Christ Himself as the embodiment of the Triune God to be the life seed sown into our being. Then we all became the many grains of this unique seed (John 12:24).
The one grain sown into us eventually became many grains, and the many grains are the components of the Body of Christ but not the constitution. We are only the components, but Christ Himself as life is the constitution. The Body of Christ is composed of the believers, but it is constituted with Christ as the element of life. Not many Christians see or know what the constitution and the composition of the Body of Christ are. The very church in the eyes of today’s Christians and in the speaking of today’s Christian teachers is merely a kind of composition of believers. They have not seen that the Body of Christ is a real constitution.
Our human body is a picture of the Body of Christ. Our body is not just a composition but a constitution. A wooden stand is a mere composition because it is lifeless, inorganic. But because our physical body is organic, it is a constitution of an inner life. If the inner life is taken away, the components of our body will become a heap of collapse. With the life, our body becomes a constitution. The Body of Christ is just like this.
The Body of Christ is not merely a composition of believers of many nationalities. We all have been born into the Body of Christ. Our stomach and our two eyes were born into our body. They were organically constituted into our body. In like manner, we were born, organically constituted, into the Body of Christ. I do not consider each of you as being composed into an organization. Rather, I consider each one of you as a living, organic member constituted into the Body of Christ through your regeneration with the very Christ whom you received into you and into whom you believed. The constitution of the Body of Christ is with the all-inclusive Christ as the life element. Today you are not in an organization as a composition; you are in an organism as a constitution. This organism is constituted not just according to the truth but with the very Christ as the all-inclusive life element.
This Christ, who is the life element with which His Body is constituted, has been sown into us, making our heart the growing earth, the growing soil. In this soil this Christ, who is the element of life to His Body, is growing. We are used to saying that we are growing. Actually, however, He is growing. When He grows in us, we grow. We grow by His growth. Colossians 2:19 reveals that we grow by the growth of God within us. We do have a living One within us who is taking our heart as His soil and growing there. By His growth we grow. This is the growth of Christ within His Body, within the very heart of the believers who are the members of His Body.
In the book entitled The Constitution and the Building Up of the Body of Christ, we saw the building up of the Body of Christ by the growth in life in the writings of John, Peter, and Paul. These three leading writers of the New Testament all touched the matter of the growth in life. This growth has a base, a way, and a goal. Our being in the Lord’s recovery is not just a matter of learning the recovery truths but a matter of giving the indwelling Christ within us a chance to grow. The Lord made this very clear to us in Matthew 13. In order for Christ as the life element to grow within us, we must deal with our heart, the soil. We must deal with the human heart as the wayside, with the shallow heart with the hidden rocks, and with the heart with the thorns, signifying the anxiety of the age and the deceitfulness of riches. By His grace we must deal with our heart to keep our heart pure for Him to grow in us. The constitution of the Body of Christ is with life, and the building up of the Body of Christ is by the growth in life.
The building up of the Body of Christ is also by the transformation of the members of the Body of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 12:2a). Transformation is not an outward change by self-improvement. We need to realize the difference between outward improvement and real transformation. Transformation is not an outward change, improvement, or advance. Transformation is a metabolic transaction within us. Through metabolism a new element is added to our being to discharge and replace the old element. Transformation does not mean that someone who is a quick person becomes a slow person. This may be a mere outward change and improvement. Transformation means that we receive more element of Christ into us while He is growing within us to replace all our old things such as our old life, old nature, old disposition, old character, and old habit. We need a replacement, not an outward change. This replacement is the living Christ, the indwelling Christ. Day after day as we love Him more and give Him more ground within us, He is adding Himself into us and growing within us to be the replacing element. He replaces our old creation. This is the real significance of transformation.
When we have the constitution with life, the growth of Christ in life, and the transformation by life, we are ready to be built up. We need to be constituted with life, growing in life, transformed by life, and built up by life. Everything related to the Body of Christ is with life, in life, and by life. Who is the life? The life is the all-inclusive Christ, who is the processed and consummated Triune God (John 14:6a). This processed and consummated Triune God is the constituting life, the growing life, and the transforming life to us. Then this life becomes the very factor of the building up of the Body of Christ within us and among us.
We need to remember these four things: constitution, growth, transformation, and building up. I hope we all can see that the Body of Christ is constituted with Christ as the life element. Then this Christ grows in His Body to add Himself more and more into us that we may have the growth in life. Then with the same life we are being transformed. Our old creation is being replaced by Christ Himself as the element and factor of the new creation. Then we are qualified and are on the proper level to be built up by the same life. This life is the Triune God embodied in Christ. We all have to see this. This revelation will revolutionize our being and will change our Christian being.
The last three points we need to see are the ministry of the New Testament, the teaching of the apostles, and the fellowship of the apostles. When we speak of the one ministry, we mean the New Testament ministry that builds up the Body of Christ. In 2 Corinthians 4:1 Paul says that we, the many, have received this ministry. Then Ephesians 4:12 says that the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the shepherd-teachers perfect the many saints to do the work of the ministry. The ministry is singular, and the work is also singular. There is only one work on the whole earth. From the day of Pentecost the Lord began only one work by one ministry, but this work has been carried out by thousands of workers, and this ministry has been carried out by thousands of ministers.
If you read 2 Corinthians 3 and 4, you can see the ministers (plural) and the ministry (singular). The New Testament ministers (3:6) all have a part in the one New Testament ministry (4:1). Peter’s ministry was a part of the ministry; Paul’s ministry was a part of the ministry; John’s ministry was a part of the ministry; and Timothy’s ministry was a part of the ministry (2 Tim. 4:5). When I came to this country and used the term the ministry, I meant the unique New Testament ministry to build up the Body of Christ. I did not mean that this was only my ministry. I hope that we all can see this.
