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Scripture Reading: 1 Cor. 14:25; 11:25; Matt. 18:19-20; Acts 12:12; Rom. 15:16; John 21:15; 1 Thes. 2:7; Heb. 10:24-25; Eph. 4:12; 1 Cor. 14:1, 3-5, 31; Rom. 14:1, 3; 15:7; Eph. 4:1-6; 1 Cor. 1:10-13; Rom. 16:17; Titus 3:10; Matt. 20:25-27; 23:8-11; 1 Pet. 5:5
In the previous chapter we saw our responsibility for the spreading of the divine truths. A great part of the divine truths we have received from the Bible is based upon the light the Brethren received in the nineteenth century. Those who know the Bible recognize that the best theology is Brethren theology. The notes in the reference Bible written by Dr. C. I. Scofield are mostly from the teachings of the Brethren. This Bible was very popular in the early part of the twentieth century. Based upon the help we received from the Brethren, the Lord has gone on in His present recovery to show us many more divine truths. We need to pick up the burden to spread these truths to the crucial parts of the world.
In this chapter we want to see the way to spread the Lord’s recovery in the countries of Europe. A recent article in The San Francisco Chronicle quoted Dr. J. Gordon Melton’s word that said, “New religious movements are finding fertile soil in Europe where low church attendance and a changing world order have led to a search for spiritual alternatives.” This shows that some need to go to Europe to meet the real need of the seeking ones with the divine truths from the holy Word. After the four-day, four-hour war with Iraq, I received a burden to “invade” Europe with the divine truths of the Lord’s recovery.
We need to see how to carry out the spread of the Lord’s recovery in the countries of Europe. Our going to Europe should be neither by a work nor by a movement but by emigration.
Europe has changed, and the people there are looking for something new. Thus, we should go there in an absolutely new way with nothing traditional. Recently, I was wondering why we have had to pass through so much opposition, persecution, and even rebellion in these past seven and a half years since 1984. I believe that I received the answer. The Lord has prepared us during these seven and a half years to get a new way to meet the new need in Europe. Before 1984 we would not have been able to go to Europe with something new in practice. We could only have gone there with the old, traditional way of meeting and serving. In these recent years I have put out many messages on the God-ordained way. Thus, while the Lord has been preparing Europe, He has used the same period of time, the last seven and a half years, to prepare us in His way of meeting and service as revealed in the New Testament.
Due to the recent changes in Europe, the people there are ready to receive something new from the West. We should not go there with our old “philosophy,” our old way. In the previous chapter I begged us to have a change in our “philosophy.” The young people there do not want any old element of Christianity. They want something new. We need to go to Europe with the Lord’s new way, the God-ordained way. We should go to Europe by emigration, not by a work or by a movement. We will be warmly welcomed because the people there want to receive new things from the Western world. Some of the young people in eastern Berlin begged the brothers to send people there to teach them the Bible.
Some can emigrate to Europe to live the Lord and serve the Lord full time. We should go there to live Christ and serve Him.
Some can emigrate there to take a job or do a business and serve the Lord. One brother reported that one of the best businesses for the American brothers in Eastern Europe is the remodeling of old houses. This is because the houses there are very old and in need of much work.
Some can emigrate there to study in a school and serve the Lord. I would recommend that some go there to be “professional students.” In other words, those who go to school should plan on remaining in school for the Lord’s work on the campuses. The longer they stay in school, the better it is. This is because they can spend their time contacting the students for the Lord’s interest. I hope that many young people among us would go to the universities in Europe to be professional students teaching the divine truths. It is glorious and worthwhile to be such a student, contacting other students daily with the Lord’s truths. I believe that some students who go to Europe can bear new fruit monthly like the tree of life in the New Jerusalem.
All those who want to go to Europe should be burdened by the Lord and have a clear guidance from the Lord.
Initially, I considered that we should go in the first step to Great Britain, France, Germany, and Russia. But after receiving reports from the brothers who traveled to Europe, I realized that our main goal should be eastern Germany and western Russia. Although we will mainly concentrate on eastern Germany and western Russia, this does not mean that no one should go to Great Britain, France, or western Germany. Furthermore, we should realize that Great Britain is very crucial for the Lord’s move throughout Europe.
