Whene’er we meet with Christ endued

We need to terminate the natural way of meeting and endeavor to practice according to the typology by all experiencing and enjoying Christ in our daily life and then bringing something of Christ to offer at the meetings. Every saint can do this. Our experiences of Christ are the produce and the surplus of Christ that we can bring to the meetings. This was presented to the saints years ago. Hymns, #864 says, "We'll bring His surplus to the church/ And thus exhibit Christ." However, because our meetings lack the reality and practicality of the light that we have seen, we need to rescue our meetings.

Eventually, through our experiences of the riches of Christ, these riches will become an exhibition, a show, of the produce of Christ. Our meetings must always be an exhibition to show forth what Christ is, what Christ has, and what Christ does. If we do not experience the riches of Christ, there will be no way for them to be exhibited. If we experience many items of the riches of Christ during the day, we will come to the meeting in the evening with the divine attributes which we have experienced. When we all bring something which we have experienced and put our experience of Christ's riches together, there will be an exhibition of Christ. In this way every meeting will be a show of Christ. Hymn #864 in our hymnal is concerning the exhibition of Christ. Such a hymn is very good for speaking to one another (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16). After speaking such a hymn, you will receive a message. There are many points in this hymn concerning the riches of Christ. Verse one and the chorus say,

We need to be people who exhibit Christ according to Hymns, #864—"Let Us Exhibit Christ." But when the brothers come together to talk about church affairs, they may talk in a way that is full of the natural life and the natural concept. The natural life and the natural concept have nothing to do with the Body of Christ. When many of the saints come to the meetings, they like to share something; they like to prophesy. But my question to these saints is, "Do you speak outside of Christ or in Christ?" I have no intention of quenching the functioning of the saints. I am happy to hear and to see the saints sharing in the meetings. But I still have a question as to whether or not our sharing in the meetings is in ourselves or absolutely in Christ. Perhaps our sharing is seventy-five percent in ourselves and only twenty-five percent in Christ.

By calling on the Lord's name we enjoy all the items of what He is, and we have a stand, a ground, a base, and a strong support to come to the meeting. When we come to the meeting calling on the Lord's name, we come as a living person full of Christ. If we are those who call on the Lord's name, there will be no need for us to try to think of what to say in the meeting. If we open up our mouth, something of Christ will come out of us. This is the way to have the church meetings. If we all would be those who call on the name of the Lord Jesus again and again day by day, whenever we come together the meeting will be high, living, and a real exhibition of Christ. Hymn #864 declares in the chorus:

Let us exhibit Christ, Let us exhibit Christ; We'll bring His surplus to the church And thus exhibit Christ.

The church meetings are the exhibitions of the Christian daily life. Whenever we come together, we have an exhibition. We do not come together to exhibit our ability, our wisdom, our behavior, our goodness, or our morality. We come together to exhibit Christ. If we do not live Christ daily, we have no Christ to exhibit in the church meetings. In 1961 when I was in Taipei, I wrote the hymn that says, "Let us exhibit Christ" (Hymns, #864). A few years later this hymn was translated into English, and it helped many of the saints. But the saints did not receive the help from this hymn to live Christ in their daily life (see verses 2 and 3). It mostly helped them to practice living Christ in the meetings. Formerly, they stood up in the meetings to say something to express their goodness, their kindness, their humility, or their patience. Then they learned to speak something of Christ, and not of themselves, in the meetings. Thus, the meetings changed, yet that change could not last long. For the long run, if we do not experience Christ daily, we will have nothing to say of Christ. If we do not live Christ in our daily life, we will become empty. Then we will only be able to repeat old stories in the church meetings. If we only exercise when we come together to meet, there may be a little expression of Christ in the church meeting, but no expression of Christ in our daily life. We may be good people without much of Christ in our daily living. Thus, when we come to the meeting, we are still poor in the experience of Christ.

One day we may have been touched by the Lord to kneel down and pray, "O Lord Jesus, You are so gracious. I present myself to You." To present yourself is to give yourself to Him. If we give someone a gift, it is not right for us to ask him to return it later. Once we give someone a gift, it is no longer ours but his. This is a vow. We may not enjoy Christ that much because we altered our vow. If we do not keep the presentation of ourselves to God, we will be out of the enjoyment of Christ. In 1963 I began to speak in the United States on the enjoyment of Christ. I also wrote the hymn "Let us exhibit Christ" (Hymns, #864). The saints were excited about this fellowship at that time. If we do not have the enjoyment of Christ, we will not exhibit Christ. Many of us who have been in the Lord's recovery for years should ask ourselves if we have been enjoying Christ all the time. We do not enjoy Christ continually because we have annulled our presentation of ourselves to Him. This is like a person giving a watch to someone and then stealing it back from him later. In principle, this may be our situation with the Lord.

