Lesson 6

Shepherding the Believers Progressively

Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 2:7-8, 11; Acts 20:20, 27-28, 31-32; 2 Tim. 3:15-17; 1 Tim. 4:6；John 4:28-29; 1 Cor. 14:26

I. We need to raise up God’s children with the word of God to know the two spirits, the basic practices of the Christian life, the different items of God’s salvation, the experiences of life, and the church—2 Tim. 3:15-17; 1 Tim. 4:6:

A. The first thing we should help the new believer to know is the two spirits—the Holy Spirit mingled with their human spirit—1 Cor. 15:45b; John 3:6; 4:24; Rom. 8:16; 1 Cor. 6:17:

1. We need to tell them that they have been regenerated in their human spirit; now they have to learn to use their spirit to pray to contact the Lord—John 3:6; 4:24; Eph. 6:18.

2. We should demonstrate to them how to pray by exercising their spirit; we need to show them how to call on the name of the Lord—Acts 2:21; Rom. 10:12-13; 1 Cor. 12:3.

B. The second category of things we should impart to the new believers must be the basic and crucial practices of the Christian life—2 Tim. 3:14-17; Col. 4:2; Prov. 4:18:

1. Reading the Bible—We should fellowship with them and charge them to set aside some time to read the Bible every day—2 Tim. 3:14-17; Acts 17:11; Col. 3:16.

2. Praying always and pray-reading the word—We should tell them that our reading the Bible should be matched by prayer; we should demonstrate how to read the Bible and pray and tell them to learn to pray the words of the Bible and that prayer should be followed by thanksgiving—Eph. 6:17-18; Col. 4:2.

3. Keeping morning [revival]—We should explain what morning [revival] is by telling the new ones that every day, we should rise up a little earlier to spend some time with the Lord to read the Bible and converse with Him and to tell Him whatever we need—Prov. 4:18; Exo. 16:13, 19, 21; Lam. 3:22-24; Mark 1:35.

4. Attending the meetings—We should tell the new believers that we Christians are like the bees; none of us can live the Christian life by himself; we must meet together; we should not forsake the assembling of ourselves together; we also must lead the new ones to know that the meetings of the believers are in mutuality—Heb. 10:25; 1 Cor. 14:26.

5. Following the inner sense—We have to help the new ones to follow their inner sense by telling them that the indwelling Spirit gives them an inner feeling, an inner sense, a consciousness, that they did not have before they were saved, and that from now on as a real Christian, they have to live, to do things, to deal with people, and to deal with matters according to this inner feeling—Rom. 8:6; Acts 16:6, 7; 2 Cor. 2:13.

6. Being filled inwardly and outwardly with the Holy Spirit—We need to lead the new ones to be filled with the essential Spirit and to experience the outpouring of the Spirit—Acts 2:4; 13:52; 4:31; 1:8.

7. Preaching the gospel—We must lead the new ones to speak with boldness by faith in preaching the gospel; we should pray, confess, stand on the word of God, exercise our spirit and our faith, and speak in boldness—4:31; 2 Cor. 4:13.

8. Speaking for the Lord—We need to lead the new ones to speak for the Lord and speak the Lord immediately after being saved; we also need to lead the new ones to realize that the meetings are for the believers to speak the word of the Lord and to listen to others speak the word of the Lord—John 4:28-29; 1 Cor. 14:26, 31.

9. Building up the crucial practices—We should not merely explain or present the crucial practices to the new ones; we need to help them build up these practices; we must check with them concerning these practices—1 Tim. 4:8.

C. The third category of things we should cover with the new believers are all the different items of God’s salvation—Rom. 5:10, 18, 21:

1. Within God’s salvation there are many different items including the washing away of our sins, the forgiving of our sins, redemption, reconciliation, justification, regeneration, etc—v. 10.

2. All of these matters are covered in the forty-eight lessons in Life Lessons—John 6:63.

D. We should shepherd the believers into the experiences of life—:

1. The assurance of salvation—After a person has been regenerated we need to help him to be assured of his salvation; we may point out the three proofs of salvation: 1) by the definite word of the Bible, 2) by the witnessing of the Holy Spirit in our spirit, 3) or by our experience of love in life—1 John 5:13; Rom. 8:15-16; 1 John 3:14.

