Published in Chinese in 1963, The Ministry of the Word, Vol. 7, pp. 500-518. (Notes of fellowship on service in the church in Taipei, not reviewed by the speaker)
The brothers asked me to give a word of fellowship tonight particularly to the brothers and sisters who serve in the young people’s or students’ work. The brothers would also like to have the brothers and sisters who serve in various homes participate in this fellowship. Therefore, tonight I am not giving a message; rather, I want to fellowship with you some principles concerning how to help the young people.
In whatever a person does, the most important thing is to have a heart. Without a heart, a person will not want to do anything, and even if he does something, he will not be enthusiastic in doing it. Of course, this is also true with the young people’s work. If you want to do this work, you must like the young people, care for them, and be concerned about their affairs. This may be considered the minimum “capital” required for the young people’s work. If you have no interest in the young people and have no heart for them, doing the young people’s work only out of reluctance, then it is useless.
Sometimes our heart may arise from our preference. When we like something, naturally we will have a heart to do it. Sometimes the heart we have may come from our knowledge. When we see the importance and value of a certain matter, we will spontaneously have a heart for it. According to my observation of the real situation among us concerning the young people’s work, I see that some brothers and sisters are doing it out of their preference. Because they are naturally inclined to the young people and they enjoy contacting the young people, they come to do the young people’s work. We cannot say that this is wrong. We have to admit that no matter how much grace we have received and how great the spirituality we possess, we are still human-we still have the part that is human. But here we have to say that it is not weighty enough to do the young people’s work with such a heart. If we truly want to do the young people’s work, and do it in a weighty manner, we must let God open our eyes to see the preciousness of the young people and their importance in God’s hands. If we see this, we will appreciate this work, and spontaneously we will have a heart within us for it.
If we read through the Bible carefully, we will discover a fact: It is not easy to find a case showing that God called an old person to do a new thing or a thing of great consequence. This may discourage the older brothers and sisters, but it is something undeniable. Indeed, we cannot see that God ever called an old person to do a new thing. Seemingly, Moses received God’s call when he was eighty years old, but if we carefully read the Bible, we will see that actually the first time he received God’s call was not when he was eighty years old. Rather, when he was still young, God’s calling had already begun in him. If you read on, whether it was Joshua, Caleb, Samuel, or David in the Old Testament, or whether it was the twelve disciples called by the Lord Jesus in the New Testament, when they were first gained by the Lord, none of them was an old man. Not only is this true in the Bible, but even in all of church history it is hard to find a strong illustration to show that God called an old man when He had a new and important thing to do. We can say that virtually everyone used by God to begin a new thing or chosen by God to turn the age was a young man.
I would like to give you a testimony. Thirty years ago the Lord’s work in China had a new beginning. In that period of time God did not call any old people. All the ones who are around fifty years old and who are standing firmly to serve before the Lord today were still young people who, thirty years ago, were around twenty years old. They were raised up by the Lord in the schools for that new work. Brothers and sisters, if you see this, you will treasure the young people before God.
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