Prayer: Lord, how we worship You for Your gracious move among us. Lord, even we thank You so much for the meeting tonight. We believe that You are with us. Lord, we even believe that we are one spirit with You. Thank You for Your cleansing blood. Lord, we do need Your cleansing. Lord, cleanse us again with Your precious blood. Lord, we’re looking to You for Your anointing. Oh, we’re looking to You for a fresh word, the word which we need today. Lord, speak to every one of us. We are nothing and we can do nothing apart from You. And we hate to do anything outside of You. Lord, come to visit every one and touch us again. Day after day we would ask You to touch us again. Lord, touch the hardest place within us. You know what needs to be touched. O Lord, touch us! Touch us according to Your mind, according to Your understanding. Lord, expose us, and grant us the grace we need for this meeting. Even right now all of us need Your grace. Be with us. Thank You, Lord. Amen.
I still feel we haven’t gotten through concerning this matter of opinion. So we would spend more time on it. Our time now needs to be more subjective than ever. We have come to the point of considering how it is possible for us not to have any kind of opinion. In the last meeting we saw that to get out of our opinion, or not to have any opinion, we need to pray more that our self may be peeled off layer by layer. We need to continue this one point—how to get our self peeled off layer by layer. This means how to get our self peeled off bit by bit. I would ask these four brothers how they have realized that their self is being peeled off bit by bit. I like this expression, peeled off. The sisters in the kitchen peel off a lot of things. They peel off the skin from a chicken, and they peel off the skin of a carrot or cucumber. However, the sisters’ peeling off is a little too rough. Furthermore, the self could not be peeled off that much or that fast. Within two minutes you may peel the skin off a whole chicken, but I don’t believe you can have your self peeled off so fast or so roughly. According to my experience I can testify that the peeling off of my self is very slow. It seems the peeling off of my self has nearly no speed. Although today there was a lot of peeling off, there was no speed. It is almost as if you drive a car for twelve hours and yet remain on the same spot. The driving has been going on, but the car is not moving. There is no effect and no effectiveness. The peeling off of my self has never gone fast. Now I would ask you brothers to speak something in a free way. Please don’t believe that after the last four messages all the opinions are gone. I have no confidence in myself nor in what we are doing here to deal with the opinions. I would say that probably the opinion situation among us remains the same. Although we have been “driving the car” for five weeks, the car has moved very little. The opinions are still here. I would ask you brothers: after these four weeks of talking concerning opinion, do you believe that your opinion is over?
It’s about the same.
This means we have been driving the car, but the car is still in the same place. Let me ask another brother: do you believe that in you or in your wife there has really been some change due to these Perfecting Meetings?
I think it’s made us more aware of our opinions, but as far as reducing the quantity of opinions, I don’t believe there has been too much change.
This simply means we all got some awareness, right? What then shall we do? Do we just stay here with our awareness?
Brother Lee, last week’s meeting touched me deeply, particularly when you came to this point of the peeling off of the self. Of all the meetings, this one touched me the most. It seems that after a number of meetings awareness could be raised up within the saints concerning the opinion. Surely I experienced this within myself. And due to that, there was some kind of going to the Lord. But my sensation is that the desperation is not there. In other words, the going to the Lord is still somewhat formal and simply a response to a word in the meeting. And I think the lack of desperation is because we still don’t see this eater. My real inner sense is that I myself and probably most in my locality still don’t see the evil or the damage that this eater has done and is still doing in us. So when you are not aware of the seriousness of the problem, your going to the Lord will not be that desperate. And without a kind of desperateness, it is hard to get the real light.
Furthermore, when there is not the real light, it is hard for the self to be exposed or to be peeled off. When Brother Lee spoke concerning the self, the Spirit seems to have really gotten through. I would say at least something is beginning to break within me. This is the point that has touched me most deeply. This week I spent most of my time in prayer on this very point concerning the self. The opinion may not be the real root of the problem. But when the self was mentioned, and especially the fortifying and the condensing of the self after many years in the church life, I felt we had touched the root. It seems that the more we go on, the more the self is built up in a subtle way. It even becomes enclosed.
