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Once a person is saved and becomes a Christian, he should know what steps he needs to take to progress in the Christian life. The Bible tells us that after a Christian is saved, he has Christ’s life in him. Receiving the Lord’s life, however, is only the beginning, not the end. To be saved and baptized and to possess Christ’s life is the first step of salvation. Although a newly saved believer has the Lord’s life in him, this life in him is very shallow; he does not yet have much progress in the Lord’s life. Many people have been saved for years. After so much time they should have deep and far-reaching progress in their Christian life, yet because they have not received the adequate leading and have not had the proper pursuit, they do not have much growth in life. They are continually treading over the same ground and walking in circles. This can be likened to someone who walks in the city of Taipei from morning to evening every day for five years but never leaves the city limits, because the whole time he just walks in circles. He walks much, but he never advances; he spends much energy, but he never makes any progress. Why is this? It is because he does not take a straight path but walks in circles the whole time. In contrast to this, it takes only a few hours to travel by train from Taipei to Kaohsiung because the way goes straight and forward the whole time.
Many Christians, however, are not like this. Although they listen to messages, read the Bible, and attend meetings all the time, they still have not made any progress. They were like this five years ago, and today they are still the same. They seem to have a little understanding of doctrine, but concerning the Lord’s life, they are still ignorant. Even though they may understand Genesis 1, Matthew 1, and many teachings in the Bible, they do not understand the way of the Lord. Although they study the Bible and have a share in Christ, they are strangers to the Lord’s way. They are totally ignorant of what it means to follow the Lord and take His way.
Progressing in the Christian life is similar to taking a train from Taipei down to Kaohsiung in the south. After the first station—Panchiao, and the second station—Taoyuan, we eventually will arrive in Kaohsiung. All those who are advanced in the Lord’s way know that the Lord’s way is just like this. The way of the Lord is “station by station,” with different levels and different steps.
The first thing a saved one who wants to take the Lord’s way must pay attention to is keeping himself absolutely clean and free from all defilement. We may use an illustration. When a cup is dropped into a trash can, after it is picked out, can we use it right away? Of course, we cannot. If we want to use it, we first have to wash and sanitize it thoroughly, and then we can use it. Before we have washed it thoroughly, we certainly cannot use it. If the cup is not washed, then it has no function and cannot be used for anything. In the same way, we are like the cup; if we are not willing to allow the Lord to cleanse us, the Lord cannot do anything with us. If we want the Lord to work in us, we first need to be cleansed by Him thoroughly.
We thank the Lord for saving so many of us. Before we were saved, we all had fallen into the trash can of the world. Actually, to compare the world to a trash can is to overestimate its worth. We should say that the world is like a manure pit. In fact, it is even smellier than a manure pit. Hence, before we were saved, our entire being was defiled and full of “germs.” None of us was clean in our thoughts or emotions; we were altogether filthy and evil within and without. However, one day the Lord came; His gospel reached us, His voice entered into our heart, His Spirit sympathized with us, and we were saved. The Lord rescued us and separated us from sin and evil. Although we have been saved, all our defilement and “germs” have not been totally removed. They still are present in our flesh and conduct. Therefore, the first step that we must take after being saved is to allow God to cleanse us. If we do not allow God to cleanse us, we will have no way to start walking on the way of the Lord. Moreover, if we do not allow the Lord to wash us, the Lord will have no way to work in us.
Whether we are newly saved or we have been saved for years, we have to take such a word. Although many of us were “picked out of the trash” by the Lord many years ago, until this day we have not allowed the Lord to do a cleansing work on all the “germs” and defilement within us. Although we may understand more doctrines, be familiar with more Christian regulations, and know more Christians than we did in the past, we have not walked a step further. The problem is here: Although we allowed the Lord to “pick us out of the trash,” we have never allowed Him to make us clean and fresh. All the defilement and “germs” are still within us. So in order for the Lord to work in us, He has to wait for our consent. When we give the Lord our consent, He will do the cleansing work in us. If we are unwilling or reluctant, then the Lord will have no way to lead us or do the cleansing work in us.