In 1969 a brother who used to be among us said that we received only one man’s ministry, whereas he desired to receive all ministries. Actually, however, even though he said that he received all ministries, he at least did not receive my ministry. When I told him this, he said that he received all ministries selectively. But his use of the word selectively meant that he did not receive all ministries. Actually, all the proper ministries of all the proper ministers are the one ministry, which is the unique New Testament ministry (2 Cor. 4:1; Eph. 4:12).
When the Lord brought me into His recovery, from the first day my eyes were opened. I saw that what Brother Nee was ministering was in the line of the revelation concerning God’s eternal plan. God’s eternal plan is His economy, His eternal arrangement, His plan of the ages. Brother Nee was in the line of the eternal plan of God concerning Christ and concerning the church in life with the Spirit. My eyes were opened to see that this is the real ministry of the New Testament. It is not just to teach typology or prophecy but to teach concerning God’s New Testament economy so that the Body of Christ can be built up. This teaching is called the teaching of the apostles.
Some have wrongly said that the teaching of the apostles is only those teachings that the twelve apostles learned of Jesus and passed on to the believers. The Lord surely taught His disciples much in the Gospels, especially in Matthew and John. But in John 16 the Lord told them that He had many things to tell them that they could not bear at that time. He could not release these things until the Spirit of reality would come and unveil all these things to them (vv. 12-13). That meant that after the Lord’s death and resurrection, the Spirit of reality would come to the apostles and unveil more to them.
The main apostle to whom the Spirit revealed more was the apostle Paul. So Paul says in Colossians 1:25 that he was charged to complete the word of God. The word of God here is concerning the mystery (v. 26), which is Christ as the mystery of God (2:2) and the church as the mystery of Christ (Eph. 3:4). Without Paul’s fourteen Epistles, the holy word concerning the divine revelation of this mystery could never have been completed.
The Spirit of reality also revealed more things to the apostle John in the book of Revelation. Who could write a book like Revelation with the seven lampstands, seven Spirits, seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven bowls? It was written by the Lord Jesus as the Spirit through His disciple John. John received the revelation of the mystery of Christ in his spirit (1:10). Thus, John said that after the book of Revelation, no one can add anything or subtract anything (22:18-19). From Matthew to Revelation is the entire teaching of the New Testament as the teaching of the apostles.
At Paul’s time some people were teaching the Old Testament genealogies and the law. Others were teaching Gnosticism and asceticism. These different teachings surely were not the ministry. All the works (the ministries) of teachings other than the teaching of the apostles for the accomplishment of God’s New Testament economy are not counted in the unique ministry of the New Testament (1 Tim. 1:3-4). The so-called ministries are the factors for so many denominations today. The teaching of baptism by immersion resulted in the Baptist denomination. The teaching concerning the management of the church by the presbytery, a body of elders, issued in the establishment of the Presbyterian denomination. All denominations have their own ministries. In the Lord’s recovery we do not have many different ministries; we have only one ministry. If we received all the so-called ministries as the ministries of the denominations, we would have to receive the ministries of the Presbyterians, the Baptists, the Methodists, the Episcopalians, etc. These different ministries and teachings issue in divisions.
In the New Testament there is only one ministry with one kind of teaching and one fellowship. The early believers continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching and the apostles’ fellowship (Acts 2:42). This fellowship of the divine life is between the apostles and the believers (1 John 1:1-3a), between the apostles and the Triune God (v. 3b), and also among all the believers (vv. 2-3, 7). This fellowship is not like that of a school fraternity. The students in a school may have their fraternity, but this fraternity does not have the flow of the divine life, the growth of the divine life, and the produce of the divine life. The divine fellowship is flowing, growing, and reproducing. It is the issue of the eternal life and is actually the flow of the eternal life within all the believers, who have received and possess the divine life. The fellowship of the apostles is the fellowship of the divine life, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in all the believers (2 Cor. 13:14), and the fellowship of the Body of Christ in the oneness of the Spirit (Eph. 4:3-4a).
We need to pay our full attention to the seven items we have mentioned above: constitution, growth, transformation, and building up plus one ministry, one teaching, and one fellowship. If all the Christians would stick themselves to these seven things, who could make a division? As the members of the vital groups, we must be clear about this. If we are not clear about this, we are not qualified to be members of the vital groups. We may be in a certain group, but that group may not be vital.
When I came into the recovery, I made a strong determination to pick up the ministry for the building up of the Body, that is, the ministry in the line of God’s eternal plan with life by the Spirit. For sixty-one years I have not changed. I have been absolutely one with the ministry.
Since we all have seen this, we must be persons who live in the Spirit, walk in the Spirit, and do everything in the Spirit. How can we be victorious? How can we be overcoming? We must live, walk, and do things in the Spirit. How can we be holy? We must live, walk, and do things in the Spirit. How can we be spiritual? We must live, walk, and do things in the Spirit. Whatever we are going to do, we should not do it until we realize that we are in the Spirit. We should not talk until we can say, “Yes, I am in the Spirit.” Degraded Christianity makes things so complicated, but actually the Christian life, the church life, is the simplest life. It is a life in the Spirit. We must stand fast in the divine revelation and must practice this one point of the Christian life, that is, to live, to walk, and to do everything in the Spirit.
If we are such people, we are ready to move with the Lord. We have to realize that we, the members of Christ, are the New Testament priests of the gospel. The first thing the priests should do is to offer the sacrifices to God. Today in the New Testament our sacrifices are not cattle, are not sheep and oxen. Our sacrifices are the saved sinners becoming the members of Christ (Rom. 15:16; 1 Pet. 2:5, 9). We are offering them as members of the Body of Christ. In God’s eyes they are the living sacrifices (Rom. 12:1). This is the first thing we have to do.
