To carry out the New Testament priesthood of the gospel, we have to perfect the saints that they may do the work of the ministry to build up the Body of Christ (Eph. 4:11-12). To perfect the saints is to entreat and console the saints as a father (1 Thes. 2:11). Paul told the Thessalonians first in 2:7 that he was a nursing mother. Then in verse 11 he said that he was a consoling and entreating father. To entreat implies teaching and beseeching. It implies giving instructions, even with rebuking, admonishing, and warning, but this is not done without consoling. Our children need our consolation.
To perfect the saints is also to teach the saints publicly and from house to house, admonishing them unceasingly night and day with tears, even for three years, according to the pattern of the Apostle Paul (Acts 20:20, 31). For Paul to teach the saints publicly must have been publicly in bigger meetings. From house to house might be in groups. We have to do these two things. First, we need to have bigger meetings to give people messages to perfect them. We also have to go to their homes, from house to house, to admonish them as Paul did night and day with tears even for three years. After the Apostle Paul established the church in Ephesus, he did not stay away from the church. Instead, he visited the church, and he once stayed there for three years to do the perfecting work in the public meetings and in the homes of the saints, from house to house. He did this not only during the night, but also during the day. He practiced to perfect the saints even with tears. There has not been such a thing among us in the churches.
All of us, especially the leading ones and the co-workers, must uproot our old way and plant the new way. We must exercise ourselves in the new way. Both the brothers and the sisters need to be nursing mothers and entreating and consoling fathers in taking care of the new ones. We have to have meetings to speak to them in order to perfect them. Besides these meetings, we need to go to visit them in their homes, visiting them from house to house. We need to visit the believers and have group meetings with them in their homes. We should not have the group meetings in our home all the time. Then we will make our home a “church.” It is better to have the group meetings one week in our home, the next week in someone else’s home, and the third week in another’s home.
All the gifted persons—not only the apostles, the prophets, and shepherds and teachers, but also the evangelists— should participate in the perfecting of the saints (Eph. 4:11-12). In particular, the evangelists have to perfect the saints to preach the gospel. The evangelists need to teach the saints the gospel truths. The saints need to be taught the truth concerning regeneration, justification, the washing away of sins and the forgiving of sins, and reconciliation. The evangelists need to teach the saints the distinctions and the differences among these truths.
They should also teach the saints techniques in the preaching of the gospel. In order to be effective in going to others for the preaching of the gospel, we have to learn many things. We have to learn the proper way to dress and comb our hair. We have to learn how to knock on the doors and how to speak an opening word. The saints need to be taught how to contact people and how to discern people. In a training in Taipei in 1954, I helped the saints to discern people by classifying them into different categories. When we go to visit people, we have to know people. When someone begins to talk to us, we may discern that he is a lover of money or of education. We have to talk to him in a way that matches the kind of person he is. Another person with whom we are talking may be a slow person. If we talk to him in a quick way, we will offend him. We have to know people in order to preach the gospel effectively. The new way will open up many new fields in the church life. This is why there is the need for the perfecting of the saints.
The purpose of the perfecting is to make all the common saints equipped to do the same work as the gifted persons do, that is, to build up the Body of Christ organically. Today only a minority of the saints can do the work of the ministry, but the day will come when everyone will be able to do the same thing. The perfecting of the saints helps the saints to arrive at the oneness of the faith and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ (Eph. 4:13). For the saints to arrive at a full-grown man, they need to be brought up. This is why Paul said that he was burdened to announce Christ in all wisdom so that he could present every believer full-grown in Christ (Col. 1:28-29). By growing in Christ, eventually we will arrive at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, which is the Body of Christ, the expression of Christ. This needs us to hold to truth in love that we may grow up into Christ, the Head, in all things (Eph. 4:15) for the organic building up of the church.
The perfecting of the saints also helps the saints to be no longer babes carried about by every wind of teaching (Eph. 4:14). The perfecting of the saints causes the Body of Christ to grow out from the Head unto the building up of the Body itself in love, through two groups of members: through every joint of the rich supply being joined closely together and through the operation in measure of each one part being knit together (Eph. 4:16). To perfect the saints will cause the entire Body, the entire church, to grow.
In order to carry out the New Testament priesthood of the gospel according to the Lord’s up-to-date recovery, all of us also need to prophesy for the building up of the church as the organic Body of Christ (1 Cor. 14:3-5). This requires the growth in life and in truth through some particular training. We need some training to train the saints in the growth in life and in the truth. There is also the need of some tutoring of the saints to enable them to prophesy. This is the face to face, one on one, tutoring. In order to prophesy, we also need to walk and live under the enlightenment of the divine light. If we are persons always under the light that we may be enabled to know the divine things, we will be able to prophesy. Furthermore, to prophesy we need to be always ready to receive spiritual inspiration in the constant fellowship with the Lord. We need to know the Word, we need to have the growth in life, we need to live under the divine light, and we always need to be ready to receive God’s inspiration. Then we will be enabled to prophesy.
To carry out the New Testament priesthood of the gospel, we must have a time with the Lord every morning. During this time we should pray-read a few verses of a certain chapter of the Bible. By doing this, we will have some inner feeling which may be called the inner inspiration. We can then write down something to remind us of what we have been inspired with. We need to do this morning by morning for six days, from Monday to Saturday. On Saturday evening we can put all the inspirations that we have received during the past six mornings together and compose something to prophesy for the Lord’s Day morning meeting.
We should try to adjust what we compose so that we do not speak more than three minutes. If possible it is better to compose a prophecy with the help of someone who can act as a tutor. Two saints may even get together to tutor each other. They can even practice prophesying to each other so that they can adjust one another. In this way we can be ready to prophesy in the Lord’s Day morning meeting. In the past, we may not have known what to speak or how to speak, but now we can have something when we come to the meeting. First Corinthians 14:26 tells us that whenever we come together, each one has something. When the time comes for us to speak, we can speak according to what we have labored on. We should not read what we have composed, but we should speak it.
At the beginning, what we speak may not be so organic, but we should try again and again by exercising our spirit. Then we will be brought into an organic situation, and we will improve. I believe that we will improve in two things. First, every morning we will have a good time with the Lord to enjoy Him with a few verses. When we pray-read these few verses, we will be nourished and receive some inspiration. This is very, very basic to our Christian life. By practicing this, we can lay a good foundation for us to do many things. This will enable us to feed the young ones, to go to home meetings and group meetings to help others. Furthermore, as we enjoy the Lord morning by morning in His Word, spontaneously, we will be built up to prophesy. Second, our capacity to prophesy will be developed unto our ability. We were created by God with a certain talent. Our God-given talent in addition to our education gives us a certain capacity. If we love the Lord and allow the Spirit to work in us, this working will be added to our natural capacity, producing a spiritual gift. As a result, some of the saints will not only prophesy in the Lord’s Day morning meetings but will also prophesy in the way of giving messages. They will be manifested as gifted persons in prophesying. It is in this way that the talents, the gifts, among us will be manifested. All the riches will be released to supply the entire Body. The abilities, the capacities, of the saints will be developed into gifts.
I hope that all of us would take the fellowship that we have received in this book and put it into practice. We need to remember that the basic thing is for us to uproot the old way and to plant the new way.