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During the past two to three years, the matter that I have been most concerned with and that has required a great deal of consideration has been the translation work of the Chinese New Testament Recovery Version. In Taiwan, the United States, and Southeast Asia, there has been an urgent and pressing call for a better translation of the New Testament. However, this matter, because it is related to the wording of the Bible, cannot be done in an ordinary way. This is not an easy matter that we are undertaking. Even someone who is knowledgeable and well-versed in Chinese, English, and Greek may not necessarily do a good job. When I was in Southeast Asia recently, I met a group of saints who were familiar with both Chinese and English and were serving specifically in the translation of the literature for the churches. They translated the outlines of my Chinese messages into English. I did not think that there would be any problem with this. However, before I was about to release the messages in English, I read the English outlines and realized that there were major differences between the two versions. The problem was not that the translators had a poor command of English or Chinese but that they did not understand the terms used in the Lord’s recovery. Therefore, I was reminded all the more that I cannot be careless in this matter.
To translate the Bible requires a substantial knowledge of the truth and also a great deal of careful consideration. Bible translators throughout the ages have not been able to accurately grasp the original meaning of the Bible or fully understand the principles of the Bible, even though many of them were highly educated people. We cannot understand the Bible or even the text of a verse according to its words alone. The words are important—without words everything is vague—but what is more important is that we understand the spiritual matters and be familiar with the principles of the Bible itself. If we are short of the knowledge concerning spiritual matters, have an inadequate understanding of the biblical principles and their interrelationships, are unable to grasp the basic truths of the Bible, and understand the Bible merely according to the letter, then it will be easy for us to make mistakes.
Concerning the letter of the Bible, the Old Testament was written in Hebrew and the New Testament was written in Greek. Even though these two written languages have been developing for thousands of years, the meanings of the words themselves are still very hard to understand. In Greek one word alone sometimes has more than ten different meanings and many different usages. The biblical truths in the Old Testament are not hard to understand, but those in the New Testament are altogether in the heavenly realm. Therefore, to decide on the meaning of a word in a verse is not an easy matter.
After I was saved, I began to love studying the Bible, especially the New Testament. During the past twelve years, I had to write the footnotes for the New Testament Recovery Version in order to release the Life-study messages. This forced me to touch each crucial word in the Bible in a thorough way.
Nearly all the crucial points in the Bible are now within me. Therefore, having further examined the publications put out by our bookroom, I am deeply concerned that if those who are involved in the translation of the Bible do not have an accurate understanding of the original meanings of the words in the Bible, their translation will surely contain mistakes. Hence, after careful consideration I have decided to labor on this personally by taking the lead in the translation of the New Testament Recovery Version, and I hope that we can complete this project as soon as possible.
Since you are being trained to be useful for the work of the Lord’s recovery, you need to be familiar with at least two languages—your mother tongue, Chinese, and the universal language, English. Learning these languages will require you to spend time and energy. In order to learn the English language, you can practice studying not only the New Testament Recovery Version but also the King James Version, which does not contain too many new words or sophisticated phrases. Most people appreciate the depth of its English. Those who are pursuing to learn the English language cannot bypass the King James Version. Many have tried to replace it with other English versions because its history is over three hundred years old and because it contains some phrases or terms that are somewhat out of date. However, no version has been able to replace it. When we were working on the English New Testament Recovery Version, we did not depart too much from the King James Version. We did our best to preserve its style and use its phrases, clauses, and words, unless they did not match the meaning of the original text. Therefore, the language of the English New Testament Recovery Version is not too sophisticated and should be easy for you to get into. This will be a great help to you.
In this chapter I am going to give you a comprehensive word as a guide for your exercise during your time in the training.
