I was originally going to China as a missionary. I had majored in classical Chinese and Guoyu at the University of London, and also in Oriental philosophy. But, Fiona, I have forgotten most of that.
I was due to go out as a missionary to China with the China Inland Mission. Then I worked for two years in the chaplaincy of the Royal Air Force, and during that time my health collapsed and China went Communist. So I came back very, very ill. For a while, I was suspected of having the beginnings of leukemia.
When I got back home in 1951, all the talk was of the revival in the Hebrides. The Hebrides are little islands off the northwest coast of Scotland. Two old sisters had spent every night in prayer for six months, and at the other end of the island, in Lewis and Harris, seven brothers had met together for one whole day per week for two years.
These folks had travailed in prayer for those islands, and in the most remarkable way—though it would take far too long to tell you, and is not part of the Richmond story in one sense—there was an outpouring of the Spirit of God upon the Hebrides.
Shepherds in the fields were suddenly struck to the ground, convicted of sin, and found the Lord. Then they wandered into the villages and towns, only to find that lots of other people had found the Lord.
There were occasions when people met together for prayer in a house and the whole house was shaken. On another occasion—and I have friends who were present at these times—when they were leaving a meeting, suddenly the heavens above them were filled with music and singing. They were remarkable times.
The whole of Britain was agog with this outpouring of the Spirit in the Hebrides. Everyone heard much about these two old sisters and these seven old gentlemen. I had been reading Finney’s Lectures on Revivals. If you want to be very uncomfortable, read Finney’s Lectures on Revivals, particularly the passage on ploughing up the fallow ground. That really finished us.
My sister, one or two others, and I covenanted together not to speak about revival, not to read about it, and not even to pray about it for one whole month. We were afraid that this burden was merely emotional, produced by all the talk of the Hebrides and everything else.
But we said that if, after one month, the burden was more deeply in our hearts than before, we would come together and start to pray. After one month, the burden was greater than ever.
So, on the first day of September 1951, we began prayer. We prayed every evening through September, October, November, and December, up to Christmas 1951.
To me, it is a miracle when I look back that we ever could pray in the way we did. We used to meet from about seven o’clock and pray until ten or half past ten—three to three-and-a-half hours every evening. You know how hard it is to sustain prayer for just half an hour. How we did it, I look back and say, was a miracle.
We were never fewer than two, and never more than eight. Yet in November 1951 we had the greatest London fog in our history, in which three thousand people died. It was so thick that we could not see across the street. All traffic and everything stopped, but we would not stop our times of prayer.
We walked two, three, even four miles through the fog to meet together for prayer. There were always at least two of us at every one of those meetings.
Out of this came our interdenominational fellowship, if you like. We called it Koinonia, the Greek word for fellowship. We had no advertisement and no publicity. We did nothing but meet together. We were just young people.
Before a week or two had gone, we began meeting every Friday, beginning in the first months of 1952. We had very little idea of the church at that time.
Our burden in prayer was twofold:
I was in a very large Baptist church, where I had really come to know the Lord. Most of the people came from outside Richmond. They drove in, and they had very little real burden for the local area.
One thing that disturbed me greatly was that you could lift the whole six hundred people out of Richmond and, provided you did not take the building with them, no one would know. There was no impact upon the locality, no impact upon the actual flow of life among the people of Richmond.
This was a very real burden, brothers. We felt that every real company of God’s children, every true church, ought to turn the world upside down. There ought to be some kind of disturbance in hell, if nowhere else.
I could never understand why we had eight ladies to every man in the church. I was a very irreverent youngster, and I was always asking, “Why are there so many women?” The older sisters would say, “Aren’t our souls as valuable as men’s?”
But I never meant that. It completely mystified me that the Lord saved so many ladies as compared with men. Others told me confidently that two world wars had killed all the men. But I could not understand that, because you saw as many men in the streets and in the movie houses as you did in the church.
I used to think to myself: when God really moves, He saves a type of man you do not often see in the churches. Why does He not do it today? He saved all kinds of people when we read the New Testament.
That is how the burden developed. It was like a tank of water which, when we prayed, would drain out. Then we would get up and go, but by the next day the water was full again, and we simply had to pray again to release the burden. Of course, it was travail, though we did not fully realize it then.
We prayed for all kinds of places: for the places of prostitution, for places of evil of one kind or another, for hospitals, schools, colleges, churches—everything. We prayed for it all in those months.