I have told the saints that we need to come to the meetings with Christ, with the surplus of Christ, with the riches of Christ, to offer Christ to God. In this way, we can exhibit Christ. I even wrote a hymn that says, "Let us exhibit Christ" (Hymns, #864). First Peter 2:5 tells us that we are being built up "into a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." In the past, we pointed out that the sacrifices we offer to God are Christ as the reality of all the sacrifices of the Old Testament types, our praises, and the things we do for God (Heb. 13:15-16; Phil. 4:18). This is according to a note on "spiritual sacrifices" in 1 Peter 2:5 in the Recovery Version of the New Testament. My note on this verse, however, is not complete. We need to add something further to the note on this verse. We need to see something further in the advance of the Lord's recovery. Today the Lord has given us further light concerning the spiritual sacrifices we should offer to God. This further light is in Romans 15:16. Paul told us in Romans 15:16 that he was a priest of the gospel who offered the Gentiles saved through his preaching as sacrifices to God. These are not the material sacrifices but the spiritual sacrifices.

Whenever we meet, we are not worshipping the idols, so we should not be dumb; rather, we are breathing a living Lord, so we all must speak for the Lord. Hymns, #864 is on exhibiting Christ. Although exhibiting Christ is good, it might be a dumb exhibition. It would be good if we changed exhibiting Christ to speaking Christ, because in speaking Christ we surely cannot be dumb. In the meetings, not only do we exhibit Christ, but even the more we speak Christ.

We should speak not only ordinary words but also poems and hymns. Poems and songs are the cream of the human language. If a language has not reached a stage of maturity, it cannot produce poems and songs, which are very powerful for the expression of feelings. Many of the hymns in our hymnal are worth speaking to one another. For example, Hymns, #864 is very suitable for singing and speaking to one another. Stanza 1 and the chorus say, "Whene'er we meet with Christ endued, / The surplus of His plenitude / We offer unto God as food, / And thus exhibit Christ. / Let us exhibit Christ, / Let us exhibit Christ; / We'll bring His surplus to the church / And thus exhibit Christ." We can compare whether the taste is richer by singing or by speaking the hymn. Both ways are very meaningful.

After singing and speaking, speaking and singing a hymn, we still need more speaking. Whenever we meet, we mainly want to bring Christ with us and to minister Christ to others. However, if we want to bring Christ to the meeting, we must first have Christ. Therefore, we still need a good message; then the meeting can be rich. God has given us two gifts: the Spirit and the Word. Today the Spirit is within us while the Word is in our hands. Moreover, many portions of the Word have become hymns and songs. For example, Hymns, #864 is a product of the exposition of the truth to the fullest extent. In the chorus, "Let us exhibit Christ" is a picture of how the children of Israel in the Old Testament brought the riches from their field to Jerusalem for exhibition during their feasts. Therefore, in the New Testament when Christians meet together, they should bring the riches of Christ to exhibit them together.

According to John 4:24 our Christian meetings to worship God should not be religious worship. We worship God by contacting Him with our spirit. Therefore, in order to overturn the old impression of Christianity, when I compiled the English hymnal in the United States in 1963, I translated the Chinese hymn on exhibiting Christ, which says, "Whene'er we meet with Christ endued, / The surplus of His plenitude / We offer unto God as food, / And thus exhibit Christ. / Let us exhibit Christ, / Let us exhibit Christ; / We'll bring His surplus to the church / And thus exhibit Christ" (Hymns, #864).

When the children of Israel kept the feasts, they brought their oxen, sheep, and grain. When they came to keep the feasts, the mountain in Jerusalem was filled with the produce of the land of Canaan. This was truly an exhibition of the produce of the good land. Based 6nsuch a background, I wrote a hymn recently on exhibiting Christ (Hymns, #864). When we sang this hymn while I was in Texas, some in the denominations criticized us strongly, saying, "This brother from China knows how to cause trouble; he said that our meetings should be an exhibition of Christ. Our meetings are for worshipping God, for teaching and edifying people, and for preaching the gospel to save sinners. How can we display and exhibit Christ?" Their excessive criticism only exposes the shortage of the experience of Christ in Christianity.