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Scripture Reading: 1 Tim. 1:4b; Eph. 1:10; 3:9; John 14:9-20; Matt. 28:19; 2 Cor. 13:14; Rev. 1:4-5; 1 Cor. 15:45b; John 7:39; Rev. 22:17; John 3:15-16; Eph. 1:22-23; 1 Cor. 10:32; Rom. 6:4-6; Eph. 4:22-24; Phil. 3:10; 1:19-21; Matt. 16:24; Gal. 5:24; Rom. 8:3; Heb. 2:14; John 12:31; Gal. 1:4; Rom. 12:2; 5:17, 21; 1 Tim. 3:15-16; Matt. 16:18-19; Acts 8:1; 13:1; Rev. 1:11; 1 Cor. 1:10-13; 10:16-17; 9:1-3; 1 Tim. 3:1-13; 1:3-4; Rom. 14:17
I. The first aspect of the Lord’s recovery — the revelation of God:
А. Concerning the eternal economy of God — 1 Tim. 1:4b; Eph. 1:10; 3:9.
B. Concerning the Divine Trinity — John 14:9-20; Matt. 28:19; 2 Cor. 13:14; Rev. 1:4-5.
C. Concerning the person and work of the all-inclusive Christ — Eph. 1:23.
D. Concerning the consummated life-giving Spirit — 1 Cor. 15:45b; John 7:39; Rev. 22:17.
E. Concerning the eternal life of God — John 3:15-16.
F. Concerning the Body of Christ, which is the church of God — Eph. 1:22-23; 1 Cor. 10:32.
II. The second aspect of the Lord’s recovery — the God-man life:
А. The life lived out by the believers, who have been regenerated to become God-men, not by the life of their old man but by the divine life in their new man — Rom. 6:4-6; Eph. 4:22-24.
B. Being conformed daily to the death of Christ by the power of Christ’s resurrection and living and magnifying Christ through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ — Phil. 3:10; 1:19-21.
C. Overcoming the self, the flesh, and the involvements of the flesh — sin, Satan, and the world — Matt. 16:24; Gal. 5:24; Rom. 8:3; Heb. 2:14; John 12:31.
D. Overcoming religion, culture, and the tide and amusements of this age — Gal. 1:4; Rom. 12:2.
E. Reigning as kings by the reigning life of Christ to conquer all persons, matters, and things contrary to God and be the overcomers of the Lord in this age — Rom. 5:17, 21; Rev. 2—3.
III. The third aspect of the Lord’s recovery — the practice of the church:
А. The universal Body of Christ being the universal house of God and the kingdom of God as well — Eph. 1:23; 1 Tim. 3:15-16; Matt. 16:18-19.
B. Appearing in various cities as local churches, with one city having only one church in order to keep the oneness and prevent division (Deut. 12:5-18) — Acts 8:1; 13:1; Rev. 1:4, 11.
C. The local churches are scattered in different places by geography, yet they are not divided by any doctrine or matter — 1 Cor. 1:10-13.
D. The unique church of God is expressed as many local churches throughout the whole globe, yet they are still the unique universal Body of Christ and should not be divided into sects or denominations — 10:16-17.
E. Among the churches there are the apostles who set up the churches, and in every church there are also elders who manage the church and deacons who serve the church; however, besides the order of these holy services, there should not be any hierarchy — religious organization or system of rank — 9:1-3; 1 Tim. 3:1-13.
F. Although the local churches in various localities are many, they all take the eternal economy of God as their center to bear the unique testimony of Christ, not teaching any doctrine that is unrelated to the eternal economy of God and that has nothing to do with the testimony of Christ — 1:3-4.
G. In these local churches there should be righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit as the reality of the kingdom of God — Rom. 14:17.
Prayer: Lord, You are the Alpha and You are also the Omega. You are the Beginning and also the End. May You speak to us again until You have completed speaking Your word. When You appeared to Abraham, he waited before You and walked with You, waiting for Your last word, until You had completed Your speaking. O Lord, this is the last meeting. From deep within we are waiting for You to speak to us the final word. The final word is the deciding word, the word most in Your heart. May we here have not only excitement but also an ambition and a great purpose of heart toward You. This is not for ourselves but for Your eternal economy. We want to be Your overcomers in this generation, to walk with You, to live together with You, and to work together with You so that we can terminate this age and bring in the kingdom age. This is what You desire and what You want to obtain. Lord, hear our prayer and take care of us. We are a group of people who need Your mercy. Our condition really needs Your mercy. May You have mercy on us in many ways. Amen.
