In order to put this into practice, we need to have the meetings. The most profitable and proper way to meet is to fellowship with one another according to the instruction we have received. Someone may ask a brother, “Do you realize that we have to exercise our spirit to contact Christ, walk in the spirit, and take Christ as our life in a practical way?” Then the brother can testify how he has experienced Christ as the life-giving Spirit by exercising his spirit. This should not be a testimony about what happened twenty years ago. It should be a testimony of the brother’s recent experience. Moreover, it should be something real, not mere knowledge. Simply to repeat the points of a message means nothing. We may compare the speaking of knowledge to teaching someone to drive a car. If we only tell a person how to turn the steering wheel, he still will not know how to drive; rather, he needs practice.
We also have seen that in order to experience Christ in a living way, we have to deal with our conscience. Our conscience must be pure, purged, good, and without offenses. This is the instruction of dealing with our conscience. It is brief, because even the apostles did not give long messages in the New Testament. To put this into practice, though, we can ask a brother, “Would you please tell us what your experience is of dealing with your conscience?” The right way is to put the brothers on a little test. Some may say that this will scare people away. That is all right; let them not come. Then whoever comes will come with a sincere heart, not just to listen as a “pew member.” What is the good of listening like this even for twenty years?
Much instruction has been given, but I am concerned about the practice. We do not meet together to learn the “menu” and the “recipes.” I do not care to learn these; I simply want to eat. Sometimes my little daughter teases me and asks me if I know what I am eating. However, I do not have to exercise my mentality to know; I simply eat to enjoy.
Today too many Christians come to the meetings only to sit and listen. They learn to criticize and say, “Good speaker, marvelous message.” After doing this for twenty years, do they have the growth in life? Do they know Christ in a practical way? Rather, after twenty years they are still the same, as far as life is concerned. They are spiritual dwarfs, without a proper stature. We need to grow, and in order to grow we need to eat. We cannot grow without eating. All mothers know that children grow by eating, not by knowledge. The church needs to nourish the saints, and the saints need to be nourished by learning to take Christ and by practicing all the things that we have learned.
I am not without the experience of these things. I experienced the vanity of the mere teachings in Christianity, so I know that today we need the real practice and the real experience of Christ. When we say that we need to deal with our conscience, the church must immediately help the saints to put this instruction into practice, and everyone should practice dealing with his conscience. Then we may ask a brother to give a testimony of dealing with his conscience. This is the proper way. If by the Lord’s grace we take this way, then week after week and month after month the saints will grow in life.
We have said that the inner anointing is the heavenly, spiritual, divine “painting.” Through this strange language we have received the instruction; however, I am concerned that even after five months not many of us have practiced the inner anointing. This is another example of how the leading ones need the experience to take the right way. It is easy simply to read a certain chapter and a certain verse and speak about a certain subject. To help the brothers and sisters to go on in a practical way, however, requires that we have the real experience. I hope the church will take this way.
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