2. The clearance of the past—after a person is regenerated, we should help him to have a clearance of his past; otherwise, he will not be able to grow well in life—1 Thes. 1:9; Acts 19:19-20; Luke 19:8.

3. Loving the Lord—the first main thing needed for a believer to grow is to love the Lord; for our heart to be dealt with by the Lord, we must first love the Lord; in order to grow, we must go to the Lord to pray that He will grant us love for Him—1 Tim. 1:14.

4. Consecration—if we love the Lord, we will spontaneously offer ourselves to Him; the real consecration comes from love and goes with love; consecration is the basis for every spiritual experience after regeneration; the practical way to consecrate ourselves is to go to the Lord to pray, itemizing all we have and are and offering it to Him—2 Cor. 5:14-15; 1 Cor. 6:19-20; Rom. 12:1.

5. Various dealings for the growth in life—dealing with sins, with the world, with the heart, with the conscience, etc—1 John 1:7; 2:15; Acts 24:16; Matt. 16:24-26.

6. These and many additional matters are covered in The Experience of Life, Practical Lessons on the Experience of Life, Life Lessons, and Basic Lessons on Life.

E. We should also shepherd the believers into knowing the church—Eph. 1:22-23; Rom. 12:11:

1. What the church is—the called out assembly, the Body of Christ, the counterpart of Christ, the house of God and the new man—Eph. 1:22-23; 5:25-27; 2:21-22, 15.

2. The two aspects of the church—the universal aspect and local aspect—Matt. 16:18; 18:17.

3. The oneness of the church and the ground of the church—Eph. 4:3-6; Tit. 1:5; Acts 14:23.

4. The division of the church—the sects in Christianity today—1 Cor. 1:10.

5. The meetings of the church—the importance of meeting and the different kinds of meetings—the bread-breaking meeting, the prayer meeting, etc.—Heb. 10:25; Acts 2:42.

6. Serving the Lord in the church—the motive, significance, way, goal and reward of serving the Lord—Rom. 12:11; 14:18.

7. Offering material riches—the Lord’s charge, the Lord’s promise, the use, the amount, and the way of offering, etc.—1 Cor. 16:1; Acts 11:29.

II. We should be very flexible and adjust ourselves to the level of the new believer, not trying to deal with too many different things in one visit; it would be better to discern which one of the things should be the subject for the visit and to feed the new one the proper food based upon that subject—Eph. 4:12-14.

Excerpts from the Ministry:

RAISING UP THE NEW ONES

WITH THE WORD OF GOD

The second point regarding the raising up of God’s children is that you have to raise them up with the word of God, not with your own word. You must always keep this principle. Do not speak your own word too much. You must learn to seize, or grasp, the opportunity to inject these new ones with the word of God. Feed them with the milk of the Word of God. This is why I published Truth Lessons and Life Lessons. In these volumes I have collected the most suitable verses for helping the new ones. I encourage all of you who are working in the Lord’s new way to become very well acquainted with all forty-eight lessons in Life Lessons. All the subjects of these lessons were carefully selected according to my knowledge and experience to meet the needs of the new ones. Study these lessons, and learn how to use all these golden verses. It is best if you can recite all these verses, but at least you must know where they are in the Bible. Then if you cannot recite a verse, you can find it quickly. Sometimes, even if you can recite the verse, it is better to open to that verse and let the new one read it. Whatever you do, you must do it in a living way, and you should try to cover at least one definite point using the best verses.

The first thing we should inject into the new ones is that our Savior is the Spirit and that we as saved ones have a regenerated spirit. We need to spend at least three or four home meetings to impart this matter into them.