In the previous chapters we have seen a number of great and profound matters. In this chapter we will go back to look at the Lord’s recovery. The speaking Spirit of the Lord within the minister of His word is most sensitive. He knows what to speak. Within me is a heavy burden. I am concerned that you might have been in the Lord’s recovery for many years, yet you still do not know what the Lord’s recovery is. Although you may know the Lord’s recovery in term, you may not know its real significance.
From 1933 to 1935 there was a publication among us that reported and fellowshipped concerning the situation of the churches. That publication was called Collection of Newsletters. Later, the brothers reported and fellowshipped in that publication primarily matters that concerned minor issues, such as leaving the denominations, baptism, head covering, etc., and not much attention was paid to the central messages given by Brother Nee concerning Christ as life and Christ having the preeminence in all things. Because of this, Brother Nee was forced to suspend that publication in 1935 and to tell the co-workers strongly that they needed to be awakened and not continue in that way but have a change. Today I am concerned about the same thing. The Lord has been speaking continuously in His recovery for seventy-three years, from Brother Nee’s publication of literature in 1922 up to today. The Lord’s speaking among us has never stopped. Today the Lord’s speaking has reached the high peak concerning God’s economy, which is God becoming man in order to make man God in life and nature. However, does our condition match this? I am afraid that many people take man becoming God only as a slogan. This is why we must look specifically at what the Lord’s recovery is.
Simply, the Lord’s recovery has three aspects. The first aspect is the revelation of God. The revelation of God is the speaking of God. From Moses in the Old Testament until the apostle John in the New Testament, God spoke for more than fifteen hundred years. His speaking collectively became the completed Bible, which is in our hands today. Hence, the last book of the Bible, Revelation, says at the end that no one should add to these words or take away from these words (22:18-19).
Even before the first group of apostles passed away, the church had already veered from the word of God, the revelation of God. This was why the apostles wrote the second and third Epistles, such as 2 Peter, 2 Timothy, the Epistles of 2 and 3 John, etc. All these second and third Epistles are books of recovery. The church had lost the truth and had left the position of the truth. The apostles wrote the second Epistles to bring the church back. What they wrote also became a part of the truth, a part of the Bible, to be a warning to the future generations. At that time the church had greatly deviated from the truth. For example, some denied the deity of Christ, saying that Christ was merely an honorable man and that because of His high honor He was later deified. There were also some who said that Christ was not God incarnated as a real man; He was merely a phantom. The first Epistle of John deals with these heretical teachings (2:22; 4:2-3).
After the first group of apostles, in church history there were the so-called church fathers, who defended the truths. However, among the church fathers, because of inadequate light, there was always much contention concerning the truths. It was not until A.D. 325 that, for the sake of maintaining the order in his empire, the Roman emperor Constantine the Great came forward to intervene by calling a meeting at Nicaea in order to quiet the contentions among the church fathers. At that time there was a young theologian named Athanasius, who was a student under the church fathers. A sentence that he spoke, “God became man that man may become God,” shocked everyone, and it has become a famous quote in church history. The Nicene Creed, which he helped to draft, was not bad in presenting the orthodox and fundamental doctrines concerning God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit. It is still used by the Catholic Church and the Protestant churches. Although this creed is good, in terms of the truth it is still very lacking. Hence, the Nicene Council did not completely solve the problems concerning the truths.
The knowledge concerning the consummated Spirit of the Triune God has been very lacking for centuries. For example, the seventeenth century edition of the King James Version of the Bible still uses the impersonal pronoun it in referring to the Holy Spirit because the translators viewed the Holy Spirit as an instrument to be used by God and not as a person ranked equally with the other two in the Divine Trinity. Two centuries later, when the British Brethren were raised up by the Lord, they pointed out clearly that the Holy Spirit is a person. This was because the word of the Lord Jesus clearly mentioned “the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19), and the church fathers long before had acknowledged the Holy Spirit as a person in the Godhead. The English translations after the nineteenth century began gradually to adopt the personal pronoun He in referring to the Holy Spirit.
In the twentieth century the Lord’s recovery has reached us. Beginning with Brother Nee, we have read through the Bible thoroughly. We have especially dug out all the verses in the Bible concerning the Holy Spirit. Concerning the consummated Spirit, the Lord has shown us three crucial points. First, the Spirit of God has been processed to become a life-giving Spirit (John 7:39; 1 Cor. 15:45b). Second, this consummated Spirit is the compound Spirit typified by the holy anointing ointment in the Old Testament (Exo. 30:23-25). Third, this Spirit has also become the seven Spirits (Rev. 1:4; 4:5; 5:6), that is, the sevenfold intensified Spirit. These three points were not mentioned in the Nicene Creed.
