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Prayer: Lord, we thank You for gathering us together into Your name once more. How we treasure this gathering together. May You be with every one of us here. We long after Your word. May You in Your word dispense Yourself into us once more. Every one of us here needs You. Grant every one of us grace that we may receive Your word and may enjoy the riches hidden in Your word. Lord, remove the hindrances, the veils, and the shadows between You and us. Open up to us Your heart’s desire, and show us Your way that we may see what You are after today. Lord, we hate the evil one; we hate the enemy. While we are fighting the battle for You here, do fight for us. You are the Captain who leads us on. Dispel all the power of darkness, and shame Your enemy. May You gain the glory among us. We stand on Your victory and declare Your victory, and we bind the evil one, Satan, by Your victorious name. Lord, deal with Your enemy, release those who love You, and release Your riches. Amen.
After four years of studying and experimenting and through a lot of work and at a great price, we have come to a fairly clear and definite conclusion today. The conclusion is very simple. It entails the life and service of the new way. We are going to cover this matter in this message.
The life in the new way is the normal Christian life, which is a life of being revived every morning and overcoming every day. Proverbs 4:18 says, “The path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, / Which shines brighter and brighter until the full day.” Dawn is the time when the daylight just begins to break and before the sun actually rises from the east. The Christian pathway is not one of sunset but one like the dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until the full day. From morning until noon is an upward path. As Christians, we only have mornings; we do not have afternoons.
God’s law in nature is that with every twenty-four hours there is a dawning. The dawn brings a new beginning and a new sunrise to every creature. This is the same with the spiritual life of a Christian. Every morning there should be a rising up and a dawning. In 1960 I gave a message on the law of revival. At that time I did not apply the light of the dawn to the subject. Today we see that the Christian life should have a dawn and a new beginning every twenty-four hours. Perhaps you fail miserably today. Nevertheless, you can confess your sins to the Lord and can ask for the cleansing of the blood. Tomorrow you can have a new beginning before the Lord. For this reason a Christian should go to bed early and get up early. When the sun rises in the morning, we should rise up together with it. We should not wait until eight o’clock before we rise. We should rise before six o’clock, preferably around five o’clock. Even the Chinese sages of old exhort people to rise immediately at daybreak. They also say that the plan of the day begins in the morning. This is very reasonable. We Christians are the most proper people on earth. We should live the most proper kind of life. The most proper life is one that follows the sun. When the day breaks, we rise. The first thing we do when we rise is not to be busy with so many things but to contact the Lord and pray-read two or three verses of the Bible and digest them into us.
Lamentations 3:22-24 says, “It is Jehovah’s lovingkindness... / His compassions... / They are new every morning... / Jehovah is my portion... / Therefore I hope in Him.” Jeremiah was a weeping prophet. There was nothing in his circumstances that could make him happy. At that time the Israelites had backslidden and become desolate. Their nation had fallen, and they themselves were taken into captivity. He was even among the ones taken into captivity. He wrote these five chapters of lamentations purposely for this. But in his lamentations there is such a portion, whose content is not a lamentation but a song of joy. It is a song of joy in the midst of songs of sorrow. He experienced the whole Jehovah God as his portion. This passage clearly tells us that Jehovah God is our portion. He has become our enjoyment in His lovingkindness and compassions. He is full of love. And when our situation is too poor for His love, there are His compassions, His mercies. These are new every morning. For this reason we must lay hold of every morning to rise to receive His new compassions, His new mercies.
I have been a Christian for many years. More and more I have come to realize that I need God’s mercies. Many times we become old and backslidden and are not worthy to enjoy God’s love. At these times we still have God’s mercies. When you were just saved, you felt good and excited; but after two months perhaps you started feeling old. It was not the dawn anymore; instead, you were at your sunset. In these times you should know that there is still a dawn waiting for you. In this dawn there are God’s mercies. The mercies of God are new every morning. This newness indicates that we who love God and seek after Him should have a new beginning every morning to enjoy the Lord as our rich breakfast.
