As we mentioned this morning, we received, I think, more than one hundred questions from various brothers and assemblies. We tried to collate them because many were related, and we brought them together into eight questions.
I was hopeful that, in the question-and-answer time, Brother Stephen would answer the eight questions. But, you know, our brother does not let somebody get away with that. He wanted me to answer some of the questions. So he convinced me to take half, but then I had the upper hand because he let me choose which questions.
The questions he took this morning were questions that only our brother could comment on and fellowship about. I thought the time we had together with him was very precious—his honesty, his experience, the examples he used. Everything was marvelous.
Well, I ended up with the rest of the questions. They are a little—well, still, we need the answer from the Lord Himself. We pray that we will get some help tonight as we look into these matters.
I think this kind of question time is good for us because we can clarify some things. But, as we have heard, I hope that we as workers, and we as brothers, will find ourselves more and more in the throne room, finding out the answers to these questions.
Some of these questions are not really answered by an answer, but by the Lord doing something. He rules and overrules, as we have heard. We have all made mistakes. The Lord overrules them and still does what He wants to do.
But He lets us take a shot, I think, as Mac put it. Then He says, “Fine. Thank you for helping Me. Now I am going the other way.”
So we are all humbled. I think if you have served the Lord long enough in your assembly, you have been humbled. I mean, brothers, it is a humbling thing to have to tell of your failures as well as successes, and to see that one side may be larger than the other.
Nevertheless, we have a chance to fellowship about some things that obviously are very important to brothers and sisters in our assemblies.
I was asked by one of the brothers whether we could actually put the questions up on the board so people could see them and then try to answer them. Brother Stephen read the question just in English this morning. Do we have it in Chinese too? Okay, good.
We want to learn how to deal with disciplinary matters in the spirit of Matthew 18:15-18.
We have a longtime member who presently is acting in ways that upset the saints.
He has not only been openly critical of our fellowship, but seems unwilling to take correction, despite our speaking with him as individual brothers.
Although he is not sinning in some flagrant way, his carnal attitude is affecting his family and the whole group.
We have asked to meet with responsible brothers, but he is unwilling.
How can we enable our heavenly Shepherd to discipline this wayward sheep?
All right, well, let us begin by looking in Matthew 18 and looking at these verses, which are familiar to everyone.
“And if thy brother sin against thee, go, show him his fault between thee and him alone: if he hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother.
But if he hear thee not, take with thee one or two more, that at the mouth of two witnesses or three every word may be established.
And if he refuse to hear them, tell it unto the church: and if he refuse to hear the church also, let him be unto thee as the Gentile and the publican.
Verily I say unto you, What things soever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and what things soever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of My Father Who is in heaven.
For where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.”—Matthew 18:15-20
I am going to take more time on this question than on the remaining three, as you will see, because some of those questions have already been touched on as we have been together.
What I would like to do is try to put this matter of discipline in the assembly into a broader context. To me, it is important that we understand, even in these days in which we live, how only the Lord can really discipline His children.
For us to see the wider context is important. I would like us to look at some verses that describe the church as we see it progressing in the first generation, before we get to Revelation or anything, because I want us to see what needs to be established among us if we are to experience spiritual discipline together.
These verses in Matthew 18 are dealing with the church. But what we also need to understand in context is that they are dealing with the church when it was very aware of the kingdom of the heavens. The King was in their midst. When the King is in their midst, there is real discipline meted out.
Here we see what I would call the church at the beginning of the apostolic age: a church that had its true connection to Jesus Christ the King. They were preaching the gospel and seeing the kingdom of heaven being built. We see this as the first stage—the kingdom and the church very much related.
If we turn to 1 Corinthians 2, we have a comment from Paul, but we can see it in the light of the early church and in the light of this kingdom view of the church. Christ was very present in the midst.
“And I, brethren, when I came unto you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God.
For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling.”—1 Corinthians 2:1-3
Paul goes on to talk about his experience as he came to Corinth. In this first stage of the church, the early church as we see it presented in the book of Acts and even in the letters, we see the Lord directing His kingdom-foundational work through the apostles and the prophets.
These men had, as it were, a direct authority from God through Jesus Christ. They were laying the foundations, and the churches were being established. The apostles were very much in view, and the Lord was using them with great anointing because they were building the foundation of Jesus Christ.
The Holy Spirit was very present in the assemblies, and so was the life of God. As an example, we remember that episode in the book of Acts when Ananias and Sapphira lied.
How did Peter do discipline then? Did they call the church together, or bring the brothers? No. He said, “Why did you lie to the Holy Spirit?” And Ananias was struck down.
In that beginning time of the kingdom and the church, this very visible discipline caused great fear to fall upon the people. They said, “God is here in our midst.” This was necessary as the church was established in its foundation.
