Finally, I would like to seriously remind God’s children that the building is the yardstick and the test for all spiritual matters. We must use the building as a yardstick to test whether the spiritual condition of the brothers and sisters is proper or not. If the more spiritual you are, the more independent you become, or the less able you are to be joined to others, then surely your spirituality is questionable. If the more you love the Lord, the more you feel that you are higher and better than others and the more you like to condemn others, then there is something wrong with your loving the Lord. Clearly, we human beings are not so simple.
I know some believers who have learned the lesson of prayer well, but strangely, although they pray so much, they cannot be joined to others. The more they pray, the less they are joined to others. Eventually, they can pray only by themselves. They form a habit in which they must find a quiet room, lock the door, and solemnly kneel down and pray. The more these ones pray, the more they sense the presence of the Lord, and the more they enter into fellowship with the Lord. It is difficult to say whether this kind of prayer is good or not. However, one thing is for sure—ultimately, every person who prays in this manner will not pray with others and will even stop attending the prayer meeting of the church. If you ask such a person why he prays in this manner, he will use the Scriptures to prove his case, saying, “Have you not read about how the Lord Jesus went to the garden of Gethsemane to pray? First, He and the disciples left the crowd and came to the deserted garden of Gethsemane. Then He took three of the disciples aside and left the others behind. However, this was not enough, so finally, leaving the three disciples, He went forward a little to pray alone before God. Only this is real prayer.” If you ask him why he does not attend the prayer meeting, he will again give you many reasons, saying, “Have you noticed what kinds of people are in the meeting? All of them are old ladies who have been saved only recently and old men who are in their seventies. When they pray, their voices are so soft and their prayers are so long. Their prayers put me to sleep. How could I pray there?” He will argue so much for only one principle, the principle of being freed from the crowd to go forward a little to the place where the Lord Jesus prayed alone. He also may give you another illustration, saying, “Look at the story in the Old Testament. When Moses went to meet God at Mount Sinai, his first step was to take Aaron with him and to leave the people of Israel behind. His second step was to leave Aaron at the foot of the mountain and to go alone to see God on the mountaintop. Therefore, to truly come before God we must be alone.”
We may have nothing to say when we meet this kind of brother. However, we should not laugh at him. This is a problem that we frequently encounter in the church. Such brothers do not realize that the Lord Jesus did not always pray alone in the garden of Gethsemane. Instead, He spent much time being mingled with the disciples. Similarly, Moses was on the mountain for only forty days at the most, while most of the time he was being mingled with the people of Israel. These brothers who think that they are following the pattern of prayer set by the Lord Jesus and Moses have never mingled with God’s children.
Not only can prayer be a problem, but spiritual gifts can also become a problem in the building of the church. Many brothers and sisters admire spiritual gifts, and the church needs them as well. However, many brothers and sisters seem able to be joined to others before their spiritual gifts are manifested, but once they become somewhat useful in the church and once their gifts have been manifested a little, then they want to be alone and not be associated with others. Therefore, the building is a great balance. If you pray to such an extent that you become independent and cannot pray with others, then you must immediately be balanced by the building. To pray is right, but you cannot go to the extreme. You need to be balanced. Similarly, spiritual gifts are right, but if the gifts cause you to be unable to coordinate with the brothers and sisters, then you have swerved toward the extreme. Thus, we need the light of the building to balance us.
Once we have the personal experience, we will realize that only by being built can we be truly spiritual. Furthermore, we will realize that only when we are built with others can we have the full knowledge and experience of Christ, which far surpasses the knowledge and experience that we have when we pursue the Lord alone. I am not annulling the individual aspect of the Christian life. However, we must realize that the truth in the Bible always has two sides, like a cake. The Christian life has an aspect of being alone, and it also has an aspect of being coordinated with others. It has an individual aspect and also a corporate aspect. When we want to fully enjoy Christ, taste the riches of the Lord’s love, and feel the rich presence of the Lord, then we must come to the church. For example, when we sing the hymns, we often sense an especially rich flavor. One absolutely cannot obtain that kind of rich flavor while singing hymns alone at home with the door shut. In another example, suppose the responsible brothers and sisters in a home meeting are in coordination and in one accord. There are no spiritual giants among them, and there are no especially gifted ones or talented ones. Yet when they preach the gospel, they are able to bring more people to salvation than the gifted ones can. Moreover, the number of attendees in their meetings is very large, and the spirit in the meetings is very strong. The reason that they have God’s blessing and presence is because they are willing to be balanced by the building.
Finally, what the Lord wants today is not a church that seems to be spiritual but is not being built up. What the Lord wants is a church that is both spiritual and balanced by the building. Only such a builded church can be the tabernacle and dwelling place of God for God and man to have rest together.