In the last chapter we saw that there is a big eater within us eating the nourishment we receive from the Lord and hindering our growth in life. That big eater is our opinion.
According to church history, the divisions and the confusion among Christians throughout the past nineteen centuries have come mostly from this one source—opinion. Satan, the enemy of God, surely knows how to frustrate God’s intention. God’s intention is not only to save us but also to build us up. Through the years the Lord has opened our eyes, and we all have seen that God’s eternal purpose, God’s ultimate intention, is to get a Body. There is also the need of the building up of all the saved ones. Through the years, however, this has been missed. The purpose of the Lord has been lowered from the building up of the Body just to individual salvation or, at the most, to individual spirituality. Individual salvation or individual spirituality has become the goal of many Christians, but in the Bible God’s standard is not that low. God’s standard is to have a building. Satan knows that nothing hinders, damages, and frustrates this building so seriously as opinion. Opinion may be considered the number one damager and killer of the building up of the Body. This has been fully proved by church history. Even during the time of the Reformation, those servants of God who were the reformers were not one; every reformer held his own opinion. Martin Luther scolded Kaspar Schwenckfeld and even called him the devil. Although Schwenckfeld was not as famous as Luther, he did see something along the line of the Spirit and life.
Do you realize what the denominations are? They are just the issues of different opinions. Every denomination is the expression of certain opinions. It is the same with all the free groups; every free group represents a certain opinion. In fact, nearly every piece of Christian work is an expression of a certain opinion. This is why Christians have been divided and confused through the centuries. All the confusions and divisions have come from this one source—opinion.
We have to admit that even in the Lord’s recovery we are slow in the growth of life, and we are not that prevailing in function. Furthermore, compared to the amount of light and revelation we have received, we are short of the proper building up. Why is this? Apparently, by the Lord’s mercy and under His enlightenment, we do not have much fighting. Actually, something hidden and secret still remains. What is this secret, hidden, and remaining thing? It is our opinion.
You may be a very good brother or a very nice sister, yet you are somewhat individualistic. This means that you are separated from others. And to some extent, at least some among us are isolated. These dear ones love the Lord, and they love the recovery. They know the church, and they would never go away. Yet, they are so isolated. By what?—by opinion.
We need four brothers to explain to us what is the real source, the real origin, of opinion. Even the unbelievers know that to be opinionated is not a positive thing.
I would say that when man was created, he was not created with any opinions, so opinion must have come in with the fall of man, when man took in the tree of knowledge. So I would say that opinions have their source in the tree of knowledge. It seems to me that opinion is just the expression of the self. The fact that we are so opinionated reflects the self.
You may say this, but still this answer does not hit the mark.
Man did partake of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but actually even before he partook of that tree, he had to have an opinion, because he had to make a decision concerning what God had told him about the tree. He had to decide that it was better to listen to another’s word about the tree. So actually it was the mind. A thought was put into the mind. The mind began to consider, and then eventually the mind developed an opinion. We learned in the past that the self is the source of opinion, but the mind is the leading part of the self that directs the operation. So I would consider the opinion has much to do with the mind. For example, the reformers during the time of Luther were divided over many points. All these things had their root in the mind or in the consideration of the mind.
Doctrinally speaking, you may say this is right, but still it is not so practical. I did say in the past that opinions come from self and that the mind is just the expression of the self. But now we need something more practical than this. We Christians understand many things in a shallow way. We take many things for granted. Actually, we should pray much concerning opinion.
I would say that in my experience opinion is just what I feel and how I see things. Opinion is just me.
This answer is not bad, but still you have not touched the crucial source. What is the source of opinion?
Culture.
No, culture is not the source of opinion; culture is the development of opinion. Or you may say that culture is the cultivation of the source of opinion. I would like to define opinion in this way: opinion is simply a person away from God. When a person is without God and away from God, he is the source of opinion. He is even the embodiment of opinion. What was the fall? The fall was a kind of a going away from God. Before the fall, man was with God, and man had God with him. Then the fall came in and took man away from God. From that time, man became a person away from God and without God. Right away this person became the source and embodiment of opinion. By our fallen nature, by our natural being, we are just the embodiment of opinion. Whether you are good or bad, whether your concept is high or low, whether your idea is right or wrong, all these are nothing but opinion. You like this—that is opinion. You like that—that is opinion. You want to be kind—that is opinion. You want to be so strict—that is opinion. All these things are just opinion. A fallen person who is away from God and who is without God is altogether an embodiment of opinion. It is correct to say that at the fall the tree of knowledge got into man and made him the embodiment of opinion. It made him the very source of opinion. Every descendant of the fallen Adam is an embodiment of opinion.