When Paul saw the brothers in Corinth, he spoke to them about the cross in the carnal matters with which they were dealing. According to Paul’s subsequent writing, the Corinthians listened as he brought the cross to bear on their carnal, childish ways. This is the initial stage of the church we see early on.
Now we need to turn to 1 Timothy 3, because we see the church at a second stage, as it were. It is still early on, but now we are in the late fifties AD. The church has been around twenty-five years or so, and things have changed.
“These things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly;
but if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how men ought to behave themselves in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness.”—1 Timothy 3:14-16
Now we see that there is a change, as it were, because the church has been established. It is the church of the living God. God is very much present, but now discipline is being meted out by elders and deacons.
Paul exhorts Timothy to set in order these elders and deacons for the various matters of conduct in the household of God.
This passage defines, in a simple way, what the church was like in those days. It was the church of the living God. It was the household of God. There was still that sense of family among the saints. It was also, wonderfully, the pillar and foundation of truth.
The foundation of truth had been laid by the apostles. There was a pillar of truth, which I always see as a light shining. The testimony was there.
When you went into the church, you not only heard the truth of doctrine, but you saw the truth in the light of Christ as the saints walked in the light. At this stage of the church’s history, they also lived in the mystery of godliness. It was very much a reality to them.
I do not want to go into that, but basically I believe the mystery of godliness of which Paul speaks is the amazing reality of Christ living in us and transforming our lives from glory to glory.
The people at this stage, even as elders and deacons handled discipline in the church, saw the light. They knew the truth, and now they needed to conduct themselves according to the standard that had been laid out.
When Paul wrote to Titus, Titus had to go to Crete. Crete was as bad as New York City. There were all kinds of problems. Still, Paul’s solution was to set things in order and appoint elders for that church.
In that way, discipline could be established and order could be established even among those rapscallions in Crete who were so carnal. But still, the church was the church of the living God.
I do not know how that affects you, but is it not wonderful if you walk into an assembly and touch the living God? Well, you could do it in those days. It was a marvelous thing. You can imagine the discipline involved when you see the truth and sense the presence of the living God.
Now, by the time we get to 2 Timothy 2, we find that something has happened in the church. Has the church devolved? I do not know how you say it. But it has grown larger. There has been a lot of gospel preaching and a lot of people saved.
“Howbeit the firm foundation of God standeth, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are His: and, Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from unrighteousness.
Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some unto honor, and some unto dishonor.
If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, meet for the Master’s use, prepared unto every good work.
But flee youthful lusts, and follow after righteousness, faith, love, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.”—2 Timothy 2:19-22
Paul describes the church as a great house. It is still the house of God, and surely it is still made up of saved people. But when you see the situation here, the quality or character of the saints is not consistent with the pillar of truth that had been standing before them.
Someone enters this great house and finds a confusing situation. There are some vessels of honor—those who have paid the price to pursue holiness. But there are also profane vessels in the church, Christians who are represented by wood and earthenware, vessels unto dishonor.
This is now the new situation in the church of God. If you fill it out with the rest of 2 Timothy, there is all kinds of false teaching, end-time immorality, and things going on in the midst.
Paul basically says to Timothy, not, “Set elders.” You do not even hear about elders. Basically, he says, “Find those willing to pursue holiness, and pursue it with them. Abstain from these things that are wrong.”
Even though the foundation is not as clear as it was in 1 Timothy, in the household of God the firm foundation of God still stands, whether we can see it or not.
What is that firm foundation that has not budged? Here it is: you can be some kind of vessel in the church and think you are getting away with this and that, but the Lord knows who are His.
That is a tremendous statement. We cannot fool the Lord. He knows those who have a heart truly pursuing Him.
The second thing is this: everyone who names the name of the Lord is to abstain from wickedness. So we see that there is a wrestling for the holy life in the church of God.
In very broad strokes, this is still the state of Christendom today. Many Christians, many people saved, many great houses, and all kinds of vessels. In the midst of that confusion, how do we discipline? How do you discipline anybody?
Have you ever been in that kind of church? I was the pastor of such a church. You had to discipline somebody, and you would bring them aside and say, “Now, brother, you cannot do that. You cannot go out and get drunk every Friday night and be a deacon on Sunday.”
You know what they say? “Well, forget it. I will even go to another church.”
You cannot discipline there because they can go somewhere else, which they consider the church just as much as this one. It is awfully hard to discipline in the midst of chaos, confusion, and largeness, where there is no standard.
I say all of that because the Lord has done something wonderful. He cannot abide the church in such a condition. By the mercy of God, at various points in history, He has recovered the church by revealing something of Christ.
That revelation causes the church to come back and see the standard, as it were—to rediscover the foundation upon which so much junk had been put. The foundation is rediscovered, and the pillar is rediscovered. That is the work of recovery.
Thank God for churches that have found some measure of recovery. It is as if the lampstand is reignited, and suddenly people can see again.
