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Scripture Reading: Eph. 1:23; 2:15-16, 18, 21-22; 3:2, 8-11, 16-17a, 19b; 4:3-4a, 11-16, 23-24
We have seen that the church is the Body of Christ and the new man, so the church needs the growth in life. This growth comes through the feeding, the nourishment, by the riches of Christ. The riches of Christ are the foodstuffs for our nourishment. The unsearchable riches of Christ in Ephesians 3:8 are for the church in verse 10. The church is the outcome of the enjoyment of the riches of Christ. This shows us that God’s economy is to dispense all the riches of Christ into our being so that these riches may become our inward nourishment. This means that Christ will be wrought, will be dispensed, will occupy, and will settle Himself in every part of our being. This makes Christ one with us, and spontaneously we will corporately be the Body of Christ and the new man.
Now we have to go on to see some further points regarding the building up of the Body. For the building up of the Body, there is the need of oneness. Ephesians speaks clearly and definitely about keeping the oneness: “Being diligent to keep the oneness of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace” (4:3). This is because the Body of Christ is one and the new man is also one; that is, there is one Body and one new man. The riches of Christ, which produce the Body and the new man, are altogether realized in the Spirit. There is one Body and one Spirit (v. 4), so we have to keep the oneness. If the oneness is damaged, the building is gone. Even though we have the best enjoyment of the riches of Christ, if we lose the oneness, there is no possibility for the building up of the Body. This oneness is not the oneness of practices, regulations, or forms but the oneness of the Spirit. The Spirit is one, and this Spirit who dwells in our spirit is the Triune God Himself.
Actually, the Spirit Himself is the oneness. It is similar to the electricity flowing within many lamps, making them all one in the shining. In themselves, the lamps are separate, but in the electricity they are one. The electricity within them is the oneness. Likewise, the Spirit within us is our oneness. The same one Spirit dwells in all of us, so He is our oneness. If we care for Him, we have the oneness. If we do not care for Him, the oneness among us is gone. If we go to something else, surely we will have different opinions and dissension. You will have your concepts, I will have my understanding, and another will have his idea. Then we will be divided. But if we give up all the other things and come back to the one indwelling Spirit, right away we have the oneness.
Ephesians 4 tells us that this oneness, on the one hand, is the oneness of the Spirit and, on the other hand, is the oneness of the faith (v. 13). The faith is composed of what Christ is, what Christ has done, and what Christ is still doing for us. The faith is what we believe in for our salvation. We all believe in Jesus as the Son of God becoming a man, who died on the cross for our sins, was buried, and was resurrected on the third day; today He is our Redeemer, our Savior, our Lord, and also the all-inclusive Spirit indwelling our spirit. If we believe in Him, our sins will be forgiven, His blood will be applied to us, and we will be redeemed, justified, saved, and regenerated to have Him within us as our life. This is our faith, which is common to all different kinds of Christians. Anyone who does not have such a faith is not a real Christian. He is not saved or regenerated. But as long as a person believes that Christ is the Son of God incarnated to be a man, crucified on the cross for our sins, and resurrected from the dead to be our life, he has the faith. Regardless of what kind of background he keeps or what kind of doctrine he holds on to, he is a brother, a saint.
In doctrines we may be different, but in the faith we are absolutely one. You should never consider any doctrine as your faith. Some may say, “My faith is in immersion by water,” but immersion by water is not the faith. The doctrine of the presbytery is not the faith, nor is any other kind of doctrine. We do not need to keep anything else other than the oneness of the Spirit and of the faith. When we come back to the Spirit, we are one. When we care only for the faith, we are one. Ephesians 4:13 speaks of the oneness of the faith, and then verse 14 speaks of the wind of teaching, the wind of doctrine. The faith produces oneness, but doctrine brings in the wind to blow us away, to carry us away. If we forget about the doctrine, care only for the faith, and turn to the Spirit, we are one.
Many Christians know that we should keep the oneness according to Ephesians 4:3, but they do not know how to keep the oneness. The following verses show us that to keep the oneness of the Spirit is to drop all the doctrines. The doctrines are just like toys to children. Children like toys, and the younger they are, the more toys they have. But the more they grow, the more toys they drop. If an older person is still playing with toys, this obviously indicates that he did not have the proper growth in life. All the different doctrines are toys. The more you grow, the more doctrines you will drop, because doctrines cause division. Instead, you will stick yourself to the faith. This is the way to keep the oneness.
