Being Equipped in the Truth, Being Perfected in Character, Being of One Heart and One Way, and Coordinating for the Building Up

In the recently held crystallization-study of Numbers, what touched us very much was that today all of us who have been saved by grace should be the army of Jehovah; we should all be formed into an army so that we may fight together for the Lord's interests. But this is not something to be talked about only; to be formed into an army means to have the appearance of an army formed for battle—to be able to fight, and to be able to bear responsibility in the house of God. In the house of God, whether in the meeting hall or in the district, we should all be able to shoulder responsibility, able to shepherd people, able to preach the gospel and gain people, and able to coordinate and be built up in the church. If we do not have such an aspiration, then I think it would be very hard for us to have the desire to attend the middle-aged training.

For once we have the desire to be blended into the church life, within us we will sense: Why does the district we serve not increase in number? Why does everything look so feeble and frail, and the meetings not so ideal? We cannot blame others; we can only blame ourselves. So within us there is a feeling that the main reason is that we lack equipping, that within us we lack the Lord's word. We very much want to prophesy well, but when we stand up we forget, or we do not know where we are speaking to; therefore within us a thought rises up: we need to exercise our spirit, and we need to learn the Lord's word well. So this middle-aged training of ours, to speak truly, is all done by the Lord. So many people have passed through the middle-aged training; we often say that it turns corruption into something marvelous. Someone may look like not much, but after a few months of training, the one who was without heart becomes one with heart, and the one who was useless becomes useful. Moreover, when he gives a testimony, it truly encourages people; then, returning to his locality, he truly becomes a living and functioning member. This is the main purpose of our attending the training.

We hope that here we all have a learning spirit and that we positively exercise our spirit. We are not here seeking a qualification—"I have attended the middle-aged training," and saying "the middle-aged training" sounds mighty, as though one has a special status. Actually, we do not mean this at all. We very much hope that through the environment of the middle-aged training we can compare notes with one another and encourage one another here, so that we may be equipped in the truth, be perfected in our character, and in coordination know how to coordinate well with the brothers and sisters; and in the spirit of one heart and one way, that we may participate together in the building up of God's house. So in this training, I hope that every one of us will lay hold of this opportunity to be perfected corporately. We have no intention here to mold a spiritual giant; we hope that after every brother and sister has attended the training, we will all be strong in our spirit and will all be living and functioning members. This is what is of the greatest profit to the church.

So the time of the training is not long—only two semesters, less than a year—but it truly will affect our whole life in walking the Lord's way. I have seen many brothers who are actually already old brothers, having walked the way for decades, yet they still come to be trained. So it is never too late to be trained; everyone needs to receive training, everyone needs to learn unceasingly, and there is no end to learning. As long as we are simple toward the Lord and willing to learn, the Lord will carry out His workmanship on us. In this process we very much stress the growth in life. Today we have been saved by grace, and we all have the divine life, like a seed sown into us; but this seed of the divine life within us will grow. Life has many aspects worthy of attention. Generally speaking, the life of our natural man has a physiological aspect of life and a psychological aspect of life; but today, having been saved by grace, we have one more life—a divine life.

Our natural life will grow old; the natural life also is not perfect, and it too needs training, needs exercise, and needs to gradually grow; but that is the natural life. Today the divine life within us likewise must grow. God is very willing to dispense His life into us through all kinds of environments; God's life entering into us mingles with our natural life, and gradually the life grows, the divine life increases, and the natural life is gradually put off. This causes us to be not merely a fleshly person; gradually we become a God-man. The Lord Jesus is the first God-man; He is God incarnated to become flesh. But within Him there is the divine life, and what He lived out was a pattern of a God-man.

In us, actually we too have this divine life, only we have not fully lived Him out; this is why we need to receive training here, training to the point that the life of God within us increases, and the appearance of a God-man that we live out also increases. Today not one of us can strongly say, "I am a perfect man"; we should say that we are God-men. A God-man is very different from a man; the difference lies in how much divine life is within you and how much you live out. When we call on the Lord's name, our spirit is enlivened, and we feel that we are different; the spirit being enlivened, the divine life within us begins to operate. Merely calling on the Lord's name is not enough; we still need to come to read the Lord's word, and the Lord's word dispenses the divine life into us. The more we labor on the Lord's word, the more the divine life is dispensed. It is not the gaining of knowledge and doctrine, but the dispensing of the divine life mingling with our human life, so that we can live out a God-man.

The environment of the middle-aged training is the best environment for exercise. Returning to our own place, of course we can also exercise, but the environment is a little worse, and it is very easy to return to our original natural life. It does not matter; we simply come back to the Lord again, again through prayer, again through repentance and confession of sin, again returning into our spirit, and the life within us begins to operate. During this time in the middle-aged training we exercise this very thing. And this kind of exercise of ours is not to train us to become a superior person, as though our morality were higher, as though our character were nobler—actually it is not. Through such exercise, it is to cause us to live out the divine life within us, that we may be the testimony of Jesus; this is what God wants.

