Events in the life of Jesus will be symbolized by the seven major feasts of Israel and presented as five stepping stones to the New Jerusalem. These five stepping stones can lead man safely back to the restored relationship with God both in this life and in the New Jerusalem. (Social Issues)
The Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1968, volume 2, contains messages given by Brother Witness Lee from August 6 through December 29, 1968. As mentioned in the preface to volume 1, from late July through the middle of November, Brother Lee visited the Far East. From July 25 through August 22 he was in Taiwan, where he was joined by over one hundred forty brothers and sisters from the United States and Canada, along with some saints from Brazil, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Denmark, and West Germany. He then visited Manila, Philippines; Singapore; Jakarta, Indonesia; and Hong Kong. There is no record of his speaking in any of these places. He returned to Taipei in late September, where he remained until early November. Subsequently, he visited Toyama and Tokyo, Japan, before returning to Los Angeles in the middle of the month. There is no record of his speaking in Japan. He remained in Los Angeles for two weeks and then visited San Francisco, California; Vancouver, Canada; and Seattle, Washington, during the next two weeks. There is no record of his speaking in Vancouver or Seattle. Brother Lee remained in Los Angeles from mid-December until the end of the year. The contents of this volume are divided into eleven sections, as follows: 1. Twelve messages given during a training for young people in Taipei, Taiwan, on August 6 through 10. These messages were published previously in Chinese under the title The Lord's Recovery and the Fulfillment of God's Desire. The last two spoken messages were combined. 2. Nine messages given in co-workers' and elders' meetings in Taipei, Taiwan, on August 13 through 17, and in a farewell meeting on August 22. They are included in this volume under the title Turning to the Age of the Spirit. 3. Three messages given to the co-workers and elders in Taiwan in August and September. These messages are included in this volume under the title Fighting for the Truth. 4. Ten messages given in Taipei, Taiwan. The first seven messages were given in island-wide elders' meetings in late September, and the subsequent two messages were given in a church meeting on November 3 and a service meeting on November 4, respectively. Of the first seven messages, the second was previously published as chapter 6 of the book entitled Character. The final message, which appeared in Church News, number 15, November 1968, consists of a report concerning the background of the two messages given on November 3 and 4. The ten messages in this section were published previously in Chinese under the title The Motive, Coordination, and Function of the Lord's Serving Ones. 5. Several messages given in Taipei, Taiwan, in September and October. These messages were compiled and published as a single message in The Ministry of the Word, number 211, January 1969. This message is included in this volume under the title The Practice of the Pray-reading Meeting. 6. Four messages given in Taipei, Taiwan, from October 19 through 22. These messages are published in this volume under the title Gospel Messages. 7. Five messages given in Los Angeles, California, from November 22 through 24. These messages are included in this volume under the title Growing in Life and Serving the Lord for the Building Up of the Church as His Testimony. The final two messages were combined. 8. Fifteen messages given in San Francisco, California, from November 28 through December 1. These messages are included in this volume under the title Various Meetings in San Francisco. 9. Eight messages given in Los Angeles, California, on December 19 through 21. These messages are published in this volume under the title Speaking Christ to Build Up the Church for the Accomplishment of God's Eternal Purpose. 10. Thirteen messages given in Los Angeles, California, from November 17 through December 29. They are included in this volume under the title The Significance, Practice, and Present Situationof the Local Churches. Two of the messages were combined. 11. Two messages given in Los Angeles, California, on November 17 and December 17. They are included in this volume under the title Miscellaneous Meetings in Los Angeles.
The Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1969, volume 2, contains messages given by Brother Witness Lee from April 4 through August 9, 1969. As mentioned in the preface to volume 1, in early April Brother Lee made a brief visit to Waco, Texas, and at the beginning of May he visited San Francisco. At the end of May he traveled to Albuquerque, New Mexico; and then to Erie, Pennsylvania; Toronto, Canada; and Erie, Pennsylvania, a second time. Regrettably, there is no record of Brother Lee's speaking in his first visit to Erie and in his visit to Toronto. He returned to Los Angeles at the beginning of July and remained there until the end of August. The contents of this volume are divided into nine sections, as follows: 1. Six messages given in Waco, Texas, on April 4 through 6. These messages are included in this section under the title Experiencing and Enjoying the All-inclusive, Compound Spirit for the Building Up of the Church as God's Dwelling Place. The recording of one of the six messages appears to have been lost. 2. Seven messages given in San Francisco, California, on May 2 through 4. They are included in this volume under the title Praising God with Christ as the Content by Our Experiencing and Enjoying Him. 3. Nine messages given in Albuquerque, New Mexico, from May 31 through June 5. These messages are included in this volume under the title Practicing the Church Life by Exercising the Spirit. 4. Two messages given in Erie, Pennsylvania, on June 28. These messages were given near the end of a longer conference that began on June 19. Regrettably, there is no record of Brother Lee's speaking from June 19 through 27. The two recorded messages are included in this section under the title TheRecovery of the Local Churches with the Sevenfold Spirit. 5. Ten messages given in Los Angeles, California, on July 4 through 13. They were originally published in The Stream, volume 7, number 4, November 1, 1969; and volume 8, number 1, February 1, 1970; and number 2, May 1, 1970, under the title The Seven Spirits for the Local Churches. 6. Eight messages given in Los Angeles, California, on July 4 through 12, 1969. They were originally published in The Stream, volume 8, number 2, May 1, 1970; number 3, August 1, 1970; and number 4, November 1, 1970, under the title The Recovery of God's House and God's City. 7. Eighteen messages given in Los Angeles, California, from July 16 through August 15, 1969. They were previously published in a sixteen-chapter book under the title The Crucial Revelation of Life in the Scriptures. 8. Five messages given in Los Angeles, California, from July 17 through August 14. These messages are included in this volume under the title Further Speaking on the Crucial Revelation of Life in the Scriptures. Two of the five spoken messages were combined. 9. One message given in Los Angeles, California, on August 9. This message is published in this volume under the title The Structure of the Book of Psalms.
The Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1970, volume 2, contains messages given by Brother Witness Lee from July 17 through October 11, 1970. As mentioned in the preface to volume 1, Brother Lee ministered in Los Angeles from the middle of July to the middle of August. He then visited San Francisco; Seattle, Washington; Moses Lake, Washington; and San Francisco again before returning to Los Angeles near the end of September. There is no record of his speaking in Moses Lake. He remained in Los Angeles for about a week, and then he visited Atlanta and Chicago until approximately the middle of October. The contents of this volume are divided into ten sections, as follows: 1. Eighteen messages given in Los Angeles, California, on July 17 through 25. These messages were previously published in a fourteen-chapter book entitled Christ versus Religion. 2. Ten messages given in Los Angeles, California, on July 28 through August 8. They are included in this volume under the title Experiencing the Divine Spirit in Our Human Spirit for the Building Up of the Church as the Body of Christ. 3. Fourteen messages given in Los Angeles, California, from July 28 through August 9. These messages were given during twenty-four sessions of fellowship held in the mornings on these days. Ten of these sessions consisted entirely of testimonies from brothers and sisters from around the world. The speaking by Brother Lee is included in this volume in seven chapters under the title The Lord's Recovery of the Sevenfold Spirit and the Unique Ground of Oneness for the Local Churches. 4. Five messages given in San Francisco, California, on August 14 through 16. They are included in this section under the title Drinking the All-inclusive Spirit for the Practice of the Church Life and the Central Work of God. 5. Six messages given in Seattle, Washington, on September 4 through 7. They are included in this volume under the title The Spirit and the Lord's Recovery. 6. Four messages given in San Francisco, California, on September 18 through 20. These messages were published previously under the title The Two Greatest Prayers of the Apostle Paul. 7. One message given in San Francisco, California, on September 20. It is included in this volume under the title The Lord's Recovery of the Church and the Strengthening and Release of the Inner Man. 8. Four messages given in Los Angeles, California, from September 27 through October 2. These messages are included in this volume under the title Worshipping God with the Worship That He Seeks. 9. Five messages given in Atlanta, Georgia, on October 6 through 8. These messages are included in this volume under the title Taking Christ as Our Person for the Church and Worshipping the Father in Spirit and Truthfulness. 10. Four messages given in Chicago, Illinois, on October 9 through 11. They are included in this volume under the title The Human Spirit and the Church.
