Read the last chapters of the four Gospels. So many of the disciples had some personal experiences of Christ. Mary did—you know the story. Early in the morning of the day of resurrection Mary received an experience of Christ (John 20:11-18). The two disciples walking to Emmaus also received a vital, personal experience of Him. They were so zealous for Christ, and suddenly Christ came and joined them. They did not know it was the Lord, but later when they constrained Him to abide with them, their eyes were opened and they recognized Him. Then He vanished out of their sight. Immediately they decided to turn back to Jerusalem, and arriving there, they found a meeting in progress. In the meeting they were told how the Lord was resurrected and had appeared to Simon, and it seemed that they said, “Amen, we saw Him too.” Then suddenly Jesus Himself appeared again (Luke 24:1-36).
All these verses show how so many of the disciples in the early days, before they were in the meetings, had some strange, wonderful, and precious experiences of Christ. We also need to have this kind of personal experiences of our dear Lord in our daily life. Then when we come to the meeting, we have something bubbling and overflowing from us as a testimony to all the others. We have something as our experiences of Christ to speak about in the meeting. You know, many times when we are sharing something of our experiences of the Lord in the meeting, while we are talking, Jesus Himself is with us; we are so conscious of His presence in our midst. In our daily walk, we do need some extra portion from a sweet contact with the Lord Jesus that we may have something to bring to the meeting. Take this principle and put it into practice. Day by day we should have some personal, intimate, sweet contact with the Lord Jesus.
Many times I have had the same kind of experience as those two brothers going to Emmaus. Many times when I have opened the Bible, it seemed that I could not see Jesus in the Word; but after a while, it was so wonderful, Jesus appeared. My heart was bubbling and burning within me; then suddenly, it seemed that He disappeared, and I was so disappointed. Have you ever had this kind of experience? Then I have felt that I must go to the meeting and tell the brothers what a wonderful, personal contact I’ve had with Jesus that day and how He seemed to disappear. When I have gone to the meeting and while I was giving such a testimony, there Jesus was! Many times it is like this. We do need the personal, sweet experiences of the resurrected Christ in our daily walk.
The next principle is that we must meet at the place appointed by Jesus, not the place chosen by us. The disciples were told to go into Galilee and there they would see Him (Matt. 28:7). “Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, into a mountain where Jesus had appointed them” (Matt. 28:16). Why did the Lord Jesus not tell His disciples that He would meet with them in Jerusalem? He was resurrected in the area of Jerusalem; why would He go far to the north, to Galilee, to meet with His disciples? The Lord did this deliberately, purposely, to move the Christian meeting away from the Jewish religious center. The meeting which He appointed had nothing to do with Jerusalem, nothing to do with the temple. The Lord wanted the meetings to be absolutely removed from religion.
Today, in principle, we have no right to choose a place to meet. The choice is not with us, but with Him. If we have the prerogative to choose a place, we are divisive. We all must meet in the place appointed by the Lord. Learn to give up your concept, your choices. We all need to come together in the place which the Lord appoints.
Whenever we come to the meeting, we must come with the intention of meeting the Lord. “He goeth before you into Galilee; there shall ye see Him” (Matt. 28:7). When we come to a meeting, we must realize that we are coming to meet our Lord. This matter must be emphasized. We always consider that we are coming for edification or for some other purpose. But we need to have a deep realization that our only purpose is to meet our Lord Jesus. We should not care whether there is a good speaker or good message. We should only care to meet our Lord.
Consider all the meetings the Lord Jesus had with His disciples. We could almost say that there was not one meeting with a message. Have you noticed that? But Jesus always stood in their midst. They saw the Lord—that was enough. We do not need the teachings, we do not need the messages; all we need is the presence of the Lord. When we see Him, we can rejoice. We go to the meeting not to hear a great speaker; we go to the meeting to meet Jesus. We do not go to the meeting to listen to a good message. We go to the meeting to meet our Lord. When we see Jesus in the meeting we can say, Hallelujah! We just rejoice at His presence. “He goeth before you into Galilee; there shall ye see Him.”
The meaning and purpose of the proper meeting is to give the Lord something to eat and also for Him to give us something to eat. Have you noticed that two times in the record of these meetings the Lord asked His disciples if they had something to eat? “Have you any meat?” He asked. Once they answered Him, “No” (John 21:5). But praise the Lord, another time they did say, “We have a little” (Luke 24:41-43). They did not have much, they just had a little, a mere piece of fish. It was not even a whole fish. Look into Darby’s translation and some other better translations—they do not say fish, but just a part of a fish. They just gave Him a part of a fish. In the King James Version you have “and of a honeycomb.” But in the most trustworthy manuscript you do not have this phrase. What they gave Him was just a part of a fish. But though it was so little, the Lord ate it.
The disciples gave the Lord just a little, but the Lord gave His disciples plenty. When He asked them that day by the seashore if they had any meat and they answered “No,” the Lord gave them a lot. He not only gave them a part of a fish, but plenty of fish. And not only fish, but also bread. The Lord Jesus said, “Come and dine,” and they did (John 21:12-15). How to meet? We must meet to satisfy the Lord and be satisfied by Him. To meet is to eat. Our meeting must be a kind of eating, a kind of feasting. We bring something as a feast for Christ, and Christ brings something as a feast for us. Christ comes to the meeting to feast with us and we with Him. Every Christian meeting should be a feast which satisfies both the Lord and us. If we are not satisfied in our meeting, we are wrong. In all our meetings we need a table, a mutual table. We eat together with Him. We have something for Him, and He has something for us. Undoubtedly He has more for us than we have for Him. What we can afford Him is just a little, just a limited portion, but what He can afford us is unlimited and inexhaustible.
We need to take all these basic principles and put them into practice. We must always be outside of religion without any form; we must always meet in resurrection as the Lord’s brethren; we must meet with some personal experience of Christ in the place chosen and appointed by Him; and we must gather to meet the Lord, to satisfy Him and be satisfied by Him. If we can find all these principles in our meetings, we are right and we have the proper Christian meetings.