Our traditional way of meeting was inherited from Christianity. Although we have been delivered from Christianity, the traditions of Christianity have not been purged from us. In the past, we did not see any other way to meet besides the traditional way. Hence, our meetings followed the tradition of Christianity. On the one hand, the old way of meeting was successful, but on the other hand, it matched our natural man. The older generation always charged the young people not to speak much, regardless of where they went or what the occasion was, because young people easily make mistakes. Therefore, they taught that the less you speak, the fewer mistakes you will make. If you do not speak, you will make no mistakes, but if you speak much, you will make many mistakes. This became a motto for people in general. Thus, when people come to the meetings, they just sit quietly and wait for the preacher to speak a good message for them. This kind of meeting, in which one person speaks and everyone else listens, is very convenient and is welcomed by almost everyone.
During the first few years that I began the work in the United States, we had a twenty to thirty percent increase in number every year. But in the past five years we have had an increase of less than two percent. When I discovered this, it made me very discouraged, and I wanted to find out the reason. So I came back to Taiwan to study the condition in Taiwan, and I found out that even though we were preaching the gospel and baptizing people every year, in the end the total number was still decreasing.
Some people told me that the reasons for the decrease were twofold. They said that the first reason was that many saints from Taipei had moved away because they had remodeled or built new houses outside Taipei and that when these ones moved away, we lost track of their whereabouts. This statement is not completely correct because we did not lose the whereabouts of any of those who moved. They said that the second reason was that more and more younger saints were going to the United States to study. This is surely true, but we cannot say that the number of those who went abroad to study exceeded the number of people who were saved. After I observed these phenomena I went back to study the Bible and church history. In the end I clearly saw that the problem was that the old way of meeting did not work and was not able to make people stay.
Our traditional way of meeting was to shut people’s mouths so that the longer people met with us, the more they did not open their mouths. There is a Chinese saying that says, “A newborn calf does not fear the tiger.” When the newly saved ones first came to the meetings, they were like little children, saying a few words. But sadly, after three to five years of meeting with us they would no longer say anything. The older they got, the more they did not speak. Under this kind of condition it was hard to bring in new ones, and it was even harder to make them stay. Hence, in the past when we preached the gospel, we may have baptized a hundred people, but less than ten stayed. For this reason we felt that we must change the system. Acts shows us that we should meet from house to house (2:46; 5:42; 20:20), so in light of this we will now change the system.
Recently, there have been meetings in the communities. If the elderly saints have the burden, I hope they also would join these meetings to help those in the communities and to establish home meetings with them. This will be effective. During our history of more than thirty years in Taiwan, never before have we had twenty-four thousand people baptized in less than four months. We estimated that one out of every four baptized would remain, but the results have been beyond our estimation. Out of twenty-four thousand people who have been baptized, eight thousand have remained. This does not, however, mean that we lost sixteen thousand. Some of the ones baptized have been unable to come into our midst for a time because of certain situations such as moving. Through our one-on-one visitations, five thousand out of these eight thousand people have already signed up. The first cause of this impact was our door-knocking, and the second cause was the continuous labor of the trainees who sacrificed their Lord’s Day meetings to meet with the new ones in their homes. This is inspiring and encouraging.
We have seen that the change in system is necessary. Through much fellowship we have more or less entered into this burden. I hope that the older saints would take the lead to pray for those who have received the burden to visit and take care of the new ones and for the commission that these ones have received. I also hope that you would try your best to join the group meetings and to pay attention to the group meetings. We have to realize that our gatherings in the homes are more important than the big meetings at the meeting halls. We have said earlier that big meetings and small meetings go together like the two wings of a 747 airplane. If an airplane had only one wing, the airplane would not be able to take off. Two wings are required for an airplane to fly. The small meetings are the base, and the big meetings are the harvest.
The basis of a big meeting hall is the homes, just as the basic unit of a nation is the home. Without homes, a society has no basis. Without homes, a nation also has no basis. Hence, we must first establish the homes. Only in the homes can we produce people, and only in the homes can we beget, nourish, and teach people. I hope that the begetting, nourishing, and teaching would all be done in the homes. Thus, the elders of all the halls must lead and oversee the saints so that they would have at least one small group meeting a week. You may be exempt from other things but not from the small group meetings.