Prayer: Lord, how we thank You for another meeting. We thank You for Your everlasting mercy, in which we live and in which You have come to us. Lord, we thank You for Yourself, we thank You for being a Spirit, we thank You for Your living word, and we thank You for this present message. Lord, cleanse us. We trust in the cleansing by Your precious blood that You shed for us on the cross. Lord, we thank You for Your anointing. You are the compound, all-inclusive, consummated Spirit who dwells within us. Lord, we thank You for Your presence, and even now we enjoy Your presence and we sense Your presence. Lord, we worship You. We worship the Lord Jesus as the embodiment of the processed Triune God. We thank You for Your speaking, for Your oracle. Thank You that there is an oracle of Yourself today on this earth. Lord, we thank You for Your speaking that is fresh to all of us every day. We believe You will speak to us again in a new way. Lord, let us be met by You, touched by You, nourished by You, strengthened by You, and supplied by You. Thank You for Your bountiful supply that meets all of our needs. Be with us and be one spirit with us in this speaking. Thank You, Lord. Amen.
This chapter is not a continuation of the foregoing chapters. I have a burden in this chapter to meet the need of the present situation in the Lord’s recovery. We need to see something concerning the oracle of God. Some among us have said that it is wrong to listen to one man’s speaking. Actually, our words are empty and are not worth listening to. However, in this universe we have One who is real, who is true, who is faithful and holy, who is our life and our light, and who is our love and enjoyment. This One is our speaking God. The Bible tells us that God has spoken (Heb. 1:1-2). He has been speaking from the Old Testament time and today in the New Testament time through all the dispensations and through all the generations. Our God is a living God and a speaking God. We have a living God who is speaking every day. Some of us can testify that we enjoy the real, practical, and genuine speaking of God to us morning by morning. All of us should be able to testify that we enjoy the practical speaking of God to us every week.
How does God speak to us? God is a Spirit. We have a spirit, and God as the Spirit speaks to us in our spirit. Our spirit is the organ through which God speaks to us. God also speaks to us through some channel, and that channel is His word in the Bible. Sometimes when we read the Bible, we hear and receive God’s speaking, but many times we do not. The word of God is printed in black and white and is available for everyone to read. However, not everyone at every time hears God’s speaking through the channel of His word. If we have a sincere, seeking spirit and if we open to the Lord from the depths of our being as we read the Bible, it will be easy for us to hear God’s speaking and receive God’s word. God’s word will reach us.
We may have heard God’s speaking and received God’s word, but can we speak something from the Bible in the way of new light? To illustrate what I mean, let us look at 2 Corinthians 3:8-9: “How shall not rather the ministry of the Spirit be in glory? For if the ministry of condemnation came in glory, much rather the ministry of righteousness abounds in glory.” We may read the phrase “the ministry of the Spirit” and the phrase “the ministry of condemnation” many times without receiving new light in God’s speaking. Who can tell us what the ministry of the Spirit and the ministry of condemnation are? Some of us may be able to answer this question based upon the help that we have received from the Life-study of 1 Corinthians. I told the saints in the 1988 Summer Training on Leviticus that a person could read Leviticus again and again without ever understanding all the significances of the offerings. The messages in that training, however, helped us to understand the real significance of each offering.
Many of us can testify that the Life-study Messages uncover us, take our veil away, and open up our eyes. The Life-studies help us to go further and see even more. The Bible is a rich, deep, and profound gold mine. There is much gold hidden deep in this mine, and the Life-study Messages open up this mine. They open up the unsearchable Word of God. When we receive such an opener, we have to dig and dig to get the gold in the rich mine of the Bible. Even though I have published Life-study Messages on the twenty-seven books of the New Testament, I am still digging in the rich mine of the New Testament. There is an inexhaustible supply of gold there.
In 2 Corinthians 4:1, Paul said that the apostles have “this ministry.” A careful reader of the Bible can tell us that “this ministry” referred to in 4:1 is the ministry of the Spirit and the ministry of righteousness in 3:8-9. If we do not have the light, all we can say is that this ministry is the ministry of the Spirit and the ministry of righteousness. This is not the oracle of God because this is only according to our learning from the letter of the Bible. Any good scholar of the Word can read these verses and understand them by his mind in this way. To merely see the facts in the Bible according to the black and white is not God’s oracle. God’s speaking in His oracle is always with new light, new revelation.
