The church according to God's will and the church in experience are two entirely different things. The church in God's plan is completely without sin; it has never known sin, nor had any history of sin. It is transcendent far above sin, without even a trace of sin. It is altogether spiritual and wholly out of Christ. However, the church in history has failed and is fallen. Today the Lord is working among fallen men to bring them back to the church of His original will. The Lord desires to work among people who are fallen, corrupted, and desolate, full of sin and filthiness, so that He may obtain a church from among them. He intends to restore and recover them to what He purposed in eternity past, so that He might have that which fulfills His desire in eternity future. In His magnificent work, the Lord is using the words He speaks as the instrument to bring the church back to God's original purpose. Oh, may we not lightly esteem the words of the Lord.

We must remember that knowledge is one thing and spiritual stature is quite another. All doctrine, teaching, theology, and knowledge are of little use if they just flow from one person to another. True growth depends upon our receiving the word directly from God. God is using His rhema to do His work, and He desires to speak to us. Therefore, if our purpose in reading the Scriptures is solely for knowledge, it is indeed pitiful. If this is so, we are finished. The real value of the Scriptures is that God can speak to man through them. If we desire to be useful in the Lord's hands, we must be spoken to by the Lord. Whether or not our building is spiritual depends upon whether the Lord has spoken to us. Knowledge and doctrine are of no spiritual use. Only the Lord's speaking in us is of spiritual value.

How can we ever be satisfied with knowledge and doctrines while the church is in a fallen state, when she has failed God and is blind to His will? May God have mercy upon us and be gracious to us! Oh, may we have such a prayer: "Lord, we pray that You would speak to us." All the words that are from without, all the words that are passed on to us by others, though they have been spoken a thousand or ten thousand times, are of no use. Only rhema is of any value. If we do something just because others tell us to do it, we are keeping the law; we are not in the New Testament. A person with a clear mind can divide the book of Romans into sections, such as "Salvation," "Justification," etc. But within him there is a great deficiency—God has not spoken to him. A man may have knowledge and yet be without God's word. Many people think that knowledge of the Scriptures and understanding of the doctrines are spirituality. There is no such thing! Bible knowledge can never be a substitute for spirituality. Only God's speaking to us, personally and directly, is of any real value. When God speaks to us through His word, we are enlightened; through His word we are sanctified; and through His word we are made to grow. We need to know what is dead and what is living, what is mere knowledge and what is spiritual. Whatever is not living has no spiritual value. If we have rhema, the living word of God, we can be cleansed and sanctified.