In January 1934 he held his third overcomer conference in Shanghai. The following excerpt is taken from his announcement of this conference. The announcement appeared as part of his open letter in the thirty-second issue of The Present Testimony of October—December 1933 and tells us the nature of that conference:

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We have previously held two conferences of the same nature, one in February of 1928 and one in October of 1931. The conference held in November of last year was of a different nature, and for that reason we consider the upcoming conference to be the third overcomer conference.

I want all the brothers to understand the nature of this type of conference; no attention will be paid to the less significant matters of the Bible. What we want to see in the Holy Spirit is Christ and Him crucified. Matters such as prophecy, church organization, Scripture exposition, types, baptism, laying on of hands, speaking in tongues, miracles, and a hundred other questions have their proper place. As Christians we should not deny them their proper place. However, these are neither the center of the Scriptures nor the center of the life of the Holy Spirit. God has only one center, which is Christ—Christ and Him crucified. Our annual conferences of this nature are to bring us back to this center. Therefore, we are reluctant to mention any minor matters in these conferences. Rather, we would emphasize only the central point which God Himself stressed....

In our conference this time, as before, we wish to stress the central message. After much prayer I feel the theme which the Lord has given me for this conference is "God's overcomers." Everything in the conference will focus on this center....

Finally, in this conference, our hope is to meet Christ, to receive light and revelation from heaven, and to be filled with the life that is unknown to ordinary people. We do not intend to pay attention to the many minor, outward matters. "To know Him" (Phil. 3:10)—this is what we seek.

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