Out of that came Koinonia. Within a few weeks, every church, chapel, and mission was represented by young people. We had Catholics, Anglicans, Episcopalians, Methodists, Congregationalists, Baptists, Brethren, Presbyterians—everything. We did not have any Exclusives at that time.
We never had any fights, troubles, or scrabbles. We simply loved the Lord, and we loved one another. We never called these times prayer meetings or Bible studies; we called them Koinonia fellowships.
Some older Christians did not understand the word Koinonia. They thought we were going politically left because it looked like a Russian word. They were convinced that we were becoming Communist or Marxist in our outlook.
At the beginning, we did not do anything in outreach. We worshipped the Lord, shared the Lord, and studied the Word. The Word became such a powerful factor in all our lives.
We were young people, used to getting everything secondhand in one sense. But once we began to study the Word and the Spirit of God shed light upon it, it became revolutionary to us. It began to mould and influence everything among us. It was like a great river of life flowing through us.
Then we began to have what we called “squashes.” Do you understand that term? They were gatherings of young people in which we squashed everyone into a small building. So we called it a squash.
We would not allow anyone to come who did not bring an unsaved friend. If you did not bring an unsaved friend, you had to go to another home, where they had a prayer meeting instead, and pray for the time.
The first time we held one, the house was packed: upstairs, bedrooms, downstairs rooms—everywhere. A great number got saved.
Then we took a cinema, or movie house as you call it, and used the restaurant in the building. That upset some Christians. They said it was terrible that young people were in a movie house. But others got saved.
We even took a steamer on the River Thames. It was built for about one hundred and fifty people, but we got over two hundred aboard. Once we had cast off, of course, they could not get off. That was one of the best times of evangelism we ever had.
We went down the river to Hampton Court, and we deliberately did not dock there. We turned around and came all the way back. Quite a few people were saved on that trip. Some of those folks are with us today. They became the nucleus of the work.
Of course, ostracism and antagonism began. Everyone getting saved at that time was passed on to the different churches, but the churches turned against us.
I am still convinced that the Lord was in it. We would never have learned the lessons we have now learned, or gone the way we have gone, if it had not been for that. As Joseph said, they meant it for evil, but the Lord meant it for good. That takes the sting out of it.
They said terrible things about us. They spread stories that we were involved in black magic, that we held séances, that we were Russellites, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, and that I was giving sex instruction to the young people.
I remember one occasion when a girl came in, banged on the door, never took her coat off, and shot into the corner like a frightened rabbit. Her face was as bright as a canary’s shirt, and she sat there with a notebook and pencil.
We did not know it, but she had been sent by a well-known local Christian to take notes of the supposed séance, to get firsthand evidence. She got so blessed that she has been with us ever since.
Of course, that became further evidence that there was something hypnotic about us all. You see, people came in who were not with us, got so “hypnotized” that they stayed, and became quite different.
In the autumn of 1952, we realized that we had a church within a church within a church. In my own church, for instance, two-thirds of the members would not even look at you. They turned aside when they saw you. They would not shake hands or say good morning or good evening.
I was reported for speaking to new members—people who had found the Lord amongst us and whom we had passed on for baptism and so on. It became a very unhappy situation.
At that time, I began to see what the church was, and that emancipated me completely. I felt that I could no longer be a Baptist; I could only be a Christian.
It was not that I was being divisive, but I could no longer be a segment of God’s people. People say that it does not matter, but it is like a Communist who says it does not matter while he is still a card-carrying Communist Party member.
I did not feel I could belong any longer to something that was a division of God’s people. So I said, “I cannot be a Baptist anymore. I am only a Christian.”
We had three weeks of prayer. We said to everyone, “Seek the Lord. We will do nothing en bloc. If you feel the Lord wants you to stay within the established groups, stay. But if you feel that the Lord has freed you, and you should be out together, let us seek the Lord and do His will.”
The result was that two-thirds decided quite happily to stay within the established groups. We were cut down to a small handful. That is really how the work began.
The ministers in the area gave us six months. They had a special meeting and said, “Well, we give them six months. They are just kids. They will come back cap in hand after six months, when they have made all their mistakes.”
But they did not realize that they had thrown us out. In one way, it was only a matter of time before we would all have been expelled. We simply jumped the gun and moved out.
Yet they had thrown us out into the arms of God. We never, at any point, decided to have a church. We had never conceived of the possibility that we would be on our own. We had only thought that the Lord would do a new thing in His people all through the Thames Valley, and that many unsaved people would be saved.