All the physical things in nature have their spiritual significance. For the health of our bodies, we need to eat a good breakfast. In the same way, for our spirit we need to have the best spiritual breakfast. When we wake up in the morning, we should call on the Lord. The first thing we should think about is the Lord. After that we should enjoy some of the Lord’s words. The writer of Psalm 119 says, “I anticipated the dawn and cried out; / I hoped in Your words. / My eyes anticipated the night watches, / That I might muse upon Your word” (vv. 147-148). One usually muses and thinks with his eyes closed. Why then does it say here that the eyes anticipate the night watches, that is, that they are awake? We can understand this from our experience. If we want to muse, or meditate, on the Lord’s word, we must open our eyes; otherwise, it is easy for us to fall asleep. This shows us that we have to struggle to rise early. It is not an easy thing to get up early. The bed is most lovable at five or six o’clock in the morning. It has a strong adhesive power to keep us there. On the other hand, after ten o’clock at night the bed seems the most hateful; no one wants to go to bed early. But anyone who goes to bed late and gets up late is not healthy and will not be strong spiritually. Today if we want to live in the new way, we must rise at the dawn of the day, and we should wake up before the night watches to do nothing else but call on the Lord and hope and muse on the Lord’s words. Hence, to practice the new way, we must be ones who rise early. It is not that easy for a person who does not have morning watch to take the new way.
In 2 Corinthians 4:16 Paul says that “our inner man is being renewed day by day.” The reviving is in the morning, and the overcoming is during the day. We are revived in the morning, but we do not stop there. We have to carry on its effect, which is to be renewed. We should be renewed the whole day. Such renewing is the overcoming. The first thing for a Christian to overcome is his temper. Everyone has a peculiar temperament. It is difficult for two peculiar persons to be put together. If you can overcome your temper for three days, not in the way of swallowing down your grudge and not just in an outward way but in an inward way, you are an overcomer. Even a church as good as Philippi needed Paul’s exhortation for them not to reason or murmur. These are our common problems. Hence, the ultimate definition of overcoming is to overcome our natural person and our self. Man’s temper lies in his natural person. If you are a natural person, living in the old creation, being full of self, and considering the self the first and foremost thing in you, you will surely be one who is full of murmurings and reasonings in the church life. This is why the Bible says that they who are of Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and its lusts (Gal. 5:24).
Every morning we need a revival and a new beginning. This new beginning includes the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus. When we contact Him, there is the element of death in the life-giving Spirit. When He enters into us, He operates within us to perform the killing and the sterilizing function. This is like taking in antibiotics. The antibiotics kill the germs within us. The element of the Lord’s death kills the temper within us, terminating our old creation and enabling us to overcome.
In Romans 7 Paul speaks of the experience of the struggle between the law of sin in the flesh and the law of good in man. This is similar to the struggle between reason and lust as promulgated by Chinese Confucianism. Both show us that only the strong willed and clear minded person can overcome and control himself. For most people it is the lust that wins and the reason that fails. This is why Paul said that he was hopeless, that the good that he willed he did not do, but the evil that he did not will he practiced. He was a wretched man, one who was enslaved to sin (vv. 24-25). But in Romans 8 he overcame. He overcame in the law of the Spirit of life (v. 2). There is a law of the Spirit of life, which is a spontaneous power. In this law he overcame the law of sin and of death.
For this reason every morning we need a revival, and every morning we need to contact the Lord. This contact has a result, which is to renew us within during the whole day. This renewing is a continuation of the morning revival, allowing the revival to develop its killing effect in us during the whole day. In this way we will live an overcoming life.
The Lord promised in Matthew 28:20, “I am with you all the days.” Since the Lord is with us every day, He lives with us moment by moment. For Him to be with us is for Him to live with us. When we are renewed every day and have the Lord’s presence and His living with us every day to be the source of our supply, we will spontaneously live an overcoming life. He not only died for us on the cross but is living for us within. Today we have such a Lord who lives with us. We can live an overcoming life daily. This is the life that a Christian should live in the new way. Without this kind of living, we are not qualified to talk about the new way, and there is no way for us to have the service in the new way.
