OUTLINE NINE

PROPHESYING IN THE CHURCH MEETINGS FOR THE ORGANIC BUILDING UP OF THE CHURCH AS THE BODY OF CHRIST

  Scripture Reading: 1 Cor. 14:23a, 26, 31-32

24. The practice of prophesying:
    1. Preparation for our speaking in the church meetings is needed to prophesy properly and adequately:
       1. From our revelation gained from the Word of God and our experience of the Triune God during the week, compose a prophecy of no more than three minutes to speak when the church comes together:
          1. By enjoying the Lord through contacting Him in a portion of the Word every morning:
             1. 1) Choose a portion of the Word consisting of ten or fewer verses, covering one chapter of a book a week.
             2. 2) Among these few verses there may be two or three verses which we especially enjoy, and we can concentrate on these.
          2. By writing down a short note of our spiritual inspiration, enlightenment, and enjoyment of the Lord each morning as a reminder of what we received from the Lord:
             1. 1) These do not need to be long notes.
             2. 2) Short notes with certain points as reminders are adequate.
          3. By putting all the notes, the “harvest” of our inspirations of the past six mornings, together for a total inspiration on the last day of the week and composing a prophecy of no more than three minutes to speak in the church meetings on the Lord’s Day:
             1. 1) Our speaking should not be too long or too short.
             2. 2) If our speaking is too short our prophecy will not be so rich in content.
             3. 3) Limiting our speaking to three minutes will help everyone to preserve the time for many saints to speak in the meeting.
          4. By having some “tutors” as coaches or instructors, tutoring us on how to compose a prophecy concerning its length, form, and content:
             1. 1) Those who know how to do this adequately can go out to visit the saints, the new ones and those willing and ready to be perfected in their prophesying, to look at their composition.
             2. 2) Those tutoring the saints can improve the composition and adjust it to help them learn more.
       2. Practice speaking the prophecy we have prepared in our home:
          1. Checking to see whether it is three minutes or more.
          2. If it is too long, we can shorten it.
          3. If it is too short, we may feel to lengthen it.
          4. In this way we will have a proper prophecy prepared in writing.
       3. On the next day, the Lord’s Day, we will go to the church meeting having something:
          1. This will fulfill 1 Corinthians 14:26, which says that when we come together, “each one has.”
          2. “Each one has” does not mean that each one functions in the meeting:
             1. 1) Even if we may not have time to function in the meeting, we will still be exercised and prepared to function.
             2. 2) Whether we function in the meeting or not, we still have something.
          3. Before coming to the meeting we should prepare ourselves for the meeting with things like these [in 1 Cor. 14:26] from the Lord and of the Lord, either through our experience of Him or through our enjoyment of His Word and fellowship with Him in prayer.
          4. Everyone has something to speak in the meeting, and when we come together in the meeting we also should come with a living and ready spirit.
       4. After coming into the meeting we need not wait, and should not wait, for inspiration; we should exercise our spirit and use our trained mind to function in presenting what we have been prepared with to the Lord for His glory and satisfaction and to the attendants for their benefit—enlightening, nourishing, and building up:
          1. This is just like the feast of tabernacles in ancient times: the children of Israel brought the produce of the good land, which they reaped from their labor on the land, to the feast and offered it to the Lord for His enjoyment and for mutual participation in fellowship with the Lord and with one another.
          2. We must labor on Christ, our good land, that we may reap some produce of His riches to bring to the church meeting to offer.
       5. Thus, the church meeting will be an exhibition of Christ in His riches and a mutual enjoyment of Christ shared by all the attendants with one another before God and with God for the building up of the saints and the church.
       6. When functioning in the meeting, we should care for the sequence of our speaking:
          1. Those who realize they should not speak first will wait for the appropriate time to speak their prepared prophecy.
          2. When twenty saints speak in this way, it is like one person speaking a composed message; the contents are rich and they are arranged in a very good sequence.
       7. In the meeting, when the opportune time comes, we will speak, not read, our prophecy, and when we prophesy, we may add something to make our prophecy richer and more living:
          1. We should always be ready in our spirit as we speak to receive the instant inspiration of the Spirit; if we are living a revived and overcoming life and are one with the Lord, we will always be ready to receive instant inspiration.
