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Concerning the foregoing word that I have spoken to the co-workers, elders, and serving ones, we may give the following concluding word: (1) We must have the loving and forgiving heart of our Father God. (2) We must also have the shepherding and seeking spirit of our Savior Christ, with the goal to gain people. (3) We need to remember these two matters and realize them, that is, experience them, in practicality.
In this chapter I wish to fellowship with you some further crucial matters. First, we should beware of several factors. These factors are like wolves, roaring lions, and speeding cars on the street that can harm us. The first factor is ambition. What I have written in the accompanying outline is according to my personal experience. I do not mean to say that only you have these negative points and I do not. I also have experienced them. Who does not have ambition? In the Lord’s work, the ambition is to be the leader. If you are among the co-workers, you may want to be the leader. If you cannot be the first among them, you may still want to be the “vice-president.” Even the sisters who have roommates want to be the leader among them. In the church you may want to be the elder, even the leading elder, the leader of the elders.
Second, your ambition may also be to get a place, even a district, for your work. Who does not have such an ambition? I was with Brother Nee, and I learned of him. I never saw that he was ambitious to get a place, a certain district to be his district or little empire. A district in this sense is a little empire. You may want to be an emperor in your district, with everything under your control and rule and where everyone must listen to you. Who is not like this? I was like this, but the Lord dealt with me. Your ambition may also be to captivate people to be your private co-workers. You may attract, charm, and capture people for this purpose. This means that in your work in the Lord’s recovery you have a party in which certain ones who are very close to you have been captivated, attracted, and charmed by you. They appreciate your ability, and they appreciate your capacity, so they stand with you. Then they become your particular co-workers. They are co-workers generally, but in particular, they are a certain person’s co-workers. Do you not realize that there is such a situation in the Lord’s recovery? I have seen this in experience.
Beginning in 1984 I called three urgent conferences of the co-workers and elders. In my opening word I pointed out that among us there is the tendency of division. By this I meant that quite a few capable co-workers in the Lord’s recovery liked to keep their district as their empire, and they liked to attract people to be their particular co-workers. We are all co-workers generally, but some became particular co-workers with certain attracting ones. Therefore, I warned you all. After my speaking, one of the co-workers stood to confess that this was the case. However, at that time I realized that his confession was not strong enough. It was very weak, and today he has become a problem in the Lord’s recovery. He still claims that he is in the recovery, and he still takes the ground of locality. He protests that his meeting is a local church, and he declares that he is one with Brother Lee. He accepts my ministry, and he receives standing orders of the books of the Living Stream Ministry even until today. Recently, he spoke to me for close to one hour to explain his stand. I told him I felt that it was not the Lord’s timing to respond to him at that time. Later, after further consideration with the Lord, I felt that I had received a clear word and that it was the Lord’s timing to respond. I felt to tell him, “You are a division, and whatever you do in your place is a division because you cut your meeting off from all the churches in the recovery. Moreover, you like to visit the rebellious ones and stand with them. You should realize that all the churches are one Body. You cannot stand alone, separate from the other churches. If you do, you are a division.” In Corinth some said, “I am of Paul, and I of Apollos, and I of Cephas, and I of Christ” (1 Cor. 1:12). Paul condemned them for this. Even if you say that you are of Christ, that is a division. It is as if Paul said to them, “Is Christ divided? Why do you say that you are of Paul? Do not be of me. I am of you, and we all are of Christ.” First Corinthians 1 shows that there should not be any differences among us. No one is of Cephas, no one is of Apollos, no one is of Paul, the highest apostle, and no one is even of Christ separately from others. We all are of Christ, who is not divided.
Our fallen disposition by birth always likes to captivate people. If someone can do a work for the Lord, he may like to attract people. He may like to charm them and captivate them, and if he succeeds in captivating others, the captivated ones become members of his little party. In the Lord’s recovery there is the possibility of having such a party. If you have the opportunity and the time, you may do this. You have not done this because you have not had the opportunity, the condition, and the situation, but when you do have the opportunity, you may do it. This is the first “underground gopher” that damages the Lord’s recovery. You may have been damaged by this. Within you there may be this very strong hidden “gopher.” I consider this as the first problem.
We should also beware of pride. To be proud is to boast. You may not boast openly, but you may boast hiddenly of your spiritual capacity, ability, and capability. Sometimes people boast in this way, saying, “See what capacity I have. Can your capacity or ability compare with mine?” Even someone without much capacity may still boast that he can do what others cannot. To be proud is also to exalt yourself and despise others. Again I ask, “Who does not exalt themselves and despise others?” I have learned this lesson, I have experienced all these things, and I have seen the situations. Therefore, I do have a burden within me to speak to you all, and I feel that this is the time to speak a word of love concerning ambition, pride, self-justification, and not being conformed to the death of Christ.
