I am grateful to the Lord that when I was young and seeking after biblical knowledge, He sovereignly brought me into touch with the Brethren teachings. That surely laid a good foundation for me. In 1932 I began to give three or four messages a week. In the first two or three years, my ministry of the Word was largely based on their teachings. Before too long, however, my messages began to improve. From the base of the Brethren teachings, I improved to the inner life. There was not too much difference, but at least I had a beginning of a change. Then I was helped by Brother Nee to see Christ and the church. That was a real turn in my life. From 1934, at the latest, my ministry of the Word was focused on Christ and the church. That ministry lasted eight or nine years and was much blessed by the Lord. One result was the revival that came in 1943.
Due to that revival I was persecuted. Christianity joined with the invading army of Japan to persecute me. The Japanese military police put me into prison for a month. Then I became sick. During the two and a half years which followed, I was ill and suffered much. At that time I began to see the tree of life. That was a fresh beginning in my ministry of the Word. As soon as I was well enough, I began to speak on the tree of life, on the two trees. The light came. The ministry in those years (1946 to 1948) served the Lord’s purpose. Then in the spring of 1949 I was sent out from the mainland of China to the island of Taiwan, and I brought this light on the tree of life with me.
After I got to Taiwan, I began to see another crucial point, that is, the Spirit. Of course, I knew the Spirit long before, but I didn’t realize that the Spirit is the consummation of the Triune God. Though I had stressed the importance of the experience of the Spirit, before 1950 I didn’t see that the Spirit is the consummation, not just the third of the Trinity.
At first, however, I did not have the expression, “the consummation of the Triune God.” This particular term came to me not too long ago. But in 1950 I realized this without having the full expression. From that time in my ministry I had a great turn to the Spirit. If you check my writings in both Chinese and English, you will see that their focus in the past thirty-four years is actually the Spirit. By 1960 and 1961 my emphasis was altogether the Spirit. During that time I wrote over eighty hymns, most of which have been translated and are in our present hymnal. A good number of them are on the Spirit.
At the end of 1961 I came to the United States. The ministry of the Word in this country began with this focus on the Spirit. In the early years in nearly every conference and training I stressed two things: the ground of the church and the Spirit. I pointed out the Spirit from all the New Testament books. Then in 1969 at the conference in Erie, Pennsylvania, the light came concerning the seven Spirits. After that conference I went back to Los Angeles and we had a conference there, mainly on the seven Spirits.
The light has kept coming concerning the Spirit. If you trace from 1969 till now, within these fourteen years, you will see that the light has mostly been on the Spirit. Quite a number of new terms have come in during this time: the Spirit as the consummation of the Triune God, the all-inclusive Spirit, the compound Spirit, the processed Spirit, and the Spirit of the processed Triune God.
In 1953 and 1954 I began to see that the Spirit includes both divinity and Christ’s humanity, including His living on earth, the effectiveness of His death, and the power of His resurrection. I saw the compound ointment in Exodus 30. My messages were a shock to the co-workers. How could I say that there were elements in the Spirit? It was an altogether new thought to them.