Chapter 6
Scripture Reading: John 6:9, 40, 63
Praise the Lord for these messages! Praise the Lord for all He has done among us! These messages are very special. I believe that in the following conferences we will say this again because the following will be better than the previous one. Let us never live according to our memories. We must follow the Lord’s presence and His steps. The Lord was very merciful toward us. He rescued from law, from tradition, from mere doctrines, from letters, and from outward knowledge and He is ushering us into His organic ministry.
Praise the Lord that He kept John. The twelve Apostles were raised up by the Lord, were trained for three and one half years in a living, organic way, not in a classroom but in each situation with each person the Lord met. The Lord used every situation to train the disciples. However, the disciples didn’t understand clearly that the Lord wanted to establish the kingdom of God. “After the Lord died and resurrected He appeared to the disciples and apostles through a period of forty days and He spoke the things concerning the kingdom of God” (Acts 1:3b). They didn’t understand what He was saying so they asked the Lord when the nation of Israel would be restored. But the Lord answered in Acts 1:8, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” Jesus wanted to establish the kingdom of God by preaching the gospel unto the uttermost part of the earth, including to the Gentiles, but the twelve apostles didn’t understand this. They focused only on the Jews with the result that Judaism got completely mingled with the church in Jerusalem. God would not tolerate that so He raised up Paul. He used Paul greatly, gave him many revelations, and preserved him so he could write his wonderful Epistles which are in the Bible.
However, even with so many revelations, with a ministry of such light, the churches fell into degradation. What was lacking? What was the secret? The Lord had invested so much in the twelve apostles but they were useful only for a short period of time. Was all this investment in vain?
Thank God, it wasn’t in vain. He preserved one among the twelve, and this one was allowed to remain until the end of the first century. In 90 AD John was found in spirit. He learned how to exercise his spirit. He saw that the way of the New Testament is the way of the Spirit. The Spirit gives life. The eternal purpose of God is to give life to men and this life is in the Son and the Son, after His death and resurrection, became the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b). This is the secret!
After he had written Revelation, John left the island of Patmos and he went to Ephesus to work. He worked not with great speeches, but in a simple way he brought the Ephesians to the spirit and the result was the spreading of the kingdom of God.
God preserved John to recover the situation of degradation at the end of the first century, but his function was not only for that time. In John 21:22-23, Jesus said to Peter, “If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? This word therefore went out among the brothers, that that disciple would not die.” Jesus wanted to indicate that the ministry of John would remain until the Lord’s coming back. In other words, John was preserved to recover the church from degradation and to introduce the church into what is organic, that is into Spirit and life. Only in this way can the Lord conclude this age, do His will, and finish His work. This function was given, not only for the end of the first century, but for the end of the church age.
We are at the end of the church age! When John wrote his gospel, there were already three other gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke. John didn’t write his gospel just because he wanted another one. No! The Spirit had given him a burden to recover the church from its dead condition, from dead doctrines, from focusing on the letter of the word with unending arguments, from living in the mind, and from frustrating the saints from doing the Lord’s will. John wrote his gospel with this burden.
John 20:30-31 says, “Moreover indeed many other signs also Jesus did before His disciples, which are not written in this book. But these have been written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, you may have life in His name.” This means that John did not receive the burden of the Spirit to write down all the miracles and signs the Lord had done, but he had the burden to record something special. “But these have been written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, you may have life in His name” (v. 31).
John did not say, “These have been written in order for you to have more knowledge so that I can give you more information about Jesus’ biography.” No! These signs have been written in order for you to have faith. The secret here is faith; it is to believe. Did you know that this verse gives us an important definition of calling on the name of the Lord? How would you define, using this verse, calling on the name of the Lord? Calling on the name of the Lord, according to this verse, is the exercise of faith to gain life. Am I right or not? Take a look at this verse, “But these have been written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, you may have life in His name” (v. 31).
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