In this issue of The Ministry, we continue to see that what the Bible reveals is not the improvement of our behavior but the salvation of God. Man’s salvation is God Himself; that is, God saves us not only by His power and His work but also by coming into us to be our salvation. Since God as our salvation comes to us freely by grace, we should not bring anything to Him except an empty heart. If we come to God, we should put ourselves aside, contact Him, let Him do everything according to the law of the Spirit of life, and give thanks and offer praises to Him. Then, as a result, we become one with Him, and what we live out will be something not of ourselves but of God’s nature. We have also included the first six messages of the Crystallization-study of Revelation held in the winter of 1999 in Long Beach, California. Message One covers two crystals: the temple with the ark and the principle of the man-child. The temple with the ark governs what is unveiled in Revelation 12—22 and relates to God’s expression through His building. The principle of the man-child is that God will choose a group of overcomers who will attain to His purpose and fulfill His demand. Message Two indicates strongly that the book of Revelation is a book on the overcomers, the man-child, God’s dispensational instrument to bring Christ’s kingdom to the earth. Message Three, concerning the firstfruits, the harvest, and the late overcomers, gives a complete view of the coming rapture. To be raptured is to be taken into the Lord’s presence; in order to be taken into the Lord’s presence, we must be in His presence today. Message Four unveils the source and essence of Babylon the Great—religious and material, and Message Five reveals the principle of Babylon. Message Six presents the marriage of the Lamb as the issue of the completion of God’s New Testament economy. Last of all, we include reports concerning the Lord’s continuing move through the radio broadcast in London, England and a recent conference in Stockholm, Sweden.
In this issue of The Ministry, we continue the series of messages on the present practice in God’s economy. These messages, given at a crucial time in the Lord’s recovery, unveil the practice of the new way which the Lord gave to the churches through Brother Lee’s ministry and practical leading. In the message which we include here, Brother Lee emphasizes our need to carry out the begetting, nourishing, and teaching in the meetings in the believers’ homes. To carry out the new way, we must no longer build up the big meetings of the church, which have the clergy-laity system as their root. This truly involves a spiritual warfare, so we must struggle every step of the way, especially in prayer, to participate in the fighting service in God’s economy. The subsequent six messages are from the second half of the Living Stream Ministry’s Summer Training of 1997, entitled The Crucial Contents of God’s New Testament Ministry. This training, which followed immediately after our brother’s departure, was a thorough review of the contents of the New Testament ministry, which he brought to us over many years. On the occasion of Brother Lee’s departure, we can consider all that the Lord has unveiled to us, all the truths which were recovered for us through our brother’s faithful ministry, to bring us into the Lord’s recovery and into the experience of Christ and the reality of the Body of Christ for God’s eternal economy to consummate the New Jerusalem. The local churches raised up under this ministry will speak these things, teach these things, write these things, and live these things until we meet the Lord. Last, we include an encouraging report on the spread of the ministry through the marketing of our publications in Christian bookstores. We also report on the work to produce the Recovery Version of the New Testament in the Russian language, which is now in its fifth and final year. A letter from the co-workers in the former Soviet Union brings us up to date on the Lord’s move there in the first training for the responsible brothers and the recent winter training held in Moscow, and letters from Berlin, Germany report on the progress in publishing and distributing books by Watchman Nee in the German language.