The second category of things we should impart to them must be the basic practices of the Christian life. As Christians we should read the Bible, the Word of God. We should pray to God, which is to breathe in God. Also, we should have morning watch. Every morning we should rise up early to have a time of morning watch with the Lord. We must also teach them how to practice morning watch by reading some verses and then pray-reading these verses. You have to charge them to attend the Christian meetings. Then you also have to help them to do the same thing that you did for them, that is, to preach the gospel to others. These are the basic practices of the Christian life.

The next matters we should cover with them are all the different items of God’s salvation. God’s salvation is all-inclusive, and within God’s salvation there are many different items. There are the washing away of our sins, the forgiving of our sins, redemption, reconciliation, justification, regeneration, and so forth. All of these matters are covered in the forty-eight lessons in Life Lessons. You have to take care of all these matters, and to do so will require many weeks.

If you cover these three categories properly, the ones who are under your care will be raised up very well. Spontaneously, they will grow and become steadfast. The home meeting is like kindergarten, and the group meeting is like elementary school. In later messages we will have much fellowship on the group meeting. (CWWL, 1989, vol. 3, “The Exercise and Practice of the God-ordained Way,” ch. 21, pp. 381-382)

FOUR CRUCIAL PRACTICES OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE

Four crucial practices of the Christian life are reading the Bible, praying always, keeping morning watch, and attending the meetings. It would be marvelous if we could cover these four crucial practices in two home meetings.

Reading the Bible

Although you may have strengthened and encouraged a new one, this alone is not adequate. You still have to grasp the time to go further, to speak something more. You should not go to a home meeting with a prepared subject, but you must have a purpose. To have a purpose in going to a home meeting is different from making a decision as to what you are going to speak. If you are going to visit a man who was baptized only two days ago, you must have a burden, a purpose, to feed, or nourish, him. You may say, “This verse, Acts 16:31, is very good and comforting. The Word is straight and pure. We Christians should know the verses in the Bible, so we need to read the Bible. From the first day that we believe in the Lord Jesus, we must pick up the practice of reading the Bible. Second Timothy 3:15-16 says, ‘From a babe you have known the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise unto salvation….All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.’ ” Then you can fellowship with him and charge him to set aside some time to read the Bible every day.

Praying Always

You may continue your talk with him by saying, “To read the Bible is good, but it should be accompanied by another thing—our prayer to the Lord. Our reading should be matched by prayer. We can take the word ‘All Scripture is God-breathed’ and simply turn it into prayer, saying, ‘Lord, thank You for all the Scriptures. Thank You that all the Scriptures are God-breathed.’ You must learn to pray the words of the Bible in this way.”

You should demonstrate how to read the Bible and pray. You can also read him 1 Thessalonians 5:17-18—“Unceasingly pray; in everything give thanks”—and say, “Prayer should, always be followed by thanksgiving. This verse says to pray without ceasing and then to give thanks to God.” You can read these two verses and then demonstrate a little bit. This will help him. In contacting him in this way, you can open up the conversation to both the reading of the Bible and prayer.

Keeping Morning Watch

After a few days, you must visit this one again. This time when you arrive, rather than listening to him first, you should say, “Two days ago we talked to you about reading the Bible and praying. Now we would like to tell you about another practice which is crucial to our Christian life—keeping morning watch.” You can explain to him what morning watch is by saying, “Every day, rise up a little earlier to spend some time with the Lord to read the Bible and converse with Him. While you are conversing with the Lord, you can tell Him whatever you need. This is to pray. You do not need to do this too long, maybe about ten minutes every morning. This will be a great help to your Christian life.” You can talk to him about this practice and charge him to practice it. Then when you come back to visit again, you can check to see if he is practicing this or not.

Attending the Meetings

You should also have the time to say, “Another crucial practice of the Christian life is to attend the meetings. Hebrews 10:25 says that we should not forsake the assembling of ourselves together. We Christians are like the bees; none of us can live the Christian life by himself. We must meet together. There are the home meetings, the small group meetings, and the larger meetings of the church.”