When this happened, we did not know what to do. We had the Book, we had the Holy Spirit, and we sought the Lord. That is how the work began.
The first lesson that comes straight out of what I have already said is the principle of travail.
Why do we not find the house of God truly in expression? Why do we not find the church of God really functioning? We have lots of New Testament patterns, have we not? Yet they look so powerless, so lifeless, and in many ways so hopeless.
I believe the key is travail. The church is not an organization; it is an organism. An organism has to be born, and for birth there has to be travail.
God’s dilemma is to find people who know how to travail. You cannot travail when you are a baby. You have to be of a certain age, with a certain spiritual maturity. Everywhere God looks, He cannot bring something to birth where there are not people who can travail.
Simply putting up a church is playing at church. People think that you can get a few people together and set up a church. Some even talk about setting up a body—as though you could set up a body.
My body was never set up; my body was born. You cannot set up a body. You cannot even set up a church.
Potentially, you have a church when believers meet together in a given area, in time, on earth. But for the church truly to function, it has to be born of God. That requires travail somewhere.
It does not matter where we look in the history of the church: behind every real move of the Spirit of God, we find a ministry of travail.
You cannot travail unless you are prepared to lay down your life. People used to come to me and say, “How marvellous that you folks could get together—you had the time. We could not do it.”
I was supposed to be dying of leukemia. My sister was taking her finals. Another sister had just had a baby and was up to her eyes in responsibilities. One brother had his own new business, which absorbed all his thought. Every one of us had a perfect excuse for not praying.
Yet it cost every one of us a great deal to set aside those times and pray. I do not think you can ever have travail without a laying down of life.
That is why there is so little church functioning. People want the blessings, the fellowship, and the advantages, but they do not want the responsibilities. The responsibilities are total.
The second lesson we learned, right at the beginning, was the headship of the Lord Jesus Christ—the absolute headship of the Lord Jesus Christ.
I come from a monarchy, and I am glad I come from a monarchy. Of course, I have to be careful here with all your history. Our monarchy is what we call a constitutional monarchy, a democratic monarchy.
This means that it is not an absolute monarchy. The monarch is a figurehead, above party and faction, but whatever government is in control writes the speeches for the monarch, and she has to read them as though they were her own.
Laws and acts are passed in Parliament, and the Queen has to sign them. They are done by others, but they pass in her name.
This is exactly what we have done with the Lord Jesus. He is not an absolute monarch in the church. So often, He is a constitutional monarch. We write His speeches for Him, and then we give them in His name.
There are many sermons that come well and truly into this category. We pass acts in His name as well.
We may meet to discuss a programme for the coming autumn and winter. We say, “Now then, here we are, the committee. Let us have a word of prayer.”
Then we pray: “Now, Lord, will You please lead us concerning the programme for this coming autumn and winter? Show us what we should do, how we should do it, and who should participate. Amen.”
Afterwards, the leader says, “Now then, have you got that list of fixtures for the coming autumn? And have you got the list of speakers? Let us hear them all.”
We hear a whole list of things already arranged. We have a little discussion, bow our heads, and somebody says, “Thank You, Lord, for showing us Your will for this coming autumn and winter.” Then we wonder afterwards why there is no blessing.
You see, we have a constitutional monarch.
We were just youngsters, but we believed one simple thing: when Ephesians 1:22-23 says that He has been made Head over all things to the church, that is practical. It is not merely mystical or abstract; it is practical.
He is our Leader. He is the Chairman of any committee we may have. He is the One who can make known His will by the Spirit.
From the beginning, therefore, we referred and deferred to the Lord Jesus as though He were physically among us. Every time we had a problem, we got on our knees and said, “Lord, tell us: what shall we do about this?”
All our mistakes came when we did not do that. All the blessings we have known through the years have come from that simple practice.
This has applied at every level: the elders, the deacons, the children’s work, the young people’s work, evangelistic outreach, and the work which goes throughout Eastern Europe and Russia.
Every aspect of the work has been the same. We have got on our knees, referred and deferred to our Lord, and refused to do anything until we were of one mind.
Sometimes one brother has felt, “No, this is not right,” and we have waited. We have said, “Brother, you know this is a great responsibility. You are the only one who feels this way. Ask the Lord, and we will ask the Lord.”
Sometimes that one brother has proved to be right. The rest of us have continued to seek the Lord and found that he was right. Often, the truth was between us all.