If we mean business with the Lord’s recovery today to afford Him an opportunity to recover the proper building, we have to drop the doctrines. By the Lord’s mercy, I have dropped all the doctrines. As long as you still hold any kind of doctrine, you have to realize that, at least to some extent, you are divisive. Some kind of divisive spirit still remains in you. Let me say again that if we mean business with the Lord’s recovery of His building of the church, there is the requirement for us to say, “We don’t care for doctrines. We care only for the enjoyment of Christ.” I am burdened that the real situation of the building up of the church be made clear to all of us.
When we say that we need to drop the doctrines, this does not mean that we do not keep the truths in the Lord’s Word. Ephesians 5:22 says, “Wives, be subject to your own husbands,” and verse 25 says, “Husbands, love your wives.” To drop the doctrines does not mean that we do not have to keep words like these. The sisters have to submit themselves to their husbands, and the husbands among us have to love their wives. But we do not make these things doctrines that we insist on. For instance, a number of sisters among us practice putting a covering on their head when they pray, but we do not insist on this doctrine for receiving others. Today if anyone asked me to baptize him, I would immerse him, but I do not insist that he be immersed for my fellowship with him. To drop the doctrines does not mean that we do not keep the Word. If you insist on a doctrine for receiving others, this doctrine becomes a dividing element. We have spoken the truth concerning pray-reading, head covering, the laying on of hands, baptism, and the Lord’s table, but we have not insisted on any of these things as a doctrine for receiving the believers.
In 1 Corinthians 11 there are at least fifteen verses on the matter of head covering (vv. 2-16). Based upon this, whenever a sister prays or goes to contact the Lord, she would cover her head to keep the Word, but if she insists on this to make it a doctrine, this is wrong. We keep the Lord’s word, but we do not make anything in the Word a legality, a kind of legal doctrine. I practice pray-reading very much, but if anyone among us would make pray-reading a legal doctrine, I would be the first one against it. I also call on the name of the Lord, but it is altogether wrong to make such a thing a legal doctrine. We have no doctrine of calling or of pray-reading. It is all right if some want to speak in tongues, but if they make tongue-speaking a doctrine, that is wrong.
I have to try my best to make the real situation clear to all of us. We have no doctrine. We have only the practice of keeping the Word according to our pure conscience. Our consciences do not function on the same level. Let me give you an illustration. In Romans and in 1 Corinthians, the same apostle taught us in different ways about the eating of sacrifices offered to the idols (Rom. 14:1-3, 20-23; 1 Cor. 8:4-13; 10:23-30). In some of the verses, Paul said that you should not eat the sacrifices offered to the idols. But in other verses Paul said that you may eat. Eventually, it all depends upon your conscience. If you have a proper conscience and feel that you are free to eat, then eat. If you have a kind of conscience that makes you feel that you should not eat, then do not eat. All these things are up to our pure conscience.
We need to allow one another to live before the Lord according to our conscience in doctrinal matters (Rom. 14:1-9). The Southern Baptists may say that we are neglecting the great commission of the Lord in Matthew 28:19, but the Quakers, Presbyterians, and Methodists do not consider this verse in this way. How Christians consider Matthew 28:19 depends upon their different kinds of realization. Those who do not feel that this verse is the great commission should not be considered heretics. A heretic is one who does not believe that the Lord Jesus is God, the Son of God. These are the modernists, who also do not believe that Christ died on the cross for our sins or that He was resurrected. They are really heretics. But as long as someone has the proper faith in the Lord Jesus, he is not a heretic.
If your conscience tells you that you have to keep a certain verse of the Bible, you should do it. But never make that a kind of doctrine, saying, “In our church, all people have to do this. Otherwise, we don’t receive them.” Sisters, do you practice head covering? If you do, that is wonderful, but do not make your practice a legality for receiving others. If some want to practice sprinkling, we will not oppose them, but they should not make this a doctrine and spread this doctrine among the saints in the church. If they do, they will cause division. If you want to speak in tongues, that is okay. But if you insist that everyone speak in tongues, you will cause division. If you wash others’ feet, that is fine, but do not say, “All the elders are not so faithful to the holy Word, because they do not practice foot-washing. Surely they are wrong, and this is not the proper church. The proper church must have foot-washing every time before the Lord’s table.” If you do this, you have made a legal doctrine that causes division. If you want to pray-read, this is wonderful, but do not make this a legal doctrine by forcing others to do the same thing and imposing it upon others. This is altogether wrong. I have to say this because the number of saints in the Lord’s recovery will be increasing more and more in the coming years. Those of us who may be considered as the foundation of the Lord’s recovery have to be clear.