The first item of service in the new way is to contact people, that is, to pay the price to contact people for the Lord. First, we must shepherd and feed the Lord’s sheep. The Lord asked Peter three times in John 21:15-17, “Do you love Me?” When Peter answered, “Yes, Lord, You know that I love You,” the Lord replied the first time with, “Feed My lambs.” Then the second time He replied, “Shepherd My sheep,” and the third time He replied, “Feed My sheep.” To shepherd is to care for in a general way, like the shepherd caring for the flock. To feed is special; it is like the mother taking care of her child. Perhaps there is a person who is very young or is involved in difficulties. There is the need to take care of him in a special way. When we preach the gospel by visiting people and bring people to salvation, they become the Lord’s lambs, and there is the need for feeding. For those saints who have been around longer, who are more mature, there is the need of shepherding. Then there are those who are involved in special difficulties; they need the special feeding.
In the church there is a great need for people to rise up to do the work of shepherding and feeding. This does not mean that we have to find some clergy-like pastors or preachers to do the job while all the other saints remain in their own jobs, raise their families, come for worship on Sunday, and contribute a little money. If that is the case, what is recorded in Ephesians 4 where all the saints participate in the work of the ministry unto the building up of the Body of Christ will never be realized. To build up the Body of Christ, all the members have to exercise their functions. This is the new way that we are taking. I hope that, as the Bible shows, every brother and sister would bear some responsibility. At present there are over six thousand people meeting in the district meetings in Taipei. But there are over twenty thousand who need to be cared for. If everyone would care for one person per week, every week we could care for six thousand people. In a month with four weeks, we could care for all twenty thousand people. This is very effective. We would like to present this burden before all of you. Let us take up this burden before the Lord together.
When you go to shepherd and to visit others, there are proper ways to do it. You should not go just to socialize. For this reason you yourselves must first be experienced in life. Second, you must study the truth well. This is not too difficult among us. Every week we are handling the truth. As long as we would learn, we can all pick up something. With the experience in life and the expression in truth, you are well equipped to visit people. When you go to visit people, you will know where they are immediately after talking to them. Perhaps a certain one has believed in the Lord only in an outward way; within he has not touched the Lord and has no experience of salvation. He is like the electric light bulb that is installed but not connected; there is still no electricity. You have to be like an electrician, helping him to connect the electricity. You must help him to touch the Lord within and to have the experience of salvation. Then you have to help him to know how to call on the Lord, how to pray-read the Lord’s Word, how to have fellowship with the Lord, how to love the Lord, how to remember the Lord by breaking bread, how to consecrate himself, etc. You must help him item by item. All these require that you have the experience and the truth.
Paul said in Acts 20, “How I did not withhold any of those things that are profitable by not declaring them to you and by not teaching you publicly and from house to house...For I did not shrink from declaring to you all the counsel of God...Therefore watch, remembering that for three years, night and day, I did not cease admonishing each one with tears” (vv. 20, 27, 31). Here Paul set up a good example for us. I hope that we all would receive the burden to visit people from house to house, supplying people, on the one hand, to help them to grow in life, and teaching people the truth, on the other hand, to show them according to the Bible what kind of life God wants us to live. Although a person who is a Gentile may repent, believe, be baptized, and be saved, yet he still knows nothing concerning the spiritual things. There is the need for some to teach him. It is not enough for him to come only on Sunday to listen to a message. This is not to mention the fact that sometimes he does not even come at all. This is why we need to care for and to teach people so that they can be brought on step by step.
Paul mentions in Ephesians 4:12 “the perfecting of the saints.” This is the most important yet most difficult thing to do during our contacting others. The word perfecting in Greek carries the meaning of “equipping.” This is like a man joining the army. He needs to be perfected by instructions, drills, equippings, as well as supplies. Now there are over twenty thousand saints. To visit them is not the end. You should hope that one day they can do the work that you are doing today. If the six thousand go out to visit the twenty thousand, and in half a year among those twenty thousand there are three to five thousand raised up who can do the same thing that the others are doing, then they are being perfected. In this way you can go out to preach the gospel again to gain more new ones, and the cycle can repeat itself over and over. Today we have six thousand. Perhaps by next year we will have ten thousand who can go out to care for and to feed others. This can never be accomplished by a few preachers or pastors. For this we need all the brothers and sisters to rise up and to strive together in one accord, to grow in life, and to be taught in the truth. In addition, there is the need to labor and to pay the price. If everyone would do this, we will surely have good results.