Now you can see why the Lord has been suffering, even among us in His recovery. We have come to the recovery, yet we still are the embodiment of opinion. You love the Lord, and you have seen the church, and you are for His recovery, yet you have not seen that you are the embodiment of opinion. Your natural being is constituted with opinion. Even a little baby has opinion. The little ones always like to express their opinions against yours. When you say sit down, they say no. When you ask them to sing, they say no. When you ask them to be quiet, they want to sing. All this is just opinion. Opinion is just our nature. We are just opinion. We have to realize that this matter of opinion is too hard and too subjective. Sometimes we have condemned our opinion but in a very superficial way. We have never considered that whatever we say is just our opinion.
Now we need to go on to find out how opinion has been developed and is still being developed. Education and culture are the cultivation and development of opinion. It is much easier to preach the gospel to a person with a high-school education than to a graduate from a university. When you are preaching to a graduate from a university, you may have the sensation that it is too late. You should have preached the gospel to him five years ago. It is very difficult to talk to the professors concerning God and Christ. This is true especially with those who teach courses such as philosophy and psychology. After finishing a course in philosophy some saved ones have almost given up the Christian life. The philosophy course deprived them of their faith. This is the cultivation of opinion.
In fact, if you do not know how to use the Bible, even your Bible study may develop your opinion. Actually, the Bible is not at fault, but men have nourished and developed their opinion through misuse of the Bible. They utilized and misused the Bible to develop their opinions. Not only is it difficult to preach the gospel to a philosopher, but it is also difficult to talk to many Christians about anything of the genuine truth. Why? Because their opinion has become developed to such an extent that they could never have any change. So all of us have to humble ourselves, to be poor in spirit and pure in heart. We need to pray, “Lord, have mercy upon me. I do not want to be a person whose opinion cannot be changed. I do not want to reserve or to keep any cultivation of opinion. I do not want to keep any development of opinion.”
It is very apparent that culture and education are used by the enemy to cultivate our opinion. What else cultivates our opinion?
Religion.
We have to rank religion, culture, and education together. They are neighbors in the same gopher hole. They are different in terms, yet in nature they are the same. So, what else cultivates our opinion?
How about the experiences we go through?
Very good! Many things cultivate your opinion. But you have to realize, no doubt, that education, culture, and religion are the giants. But there is also another subtle development—our experience including our practice and our habit. Our experience, our practice, and our habit are small gophers in another hole. These are one group. The more experiences you have, the stronger your opinion will be developed and strengthened. The young people sometimes have a difficult time with the older ones because all the older ones have been fully developed in their opinion by their daily life and their experiences. There is even a difference between young people who are fifteen and those who are eighteen. Three years makes a big difference. Those who are eighteen years of age have developed more in their opinion.
You also must realize that your background, your environment, and your circumstances are also a kind of development of your opinion. If you grow up in Japan, you have the Japanese opinion. If you grow up in France, you have the French opinion. If you grow up in California, you have the Californian opinion. If you grow up in Texas, you have the Texan opinion. Your opinion is developed by your background, environment, and circumstances. What else develops our opinion?
What about our disposition and make-up?
You may consider your disposition and your make-up as developments of your opinion. But actually they are not developments. Your make-up and your disposition are just your opinion. It is easy for you to have a certain kind of opinion because you have that kind of make-up and disposition. In a sense you are the opinion. Whether your opinions are developed or undeveloped, you are just the embodiment of opinion. Even a few years ago when I talked about opinion, I did not have such a thorough light. I learned to know the opinion not by observing others but according to my own experience. I discovered that I am just the embodiment of opinion. When I am off from the Lord, I am nothing but opinion. During the night, when the room has no light, there is nothing but darkness. What is darkness? It is just something away from the light. What is opinion? Opinion is just you and I away from the Lord. When we are off from the Lord, we are nothing but opinion. Although I dare not say that I have learned the lesson thoroughly, the Lord has been teaching me quite much that whenever I realize that I am not with the Lord, right away I should stop. I dare not say anything or do anything. Whatever I say and whatever I do away from the Lord are just opinion. In this Perfecting Training I do not care too much for doctrine. Rather, this is a kind of medical work to diagnose the diseases and sicknesses.
