If you study the footnotes in the New Testament Recovery Version, you will discover that those footnotes were not composed in a loose way. I revised the footnotes repeatedly until they accurately expressed the meaning of the truth. To study in Taiwan you need to strive and to be industrious. Our striving and being industrious are related to our character. What Paul said to Timothy was entirely related to the matter of character. Perhaps you may say that although the letters to Timothy mention many matters, the word character is never mentioned. This is correct. However, the charge that Paul gave to Timothy was definitely a teaching regarding the matter of character.
In 1 Timothy 4:12 Paul said to Timothy, “Let no one despise your youth, but be a pattern to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.” This verse has a very profound meaning. You should not let anyone despise your youth. However, if your attire is unsuitable and your speech is inappropriate, how could others not despise your youth? If you are careless and frivolous in your actions, people will spontaneously despise your youth. Therefore, what Paul was telling Timothy in this verse was that Timothy should be dignified in his conduct and actions and proper in his speech. What he said, how much he said, and when and how he said things should have caused others to respect him rather than despise his youth.
In this verse Paul first mentioned our words, then our conduct, behavior, and actions, and lastly our love, faith, and purity. Love and faith are matters of life, whereas our words and conduct are matters of our character. If we were to write this verse, we would mention faith and love first and then conduct and word. However, in doing so we would mistake the means for the end and say exactly the opposite of what Paul said.
I do not intend to boast, but I would like to testify that when I was thirty-one years old, I was already pursuing the truth. One day a brother said to me, “Brother Lee, I would like to know what your background is, because you seem to be someone of noble birth in your words, actions, conduct, and manner of speech.” I answered, “My background is not noble but poor. When I was ten and was beginning to understand the affairs of human life, I realized that my family was in a destitute situation.” I was of a lowborn family, but I was strict regarding my education. Thus, as one who was still in school, whenever I stood up to speak, people around me, including the elderly, would become quiet and respectfully listen to my speaking.
Wherever I go in the United States, those who have a higher status than I still respect me, even though I am Chinese. If I seemed like a lower class person, they would not respect me, and it would be difficult for them to accept my speaking, no matter how well I could speak. Thus, in order that others would not despise your youth, you should learn of me and be strict from your youth in disciplining yourself and taking the initiative to learn by yourself.
In the recovery we emphasize the way of life. The way of life is not a matter of ethics, morality, or culture but a matter of walking according to the Spirit. In light of this, some may say that character training is contrary to our emphasis in the recovery. They may say that character training is not a matter of life but a matter of developing our “bright virtue.” However, surely the character of a person who walks according to the Spirit would be much higher than the character of a person who develops his bright virtue. If we talk about life, but our character is lower than the character of those who develop their bright virtue, then we make the salvation of the Lord Jesus worthless. I hate for this to happen. In the recovery we are pursuing the truth, we are learning to take the way of life, and we are proper with regard to morality. However, when we examine the matter of our human character, immediately our inadequate condition is exposed. We are lacking in diligence and seriousness, and we are short in pursuing, making progress, and learning. This makes me very sorrowful.
Because of our shortages with regard to character, the church is not highly respected in people’s eyes. Our way of working is not very high, so when a Christian group with a way that is superior to ours emerges, we immediately fall behind. Thirty-five years ago in the Far East, there were not many groups that had as many high quality people as we had in the Lord’s recovery. When we were in mainland China, a group of saints was raised up among us. When we officially began the work in Taiwan on August 1, 1949, we had only four to five hundred brothers and sisters on the island of Taiwan and a little over a hundred in Taipei. In 1955, after six years, there were 45,000 believers in the churches on the entire island. Other groups could not match our large size. However, today these groups have adopted a number of our ways and even improved on them through further study and revision. We have the truth and life, but because we have been so closed to new things and have confined ourselves to the old ways, we have fallen behind the other groups.
For example, some Christian groups are now using small groups to bring hundreds and thousands of people to salvation. Thirty years ago we already had the practice of the small groups. We used the small groups as a means of going from house to house to bring people to salvation. However, we unconsciously dropped the practice of the small groups and started to bring people to the meeting hall to gather them for conferences. Outwardly, the conferences seemed to be merely conferences, but in reality they had become occasions for “celebrity speeches.” This may be likened to gathering students to a school that does not have classes, classrooms, or teachers but only a few celebrities who come in to speak, and hoping that the students will eventually be able to graduate after hearing this kind of speaking for ten years. Our work in the past replaced the cause with the effect. Speeches display a person’s achievements, but if you want to learn the way to attain to those achievements yourself, you need to go through certain courses and learn them sequentially, lesson by lesson.