In the beginning when we came to the church life we were young and we were still somewhat open and willing to be touched and changed. But after a period of time in the church life we somehow acquire a way to have our self fully insulated and protected to the point that we can go on in the church life without having our self touched. Now it’s getting harder and harder for the Lord to really penetrate because there are more layers than ever before. Now I really see the need of a definite surgery. This point cannot be touched lightly. The self has been enclosed, built up, and fortified through years of experience in the church life, and to get into it now seems to be harder than ever before. It seems for the Lord to get into it, to peel it off, or to penetrate it will necessitate some pain. I’m just desperate and desirous for some light in this matter. I feel that all the saints, especially the older ones who have some history in the church life, really have this great need. This really frustrates the real growth. This also is the reason why the functioning is so inadequate. Even sometimes there is no feeling that we are not growing and no feeling that we are not functioning. This means the self has really been built up and untouched. Now I feel our self needs to be touched. I feel we need some surgery.
I would answer in this way: for the peeling off of the self, surgery doesn’t work. Surgery is to cut off a sick part of the body. But according to my experience, the matter of self cannot be cut off. If you are going to cut it, you have to cut every part. But the self has become every part of our being. This is why I did not use the word surgery but the word peeling. I used the term peel off. If a part of a cucumber becomes rotten you cut that part off. But to peel off the skin is different. In the past meetings we have learned about the problem of the opinion and the source of opinion. We are aware of the need, but how to experience the peeling off of the self which is the very source of opinion is a real problem. I would ask you brothers to say something more.
The word that comes to me initially that I can relate to my limited experience is light. It is one thing to listen to the fellowship regarding the self, to agree with it, and even for a period of time to let it be a topic of conversation. We may even pray about it, but to have a very subjective light on our self in a particular way is quite another thing. I feel, though, that I have experienced at least a little peeling, and what I have experienced seems to be related to a definite exposure in a subjective way where I can recognize the self. I can see that that motive, that thought, is self. I recognize that that attitude and that concept is self. I do have the feeling that this kind of exposing never ends. Subjectively, right now I’m not discouraged, but I spend a lot of my time being discouraged because this matter of exposing never ends. It’s like an onion that you never stop peeling. Although you peel off one layer, it is so thin it hardly changes the appearance at all. The main feeling I have is concerning this matter of light. I think my self is the strongest when it is the least apparent. And I think that something is peeled off when it is genuinely exposed—not just in knowledge or in doctrine—but by having light in a specific way. That’s all I can say.
Do you think that the self really peels off by being enlightened, by receiving some amount of light? Is this your experience? This seems reasonable and logical, but I doubt whether it is practical. Reasonably and logically it seems right to say that the light kills and that the more light we receive, the more self will be peeled off. Doctrinally it sounds quite right but practically it is different according to my experience. Do you really think this is practical?
The brother was speaking about light. After a word like we had last week the more I try to go after the light, the more I simply come up with self-realization. I thought I was clear that the light kills the self, but I’m not clear concerning the peeling. Last week I told someone I feel like the blind man in John 9. I see something but I’m blind. I need a word telling me to wash and to come out seeing. I’m simply blind to what it means to peel off the self. This has been my prayer to the Lord. I’ve been crying out for His mercy. I realize that light originates from Him, but at this point I still feel I’m not clear how to be peeled off.
I believe that through the past meetings we have received some light, some help, and we have gotten some awareness. I feel, though, we have not gotten through with this matter of opinion. Regardless of how much help we have received, opinion is still here. I am trying my best to present you with a very fine explanation or fine definition of this spiritual experience of having our self peeled off. First, when we came to the matter of opinion, we pointed out clearly that the antidote to heal opinion is the Spirit. The effective dose to heal this sickness of our opinion is the Spirit. Second, the Lord told us in John 15 that apart from Him we can do nothing. So we have to abide in Him. We have to remain in Him, never apart from Him.
Third, we also have pointed out what opinion is—opinion is just us apart from God. When we are apart from God, we are just opinion; we are just the self. If you are abiding in the Lord and letting the Lord abide in you, that is Christ; that is not you. It is no more I, but Christ who lives in me (Gal. 2:20). But when does Christ live in us? It doesn’t mean always or all the time. Galatians 2:20 tells us the fact, but it doesn’t say something practical in time. In the Bible not only do you have the fact, but you also have the practicality in time. This principle applies to many points. For example we have Christ as our holiness, our sanctification. This is the fact, but this may not be the practicality in time. When you abide in the Lord and the Lord abides in you, you have the practicality at that time that it is no more you but Christ who lives in you. At the time that Christ lives in you, you are not the self; you are Christ. Or you are one with Christ. At that time you are not apart from Christ. At that time you are one with Christ, and the self is gone. When the self is gone, the opinion disappears because the source of opinion is gone.
