Please do not have the peace and assurance that as long as you teach things scripturally that it is alright. It is not alright because your teaching creates division. Even your right teaching creates division. We all must realize that, generally speaking, the different denominations do not teach anything wrong. They have all tried and endeavored to teach the right things, the scriptural things. Eventually, however, the Body of Christ has been cut into pieces. We thank the Lord that thousands of missionaries went to China. They brought the Bible, the gospel, and the Lord’s name to China, and they brought a substantial number of God’s chosen ones into the salvation of Christ. Through them, the old, conservative people of China were opened up to receive the things of the Lord. No one can deny this. On the other hand, there were some missionaries who went to China to teach different things according to their concept. As a result, they brought divisions there that have cut the Body of Christ in China into pieces and which could never be healed. What a terrible situation this is! They did something right. They preached the right thing but with a terrible issue. Who is responsible for this? The teacher who taught the right thing to create a division. This is terrible.
We should be on the alert and watchful. We do not want the right teaching. We want the teaching which teaches God’s economy. Now we can understand Paul’s charge in 1 Corinthians to speak the same thing (1:10). What same thing should we speak? Should we speak Bible teaching, how to meet, the way to baptize, the way to edify the saints, the way to help people to be spiritual, or the way to render much help to the Christians that they may grow in life? These are right things to teach. Something from the Bible such as evangelism is altogether right. However, if you do these things and teach them apart from God’s economy, you are divisive. You are divisive in right things, in scriptural things, not in wrong things, heathen things, or pagan things. To teach the Bible and to preach the gospel are not pagan. They are altogether right and altogether scriptural, but we must be on the alert as to whether or not we are divisive. Whatever you teach should not be measured by whether it is wrong or right. It must be measured by whether it is divisive or not. Only one kind of ministry builds up and never divides—this is the unique ministry of God’s economy. We must be reminded that Paul left Timothy in Ephesus with a charge to tell certain ones not to teach differently and that what they teach should be related to God’s economy.
It is impossible for anyone to control the church. No one can control the entire aggregate of Christians today. Even no one can control the Lord’s recovery today. I cannot control it. Please do not think that I am controlling. I am not controlling. I cannot do it and I would not do it. To control means nothing. Paul could not control the situation in Corinth, but he charged the Lord’s seekers and lovers to speak the same thing. Paul also charged his young co-worker, Timothy, to remain in the place which was under the poison of the divisive element of the right things, the scriptural things. Timothy was to charge these teachers not to teach differently. This is what we can do by following the steps of the Apostle Paul. This is what I want to do. If you mean business in the Lord’s recovery, if you love the Lord, and if you are a real seeker of the Lord, you must take care of this—do not teach differently. What then should we teach? We should teach God’s economy. This is the only answer available. No other result will come out of the different teachings but division. It is possible for you to do something like the missionaries, who did a great work in China, but they cut the Body of Christ into pieces. This is much more significant than what they did positively. The situation there was incurable and the Christian situation today is also incurable.
Do not consider that I am rebuking, warning, or threatening you. I am loving all of you. I am speaking a word in love because you all love the recovery. If you do love the recovery, be on the alert, not concerning others, but concerning yourself. Do not be cheated by the enemy. If you love the recovery and if you treasure the ministry, you must realize what the Lord’s recovery is. The recovery is not for any kind of doing. The recovery is for God’s economy in order to keep the oneness of the Body of Christ. This is the Lord’s recovery. If we are through with the oneness, we are through with the recovery, and we will become another repetition of today’s Christianity. Be on the alert to watch for the subtle one, the Devil, who can put any kind of mask on his face to come to you. This is my word of love. You may wonder whom I am talking about. I am talking about those of you who have an intention to teach things different than today’s ministry. You know and the Lord knows whether or not you have such an intention. If you do not have such an intention, praise the Lord. That is alright. We must realize, though, that it is a serious matter to teach scriptural things and good things, yet somewhat different from God’s economy.
As we have seen in our fellowship concerning the New Testament ministry, four names in the New Testament remind us of the seriousness of getting away from God’s economy. The first name is that of John the Baptist. Even he was not on the alert that he was causing trouble to make a division. He initiated the New Testament by ushering in the Savior. Eventually, however, his ministry was in danger of building up a new sect. There were two sects already among the Jews—the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The third sect would have been “the Johnites.” The Lord was wise in allowing John to be in prison. The other names are Barnabas, Apollos, and even the name of the top Apostle, Peter. Even Peter was in danger of falling into division. Peter never fell into division, but his being “grey” in his ministry issued in the Corinthians taking him as a foundation of division (1 Cor. 1:12). Some in Corinth were saying that they were of Cephas, that they were of Apollos, and even that they were of Paul. Paul indicated to the Corinthians that he was nothing (1:13, 15), but Paul never said that Peter was nothing. Paul’s attitude toward the Corinthians was, “Do not say you are of me. I say I am of you.”
The only way that can preserve us in the recovery is the unique ministry. If we say that we are in the recovery, yet we teach something so lightly, even in a concealed way, that is different from God’s economy, we sow the seed that will grow up in division. Therefore, the only way that we can be preserved in the eternal oneness is to teach the same thing in God’s economy. This kind of teaching is called the New Testament ministry, the ministry of the new covenant. The ministry of the new covenant is only to minister the Triune God, processed, to be dispensed into His chosen people as life and life supply to produce members of Christ to form the Body to express the Triune God. This is the New Testament economy. To teach anything, even good things and scriptural things, which is even a little bit apart from God’s New Testament economy will still issue in division and that will be very much used by the subtle one, the evil one. We must, therefore, be on the alert.