As we said in the first chapter, we do not use the word service in the way today’s Christianity uses it. We refer to the Christian service as having several main items. First it is the function of ministering in the meetings. This means that every believer must function, that is, minister, in the meetings.
The so-called message meeting, the meeting for giving a message, is not as important as the other meetings. The meetings such as the Lord’s table meeting, the prayer meeting, the fellowship meeting, and the study meeting are all much more important than the message meeting. In today’s Christianity, however, people mostly pay attention to the meetings for preaching, teaching, and ministry, so they have a minister or a preacher to preach and to teach, while everyone else sits in the pews to listen. This is not what the believers did at the beginning of the church age. Rather, this is something degraded. We should not bring this to the church life. It is part of the leaven mentioned in Matthew 13:33, and we have to drop it. The church service must include meetings for believers to come together to function mutually. In the Lord’s table meeting we all have to learn how to exercise our spirit to minister to others and to function, and in the prayer meeting, the fellowship meeting, and the study meeting it is the same. When we come together, we all need to learn to function one with another. This is the first item in the Christian service.
The second item in the Christian service is that we need to learn to be related one to another. In order to minister as functioning members, we have to learn to be related to others. Consider the members of your body. All the different members must be rightly related one to another. If the arm is not related to other members, it cannot function properly; before an arm can function, it must be related rightly with the other members. When we offer a prayer, give a testimony, or minister in another way in a meeting, it seems that there is no need to be related with others. However, in order to serve the Lord, to be a living member in the Body, we must realize that we need relatedness. We need to be related with others. Before we are going to serve or do anything as living members of the Body, we first must be related with others.
What is the way to be related with others? Again, consider your body. Every member is related to one, two, or three other members. The arm, for example, is related on one end to the shoulder and on the other end to the hand. We can say that we are members in the Body, but we must know what members we are directly and definitely related to. If we ask an arm, it will tell us definitely that it is related to the shoulder and to the hand. We should not say merely in a general way, “I am in the church; I am a member in the Body.” We must know to whom we are related.
In a building, every piece of material is related to other pieces. A stone that is built into a building is directly related to at least four or five other stones. On the right there is one piece, on the left there is another piece, on the top is another, and beneath is another. In order to be built up in the church, we need to have some brothers and sisters directly related to us. We cannot be in the Body in a general way.
It is not good enough to be related to only one or two others, because these one or two may merely be our favorites. We may like a certain brother, so day by day we try to be related to him. We must be related to several others; then we will be balanced. At our right hand we need one brother, at our left hand we need another one, in front we need another, behind we need another, and on top we need still another. We need at least five or six to balance us. To be sure, if we can go on with these five or six, we can go on with the whole Body. But if we cannot go on with these five or six, I am assured we will not go on with the Body.