My burden today is to fellowship with you concerning our experience and the achievements which the Lord has given us during the past four and a half years.
We know that we began speaking of the new way here in Taipei in October 1984. From that time until now, it has been exactly four and a half years. When we first began to take this way, we said that this is a new way. We did not have any experience concerning this new way, and we were also lacking in a clear vision concerning it.
At the same time, we pointed out a series of matters related to how Christians should meet, preach the gospel, serve God, and work for God. From the time the Apostles passed away until today, Christians during the past nineteen centuries have been debating these four things. Because these four matters were very much related to the practical move and work of Christians, the debates became more and more heated. It even stirred up strife and hatred among brothers. Until today, the problems have not been resolved.
We know that as far as the Lord is concerned, everything in the universe was complete as soon as it was created. Nothing in the hands of the Lord needs advancement. But everything in the hands of man requires learning. This is because we cannot create. God requires no learning; hence, He requires no advancement. But human beings are different. Even to acquire fluency in a language requires a long period of time. From this we see that man is not a creator; rather, he advances through learning.
When we study church history, we find the same principle there. The word “overcome” was found in the epistles of the aged Apostle John before the Apostles passed away. To overcome is to be recovered. It means that something that was there originally was lost due to failure. There is the need to retrieve it. When the aged John wrote Revelation, the last book of the New Testament, he wrote seven epistles to the seven local churches. At the end of every epistle, he ended with the exhortation for overcomers (2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21). This is a recovery.
We see that before the end of the first century, the Lord’s recovery began. Thereafter history shows us that, century by century, the recovery continued on. At times it was dim, but it was gradually becoming stronger and stronger. This went on until the 1500s, when Brother Martin Luther was raised up in Germany. He inherited the items of recovery from the past and culminated all the Lord’s recoveries during the preceding sixteen centuries. But this does not mean that the recovery was completed; rather, it continued on. Not long afterward, the national church to which Luther belonged became a dead religion. This also became the general condition of Protestantism at that time. That is why the Lord told the church in Sardis, “I know your works, that you have a name that you are living, and you are dead...I have not found your works completed before My God” (3:1-2). At that time, the whole of Protestantism was in a state of half completion and near death.
In the seventeenth century, the mystics, who emphasized the inner life, rose up from among the Catholics. In the eighteenth century, Brother Zinzendorf from the southern part of Germany began the recovery of the church life and the church practice. These were great advances and progressions in the Lord’s recovery. However, these were not enough. The Lord had to go on in His recovery. In the nineteenth century, the Lord raised up a group of brothers in England. They went further in the recovery of the church life; but in certain aspects they were still a failure. Because of this, the Lord could not go on at that time anywhere in the Western world.
In the beginning of the twentieth century, the Lord came to the Far East and raised up a young Chinese brother by the name of Watchman Nee. Initially, the help he received was inherited from the Brethren. But after ten years, he discovered that what he had received was not that complete. As a result, he had a turn, even many turns. For example, in 1938 he published the book The Normal Christian Church Life. In 1948, when he was conducting a training on Mount Kuling in Foochow, he shared that at the time of the publishing of The Normal Christian Church Life he only saw the line of Antioch. But by 1948 he had gone on to see the line of Jerusalem. Hence, he turned from the line of Antioch, which was a “rethinking,” to the line of Jerusalem, which was a “re-rethinking.” From this example, we see that the Lord’s recovery is progressive. There have been many improvements.
Our God is a God who calls and there is. He does not need to change, neither does He need to improve. For us, however, this is not the case. When we were raised up to follow the Lord and to receive from the Lord, we received things step by step. Not only did Watchman Nee have a rethinking, even Brother Paul had rethinkings. In 1 Corinthians 7:8 he told the Corinthians, “But I say to the unmarried and to the widows, It is good for them if they remain even as I.” However, when he wrote 1 Timothy at an old age, he said, “I will therefore that younger widows marry” (5:14). The reason is that Paul’s word in 1 Corinthians represented his wish at the early stage of his ministry. In 1 Timothy he was advising the young widows according to his experience. This shows us that everyone has to learn; everyone has to rethink and has need of improvement.