The Meaning of Human Life and a Proper Consecration, Chap 10, Section 1 of 3

Sections:

CHAPTER TEN

RELEASING THE LORD’S LIFE AND 
AGGRESSIVELY PREACHING THE GOSPEL

A COMMISSION TO LEAD CLASSMATES TO SALVATION

As young saints, you need to receive a commission to contact and preach the gospel to your fellow students. You do not need to preach the gospel to older people. The older saints can take care of this. However, you should preach the gospel to your parents. You should preach the gospel to the students in your school and lead them to salvation. It is not necessary to try to save many students at one time. It is best to gain one student at a time. Look to the Lord and ask Him which student He wants to gain. Then follow the Lord’s leading. If you feel that the Lord wants to gain a certain classmate, you should exercise your faith and contact that classmate. In this way, your classmates will be saved.

After a classmate is saved, you must meet with him. Do not depend on others; do not depend on the co-workers, the elders, the responsible ones for the district, or those in the small group; do not depend on your parents or siblings. You should depend on the Lord. You need to pray and then meet with your newly saved classmate. Help your classmate to be stirred up by the Lord, just as you have been stirred up. Then the two of you can go and contact others. In this way one becomes two, two become four, four become eight, and so forth. Depend on the Lord who is a living person. This does not mean that you should not use the tools that we have, such as the literature, but that you should not rely on them. Lead your classmates as new ones, and preach the word to them. When you speak, avoid shouting and screaming. After speaking the word, you can lead them to pray-read and enjoy the Lord. Then go with your classmates and contact others. This way is very effective.

Every young saint who is still studying in school should contact his fellow students one by one. The best place to effectively contact people is your school. First contact your classmates. Other students [214] can be contacted at your convenience, but your classmates should be your target. You must remember to earnestly pray for your classmates and for your school.

There is a Catholic university with about a dozen young saints. These saints should first come together at least two or three times a week for half an hour, maybe at noontime, to pray-read or fellowship. Next, they should contact their classmates one by one. They should not attempt to first contact the clergy. Instead, they should first contact their classmates. They should not merely distribute tracts or exhort their classmates to call on the Lord. Rather, they should focus on one person until he has no alternative but to be saved. They should pray for him unceasingly until he is saved. This can be compared to digging a hole in the ground. You should not dig a little here and a little there, but in the end there is no hole. If these twelve saints would each diligently work on one classmate, within a year they could gain more than fifty classmates. Furthermore, these new ones will be living. They will not be fruit that dies prematurely; they will be remaining fruit.

THREE CRUCIAL ITEMS 
FOR THE RELEASE OF THE LORD’S LIFE

Not Being Ashamed of the Gospel

The life in a Christian is a Lord-releasing life. If a Christian does not release the Lord, the divine life will be restrained within him and will not grow. Therefore, we must remember that if we desire to grow in life, we must release the Lord and supply others with His life. The more we release the Lord’s life, the more we will grow in His life. The highest way to release the Lord’s life is to preach the gospel. If we desire to contact others for the release of the Lord’s life, that is, to lead others to salvation, we need to pay attention to a few items.

First, we must not be ashamed of the gospel. Satan’s basic work in us is to cause us to feel ashamed of the gospel. We are not ashamed to discuss Chinese classics, the world situation, science, chemistry, or mathematics with others. However, when we speak to others about the Lord Jesus, we immediately feel ashamed. We all have had the experience of being ashamed when we speak with others concerning the Lord Jesus or the gospel. Believing in the [215] Lord Jesus should not be a matter of shame. Why should we be ashamed when we speak to others about the Lord Jesus? We should be ashamed of stealing, lying, or provoking our parents to anger. However, we should not be ashamed when we speak to others about the Lord Jesus.

This sense of shame comes from the devil, Satan. In Romans 1:16 Paul said that he was “not ashamed of the gospel.” Satan wants every believer to be ashamed of speaking to people concerning the Lord Jesus. The young people are the “best soldiers” in the churches. They must be strong in spirit. When they feel ashamed of the gospel, they should use their strong spirit to say, “Get behind me, Satan. You will not have any ground in me; instead, I will call on the Lord’s name.” Whether they are preaching the gospel to a classmate or putting on a gospel vest, they should simply say, “Get behind me, Satan. Stop troubling me.” None of us should feel ashamed of the gospel. This is not a small thing.

If we are not ashamed of the gospel and of the Lord Jesus, we will overcome our weaknesses and our problems. If we are ashamed of the Lord Jesus and of the gospel, the enemy has a hold on us. Hence, I exhort the young brothers and sisters to deal with this problem of being ashamed of the gospel.

We need a thorough consecration to the Lord concerning the gospel. When Satan comes to disturb us, we should immediately declare, “Jesus is Lord!” and Satan will flee. We must overcome Satan’s trap. We should first deal with the feeling of shame concerning the gospel. The gospel is glorious, and the Lord Jesus is glorious. No one in the entire universe is more glorious than the Lord Jesus. No matter how much we have achieved, if we do not overcome the feeling of shame related to the gospel, we will not be useful. Hence, we must deal with this matter of being ashamed of the gospel until we, like Paul, can say, “I am not ashamed of the gospel.”

Satan persistently uses this tactic to entangle us. Do not think that your sense of shame related to the gospel comes from you. This feeling comes from Satan; hence, it is a battle, and we must fight. We should always stand against any feelings of shame related to the gospel. We need a strong resolution not to be ashamed of the gospel.

Asking the Lord for the Infilling of the Holy Spirit

The second item for the release of the Lord’s life is the infilling of [216] the Holy Spirit. We need to go before the Lord in prayer and ask Him to fill us with the Spirit. There is no need to speak doctrine to the Lord. Simply say, “Lord, fill me with the Holy Spirit. Occupy me and fill me.” Our Lord is true, living, and practical. He is the living Spirit. He is also the Spirit of power. He will always be with us. We need merely to say, “Lord, possess me and fill me. You are the Spirit. You are the Spirit of life and the Spirit of power. Lord, fill me.” When we pray, we should believe, and we should believe what we pray. We pray by faith. We do not seek feelings, ask for results, or care about doctrine. We simply say, “Lord, I want to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Fill me now.”

© Living Stream Ministry, 2021, used by permission