BUILDING UP THESE CRUCIAL PRACTICES

We should not merely explain or present these four practices to the new ones. We need at least one month to help them build up these practices. Every time we go back to visit them, we must check with them concerning these four practices. They may tell us that they have failed. One may say that he kept morning watch for three mornings but on the fourth morning he could not rise up. We need to check with him, “When did you get up? When did you go to bed?” No one likes to go to bed early. Even if you decide to go to bed at 10:30, you may not get to bed until 11:30. If we are going to learn to keep our morning watch, we must ask the Lord to grant us His grace and mercy so that we can go to bed earlier. If we do not go to bed earlier, it will be hard for us to get up earlier. We have to try to help the new ones build up their time of morning watch as a habit.

If the new ones are to live a healthy Christian life, they must practice these four things. They must read the Bible, and to some extent they must learn to study the Bible. Prayer is healthy to their spiritual life, so we must do a lot to help them to pray. We must help them build up a habit of prayer and tell them that to pray is not merely to ask God to do things for us but to breathe God into us. We must also help them to keep morning watch and attend the church meetings. We must work to build up these practices over quite a period of time.

While we are helping to build up these four practices in the new ones, we will also need to touch other matters. We must go to the home meetings in a very flexible way. In one visit we can cover two or three things, but with some subjects we must help them over a period of time. With the matter of consecration, we do not need a long time, but with these four practices, we need a longer time. Even one month may not be adequate for building up a new one in these practices. While we are working on him concerning these four practices, we can cover other things.

Now is the time to practice the home meetings by taking care of those whom you have baptized. You delivered these babes, so the responsibility is upon your shoulders to go back to them to feed, nourish, and cherish them. Do not do things without any kind of direction. You should work for quite a period of time to develop in them these healthy practices that are crucial to the Christian life. (CWWL, 1989, vol. 3, “The Exercise and Practice of the God-ordained Way,” ch. 17, pp. 338-341)

SHEPHERDING PEOPLE IN THE EXPERIENCES OF LIFE

Helping People in Each Stage of Life

to Have Particular Experiences

We need to shepherd people in the way of experience. This is not simply to share our experiences with them. Rather, when we care for young ones, new ones, and weak ones, we need to know where they are in their experience. We may use the educational system to illustrate the way to help people. If a teacher knows what grades a child has completed, he can help him to advance in a proper way. In the old days in China, those who did not accept the modern educational system would learn only a few things each year in a very general way. By the time they were middle-aged, some still could not write properly. In contrast, all the children in the modern educational system could write well after only a few years. These children learned in the proper way without wasting time. Too many people in Christianity today are not on the proper way. My own mother was baptized and taught in a Christian school when she was young. Because she attended Christian meetings and learned some things there, she was able to tell her children stories from Genesis and the four Gospels. After we were saved, however, we realized that she was not yet saved. She knew many things, but she had no particular experience of salvation. This illustrates our need to help those who are under our shepherding to have definite, particular experiences of life.

We must first know whether someone is clear about the assurance of salvation. Someone may come to the church meetings, but if he is not truly saved, he is not actually in the church. Although we believe that almost everyone in our meetings is saved, some of the new ones who have come into the church life only recently may not have the assurance of salvation. If we check with them, they may say, “I believe I am saved, but I am not very sure.” Without the assurance of salvation, it is hard for anyone to go on. Salvation is our foundation, and the assurance of salvation is our motivation. If anyone does not have the assurance that he has been fully saved, it is difficult for him to go on.

If someone is clear concerning his salvation, we should go on from the assurance of salvation to another experience. Perhaps we can help him to have a particular experience of consecration. He is clear about salvation, but he may never have consecrated himself to the Lord. We should not merely pass on a little knowledge about consecration. Instead, we must pray for him, contact him, have fellowship with him, and do something to help him to fully pass through the experience of consecration. Then for eternity he can never say that he has not consecrated himself. To be saved is a particular, initial experience, and following this, people need the assurance of salvation. These are the first two experiences they need. Then we need to help them to pass through a particular, definite, specific experience of consecration. Our ability to do this depends on whether we ourselves have had this experience. After we help people in this way, we can go on to another experience. No doubt, they also need to have a definite experience of clearing their past. In actuality, the clearance of the past and consecration go together.

