Some have wrongly said that the teaching of the apostles is only those teachings which the twelve apostles learned of Jesus and passed on to the believers. The Lord surely taught His disciples much in the Gospels, especially in Matthew and John. But in John 16 the Lord told them that He had many things to tell them which they could not bear at that time. He could not release these things until the Spirit of reality would come and unveil all these things to them (vv. 12-13). That meant that after the Lord’s death and resurrection, the Spirit of reality would come to the apostles and unveil more to them.
The main apostle to whom the Spirit revealed more was the apostle Paul. So Paul said in Colossians 1:25 that he was charged to complete the word of God. The word of God here is concerning the mystery (v. 26), which is Christ as the mystery of God (Col. 2:2) and the church as the mystery of Christ (Eph. 3:4). Without Paul’s fourteen Epistles, the holy word concerning the divine revelation of this mystery could never have been completed.
The Spirit of reality also revealed more things to the apostle John in the book of Revelation. Who could write a book like Revelation with the seven lampstands, seven Spirits, seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven bowls? It was written by the Lord Jesus as the Spirit through His disciple John. John received the revelation of the mystery of Christ in his spirit (Rev. 1:10). Thus, John said that after the book of Revelation, no one can add anything or subtract anything (22:18-19). From Matthew to Revelation is the entire teaching of the New Testament as the teaching of the apostles.
At Paul’s time some people were teaching the Old Testament genealogies and the law. Others were teaching Gnosticism and asceticism. These different teachings surely were not the ministry. All the works (the ministries) of teachings other than the teaching of the apostles for the accomplishment of God’s New Testament economy are not counted in the unique ministry of the New Testament (1 Tim. 1:3-4). The so-called ministries are the factors for so many denominations today. The teaching of baptism by immersion resulted in the Baptist denomination. The teaching concerning the management of the church by the presbytery, a body of elders, issued in the establishment of the Presbyterian denomination. All denominations have their own ministries. In the Lord’s recovery we do not have many different ministries; we have only one ministry. If we received all the so-called ministries as the ministries of the denominations, we would have to receive the ministries of the Presbyterians, the Baptists, the Methodists, the Episcopalians, etc. These different ministries and teachings issue in divisions.
In the New Testament there is only one ministry with one kind of teaching and one fellowship. The early believers continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching and the apostles’ fellowship (Acts 2:42). This fellowship of the divine life is between the apostles and the believers (1 John 1:1-3a), between the apostles and the Triune God (1 John 1:3b), and also among all the believers (1 John 1:2-3, 7). This fellowship is not like that of a school fraternity. The students in a school may have their fraternity, but this fraternity does not have the flow of the divine life, the growth of the divine life, and the produce of the divine life. The divine fellowship is flowing, growing, and reproducing. It is the issue of the eternal life and is actually the flow of the eternal life within all the believers, who have received and possess the divine life. The fellowship of the apostles is the fellowship of the divine life, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in all the believers (2 Cor. 13:14), and the fellowship of the Body of Christ in the oneness of the Spirit (Eph. 4:3-4a).
We need to pay our full attention to the seven items we have mentioned above: constitution, growth, transformation, building up plus one ministry, one teaching, and one fellowship. If all the Christians would stick themselves to these seven things, who could make a division? As the members of the vital groups, we must be clear about this. If we are not clear about this, we are not qualified to be members of the vital groups. We may be in a certain group, but that group may not be vital.
When I came into the recovery, I made a strong determination to pick up the ministry for the building up of the Body, that is, the ministry in the line of God’s eternal plan with life by the Spirit. For sixty-one years I have not changed. I have been absolutely one with the ministry.
Since we all have seen this, we must be persons who live in the Spirit, walk in the Spirit, and do everything in the Spirit. How can we be victorious? How can we be overcoming? We must live, walk, and do things in the Spirit. How can we be holy? We must live, walk, and do things in the Spirit. How can we be spiritual? We must live, walk, and do things in the Spirit. Whatever we are going to do, we should not do it until we realize that we are in the Spirit. We should not talk until we can say, “Yes, I am in the Spirit.” Degraded Christianity makes things so complicated, but actually the Christian life, the church life, is the simplest life. It is a life in the Spirit. We must stand fast in the divine revelation and practice this one point of the Christian life, that is, to live, to walk, and to do everything in the Spirit.
If we are such people, we are ready to move with the Lord. We have to realize that we, the members of Christ, are the New Testament priests of the gospel. The first thing the priests should do is to offer the sacrifices to God. Today in the New Testament, our sacrifices are not cattle, are not sheep and oxen. Our sacrifices are the saved sinners becoming the members of Christ (Rom. 15:16; 1 Pet. 2:5, 9). We are offering them as members of the Body of Christ. In God’s eyes, they are the living sacrifices (Rom. 12:1). This is the first thing we have to do.