The Lord is doing this in His mercy. We see an example of it, I think, in the church of Philadelphia. A number of assemblies here, in one sense, may be like the church of Philadelphia: small in number and quite weak, but with these things going for them.
You know the Holy One. When the Lord recovers something, if it does not have holiness to it, it is not His recovery. It may be a revival, with some people being saved, but holiness is essential. Jesus says, “I am the Holy One.”
You are holding fast to the Word, and you have not denied His name. Those three simple things somehow touch the simplicity of the assemblies that the Lord is recovering, even in these days and until He comes back.
In the mystery of God, somehow in this recovery He keeps producing a bride. She is getting more and more prepared in ways we do not know, in far-flung countries of which we have no idea. God is working, preparing this bride in many different places, bringing recovery to restore the house of God.
When Christ reveals Himself once again in His Body, we find a foundation once again.
How does the Lord recover something anyway? Behind the scenes, the Lord reveals Himself to some people who want more of Him. Sometimes recovery comes because there are praying sisters who just want the Lord in reality in their midst. The Lord touches and opens people’s eyes.
Thank God for sisters. They have so often been involved in revivals and recovery, although their names are written up there in heaven and we do not know them at this present time.
But before the Lord can recover the reality of discipline, He has to raise up some brothers and establish character in them by disciplining them, so that they in turn can discipline the saints.
That is where we come in. We have heard testimony in these last two days, and we can see for ourselves that some of these responsible brothers are quite young, even spiritually at some early stages.
Yet it seems that this is the best the Lord has in that place because they have a heart for the Lord. Then there are others who have known the Lord longer, whose character has been built into them more, and who have gained more wisdom through their mistakes.
When the Lord recovers, He is looking for some people with hearts—real hearts for the Lord. When He finds them, He takes some men, and in the family He disciplines them. At some point, He raises up these brothers.
Now, we can discipline, but we can only discipline when two things are present:
Otherwise, a person cannot even understand what you are getting at unless he can see something of Christ in His holiness.
Just to step aside for a moment, I told you last night that, as a Baptist, I was reading all the Watchman Nee books. I could intellectually visualize what this thing was all about, but I had to see an assembly that had a foundation, that was Christ-centered, and that had a testimony.
As soon as I saw it, I said, “Ah, now I see it. Now I understand what you are talking about.”
Until there is an assembly so recovered that you can see Christ, you can talk until you are blue in the face, but it is only theory. As soon as you walk into the house of God, you say, “Ah, I see.” You may not even be able to describe what you see, but you see.
It was enough to enable me to leave everything to pursue what I was seeing, even though I could not describe what I saw.
It is the same with discipline. If the standard of holiness is before us, then at least discipline can be understood. The Lord can discipline because it is not only human beings bringing discipline to a person; it is the Lord Himself, Who is in our midst, disciplining.
That is really the key. If we as humans are simply going to discipline people, we can do that very legalistically if we want. But what is the purpose of discipline? What is the purpose of Matthew 18?
It is to restore the brother—not to beat him up, kill him, condemn him, throw him in the ditch, or yell, “Anathema!”
Discipline is for restoration.
Does the Lord know how to discipline mercifully? Of course He does. So must we. We have to learn from Him how to discipline.
There are two things I would like to say. First, discipline is for the restoration, not the punishment, of somebody.
Second, we learn by experience that behind the iceberg of a person—the top of which you see—there is a big story underneath the sea that we do not know about. But the Lord knows.
For about forty years, though it has now stopped, every spring I went to a men’s retreat in Maryland with Brother Ed Miller. We spoke for a weekend once a year in the springtime.
The organizer arranged it so that, in each meeting, one of the brothers would come up and share his testimony. I watched and knew these brothers for more than thirty years. Many of the same brothers came back, mostly from the Baltimore area.
I would look at one and say, “Well, there is a happy-go-lucky person.” Then he would get up and share his story—his iceberg underneath the sea. What deep dealings he had gone through: parents who kicked him out and rejected him, trouble on the streets, and then the Lord saved him.
When you hear the story, you say, “Wow. There is a lot going on there.”
Then you see another brother. He is a fine-looking fellow. But he gets up and shares his testimony of how the Lord gave him a son who was not only autistic but dangerously autistic.
As the child grew into an adolescent, he would beat on his mother and on the other children in such a way that only the father could handle him. This brother told the story of taking him to doctors, who could do nothing; putting him in school, from which he was expelled; and finally caring for his son until the day he died.
This man struggled the whole time. Jesse told his story, and we all said, “Man, what a life is behind people.”
Much of our life may be sinful. We may have been beaten about underneath by parents, by life, by mistakes, by firings, and by all kinds of things. But here is the point: the Lord knows about these things, and sometimes we do not.
That is why, when we go to discipline a person, we need to respect the fact that the Lord wants to discipline them mercifully.