Today all of Russia is open to our publications. We should not lose the opportunity to fill Russia with our writings. We are looking to the Lord for the publishing of one million copies, as proposed by some Russian brothers to us, of each of the six books we mentioned in chapter 1—The Normal Christian Life, The Spiritual Man, The Experience of Life, The Knowledge of Life, The Economy of God, and God’s New Testament Economy. I hope that we would pray for this.
I expected that we would initially have forty saints who would be willing to be trained in the fall for emigrating to Europe, but thus far, more than one hundred seventy have signed up for going to Europe. We hope that the saints who are burdened and who will be trained in the fall will be able to leave for Europe by January 1992. By that time some of the books in different languages will be prepared. We hope to teach the trainees a foreign language by means of a particular book from the ministry, which we will compose in English and translate into that language. In this way they will be able to pick up the spiritual vocabulary, and they can go to Europe to speak to the people with the truths from the book they have studied.
We are burdened to emigrate to the leading cities that have colleges and universities for us to work on. We are doing research so that we can find all the leading universities in Europe for our emigration there.
We are burdened to go to Europe in a team of at least four saints, including a couple between the ages of thirty to fifty, in whose home the meetings will begin. Every team of saints going to Europe should have a couple, and this couple may have some children. This family will be the center of the team. We will try to help them to get a home close to a college or a university. Hopefully, this home will be big enough for keeping two or three guests. It could serve as a place for some emigrating saints to stay until they can become properly situated. The newly contacted people can be brought to this home for fellowship. This will be our way.
Now we want to see the way to live, to work, to serve, and to meet. First, we need to live a life in resurrection under the cross. To live in resurrection is to live in the Spirit of Christ, who is the reality of the resurrection of Christ, and to live under the cross is to experience the death of Christ in our union with Him in His Spirit for the denying of ourselves and our flesh and for the rejection of the world and its influence.
We also need to work by contacting people in preaching the high gospel, in teaching the deeper truths, and in testifying the Christian experience. We should always practice to contact people one by one. We should not try to preach to a group. We may speak to fifty persons at one time, but eventually we may gain none of these fifty. The most effective way is to contact people one by one.
We need to preach the high gospel. We should not be influenced by the old concept that people will not understand us if we share things that are deep and high. The thoughtful people want to hear the deeper truths concerning the real meaning of human life.
It is possible that we could share with someone about Genesis 1 in the deepest way. We could ask them to read this chapter with us. Then we could say, “Here it says that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The first thing God did was to call light into being, and then God made the air. Later, God caused the dry land to appear for the existence of the plants, the animals, and man. He created man in His image, according to His likeness. In Genesis 1 we see the plant life, the animal life, and the human life, but this is not the highest life. The highest life is seen in the next chapter, and that is the tree of life. For our existence we need the light, the air, and the land, but we are also human beings in God’s image, according to God’s likeness. God’s intention is for us to have His life.” We can then grasp the opportunity to ask them to pray with us and call on the Lord’s name.
If we shared the truth from Genesis 1 with them in such a way, they would wonder where we learned all these things. We can tell them, “I was a Christian for years, and I did not know these things. But one day I read a message that pointed out all these things in Genesis 1.” This will lead them into a further seeking of the divine truths. The next time we see them, we could fellowship with them about the tree of life.
We can speak the high gospel to people from any part of the Bible. It is even possible to preach the gospel from the beginning of Matthew 1. Verse 1 says, “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” From this point we can say something about Christ. Then we can proceed by telling the stories about David and Abraham. We can eventually arrive at the point of the Lord Jesus being the Redeemer and the Savior.
We all have to learn the truths. The entire New Testament has been expounded by us, so we have to study this exposition. From the middle of August to the middle of December, we will have a special four-month training to equip the burdened ones to go to Europe. This equipping will mainly be accomplished by an intensified study of the Life-study messages. After the saints have applied for this four-month training, there will be a process of being accepted to the training, being educated, being trained, and eventually passing the training. All of us need to study the divine truths in the printed ministry to equip us for the preaching of the high gospel.
