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In this chapter we will consider three important practices in our Christian life—pursuing to know the Lord, fellowshipping with the Lord, and preaching the gospel. Every believer should make a resolution before the Lord to practice these three matters. Such resolutions are a great help.
Every great matter in the Christian life requires a resolution. We cannot say that Christians should leave everything to the Lord’s grace, that resolutions are regulations, or that we should not make resolutions. The Bible says, “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you” (James 4:8). The condition for the Lord’s drawing near to us is our drawing near to Him. In addition, the Lord said, “Abide in Me and I in you” (John 15:4). The Lord wants to draw near to us and abide in us, but there is a condition: we first need to draw near to Him and abide in Him. This does not mean that our human effort is effective but that the Lord has graced us and is waiting for us to take the initiative to respond to Him.
For example, suppose a brother comes to a love feast. Unless he uses his hands, the food cannot enter into his mouth. No matter how rich the food may be, he must respond by picking up the food, opening his mouth, and putting the food in his mouth. If he does not use his hands or open his mouth, no one can help him. Hence, we will be fed if we receive, but we will be hungry if we do not receive, because receiving love and grace is our response. Suppose there are forty guests at the love feast, but only thirty-eight respond. Those who respond will be happy and satisfied, but those who do not respond will be hungry. The host cannot be held responsible for the guests who are hungry, because he has given them food and drink. The problem is not a lack of love from the host but a lack of response from the guests.
The same applies to the Lord’s grace. He has done everything and has given us everything. He died on the cross for us, accomplished the work of redemption for us, and dealt with the problems of sin and the enemy for us. He resurrected from the dead, satisfied God’s requirements, became the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45), and has given Himself to us in this Spirit. He is now waiting for us to respond to Him. If we would draw near to Him—respond to what He has done and given to us—He will draw near to us. An open vessel can be filled. If our being is open, we will be filled. If the opening of a vessel is turned downward, it cannot be filled with rain even in a downpour. If we do not receive grace, we should not say that God’s grace is not sufficient or that God is a respecter of persons and gives grace to others but not to us. Rather, we should question whether we have responded to Him. The Lord has done everything for us and has given us everything. He requires us only to respond to Him.
The Bible can say that the Lord will draw near to us if we draw near to Him, because He is waiting for us to draw near to Him and to receive Him. The Bible can say that the Lord will abide in us if we abide in Him, because the Lord is already abiding in us. However, we will not sense His abiding in us unless we abide in Him. A person who does not read the Bible or pray in order to draw near to the Lord can be moved by the Lord occasionally but will not always sense that the Lord abides in him. But a person who prays, reads the Bible, and fellowships with the Lord will always sense that the Lord abides in him. According to our experience, it is possible to sense that we are filled with the Lord when we pray and fellowship with Him. This is to experience His abiding by our abiding in Him and fellowshipping with Him.
There are a few great matters that require resolutions. These matters are: pursuing to know the Lord, fellowshipping with the Lord, and preaching the gospel. We should consider the pursuit of the knowledge of Christ to be excellent. In the preceding chapter we saw that Christ is both God and man and that He is in us. He is God; man calls Him the great God. He is man; He appeared on the earth as a small and lowly man. Because He is God in us, we are so enlarged that we can forbear and accept anything. Because He is a man in us, we are so low that we can accommodate and endure anything. His life is both great and small, because He is both God and man. This is truly wonderful. There is no end to pursuing the Lord or to knowing Him. Therefore, we must make a resolution to know Him. We should not resign our knowing Him to fate, nor should we live on the spirituality of others.
Next, we must fellowship with the Lord by drawing near to Him every morning and by reading the Bible and praying daily. As Christians, we must absorb the Lord through reading the Bible, praying, drawing near to Him, and enjoying Him. This is not a matter of doctrine but a matter of practice. Some believers have been saved for many years, but they still do not know how to fellowship with the Lord, nor do they know the key to fellowshipping with the Lord. They are thus unable to touch the Lord or enjoy Him. Such Christians are not normal Christians. Persons who do not eat or drink cannot be healthy, and those who are malnourished are susceptible to all kinds of sicknesses. Christians can also be sick if they are spiritually malnourished.