I am so thankful that, in some of our situations, the Lord has recovered enough real church life that a person who loves the Lord does not want to be taken out of that fellowship. If I am in the church and I love the Lord, I am so happy to be somewhere where there is a foundation of truth and where light is shining. I do not want to be removed from that.
If somebody comes and disciplines me, saying, “Now, brother, if you are not willing to toe the line, we are going to have to remove you from fellowship,” then I do not want to miss this, if I love the Lord.
But if you cannot see this, if you do not see any foundation, then you say, “Sure, kick me out. I will go somewhere else. What do I care? You guys have nothing.” You know what I am saying?
It is so important to have the reality of the Lord present if we are going to do any discipline.
Now, here we have a brother in this question who has been a longtime brother. We make a distinction, because sometimes we discipline somebody who has recently entered the assembly.
How many of you know that you have to show a lot of mercy to people who have just come in? They have no idea what you mean by vision, holiness, or the cross. They come in smoking in the bathroom and doing all kinds of things. You get people who do not have much background.
You need to take them aside and be very careful and merciful because they have not learned these ways.
Especially with newcomers, they are always asking for the wrong song and speaking up at the wrong time. But they are so happy to be there, and we need to be very gentle with them.
This brother, however, has been around for a while. From the story here, it sounds as if there has been a change in his life. He has come into a different attitude than he once had.
Before the Lord, when you go to see somebody, I like to ask this question when somebody is coming for correction or counsel: “Lord, what is really going on behind this?”
Often people are saying something, but they need something else. That is the only way they can verbalize it. They are talking out, acting out, and carrying on, but the important thing is to find out what is going on inside.
Often, when you see somebody like this who used to be a saint in the assembly, taking a real part, and suddenly they are not—when they become cold, unreasonable, disagreeable, and all this—what is the usual thing that has happened?
They have been offended. They have been offended by something.
A brother may have charged them with something. Perhaps it did not happen. They were misunderstood and criticized, and they became offended.
Dear old DeVern Fromke had a way of saying things that stay in your head for the rest of your life. One brother was just telling me tonight that he kept thinking, during our sessions, about what DeVern said: “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”
That makes a lot of sense, does it not? Hang on to that vision from the Lord. Do not let anybody get you distracted.
Here is another thing DeVern said one time. I did not write it down; I wrote it in my heart. He said, “Anybody who has been in a fellowship long enough will be offended if he can be offended.”
You live with other human beings who are making mistakes, who are fallen, and who are sinners. You will be offended. The devil will make sure of it. The devil has an interest in getting you offended if you are offendable. That is the key.
So often, these problems that come up are matters of unforgiveness. People have been offended.
When you get right back to the first kingdom principle, it is this:
“Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”
—Matthew 6:12
So often, if you really find out—if somebody will open up—you will find that they are offended by something.
Recently in Manhattan, somebody brought in a book called Unoffendable. Everybody in Manhattan read it, and now we are in a lot of trouble. It is actually a very fine and simple Christian book.
The bottom line is that there is nothing we should not forgive, because we know we are fallen sinners. But as soon as we draw a line and say, “I am sorry, I cannot forgive that. I am getting out of here,” you have been offended.
What happens when we get offended and lack forgiveness? Our spiritual life becomes bitter.
We need to try to get to the bottom of things as we talk to this brother who does not want to listen to the brethren.
There is another crucial question I always think about: What is really going on in the person’s heart? There are two reactions when you talk to somebody who is under discipline or needs discipline.
Sometimes a person’s heart has been broken or hurt. Sometimes it has nothing to do with the fellowship. Something at the job, the loss of their mother, or something seemingly unrelated has shut off their soul. They have stopped growing in the Lord and have become contentious and disagreeable.
If they can open their hearts, you see that their heart is broken. You take the Lord’s heart to the person’s heart, you pray with that person, and sometimes they cry some tears and get up a different person.
Their heart had not been touched. Something had to be addressed—the grieving, the heartbreak, or the disappointment.
How often does that happen in our assemblies? “I have been here for twenty years. They never asked me to do anything.” They get disappointed. “I thought we were really going somewhere, and then this happened.”
People get disappointed. They get offended. If it is heartbreak, it can be mended. If it is a hard heart, then it has to be disciplined.
In Hebrews there is that verse in Hebrews 3:12:
“Take heed, brethren, lest haply there shall be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief, in falling away from the living God.”
—Hebrews 3:12
This is indeed a problem when somebody’s attitude has changed because his heart has become hard through the deceitfulness of sin.
If the light of truth is present in the assembly, then when you talk about that sin, they will see it as sin. They may not want to repent of it, but they will know that it is sin—an evil heart of unbelief that falls away from the living God.
Something has happened there, and something needs to be dealt with. I connect this with what Hebrews later says in Hebrews 12:15, when it says that somebody has come short of the grace of God.