We should fully abandon the old, traditional, natural way of preaching the gospel. We must have a change to the scriptural, uplifted way of preaching the gospel. Even the way of teaching mathematics has been absolutely changed from the way of teaching years ago. In order to teach the truths properly, we need to get ourselves qualified. We may feel that we need a lot of time to become qualified, but we do not need that much time. The special four-month training we will have from August through December will help us to become qualified. We may feel that we cannot make it, but the training will help us to make it.
We need to be equipped to teach the deeper truths of God’s economy to those in Europe. Most in Christianity do not know the high gospel or the deeper truths. Furthermore, because of the clergy-laity system, they have not been trained to function as living members of the Body of Christ. We need to change our way. The clergy-laity system offends the Lord because it annuls the use of the members of Christ. The Lord wants every member of the entire Body of Christ to work, to function.
The traditional way of Christianity with one man speaking and the rest listening kills the members of the Body of Christ. All the saints can speak for the Lord. To oppose the God-ordained way is to oppose the Lord. The clergy-laity system of Christianity annuls the ability, capacity, gifts, and functions of the saints. When we go to Europe, we need to forget about serving in the way of one person speaking to a congregation. Instead, we should spend our time contacting people one by one. Then we can bring the ones helped by us to a home of the saints near the campus. Spontaneously, we will nourish the ones under our care. We will obey the Lord’s charge to feed His lambs.
I would ask the leading ones to consider their situation. We may have been managing the church for years with little result. Should we not have a change? Today Taiwan makes much money because they have changed much within the last twenty years. We need the training. The training helps us to change.
We also need to serve in the Spirit according to the divine revelation. In the past, did we serve in the Spirit according to the Scriptures? The Spirit surely did not guide us and lead us to serve in the old, traditional, and unscriptural way of meeting and serving. We have to change our way to the new way of meeting and serving. Human culture changes and advances as time goes on, and people need to change to live in this culture. By saying that we need to change, I do not mean that we have to follow the world or fashion ourselves according to the world.
In our work to spread the divine truths, we should always serve in the Spirit. Before I minister the word, I always take some time to pray, “Lord, here I am again. You must fill me up with Yourself. You must infuse me with Your desire, with Your intention, with Your feeling, with Your thought, with Your word, with Your utterance, and with Your expression. Fill me, Lord, and pour Yourself out upon me to be my impact. I don’t want to speak just by myself. I want to speak in You as in one spirit with You. I pray that You would speak in my speaking.” We need to serve in the Spirit in such a way.
Our serving in the Spirit should also be according to the divine revelation in the Scriptures. We should consider how the Bible tells us to preach the gospel. The scriptural way is to preach the gospel by contacting people one by one. Then we need to be like nursing mothers to feed the new ones (1 Thes. 2:7) and like teaching fathers to raise them up in home meetings (v. 11). We also need to have group meetings to perfect them so that they can do the work of the New Testament ministry as the apostles, prophets, evangelists, and shepherds and teachers do (Eph. 4:12). We also need to have larger church meetings, encouraging everyone to prophesy (1 Cor. 14:23-25, 31). This is the biblical way.
We all need to function as priests of the gospel. We have seen the truth revealed in Romans 15:16 concerning the priesthood of the gospel. In this verse Paul says that he was a priest of the gospel of God, presenting the saved nations as sacrifices to God. Preaching the gospel is not merely a matter of getting sinners saved or of winning souls; it is a matter of gaining sacrifices to offer to God. When we go out, we must serve in the Spirit according to the Scriptures as priests of the gospel of God.
We need to meet according to the God-ordained way as revealed in the New Testament, fully in mutuality, avoiding the one-man ministry and abhorring the system of clergy and laity, for worshipping God, remembering the Lord, praying, saving sinners, feeding the new believers, perfecting the saints, and building up the church as the organic Body of Christ, without any element of the traditional way, formality, and ritual (1 Cor. 14:25; 11:25; Matt. 18:19-20; Acts 12:12; Rom. 15:16; John 21:15; 1 Thes. 2:7; Heb. 10:24-25; Eph. 4:12; 1 Cor. 14:1, 3-5, 31). We need to study the truth concerning the God-ordained way. We have published many messages on the God-ordained way, and we need to read these messages.