The Lord’s recovery is surely of the Lord. This means that we believe in the Lord, follow Him, serve Him, and bear the testimony of the church for Him altogether according to the pure revelation of the Holy Scriptures. In the past we examined the characteristics of various Christian denominations, such as how much they accepted the Bible, how they practiced the Christian living, and how they set up churches. We did not accept their practices right away, regardless of what kinds of practices they had. Instead, we brought their practices before the Bible and compared them with the revelation in the Bible. We accepted only that which was according to the Bible, trying to accept as much as possible. Although we were born not in the first or second century but in the twentieth century, through our thorough research and our open-mindedness we have received nearly everything that measures up to the Bible. Therefore, we have received much help. We can say that the way of the Lord’s recovery today is altogether according to the Bible and not according to the two thousand years of Christian tradition.
The University of the Philippines, as the highest national institute of education in the Philippines, gathers the country’s top students. There was a professor of agricultural technology who was saved among us and who saw the way of the church while pursuing his doctoral degree in the United States. After returning to the Philippines, he started teaching at this university. He bore a strong testimony for the Lord and led almost everyone around him to salvation. Within only four years the testimony of the church was raised up in that locality. There were about forty saints meeting together, and almost all of them were in the field of education. Some of the saints were his colleagues and teaching assistants, and others were his students and friends. There were also some middle-school teachers.
When I visited the Philippines recently, I visited this church. The saints told me that the agriculture department at the University of the Philippines has seven thousand students and that there are fourteen Christian organizations, mostly from the United States, that are carrying out campus works among the students to gain the campus. The saints specifically pointed out that most of these fourteen organizations oppose us. Furthermore, in opposing us they take the same way used in the United States—whomever we contact receives the slanderous book The God-Men the following day. The brothers had been doing their best to defend the truth. I asked them if they had used the “Statement of Decision” issued by the court in relation to the lawsuit we had filed in the United States, and they said that they had not. They had only used some articles printed in the newspaper. I told them that this was not enough and that they had to utilize the “Statement of Decision.” After they published a defending statement of rebuttal in the newspaper, one pastor wrote a letter to us, saying that our rebuttal was excellent and that the only defect was that our truths were not according to tradition. I told the brothers that this was the best kind of praise. The truths that we teach are definitely not according to tradition but according to the pure words of the Bible. So I had the brothers tell that pastor that if he wanted to debate with us, he would have to use the Bible, because that is what we respect. We would disregard any debate with us that is based upon the Nicene Creed or the things of tradition.
Many of the beliefs in today’s Protestantism, and even more in Catholicism, are not according to the Bible but according to the so-called councils. Some in Christianity believe that the decisions of the councils surpass the teachings of the Bible. Therefore, instead of saying, “This is what the Bible says,” they say, “This is what the councils decided.” The first council was the Nicene Council of A.D. 325, presided over by Constantine the Great. Afterward, in A.D. 600, the papal system was officially recognized, and the pope replaced the councils. Before the recognition of the papal system, all the controversies over spiritual matters were settled according to the decisions of the councils. Throughout the generations much of Christianity has been saying, “Thus says the councils,” and not, “Thus says the Bible.”
The Lord’s recovery, however, is different. We declared from the beginning that we were absolutely not according to tradition and that we did not care for the Christian councils prior to the establishment of the papal system. We have come back to the pure word of God. Regardless of how good the teachings of the Christian councils and the traditional theology are, as long as they do not correspond to the Bible, we reject them. We are only for the pure word of God.
Since you are attending the full-time training, as a rule, you should be trained in the matter of knowing the church. This means that you should learn to come back to the pure and accurate word of God to see what the church is and what the way, the ground, the practice, and the content of the church are. I hope that you all would know these points clearly. We have many books regarding these matters, but regrettably, they have not been compiled in a systematic way. Rather, the books contain one point here and another point there. Presently, we are compiling Truth Lessons and are preparing to publish them in four levels. Each level will consist of forty-eight topics. The purpose is to systematically arrange all the literature that we have published in the past sixty years so that the saints can have a summarized and clear understanding of the truth.