The crucial question is this: how can we remain in the situation that we are one with Christ? We have seen that the Spirit is the effective dose to heal the sickness of opinion. And we have seen that if we are apart from the Lord we are just the self, just the opinion. Also, we have seen that when we abide in the Lord and let the Lord abide in us, we are not the self, or we are not the self at that time. It is at that time that the self is gone and the opinion disappears. But how can we remain in the condition that we are no more the self but the Lord? We have the awareness; we have received the light. All this helps, but still this is not the practical experience of having your self peeled off. We must come to this crucial point.
By past experiences and by pursuing after this kind of experience in these recent months, I have discovered something which I never realized so clearly in the past. For instance, the Bible says, pray unceasingly (1 Thes. 5:17). I have never realized this matter of praying unceasingly as clearly as now. Also I have never realized the word of the Lord, “abide in me” (John 15:4, 5) so practically as in these days. What does it mean to pray unceasingly and to abide in Christ? Regardless of how much awareness you have received and regardless of how much light you have received, if you are not abiding in the Lord even at this moment, you are in the flesh. You may have received the greatest light and you may have received a thorough surgery, but if at this moment you do not abide in the Lord you are the flesh. The surgery and the light you have received become useless. They do not avail. They availed at the time you saw the light. But still that availing is not the practical experience. That availing was only a kind of apprehension, a kind of realization. Mainly it was a kind of understanding. It was not the real peeling off of the self. Awareness, surgery, and light all are good and helpful, but practically speaking the peeling off of the self occurs only at the moment when we are abiding in the Lord. In other words our self peels off only when we pray. I don’t mean a kind of shallow or superficial prayer. I mean the kind of prayer that brings us into the spirit, a prayer that prays us into the spirit. When we have this kind of prayer, it is at the very moment our prayer is going on that our self is being peeled off. When you pray yourself into the spirit, at that time the self peels off automatically. The self cannot be peeled off by anything except by the prayer that prays us into the spirit. This kind of prayer is the real abiding in Christ. For many years I did not have a clear word of how to abide in Christ. According to my experiences, the real abiding in Christ is the praying that prays you into the spirit. When you pray yourself into the spirit, that is your abiding in Christ. It is at this time, and only at this time, that your self is peeled off. When your prayer stops, the peeling of the self also stops. The peeling of the self doesn’t work at any other time. It doesn’t work at just any time; it works only at the time when you abide in the Lord.
So we have to pray unceasingly. When we stop our prayer, we are the self again. When our prayer stops, we are the self. When our prayer goes on, we are not the self. In other words, when our prayer stops, we are apart from the Lord. When our prayer continues we are not apart from the Lord, we are not the self, but we are the Lord. This is not something according to doctrine, but according to experience. Regardless of how many years we have been in the Lord and regardless of how holy and how spiritual we may be, as long as we are still living in this tabernacle, this flesh, if we do not pray ourselves into the spirit, we are still the self. Apart from the Lord we are the self. Whether you are a new convert or have been in the Lord a long time, if you don’t pray, you are still in the self. If we do not pray ourselves into the spirit, at that time we are the self. For example, for the electrical lights in the room to continue shining, the switch must be left on. If the switch is turned off darkness is here. But when the switch is on, there is light. It has nothing to do with whether the lamps are old or new or strong or weak. It is altogether a matter of whether or not the switch is on.
What is the self? The self is just us apart from the Lord. How could we be not apart from the Lord but joined to the Lord? It is only by abiding in Him. Consider the branches. Regardless of how many years they have been on the tree, once they are not abiding in the tree, they are dead branches. Nothing else helps. Only one thing avails, that is the abiding. When we abide in the Lord we are no more self; when we are not abiding in the Lord we become self again. In our self, we are self; in Christ, we are not self. So the real peeling off of the self is in this kind of prayer that brings us into the abiding. This experience is not rough, but is very, very fine.