The God-ordained way of meeting is in mutuality, not in plurality. In the eldership we should have plurality, that is, a number of elders. But the church meetings are not a matter of plurality but of mutuality. We may arrange to have ten or twenty speak in the meeting. This is plurality. But when the meeting is open for everyone to speak, this is mutuality. I speak, and you listen; then you speak, and I listen. This is mutuality. Mutuality, not plurality, is the biblical way. The biblical way is for the church meetings to be open for everyone to function.
We have to practice all the aspects of the God-ordained way. Then we will be qualified to go to Europe. Europe has changed and is still changing. The people there will not accept anything old. Many of them have dropped atheism and communism. They like democracy and they want to know the things concerning God as the Bible reveals, but they do not want any kind of empty religion. This is why we have to learn to minister Christ to people according to the God-ordained way revealed in the New Testament.
In our meetings, which are grounded on the unique oneness of the Body of Christ, we receive all real believers in Christ without any terms (Rom. 14:1, 3; 15:7). Any term or condition added to the faith in Christ, which is the unique term for us to be members of Christ, causes divisions.
We should attend, if necessary, the Christian meetings that are grounded on the unique oneness of the Body of Christ, without trying to adjust, correct, or improve the way of their service and meeting. We should avoid going to other meetings that are not grounded on the unique oneness of the Body of Christ. We should go to Europe to have a new start with the Lord’s new way. Our time is short, so we should spend it to contact people in a new way with the high gospel, the deeper truths, and the Christian experience.
The full-timers should live a life by faith, trusting in the Lord for their necessities and receiving the Lord’s supply through the saints and the churches. If we feel led and burdened by the Lord to go full time, we should not worry about our necessities. We have to believe in the Lord and put our trust in Him. We should not think that we will have a prosperous life in material things. We must get ourselves prepared to suffer. The first suffering is poverty. We need to learn to serve the Lord in poverty. Some think that if they serve the Lord in poverty, that is a sign they have not been chosen and called by the Lord. However, the apostle Paul was in poverty (2 Cor. 6:10; 11:27). Because the churches established by him did not adequately support him, he was forced to make tents (Acts 18:3). At the same time, he ministered to the needs of his co-workers (20:34).
When I was called by the Lord to serve Him full time, I thought that He had just called me to preach the gospel to my countrymen in the villages. I told the Lord that as long as I could have water to drink and food to eat, I would be satisfied. I never thought that the Lord would bring me to the big cities of mainland China and eventually to Taiwan and the United States. In 1961 I came to the United States with the intention of staying here for the Lord’s recovery. At that time I had just a little amount of cash on hand to meet my need. However, the Lord supplied me with enough for my necessities. The Lord is faithful to meet all our needs when we follow Him and His calling.
By the Lord’s mercy, I have learned how to be abased in poverty and how to abound (Phil. 4:12). If we have the money, we should learn to save some for others and for the needs of the churches. To serve the Lord in this way is glorious. If the Lord has called us and sent us, He will surely take care of us. He has a way to supply us through the saints and the churches.
When we serve the Lord, we should not have the thought that we are hired in any sense by anyone or by any church. If the church supplies us, that does not mean that the church hires us. That is not a wage but the Lord’s supply through the church. We have to fully realize that the Lord in supporting us needs His Body (the church) and the members of His Body (the believers) to cooperate with Him. He does not supply us directly by Himself but indirectly through His Body and His members.
We need to keep the oneness of the Body of Christ and maintain a good order in the Body of Christ so that the Lord’s recovery can be kept to go on in the proper way.
We should always endeavor to keep the unique oneness of the Body of Christ locally and universally (Eph. 4:1-6). This should be the prerequisite of our remaining in the recovery.
According to 1 Corinthians 1:10-13, we must condemn any kind of division.