In order to fellowship with the Lord, we must know that He is omnipresent. The Bible says that “the Lord is the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:17). He is the Spirit indwelling our spirit; therefore, we can fellowship with Him at any time. The Lord is also the Word. In the Gospel of John the Lord said, “The words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life” (6:63), and in Romans Paul says, “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (10:8). If we contact the Lord’s word by reading the Bible, we will be able to contact the Lord. However, we must take heed to read the Bible not only with our eyes or our mind but to contact the words of the Bible with our spirit. This is the way to receive the Lord as our supply from His Word.
We must also pray after reading the Bible. When we pray according to our spirit, we will be able to contact the Lord in our spirit. If we will spend ten to thirty minutes reading the Bible and praying every morning, we will be supplied inwardly by the Lord. In our fellowship with the Lord, He may shine in us, rebuke us, comfort us, or encourage us. No matter what we experience, we gain the Lord. To gain the Lord is to be fed within. It is best to do this not only in the morning but also to find a quiet time to fellowship with the Lord in the afternoon and in the evening before going to bed. The Lord is our true food, true drink, true sunlight, and true air. If we eat Him, drink Him, breathe Him, and accept His shining, our spirit will be strong.
Regrettably, some Christians do not know how to have genuine contact with the Lord. Hence, they have a nominal Christian life and are merely religious. They know only doctrines; they do not know how to use their spirit, nor do they know about using their spirit. As a result, they are often deflated spiritually. Because they do not fellowship with the Lord, they are also indifferent to their mistakes and their coldness. If we are genuinely saved, we must learn the way to fellowship with the Lord, to contact Him, to read His Word, to pray to Him often in spirit, and to be supplied by Him. Then we will accept the Lord’s dealings and experience His demands, restrictions, limitations, and breaking. The more we have such experiences, the better.
We should bring what we sense to the Lord in prayer. As soon as we have a sense, we should pray. To pray much is to let the divine air flow more through us, to penetrate us further, and to flow deeper within us. Such prayer can be compared to deep breathing and will refresh us and make our spirit healthy and strong. Sometimes we may further experience being led in prayer, and we may also experience the infilling of the Spirit and the outpouring of the Spirit. We will also have a burden for the gospel and the spirit of the gospel when our spirit is open. When we are enlivened within, we will be living and full of the Spirit, instead of being deflated while preaching the gospel.
I hope that all the saints will make a resolution to pursue knowing the Lord and to fellowship with Him. Fellowshipping with the Lord includes many things, such as drawing near to Him, reading the Bible, and praying in the morning. How can the Lord bless us if we do not read the Bible, pray, or rise up early to draw near to Him? If some do not have the time in the morning, they can be flexible and use other times. However, the morning is the most suitable time. The saints in Los Angeles are an example. Both the younger and the older saints do their best to come together for morning revival at six o’clock. Some wake up before five o’clock and drive an hour to join the morning revival. It is good for individuals to rise up early and draw near to the Lord, and it is more helpful for several to draw near to the Lord together. We all need to pay some price. We will lose the blessing when we are at ease. It is important for us to pay the price of rising up early by sacrificing some sleep so that we may enjoy the Lord in morning revival. In our morning revival we should read the Bible and pray, but we should not read for too long. The important thing is to absorb the Lord, pray much, and fellowship with one another.
The saints who live close to one another should practice daily to rise early in order to read the Bible, to pray, and to enjoy the Lord together. It is not easy to open up to others, because of our human nature. Our natural life is closed and wants to do everything on its own. We should have personal prayer, but there are many things in which we cannot get through with personal prayers. These things require that we pray with the brothers and sisters in order to get through. Hence, we must learn to be open persons, to open to the brothers and sisters, and to read the Bible, pray, and pursue the Lord together with others. Those who keep themselves closed cannot fellowship with the saints, and as a result, it is not easy for them to receive grace and grow. If we are open for fellowship with others, they will remember our problems in prayer.