We must have a particular burden for the new ones. We may realize that a certain brother is very promising but that he has never consecrated himself to the Lord. Then we should not touch this matter in a shallow way. We need to touch this in the deepest way. First we may give him our own testimony and tell him how so many saints in the past consecrated themselves to the Lord. We should contact him several times until we see that he has truly passed through this experience.

After consecration and clearance of the past, we can go on to further experiences. How far we can go with others depends on how far we have gone on. We can help others only to the extent of our own experience. In mathematics, for example, if we have learned only addition and subtraction, this is all that we can teach. If we have had adequate experiences of life, we can help people in a further way. Perhaps we can move on to the inner anointing. To help someone under our care to experience this will take a long time. We need this kind of shepherding, a shepherding according to an “educational system.”

I strongly recommend the book The Experience of Life. This book was taken from a training course given from 1953 to 1954, which was based on all the experiences of the inner life taught by the saints from the first century. In particular, it relied on a book by Madame Guyon entitled Life out of Death—Spiritual Torrents. Mrs. Jessie Penn-Lewis used Madame Guyon’s writing very much in her expositions. We received help from both authors, we digested what they spoke, and we added something further. Spiritual Torrents is somewhat difficult to understand, but today it is very easy to read The Experience of Life. If someone reads from it for ten minutes a day, he can finish the book in a short time. The four stages in the spiritual life mentioned by Madame Guyon are covered in this book, including nineteen experiences of life, and they are presented in a very “scientific” way. Everything related to our physical life can be known scientifically. If we care for our eating, breathing, drinking, working, and resting in a scientific way, we will be healthy. Likewise, we can know the things of the spiritual life in a scientific way. What is presented in The Experience of Life is not a mere theory, consideration, or imagination. It is based on the experiences of many seeking saints through the centuries. We should first shepherd ourselves by using this book to check our experience. Doing this will help us to know if we are in “high school,” “college,” or “graduate school” in our spiritual experience. Then we will know where we are and what our need is.

Knowing the Spiritual Stage of the New Ones

in Order to Help Them in a Particular Way

If we do not know where we are or where those whom we contact are, our fellowship with them will be very general. Of course, this is better than nothing, and for the first few contacts this may be good enough. For the long run, however, we need further learning. Then we will know where we are, and we will know where others are. We will know what we are short of and we will be able to help others to the extent of our own experience. Then the whole church will grow. Otherwise, we will simply meet together in a general way without being clear or knowing what we are doing. Not only the service groups but also every local church with an adequate eldership must help the saints to go on in this way. At first, the church life may be only in the “sixth grade,” but after a few years we will advance to “junior high,” “high school,” and eventually “college.” At the same time, some of the new ones will still be in “junior high” and even in “nursery school.” As a whole, however, the church will be at a higher level of life. This requires us not merely to give messages week after week. Rather we must know how to help the saints at every level, just as in America today we have all the different levels of education. Because of this, to be an elder in the proper church life is not an easy burden.

We must all see that this is the proper way of shepherding. Otherwise, we will not be clear what we are doing for the long run. We must know people’s spiritual condition. Then we will know where they are and what they need. We will realize whether or not we can afford them what they need, and we will go on to experience something further. This is what it means to shepherd people according to the experiences of life. (CWWL, 1973-1974, vol. 2, “The Normal Way of Fruit-bearing and Shepherding for the Building Up of the Church,” ch. 9, pp. 617-620)

References and Further Reading:

1. CWWL, 1989, vol. 3, “The Exercise and Practice of the God-ordained Way,” chs. 17, 21-22.

2. CWWL, 1987, vol. 3, “The Scriptural Way to Meet and to Serve for the Building Up of the Body of Christ,” chs. 18-19.

3. CWWL, 1973-1974, vol. 2, “The Normal Way of Fruit-bearing and Shepherding for the Building Up of the Church,” ch. 9.

4. Life Lessons, Lessons 1-48.

5. Practical Lessons on the Experience of Life, chs. 1-16.

6. The Experience of Life.

7. Lessons for New Believers.