The children of Israel in the Old Testament typify us, who are saved by grace. Their keeping of the Feast of the Passover typifies our being saved by grace. They were saved by killing a lamb and putting the blood on the lintel and the doorposts. Today when we receive the Lord and “put His blood on us,” the judgment of God and the wrath of God pass over us, and we are saved. Immediately following the Feast of the Passover, the children of Israel kept another feast, which is called the Feast of Unleavened Bread. There was no gap in time between these two feasts. The Feast of Unleavened Bread was right after the Feast of the Passover. The children of Israel kept the Feast of the Passover in the evening on the fourteenth day of the first month of the year. On this night they started to keep the Feast of the Passover, and on the very next night they immediately began to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. The beginning of the Feast of the Passover could also be said to be the beginning of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Hence, once we are saved and we keep the Feast of the Passover, we also should keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread immediately. First Corinthians 5 says, “Purge out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened” (v. 7a). This means that once we are saved, we should purge out the old leaven. What is it to purge out the leaven? In the Bible leaven refers to corruption. The reason meal rises is because of the leaven within it. There is an element of corruption in leaven, which enables it to leaven the whole meal in several hours. So the leaven in the meal refers to corruption.
All fallen human beings live a corrupted life. Some people may ask, What do you mean by a corrupted life? What is the leaven in our living? We may use a young person as an illustration. We all know the situation of the young people. A teenager’s mind may be very clean and pure, but once he goes to high school, he may begin to read romance novels. Then these romance novels begin to enter into him as leaven, until one day this leaven in him becomes sour and smelly, causing this person, who was originally so pure, to be gradually corrupted within.
Some people say that movies are good and that they can be very helpful if they are used for educational purposes. It is true that in some aspects movies may be quite useful, but unfortunately, in these days people misuse movies. All parents know that today the market is filled with movies that do not enlighten the minds of the young people; rather, they stimulate the evil in them. Many times although the movie itself is good, due to the improper environment in which it is viewed, many problems arise. We have to know that theaters are dirtier than pigsties. Some young people have asked me indignantly, “Is it also wrong to watch films about science or history?” There is nothing wrong with watching films about science or history if they are shown at school, but we should not go to theaters, because that kind of place is too dirty.
We may also illustrate this point using a calendar. A calendar is something good and indispensable, but some people like to print improper pictures on calendars. What is this? This is leaven, which is subtly imparted into man, and which causes many young people to turn sour and smelly. Doctors and biologists both tell us that the whole world is full of germs, that is, full of leaven. This is a world of corruption. The thoughts and deeds of so many people have a corrupting influence. Just by existing in this corrupted world, regardless of whether we are conscious of it or not, we are continually being contaminated by defiling things and germs. When we were saved, the wrath of God passed over us. Nevertheless, we are still full of germs and corruption. How can the Lord work in people like us? He cannot. If we want the Lord to work in us, first we must allow the Lord to cleanse us.
After the children of Israel kept the Feast of the Passover, they kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread right away. Today many Christians keep the Feast of the Passover, but there are very few who also keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. One time I was invited to a love feast. As I entered into the house, I saw something there that made me very uncomfortable. If you always live in an environment of fresh air, once you enter into a house that has a scarcity of fresh air, you will immediately feel very uncomfortable. Your feeling will be very sensitive. However, for those who are used to living in that kind of environment, not only will they be unaware of the lack of fresh air, but they will even say that you are strange. I was a guest that day, so I did not feel that it was appropriate to say anything. We all sat there singing and praising God, but there was a calendar with an improper picture on it hanging on the wall. This was like eating a great meal beside a dunghill; the taste was disgusting.