We have been saved from many a tragedy simply by adopting this principle of unanimity: being of one mind in the Lord and respecting one another.
We must not say, “That is just so-and-so. That is his temperament. He always thinks that way.” When we do that, we distrust one another, and the devil gets a foothold. But when we say, “This is a brother in the Lord,” we trust the Lord in one another and find the way through.
If anyone asks me for the single greatest lesson of our history, I would say, without any shadow of doubt, that it is this matter of referring and deferring to our Lord Jesus.
If you really know the headship of Jesus Christ in practical terms, you will undoubtedly know the Body. As Colossians 2:19 teaches, hold fast the Head, and you find the Body. You do not find the Body and then get to the Head; you hold fast the Head and find the Body.
Moses and Aaron were leaders, yet whenever there was a problem, they fell flat on their faces before the Lord. Why? They were broken men. They could only do one thing when a problem came: hand it over to the Lord and say, “Now, Lord, what do we do? We do not touch it. You tell us what to do.”
That is headship.
The headship of the Lord Jesus Christ cuts against all the petty dictatorship found in so many little groups, where certain brethren want a platform or want to become dictators in their own little empires. It destroys the whole thing.
The headship of the Lord Jesus can only be exercised by people who know something of the cross and the Spirit in their lives. They are broken people. They are dependent upon the Lord.
Even when they know their Bible from cover to cover, they cannot simply put it into practice mechanically. The most dangerous thing is to know your Bible and, as soon as a problem arises, say, “Ah, well, I know. Of course, it says it here.”
Have you not seen the tragedies that come from doing a biblical thing in the wrong way at the wrong time? But when we seek the Lord, He may say, “Just hold back. Wait.”
If God gives you responsibility in the work of God, for the people of God and the flock of God, your life must be wholly given to the Lord. You have no time for yourself. Your life must be laid down.
There are absolutes in this matter. There must be none of this glamour, romance, throwing your weight around, and saying, “I am the leader.”
Some years ago, we felt that the company in Richmond was in great need. Most of us were busy every evening, and some all day as well, in various aspects of the work.
We concluded that there was only one thing to do: give up the one free evening we had, Monday evening, and make ourselves available to anyone in the company who wished to come.
We announced that, beginning the following Monday, the elders would be available from half past five. If anyone wanted to come with complaints, suggestions, criticism, for counselling, or for prayer, they should come. If they wanted to be sure of seeing us, they could make an appointment.
We thought perhaps one or two people in need might come. Instead, every Monday we found ourselves there from half past five until half past eight at least.
That one thing has meant more to the company than almost anything else. We have found the Lord coming in in remarkable ways.
I have learned not to see people too much alone. If a matter concerns someone in the company, I say, “Why do you come to me? Why do you not go to the elders?” The Lord restricts Himself when it is merely me, but when the five elders are there, He may give the person you would least expect an understanding of the situation.
Someone may ask one question, and the whole situation opens up. It is settled. We have found this again and again.
What about elders? How do they come? We made a big mistake here.
We were kids, in our late teens and early twenties, reading the Scriptures. We thought, “There are elders and deacons, and they were set aside by prayer and fasting.” So we had two weeks of prayer and fasting. At the end, we set aside three brethren as elders and four brothers as deacons.
We had a perfect New Testament pattern: three elders, four deacons, a deaconess, and the Lord’s Table every Sunday. We were perfectly one. There was not a whisper of disunity or faction. It was beautiful. People were saved, and everyone who came said, “What a lovely New Testament pattern you have.”
After two years, however, several of us became deeply aware that something could split the whole thing as an earthquake shakes the earth.
We felt it not in our souls but in our spirits. Every time we came together, there was this sense that something was trying to get out. We became so disturbed that thirteen brethren spent a day in prayer and fasting, from early morning until late evening, taking hold of the Lord.
We prayed, “Lord, show us what it is. There is something about the work, something about the company, something about the church, that is not right. We cannot put our finger on it.”
About a third of the way through the day, I had my eyes open. Across the room was a little acorn vase with an acorn in it. It was full of water. As I looked at it, it was as though the Lord said, “That is the answer to your problem.”
The unity of your pattern is like the unity of that acorn shell. You have a perfect New Testament pattern, but it is not organic.
Inside the acorn is oak life. That life is another kind of unity. It will break the outer shell, grow into a tree, and produce many other acorns.
I saw it in an instant. Our elders had been appointed in the most spiritual manner possible, but we had not observed the organic principle.