Now we have to find the medicine for this disease. Where is the healing for this disease? Do not think that it is only in a casino that people fight over opinions. Even in a Bible school people have opinions that cause them to fight. What is the proper medicine to heal this sickness?
After considering this matter, I realized that the more we go on in the church life, the more we go through certain experiences, and the more we pick up things, spontaneously there is a danger to become more opinionated. So the most serious problem is with those who have been around the longest period of time. This past Lord’s day, we were on John 11 in our meeting. Of course, that chapter is full of opinions. Everyone had an opinion. When the Lord came into that situation, all they needed to do was drop their opinion and take the Lord. He was there as the resurrection life, but what frustrated them from experiencing Him as the resurrection life were the opinions. Many times it is the same among us. The Lord is among us as the resurrection life, and He wants to be resurrection life to us, but our opinions cause Him to weep. Regardless of how long I have been in the church, I need the grace to drop whatever I have gained, whatever I have gone through, and hold on to the living Christ in a resurrected way.
This is good, but I would say that it is a doctrinal way and still not so practical. I believe we all have seen that our definition of the source of opinion has really hit home. Now let us do the same thing to find out what is the real medicine to heal this big disease. For this you had better not care so much for the doctrine but should consider your experience. According to your experience, what is the way that your opinion is cut off or healed?
Perhaps it is by contacting the Lord with our spirit. Sometimes when my opinion comes up, if I go to the Lord and deal with it in His presence by exercising my spirit, I am relieved of the opinion.
This is very close.
Do we simply need to have so much light as to what the opinions are in a practical way that every time we see an opinion expressed, we take it as an indication that we are away from the Lord and that we need to come back to the spirit? Are all these manifestations used to turn us back to the spirit to contact the Lord?
This is very close, but still this does not hit the mark. Let me say it in this way: We have surely found out where opinion is. Opinion is in the place that the Lord is not. Wherever the Lord is not, there is opinion. Now you have to tell me where the Lord is.
He is in the Word.
In the Word? This is not bad, but it is not so close. Where is the Lord?
He is in our spirit.
Do you really believe that the Lord is in your spirit? For quite a long period of time I have been trying to practice one thing. Nearly every day I pray not once but several times that I would practice the one spirit with the Lord. He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17). Brothers and sisters, you need to pick up this practice—to practice the one spirit with the Lord. Brother Lawrence practiced the presence of God, but we need to practice the one spirit with the Lord. To practice the presence of the Lord is somewhat of the Old Testament. The Old Testament, especially in the Psalms, tells us to seek the face of the Lord or to walk before the Lord. What is this? This is the practice of the presence of the Lord. This kind of word is not repeated in the New Testament. Rather, the New Testament says, “Walk by the Spirit” (Gal. 5:16); it also says, “He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit” (1 Cor. 6:17). Now it is not a matter of the face or the presence of the Lord; now it is a matter that you and the Lord are one spirit. By this you can see that at the time Brother Lawrence lived, three hundred years ago, the light they had received was not so much of the New Testament. They used the Psalms very much, but the up-to-date light that we have received is not concerning the presence or the face of the Lord but the Lord Himself as the Spirit being one with our spirit—even that these two spirits are now one. Now we have to practice to live this one spirit.
If you would bring this matter into your daily practice, you will discover that this is the hardest thing to practice. Out of twenty-four hours, you may sleep eight, leaving sixteen hours in the day. If you could have one and a half hours out of the sixteen hours that you practice strictly the one spirit with the Lord, I believe, you must be very holy and very spiritual. You may study the Bible, but in your studying of the Bible you are still not one spirit with the Lord. You are you, and He is He. To say that we trust in the Lord is still somewhat of the Old Testament. The New Testament is not a matter of trusting but a matter of oneness. If you are one spirit with the Lord, you do not need to trust. When you need to trust, that means you are not one spirit with Him. You are separate from Him; He is He, and you are you. So one needs to trust in the other. But when you and He are one, there is no need of trusting. Have you ever realized that much of your Christian understanding is altogether Old Testament? It is not up to the standard of the New Testament. Today Satan is blinding the Christians with all these Old Testament terms and practices from seeing the New Testament. In the past I have told you to go to the Lord three times a day, and I have pointed out that David said we have to praise the Lord five times a day. But when you come to the New Testament, there is no mention of how many times a day. As long as we use the word times, that is Old Testament. The New Testament way is to pray unceasingly and to always rejoice. It is to pray continually and perseveringly. To count the number of times is Old Testament. Even in the book of Acts, Peter and John were in a transitory period where they had a time of prayer. We must come to the New Testament. The Old Testament is not adequate to heal your opinion; you must be in the New Testament. The New Testament is a matter of being one spirit with the Lord.