The second item of service in the new way is also a very difficult thing. It is to prepare to prophesy. In the church meeting the most precious thing is the prophesying. This matter appeared briefly like the blossoming of an overnight flower in the history of the church. During the apostles’ time, prophesying appeared for a short while. But after the apostles passed away, the clergy system was brought in. After that, only a few were able to preach. The saints’ opportunity to prophesy was replaced, and the one-man-speaking meeting came in to take its place. At the same time the clergy system produced the religious organization and destroyed the body nature of the church, killing the organic function of the Body, degrading it instead into an organization and causing the church to deviate and to be distorted. For this reason we left Christianity and came into the Lord’s recovery. We do not want an organization; what we want is the organism. We do not want to have one speaking and all listening. Rather we want to have all speaking and all listening. Our emphasis is not the preaching but the prophesying.
To prophesy is to speak for the Lord and to speak forth the Lord, which is to supply Christ to others. First Corinthians 14:1 says, “Pursue love, and desire earnestly spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.” This is because prophesying is the highest spiritual gift. This matter is not something that only a few can do. Rather all can do it one by one. Verse 31 says, “You can all prophesy one by one that all may learn and all may be encouraged.” Moreover prophesying builds up the church. Verses 4 and 5 say, “He who prophesies builds up the church. I desire...especially that you would prophesy...that the church may receive building up.” The conclusion from these few verses is that everyone who is saved is expected to desire speaking for God that the church may be built up.
In verse 26 Paul continues by saying, “Whenever you come together, each one has a psalm, has a teaching, has a revelation, has a tongue, has an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up.” Here this verse mentions mainly three things: psalms, teachings, and revelations. The psalms are for praising God, the teachings are for teaching men, and the revelations are for revealing and releasing the light of God. All these are prophesying. They should not be done by one man only. All the brothers and sisters should do this. For this reason you need the exercise. Since all of us love the Lord, love the church, and are willing to help others, we should first go to contact people. Second, we should prophesy for the Lord. Prophesying must be based upon your own experience and your knowledge of the Bible. The Bible is the expression for our spiritual experience. In the daily life you should grow in life and should labor in God’s Word. When you go out to visit others, all this will become your capital with which to serve others. When you go to the small group meeting or the district meeting on the Lord’s Day, you will be able to practice prophesying for three to five minutes. This requires that all of us be prepared for the prophesying. You should have the few verses that you pray-read every day digested in you. The little you have every day will eventually become a lot. In a week you will have over ten verses. When we all come together on the Lord’s Day, we all pray-read these verses and share and prophesy according to them. As long as we all labor to learn and to exercise, it will not be too difficult a thing to do. Surely we will succeed.
Today in the Lord’s recovery we must make everyone seek after prophesying. Although this is not an easy thing to do, we will succeed if we have a heart for the Lord and if we desire to advance. I hope that we would take up these two burdens—to visit others in our daily life and to prophesy in the meetings. Visitation will bring people to the meetings, and prophesying will keep people in the church life. If all the visited ones prophesy in the meetings, the increase and spread of the church, the growth of the church, and the perfecting of the saints will no longer be a problem.
This is why the new way is not a difficult way; it is just a laboring way. You must labor. You cannot be a pew member like those in the denominations, nor can you be in our former condition, participating only in miscellaneous affairs such as cleaning and ushering. When the church was going to preach the gospel, you would only invite a few to come to listen to the messages. At that time the brothers and sisters among us could still be somewhat relaxed. But today we cannot do that anymore. You must be revived every morning, and you must be overcoming every day. In addition, you have to learn the truth, experience life, pick up the burden, and pay the price to care for people. Only then will the new way be successful.
Forgive me for saying an honest word. All those who say that the new way is wrong are speaking nonsense. Only the lazy ones would say that the new way does not work. I hope that all those who have not seen the new way would not criticize or oppose. Neither should those who have seen it condemn others. Whoever can practice it should just go ahead and practice it. Whoever cannot practice it should just leave it alone. But you have to see that this is an age of advance; everything is advancing. We should not be left behind any longer. We cannot change the truth, but we should always improve on the method. According to the truth in the Bible, this new way is the most scriptural way and the most effective way. May the Lord be merciful to us. I hope that we would all receive at least some amount of this word so that the Lord would have a way among us.
