According to our experiences and the study of the New Testament, we have found out that the group meetings occupy about eighty percent of the practical church life. If there are no group meetings in our local church, our church life cannot be that practical, strong, and living. We all must be trained to have these group meetings. The group meeting should not start after we arrive at the meeting place. It should be started in our home even before we have dinner. Before a brother begins to eat his dinner, he can sing to the Lord with a view that he is going to the group meeting. After he eats dinner, he can continue to sing to the Lord and keep singing in his car on the way to the meeting. Sometimes he may stop singing and begin to pray. If his wife goes with him to the meeting, they can both sing and pray together. But what if a brother has a disagreement with his wife before going to the group meeting? He needs to make a quick confession. While he is still in the car he can pray, “Lord, forgive me for my attitude toward my wife.” Then he can turn to his wife and say, “Dear, please forgive me.” Then his wife can tell him that she forgives him. They can both thank the Lord that His blood cleanses them. They can sing and pray together about the cleansing blood. Together they can pray, “Lord Jesus, how we thank You for Your cleansing blood which keeps us living in Your presence and joyful in You. Thank You that we can live in Your presence without any hindrances or obstacles because Your blood cleanses us all the time.”
The cleansing blood that this brother and his wife experience on the way to the meeting can be a subject for the group meeting. When he and his wife enter into the meeting place, they can say, “Hallelujah! Hallelujah! The blood of Jesus cleanses us!” After eight or ten of the saints have arrived at the meeting, this brother may give a testimony: “Brothers, while my wife and I were getting into the car, I expressed a wrong attitude toward her. That offended her and silenced her in the car. I began to feel that was not so good, so I asked the Lord to forgive me. Then I turned to my wife, confessed my weakness, and asked for her forgiveness. She forgave me, and we both became happy again. We began to thank and praise the Lord for His precious blood that always keeps us living in His marvelous and wonderful presence.” After this kind of testimony, an older sister may say, “Praise the Lord! I experienced the same thing this morning. I thanked the Lord for His cleansing blood and asked Him to forgive me for my attitude toward my husband.”
After hearing these testimonies, a young sister may say that she does not know what the Lord’s blood is. A brother in the meeting can respond, “The blood is the Lord’s blood which He shed for our sins. In Matthew 26 the Lord Jesus told us clearly that He shed His blood for the forgiveness of our sins. This blood is powerful in the eyes of God. When we confess our sins and apply the Lord’s blood to our situation, this blood cleanses us in the eyes of God.” When this brother gives such a word, it is a teaching to the young sister and also to all the other attendants. Everyone hears something concerning the cleansing of the blood.
Another brother in the meeting may say, “We have an enemy, Satan, who is always accusing us. When we have even a small failure, he accuses us. The New Testament tells us that the blood of Jesus overcomes Satan, our accuser. When we make a mistake, we have no peace within us. This is because of God’s condemnation, but at the same time the accuser is there accusing us. His accusation troubles us. When we confess our sins to God and apply the blood of the Lamb, which is the blood of the Lord Jesus, this blood washes away our sins. Then God forgives us and the accuser, the Devil, has no ground to accuse us any more.” This brother’s speaking is a little deeper than the other brother’s speaking. In this group meeting, two brothers speak on the blood—one at the beginning and the other at the completion. Their speaking does not take too much time, but what they speak is a spontaneous teaching. If this kind of spontaneous teaching takes place in our group meetings, the saints will hear something of the truth every week and year-round.
Whenever we have the group meetings, we are free to cover all kinds of matters. This is included in our fellowship together. As I have illustrated, the fellowship in a group meeting may usher in a question about the cleansing blood of Jesus. That question results in an answer by two brothers. These answers become a good, practical teaching. After the two brothers speak, a young sister who is strong in praising the Lord may say, “Lord Jesus, how we praise You! We praise You for Your blood—the overcoming, prevailing, washing blood that keeps us clean in the eyes of God and that always keeps our enemy away.” Another brother who is very thoughtful may ask another question. He may ask, “Suppose I commit a sin and I confess this sin, but I don’t have the feeling that the Lord’s blood has cleansed me?” This question will bring in further teachings from another angle. By this we can see that the group meetings will have many teachings. These teachings are not out of a lesson book as in a classroom, but they are teachings in a living way through the fellowship. What is spoken may not sound like a teaching, but it actually is a teaching. It is a teaching in the fellowship of the Christian brotherhood.