We can say it as a trite line, but Paul did not mean it that way when he said, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” The Lord said to Paul, “Whatever you are going through, hang on to My grace, because I love you.”
As our brother Kit says, “God is for me.” We hold on to that when we are going through a difficult time.
But if we fall short of the grace of God, bitterness comes in—a root of bitterness. The book of Hebrews says that it troubles and defiles many.
Once that root starts going through the assembly, that bitterness affects somebody else and somebody else. The next thing you know, there is a bitterness that started with this person who came short of the grace of God.
Having said that, we need to be shepherds who know what to do. If it is a staff to draw them back, then draw them back.
I like this passage, although it sounds like a tough verse:
“And on some have mercy, who are in doubt;
and some save, snatching them out of the fire;
and on some have mercy with fear; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.”—Jude 1:22-23
We can recover such a brother. Take the staff, pull him in, and say, “Repent of these sins. Come back into fellowship. Take the grace of God.” Maybe that happens.
If it does not, what does the Scripture tell us to do? If we have a sufficient life of the Lord in our midst, we tell the whole church what is going on.
Sometimes our churches cannot handle that. But we need to be recovered to the point where we can handle the fact that people are sinners and have to be dealt with.
Then, if it still continues, we have to treat them as an outsider. That does not mean that you hate the tax collector and the sinner. You love them. But you cannot give them a place and position in the assembly that can continue to affect things negatively.
This becomes a very difficult problem. But my question is this: brothers, have you been disciplined enough by the Lord that you can discipline somebody mercifully in order to recover them?
Can you be disciplined enough by the Lord that you can ask, “Lord, what is going on behind the scenes?” before you make summary judgments?
Several brothers have said, “I have my prescription right here. I have a little section in the back of my Bible. If you have doubt, read this verse. If you have a problem with sin, read this verse.”
But there are deeper prescriptions needed, which are only known when you know the heart of a person.
This is my answer to this question. We need to be those who understand the Lord’s discipline in our own lives.
I do not know about you, but the Lord has disciplined me many times, usually so mercifully that it breaks me down. His mercy is so great. Instead of punishing me when I do something wrong, He blesses me. Then it breaks my heart. Why would the Lord do that?
Sometimes I do something, and He has to immediately knock that out of my hand. The Lord knows what He is doing.
All I am saying is that His mercy is what we should also know, so that we can discipline people and recover them into the Body of Christ.
Our meeting has recently undergone a division among the saints, despite our best efforts to remain as one.
The problem even divided the brothers in leadership, who had been serving faithfully for years.
It is especially hurtful to saints who do not really understand why they are divided, and there are confidential reasons we cannot bring the full situation into the light.
We want to press on for the testimony of Jesus, but how can we help the saints, many of whom are discouraged, hurt, and grieving over the loss of friends, and who feel that things will never be the same again?
This is a tragedy. When it happens in an assembly, our brother Kenny has already spoken much about the feelings involved and what happens to people who have invested their whole lives—not in a business, but in the assembly.
Then there is this fracture, this division, despite all efforts. This question was asked by several assemblies, by the way. It was not just one assembly; several wanted to know about these matters.
We could say that the enemy has done this. Indeed, sometimes when you look back, you can see the strategy—how we fell asleep, how something was set up unbeknown to us, and how, when the enemy strikes, it is usually a threefold strike from here, here, and here. Boom—something happens.
The enemy always wants to divide the Lord’s flock. Always.
If you have a flock in perfect fellowship right now, be overseers of the flock. Paul says wolves will come in among you. This is part of the enemy’s work: to try to divide.
I do not want to speak much more about it because Kenny shared things he learned through it. I just want to look at the matter from the kingdom perspective.
It is always helpful to take one step back and face reality. Jesus spoke to His disciples in Matthew 13 concerning the mysteries of the kingdom of the heavens—those parables He spoke.
I do not want to go into the parables, but the bottom line for us is this: on earth, in the kingdom of heaven, you discover tares. Who would have thought that there would be tares in the kingdom of heaven?
There was wheat sown. Who would have thought that leaven could get into something that was God’s bread? How could it be that a mustard seed of a human kingdom could come up and take over something that began so small by faith?
What Jesus is trying to tell us, because it is relevant to us in the church, is that as long as we are upon this earth, the church of Jesus Christ faces the fact that we are all fallen and we are all sinners. Sometimes things come in.
It is a mystery. Why does He say it is a mystery? Because the Lord knows what is really going on, and He is going to judge the matter in the end and expose it in the end.
At the present moment, can you imagine the first time the disciples, after Pentecost, realized there were people in their midst lying, cheating, swindling, stealing, and taking money from the widows’ fund? They must have said, “Whoa, wait a minute, wait a minute.”
Until the kingdom of heaven comes back to earth, there is this mystery among us: things may start out well and look well outwardly, but there may be leaven in there. There is the possibility of corruption and division.