Brother Watchman Nee used to tell us that we needed at least twenty years to become mature. When we heard this we were disappointed. Twenty years seemed like a long time. But now from 1933 to 1980 it has been almost forty-seven years. But I cannot find that I am much different from forty-seven years ago. Yes, maturity does mean something, but it does not mean that you are qualified to be apart from the Lord. Honestly, forty-seven years ago it was easy for me to speak or to fellowship with others without praying for one day. Many times I was so occupied that I did not pray for the whole day. Many things were piled up waiting upon me. I never liked to see things piled up. Especially in my study room I don’t like to have things piled up on my desk. Every night I like to get my desk cleared off. This is not easy to do and it means a lot of work. If something is left on my desk uncared for I couldn’t sleep so clearly. I may sleep well, but not that clearly. Then when I rise up in the morning I can’t pray that well and I can’t pray that clearly because something is left on my desk. Many times I sacrifice the prayer in order to get the desk cleared up. Forty years ago I could still be strong to speak and to fellowship with others without much prayer. But today I’m much weaker. Today if I don’t pray quite regularly and continually I could not be so strong. This means that I am weaker than I was forty years ago. Is it better to be stronger or weaker? Actually, as long as we do not pray ourselves into the spirit we are just the self. When we pray ourselves into the spirit, it is no more the self but the spirit. So the antidote to the sickness is here.
It is easy for the sisters who are wives to check this out according to their experience. When the sisters who are single live together, they maintain a distance of politeness which hinders and frustrates their being exposed. But once they get married, after three weeks or three months there is no more protection of politeness. It is so good that all the sisters who are married have a husband to expose them. Consider your experience. You stop praying and then try your best not to have any opinion. I assure you that whatever situation you face you will be fully opinionated.
Please don’t consider that Brother Lee is over fifty years in the Lord, that he has a lot of experiences, that he is matured and surely he cannot have opinion. It is easy for him not to have any opinion. This is wrong. I am not a “saint” or a sage. Even the more I am not an angel. Maybe it is easier for me to have an opinion than for you. Why is this? Because the older you are the more opinions you have. The most opinionated persons are those who are older. Let us check with an older brother. Here is a brother who is always smiling. You can never see him with a long face. He was born with a round face smiling all the time. Let him tell us whether he had more opinion thirty years ago or more opinion today.
I have more opinion today.
Listen to his answer. He has more opinion today. And to my impression this brother is very innocent. He is always so nice, so pure, so clean, always smiling. For more than ten years I have never seen him with a long face. We always think that he has no opinion. But I know this kind of person. This kind of person who is always smiling is even more opinionated. Although I shouldn’t offend this brother, the fact is the fact. It is so easy to use a fork to pick up a piece of steak. But to use a fork to pick up vermicelli noodles is very difficult. This is like the opinion of the smiling people. Another brother may be altogether different. It’s easy to catch his opinion. He is not like a noodle. Rather, he is like a piece of marble. But with the older brother it’s really difficult to catch the opinion. His opinion is so flexible like vermicelli noodles. However, you have to forget about whether a person is hard or soft or whether he is cold or smiling. We all are the same. The more we grow the more we become opinionated. The more we experience, the more we have opinion. As the years go by we pick up a lot of things, even spiritual things. Even the matter of living Christ becomes an opinion. What then shall we do? Oh, wretched man that I am! Who can deliver me out of the sickness of opinion? Only One can—that is the Spirit. The Spirit is the dose. Yet the Spirit could never be effective if you don’t pray. You have to pray, not in a religious way, but in the biblical way, that is, to pray yourself into your spirit. Only by this kind of prayer can your self be peeled off. This kind of prayer keeps your self peeled off. Now I do believe that the Lord has shown us what it means to pray unceasingly, what it means to abide in Him, and what it means that apart from Him we can do nothing. All these expressions are describing one thing— to be practically one with the Lord. Then you are no more flesh. When you are apart from the Lord, you are nothing but the flesh. You think that if you have been a “saint” for over fifty-five years, you could never be the flesh. No, even if you were like Adam and lived over nine hundred years, yet you don’t pray yourself into the spirit you will still be the flesh. Apart from the Lord we are just the flesh. But when we pray we have a practical oneness in the spirit with the Lord. At that time we become no more flesh; rather we become the Lord. To me to live is Christ (Phil. 1:21). That is true and that is practical. It is at that moment that opinion is gone. I have found out by my experiences that we have no way to get rid of our opinion. It is because we ourselves are just opinion. It is not a kind of cancer which can be cut off by one surgery. It is like a kind of cancer which gets into the cells of our blood. There you cannot operate. The only thing that can cure it is for the Spirit to get into our blood. The Spirit is the dose. The Spirit keeps down this blood cancer. But whenever our prayer stops and the Spirit has no way to get into the blood cells, the cancer is still there.