When we asked the Lord what we should do, we felt Him say, “Do nothing. Leave it to Me.” So we did not cancel anything or force resignations. We simply left it to the Lord.
A few Sundays later, one by one, everyone who was anything in the company fell out of position. They did not leave the company; they simply ceased to function in their offices.
By the end of that Sunday, we were left with one elder and one deacon. The Lord had acted. We were cut right back to simply being brothers and sisters, and we committed ourselves to the organic principle.
We learned that no spiritual approach can ever make up for the non-observance of a principle. Never forget that.
You can do something in the most spiritual way, but if you do not observe a principle, the principle will take over. You can read your Bible for one solid hour, pray for another hour, and then step out of the window. The principle of gravity will take over. Your approach was spiritual, but you did not observe a principle.
Why did the Apostle Paul never appoint elders and deacons on his first missionary journey? We do not have a single case recorded in the New Testament of the apostle appointing elders and deacons on his first journey. Only on his second journey—sometimes two or three years after his initial visit—would he return and appoint them.
In Titus 1:5, Paul says:
For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting,
and appoint elders in every city, as I gave thee charge.
Why could Paul and Titus not simply have prayed together and known by the Spirit who should be elders in every city? Because Paul knew he had to observe the organic principle.
Within a year or so, brethren emerged from the midst of the company who were true elders. Everyone looked to them. Proverbs says that a man’s gift makes room for him.
When a man is an elder, nothing can stop it. Everyone turns to that man. If a person has a real practical sense of responsibility, he will care for things, and before long it becomes apparent that he has the ministry of a deacon.
That was one of our great lessons. Wherever I go, I find that many tragedies have arisen because people appointed elders and adopted New Testament regulations without observing this principle.
Another lesson we learned very early was the matter of our unity. We saw that we were one people, with no label, no particular movement, and no division. We were Christians, and we belonged to all believers.
We refused to make any barrier between ourselves and any other believers. We would not have a membership roll, because we saw that a membership roll was a division: it meant someone was in and someone was out.
A leading evangelical in Britain, one of the few men who stood with us from the beginning, said to me, “I agree with everything you have discovered so far, but I cannot go along with you on this matter of membership.”
He said, “You will learn to your sorrow that you will be unable to discipline believers. The church must have discipline, and to have discipline, you must have membership. When someone does something wrong, you may have to put them out. How can you do it if you have no membership?”
We sought the Lord very much about this matter, but we could not find membership in the Scriptures. We looked backward and forward, up and down, in every way we knew how. The only membership we found was being members of Christ’s Body, and members one of another. That is a different kind of membership.
We committed the matter to the Lord, and we have never had any problem with discipline.
There have been people whom we have had to debar from the Lord’s Table. There have been people whom we have had to put outside the company. But when you put someone outside for disciplinary reasons, you do not cold-shoulder them or treat them horribly.
The Scripture says to treat such a person as a Gentile. Remember how we ought to treat unsaved people: with the greatest courtesy and love.
Many tragedies have been caused when people have fallen into sin, the church has had to deal with them, and then everyone has turned their backs on them as though that were spiritual.
Of course, we must deal strongly with sin. But we are to seek to restore such a one in the spirit of meekness. If a drunkard comes to the meeting, we do not simply throw him out; we love him and seek to lead him to the Lord. We must treat the fallen person with the same redemptive love.
We saw that, in practical terms, our oneness was with the believers in our town—the believers in Richmond. Of course, we were one with believers in Tokyo, Richmond, Virginia, Washington, Melbourne, and everywhere else. We are one family.
We would not debar a Catholic who was born again. We would say, “Come in. We love you with all our hearts.” We would do the same with anyone whom we knew to be a believer.
But in practical terms, the believers living in Richmond are the constituents of the church in Richmond. We refused to believe that because someone worshipped in another place or company, we had no responsibility toward them.
There was an old sister in our town, a great prayer warrior, who came to the last years of her life. The company with which she met did almost nothing for her. They did not nurse her. Every now and then, they sent a bunch of flowers.
We felt that this was terrible. She was unable to care for herself, so we provided her with a nurse, who lived with her until the day she died.
People said, “They are sheep-stealing. The only reason they are doing this is to get her into their group.” She was eighty-nine years old! We said, “No, we care for the people of God as the people of God.”
If others want to use labels, let them use labels. We do not agree with labels, and we do not see labels. We will not deliberately do things to upset other companies, but we are one people.