Proverbs 29:18 begins, “Where there is no vision, the people cast off restraint.” If we do not have a clear vision, it will be hard for us to pursue progress in our service. Without the stimulus of competition, worldly people would be without a goal and would be eliminated. It would be hard for someone opening a factory to achieve anything if he did not think of a way to gain the market. Even though we are not opening a factory for business, the principle is the same for us who are doing the Lord’s work. We have the highest truth and the practice that most agrees with the Bible. However, if we are ignorant, boastful, closed to the outside world, and do not pursue progress, the Lord will not have a way among us.
In order to propagate and increase, some people in the Catholic Church have accepted the so-called Pentecostal movement. Once I researched and attended this kind of Pentecostal meeting. I went to a meeting where they used the word charismatic instead of Pentecostal at their door. In the meeting the Catholic priests wore their priestly robes, and the nuns wore the nuns’ garments. However, they did not sit in an orderly way. Some prostrated themselves, and others sat on the floor. There was no one presiding over the meeting, nor was there a preacher. The believers simply stood up one by one to testify and share, and then at the end someone made some announcements regarding practical affairs.
Their way is very smart. It is known as the moderate charismatic movement. They approve of speaking in tongues, and they practice speaking in tongues, but in the meetings they do not do it, nor do they force others to do it. Furthermore, they do not perform miracles and wonders. They simply encourage the believers to share and testify how they have touched and enjoyed the Lord. This kind of practice touches people’s hearts. Moreover, they do not put any demands on the believers; they do not even demand that they attend the Lord’s Day meeting and testify. Therefore, it is easy for them to bring people in.
Our difficulty is that we are not only hoping to bring people in, but we are also hoping to bring them into the church life. Surely we need to bring people into the church life, but this requires us to endeavor step by step. We have to work harder because we not only ask the saints to meet but also expect them to meet according to a schedule. The dear elders in the churches even expect the saints to participate in practical services, such as cleaning the meeting hall, cleaning the restrooms, and giving hospitality. Many people are willing to believe in Jesus, but they are not willing to clean the meeting hall and the restrooms. The charismatic Catholics normally rent their meeting halls. They hire people to clean the place so that it is very neat and clean. Even the restrooms look very nice. Therefore, their members are responsible only for coming to the meetings and do not have to worry about anything else. However, although they spend time together in the Lord’s Day meeting, the remainder of their time is spent going to movies, window-shopping, and playing games. We cannot condemn them though, because quality comes out of quantity. The charismatic Christians have been able to bring in so many people. Thus, we cannot deny the fact that there has been a certain amount of the work of the Holy Spirit among them.
Today one cannot do business or operate a factory in an isolated way. Rather, one must learn from and investigate others’ practices and absorb others’ strong points in order to succeed. The Japanese do a very thorough job in this matter. Regardless of what line of business they are in, the first thing they do is send people to foreign countries to learn from others. They then come back and have a meeting to compare and absorb all the good points and strong points from each country. This is why their products can be marketed to countries all over the world, occupying the international market. The co-workers among us who are fifty years old or above are not like this; they are closed to everything except the truth. They do not care about anything and do not want to learn anything besides the truth. Consequently, there has been no progress. Today we are unaware that there are many groups that are far more advanced than we are, and we are also unaware of where we are. My burden is very heavy. Basically, I hope that all you trainees would clearly understand the way we are taking and also aggressively pursue progress in the matter of service.
First, the serving ones in the recovery must pursue progress in their service; second, they must pursue the knowledge of the truth. This is an area in which we have had the upper hand for the past sixty years. This is true even in the United States today. Regrettably, the co-workers whom I trained thirty years ago have not sufficiently entered into the deeper study of the truth. They are able to give messages, but they cannot get into the depths of the truth. Not only so, some co-workers even feel that since we speak only on messages given by Brother Nee and Brother Lee, it would not be a bad idea to find some materials from others to speak on. This kind of understanding and feeling is altogether wrong.
