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Let us consider further how to select hymns in the meetings. At the climax of the Lord’s table meeting, in order to maintain the spirit of the meeting after the bread and the cup have been blessed and passed, there is the need to fill up the rest of the time with hymns and prayers. Then the meeting should turn to the second section, which is the worship of the Father.
When we worship the Father, we do not need a new beginning; we simply need to make a turn. A hymn for praising the Father is also a hymn for worshipping the Father. Although the worship of the Father is another section, it still needs to be linked to the previous section. For example, in the first section of the table meeting if we have seen the Lord’s redemptive love that seeks and brings us back, we should turn to the worship of the Father with this feeling. In such a feeling we can worship God the Father for sending the Lord Jesus to the earth. Hence, our praising and singing will provide a flavor of the Father’s sending of the Son. However, if we select Hymns, #178, “Our hearts are full of Christ and long / Their glorious matter to declare,” we will certainly go backward. This is not acceptable. Instead, Hymns, #42 would be a good choice, “By Thee, O God, invited, / We look unto the Son, / In whom Thy heart delighted, / Who all Thy will hath done; / And by the one chief treasure / Thy bosom freely gave, / Thine own pure love we measure, / Thy willing mind to save,” because it meets the requirement of worshipping the Father, and its taste is also higher.
When we worship the Father, we often call Hymns, #33 or Hymns, #52, without paying attention to the theme of our remembrance of the Lord. Hence, our spirit often cannot follow when it is time to worship the Father. This is because we do not enter into the atmosphere and feeling of the meeting; we do not enter into the spirit of the hymns that were selected in the section on remembering the Lord.
If we have seen the Lord’s redemptive love, when we turn to worship the Father, the feeling of such worship should be based upon the Father’s sending His beloved Son to redeem us. Thus, we should select a second hymn. If we select Hymns, #52, however, it may be too quick. We can also turn from the feeling of the Lord’s coming to seek us to the praise of the Father’s love, matching this with prayers that praise the Father’s love and then proceed forward. Even though Hymns, #299, “A mind at perfect peace with God,” is not a hymn on the worship of the Father, it can be used. After singing this hymn, it would be good if someone were to stand up and pray, “O Father, thank You for sending the Lord Jesus to seek us. In Your love we were sought and brought back. Now before You in Your house, we enjoy the love You prepared for us in eternity.” After such a prayer, we can call Hymns, #43, “‘Abba, Father,’ we adore Thee, / While the hosts in heaven above / E’en in us now learn the wonders / Of Thy wisdom, grace, and love. / Soon before Thy throne assembled, / All Thy children shall proclaim / Abba’s love shown in redemption, / And how full is Abba’s name!” Singing this hymn can be compared to putting on a vest in fall; we feel just right, neither cold nor hot.
It is good for a brother to choose Hymns, #45, but we should avoid singing two hymns of a similar nature in succession. It would be too much for us to sing Hymns, #45 after singing Hymns, #43. After the singing, either a brother or a sister can offer a prayer, saying, “Our God, because You have chosen us before the creation of the world, now in Your love we have come back to Your house.” This is another turn, from the praise of the Father’s love to the praise of the Father’s choosing. After the praises we can call Hymns, #33, “Father, long before creation, / Thou hadst chosen us in love; / And that love, so deep, so moving, / Draws us close to Christ above, / And will keep us, and will keep us, / Firmly fixed in Christ alone...” This is truly good and can be compared to singing hymns of ascent, going up higher and higher, step by step, waiting for the bread and the cup to be put back on the table. Then at the end of the hymn, that is, at the climax of the worship of the Father, a brother should lead everyone to stand up and conclude the meeting with a prayer.
However, sometimes even though the meeting has ended, everyone may still be unwilling to depart and want to continue. At this time there is the need for sending off by singing the last stanza of Hymns, #33 again. I hope that we could all see that this is a lesson we should learn and practice. In this way we will be able to function in the meetings.
Like the singing of hymns, the prayer in the table meeting has different sections. There are opening prayers, introductory prayers, strengthening prayers, spirit-uplifting prayers, spirit-maintaining prayers, turning prayers, correcting prayers, time-filling prayers, concluding prayers, and sending-off prayers. Just as singing has its steps, prayer also has its process with many sections. I hope that we will remember this principle and will practice it diligently so that we may function in the meeting, like an experienced basketball team.
If the feeling of the saints is plain and indifferent at the Lord’s table, we can select Hymns, #213, “On that same night, Lord Jesus, / When all around Thee joined / To cast its darkest shadow / Across Thy holy mind.” After singing this hymn, the saints should have some feeling. When we touch this feeling, we should immediately offer a prayer. If we sense that the prayer is vague, we can share our feeling with the saints.
There are a few points that we must grasp firmly and take heed to. First, we must come out of our own feeling when we pray in the meeting. Second, we must be able to follow and touch the feeling and the atmosphere we sense when in the meeting. Whether it is our selecting of hymns, testifying, or praying, it must follow the flow of the Holy Spirit. Sadly, very few brothers and sisters pray this kind of prayer in the meeting. Almost all the brothers and sisters bring their personal feelings into their prayers in the meeting.
For example, after singing a hymn of praise to the Lord for His glory and greatness, a sister may pray in tears, “O Lord, I am really suffering, but I thank and praise You for the cross You have given me.” She was not moved to tears while praying; rather, she had tears in her eyes when she was on her way to the meeting. Immediately after singing the hymn, her prayer with tears quickly brings her own feeling into the meeting, completely ignoring the feeling and atmosphere of the meeting. All sorts of strange thoughts can be brought into the meeting. Therefore, we should not hold on to our personal feeling. As soon as we enter a meeting, we should sense and closely follow the atmosphere of the meeting.