The Lord has caused us to receive much revelation in the Bible. In order for us to present these revelations, we have invented many new terms. An example of a new term invented by us is the processed and consummated Triune God. The church fathers long ago used the term the Triune God. Although this term is not in the Bible, the fact that God is triune is definitely in the Bible. Both processed and consummated are terms that had never been used in the history of Christianity before us. However, no one can deny that God has passed through the processes of incarnation, human living, crucifixion, and resurrection, ultimately producing a consummation, that is, the life-giving Spirit.
Today many Christians have never heard of the processed and consummated God. Hence, what they are preaching is the unprocessed God in Genesis 1. However, what we have seen is the consummated God in Revelation 22. At the end the Bible says, “The Spirit and the bride say...” (v. 17). The Spirit is the processed and consummated God; the bride is the processed and consummated church. The two are joined to be a loving pair in eternity. The final word of the Bible is the highest authority for defining the truth. The Lord in His recovery has already shown us the highest truth defined by the Bible.
The divine revelation in the Bible is the content of the Lord’s recovery. This revelation contains six major items. The first item concerns God’s eternal economy (1 Tim. 1:4b; Eph. 1:10; 3:9). God’s eternal economy is something that today’s theologians overlook, yet it is a very important truth in the New Testament. Briefly, God’s economy is God’s plan. For this plan God made an administrative arrangement, which is His administrative management for dispensing Himself through the processed and consummated all-inclusive Spirit into His chosen, regenerated, sanctified, and transformed tripartite men so that they can become God in life and nature yet with no share in His Godhead. Thus they are being constituted to be the Body of Christ and will ultimately be enlarged and built up to be the New Jerusalem as God’s eternal and corporate expression.
The second major item in the divine revelation concerns the Divine Trinity (John 14:9-20; Matt. 28:19; 2 Cor. 13:14; Rev. 1:4-5). Although theologians today also speak of the Trinity, what they speak is not very impressive or complete and is not very scriptural. For the purpose of presenting the truth concerning the Divine Trinity, the Bible expositors invented a number of new terms, such as the economical Trinity, the essential Trinity, etc. God is triune; He has an economical aspect as well as an essential aspect. Although these new terms were not invented by us, because they are quite expressive and meaningful, we also use them.
What the Lord has shown us in His recovery concerning the Divine Trinity is that the three coexist and coinhere. Although the three are distinct, They cannot be separated. All this is not for doctrinal debate or study but for our experience and enjoyment (2 Cor. 13:14). The Divine Trinity is for the dispensing of God into His chosen people that they may accomplish His eternal economy.
The third major item in the divine revelation concerns the person and work of the all-inclusive Christ (Eph. 1:23). The Christ who is revealed in the Bible is all-inclusive. Ephesians 1:23 says that Christ is the One who fills all in all. This all-inclusive Christ, as the preeminent One over all things and the One who fills all in all, is the center and circumference of God’s economy. By passing through incarnation, thirty-three and a half years of human living, the all-inclusive death, the all-conquering resurrection, and the all-transcending ascension, He dispenses Himself into the believers to regenerate, sanctify, renew, transform, and conform them to the image of God’s firstborn Son, that is, the image of Christ, the first God-man, and ultimately glorify them with God’s eternal glory. They become the many God-men to constitute the Body of Christ, which will consummate in the New Jerusalem as the enlargement and expression of God in humanity for eternity.
The fourth major item in the divine revelation concerns the consummated life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b; John 7:39; Rev. 22:17). The term consummated implies that the Spirit passed through many processes to become a consummated Spirit. Concerning the consummated Spirit, there are three major and crucial points. First, the Spirit of God has been compounded with a number of elements to become a compound Spirit, as typified by the holy anointing ointment in Exodus 30:23-25. Second, John 7:39 and 1 Corinthians 15:45b reveal that before Jesus’ resurrection, in which He was glorified, the Spirit of God had not yet been processed to become the Spirit who gives life. It was at the time of His resurrection that Jesus was glorified (Luke 24:26). In His resurrection Christ, the last Adam in the flesh, became a life-giving Spirit. The life-giving Spirit is also called the Spirit of Jesus (Acts 16:7), the Spirit of Christ — the pneumatic Christ (Rom. 8:9) — the Spirit of Jesus Christ (Phil. 1:19), and the Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2). Third, in Revelation the Spirit of God eventually becomes the seven Spirits, that is, the sevenfold intensified Spirit (1:4; 4:5; 5:6), to enable the believers to overcome the various degradations of the church in the dark age of the church. The Spirit of God, after being compounded, transformed, and intensified, became the consummated Spirit of the Triune God (22:17a).
