In this meeting we need four brothers who will represent all the attendants and tell us three things: first, what real help have you received from the Perfecting Messages? Second, in what aspect has your Christian life been improved by these messages? Third, what kind of further help do you need, if anything?
First brother: To be honest I would say that the change in my life in the last ten months has been as significant as when I first came into the Lord’s recovery. During these last ten months, something has definitely happened to me, and I really feel it’s related directly to the Perfecting Training. When we began the Perfecting Training in January, we were in the midst of building our meeting hall, and the Lord was so faithful that I should experience an environment where He could definitely and directly touch me. When we were on the matter of opinion, I was also experiencing being full of opinion concerning the meeting hall. Those were not easy months probably because of me. I was totally unaware of how opinionated I am until we had those meetings. In many meetings it was difficult for me to look up because the Lord was touching me directly, and it was hard. The light was there. Outside of the meetings I had a corresponding experience with the brothers while we were building the meeting hall. When definite decisions had to be made, my whole inner being many times just got exposed. The Lord was faithful in those months, and I would say that the basic help I got was to see my real situation. I would say that I was a blind person. Eventually, I went to the brothers, telling them that I was blind and that I needed help. I really needed to be opened up more. I need what is being shared in the meetings. I need mercy. I don’t think I ever had such a sensation before we began to have these Perfecting Meetings.
Concerning the improvement in my Christian life, I would say because of these Perfecting Meetings, I have gone to the Lord in a definite way and that the Lord has really touched the way I was living. I would say that the Lord has shown me that I was simply living in myself a lot. When I would have an opinion, I felt it was simply living in myself a lot. When I would have an opinion, I felt it was the right opinion, the opinion. And even though many times I realized I had to drop it, it took the Lord some time. But in these last months something in me has been more opened up just to want the Lord. I really don’t want to be stuck or closed.
Finally, I feel what the Lord has been speaking to me is that I need the Body. The more we have talked about living Christ, the more I feel a need for the corporate side. I need more building up. The more I open to Christ to live Christ, the more I see the need for the Body and for the brothers. Many times in these months I’ve experienced that there is no way to get through, even on these matters of living Christ, without going to the Body. I have more consciousness, not only of my need for the Body, but also how much the Lord has a need. I never before realized how much we can be in a routine, how we can go through so many things, even having a pleasant and comfortable church life. Although we are happy here, still the Lord needs something. I feel as if I am in the middle of a change. I wouldn’t say that by any means I have arrived, but something has been put into me to pursue. I feel the Philippians Training was a kind of concentrated dose of what we had been receiving in the Perfecting Training, and it opened my eyes even more to the matter of culture. Through some circumstances and certain situations, I realized how much I am living in my upbringing, my background, and how easy it is to stay there. It’s good, it’s upright, it’s proper, but it’s not Christ. I also saw a brother at that time who was very similar to me, but who is no longer in the recovery simply because he wouldn’t drop his culture, his good opinion, his right way. His leaving shocked me. This helped wake me up to see that if the Lord doesn’t get through, we are in serious trouble. I could be here many years in the church life, apparently so good, apparently doing fine, but inwardly my constitution is not really Christ. This is a serious problem. I would say that my desperation since that time has definitely increased; if there is any kind of change in me, it may be a change in desperation. Within me has been a kind of cry, “Lord, get through in me. For Your Body’s sake, get through in me. For Your recovery on this earth, for what You are doing, get through in me.” I realize that the Lord has so much that He desires, that He is after, but if I’m not living Him, what can He do, and where can He go? If we in the Lord’s recovery are not in this kind of way, what can He do?
Second brother: Before we started the Perfecting Training, I remember thinking that I was doing better than I had ever been doing before. Then right away in the first meeting you shared with us that you realized something among us needed to be operated on. I was very surprised at this. I had a kind of feeling that everything was all right until I came to the Perfecting Training. Then I gradually began to realize that everything was not all right, but that there were problems with many things. These times of sharing concerning culture and opinion and habitual living have caused me to go to the Lord in a way of genuinely opening to the Lord that He would have mercy upon me. I would say that the main help I have gotten from the Perfecting Training is a kind of awakening spiritually to realize how much genuine experience of Christ I don’t have. I can’t believe that I was so blind before, thinking that I had so much when I had so little. I would say these meetings have given me a real awakening and awareness and also a real desperation that I would be one who lives Christ, that I wouldn’t be caught by so many things. This has become practical to the point that many times the Lord comes to me in my daily living and points out things that are my habitual living or that are my opinions. So I have an awareness and even a pressure arising from within that won’t let me get by with simply living myself in such an easy manner.
As far as what change I have experienced in my Christian living, I would just say that this kind of desperation has produced in me more of a willingness to go along with the Lord. It has caused me to see how short my real consecration to the Lord is, and it has given me a willingness to go along with the Lord. I can’t say that I go along with the Lord so much; many times I see that I just choose myself; I love myself; I love my habit. But there is an increasing desperation that makes me go along with the Lord more and to go to the Lord more.
As to the further help I need, I do feel a real need that something within needs to be broken down or shined upon. I don’t know what it is, but I feel a real need not simply to live Christ myself, but to be able to flow and to be so genuinely open and free with other brothers. I feel a real blockage within me. This may be something purely personal, but I feel a real need to be genuinely and freely open to flow, to fellowship, to be mingled with the brothers, and I would say even with people in general, even the unsaved. I feel a real lack in this way. I would say this would be the further help I would ask for.