These things are tragic. But when they happen, and after our hearts are broken, at least one lesson we learn is that we see how the Lord’s heart feels when He looks at the state of Christendom today.
How does the Lord feel about all this bamboozling, all these semi-Christian people who are saved and wandering without a shepherd? How does He feel about all this?
Sometimes, when we see a tragedy in our own midst, after we thought we were perfect, as our brother said, we thought we were Antioch and turned out to be 1 Corinthians.
All of us are 1 Corinthians. We have things in there that eventually show themselves, and we have to deal with that reality.
If that offends you, then quit right now. But, of course, the Lord does not want you to quit. The reason we come to understand these things through harsh experience is this: God’s servants have got to be tough—tough-skinned.
“I am going on to serve the Lord. I am going to be faithful and follow.”
Can you imagine how many times Paul must have been discouraged, when he was even kicked out of some of the churches he had established? But Paul had a heart fully for the Lord, and he was tough as nails.
Listen, we need to be merciful, but in our hearts we need to be tough as nails. No matter what happens, we are going to serve the Lord because we love Him. Everything will test that, even such things as a terrible division.
But, once again, it toughens us. So that did not work out. Do you want to quit? All those plans, all that effort—the whole thing fell apart. Do you just want to quit now?
You can say yes. Or you can say, “Where else can we go, Lord? Thou hast the words of eternal life,” and keep following after Him.
I have great vision of what I see as the church in reality, but sometimes I am very disappointed with what I see on earth. Yet I am not going to get discouraged, nor am I going to be offended by what I see on earth, because I know the goal.
I am going to press on and touch that goal and see that goal. Can you imagine Paul pressing on to reach for that high goal and finding Christ in new ways, even when it came to the fellowship of sufferings?
We will go through suffering. Everyone who serves the Lord will know basic suffering.
The only other thing I want to say about this is that Lance helped me tremendously to understand that, when we are together as God’s people, as imperfect as we are, everything we do in sincere faith has eternal value.
Every venture we undertake, every gospel soul won, every victory we find in prayer, every life consecrated before the Lord in service—everything that is done with eternal value finds its way up into New Jerusalem.
Even if our situation seems to come to nothing, even if our congregation gets older and older and all the young people go away, and now there are only twelve people, all over eighty years old, dying one by one—everything that happened in the life of that assembly that was real will be there in New Jerusalem.
The Lord Jesus does not lose anything that is done for Him.
Even though we face the fact of sin, and we come to places where the enemy gets in because we were not watching, and even though much damage can be done, you press on.
You know the Lord. Your reward is that which has been laid up in New Jerusalem.
We have been meeting for a number of years, and now we are facing the problem of losing our young people.
Even though they grew up in our church, somehow they do not feel united with us in vision, or even in the way we worship, study, and pray.
We also have a language difference between the young and the old. Our young people finish college and usually move to cities where they can pursue their jobs.
These circumstances have led our responsible brothers to ask two questions:
- Even if many of our young people move away, how can we give them the vision of God’s purpose so that, wherever they go, they would seek such a testimony?
- What practical things can we do to bring the young people who still meet with us into being active in serving the Lord? Many know the Lord and the Bible but do not seem to sense any consecration or desire to serve.
This is a difficult matter. It is a very real matter in the midst of us as well.
I liked what the brother from Iselin said. In my experience, I have worked with young people for some decades, and I have noticed that when there is a Chinese church and they hire a youth worker from the local Bible college to take the children off and do an English thing with them, it usually does not end well.
Usually, the young worker, the seminary student, or whoever he is, does not really have the vision that you have. That kind of situation does not really work.
On the other hand, if you simply remain one meeting with translation, I do not think that is the long-term answer either.
The young people grow up all-American, right? You can take them to Chinese culture classes, but they are learning too much crummy American culture by the time that is over.
The best wisdom I ever heard comes from my dear departed brother, Christian Chen.
Since 2002, for seventeen years now, I have been in the assembly of Christian Believers Meeting in Flushing. We have a large contingent of Chinese people because Flushing is very Chinese. We also have some English-speaking people like me, some Brazilians, and others. It is an interesting mix.
They decided long ago that, when we have the breaking of bread, everybody can pray and everybody can sing a song. When somebody prays in English, they pray in English. They have headphones for people who do not understand.
When somebody prays in Chinese, they interpret it during the meeting so that all the English-speaking people can understand. Why are they doing that? Because they are trying to become a testimony that local people can understand and be part of.
If you are willing to put up with prayer interpretation, prayer interpretation, you can assemble there. This is movement in a certain direction.
Every once in a while, our brother Christian would preach on Antioch. I cannot tell the Chinese what to do, because I am only ninety percent Chinese by weight.
But our brother Christian was a dear brother, and every so often he would preach on Antioch. He said, “I think the Lord wants us to be an Antioch.”