I respect not only every verse but also every word of the Bible. But I have the full boldness to say that I do not make any verse a legal doctrine. We keep only the oneness of the Spirit and the oneness of the faith. We love the Lord’s Word. We respect the Bible. As long as our conscience tells us that we have to keep a certain verse, we do it. But we never make that a doctrine. If we make any doctrine a legality, this will frustrate and hinder the fellowship among us. We keep the living Word, but we have no legal doctrines. We keep the Lord’s Word not in a legal way but in a living way. We keep only the oneness of the Spirit and the oneness of the faith.
Now we want to see that Christ has abolished all the ordinances so that He could put the different peoples into Himself to make a new man (Eph. 2:15). For creating the new man, He needed to abolish all the ordinances. An ordinance is a way to worship God or a way of living. Any way for your living or for your worship is an ordinance. The Jews and the Arabs worship the same God, but they are enemies because the ways they worship God are different. The Jews have the Jewish way, and the Arabs have the Arabian way. These different ways create enmity. Even today there are a number of so-called Christian brothers who hate each other. Such religious prejudice is really awful, and it comes from different ways of worship.
In the church life, we do not have any ordinances. We do not have ordinances about how to arrange the chairs or about having quiet or loud meetings. We have no ordinances. Positively speaking, we need to endeavor to keep the oneness of the Spirit and to arrive at the oneness of the faith. Negatively speaking, we have to drop two things: doctrines and ordinances. Today the Lord is carrying out His recovery, and He is demanding that we drop all the doctrines and ordinances.
The Jewish ordinances were abolished on the cross, so the church had an opportunity to come into existence. But regretfully, after not too long a time the Christians created a lot of ordinances. Christians today are divided either by ordinances or by doctrines. There are so-called different churches because of the many doctrines and ordinances among the Christians. In order for the Lord to build up His church, we must keep the oneness and have no ordinances. This does not mean that we become a loose people. We are very proper, but we do not have any ordinances.
In the New Testament you cannot find a definite way for Christians to meet together. The only way you can find in the New Testament for us to worship God is to be in the spirit (John 4:24). There is no other way. People today like to quote 1 Corinthians for the way to meet, and in my early years I did the same. In this book, however, Paul says two things that are very difficult to reconcile. According to 11:5, women may pray and prophesy with their head covered, but in 14:34 Paul says that the women should be silent in the churches. Thus, chapter 11 permits women to speak, but chapter 14 forbids them. How can these passages be reconciled? According to the New Testament principle, for women not to be permitted to speak in the church meetings means that women are not permitted to teach with authority in relation to the defining of the truth (1 Tim. 2:12). In this sense, they should be silent in the church meetings. They may, however, pray and prophesy, that is, speak for the Lord and speak forth the Lord in the church meetings. But they must do this under the covering of the brothers.
When I came to Shanghai in 1933, that was the biggest city and the biggest local church among us in China. Brother Nee was very burdened to take care of the speaking in our meetings. The sisters in our meetings were not even allowed to pray at that time. They had to be silent. Brother Nee was bothered by this practice, and he had the burden to show the church that it is okay for the sisters to pray in the meetings. But some of the brothers would not agree with this. Eventually, the announcement was made that in our meetings it would be okay for the sisters to pray. But they were still not allowed to speak, including to testify. Then gradually the leading ones among us agreed that it would be altogether a loss if we did not allow the sisters to give testimonies. Later, we saw that in 1 Corinthians 14 to speak means to teach with authority, not to testify. Thus, we said that it was okay for the sisters to give testimonies.
I am sharing this to show that there is no definite way for us to worship God today, because today is the day of the Spirit. It is no longer the day of any ordinance. We do not have any ordinances. If we are clear about these things, there will be no division among us. We care only for the oneness of the Spirit, and we desire to arrive at the oneness of the faith.
Day by day, we all have to put off the old man and put on the new man by being fully and thoroughly renewed in the spirit of our mind (Eph. 4:22-24). To put on the new man is to put on the church life. By this way we will be one, we will grow, we will be transformed, and we will be built together. This is the real recovery of the Lord’s building of the church. I look to Him that in these last days we would be so clear and we would sell ourselves to this recovery.
