The Meetings and Spiritual Exercise of the Local Church

Additional Quotes about the Local Church by Watchman Nee and Witness Lee

1. Reading the Word

In Life Messages, Witness Lee shares on salvation in the Word:

The saints of old have given abundant testimony of how they were saved by the Word. Psalm 119:147 reads, “I prevented the dawning of the morning, and cried: I hoped in thy word.” The psalmist is saying here that he arose before dawn and cried. All his future, all his living, was bound up with God’s word. Without it, he had no hope.

Consider how much better off we are than the Old Testament saints. Moses did not have even the first five books of the Bible. David’s Bible did not include the prophets. He had neither the sweet book of Isaiah, nor the mysterious Zechariah, nor the marvelous book of Daniel, not the unveiling book of Ezekiel. We not only have all these; we have the Gospels, the Acts, the Epistles, and Revelation as well.

Do you realize what a precious heritage this is? I remember when I was newly saved how much I treasured the Bible. For me, nothing in the world could compare with it.

(Witness Lee, Life Messages, 226)

Witness Lee encourages the believers to have a private time in the Lord’s Word:

We should encourage the saints to have a private time in the Lord’s Word and that they should do this as a proper rule of their daily life. Regardless of how busy or how tired we are, we can reserve thirty minutes a day for a time with the Lord. It all depends on our will. If there is the will, there is the way. To save half an hour among twenty-four hours is not a hard thing. If the saints could practice one hour or more in the Lord’s Word this would be wonderful, but at least we should encourage them to give a half an hour to the Lord every day. The saints should be encouraged to separate or sanctify thirty minutes everyday to the Lord. We all can realize what a blessing this will be, and I believe this will make the Lord very pleased. Then every local church needs to find a way to carry out the meetings in the principle of giving the saints the proper education in the full knowledge of the truth.

(Witness Lee, Way to Carry Out the Vision, 146-147)

Witness Lee remarks that the riches in the local church meetings come from getting into the Word:

The outcome of getting into the Word regularly will be a proper Christian life. Then as you come together with the saints, your meetings will display your daily walk. You are not coming together for a performance not to be entertained. You live Christ and feast on His Word day by day. Then as you meet with the saints, if you have a hymn, you call for it. If you have a prayer, you offer it. If you have a word, you utter it. If you have a message, you give it. The result will be the genuine church life, with the meetings enriched by prayers so full of life, by words so full of light, and by testimonies so full of help. How you meet does not depend on form but on how you live….Come back to the Bible and to the simplicity of cleaving to the tree of life. If you live according to His Word, when you meet together you will experience His blessing.

(Witness Lee, Life Messages, 227)

In this portion, Witness Lee emphasizes accompanying Bible reading with prayer:

Make calling, praying, and reading three-in-one. Then it will be hard to discern whether you are reading, praying, or calling on the name of the Lord. While you are calling, you are praying; while you are praying, you are reading; while you are reading, you are praying; while you are praying, you are calling. Then the word of the Bible becomes spirit and life to you (John 6:63). It is by this way that we take the Lord into us all the time.

…At the end of the whole Bible, the last call from God is a call to take the water of life freely (22:17). The Spirit and the bride yearn that the thirsty ones would come to take the water of life for their satisfaction. When you drink the water, you get the food. This is God’s final call, and this will produce the new city, the holy city, the New Jerusalem. All that we need is to come and drink the water of life that we may feed on Christ as the tree of life. This will produce the Body of Christ, the church life, the local churches, and ultimately the holy city, New Jerusalem.

(Witness Lee, Growth of Christ, 20-21)

Main

Meetings

Lord’s Table

Prayer

Prophesying

Small Group

Gospel

Children’s

OT Type

Spiritual Exercise

Reading

Praying

Singing

Speaking

Thanksgiving

Praising

Serving

Calling

Pray-Reading

Bibliography

Links