We need to pray ourselves into the spirit. It is here and it is by this that we abide in Christ. Then we don’t live ourselves but we live Christ. Then we are no more self but Christ. When our self is gone the opinion disappears. There is no other way. Don’t think that you can fast for three days and three nights and get out of opinion. Don’t think that you will receive a great light which will kill your opinion. It will not work that way. Not only is the cancer in the blood, even we ourselves are the cancer. As a whole we are opinion, so there is no way to cut it off. The only rescue is the Spirit, and yet the Spirit needs an application, and that is our unceasing prayer. We need to pray ourselves into the spirit. It is here we abide in the Lord and it is by this that the self is being peeled off. Then the opinion is over. This is the way not to have any opinion. In every kind of meeting of the saints the problem is there. In the service group meetings the problem is there. When you come together and do not pray to keep yourselves in the spirit, after a short time you will be exposed that you are nothing but opinion. So you can see this disease is really terrible. Without prayer this disease is incurable.
You may ask, doesn’t the Bible tell us that we have been crucified? Yes, the Bible does tell us that we have been crucified. I have known this fact for over fifty-five years. But without this kind of continual prayer you are not crucified practically. You are still living; you are still here. No matter how many spiritual books you may read you are still here. The best book to tell us that we have been crucified with Christ must be Brother Nee’s The Normal Christian Life. Many Christians have read this book. But to my impression there is not much difference in the Christians who have read this book. This doesn’t mean I am belittling Brother Nee’s writings. But you have to tell me whether or not you have been changed after reading that book concerning being crucified with Christ. Before that book was printed I heard all the messages with my own ears from Brother Nee’s mouth. In 1935 he was in my hometown of Chefoo, and he had a conference concerning Christ as the overcoming life. We all were helped very much.
Later in 1937 and 1938 he went to London, Denmark, and Norway where he spoke the messages which were edited, polished, and compiled, and published as The Normal Christian Life. On the one hand I received help, but on the other hand I was still I. Even today I am still I. I have not been improved one bit. Do not think I am belittling Brother Nee’s book. This simply means I could never be improved. Without the Spirit I am still I. The only difference that can be made is for the dose of the all-inclusive Spirit to be put into our being.
From 1922 to 1939 Brother Nee was continually ministering this kind of message which is contained in The Normal Christian Life. But after 1939 he suddenly told us that the experience in Romans 6 could never be ours until we get into the Spirit in Romans 8. He said that the fact of being crucified with Christ could never become our experience until we get into Romans 8. Secretly we somewhat considered that Brother Nee had changed. Surely he had changed! Before 1939 he didn’t see that much. I appreciated The Normal Christian Life also, even encouraging the brothers to translate it into Chinese. We still carry out the Chinese publication. I am for it because it helps people. But you have to realize that regardless of how much help you could get from that book or from any message, as long as you do not pray yourself into the spirit, no help actually avails.
Only one dose can encounter our cancer-sick being. As long as we do not have the dose of the Spirit we are just sick. Whether you have been in the Lord for one century or one month it is the same; there is no difference. Whether you have read through The Normal Christian Life or even a hundred books like that, or you have never read even one, it is the same. We must see this. This is a kind of fine dealing. The peeling off of the self issues only from the Spirit. And this is not the Spirit separate from us but the Spirit into whom we have been mingled. When we are mingled not only with Him but into Him, He becomes the dose. This is the Spirit into whom we have been mingled through our unceasing prayer. Without this kind of abiding in Christ our self still remains. Regardless of how many messages you hear, how many books you read, or how much help you get, the self still remains. I must admit that I too received much help from this kind of message. In 1935 we had a big revival among us just through this kind of message. Many had a great turn, but the self still remained. Unless we pray ourselves into the spirit there is no way to get rid of the self. Only at the moment when you pray yourself into the spirit are you no more the self, but Christ. When you stop this kind of prayer, you become once again the self.