To be proud is also to think of yourself more highly than others. To be sure, this is a common illness among all Christians. Therefore, Paul charged us, saying, “I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think, but to think so as to be sober-minded, as God has apportioned to each a measure of faith” (Rom. 12:3). Although the Lord has been gone for nearly two thousand years, why does it seem that almost nothing has been accomplished for the building up of the Body? It is simply because of all these “gophers.” Paul was very aware of the matter of pride. He said that a new convert should not be appointed to bear responsibility, because, being blinded with pride, he may fall into the judgment suffered by the devil (1 Tim. 3:6). I have seen this. In appointing certain ones into responsibility there is the risk of spoiling them with pride.
We must also beware of self-justification and exposing others’ failures and defects. We often like to justify ourselves and expose others’ shortages, mistakes, and defects. Among us some are very particular in doing this, justifying themselves all the time. We never hear that certain ones condemn themselves, but rather they are always justifying themselves while exposing others’ failures and defects. To be snared in this way is to justify yourself and speak well of your success and merits. It is to speak of how you succeeded in this work or in that work and to speak well of all your good points. I wish to put this message into your mind so that you may keep it in your memory. Then you can look and see our situation. The situation in the Lord’s recovery is exactly like this.
As I have said before, the spirit of not shepherding and seeking others and being without love and forgiveness is spreading in the recovery everywhere. I believe that not having the Father’s loving and forgiving heart and not having the Savior’s shepherding and seeking spirit is the reason for our barrenness. I realize that you all work hard, but there is almost no fruit. The Lord said, “By the fruit the tree is known” (Matt. 12:33), but we are a tree without any fruit. Everywhere among us barrenness is very prevailing. A good, gentle pastor may not have a particular gift, such as the gift of speaking; he may simply visit people and welcome them when they come to his meeting, but according to statistics, he will have a ten percent yearly increase. We, however, do not have even a ten percent increase. Can you see how barren we are? Many of you are good speakers, knowing the higher truths. The truths we hold are much higher than those in Christianity. However, we do not have fruit, because we are lacking in the Father’s loving and forgiving heart and the Son’s shepherding and seeking spirit. We condemn and regulate others rather than shepherding and seeking them. We are short of love and shepherding. These are the vital factors for us to bear fruit, that is, to gain people. I am very concerned for our full-time training. Do we train the young ones to gain people or to regulate people? We have to consider our ways, as Haggai said (Hag. 1:5). Our way is not right; something is wrong.
We often condemn others, exposing their failures and defects. We must admit that to speak well of ourselves and to expose others’ defects is our natural disposition. Our disposition is like this by birth. There is no need for us to speak about others’ defects, but we may simply like to do it. Many times the brothers come together and speak about others’ weak points, defects, and failures. I have learned the lesson to be fearful and trembling about speaking of others’ defects. In the world the legal term for this is defamation. Why do we need to speak in a defaming way? However, nearly all of us do this. Because by the Lord’s mercy and grace I have learned the lesson, it is very hard for you to hear me speak of anyone’s defects. Whenever I speak of others’ shortages, I am condemned, saying to myself, “Do you not have shortages?” The Pharisees and scribes brought a sinful woman to the Lord and said, “In the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. What then do You say?” (John 8:5). First, the Lord stooped down. This was to show them humility. He did not stand, saying, “What! Do you come to Me? Let Me tell you something!” The Lord stooped down to write on the ground. According to my study of the Bible, I believe that what the Lord wrote was, “Who is without sin?” It is as if He said, “There is no doubt that she is sinful, and she got caught. But are you without sin?” They charged the Lord to say something, so He said, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her” (v. 7). Their conscience was caught. Everyone, beginning from the older ones, the experienced ones, was smitten. Who is without sin? When you speak of others’ shortages, do you not have shortages? Yet according to our disposition by birth, to speak about others’ defects is our “hobby.” Do you like to expose your own shortages? You do not; you like to cover them.
We must also beware of not conforming to the death of Christ. We should always conform ourselves to His death, but often we do not. We should be warned. Beware of this! Matthew 16:24 says, “If anyone wants to come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me.” To not conform to the death of Christ is to not absolutely deny your self, not others’ self, and bear the cross. To bear the cross is to keep your self on the cross. Do not leave the cross. That is the right place for your self to be. Not to conform to the death of Christ is also not to always crucify your natural man. Often when people contact me, their every word is out of the natural man. Sometimes we crucify our natural man, but most of the time we do not. Not to conform to the death of Christ is also not to put to death your disposition by birth. A person may boast of his race or that he is from a certain country with a prideful spirit and an air of superiority. Some even boast of their disposition by birth. Sometimes I have wanted to say, “Don’t you know that I am a quick person?” However, as soon as this word comes to the tip of my tongue, I must swallow it. Honestly speaking, who is not like this?