Third, we should try our best to avoid ritualistic formalities in our prayers. For example, in a table meeting we may sing Hymns, #226, “For the bread and for the wine, / For the pledge that seals Him mine.” At the last stanza, when we are uplifted in our spirit, a brother may take the lead to stand up to bless the bread and the cup. However, another brother may stand up and pray, “Lord, we thank You for gathering us here to remember You. Lord, we praise You for calming our hearts, causing our hearts not to be disturbed or distracted.” If the ritualistic phrases were removed from his prayer, there would be nothing left. This may be compared to writing a letter full of ritualistic expressions; eventually, no one will understand the letter. Prayers that contain many ritualistic expressions sound insincere. We should do our best to avoid using ritualistic phrases; rather, we should pray with clear utterances concerning the Lord’s bread and cup: “Lord, this is Your bread and cup, which we receive from Your hand. Grant us the realization that it is because Your body was broken for us that we may have Your life, and that it is because Your precious blood was shed for us that we can be filled with Your comfort.” This kind of prayer is clear and accurate; it is uttered with powerful words and void of superfluous ritualistic phrases.
Many of our prayers in the meeting contain too many ceremonial expressions and very few words of revelation. We must learn to follow our inner feeling at all times. In order to express our spiritual feeling, we need to practice. We are often short of the utterance for these feelings. This is because we lack practice. Hence, we need to practice in order to have eloquence for our spiritual utterance at all times.
Furthermore, when we comment on the prayers of the brothers and sisters, we must never criticize. Criticism comes out of the flesh and is the issue of partaking of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which opens people’s eyes. We need to learn to have a kind of spiritual study that enables us to make progress in spiritual matters.
For example, a brother may pray too quickly in a table meeting, not in terms of his words but in terms of his proceeding directly to bless the bread and the cup at the beginning of the meeting. It is too quick to mention the bread and the cup in the first prayer in the meeting. Even though his prayer is strong in words and in spirit, the quality of his prayer is low. We must hold firmly to the principle that after the first hymn in a table meeting, the first prayer should not be too quick to mention the bread and the cup. Our prayer should be the same as our singing, it should be of high quality.
If we can pray, “Lord, we are here to remember You because in the evening when You departed from us, You left us with a charge to remember You. Today we are here, seemingly remembering You, but in fact, it is You who first remembers us. You have remembered us from eternity. There has never been a moment in time that You are not thinking of us. This is the reason we can be here to remember You today.” Such a prayer proceeds higher and higher without mentioning the bread and the cup. It reaches the point where we sense that the Lord is remembering us, and in this remembrance we have fellowship with Him. On the one hand, we worship Him, and on the other hand, we contemplate Him. This kind of prayer is high in quality.
First Samuel 2 in the Old Testament records the praise of Samuel’s mother when she offered Samuel to God (vv. 1-10). The quality of her praise was high. In the New Testament, Mary, the mother of the Lord Jesus, in the flesh, also offered praise that was high in quality (Luke 1:46-55). Another example is Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 1, which says, “That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of Him” (v. 17). This prayer is high. Then in chapter 3 the prayer and praise are even higher (vv. 16-21). Hence, we need to practice so that our prayer, praise, and hymns can be uplifted.
Now let us consider how to select hymns in the prayer meeting. Suppose in the meeting we sense that the atmosphere is depressed, the enemy’s attack is there, and the spirit of the saints is very heavy; perhaps the church has some problems, or some brothers and sisters are ill or have suffered some hardships in their homes. How should we select a hymn in this situation?
Like the table meeting, the prayer meeting has different sections. The table meeting has ten sections, but the prayer meeting may be for spiritual warfare, for spiritual pursuit, for the gospel work, for the revival of the church, for specific matters, or for general affairs. When the atmosphere of the meeting is depressed, we need prayers of spiritual warfare. Although the Lord’s table meeting and the prayer meeting are different in their nature, content, and items, their course is the same. In selecting a hymn, we always have to hold on to the principle that the meaning of the words in the hymn must match the feeling we sense in the meeting.
After singing, we should pray one after another. Sometimes, when the allotted time for a prayer meeting is long, we need to use a hymn to fill the time, stir up the saints, and maintain the spirit. We can sing Hymns, #890, “Hallelujah! Christ is Victor.” However, it is better not to sing the whole hymn; rather, it is sufficient to sing only one stanza and the chorus. We can also sing Hymns, #880; this hymn strengthens the brothers and sisters in their inner feeling to oppose Satan. After the prayer, when the spirit has been released to the point that our utterance has been exhausted, we may express this feeling through a hymn. When everyone is released in the singing, a brother needs to add a prayer. At this time it may seem that the meeting is over. But if the meeting has a lingering taste, and there is a need to send people off, we can sing the chorus of Hymns, #890 again. This can be compared to wrapping a gift perfectly and then adding a beautiful bow. If the saints attend this kind of meeting, they will surely like to continue meeting.
Our problem is that we always seem to have a good beginning but not a good ending. This is because we are not familiar with the hymns. Thus, we not only need to know the principle of selecting hymns, we also need to study and practice selecting hymns. From now on the responsible brothers should practice selecting hymns in all the fellowship meetings of the church. Then our meetings will spontaneously be good and rich.
Moreover, there is a great principle with regard to singing. It is acceptable to sing slowly when we are alone, but if we sing slowly in a big meeting, the whole meeting will be finished. It is good to sing slowly in private, but we should not bring the same slowness into the meetings. Furthermore, I hope that all the brothers in various localities who can sing would not rely on only one or two to lead the singing. In a meeting all those who know how to sing should lead the singing, and those who do not know how to sing should not begin a tune. In other words, all those who do not have the confidence should not lead the singing, but those who can sing should not wait for others to lead the singing. Everyone must function properly.