They may not accept us as members, but we accept them as ours. We refuse ever to accept division between ourselves and other believers in our town.
You might like to know how we meet. Let me take a normal week and tell you what we do.
On Sunday, we have a brothers’ time at quarter past ten. It is open to all brethren in the company. We meet from 10:15 until about 10:45 and pray.
Our morning meeting begins at eleven o’clock. We really have two meetings that run into one another. First, we have the Lord’s Table, open prayer, and worship. Then we have ministry, though you would hardly know these are two separate meetings.
The first hour is completely open. As the Holy Spirit leads, anyone may contribute in praise to the Lord, suggest a hymn, give a testimony, and so on. During that time, we share the Lord’s Table.
At some point after twelve, we have children’s hymns and pray with the children. The children have been with us throughout the meeting, and then they go to their classes. Everyone else remains for ministry.
The brethren come together beforehand for two reasons. First, we believe you can never have an open meeting without a great deal of prayer.
One of the great mistakes in open meetings is to think that because it is an open time, no one needs to pray about it. I say that a led meeting requires less preparation than an open meeting.
An open meeting requires brethren to meet beforehand, to bind and loose things in the name of the Lord. We pray, “Lord, we bind every contribution that is not of Yourself for this morning, or which may be true in itself but is not for this time. We bind it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. We release all that is of Yourself for this time.”
Secondly, any brother may have a hymn, a psalm, a reading, or some other contribution. We share these things before the meeting and ask, “Lord, how do we begin? Quietly? Strongly? With a hymn, prayer, or reading?”
We seek to know the note God would have struck. Sometimes three brothers have the same hymn, and then we know easily. At other times, we feel a heaviness and know that we must begin with prayer.
Any brother may also believe he has a word from the Lord for ministry. He may come to the brethren beforehand and say so. Then two or three brothers pray about the matter and seek to know who is the one for that time.
On Sunday evening, we have a time at 6:30. At 5:30, a number of people meet together for prayer. They are given tracts and gospel literature and go out into the town two by two to reach men and women and bring them under the sound of the gospel.
Most of our converts have come in this way: through house-to-house work, street work, or what we call fishing. They go out fishing.
In the evening meeting, one brother leads and another preaches the gospel. We often have testimony and sometimes singing. Recently, we made another discovery that has been a tremendous blessing. A number of people have been converted, and we have baptized forty-eight people since January, with another sixteen being prepared.
We always praised the Lord in our meetings, but we had not done so in gospel meetings because we thought it was not for unbelievers. Then the Lord showed us that we should.
This opened up a whole situation. Many who came said, “This is something we have never met before. We have never met people like this. We have never met an atmosphere of love like this. We have never felt this sense of something.”
Of course, it is God. But before that, they had felt that everything was aimed at them—every hymn, prayer, and contribution, straight between the eyes.
Then we would turn away from them and say, “Forgive us. Now, we Christians love to worship our God. He is so wonderful. We are just going to forget you all for a while, if you do not mind, and worship Him.”
We would have five or ten minutes of simply worshipping the Lord. That did something to people. When they saw Christians obviously enjoying the Lord, it spoke to them in a different way.
We normally end at about quarter to eight on Sunday evening. Then, because we are British, we have a cup of tea. Everyone who wants to stay may do so, and this gives an opportunity to get to know one another.
At 8:30, we have a final time of the day, which we call ministry time. We may sing, have testimonies, hear from those who have come to the Lord, or consider questions.
On Tuesday, we have prayer. Normally, one hundred to one hundred and twenty people, or more, come to this time of prayer. We found that this was becoming too many, so we divided the whole area of the company into five district groups.
Every other week, we meet in homes in these five districts. We pray for the same major matters, but these groups are more open. We ask people whether they have personal needs, relatives, friends, or neighbours for whom they would like prayer.
Every other week, we all meet together. In the district gatherings, we pray for personal and local matters; when we are all together, we pray for national and international matters.
People who come to the company in Richmond are often struck by the prayer ministry. They say, “We cannot get over the prayer ministry there—the way people pray.”
We have been taught to pray in an executive manner—not simply vaguely asking, but taking hold of the will of God and, as it were, executing it in the secret place.
We believe prayer is a military operation, and it must be conducted like a military operation. We do not think it is good simply to have a free-for-all, or merely to wait for a burden to develop when there is little time.
We find it better for certain children of God to pioneer the way, touch the Lord, know the burden, and then bring it to the company.
