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Scripture Reading: Acts 2:46-47; 5:42; 6:7; 8:1, 4; 9:31
My burden is to share with you all on a very particular matter. Since the Lord began His recovery among us over sixty years ago, we have been seeking to find out what is the right way and the proper way for the believers in Christ to meet. We were clear that the way Christianity takes to meet together was not according to the Bible, and it was not so profitable. Throughout all the years we studied the Bible, and we studied the history of all the different Christian groups, yet we did not know what would be the right way to meet. This question had become more serious year after year. When I went to Taiwan in the fall of 1984, I went through the New Testament thoroughly once more. I know where the verses are concerning this problem, so I put them all together and had a bird’s-eye view. I thank the Lord that He has opened up my eyes.
When the day of Pentecost came, the church began with one hundred twenty as the initiation. Then that initiation brought in on the very first day of the church life three thousand and then on another day five thousand. They began to meet not according to the Jewish congregational way of the Old Testament nor according to the Roman way nor according to the Greek way. Then who invented the way for the first group of Christians to meet? The Holy Spirit invented the way. We can say this because on that day the one hundred twenty were filled with the Holy Spirit economically. And no doubt the three thousand new converts were also filled with the Holy Spirit. Therefore, whatever they did on that day was initiated by the Holy Spirit. The main thing they did was to begin to meet in the temple for big congregations and in the homes. I like the two phrases in Acts 2:46, day by day and from house to house. It is clear that the way they met had two sides. Perhaps at least three thousand met daily in the temple, a big meeting place. And at the same time they met day by day in the homes.
According to the Greek expression in Acts 2:46, they met from house to house. This indicates that they did not select some houses that would fit their purpose. They met from house to house. They included every house. Today we should have our home meetings entirely according to the Holy Spirit’s created and ordained way. According to our feeling, we may say, “How could every brother have a meeting in his home? There are so many weaker ones. Oh, we had better consider and select some stronger ones.” But we must realize that selecting is not the Holy Spirit’s way — it is the human way. In Chinese this phrase means “door after door.” This indicates no selection, no missing. Whether you are weak or strong, whether old or young, whether knowledgeable or unknowledgeable, as long as you are a believer, you meet in your home. Do you dare do this? You say yes in the meeting, but after the meeting some may say there is no way to practice this. Some would say, “We selected thirty homes, but eventually fifteen have been sifted.” If you would select in this way, I am afraid that after another period of time only twelve homes would be left that are good for the home meetings. But you have to see that at the very beginning the way created by the Holy Spirit and ordained by God was to meet in two ways, in the congregational way and in the home way, not in selected homes but in all homes. If you are a Christian, if you are a believer, you have to open up your home for meeting. This is the first pattern at the initiation of the church life.
Since the Lord has shown this, I have begun to see all the benefits of this God-created-and-ordained way. If a new one would believe in the Lord, be baptized, and right away begin to open up his home for meetings, this opening up of his home would encourage him and even uphold him. Therefore, we can see that the home meetings are the top way, the super way, and eventually the unique way to meet.
I fully realize and agree that to have every believer open up his home for meetings is not an easy thing. This is because not everyone would pick up the burden to teach the divine truths or to preach the gospel. Some are not so eloquent and would never speak openly. Others have natural eloquence, but they do not have the spiritual knowledge and do not know the contents of the Bible.
The God-ordained way lasted a very short time. Right after the departure of all the apostles, this way began to wane and by the second century, according to my knowledge of church history, was altogether given up. The church by the second century picked up the congregational way according to the worldly way. As a result, they needed the big evangelists. They formed monasteries, ancient seminaries, to train people. Today Christianity’s existence depends upon the seminaries. Without the seminaries where could they get preachers? There would be no place to get the people trained to preach or teach. Then all these trained and taught preachers and teachers became the clergy. Then through clergy, hierarchy has been built up. This is today’s organized Christianity, and this is the organizational way of today’s Christianity. We all hate hierarchy and reject the clergy-laity system. But unconsciously even today to some extent clergy creeps in among us.