The Lord’s speaking today is mostly in His recovery, yet we do not cherish it. People outside the recovery use the truths that have been released among us in a serious way, yet we who are in the recovery are indifferent toward these truths. There is a certain group that holds educational classes on the Lord’s Day. The believers who join the class must register and take a test, and no one can join the class in the middle of the course. Everyone in the special class has the book The Normal Christian Life, and they study it seriously. The author of that book is Brother Watchman Nee, and I wrote the preface. If you asked the people in this class whether they know Watchman Nee or Witness Lee, they probably would not recognize those names. However, each person has a copy of the book and is learning the truth from it. Few of us, however, possess the entire set of Life-study messages. Others love the truths in the Lord’s recovery to such an extent, but what is our attitude toward the truths that the Lord has given us?
By glancing through the outline of the Bible study put out by that group, one can immediately recognize that they are using our material. For example, the outline for Romans 1 talks about the three “giving-ups” (vv. 24, 26, 28). This was not my personal invention. Rather, I started seeing this while I was with the Brethren. I was taught by the Brethren when I was young. Then I brought what they had taught me into the Lord’s recovery. I published my writings in the Life-study of Romans over ten years ago. Some young co-workers wrote to me a few years ago, telling me that they had visited the churches in Europe and America and had been influenced to study others’ writings. After their return they took many different expositions and compared them with our Life-study messages. Eventually, they concluded that all the materials out there cannot be compared to ours. In spite of this, we still do not appreciate the Lord’s speaking among us as much as others do.
You need to clearly know this way—the way of the recovery. If you do not know the way of the recovery clearly, I would advise you not to remain in it. Rather, you might as well take the free way of Christianity. However, even if you know the way clearly, you still need to know the truth and enter into the light that the Lord has given to us over the past sixty years. The light from these sixty years is a collection of what all the pursuers of the Lord in the past two thousand years of church history have understood concerning the Bible. Although we do not have as many publications as Christianity does, our publications are at the top. I am very confident about this matter. I have already told you that our writings were produced by our standing on the shoulders of many who studied the Bible during the past two thousand years, plus what the Lord has shown us. You need to make an effort to study them in a deeper way.
Perhaps you may have some understanding of the basic truths of the Bible, but you probably have not spent much effort to study them. To study any course of learning is not that easy. You need to know the achievements of the masters throughout the ages. You need to spend time entering into their writings in order to reap the benefit. I hope that you will treat the truth among us in this way, spending time to enter into it.
The third thing that the serving ones in the recovery must do is to pursue progress in life. This means that you must first endeavor to know the Spirit, Christ, life, the cross, and resurrection. Then you should have the practical experience of all these things. As long as you have the heart to do so, it will not be difficult to practice this matter. There are many books among us concerning the knowledge and experience of life. If these writings had been available sixty years ago, I would have been excited to spend all my time storing up all these riches within me. Regrettably, at that time I could not find one book that even explained the truth of regeneration. We, however, have studied this matter of regeneration in a thorough way. Of course, we received help from a word given by Brother T. Austin-Sparks. He said that regeneration is to receive a life in addition to the life that we already have. Based on this word, we have further developed this matter. Among all of the books in Christianity today, the ones that give the clearest explanation of regeneration are our books.
To pursue the progress in life, you must study The Knowledge of Life. The more times you read it, the better. Then you need to study the book The Experience of Life. It would be good to read this book once every two years and to actually practice what it teaches regarding both the dealings in life and the learning in life. These two books contain the messages that I gave during the trainings in 1953 and 1954. They were first published in a series in The Ministry of the Word. The brother who wrote the preface said that throughout the generations many people had spoken about life and had taught about life but did not know what life was, not to mention the experience of life. It was I who used the scientific method to completely present what so many throughout the generations had taught and experienced, plus my own experience. So I hope that you would all study it diligently.
I will not train you as I did in the former days. We already have the richest and most complete truths among us. Thus, there is no need for me to speak more to you. Instead, I will use the method of graduate study to teach you, that is, to let you study the reference books and then to test you. It would be more than sufficient if you collected all the books published among us from the time of Brother Nee until today and seriously studied them one by one.