On Thursday, we have studies in the Word. This is normally a more led time. If we have a minister of teaching among us, the time is largely given to that. Between one hundred and twenty and one hundred and fifty people may come.
On Friday, the younger ones meet together. We were particularly concerned about the children of Christian parents. Young people saved from the streets usually had no problem; as soon as they came in, they knew it was their family. They would carry trays of tea, help, and take up books immediately.
But the children of Christian parents often had the greater difficulties. We began these times for the younger ones to help them over.
May I say something to those of you who are Christian parents? We have been greatly encouraged recently to see family after family finding the Lord. Years ago, we were told that because our meetings were long, our children would become bored and would not come to the Lord.
But, praise God, we can only say that it is amazing—the way those whom we once dedicated are now finding the Lord.
One family had four sons and one daughter. The parents were deeply burdened. The daughter and eldest boy knew the Lord, but the others did not.
The mother said to the father, “I am going to get up at 5:30 every morning to pray for the boys.” He said, “If you do, I will.” So they both got up every morning at 5:30 to pray for their children.
They could not pray only for their own children. Another family living around the corner said, “We will pray for their children as well.” Then one of the boys was wonderfully saved. His elder brother came next. Then the other family’s boy and girl were saved. Another couple with an only son began getting up early to pray, and their only son was saved.
It spread through the whole company. I can only say that I believe it happened because parents took real responsibility before the Lord.
The principle on which we have always operated is faith. We believe that all that is not of faith is sin.
In the early days, we had great discussions about whether we should take collections. After searching the Scriptures, we decided that, although collections were not wrong in themselves, they were the lowest way.
If you take a collection, be bold about it. Say to everyone, “The collection is now coming. Please empty your pockets.” That seems healthier and more honest than shoving a plate under people’s noses and psychologically embarrassing them into giving.
But we felt that the better way was to have a treasury placed somewhere inconspicuous, where people would have to go deliberately and give. That going would be an act of worship in itself.
A minister once said to me, “My dear boy, you are making a big mistake on this money matter. You are an idealist. Sooner or later, you will have to come down to reality. The people of God will not give unless they are reminded. You will be begging for bread and butter before long.”
We continued on that basis. Thousands and thousands of pounds have passed through our hands, and the Lord has done far more for us than I am sure He would have done if we had relied upon collections.
The story of the provision of our meeting house—the miracles of provision, money, care, and maintenance—would take a whole afternoon to tell. But the Lord has proved Himself faithful.
More recently, we have learned the value of worship. We have always been a worshipping company, but in more recent years we have seen that there is something about worshipping the Lord which is one of the deepest, most fulfilling, and satisfying matters in which we can ever engage.
We found that even in our executive prayer meetings, where we dealt with unhappy or satanic things, it transformed the atmosphere if we began with open worship.
We would say to people, “Do not ask for anything. Do not pray for anything. Do not petition the Lord for anything. Simply worship Him. Tell Him what He means to you. Tell Him how lovely He is.”
Sometimes I think the Lord gets more from someone who opens their mouth and stammers, “Lord, I love You,” than from one of those long sermons in prayer.
There is an idea that, to worship the Lord, you must give Him the whole Song of Solomon or chapters of Isaiah, somehow rehashed in your own words. But sometimes I think the Lord wants to cut through all that and ask, “Do you love Me or do you not?”
I think it means more to the Lord when someone says, “Lord, I love You. I love You with all my heart.”
We have also found that people can hide in singing. There is nothing wrong with hymns; we are to speak to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. But we must be careful that we are not hiding in our singing.
Otherwise, our worship is not worship. It is hiding. It is not an expression of adoration toward the Lord.
What is wonderful is when we truly open our lips, one by one, and praise the Lord. Then a song comes, another song, a few others praise the Lord, and more thanksgiving comes. We have found this to enrich worship very greatly.
We also have what we call family fellowship, a completely open time. Every one of our gatherings is covered beforehand by the brethren meeting together in prayer.
We have found value at times in standing for prayer. In Britain, we normally sit to pray and stand to sing, whereas on the Continent they often stand for prayer and sit for singing. We found that standing to pray can bring a kind of release.
Some people like to lift their hands. Others have felt that this was a little excessive. But I have pointed out that the Lord is looking at the heart.
It does not matter whether you clasp your hands, keep them down, put them behind your back, or lift them up. What matters is the heart. Let people be free. If someone feels able to worship the Lord by lifting their hands, let them lift their hands. If someone feels more comfortable keeping their hands down, let them keep them down.