I am afraid that even while we have been talking about meeting in the homes, we do not have a meeting in every home but rather in a selected way. Some might have said already, “We don’t have that many big speakers, do we?” To have a big hall with a big number of people coming together with a big speaker is the Christianity way to worship God today. They do not see how the home meetings are needed. This God-invented way was altogether lost by Christianity.
Three centuries ago Zinzendorf began to practice the church life. It was quite good in a sense. But Zinzendorf did not say anything about the home meetings. Then after Zinzendorf, one century later, the Brethren were raised up in England. They paid much attention to the way to meet. They wrote books on this. When I was young, I was with them for seven and a half years. I never heard the term home meeting. Every week I attended five meetings among them. All the time I went to that one meeting hall. They met only in that one meeting hall. They never met in any other’s home. The Lord in these days has shown us the lack, the loss, and the damage we have been suffering by missing the home meetings. The big speakers with big congregations could only bring people in. There is no way for the big congregations to build up the saints.
The way to build the church may be illustrated by the building of this hall. When we built this hall, I gave a rough design, and the brothers made the drawings. Every day in the early morning, I was watching and observing. One brother was the purchaser. He collected all the materials. Trucks of materials came. If we had only one brother to collect and pile up all the materials on the ground for nine years, they would be ruined. To collect the materials is one thing, but to get all the materials built together is another thing. Look at this building today. In this hall you cannot see one individual piece of material. You can only see one building.
Another brother was directing every group. At that time we had over eighty full-timers whom this brother formed into groups. One group made the stairway, and a group of sisters sanded the handrails on the stairway. They were all grouped together to do a certain part for the building and eventually to put all the pieces together. Now we are enjoying the building.
In the early days of the church life, when the apostles were first raised up by the Lord, they built the church in this way. It was very quick. The church in Jerusalem was built up. Acts 9:31 says, “So the church throughout the whole of Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace, being built up.” In a short time they were all built up. Could we say that all the churches in the U.S.A. have been built up? You cannot say that we have been built up, because we have never taken the building way. What is the building way? Small groups! Home meetings!
The big speakers are useful. Peter was useful. Peter spoke to the big congregations, and his speaking brought in thousands of people. But that was only one side. There was another side. They met in their homes, in their houses, from house to house. There was no time for them to train preachers. There was no time for them to learn the truth. They had heard only one message, and that message was their New Testament. On the day of Pentecost their New Testament was so short, just one message given by Peter in Acts 2. But everybody heard that, everybody learned of that, and everybody spoke that. On the day that Peter spoke the message, they all got baptized. Then I believe that they went back home and began to meet, repeating what they had heard from Peter. I believe this shows that everybody can teach and everybody can preach.
If you open up your home for meetings, you will feel there are some things there that need to be cleared up. However, if you do not open up your home, you will leave those things there, maybe for three years. You will come to the big congregations without any feeling about those black, dark things. If you would open up your home, you would consider before you lose your temper with your wife. You would think that after half an hour all the saints will come to meet. This is just something on the negative side, but there are a lot of benefits, a lot of blessings, on the positive side. When saints come into your home, they all come in with God, they all come in with Christ, and they all come in with a lot of prayer to bless your home. One will step in and say, “Lord, bless this home.” And another one will say, “Bless this family. Lord, remember them all.” The Lord will answer the prayers, and there will be much blessing for you. You may say that you are so weak, but if you will open up your home, many will come in who are not so weak. You may be poor, but those who come are rich. The home meeting will rescue you, strengthen you, and enrich you.
Christianity’s way to meet is according to the natural concept. In human history you could see this kind of congregation. Even the Greek word ekklesia was a word for a called-out congregation of a city. A call was given that all the city people should come together for a certain purpose, so there was a congregation. Thus, to meet in today’s Christianity way, to have the great congregations, is altogether natural, worldly, and according to human society. I have never heard of any kind of movement or any kind of culture that invented this way of meeting in every home. Such a thing is only in the Bible. At the very initiation of the church life the saints met from house to house. This is quite extraordinary. This is not following the natural way.
