Wednesday

Related Verses
1 Cor. 12:23-25
23 And those members of the body which we consider to be less honorable, these we clothe with more abundant honor; and our uncomely members come to have more abundant comeliness,
24 But our comely members have no need. But God has blended the body together, giving more abundant honor to the member that lacked,
25 That there would be no division in the body, but that the members would have the same care for one another.

1 Thes. 2:11
11 Just as you know how we were to each one of you, as a father to his own children, exhorting you and consoling you and testifying,

2 Cor. 1:3-4
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassions and God of all comfort;
4 Who comforts us in all our affliction that we may be able to comfort those who are in every affliction through the comforting with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

Rom. 1:11-12
11 For I long to see you that I may impart to you some spiritual gift so that you may be established;
12 That is, that I with you may be encouraged among you through the faith which is in one another, both yours and mine.

Related Reading
Most importantly, we must learn to minister life to others. In order to do this, we ourselves must have life…Therefore, we must learn the lessons of life. Then we will know how to minister to others. In fact, if we have life, there is no need to purposely minister life to others. Life will already be ministered to them. 

We should not try to wrongly impress people that we have the way to do things, that we are smart, or that we know everything. Rather, we should simply help people to put their trust in the Lord and depend on Him for everything. To this end, we should bring with us a spirit and atmosphere of prayer to help others to come into a prayer life. We need to create an atmosphere so that whatever happens to people, they will pray, look to the Lord, and rely on Him for His presence and clear leading. 

A weaker one may require our patience to contact him again and again. This kind of continual, patient contact will shepherd people. This takes time, but there is nothing else we can do. The church grows through shepherding…It is impossible for only the leading brothers in a church to take care of the shepherding. Everyone must pick up the burden to take care of others. This requires our patience. (CWWL, 1973–1974, vol. 2, “The Normal Way of Fruit-bearing and Shepherding for the Building Up of the Church,” pp. 613-615) 

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We must learn to trust and rely upon the ones who are under our care. This is to have a proper fellowship. In one sense, we are the parents nourishing our children, but in another sense, we are all brothers and sisters. Therefore, we should show others that not only do they rely on us, but we also rely on them. This mutual reliance creates much profit. It causes others to be open to us, trust us, and have confidence in us. This is to “open our veins for the blood to circulate.” All the members must be open to one another. Then the circulation will do its proper work. We have seen that some of the ones who are under our care do not open to us, regardless of how much time we spend with them. This means that they have no confidence in us. We need to behave in a way to build up a mutual confidence; this will cause them to open to us. This requires us to depend on them, rely on them, and show them that we need their help. 

We should never give anyone under our care the sense that we are forcing them to do anything. We must all learn the attributes of God. From the beginning, God never forced people. Rather, He gave them a free choice…Not to force or coerce people is contrary to our natural concept. In shepherding, however, we should stay away from every kind of forcing, coercing, and convincing. 

Whatever we fellowship with the dear ones must be according to our own experience. Paul told the Thessalonians, “Just as you know how we were to each one of you, as a father to his own children, exhorting you and consoling you and testifying” (1 Thes. 2:11). No doubt, Paul testified many things to the saints, but a great part of his testimony must have been his own experiences. We need personal experiences to be able to testify to the younger ones. In the proper sense, whatever we render to them as a help should be from our own testimony. How much we can testify in this way depends on how much we have experienced. We must have a certain amount of experience of all of the foregoing detailed items. The more we pick up the burden to shepherd others, the more things we will need to learn. (CWWL, 1973–1974, vol. 2, “The Normal Way of Fruit-bearing and Shepherding for the Building Up of the Church,” pp. 615-616) 

Further Reading: CWWL, 1973–1974, vol. 2, “The Normal Way of Fruit-bearing and Shepherding for the Building Up of the Church,” ch. 8