One matter that truly worries me is that those of you who are being trained here all want to do something special. This truly grieves my heart. I worked with Brother Nee in China for eighteen years. I was completely one with him. I spoke what he spoke, and I preached what he preached. I even imitated his gestures. There was no difference between us. Anyone can testify for me that wherever I went, I did not speak on other topics but only repeated to the brothers and sisters the messages that Brother Nee had released. I am proud of this. However, I found out that this is not the situation among my co-workers. Rather, everyone wants to have his own “new tricks” and “new gimmicks,” not realizing that it is these new things that delay the Lord’s work.
I never tried to play tricks or use gimmicks. Rather, I simply worked with all my effort to compare and study the Bible in its original language and in Chinese and English and then to find the basic truths and present them. I hope that you also would not try to invent new things. Simply absorb these basic truths and teach them accordingly. Concerning the pursuit of life, what other books are more basic than The Knowledge of Life and The Experience of Life? What other book can speak as clearly and transparently as the chapter on the three laws and four lives in The Knowledge of Life? These books are like the multiplication table; they are very basic and cannot be replaced with a new gimmick. If you teach multiplication, you must use the multiplication table. Do not think that you do not have to teach it because it has already been taught by others. This kind of thinking truly causes my heart to ache.
I do not have the time to speak all these things to you again. You have to understand that all the basic items are in the books. All you have to do is to study them thoroughly. In particular, you must spend time and energy to get into The Knowledge of Life and The Experience of Life. I have decided to incorporate all the points covered in these two books into the forty-eight lessons of Truth Lessons. I hope that you will all be able to have a solid pursuit and progress in life.
The fourth point is that you need to learn how to conduct yourself, how to do things, and how to work. This point is all-inclusive. When I was here holding the training thirty years ago, I once said, “If you do not know how to conduct yourself, you will not know how to do things, and if you do not know how to do things, you will not know how to work.” I called this the “three how-to’s.” At that time I also spoke concerning the thirty items of the character training. In this chapter I will not explain them one by one but will only fellowship about them briefly.
Anyone who loves the Lord and is serving the Lord, even if he is not a full-timer, must be built up in his entire person, including areas such as whether one’s attire and hairstyle are appropriate and whether one’s shoes have been shined. In 1953 I used some wood to build the workers’ home across from the meeting hall. It looked simple and crude outside, but it was orderly inside. During the training, when no one was paying attention, I would often go to the workers’ home to check how well the tables had been wiped, the beds made, the shoes organized under the beds, and the clothes hung in the closets. It is a pity that later on the co-workers did not practice these matters thoroughly.
Although Mormonism is heretical, the Mormons are more proper and are neater than people in Christianity. When the young people among them reach a certain age, they have to render two years of church service. During the service, the boys’ hair has to be proper; it cannot be too long. The girls have to be even more proper and dignified. Their schedule is very tight. They do not drink alcohol, tea, or coffee, and they do not smoke. Their practice is successful due to their conduct. Paul tells Timothy, “Let no one despise your youth, but be a pattern to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity” (1 Tim. 4:12). The conduct mentioned here includes the matter of our clothing and attire being tidy, proper, and dignified.
I do not like to see my co-workers and the full-timers dressed slovenly. The people in Shanghai call these kinds of people “bums.” Some people have not polished their shoes for half a year, and their black shoes have become gray shoes. If such a one were to stand before me and speak, I would immediately discredit what he would say by fifty percent, regardless of what he would say. I would not have any confidence in him. One day when I was giving this kind of message about our dress, a brother immediately testified that what I had said was absolutely correct. He said that his father, who is an employer, looks at applicants’ shoes when he is interviewing and hiring people. You need to learn in all these matters.