Today God created man with the purpose that man may express Him; if we can match God's will, we can please God. So here we hope that the brothers and sisters all have such a preparation in their spirit. In the church there are many brothers and sisters, but not every brother and sister can function; that is not certain—most are not able to function. Just as we were before, it was already good enough to come to the meeting. But when you come to the meeting, within you there is a thirst, wanting to come to serve God; and serving God is also a natural reaction of the life of God within us. As long as you have God within you, within you there is the desire to serve God. Only, whether or not it matches God's will is not certain: some serve God according to their own ideas; some, having been perfected and trained, no longer follow their own ideas, but serve God according to God's operation within us—there is a great difference here. Likewise, we hope that in the church every one is a useful vessel. How do you cause every person to become a useful vessel? This is for us to create an atmosphere in the church in which everyone is eager for good works and everyone does the Lord's work.

Today in the church those who really do the Lord's work are indeed too few. In the church we stress again and again that we want to go out to knock on doors and visit, to bring people to salvation and to become remaining fruit; that after being saved they can also live a normal church life, that in the church life they can also function, and that they too, like us, can also go out to preach the gospel and can also feed and care for people. We think it should be this way, but to make a person into this is very hard; it is not a matter of working him out, but of his needing to obtain the growth of the divine life within him. So in the church, through all kinds of perfecting and training, the purpose we all regard as important is how this divine life is wrought into every person. So we should all pray to God, asking the Lord to work this divine life into us, mingling with this person of ours, so that we can live out the appearance of a God-man.

In whatever we do, are we able to be temperate and self-controlled, sober and self-restrained? This speaks of how we still live in the flesh; sometimes the flesh very easily issues from within us. To be sober and self-restrained means that our mind is sober; sometimes when the temper comes, the mind becomes muddled; when the environment comes, perhaps we cannot hold ourselves in check. These situations speak of our deficiency. Here it also says we should be orderly, hospitable, and apt to teach. In the church we very much hope that every one of us is a person apt to teach. We often say we cannot do it, "I do not know how to do this," "I do not quite understand this either." You may speak this way now, but every one of us needs to have a kind of thirst: in the church we want to be one who is apt to teach. What we lack is perhaps that in our own pursuit we may think, "It is enough if I myself am good; it is enough if I myself can function." But today in the church it is not only that we ourselves can function; we still have to bring others along to do the same work with us.

Today in the church many of our brothers and sisters—in your district, in your group—perhaps you are the responsible one, perhaps you are the district responsible one, perhaps you care for a small group, and you discover that this district is very hard to multiply because there are no people; and when there are people, there are no middle-level co-workers, so it still cannot multiply. This situation speaks out that we often care only for our own affairs, and it is very hard for us to be one who is apt to teach. In this training we have one function: we want to train every trainee to be one who is apt to teach. Do not say you cannot do it, and do not say "this I cannot manage"; as long as you are willing to exercise, you will rise up to prophesy for the Lord, you will exercise to be a small-group leader, and you will exercise to be a dormitory head in the dormitory. These exercises are to train every one of us to be one who is apt to teach; and to be hospitable, willing to perfect others. Some people are rather conservative, often thinking it is enough just to take good care of themselves; to be able to take good care of oneself is already not simple, but this still does not reach God's requirement. We still have to perfect people in the church; according to our age, we want to perfect the next generation, perfect those younger than us, perfect the newly added ones, so that they can all do the same things we can do—only then can the church continually multiply. Otherwise, the church stops in that place. Once it stops in that place, it will discover that it becomes older and older. What the church most fears is becoming older and older, because time waits for no one and moves forward every day. If we do not bring in new ones and do not perfect new ones, then of course we become a day older each day. Then when we look at our district, at our meeting hall, they are all old people. But thank and praise the Lord! Our inner man is being renewed day by day. Not only is our inner man being renewed day by day; as to the outer, we still have to perfect new ones and still have to bring in new ones. So we very much stress the work among the young people; almost whenever we speak of the young people's work—whether children, junior high and senior high, college students, or young working ones—they are all our focus.

When you touch the things of the church, you had best exercise your spirit, pray in the spirit, and touch things in the spirit, so that your service may become more and more seasoned, and your service may be able to supply life to people rather than merely the outward things. Matters are very simple, but through our service we are able to supply life to people—this is what is important. We hope that every one of us here will not only learn some knowledge here, learn some truth, but we also hope that in our living, through our various kinds of fellowship, we will have some learning here as to how to serve in the church, and then how to serve properly. As Paul said, "But if I delay, I write that you may know how one ought to conduct himself in the house of God" (see 1 Tim. 3:15). This is the purpose of our training: to let every brother and sister become a useful vessel, a living and functioning member in the church. May the Lord bless us.

(Fellowship at the Autumn 2019 Commencement of the Middle-Aged Training)