It is actually not that hard to carry out the small groups. We simply need to learn to adjust as the situation demands. Those who have been trained by me can testify that what I teach in the training and what we do in actual practice are sometimes different. This is because in the actual carrying out of what is taught, we sometimes have to adjust due to practical needs. A good coach teaches his students according to regulation, but at the same time he also teaches them that when they are carrying out what is taught, they need to be able to adjust according to the demands of the situation. For example, a boxer may box with his coach during practice in a particular way. However, if he uses exactly the same movements at a competition, he will lose. If his coach were to box in a competition, he would not box in exactly the same manner as he boxes while practicing. Instead, he will adjust as the situation demands and will win. This is the coach’s wisdom.
Let us use driving as another example. We must follow the traffic rules and regulations when learning to drive. However, when we are on the road, we need to be able to adjust to the conditions on the road. Otherwise, an accident might happen. This is the challenge. When you are teaching someone to drive, you should give him some teaching materials. If you do not give him any materials containing various principles, then you will not be able to teach him. It is good to teach the regulations during the class and during training, but when it comes to the actual driving, the driver must learn to adjust according to the situation and apply what he has learned to the appropriate environment. The same is true with translation. A word can be interpreted many ways, and one needs to make the best judgment based upon the context and logic of the facts. For you to begin working on a group, I can only teach you the principles. You have to endeavor to get into the details and to put them into practice. Then the results will be unlimited. In doing anything, you cannot be so rigid. It is the same with leading a small group. You need to adjust according to the situation, and you need to properly apply what you have learned.
This situation is a perfect opportunity for you. I have given you the way and the principles. You need to hold on to these, be diligent to carry them out, and learn to adjust according to the situation. I believe that if you do this, you will see some results, even if your results are not complete.
As ones who have come out to serve full time, you should serve in the new way ordained by God. Do not think that to serve full time is to learn to stand on a platform and give messages. This concept is wrong. In the past we could not maintain the Lord’s Day meeting without someone giving a message. However, now we are not depending on you to give messages on the platform. Rather, we want you to contact people. If you are willing to spend five years to attend as many church meetings as possible and to learn to serve, using half of every day to learn the truth and the other half to work, then the future of the Lord’s recovery will definitely be bright.
There are many ways by which we can work. We can work by contacting the members in a small group or the saints attending the meeting. It is not necessary for others to give you a charge and a commission. Rather, you should already have this view that your work is to happily and voluntarily contact others and then to fellowship with them in a normal way by either inviting them for a meal or visiting them in their homes to cherish and help them. If you would do this for months and even years, the result would be inestimable.
You must realize that your work is not like a carpenter’s work, which cannot reproduce itself. What you are working on is something that reproduces itself. Today you may be laboring on eight people, all of whom can reproduce. In the beginning the Lord created only one couple, but the issue of this one couple has been a continual multiplication and increase. Now after six thousand years there are billions of people. If in the beginning the Lord had created a chair, today there would still be only one chair. So do not view your caring for eight people as a light matter. It may be that one of them will become a leading apostle and be greatly used by the Lord. Who can say that this will not happen? I hope that you would all be in this new, God-ordained way, endeavoring to learn how to serve.
It is a big mistake to overemphasize a particular service and to neglect the church meetings. This is acceptable occasionally but not for a prolonged period of time. Since the meetings are your work and service, in scheduling your time you should make sure that your particular service does not occupy the meeting times. You have to meet because the meetings are your work. Of course, one of those meetings should be the small group meeting. I hope that every one of you would diligently labor and care for one small group.
Since I have not observed your specific services, I am not quite familiar with your situations. Thus, I can only give you some principles. I believe that these principles are right and are according to the ideal concept as well as the proper spiritual theories. First, regardless of whether we are serving with the junior high, high school, or college students, the first goal should be to get people saved. We should get people saved in an aggressive way. Following a person’s salvation, we should not bring him to the meeting hall to mop the floor or wipe the windows. Instead, we should lead him to preach the gospel and encourage him to lead others to salvation. This should be their service, even their primary service. After getting a student saved, we should not bring him to the meeting hall to join a service group. That would be wrong. Even if a person has the time and the heart to join a service group, this kind of leading would be wrong. These newly saved ones, because they are students, should be encouraged only to endeavor to preach the gospel to get others saved. This should be their service.