This is the word of love which I am burdened to pass on to you all. Ambition, pride, self-justification, and not conforming to the death of Christ are four “gophers.” If we deal with these four matters, the Lord’s recovery will immediately have a revival, and within one month we will see fruit as the result. Trouble after trouble has come to the Lord’s recovery over the years simply because of these four matters. Some co-workers were ambitious, intending to gain a place or a person, using my name to give people the impression that Brother Lee sent them. Did I send them or not? Yes, in a positive sense I did say, “That place needs your help.” Whether or not that was my sending, I do not know, but even if that was a sending, I did not send you to control others, to subdue others, with my name. I have suffered very much because of this. Some people have thought, “Brother Lee is such a person. He would not come to control us, but he would control us through certain other persons.” This has happened in the recovery. Because of this, some people not only rejected this one who utilized my name, but some also rejected me even the more. They said, “Why is Brother Lee so bad?” Actually, the one who went there to utilize my name and misrepresent me caused the trouble. Such a thing transpired two or three years ago among us, and the trouble still remains.
Dear saints, I know that you all love the Lord, and I know that you love the recovery. I also believe that you receive my ministry from the Lord, but there is a big “but.” If you would not deal with these four gophers, everything else means nothing. We may have some capacity, but our capacity will be annulled, annihilated, by our disposition, our pride, and our unwillingness to put our disposition by birth on the cross. The Lord has blessed His recovery and is still blessing it. Look at the spread of the recovery. However, our situation is like that of Song of Songs 2:15, which says, “Catch the foxes for us, / The little foxes, / That ruin the vineyards / While our vineyards are in blossom.” This is my concern, and this is why I purposed to speak these few messages. Our carelessness in these four matters and our failure to beware of these four things are opportunities afforded to Satan to spoil the blossoming of the Lord’s recovery today. The enemy is subtle. We should not be ignorant of his devices.
The Lord is giving us the high peaks of the truth, and we appreciate them and are learning to speak the same thing, but on the hidden side these four negative factors are still remaining among us. This will annul whatever benefit we receive from the high peaks of the divine truths. This is my concern. Doctors are always concerned about hidden germs. My burden is to kill these germs. I have the deep realization that the Lord has had mercy on His recovery to unveil to us all the deep points in His Word. Recently, I spoke a word to explain the four ins in John 14. According to verse 17, the Spirit of reality is not only with us but also in us. Verse 20 continues by saying, “I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” The in of verse 17 is the totality of the three ins in verse 20. God is three: the Father is the source, the Son is the course, and the Spirit is the flow. This can be compared to a river of water, which has a fountain, a spring, and a flow. It is not that there are three kinds of water; it is that the flow is the consummation of the water. The Spirit as the flowing river is the consummation of the Triune God as living water. This can be strongly proved by 2 Corinthians 13:14, which says, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” In actuality, there are not three elements in this blessing. There is only the element of grace and the element of love. What, then, is the third item? It is the transportation, the fellowship, of the elements of grace and love. All cargo needs to be transported. The fellowship of the Spirit is the consummation of the grace of Christ and the love of God. This is an illustration of the high peaks of the truth that we have. I have a burden from the Lord to write a further crystallization-study of Romans. I will give a number of messages on reigning in life by the abundance of the grace that we have received. However, I am concerned that if these four “gophers” are not dealt with among us, the more the deeper truths and higher peaks of the divine revelation are released among us, the more proud we will become. All across this country all the churches are speaking the same thing, which are the high peaks. But the gophers are here, so I feel I must do something.
I will repeat and stress these matters more strongly in the upcoming international conference of co-workers and elders on the full ministry of Christ in His three stages: the stage of His incarnation, the stage of His inclusion, and the stage of His intensification. Intensification is not only to give you more of the Spirit; it is also to cause you to be conformed sevenfold to the death of Christ. Your being crucified, your denial of the self, and your bearing of the cross should be intensified sevenfold. You cannot preach only the side of the Spirit without the side of the cross. If there is no cross, there is no Spirit. Hymns, #279, written by Brother Nee, tells us that we first need the cross and then the Spirit. Stanza 5 says, “When we see the ripened harvest / Of the golden countryside, / We may know that many seeds have / Fallen to the earth and died.” The blossoming harvest is due to seeds falling into the earth to die. The shell of our natural humanity must be broken. First is Golgotha, the cross, and second is Pentecost, the Spirit (stanza 1). Without crossing through the Jordan River, that is, the cross, how can you enter into the good land (stanza 4)? On the one hand, I feel burdened to minister the high peaks of the truth concerning the full ministry of Christ in the flesh, as the life-giving Spirit, and as the sevenfold intensified life-giving Spirit. On the other hand, the Lord has charged me to minister the cross.