The fifth major item in the divine revelation concerns the eternal life of God (John 3:15-16). Generally, in the understanding of Christians, eternal life is not a life but a blessedness in the heavens to be enjoyed forever after death. The teachers in Christianity do not give people the proper knowledge concerning the eternal life; instead, they explain the eternal life as a place where the believers go after death to enjoy the good things in the heavens forever. What an error this is!
Thank the Lord that in the past seventy years He has recovered among us the scriptural view and the proper understanding concerning the eternal life of God. We obtained this eternal life from God through believing in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This life is the life on the highest plane; it is the divine life of God, even the complete Triune God Himself. It is uncreated, incorruptible, indestructible, and eternal. Eternal implies that in quality, quantity, time, space, and existence, it is perfect and complete. We are regenerated and transformed in this eternal and everlasting, perfect and complete, incorruptible and indestructible, marvelous and wonderful life and glorified with the consummated Triune God as our eternal glory. This is the eternal life.
The sixth major item of the divine revelation in the Bible concerns the Body of Christ, which is the church of God (Eph. 1:22-23; 1 Cor. 10:32). According to the revelation and pattern seen in the New Testament, the church is the gathering of the believers in Christ, who are called out from the world. This gathering, on the one hand, is the house of the living God (1 Tim. 3:15) for God to dwell in to accomplish His will according to His desire for His good pleasure. On the other hand, it is the organic Body of Christ (Eph. 1:22-23) for Him to have a counterpart that is organically united with Him to be His expression. Such a church as the house of God and also the Body of Christ is unique in the universe, yet it is manifested and expressed in many different localities on the earth to be the many local churches. The fellowship in life of this church, whether universally or locally, is unique.
I would exhort the brothers and sisters, especially the co-workers and elders, to study thoroughly the revelation of these six major items and even to widely teach and preach concerning them.
Now we come to the second aspect of the Lord’s recovery, that is, the God-man life, which is the kind of living that the believers need to have. The worldly people emphasize moral and ethical living and religious living, yet these are not what God wants. What God wants is the God-man life, which is God and man living together. In your family life you should have God living together with you. As a wife, you should have God be the wife with you. As a husband, you should have God be the husband with you. As a co-worker, you should have God be the co-worker with you. Even when you go shopping, you should have God go shopping with you. I have often prayed, “Lord, are You willing to go with me? I have a few words that I want to speak to Brother So-and-so. Lord, will You go with me?” Not living alone but living together with God in this way is the God-man life.
We are not religionists living a religious life. Neither are we followers of Confucius’s teachings or Mencius’s thoughts, living a moral and ethical life. We are God-men living a God-man life. The Lord’s recovery is to recover this kind of God-man life.
Paul was this kind of person. He said, “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me” (Gal. 2:20). We all need to be like Paul in being able to speak such a word. We must be able to boast by saying, “I am a God-man. The life that I am living is a life lived by God and man together; it is God and I living together.” This kind of life lived by God and us together is the life lived out of the believers, who have been regenerated to become God-men, not by the life of their old man but by the divine life in their new man (Rom. 6:4-6; Eph. 4:22-24).
The God-man life is also one that is conformed daily to the death of Christ by the power of Christ’s resurrection and that lives and magnifies Christ through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ (Phil. 3:10; 1:19-21). We have received the power of Christ’s resurrection; hence, we can live a crucified life by this power, being conformed to His death. Paul was this kind of person. Not only so, when he was in prison, he lived and magnified Christ by enjoying the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. We also should live this kind of life.
When Christ was crucified on the cross, He dealt with our old man, our flesh, and the involvements of the flesh — sin, Satan, and the world. We, the God-men, in living the God-man life by the Spirit, can now apply what Christ has accomplished on the cross to overcome the self, the flesh, and the involvements of the flesh — sin, Satan, and the world (Rom. 6:6; Matt. 16:24; Gal. 5:24; Rom. 8:3; Heb. 2:14; John 12:31).