Today many people are truly saved, but they have not purged out the leaven within them. If a small and lowly slave of God like me felt uncomfortable when I entered into that house, how could God Himself be comfortable there? A number of other Christians were also there, yet none of them had any feeling. While the people in this house read the Bible, there was something unclean hanging on their wall. This shows that this family has never purged out the leaven or seriously walked the Lord’s way. God has no way to do a deeper work in this kind of people.
We who are saved should all be serious about taking this way. Before the young people are saved, they love to read romance novels, but after they are saved, all these things should either be thrown away or burned. They should never give these books to their classmates. If they give them to their classmates, they are not doing their classmates a favor; rather, they are doing them harm. In 1944 I went to Weihaiwei to preach the gospel. The majority of the congregation there worked as customs officials. Nearly all of their wives were saved, yet their houses were filled with either mah-jongg games or Chinese dominoes. After they were saved, they did not have any peace within, so they came and asked me, “We have mah-jongg tiles of very good quality, and they all cost a lot of money. What should we do with them?” I asked in return, “Why do you come to ask me?” They replied, “It is because we do not feel peaceful.” Then I told them, “If you have no peace, then why do you still need to ask me? If you have already smelled something stinking, do you still ask people whether or not you should eat it? If you have already smelled the stinking odor of mah-jongg, you do not need to ask people whether or not you should play it.” They answered, “Then we had better give them to other people.” To give your mah-jongg tiles away is even worse than being a bandit. A bandit who robs people’s money only does harm to them for a short while, but to give your mah-jongg tiles away may ruin someone’s life and harm people for two or three generations. So finally, they went back, spread this word amongst one another, and gathered together all their mah-jongg games. Then I said, “You all should burn your mah-jongg tiles as a testimony for the Lord.” Then they put their mah-jongg tiles together, piled them up, and while we were giving messages inside the house, they burned all the mah-jongg tiles, Chinese dominoes, and dice in the backyard. This is an example of purging out the leaven.
In 1938 I was staying with someone in Beijing who worked in the Union Hospital. One day he told me that he wondered if the Lord was happy with his silk umbrella that he had in his living room. I was younger than he was, so I respectfully asked him, “After you have spent so much money to get it, why do you now think that it is not good?” He answered, “The umbrella itself is not the problem. The problem is that the umbrella has dragons on it. Do you think that something with dragons on it should be kept in a Christian’s home?” Then I told him that since the first day I entered into his house, whenever I saw those four dragons, I felt very uncomfortable within. This brother’s feeling came as a result of reading the book of Revelation. When he read that the devil is a dragon, he asked himself, “If I belong to God, why do I still allow something of Satan to remain in my home?” Satan is very deceptive. This is the reason why people today not only have pictures of dragons, but they also wear dragon ornaments, perform the dragon dance, and even wear clothing with dragons embroidered on it. They are totally occupied with dragons.
In 1936, when I was in Tientsin, a sister invited some of us for dinner. This sister’s husband was a very famous architect, and the ceiling of her dining room was filled with dragon paintings. Her husband was not at home that day, and we went to her home for dinner. She said that whenever she ate in that dining room, she felt very uncomfortable. I asked her why, and she told me that it was because of the dragons on the ceiling. Then I asked her why she did not like dragons when everyone else likes dragons. Everyone has the image of a dragon either on their teapots or on their clothes. She told me that because she was a child of God, she should not allow such things to remain in her home, but that since her husband was not willing to remove them, it was out of her control. I consoled her by saying that if it is not up to us, then it is not our business.