The prayer of two or three gathered into the Lord’s name has the most authority. The Lord said, “Truly I say to you that if two of you are in harmony on earth concerning any matter for which they ask, it will be done for them from My Father who is in the heavens. For where there are two or three gathered into My name, there am I in their midst” (Matt. 18:19-20). The Lord also said “Whatever you bind on the earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on the earth shall have been loosed in heaven” (v. 18). Personal prayer does not have such authority. In any matter the strength of an individual is much smaller than the strength of many. This also applies to prayer; the prayer of several people together is very effectual. If we can practice this, it will afford much growth to the church.
We must also make a resolution to preach the gospel. Christians must preach the gospel. A Christian who has never brought anyone to salvation has a spiritual problem. The fruit-bearing branches of a tree are an example. The branches that do not bear fruit are sick. Another example is that of people getting married and having children; when life grows to a certain point, it will produce offspring. This is normal. Because we are saved, we are branches of the Lord, the vine. Therefore, we must grow in life so that we can bear fruit. Every child of God should bring forth spiritual children. The apostle Paul did not have children in the flesh, but he had spiritual children, such as Timothy and Titus, whom he brought forth, raised, and taught in the Lord (1 Tim. 1:1-2; 2 Tim. 1:1-2; Titus 1:4). After a person is saved, he should not wait three to five years before bringing someone to the Lord. A believer who does this has a spiritual problem. Therefore, we must make a resolution to preach the gospel and bring at least one person to the Lord each year.
However, we should not be hasty. After we have the desire to preach the gospel, we should first pray to consecrate ourselves to the Lord. Second, we should make a list of our relatives and friends and pray for the ones who are not saved. If a relative or friend is not in our locality, we may write him a gospel letter and ask the saints in that locality to visit him and give him gospel tracts, books, or the Bible. This would help our relative or friend to be brought into that local church. If a relative or friend lives close to us, we should seek the Lord concerning how to visit him or to invite him for a meal. Our contact for the gospel should be in coordination with the saints. We should not be hasty, nor should we expect everyone to get saved immediately upon hearing the gospel. We just need to receive a burden from the Lord and then spend a year bringing one person to the Lord. If we are burdened to preach the gospel to a relative or friend whom we have not been in touch with, we must first build a little friendship with him. Do not rush into preaching the gospel. We should first establish a friendship and then slowly bring up the gospel or give him a few books. After a few months we can invite him for a meal and also invite two saints to speak with him. We should move slowly and wait until he has a taste for the Lord before inviting him to hear the gospel. Haste makes waste, and rushing may slow things down. As long as we can maintain our burden for him, pray for him, and work on him, he will get saved. If the saints are willing to do this, we will be able to bring the Chinese as well as the Americans to the Lord. If we will spend the time, our relatives and friends will be baptized.
People say that it is difficult to preach the gospel in America but easy in China, but this is not the case. A tree can grow and bear sweet fruit. However, a dead tree is not completely useless; as long as we work on it, we can make a good vessel or a tool out of it. I believe that it is not difficult to preach the gospel in America, but this depends on whether we are willing to make an effort. For thirty years when I went to the countryside in China, people would say that it was easier to preach the gospel in the city, but when I went to the city, people would say that it was easier to preach the gospel in the countryside. The Christians in both the countryside and the city had many excuses for not preaching the gospel.
In April 1942 I was in Tsingtao. When the brothers there heard that Chefoo was blessed, they said that Tsingtao was a dead city and could not be enlivened and that in the northern cities of Tientsin and Tsingtao everything but religion prospers; hence, they said it was difficult to preach the gospel. I knew this was an excuse to avoid preaching the gospel. There were around a hundred and thirty saints in Tsingtao. I gathered the saints and led them first to meet for several days and then to preach the gospel. As a result, from April to June we had six or seven baptismal meetings and baptized about two hundred. That year the number of people meeting in Tsingtao doubled. The gospel was later interrupted by the Second Sino-Japanese War, but after the victory was won, Tsingtao had a revival in 1948 and 1949, and more than seven hundred were baptized in one meeting. This shows that it is not difficult to preach the gospel.