Not only so, in our living the God-man life, we must also overcome religion, culture, and the tide and amusements of this age. Is it good to celebrate Christmas? I must say that that is the culture of religion. Is it good to celebrate the New Year? I must say that that is the tradition of the world. We are having this conference during the Chinese New Year period, which causes many of you to forsake the tradition of celebrating the New Year. This is actually quite good. Also, what about celebrating birthdays? That is the tide of today’s age. I must ask, when you are there singing the “happy birthday” song, can you say that God and you are singing together? Besides these, there are many other amusements of this age that we need to overcome. Paul said that the Lord gave Himself up for us to deliver us from the present evil age (Gal. 1:4). The age mentioned in Galatians 1:4 refers particularly to the religious world, which is Judaism. He also says, “Do not be fashioned according to this age” (Rom. 12:2). Hence, the God-man life also includes overcoming religion, culture, and the tide and amusements of this age.
Romans 5:17 and 21 say that we who have received the abundance of grace should reign in life through this abundance of grace. In 1938 I stayed in Beijing for two months. One day a sister came to me and said, “Brother Lee, my husband loves to go to watch movies. He often watches them until midnight, and he even wants me to accompany him. What do you say I should do?” I said, “You tell me, what do you do?” She said, “When he comes home and knocks on the door, I do not open the door for him. When he knocks again, I still do not open the door. A long time later, I open the door for him. Once I open the door, I just walk away. I do not pay attention to him.” Then I said, “You are wrong. When he wants to go to watch movies, you should take him there. When you arrive at the entrance, you should say to him, ‘Sorry, you know that because of the Lord I cannot go into the theater. Please excuse me. Peace be with you. I will be waiting for you at home. I will cook you the best refreshments. If you do not come home, I will not go to bed.’ When he comes home, once you hear the sound of his footsteps, do not wait until he knocks; immediately open the door for him and present the refreshments for him to eat.” She went and did as I told her. Eventually, her husband repented and believed in the Lord because of the way she treated him. This sister was reigning as a king in life. When we live the God-man life, we can reign as kings by the reigning life of Christ to conquer all persons, matters, and things that are contrary to God and be the overcomers of the Lord in this age (vv. 17, 21; Rev. 2—3).
Finally, we need to see the third aspect of the Lord’s recovery, that is, the practice of the church. First, the church as the universal Body of Christ is the universal house of God and also the kingdom of God (Eph. 1:23; 1 Tim. 3:15-16; Matt. 16:18-19). These three — the Body of Christ, the house of God, and the kingdom of God — are just one. The Body of Christ is the house of God, and the house of God is the kingdom of God.
The universal Body of Christ is the house of God, that is, the kingdom of God, appearing in various cities as local churches. The Bible shows that one city should have only one church for the sake of keeping the oneness and preventing division (Acts 8:1; 13:1; Rev. 1:4, 11). Deuteronomy 12:5-18 clearly tells us that when the Israelites arrived in the good land, they could not choose a place of worship as they liked. They needed to go to the place where God had placed His name, which was the place where God would build His dwelling place. The Israelites needed to worship God there. In the Old Testament God chose Jerusalem. Hence, although the twelve tribes of Israel were scattered throughout the land of Israel, all their males had to go up to Jerusalem three times a year to worship God there. No one dared to set up another worship center besides Jerusalem. Later, Jeroboam rebelled. He set up Dan in the north and Bethel as worship centers and thus was cursed and punished by God, with the result that all the kings of the kingdom of Israel were rejected by God and excluded from the record of 2 Chronicles.
Today the practice of the church that God desires is the same as this in principle, that is, one city having only one church for the keeping of the oneness. One cannot say that he is not satisfied with the church in a certain locality and then start another meeting on the next street with a few of his more intimate brothers. Because Christianity is not willing to be restricted by one city having only one church, today’s situation has become confused and divided.
The local churches in the various localities are scattered in different places by geography, yet they are not divided by any doctrine or matter (1 Cor. 1:10-13). Some people suggest that the local churches should be autonomous and that the churches should be independent. However, I must say that to be autonomous is the biggest division. The United States of America has only one federal government, one national defense, one diplomacy, one postal service, one monetary system, and one highway system that connects the whole country. If each state issued its own currency, the entire United States would have to issue fifty kinds of notes, and the market would be in turmoil. It is the same regarding the highways. The entire country has only one highway system. If the highways in each state could not be connected, then the transportation in the entire country would be choked. It is because of all these onenesses that the United States of America has become so strong and so great.