According to my own experiences, whenever I was one spirit with the Lord, there was no opinion. Whenever I was not one spirit with the Lord, although I may have been nice and good and even somewhat spiritual, I was still full of opinion. If we are not one spirit with the Lord, we can have nothing within us but opinion. You may even pray yet still not be one spirit with the Lord. Doctrinally it may be difficult for you to understand this word, but by your experiences you can understand. You may pray and yet not be one spirit with the Lord. Surely you are not one spirit with Him when you quarrel, but even when you study the Bible or pray, you still may not be one spirit with the Lord. At the time when you are not one spirit with the Lord, opinion is there. Your opinion may be good, it may be in the heavens, but still it is opinion. Opinion could only be healed by the one spirit with the Lord.
In Philippians 1:27 Paul points out that the Philippians needed not only to be in one spirit and to stand firm but also to strive, to contend, for the gospel with one soul. Then in Philippians 2:2 Paul says that in order to make his joy full they needed to be joined in soul. To be one soul is one thing, to be joined in soul is another. Furthermore, in Philippians 2:20 Paul says that he had no one like-souled who would genuinely care for what concerned the Philippians. Like-souled means to have the same soul. How could we be joined in soul and be like-souled? In Philippians 2 and 4 Paul even says that we need to think the same thing and that we need to think the one thing, that is, Christ. According to these verses, to be with one soul, to be joined in soul, and to be like-souled, we need to have one goal or one object, that is, Christ. To have other goals means to have opinion. To have other objects than this means to have opinion. Today in the Lord’s recovery we need to see two things: first, we should have only one object, one goal; second, we need to practice the one spirit all the time. To have only one goal, one object, and to practice the one spirit is the practical way to kill our opinions, to heal this disease. When you are not one, you are not in the spirit; you are in your soul, in your opinion. In your soul you are not one.
In the past, when we realized that there was a problem of oneness between two brothers, we did our best to help them sympathize with one another. We tried to help one see the other’s situation. Actually, this did not work so well. But today, because of my experiences, I would not waste my time in that way. Rather, I would simply fellowship with the brothers, telling them that they have to practice the one spirit. They have to take Christ as the only object and the unique goal and practice the one spirit with the Lord. If the two brothers would simply practice the one spirit with the Lord for a few minutes, they would be one. They do not need to overcome anything. They do not even need to overcome their opinion.
To practice the one spirit with the Lord is the medicine to heal the disease of opinion.
I have tried different ways. I have tried taking the cross, bearing the cross, and living a crucified life. I tried these things, but not one thing is so effective as practicing the one spirit with the Lord. Whether you consider yourself to be opinionated or you consider others to be opinionated, you can never stay away from opinions. We ourselves are just the embodiment of opinion. When we are off from the Lord and when we are away from the Lord, we are nothing but opinion. How can we heal this disease? It is only by practicing the one spirit with the Lord. If you practice, you will discover that out of the sixteen hours, most of the hours you do not practice the one spirit with the Lord. You simply live by yourself. You may not do bad things; you may be doing good things, but by yourself. You pray by yourself; you study the Bible by yourself; you fellowship with others by yourself; you do many things by yourself. You do not practice the one spirit with the Lord, so whatever you say and whatever you do is altogether opinion.
When you are separate from the Lord, right away you are just opinion. I would ask you to go back and practice the one spirit with the Lord. Tell the Lord, “Lord, I just want to live the one spirit with You. I would like to practice the one spirit with You. I do not care whether I am praying or I am not praying. I only care for the practice of the one spirit with You. I do not care whether I am talkative or I am not talkative; I only care to practice the one spirit with You.” If you will do this, you will be one spirit with the Lord, and your opinion will be over.