In order to carry out the New Testament priesthood of the gospel, we should first go to get sinners saved to make them sons of God and members of Christ. Then we should continue to feed them, to nourish and cherish them, as nursing mothers do with their infants. Within one or two weeks, we should bring them to the group meetings because these newly saved ones are not used to fellowship-ping with believers. They do not have this kind of habit. We have to bring the ones that we save and feed out of their houses to the nearby group meetings. After attending two group meetings, they will become familiar with the saints. They will observe how Christians meet together and take care of one another. They will be inspired and incited to love and good works. They will begin to participate in the meetings and even learn to ask questions and answer questions.
As a new brother begins to read his Bible, he may have a question concerning what the Sabbath is. A young sister may say, “God created the heavens and the earth with all things in six days. Then on the seventh day He rested, and this day became a Sabbath. The Sabbath is not only for God to rest but also for us to rest.” This speaking by this young sister should be considered as a teaching, but this teaching is not so complete. Another middle-aged sister who has been in the church for about five years may say a little more: “The Bible tells us that God worked in creation for six days, and after working He rested. God created man on the sixth day. When man came out of God’s creating hand, he immediately entered into rest. Man does not work first and then rest. Instead, man should rest and enjoy God and then begin to work. God works first and then He rests; but man should rest first and then work.” Then another brother can say, “What this sister described concerning the Sabbath is grace not law.” Within a short time, the saints have rendered a very good teaching.
Questions concerning the truth will bring out more things and other questions. Another young brother who was recently saved last week may ask another question concerning what God’s economy is. The answers to these questions do not come just from one person but from all the attendants. In the group meetings, everyone is equal. Everyone has an equal opportunity, the equal time, and the equal right to fellowship something, to say something, to ask something, and also to answer. We should not assign anyone to take the lead in a group meeting, but someone will spontaneously bear the responsibility of that group.
If we assign a brother to be the leader of a group meeting and also assign a helper to help him, this is organization. We do not like to have any element of organization in the church. Everything must be organic. We must kill any element of organization among us. We want to keep the group meeting in the hands of all the saints. Everyone in the group meeting is a leader. Even if a brother was baptized the previous night, he can be one of the leaders in the meeting because he has an equal opportunity to speak, to fellowship, to ask questions, and to answer others’ questions. All of the attendants in the group meeting can answer questions. Eventually, all these short answers added together equal a complete teaching of a certain truth. In one group meeting, three truths may be taught. Just as we illustrated, the truth concerning the blood of Christ, the Sabbath, and God’s economy may be taught in a group meeting. Therefore, year-round many truths will be spontaneously covered. To cover the truths in this way is according to the way of the Bible. The Bible is not written in the way of a lesson book. The divine truths are scattered throughout the entire Bible.
I wrote Truth Lessons and Life Lessons according to an educational system in a systematic and progressive way. When we come to the group meetings, however, we should forget about having lessons according to the proper sequence. I am not saying, though, that we should not use Truth Lessons in the group meetings. If possible, all the attendants of a group meeting should own a copy of Truth Lessons. If we turn to any page of Truth Lessons, we will receive some benefit. Books such as Truth Lessons and Life Lessons are extremely profitable to read. Some saints practice putting the Life- studies and the publications of the ministry throughout their home. If we read just a few lines from the Recovery Version footnotes or the Life-studies, we will receive some profit. We need to redeem our time to get into the holy Word and into the publications that open up the holy Word. We may not need to use Truth Lessons in the group meetings, but we need to get ourselves prepared, strengthened, and instructed in the holy Word so that we will gain more and more knowledge concerning the things of God. The riches that we gain will come out in the group meetings.