The same happened in Shanghai. In 1942 the church in Shanghai had an internal problem, and at the same time the Japanese were forcing the church to join their false Christian organization. Because the church in Shanghai refused to join, it had to close down for more than three years. The breaking of bread did not resume until 1945, and there were only a little over a hundred people. After the victory of the Second Sino-Japanese War was won in 1946, the brothers wanted me to go to Shanghai. By the time I arrived in Shanghai, the saints in Shanghai had heard that the churches in the north had been blessed. However, when I mentioned preaching the gospel, they said that the northerners were simple and leisurely, and hence, it was easier to preach the gospel to them, but the Shanghainese were sophisticated and busy, and hence, it would not be easy for them to believe the gospel. Instead of arguing with them, I said, “Let us try.”
We started meeting at the end of 1946 and had a gospel meeting at the beginning of the following year. I can testify that it was easy to preach the gospel. A multitude of people came to the first gospel meeting, and one to two hundred people were baptized. This happened more than once. By the summer of 1947, less than a year after we began preaching the gospel, the church in Shanghai had seventeen districts and over a thousand people. Therefore, we should never believe that it is difficult to preach the gospel.
The same thing happened in Hong Kong. I visited Hong Kong in 1948, and the church met upstairs in a small, quiet, and desolate building. In 1950 the church in Hong Kong still met upstairs in the same small, quiet, and desolate building. Brother Watchman Nee cabled me in Taiwan and asked me to go to Hong Kong. One evening I told the serving brothers that Hong Kong is a modern city, but our meeting place was in a small building with narrow stairs, and it was even difficult to find the doorbell. The meeting place had an old organ that had been donated to the church by a missionary before he went back to his country. The brothers said that they did not know Cantonese and that the Cantonese people were not open to those from their province. However, I said that we must preach the gospel to bring people in. When we did, the church in Hong Kong grew so large that it had to build a large meeting hall in order to accommodate everyone. The number of people kept increasing, and eventually even the new meeting hall was too small.
Everyone thinks that it is easy to preach the gospel in Taiwan. When we first arrived in Taiwan, people said that it would not be easy to preach the gospel. They had all kinds of excuses, such as, the Taiwanese were not open to outsiders, and the mainlanders were not open because they had not yet settled down. These were words of cold water. Now, however, everyone says that it is easy to preach the gospel in Taiwan. These examples prove that it is easy to preach the gospel; it depends on whether we are willing. It is not difficult to preach the gospel in America either. The day will come when we will prove that it is easy to preach the gospel in America. Whether or not it is easy to preach the gospel, we must always receive the burden and make an effort. If we would receive the burden, look to the Lord, and make a resolution to bring one person to the Lord in a year, we will succeed. If a locality has fifty saints, it will have a hundred saints the following year, two hundred the year after, and four hundred the year after that. Such an increase would be marvelous. May we all respond to the Lord and make a resolution to bring people to salvation.
In regard to preaching the gospel, no one can boast of seniority; we must remind and incite one another. The church does not have a regulation of preaching the gospel, but we must care for one another and bring people into the church. If we are faithful, our number will double in one year. We should not think that it is too difficult; difficulty comes from Satan, the devil. Nothing is too hard for God (Jer. 32:17, ASV; Luke 1:37). As long as we are willing to make an effort, someone will be saved. We should preach the gospel to the Americans and bring them to salvation and into the church life. We should not work only on the Chinese in America. We are all sojourners in America; therefore, we should bring grace to the locals, and let them continue the work with us.
The results depend on whether we can carry out the gospel faithfully. May we make a resolution to practice these three important matters. Without such a resolution, we will merely be meeting year after year without pursuing the Lord, without growing in our knowledge of the Lord, without having more fellowship with the Lord, and without preaching the gospel. Eventually, our labor will not have much fruit. We cannot leave things to fate; we must rise up and do our best. Our effort determines how much God will bless us, and our response determines how much grace we will experience. The Lord has already given us grace; therefore, instead of making more excuses, we should receive the Lord’s grace and eat joyously and be satisfied. These are not matters of doctrine but of practice. Hence, we must make a resolution. Our resolution is our response to the Lord’s grace. If we make a resolution and practice these matters, we will be blessed.