Our problem today is that we were born natural. We were born into the worldly way. Even before we were saved, when we were invited to come to the “church,” we would ask who the speaker would be. If we were told “Doctor So-and-so” would be speaking, then we would come. This is the natural way. Even among us, if the announcement is given that there is to be a meeting next Saturday, many of us would ask who the speaker would be. Who will speak may decide whether or not we will come. This has been wrought into our blood. If we mean business with the Lord to see the real increase of the church and the building up of the church, we must repudiate the Christianity way. We must get this blood out of our being. I still treasure the big meetings, but if we have only the big meetings, we are like a 747 that has only one wing. How could we fly? We need the two sides. We need the big meetings and the small meetings as well.
You may ask, “Without the big meetings how could we have the increase?” In the sixties when I came to this country, the evangelist Dr. Billy Graham was promoting small group meetings. Because Billy Graham found out that many brought to the gospel were scattered in the denominations and eventually became cold, he encouraged people to form small groups to have Bible study and to pray together. What he promoted was the same in principle as what we are talking about. Although thousands of people may be brought in without the small groups, how many of them could remain? There is no way. It is just like bringing water out of a deep well and pouring it on the earth. All the water will sink back. We may get the increase, but without the small group meetings they cannot remain in the church to be built up.
Even in Taiwan over a hundred thousand were baptized through our preaching, but I doubt if twenty percent are left. So many were lost because of no home meetings. This is absolutely different from what was practiced in the early days after Pentecost. At Pentecost through the big congregations people were brought in, and right away they were put into the home meetings. In the home meetings they were upheld, in the home meetings they were kept, in the home meetings they grew, and in the home meetings they were built up together.
We should not despise the big meetings, but we must match the big meetings with the small groups. We should pay sixty percent of our attention to the small meetings and only forty percent to the big meetings. But I am a little concerned that many pay eighty percent or more of their attention to the big meetings. Many, according to their concept, would say that they prefer to go to the big meetings rather than the home meetings. We need a change of concept! We need both. Without one brother purchasing the materials and collecting them, surely we could not have built this hall. But after the collection of the materials, we surely needed another brother to assign all these materials to the builders. In the building of the hall we had a good situation, but today in the building of the church we are short of this. I say this especially to the leading ones of all the churches: what you have been doing is just to maintain a meeting situation of the church. As you do not have small groups, how could you have the building up? It is impossible. I still remember meeting with the Brethren assembly for seven and a half years. Every week I attended five meetings. Yet there was very little contact with any of the others. Of course, we are much better than that. After the meeting we have much contact with each other, but we still do not have much positive building because we are short of the home meetings. We must see the need of the home meetings. Without home meetings there can be no building.
In the coming chapters, my burden is to share with you how to have the home meetings, how to make them rich, strong, fresh, living, so attractive, even so attracting, and able to uphold people.
Many of us are very much concerned for the home meetings because it is not so easy for the home meetings to be rich, strong, fresh, living, attractive, and able to uphold people. In the big meetings we need only two or three trained and selected ones. If you have a Billy Graham, you can hold thousands of people. You may argue that you do not have such a one in your home meeting. But praise the Lord, we have thousands of small potatoes. All these have to be made useful.
How do you have a meeting in your home that is rich, strong, fresh, living, attractive, and able to uphold? Acts 5:42 says, “Every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and announcing the gospel of Jesus as the Christ.” The word teaching means they knew the truth. And announcing the gospel of Jesus as the Christ means that they were preaching. They were able to teach, and they were able to preach. In the past we have had conferences and annual trainings, both summer and winter. We have finished the entire study of the whole New Testament, and the messages have been printed. Many of you have the complete set of Life-studies of the New Testament in your home on the shelves. Yet how much of the truth conveyed in those pages of the Life-studies has really gotten into you? And how many truths are you able to teach others? I am a little concerned that it is not too many.
We have also stressed the growth in life very much. We need to know the truth, and we need to grow in life. Yet again, how much growth have you had in the past years? According to my observation, it is not too much. In one sense it is disappointing. Yet in another sense it is encouraging because you are still here. You are still seeking, hungry, and thirsty.
I realize that we have put out the truths, but we have helped the saints grow in life in a very loose way. In a sense I regret, but I must tell you that I had no choice in the past; even in the coming days I still have no choice. I must spend the time to put out the word of God. Brother Nee, like others who have gone before us, knew so much, yet not very much of what he knew is left. We have only some of the books. From this I realized that I must take the time to put out whatever the Lord has shown us in these years and get it into print.