Third brother: I would say the thing that has helped me most is to see that I don’t live Christ. Even I don’t have the desire to seek to live Christ. I can honestly say that when every subject was brought up I was wide open, and I received it as light and as help. When the matter of culture was shared, I realized that my whole being was culture. When peculiarity was shared, I felt I am just peculiar. Truthfully, I can say that if you take these items away—culture, habit, peculiarity— there is not much left of me. I feel that this is really the case. As to the change I have experienced, there are some practices. I go to the Lord more often during the day. I notice that I relate to brothers in more of a relaxed way. There is not a tenseness that things must be according to what I feel is the right way. I am more relaxed. And perhaps there is some dealing with my peculiarity. But I feel it is simply a small outward change. There is not much of an inward fundamental change. The help that I would like to get is a fundamental change. Sometimes the lid on a jar will not come off although it may move a little bit. I would like to get the help to completely take the lid off. I don’t know what form it may come in, but I am open to the help. I feel that corporately we must take the step. Personally I am willing to take this step for a fundamental change. I can’t say why, but I still feel unsatisfied. I would like to get the lid open.
Fourth brother: For me to share how the Perfecting Meetings have helped me, I need to share a little of my history as a Christian and in the church. For a good number of years in the recovery I had a great deal of confidence in my experience of Christ. I felt I was enjoying the Lord and that I could go on with the Lord in a strong way. I don’t think that I was ever fully pleased with my Christian life, but I felt very confident in it, and I felt I was growing into the proper Christian life and church life. But as I went on, things began to happen, and I began to have the experience of more frustration and to have a sense that I was letting the Lord down, letting the brothers down, and not really going on in an adequate way. As time went on, I felt it was getting harder and harder to live Christ. Eventually, I felt I simply couldn’t live Christ.
A few years ago a brother asked me whether we should worry if we are not in the Lord’s presence in our daily lives. At that point I thought it was impossible, and I even told him that I didn’t feel I could really be in the Lord’s presence during my daily life. I just felt so frustrated. In the meetings I would hear a word, and I would realize that I should experience Christ in my daily life, but the more I tried, the more I was frustrated. Eventually, I despaired in this matter of living Christ. I enjoyed the church life to a certain extent, but it seemed there was a problem with a kind of double standard. I lived a kind of certain life during the day, but when I got together with the saints I turned to the spirit. This made things very difficult. Although my church life in the past few years has improved greatly, I still have this problem, and I really have thought it could not be resolved. I felt I knew the ropes, and I had gone to the limit of my experience, and now I was simply going to hang on and hope for the Lord’s coming. This was basically my situation when the Perfecting Training started. Every time Brother Lee brought up the matter of living Christ, although I wanted to be open to the ministry and trust the ministry as much as I could, I felt as though I had tried this before. I felt frustrated. I knew that I could enjoy the Lord with the brothers, but I didn’t see a way to live Christ in my daily life. I knew I wasn’t living Christ in my daily life, but who was? So basically I had to reconcile these two sides and still go on in the church life. I felt I couldn’t live Christ, but maybe a few others could. Then the Perfecting Training began, and Brother Lee once more brought out the matter of living Christ. I just couldn’t see any way. Then he began to point out all the shortcomings—the peculiarities, the opinions—and it was torture to me because everything he said was exactly my case. All my shortcomings were brought out, and I began to despair. I had thought I was doing pretty well, but then I found out I was doing terribly. What would I say at the judgment seat of Christ? My idea of the condition of my Christian life had been destroyed. I had thought I was doing well, but I wasn’t. I didn’t know how to get out of this.
Then, of course, Brother Lee began to share on the positive side of living Christ and by the second or third meeting, I finally was convinced it was possible to live Christ. It seemed as if the heavens opened to me. I wasn’t sure that I could do it, but at least I finally realized this was something we should do and something we should aspire to. I was overjoyed because even if I failed, at least this was something to aspire to. This was the biggest help I have received—that God does want us to live Christ, that my Christian life is not adequate, and that I need to aspire to live Christ.
As to my practice, as the weeks went on, I became more and more encouraged about living Christ, and I really feel this has made a difference. If I were discouraged and didn’t think I could live Christ, I wouldn’t even try. To my surprise as I began to open to the Lord, I began to have experiences of the Lord that I hadn’t had for years. My confidence in experiencing Christ began to grow. I would say that my daily life has changed drastically. I am not saying, of course, that I have arrived. Some days are glorious and other days I forget all about living Christ. But I think the Lord has restored the heart in me to live Christ. As far as how to go on, I just need more encouragement. Because I have so many habits of not living Christ and of doing other things and of being preoccupied with so many other things, I feel I need more encouragement to live Christ.
Very good. This is quite helpful to me. In the past months we have covered a number of negative things: culture, opinion, peculiarity, Christianity traps, and habit. Don’t think that we have covered all the negative things. There are still some very negative, deeper, more damaging, and more subtle things which we have not covered. The five or six items which we have covered already are somewhat adequate yet they are still so shallow. They are still mostly outside of you. Your being has not been touched yet. What are the deeper, more subtle, negative things? If you check with the experiences of Christians today, you may realize that very, very few Christians live Christ. It may be a good number, at least among us, are desiring and have such an aspiration to live Christ. They have practiced this to some extent, and to some extent they may consider that they had some success. Actually, though, if you get into the matter you will realize they still don’t have much experience of Christ.