This ministry, which is the ministry of the Spirit and the ministry of righteousness, is the New Testament ministry, the unique ministry of God’s New Testament economy. This word is the oracle of God. This is not something acquired merely by reading according to the understanding of the mind, but it is by God’s enlightenment. The light regarding this ministry is that it is the New Testament ministry that enlivens people, giving people life and dispensing the very Triune God into man’s spirit. Second Corinthians 3:9 mentions the ministry of condemnation. The ministry of condemnation is the Old Testament ministry that always condemns people and kills people. This understanding is something from the oracle of God. With God’s oracle, there is always the enlightening.
When we listen to the oracle of God, this does not mean that we are listening to a man. We are listening to God in His oracle. I have been ministering in the United States for approximately twenty-six years, and much of my speaking has been printed in books. I would ask the saints who have been in the Lord’s recovery for many years who they have been listening to. If you have been listening to a man for many years, you are the most foolish person. Only a fool would listen to a man again and again for such a long period of time. If any of the saints in the Lord’s recovery would say that he has been listening to a man, this saint is the most foolish person on this earth. To listen to a man is foolish, but to listen to God in His oracle is wise. We come to the ministry meetings in order to listen to God in His oracle. To listen to God in His oracle is to be blessed with the processed Triune God. I heard of someone who repented to God that for the past approximately twenty years he had been listening to a man. If he did listen to a man, he has to confess this as a sin. If we listen to a fallen man as a fallen descendant of Adam, this is surely a sin we have to confess and repent for. However, I think that many of us can testify that we have not been listening to a man but to God in His oracle.
We need to consider the main, new revelations that we have seen in the past twenty-five years through God’s oracle. We have seen that the last Adam became a life-giving Spirit, that the Lord is the Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:17). Before the Lord’s recovery came to the United States, we had never seen this revelation. Terms such as enjoying Christ, experiencing Christ, and exhibiting Christ were not used by us before the Lord’s recovery came to the United States. Based upon the biblical revelation, I invented these terms. I even wrote a hymn on exhibiting Christ—“Let us exhibit Christ” (#864 in Hymns ).
Another new revelation that we have seen in the past twenty-five years is the sevenfold Spirit of God (Rev. 1:4; 4:5; 5:6). We have also seen that he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17). The Lord has opened up to us the matter of pray-reading the Word (Eph. 6:17-18). I invented the word pray-reading to convey the revelation of this fact in the holy Word. Furthermore, we never saw the real significance and the vital importance of calling on the Lord (Rom. 10:12; 2 Tim. 2:22) until the Lord’s recovery came to the United States.
Another main, new revelation that we have seen in the past twenty-five years is that the all-inclusive Spirit of Christ is the consummation of the processed Triune God (Rom. 8:9; Phil. 1:19b; Matt. 28:19). This revelation came from the very God in His oracle. Does this mean that when you hear this speaking, you are listening to a man? This means that you are listening to our dear, beloved God in His oracle. If you have been listening to God in my speaking, you have been blessed. My speaking of these main, new revelations in the past twenty-five years has been the oracle of God.
Another revelation that we have seen is the dispensing of the processed Triune God into the transformed, tripartite man (Rom. 8). I am so happy that this point has been passed on to all the saints in the local churches. We have also seen the mingling of the processed God with the regenerated and transformed man (John 6:57b; 15:5; 1 John 3:24). Since the Lord’s recovery came to the United States, we have seen the economy (dispensation) of God (1 Tim. 1:4; Eph. 1:10; 3:9). God in His oracle has also shown us the New Jerusalem as a corporate person composed of all the chosen and redeemed saints of God to be God’s tabernacle, His dwelling, and the Lamb’s wife, His counterpart (Rev. 21:2-3, 9b-10, 12, 14). Thank the Lord for the main, new revelations that we have seen in the past twenty-five years. We received these revelations from God in His oracle through the speaking of His present ministry. Each one of the main, new revelations that we have seen in the past twenty-five years is the Word of God in the new light. If someone does have the oracle of God, he must have the light.
Furthermore, whoever speaks for God in His oracle has a certain amount of divine authority. There is the deputy authority of God in His oracle.