Vital Groups

Without home meetings there can be no building

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“And day by day, continuing steadfastly with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they partook of their food with exultation and simplicity of heart.” (Acts 2:46)

“[T]o meet in today’s Christianity way, to have the great congregations, is altogether natural, worldly, according to human society. I have never heard of any kind of movement or any kind of culture which invented this way of meeting in every home. Such a thing is only in the Bible [Acts 2:46].  At the very initiation of the church life the saints met from house to house. This is quite extraordinary. This is not following the natural way.

…You may ask, ‘Without the big meetings how could we have the increase?’ In the sixties when I came to this country, the evangelist Dr. Billy Graham was promoting small group meetings. Because Billy Graham found out that many brought to the gospel were scattered in the denominations and eventually became cold, he encouraged people to form small groups to have Bible study and to pray together. What he promoted was the same in principle as what we are talking about. Although thousands of people may be brought in without the small groups, how many of them could remain? There is no way. It is just like bringing the water out of a deep well and pouring it on the earth. All the water will sink back. We may get the increase, but without the small group meetings they cannot remain in the church to be built up.

…I say this especially to the leading ones of all the churches; what you have been doing is just to maintain a meeting situation of the church. As you do not have small groups, how could you have the building up? It is impossible…. After the meeting we have much contact with each other, but we still do not have much positive building because we are short of the home meetings. We must see the need of the home meetings. Without home meetings there can be no building.

…Do not say that you are weak, that you cannot overcome your self, that you cannot overcome your temper, that you cannot control yourself, that you cannot do this or that. Just set up a home meeting in your home. I have seen in many cases that when you set up a meeting in your home the Holy Spirit brings people to you. Gradually people will come. I would say that if you are a Christian, yet you do not have a home meeting, you are not up to the standard. You may know the Bible, be spiritual, be seeking, love the Lord, and so forth, but if you do not open your home, you are not up to the standard. Even a single sister could open her apartment for meetings. Every lodging of the saints, whether single or with a family, should be opened up for meeting.

…Are you going to be holy? Set up a home meeting. Are you going to be spiritual? Set up a home meeting. Are you going to know the Bible? Nothing will force you to seek the knowledge of the Bible more than setting up a home meeting. The home meetings will force you to seek after the proper, spiritual knowledge, and while you are seeking the knowledge for teaching others, you yourself will be taught, enlightened, and nourished. I can recall my own history. When I was trying to teach others I began to realize that I needed to be taught. The definite, single, and sole step for the Lord’s recovery to take today is to promote the home meetings. This is the unique way.”

(The Home Meetings, pp.12-13, 20)

How to overcome the degradation of the church

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“… I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God has not given us a spirit of cowardice, but of power and of love and of sobermindedness.”  (2 Timothy 1:6-7)

“How can we overcome the degradation of the church? We must have a burning human spirit of love [2 Tim. 1:6-7]. Under today’s degradation of the church, we all need a spirit of love fanned into flame to be burning in spirit. Love prevails in this way.

According to my observation throughout the years, most of the co-workers have a human spirit of ‘power’ but not of love. We need a spirit of love to conquer the degradation of today’s church. We should not say or do anything to threaten people. Instead we should always say and do things with a spirit of love, which has been fanned into flame. This is what the recovery needs.”

(The Vital Groups, pp. 71,73)

Where is the reality of the Body of Christ?

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“Today in the recovery, we need to go on and on to reach the high peak of God’s economy, that is, Mount Zion…. Although Jerusalem is good, it is not the peak. In Jerusalem there is a peak, that is, Mount Zion, on which the temple was built…. The good situation in the recovery today is just like Jerusalem. However, there is no Zion. In the New Testament the overcomers are likened to Zion. In Revelation 14:1 the 144,000 overcomers are not just in Jerusalem; they are on the peak of Zion. The overcomers, the vital groups, are today’s Zion. My burden today is to help you reach the peak of the vital groups, that is, the overcomers’ Zion. Although we may have a good church life, among us there is almost no realization, no practicality, no actuality, and no reality of the Body life. This is the need in the recovery today.

The regular procedures of the church work in the Lord’s recovery today consist of four steps: begetting, nourishing, teaching (perfecting), and building. Begetting is to have sinners saved and regenerated to become the members of Christ (1 Cor. 4:15b; Matt. 28:19); nourishing is to feed the new believers for their growth in the divine life (1 Thes. 2:7; John 21:15, 17); and teaching is to perfect the saints that they may mature to be built (Matt. 28:20a; Eph. 4:12-16). The steps of begetting, nourishing, and perfecting are all for another higher step, that is, for the building up of the Body of Christ (Eph. 4:12b, 16) in the local churches (Rev. 1:4a, 11). However, we need to ask ourselves, ‘Where is such a building? Where is the Body of Christ today? Within and among the many local churches, where is the reality of the Body of Christ?’ According to my observation, we cannot see the reality of the Body of Christ anywhere today.

….The highest peak of the Lord’s recovery that can really, practically, and actually carry out God’s economy is for God to produce not many local churches in a physical way but an organic Body to be His organism. We all have a physical body, but our body actually is not the reality of our being. My body is me, but it is not the reality of my being. Likewise, the churches set up around the globe are a physical frame, but among the churches there may be no reality of the Body of Christ. If we are honest with ourselves, we must admit that this is our situation today. Where is the reality of the Body of Christ?”