Antioch was a major city with four quarters. There was a Syrian quarter, a Roman quarter, a Jewish quarter, and a Greek quarter.
As you know, some Jews went in there preaching the gospel among the Jews. Somehow they started preaching to the Gentiles, and some Gentiles were saved. Some Greeks from the Greek quarter were saved. Then others began to be saved, including Syrians.
Now they had a problem. What were they going to do? Were they going to have every message in four languages, with one language and three translations?
They came up with a solution. Even though Antioch had four quarters, there was something in the middle called the marketplace. In the marketplace, everybody bought and sold.
If you wanted good electronics, you went to the Jew in the marketplace. If you wanted fish still alive, you went to the Chinese section. But here was the point: in the market, they had to speak pidgin Greek because they had to be able to make transactions.
People who are in the trading business learn languages fast. If it is not their native language, they still speak some kind of pidgin language in order to make the deals.
That pidgin language was called Koine Greek. In the sovereignty of God, it became the language of the Greek New Testament. Koine means common. The New Testament was written in common Greek. It is not literary Greek; that is Attic Greek.
I studied both forms of Greek, and Attic Greek is much tougher. Koine is pidgin Greek. So they all spoke in pidgin Greek.
Here is what Brother Christian said: “Brothers from Brazil, brothers from China, I know you like praying in your native language much better, but we need to pray in pidgin English, because that way we can all understand.”
It is marketplace English. He told them, “Do not be so embarrassed about your broken English and that you cannot pray well.”
Of course, you would rather wax eloquent in beautiful Beijing Mandarin. But for the sake of the assembly, you bear the cross and share in pidgin English so everybody can say amen.
Brazilian, the same way: pidgin English, and everybody can say amen. Wherever somebody comes from, whatever quarter, there is a common language—this pidgin English. He said, “We need to become Antioch.”
Now, we have some folks in Flushing who are way beyond the point at which they are going to learn English. They are older saints. As a seventy-five-year-old man, I say that once you are over fifty-five years old, keep your language.
We are going to need some headphones and things like that. But for the younger ones, and for most business people who have to speak English in their jobs, they are simply afraid of speaking in pidgin English.
Yet it is the key to establishing something in which young people and old people can feel at home because they understand.
Brother Christian was a wonderful man. He would always tell the people this. You know what is so wonderful? Some dear saints who had been used to beautiful Chinese prayers are now praying in English. It touches my heart.
I see what they have been willing to do in order to be one with me. I do not have to sit there and look out the window, waiting for a translation.
My point is this: I believe the Lord wants us to have a church where anybody can come and where it is not restricted by language, race, or anything like that.
But to do that, we have to take that step and bear the cross. We have to provide a means for people to understand what is going on.
It is amazing to me how the Moravians, who were kicked out of Germany, moved to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Within ten years, all their materials were in English. They were Germans and Slovaks and spoke all kinds of European languages.
But in the United States, under William Penn, in the colonies, they spoke English. They all had to learn English, and they did. They even learned Indian tribal languages because they went out and witnessed to the Indians.
It is quite an amazing story. They bore the cross in that matter.
What do we do? We are not going to change everything overnight. But if you are on the road toward pidgin English, it may take a generation to grow and transform into a church that is open in terms of language and such things.
If you are on that way, I think the Lord honors it.
If we just remain as we are—can I make a silly example? One day it could be that Americans who want to go to a good school will go to China because the best jobs, where you make the most money, may be there.
People from America may begin migrating to China. Imagine that I decide to go there and preach. I go to Wenzhou and preach in English.
I gather some university students and people starting jobs who know English, and I start an assembly of two hundred English-speaking people. We baptize English-speaking people and everything. Is that not wonderful? But how many Wenzhou people are going to join us?
They will say, “Who are these people? I have nothing in common with that.”
But suppose I begin speaking pidgin Chinese. I do not know which version that would be. Wenzhou people speak their way, and every group speaks its way. Probably among yourselves, you have to speak some kind of common form.
But imagine if we all learned that. Perhaps there would be an open door. I am simply making a reverse example of what I am trying to say.
Obviously, right now there is a priority of gospel work among immigrant Chinese who are coming in. It is a wonderful work. The Lord is doing it and using your assemblies, and people are getting saved.
In Flushing, we rejoice that we are always baptizing ten people, and perhaps seven of them are recent immigrants. This is a work God is doing. God loves the people who are coming in.
Because they are in new territory, they are open to new things. We share the gospel with them, and they get saved. That is a wonderful thing.
But what if that is only for a period of time? We need to become a testimony in the place where we live.
I was asked to speak a couple of times in Chinatown in downtown Manhattan. I went to one church, and they had a tremendous building. I was very impressed. Then I went in and spoke to about twenty people.