I believe that there will be a period of time for the Lord to do something to build up His church before He comes back. Because of this I anticipate a great need for the Life-studies in the future. I am still burdened to put out the Life-studies on the Pentateuch and the prophets of the Old Testament. I must spend at least half of my time to get these things written, spoken, and published. Then I still have the burden to take care of a few regions, for example, Taiwan. There is the need to go back again and again. I am also endeavoring to do more than what I did in the past for the churches in the U.S. From now on I would like to have more time with you and with the leading ones, charging all of us to be definite. Although we have Life-studies on the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, the saints must get into them. We must get into what is taught in Matthew, what is taught in Mark, what is taught in Luke, what is taught in John, in Acts, and so forth. This needs some time.
The educational system in the human race has been practiced for thousands of years. Now the entire world follows the same kind of educational system. You have kindergarten, elementary, junior high, high school, then college and graduate school. If you teach people in mathematics in a loose way without following this educational system, when they become old, they will not know much. You must have a definite way to charge people to finish the course. Six years are required to finish elementary school, another six years to finish junior and senior high school, then another four years to finish college. After they have finished this, they will have received definite training. We must follow this way. So we all have to endeavor. By the small groups we have the way to do this. Suppose a school with a thousand students has no classes formed but only invites people to give good speeches all year round. The students will get something, but only in a very loose and general way. But if I were to open a school, I would not invite good speakers but rather good teachers. I would build up classrooms, form the classes, and put in the best teachers. Then they would teach the classes semester after semester. I would not need to invite a good speaker. I would have a strong school built up, and all the students who graduate from my school would be very definitely educated. We must learn this way. Our classes are the small groups. We must form the small groups.
At one time in Dallas there were two particular Baptist congregations. One depended upon having a good speaker for the big congregation, and the other one depended upon classes. After some years the one that was for the big meetings, which had the big number, eventually came to a failure with a small number. But the one that paid attention to classes and had a small number at the beginning eventually had a number about ten times more than the other one.
Just to have general conferences to give certain messages does not work too well. We need to set up classrooms with definite teachers. But where are our classrooms? Every home is a classroom. And every brother or sister of that certain home should be the teacher. You have to set up your home as a classroom. Get yourself educated and trained as a teacher. Then along with this, a good teacher must be a grown-up person. Although a child may have the best knowledge, he could not be a good teacher. Therefore, we need to grow in life. All the churches have to endeavor to educate every saint fully in the spiritual truths and to cause them all to grow in life. Only these two things could qualify all the saints to be good for the home meetings.
We have to believe that in a home meeting of five or six, at least two or three could be and should be rich in the knowledge of the truth and rich in the growth of life. When they come together, these two or three will spontaneously become the richness, the strength, the newness, the livingness, the attracting power, and the upholding power of that small group. They could be useful, and their usefulness could be applied to the practical situation. However, listening to a speaker in a large congregation, in a sense, annuls their usefulness. So from now on I would advise all the churches to have at most only one big meeting every week. Do not treasure Brother Lee’s speaking; you all have to come together to practice speaking. Do not say that you do not know how. Just speak. Every one of you can be an apostle, an evangelist, a shepherd, and a teacher.
I hope that you would be deeply impressed to repudiate the over-treasuring of the congregational way and to realize the need for the small groups. Then secondly, I hope that you would be deeply impressed to pick up the adequate knowledge of the truth. Try to study the New Testament, and try to spend time to get into the Life-studies. I like to see saints’ homes where there are Life-studies in every room so that anytime, anywhere, they can get into them. But I am afraid that in your home all the Life-studies are piled up on the shelves. Get into the full knowledge of the truth and then pray to the Lord, “Lord, grant me mercy and grace that I would grow in You. Grace me to grow, Lord.” Pray much, seeking the growth in life. You will be enlivened. You will be a factor to enrich, to strengthen, to refresh, and to enliven the home meetings. Then the home meetings will be attractive and will be able to uphold any member.