Furthermore, some said that although the Bible speaks of the apostles setting up churches and appointing elders, after a church is established and the elders are appointed, the apostles should take their hands off. However, the Bible clearly shows that after Paul established the church in Ephesus, he continued to visit them and wrote letters to that church to care for them. One time he even stayed there for three years, admonishing them night and day, both publicly and in the homes (Acts 20:20, 31). On the way of Paul’s last visit to Jerusalem, he even sent people from Miletus to go tens of miles away to ask the elders of the church in Ephesus to come, and he exhorted them to take heed to all the flock, to shepherd the church of God, which was purchased by God’s own blood. He said this because he knew that after he departed, wolves would come into their midst. Hence, after the apostles established the churches and appointed the elders, the apostles did not leave them and cease caring for them; rather, they continued to care for the churches that they had established.
In the practice of the church, although the unique church of God is expressed as the many local churches throughout the whole globe, the churches are still the unique universal Body of Christ and should not be divided into sects or denominations (1 Cor. 10:16-17).
In the practice of the church, although there are the apostles who establish the churches, and within each church there are elders who manage the church and deacons who serve the church, besides the order of these holy services, there should not be any hierarchy — religious organization or system of rank (9:1-3; 1 Tim. 3:1-13). In the Catholic Church today there is a hierarchy of the pope, the cardinals, the archbishops, the bishops, and the priests. In the Protestant churches there is also the system of rank of the pastors and the common believers. All these should not exist, and these practices are not scriptural.
In the practice of the church, although there are many local churches, they all take God’s eternal economy as their center to bear the unique testimony of Christ. They do not teach any doctrine that is unrelated to God’s economy and has nothing to do with the testimony of Christ. In 1 Timothy 1 Paul wanted Timothy to remain in Ephesus to charge certain ones not to teach things that were different from God’s economy (vv. 3-4). In the practice of the church we should not teach any doctrine that is unrelated to God’s economy and has nothing to do with the testimony of Christ. If we do, this will cause division.
In the local churches there should be righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit as the reality of the kingdom of God (Rom. 14:17). The kingdom of God is the sphere in which God exercises His authority so that He may express His glory for the fulfillment of His purpose. In such a kingdom, what matters is not eating and drinking but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Righteousness denotes that which is right and proper. Those who live in the kingdom of God should be right and proper toward others, toward things, and toward God; with them there should be nothing erroneous, improper, crooked, slanted, or biased. This requires that they be strict in dealing with themselves. Peace is the fruit of righteousness (Heb. 12:11 and footnote, Recovery Version). It characterizes the relationship that those who live in the kingdom of God should have with others and with God. If we are righteous, right, and proper toward others, toward things, and toward God, we will have a peaceful relationship with others and with God. Thus, we will have joy in the Holy Spirit and, in particular, before God. In this way we will be filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit (Acts 13:52) and will live out righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, which are the reality of the kingdom of God. This proves that the normal church life is the kingdom of God on the earth today.
In conclusion, the Lord’s recovery has not only the revelation of God but also the God-man life; and the God-man life requires a proper practice of the church. I cannot say that in the church everyone is a God-man, an overcomer, but I can say that in the church the opportunity for us to be a God-man is greater, and it is easier to be an overcomer. This is because in the Lord’s recovery, every local church is daily nurturing us to be overcomers, to be God-men. I hope that the elders and the co-workers in every locality will create an environment in the church to nurture the saints to be God-men to live an overcoming life.
In the Lord’s recovery there are a few matters that are urgent at the present time to which we should pay special attention. First, every brother and sister needs to ask the Lord for a new revival. Although we have so much vision, we still need to ask the Lord for a new revival. This revival is the God-man life. In every church we all need to live the God-man life. Whether we are at home or in the workplace, we all need to live the God-man life.
Second, we need to produce vital groups and endeavor to gain people to be members of the Body of Christ for the building up of the Body of Christ. Every member should be living, organic, and not in organization, especially not in arrangement. It is through the vital groups that we all can become the living members in the Body of Christ.
Third, every brother and sister in the Lord’s recovery needs to pursue prophesying for the building up of the Body of Christ. We should not make any excuses, saying that we are weak and without strength. Every one of us has the consummated Triune God, who has become the life-giving Spirit, living within us to enable us to pursue prophesying, to speak for the Lord for the building up of the Body of Christ. These are the present urgent needs of the Lord’s recovery. I hope that the Lord will be gracious to us so that we can receive these words and actually practice them in our living and in our church.