I asked, “What happened?” They said, “Well, our church basically spoke Cantonese.”
Now the neighborhood is not Cantonese. The children have all left and gone to American churches. It is like a ghost town in some of those churches, because there are only a few old people who speak Cantonese. It used to be a Cantonese place. Now there may be more people from Thailand there than Cantonese.
They did not keep up with the times, and now they have a big, beautiful church with nobody going.
The point is that we must always ask the Lord, “Lord, how can we take this ground?” This is where it affects the children, because they are very American.
I know children like to make excuses about why they do not like going to the assembly. “Oh, the meeting is two hours long. Who can take it?” Sam’s young people said, “We have to go for ten hours. Who can take it?”
It is all relative. Teenagers do not like hanging out with Mom and Dad forever and ever, and two hours can seem that way. But I have noticed a couple of things.
Teenagers are not very spiritual, but they can tell when there is life and when it is dead.
It may be a service entirely in Mandarin, but I am telling you, if it is full of the Holy Spirit, the children can sense it. They can also sense when it is some kind of tradition, when people are just saying things by rote, and when there is no life there.
Children will not stay in something that has no life—not if they are living.
As soon as they go to college and get into InterVarsity or other groups, they may be invited to participate. Of course, our children immediately become the leaders, right? Some brothers have said that already, but it is so true.
People say, “How do you know the Bible? How did you know where to find Nehemiah?” The rest of the InterVarsity people are amazed.
Your children are so good because you have given them life. You have helped them get saved. You have told them the truth. But if you are dead, they are not going to stay.
If they taste the testimony, they may go off to university, but some of them will come back. If you have tasted the truth and seen the Lord high and lifted up in the assembly, there is something that will attract you.
Other children will leave, and for those who leave, we have to leave that up to the Lord. But there is one more thing I want to say.
When you watch teenagers growing up in our churches, it is so obvious which parents have consecrated their children and are raising them in the fear and admonition of the Lord.
There are many parents who simply leave their children to Sunday school. But those who really pray for their children, talk to their children, and read the Bible with their children—there is something different about them.
By the time they are seventeen years old, they stand out. You can see it.
I am leaving here on Friday, and we are having a youth weekend at the assembly in Flushing. You can see who is raising up their child and who is pressuring their children to get a better job, make more money, and go to a better school.
It becomes so obvious. We lose those children.
But those who have been trained, many of them come home and say, “Well, I could work somewhere in the big city, but I think I would rather be here among God’s people in a testimony.”
It is so important, brothers and sisters, if you are raising children. It makes all the difference in the world.
I say that as one with a broken heart. I have two living sons far from the Lord. It breaks my heart. We were unable to hold them, but I keep praying that the Lord will somehow reverse the world’s grasp and bring them back.
I know many of you are in the same kind of situation.
While we have opportunity, let us raise these children in such a way that they will be caught by the Lord. If they go somewhere else, let them go somewhere where they see the Lord, are caught by Him, and serve Him there. That would make us all happy.
I think I am going to stop. We have another question, but I think we have shared enough. There is a lot more we could say, but once again these questions drive us to the Lord and make us say, “Lord, how we need Your help.”
Sometimes I upset some Chinese folks who feel that their churches are wonderful. I am going to tell you: I agree with you. I love coming and speaking.
There are no more precious people. I do not know why, but all the Chinese saints smile at me while I am speaking. I do not know whether that is just the way you do things.
But I always appreciate being in the midst of assemblies. I am always looking at the young people. I do not know; that is my heart forever. I always look at young people.
What are they doing? Are they in rebellion? Are they checking out? Are they wearing wild things? Where are they at?
Then where is this group going? Are they locking into something smaller than the Lord wants, or are they trying to open to all the Lord has for them?
I hope that helps us a little bit, and that the Lord will answer our questions, especially in these difficult situations. There are no easy answers for these things.
But the Lord knows our hearts. When we have a heart wholly for the Lord, surely He can lead us in His living way.
Father, we thank You so much for the wisdom that comes from heaven.
In these last days, all we can do is ask, “Lord, we give You our hearts. Do discipline us so that we can discipline.”
Lord, as we gather, do give us life, so that whether young or old, they can touch that life and see that lampstand of testimony in the midst. May they sense that foundation of truth that marks and characterizes the life of the Christians who are assembled.
Oh, do recover us, Lord. Recover us. We want to be all that You want us to be.
May it be that out of our assemblies You can raise up those overcomers to be Your bride, to swim upstream in this great down-current of sin and darkness in our country, and to swim upstream in holiness toward the Lord Jesus.
Lord, we are so thankful that we could have these days together with brothers whom we trust and love in the ministry to which You have called them. Do bless them, Lord. Bless us together, Lord.
As short as the hour is, we do not need to reprimand one another, but rather stand together to see Your bride ready and the Bridegroom come for her.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus. We pray in Your precious name.