We also must turn away from those who make divisions (Rom. 16:17; Titus 3:10). This is why I published the book entitled The Fermentation of the Present Rebellion. Because some are sick, full of the germs of division, they need to be quarantined. This is according to Romans 16:17, where Paul charges us to turn away from those who make divisions. If we do not turn away from them, we will be infected with the same disease of division. To turn away from such ones is for our preservation. According to Titus 3:10, a factious, divisive person should be refused, rejected, after a first and second admonition in order to keep the oneness of the Body of Christ.
In the Lord’s recovery, on the one hand, we should keep the oneness of the Body of Christ, and on the other hand, we should maintain a good order in the Body of Christ. For the Lord’s recovery to remain in a proper condition, we need both the oneness and a good order.
We must maintain a good order in the Body of Christ by abandoning any kind of dictatorship (Matt. 20:25-27; 23:8-11). According to Matthew 20 and 23, we all are brothers. There is no rank among us. Ambition for higher rank in the Lord’s recovery must be fully killed.
We abandon any kind of dictatorship, but we maintain a good order in the Body of Christ by subjecting ourselves one to another (1 Pet. 5:5). Even the older ones should subject themselves to the younger ones. We have God as our Father, and we have Christ as our Lord and Head. This indicates that we should be a submissive people. Although we are all brothers, Paul tells us that we should obey the ones leading us and submit to them (Heb. 13:17). The church is not an anarchy, but on the other hand, in the church the elders should not lord it over the saints (1 Pet. 5:3). There needs to be a good order in the church. According to 1 Peter 5:5, the younger men should be subject to elders, which includes all older men. The young people among us need to practice this. The elders among us, on the other hand, should have no attitude or feeling of superiority. We need a good and beautiful order in the church, with all being subject to one another in the fear of Christ (Eph. 5:21).
We will have a special training for four months to prepare and equip the burdened ones in foreign languages. These languages at first will be German and Russian. The more languages we can learn, the more useful we can be in the spread of the divine truths.
We will also prepare and equip those who are burdened to go to Europe with an intensive study of the divine truths.
This special training will prepare the burdened ones in the manner of life. The brothers among us need to learn to dress properly, as those who live Christ. If a high-ranking person invited us to his home for dinner, we would surely go properly and appropriately dressed. We need to realize that the One who has invited us to the church meetings is the Lord Jesus. He is there waiting for us in the meeting. Therefore, we should dress properly when we attend the meetings. The brothers should wear a proper tie and comb their hair properly. They should also shine their shoes regularly. We should not be worldly, but on the other hand, we should be comely and neat. We should pray about how to cut and style our hair. The sisters, especially, need to do this. The appearance of the sisters means a lot. A sister in Christ should be comely in a proper way, remembering that she is one who fears God, worships God, lives Christ, and ministers Christ.
The special training will also help the burdened ones in the personal contacting of people. We have to learn to be polite when we contact people. We need to learn how to sit before people, especially before someone who is older than we are. We should also be very proper in contacting those of the other sex. The sisters should remember their position in the Lord as females. If we behave ourselves properly in our contact with people, this will open the door for the gospel and the deeper truths. Otherwise, the door will be shut. Again, this shows that we need a change. We need the training.
Finally, nothing is more crucial, vital, or valuable than the one accord for keeping the oneness. We must always endeavor to keep the oneness by practicing the one accord. We should always practice going along with others, not insisting on our way of doing things. We should not be “back-seat drivers” in the church life who are full of opinions. This does not mean that we should drop our discernment. When I do things by myself, I will take the top way. But when I go with others, I will take their way. We should learn to do this.
We also need to learn to teach the divine truths in the central lane of God’s New Testament economy. I served the Lord with Brother Nee for eighteen years, and we never had any discrepancy in our teaching concerning Christ and the church in the central lane of God’s economy. In our teachings we always practiced the one accord.
If we open to the Lord and receive the fellowship in this book, I believe we will be blessed, we will enjoy the Lord to the uttermost, and we will be a living testimony to the people of Europe.