Not only should we dress properly and neatly; even our living place should be clean and tidy both inside and outside. We Chinese are very negligent in this matter. The Japanese clean their dwellings every day. They wipe their tatami once a day. They pay special attention to the four corners of the room and wash the front entrance. The Germans not only wash the steps up to the front porch but also scrub them with soap. It would be considered a great accomplishment if a Chinese family cleaned their house once a week. If you go and examine our meeting hall, you will find that it is very unseemly. There is dust everywhere, yet we do not have any feeling regarding it. The Lord has entrusted so much to us, so how can we allow our meeting hall to be arranged in such a poor way? This is distasteful in the eyes of the unbelievers. We have disgraced ourselves.
Your attire is also often unseemly. Some brothers dress like bums. When they stand up and speak, dressed like a bum, who will listen? I do not have the time today, but if I were to conduct the training myself, the first thing that I would do would be to change you thoroughly from head to toe. I am not asking you to buy good clothes. Rather, I want you to dress in a dignified, proper, tidy, and elegant way. You have to admit that if those who work in the bank dressed like you, they would be disqualified. You also have to agree that the church is higher than a bank. The work that we are doing today is much more valuable than the work that is done in a bank. However, the way you look today, you would not be hired if you were applying for a job at the bank.
Because of this, I have told you young people many times that you should not acquire the looseness that is among us. I do not like to see you in such a condition, doing things half-heartedly and without enthusiasm, coming to the meetings late, and taking your seats in a disorderly way. As we are learning to serve the Lord, we should be proper, even in the way that we walk into a meeting. Do not forget that we are doing a great business for the King of the heavenly kingdom and are representing Him on the earth. Of course, we should not pick up the worldly way. Nevertheless, we need to represent the Lord in a suitable manner.
One time I went to a small group meeting, and a sister told me that she had been touched when she had seen an elderly sister in that meeting who looked graceful and elegant. In my opinion, that elderly sister was very ordinary. She was nothing special. However, when others saw her, they saw a certain kind of expression. This proves that the saints are observing how we who serve the Lord dress and adorn ourselves and how we speak and act. Some of you act very lightly. You swing your arms and shuffle your feet while talking. When you get excited, you push and shove one another like elementary-school children. How can you serve the Lord if you behave this way?
Therefore, you also have to learn how to speak. You cannot speak as loudly or softly as you like. When you call a hymn in the meeting, your voice must be loud and clear, being considerate of others’ ears. If you do not learn to speak with the right volume, speed, and expression, your preaching of the word will be unbearable to others. You also need to learn the proper way to conduct and deport yourself. Do not think that your deportment is unimportant because you have only recently enrolled in the full-time training as a trainee and are nobody important. You are not merely trainees; you are also those who go out to teach people the truth. If you are not properly built up, how can you gain people’s respect? In building up yourself, you must pay attention to these small, fine matters.
Consider the matter of attire for example. Some of you are very peculiar in your attire. You wear black shoes with blue socks and brown pants with red ties, which are as far from matching as heaven is from earth. When you stand in front of people, and they see you dressed in such a peculiar way, how will they receive your exhortation and teaching? The clothing that you wear is bought with your money, so you should give careful consideration to the clothes that you buy. There is a Chinese saying—“You can tell how things will develop by the small beginning.” A person’s character is established little by little, just as a house is built by setting small bricks on top of each other one by one. If you do not establish your character in these minor things, it is like building a house with small pieces of bricks that are not uniform in color and shape. The house naturally will not look pleasant or sturdy. Who would want to move into such a house?
I charged you before to thoroughly read and study 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus. Now I would like to ask whether you found all the crucial points concerning fleeing and avoiding in these three books. If you study these points carefully, you will have some understanding regarding this matter of character building. Philippians 4:8 says, “What things are dignified,...what things are well spoken of, if there is any virtue and if any praise, take account of these things.” Does your attire and adornment cause others to feel that you are dignified? Does it invite praise? This does not mean that you should pay attention to only one aspect of your character. Rather, you should pay attention to every point and aspect of your character. If you do not take account of these things and do not pay attention to them, there will be no way for you to build yourself up.