(Practical Points Concerning Blending, Ch. 2)

Mutual fellowship is better than merely listening to messages

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“The content of the small group gatherings involves mutual fellowship. In Greek the word fellowship conveys the meaning of flowing, being in agreement, linking up, and communicating. Hence, fellowship is a flow. For example, the circulation of the blood in the body is a kind of fellowship. Likewise, the electric current in a lamp is a kind of fellowship. When there is no flow of electricity, a lamp stands alone. But once a lamp is connected to the electrical current, it is connected not only to the power plant but also to other lamps.

As believers, we have the Spirit of God and the life of God in us. Today the life of God and the Spirit of God are flowing within us continually. We have this flow, and even those who have not been meeting for a long time have this flow. Many dormant saints say, ‘I have not been meeting for many years, and I am embarrassed to go back.’ This sense of embarrassment proves that they still have God’s life in them; they are still breathing. It also proves that they have the sense of life within them. Hence, there is still hope for them. This hope is related to the flow of life, which is also the fellowship.

When we gather together in the groups, we should believe that the Lord is in our midst. From the day we were saved, He came into us with His life, and He has never left. Furthermore, we can also stand on His promise in Matthew 18:20: ‘Where there are two or three gathered into My name, there am I in their midst.’ We must acknowledge and grasp this privilege.

…. Each time we come to a gathering, it is not to conduct business, not to eat hot pot, and not to make friends or seek assistance. We come to seek the Lord Jesus, that is, to be gathered into the Lord’s name. Once we have this faith, we can say, ‘Lord, we thank and praise You. This small gathering is connected to heaven. You are on the throne, in our midst, and even in us.’ We must have this faith and make this declaration.

…. Mutual fellowship is truly better than merely listening to messages. Listening to messages is similar to eating only white rice during a meal; there is not much variety in flavor. When we have a meal, we always have other dishes in addition to white rice. The two-way traffic in fellowship is similar to pickled vegetables, which stimulate one’s appetite during a meal…. There may be strengthening prayers or testimonies that follow one after another. Following this fellowship, the entire gathering will open up. After half an hour of fellowship, everyone will be full and satisfied, and when they part, they will yearn for the next meeting.”

(Crucial Words of Leading in the Lord’s Recovery, Book 4: The Increase and Spread of the Church, ch. 8)

If we gather together only in big meetings, the proper church life will be hindered

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“The group meetings are the life line of the God-ordained way. As long as we have not touched the group meetings, we have hardly begun to practice the God-ordained way. Satan has deceived us, just as the serpent deceived Eve, through the practice of Christianity to pay attention to big meetings. However, the New Testament makes it clear that the first stage of the Christian meetings was in the homes. According to Acts 2:46, on the day of Pentecost the believers met from house to house. This means that they met in homes, from home to home. The Greek phrase translated ‘from house to house’ implies that wherever there is a home of a Christian, there should be a meeting. In all the Christians’ homes, there should be meetings. Although I stressed this again and again, today we may still prefer to have big meetings. If we gather together only in big meetings, the proper church life will be hindered. When clumps of grass are scattered about, they grow and spread, but when they are piled together, they die. We may prefer to have the facade of a big meeting, but the Lord is not for that. The Lord is for His spreading, and His spreading is in the homes.

…. I fully realize that our barrenness is due mainly to the lack of the group meetings. If we do not have the group meetings, it will be difficult to overcome our barrenness. We may still have some increase, but the rate of increase will probably not be high, and the atmosphere in our meetings also will not be high. A large tree without branches cannot bear fruit. The big meetings are like the trunk of a tree, but a trunk alone cannot bear fruit. The trunk needs tender, fresh branches. It is the branches that can bear fruit. In the church life the branches are the groups. We should not be individualistic but should live in the Body. According to the New Testament, to live in the Body, we need the groups. This does not mean that we should group all the saints into one gathering. According to Acts, it means that we should group the saints together in home meetings.”

(Fellowship Concerning the Urgent Need of the Vital Groups, ch. 1)

What does it mean to meet?

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“This is the start of the vital groups… we are in a stage in which we need to be vital. We need to be living, burning and fruitful…. How can we be vital? We have to run the race… we all have to run the race by contacting people… we should contact one another every day, every week, every month, and every year. When we contact one another we are meeting. To meet is to blend and to know each other. Our contact should not be formal and official but normal and living in every way.”

(The Training and the Practice of the Vital Groups, ch. 4, 9, 11)

Changing our concepts and habits to take the God-ordained way

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Link from LivingToHim.com:  Changing our Concepts and Habits to Take the God-Ordained Way (Part 1)

“Unless we have the right view and are willing to change our concept and our system so that every saint fulfills his function, we will not be able to multiply….” (Shepherding the Church and Perfecting the Young People, Chapter 3)

Excerpt:

We need to have 6 changes of concepts and habits (practices):

  • From meeting to people: from meeting-centered to people-centered
  • From big to small: from holding big meetings to gathering in 2s and 3s
  • From coming to going: from always asking people to come to going to visit people where they are
  • From “center to circumference” to “mutuality to mutuality”: from one-directional working on a few “promising” ones to mutual caring among all
  • From “top to bottom” to “bottom to top”: from having a top-down one-directional organized church structure to everyone actively initiating and functioning
  • From “small to big” to “few to many”: from making one home meeting bigger and bigger to multiplying one home into many homes — the principle of the mustard seed vs. the principle of the grain of wheat