We must not be under a dictatorship in these things.
From the beginning in Richmond, we knew something of spiritual gifts. Therefore, we could not understand some dear Pentecostal friends when they told us that first you must have a definite experience, then speak in tongues, and then receive gifts.
We knew these things in operation before we were open to some of those other matters.
We always expected the Lord to speak to us. When we asked, “Lord, shall we go this way or that way? Shall we have a meeting on Friday instead of Thursday? Shall we buy this property or not?” we expected the Lord somehow to speak.
Praise His name, He always did.
We knew nothing about prophecy in technical terms, but what often happened was that one person would read something from Scripture and another would read something apparently unrelated. Yet it would be the answer to the situation, and everyone would recognize it. We would be of one mind.
If some were not clear, we would wait and pray further until we were of one mind. Again and again, this was how we found the Lord’s mind.
We also knew the gift of faith from the beginning. When we took a house, we had fifty pounds, and the owners wanted £1,750 for the original property. Then we found another place for which they wanted £3,000. We offered £200, and they said it was too little. We prayed and offered £400, adding the fifty pounds we had. They said, “Yes, you can have it.”
That property was valued at £173,000 two or three years ago.
Every time we had to take a step forward, we knew the gift of faith. We knew the word of wisdom and word of knowledge as well.
Again and again, after we had prayed about something, an apparently insignificant member of the company would say, “While we were praying, it occurred to me that…” and that quiet little soul would have the whole answer.
Sometimes someone would say, “We were praying last night about so-and-so. As I prayed, I wondered whether it might be right to do this.” They had a word of wisdom—a practical application that had not occurred to the brethren.
More recently, as we have become more open to the work of the Holy Spirit, it has been wonderful to see some of the things God has done.
We have a sister among us who had been a well-known actress. She found lordship difficult because of her background, personal problems, divorce, and other matters. Yet she grew in the Lord.
At a prayer and Bible gathering, the Lord greatly blessed us. A few days later, at an open time, one of the brethren said, “Perhaps there are people here who have been touched by the Lord and want to get up and confess their need before the people of God and before the Lord in prayer.”
This sister stood and prayed, “Lord, You know that for six months I have been almost only a Christian in name. Inwardly, I have collapsed. I do not know what it is, Lord, but I feel I cannot go on.” She cried out, “Lord, please, please, please.”
Then a visiting brother gave a word of prophecy. He did not know anything about her situation, but the word spoke of the Lord dealing graciously with the matter and bringing release.
The sister went home and said, “Lord, that word was from You to me. I know it. Do something for me. I stand on that word.” That night, she experienced a profound release.
The next morning, she was up in Richmond Park at half past five, praising the Lord and feeling renewed. The following evening, she came to the meeting, and during ministry another brother spoke directly to her situation.
The word was that the Lord had heard her cry, but that there were matters in her life involving gossip, grumbling, criticism, and hurt caused to others. The brother did not know her. He told her not to argue or say that the word was for someone else. He also mentioned pain in her knees going up into her hip, which had troubled her privately for three months.
She knew that God had spoken to her. Rather than being crushed, she was filled with joy and the Holy Spirit, because she knew the Lord had dealt with her.
When people say that these things are of the devil, wrong, excessive, counterfeit, or abused, we entirely accept that there can be excess, counterfeit, wrong use, and abuse. But there is also that which is truly of God. We have learned that.
In the last five or six years, we have known a little more definition in these matters, without going overboard. We simply regard these gifts as equipment for doing the job.
Finally, let me say that we are nothing special. We have never thought of ourselves as something incredible, or as the beginning of a new worldwide movement.
Whenever I hear anything that says, “Now we are the new move of God,” or, “We are the new level,” I am cautious. We believe God has done this kind of thing again and again throughout the history of His people.
We have a heritage, brothers and sisters. We come at the end of the age, not the beginning. We have a heritage that goes right back through church history to the very beginning.
Our Lord’s hands laid the foundation, and His hands shall also finish it. We are part of something that goes right back to the beginning.
We need to be very careful with the heritage that is ours—not to throw anything out merely in reaction. Many of you have spoken of things you have experienced in this country that upset and disturb you. Be very careful of reaction. Reactions are rarely right.
Do not throw the baby out with the bathwater. That is what most people do. Do not do it.
We have a marvellous heritage. We are coming to the end of the age, when God is going to complete the work of His Son.