Your natural man, your self, can be fed with the high-peak truths. They can make you more ambitious because they give you more capacity, and they can make you prouder because you now have the high peaks. Many people have never heard these things, but today you are hearing them. When you go out to preach and speak them, everyone will welcome you. This will feed you, not in a positive sense but in a negative sense. This feeding is negative. Good doctors who feed their patients first take care to kill the germs. If they do not kill the germs, their feeding will be full of germs. The northern Chinese often eat dumplings with garlic and vinegar. Both garlic and vinegar kill germs. Moreover, vinegar is also good for digestion. The germs are killed, and the people have good digestion. The dumpling-eaters do not become sick, because they are protected by the germ-killers. The garlic and vinegar make their dumplings not only tasteful but also safe. I cannot feed you the high-peak truths without “garlic.” I must minister some garlic and vinegar to you even though this is not sweet. People may prefer honey, but honey is prohibited in the Bible. In the Old Testament the people were not allowed to put honey in the meal offering; rather, they put in salt, which kills germs (Lev. 2:11, 13). I am afraid that in speaking so many high-peak truths, I have fed you with honey. This will eventually kill you. I must put in some salt; we all have to be salted.
I am concerned for the Lord’s recovery. Nothing else on this earth is upon my heart, especially at the end of my course. I must treasure the end of my course. I want to do the best to minister the all-inclusive Christ and the compound, all-inclusive, consummated Spirit, but not without the cross. I will minister “dumplings” to you, but I must put strong garlic in them with much vinegar, the more the better, and the more the safer. I am not so capable to expose all the problems, but I am under the Lord’s dealing. The Lord has given me a thorn. I thank Him for this. I have told Him, “Lord, I love Your dealing. I love this thorn.”
Our full-time training should not have a purpose to keep the trainees in Anaheim to do a work in Anaheim or in Southern California. We should send them back to the places from which they came. Recently, I heard certain ones complaining that they spend much labor to gain people, and they send them to the training for four terms at a great cost, but eventually the trainees do not come back. They are retained in Anaheim. We should not convince the trainees to stay in Anaheim after their four terms. This is to be ambitious, to get people for our work and not for the work of the Lord’s recovery. I am not for this. I am for the Lord’s recovery. The training I set up has the intention to train people from all the nations. I have strongly said that all the foreigners should go back to their country after being trained. A number of trainees from New Zealand wanted to stay, but I encouraged them to go back to New Zealand. Some like to keep more people on the campuses in Southern California, but what about the campuses in other countries? Something wrong is hidden here, and some have complained about it. Do not think that I have the intention to keep the trainees here. If I have such a concept, I should be condemned. This would mean that I am ambitious to get all the best ones to come to Anaheim.
Be careful; do not keep people for your campus. The enemy does things subtly, so the Lord said, “Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation” (Matt. 26:41). We are short of watching and praying, so the subtle one has come in to deceive us. Some like to keep the good ones in their own city, and they complain that the training assigns too many good ones to the other cities. You may say, “We are keeping the trainees so that we can gain more people.” However, to the Lord every place is the same. Whether He gains people in one place or in another is the same. Why do you want to keep people in your place? It is simply for yourself. This is ambition; it is something hidden. Do not think that I do not love the church in your place. My heart is for the recovery, and by the recovery I mean the Lord’s move on the whole earth. I am for the churches, not merely for one church. Therefore, when I see these things, my heart aches.
You must learn to condemn and reject your self to the uttermost and simply take care of the Lord’s interest, of His recovery, and not your work. Then the Lord will honor you. You do not need to go out to advertise. To the Lord money does not mean anything. If we afford Him a way, He will provide. After the Gulf War in 1991, we were ready to afford the Lord a way for His move in Russia, so right away He put His blessing upon us. Where did the saints come from who went to Russia? Many simply wanted to go. This was the Lord’s doing; it was not my doing. I did not go out to convince anyone to give, to go, or to pray, but many prayers were poured out for this move. Now we can see the result. Thousands of the leading cities in Russia, some with over one million people, have been reached by our publications. I have read some of the responses of the Russian people. They ask for more books by Brother Nee and myself. They realize that we are one, and they do not want others’ writings. As of this time we have sent seventy Americans and sixty Chinese, and about seventy Russians have been raised up locally and trained to serve with their full time. This is the result of the Lord’s move, not the result of my work. I am not able to do this much. The Lord has done it.
I have received many letters to which I did not reply, because I knew your concern was merely for your district. This is for your work, and I am not for that. The Lord is spreading widely throughout the world and around the globe. Therefore, I would like to see that all of you are for the concern of the Lord’s recovery, not for the work in your district.