Besides the building up of your character in relation to how you conduct yourself and how you do things, you also need to learn how to carry out the Lord’s work. In working for the Lord, you need to learn several matters in particular. The first matter is contacting people, the second is ministering the word, and the third is visiting people in their homes or on the campuses. If you learn these few things, you will be quite useful in the Lord’s recovery.
All these points that I have fellowshipped about are areas in which we need to be trained. We must know the way of the Lord’s recovery. We need to pursue and enter deeply into the truth. We need to have the experience and growth in life. Furthermore, we need to be built up in the way that we conduct ourselves. We must go on from knowing how to conduct ourselves to knowing how to do things, and from knowing how to do things to knowing how to work for the Lord. Regarding the content of the training, I hope that we would be able to coordinate with the campus work in a practical way. I hope that we could have two to three months to be trained to practice how to do a campus work to gain the students. We have much to learn in every aspect in order to handle the need of this work.
Regarding the arrangement of the training schedule, the morning time for pursuing the Word should continue. Another time should be set aside for us to be trained to do the campus work. We all know that every country in the world that does not emphasize education will fall behind. The main reason why Taiwan is prosperous today is that in these years the university students are being educated quite well. Because of this, we must now pay attention to the campuses.
Furthermore, the campus work is also the Lord’s flow on the earth today. I have noticed that not only in America and Asia but also in Europe and South America, the college students are very willing to receive the truth, especially the truth in the Bible. Recently in America we sent out gospel teams, with ten people on each team, to the various campuses to take care of the Lord’s need. On the campus we do not preach the ordinary gospel but the gospel of the truth. In many places the first message we give is on the Triune God. This is very attractive in the United States. More than half of the college students in America were born into Christian families. They have already heard many shallow teachings. If we preach the same old teachings, they will feel bored, even though they still desire to know something about God. Therefore, we are eager to publish the New Testament Recovery Version in English to meet this need. Many college students greatly welcomed the New Testament Recovery Version when they saw it.
There is a way and a technique to do things and to work for the Lord. In Philippians 4:12 Paul speaks of the “secret,” referring to the key to doing things. Not only do we need the Spirit and the Word in preaching the gospel; we also need the content. Some brothers are strong in their spirit, but the content of their gospel is very light. Therefore, they do not gain many people. The standard of education for the young people has been greatly raised. The young people have their own logic, philosophy, and thinking. The truths in the Lord’s Word are very logical and are able to meet the real inner need of people. When we contact the college students on the campuses, the question we must ask is how do we present these logical, high, and rich truths to them in a clear fashion? If we learn the way to contact people and the key in speaking to them, we will be able to touch people in their hearts and gain them right away. Therefore, there is a great deal to learn in this matter.
There are so many of you attending the full-time training. If you go out to work in an ordinary fashion, it will not only be a waste of time but also a waste of your learning. You should cherish the training that you have received to carry out the proper work on the campuses by contacting and gaining the college students. In addition, you must also continue in the basic training and learning. You need to take care of such things as prayer, coordination, fellowship with the Lord, and not being individualistic.
In taking care of practical things and working for the Lord, you do not need to get into the particulars. You simply need to grasp the “secret” and pay attention to being efficient. If you are too particular, you cannot be efficient. Nevertheless, you have to lay hold of the “secret.” In order for you to be efficient in doing things and in working, you must first build yourselves up in your human character. Regardless of where I move to, the first thing I do is clean the house thoroughly and then settle down. If you conduct yourselves in a loose way, seeking only for a place to lie down and sleep, this will spoil your character. Not only so, when you work or serve, you will be unprepared and bewildered. This is not acceptable.
Therefore, you need to take this comprehensive message of mine. Do not wait until someone comes to supervise you. Rather, you need to take the initiative to learn here. You have all graduated from college, so you should know what to do. If you learn, practice, and endeavor to build yourselves up in all the points that I have mentioned, the Lord will have a way in you. The urgent need in the Lord’s work today is that we would do the campus work to gain the young people for the Lord’s recovery so that we may have a promising future.