Since we are saved, we should allow the Lord to enlighten us so that we may see if there is anyone that we have wronged or treated unrighteously. If we have done so, we have to deal with any problems we have with them thoroughly. In addition, if we have obtained something in an unrighteous way, whether it is from someone in our own household or from work, we have to deal with this matter absolutely. If we are willing to go to the Lord and check with ourselves completely, we will find that our entire being is full of leaven. One time, Dr. F. B. Meyer, an American, went to England to preach. He said that there was no way for a Christian to be blessed if he merely listened to sermons day after day yet was unwilling to be dealt with and had no feeling when he stole money from his manager or spent his company’s funds. After that sermon all the bank drafts of the surrounding post offices were sold out in a few hours. Why did this happen? This happened because so many people, after seeing their unrighteousness, went to buy bank drafts so that they could pay back the money that they had taken. In that meeting Dr. Meyer used a young man as an example. He said, “This young man has stolen three pounds and eighteen shillings from his master and even until now he has not returned the money.” Then he asked the young man, “Do you have peace within?” Later, someone invited Dr. Meyer for a meal. The young man was waiting for him there and told him, “Some years ago I really stole three pounds and eighteen shillings from my master, and I have no peace within. I have purchased a check for three pounds and eighteen shillings and have enclosed it in an envelope to return it to my master. Please tell me, am I doing the right thing?”
One time Charles Spurgeon used an illustration in his preaching, saying, “There is a young man here who is wearing a pair of gloves that he stole, and he should return them.” When he spoke such a word, he said it without any particular intention, but after he spoke, a young man came up to him and said, “The gloves that I am wearing really were stolen from my master. How did you know?” Spurgeon said, “I did not know anything. When I was speaking, I just was inspired to say that.” Many Christians have no problem with their salvation, but they have never dealt with all their unrighteous possessions. If we want to follow the Lord in a serious way, we should deal with all the idols, the ancestral tablets, and the stolen things in our homes.
Many years ago in Kaifeng, Honan Province, there was a sister who had an image of Jesus in her home. She bowed down to worship the image every day and at every meal took some food to offer to the image. Later, she was possessed by demons. A sister who knew her wrote to me and asked, “Can we worship an image of Jesus? Why is this sister possessed by demons even though she worshipped an image of Jesus?” I replied to her that we should not worship even an image of Jesus. We have to use our spirit to worship Jesus Himself. The Gospel of John shows us that when we worship the Lord in spirit and in truthfulness, He will accept us. We should not worship any image, even the image of Jesus, because there are demons behind all these kinds of images, even behind the image of Jesus.
We need to pray much and to come back to God. We need to let Him enlighten us and show us if there is anything in our homes, in our being, or in our surroundings that is unpleasing to Him. For example, before some people were saved, their mothers-in-law were a great suffering to them, and they did not like them. Once they are saved, however, this dislike has to be removed. The dislike of the mothers-in-law toward their daughters-in-law also has to be removed. In short, if we dislike anyone or are holding a grudge against anyone—whether they are family, friends, or colleagues—we should confess and thoroughly deal with any problems that are between us. In this way, even if we do not preach the gospel to them, they will be saved through our behavior.
After one sister believed in the Lord, she felt very unpeaceful when she recalled all the times that she had been hard on her daughter-in-law. She desired that her daughter-in-law would be saved, but she was not bold enough to preach the gospel to her. She came to see me, and I said to her, “You persecuted your daughter-in-law before you were saved. Do you think she will listen to you now? You should confess to her.” She replied, “I am her mother-in-law, how can I confess to my daughter-in-law?” I asked her whether she wanted the Lord or to preserve her face, whether she wanted her daughter-in-law to be saved or she wanted her to go to hell? She said, “In the past I persecuted her; if I confess to her, and later she persecutes me, what will I do?” I told her that she had to trust in the Lord to grant her the grace in this matter. A few days later she came back to me and said, “After I confessed to my daughter-in-law, she cried, and I also cried. Then the two of us knelt down to pray together, and she was saved.” Do you see this? Sometimes we can get people saved even without preaching the gospel. We may be sloppy, but our God is never sloppy. We should not be careless or excuse ourselves in these matters; rather, we should carefully purge out all the leaven. In this way one day our whole being will be absolutely clean and free from all defilement within and without. In addition, everything in our family will also be clean. A person who is free from all defilement is clean material in the Lord’s hand.