          2. We also need to have the spiritual insight into all matters through the enlightening of the divine light.
       8. According to our experience, it is better to have about fifty, or at the most seventy in the meeting when the whole church comes together or in a district meeting of the church:
          1. When the church meeting reaches eighty, we should divide into two meetings.
          2. If there are fifty, about one-third of the attendants can speak in one hour.
          3. Twenty speakers can occupy three minutes each, speaking for exactly one hour.
    2. Preparation of our whole being is also needed for each church meeting in order to meet according to the standard of the New Testament:
       1. We must be revived every morning.
       2. We must live an overcoming life every day.
       3. (If we have all the light, all the revelation and all the truth, without revival and an overcoming living, everything is vain talk).
       4. We must abide in fellowship with the Lord daily.
       5. We must be a praying person, having a praying spirit and filled with a desire and an aspiration to pray.
       6. We must deal with our sins continually.
       7. We must be constantly filled with the Spirit.
       8. We must spend some time to pray for at least five to ten minutes immediately before attending the meeting to get our spirit prepared:
          1. If we have time we can pray for fifteen or twenty minutes, but we should not pray too long.
          2. A longer prayer can exhaust our spirit for the meeting.
          3. Confess your sins and enjoy the filling of the Spirit.
          4. After praying and before going to the meeting, we should exercise to avoid any discord with another person, and we should do our best not to receive phone calls or open any mail; many times these things are used by the enemy to deaden our spirit and distract us just before the meeting.
       9. Start the meeting from your home, not when you come together with the saints:
          1. Calling on the Lord’s name.
          2. Praying.
          3. Singing.
          4. Praising.
          5. Speaking.
       10. Do not come to the meetings in a loose way:
           1. Come to “play in the game.”
           2. To come in a loose way will deaden the meeting.
           3. Come to the front as fighting soldiers to conquer the enemy and as a prepared athlete to win the game.
       11. Come to the meeting with the decision and anticipation that you will speak:
           1. At a feast the main thing is to eat.
           2. In a meeting the main thing is to speak.
           3. Go to the meeting to speak!
    3. The subject, goal, and purpose of the church meetings:
       1. We do not need to have a definite subject in our meeting—1 Cor. 14:26:
          1. Our church meetings should be a feast of the riches of Christ.
          2. A feast is full of many different kinds of food.
       2. The goal of our meeting is to exhibit Christ.
       3. The purpose of our meeting is to build up the saints for the building up of the Body of Christ.
    4. Further principles for prophesying in the church meetings (see XV):
       1. By taking Christ as the center and element of our speaking.
       2. By endeavoring to speak everything with a verse or portion of the Scripture as its base.
       3. By looking to the Lord for instant and fresh enlightenment, vision, and utterance.
       4. By trusting in the Lord’s speaking within our speaking.
       5. By following the anointing of the Lord.
       6. By being empowered by the Spirit.
       7. By being ready to prophesy at the appropriate time.
       8. By waiting on others to finish their speaking.
       9. By endeavoring to take care of the flow and atmosphere of the meeting.
       10. By having a good continuation and a proper order.
       11. By exercising our spirit all the time we are speaking.
       12. By speaking neither too low or too loud.
       13. By speaking neither too slow or too fast.
       14. By avoiding lengthy speaking—we speak but we also leave time for others to speak:
           1. By not speaking a number of unrelated points without a substantial emphasis.
           2. By not telling long stories.
           3. By not using lengthy illustrations.
       15. By speaking every word accurately and precisely.
       16. By avoiding referring to secular stories, illustrations, and parables.
       17. By avoiding speaking merely doctrines, though scriptural.
       18. By avoiding liberal and wrong interpretation of the holy Word.
       19. By avoiding quotations from books without spiritual weight.
       20. By avoiding speaking anything natural.
       21. By avoiding striving and competing with others.
       22. By avoiding exposing others.
       23. By avoiding anger in speaking.
       24. By avoiding any kind of debate, argument, or depreciation of others’ speaking.
       25. By avoiding mentioning people’s names as much as possible.
    5. Certain ones acting as “tutors” can spend time with a number of saints after they have spoken a prophecy in the meeting to render more help, adjustment, and perfection to them.