The Ministry of the Word, Vol. 2, No. 9

This issue of The Ministry contains the first and second of a series of crucial messages given by Brother Lee to the co-workers in Southern California in August 1996 concerning the principles of fruit-bearing and of shepherding the young ones in corporate living. The first principle of fruit-bearing is that it is not by mass production. The second principle of fruit-bearing as seen in John 15 is that each branch bears its own fruit. As branches of Christ, our unique responsibility is to bear fruit. Brother Lee’s burden in the second message is expressed in the following excerpt: “I want to shepherd and disciple you from the Bible so you can see this matter and have a change. I am discipling you to change your concept. The God-man concept is that Christ came to save sinners, especially the top sinners....If we lose this spirit, whether we are elders, co-workers, or serving ones, we are finished. This is the main reason why we are so barren, bearing no fruit for so many years” (p. 24). Our need is to learn of the Lord to shepherd people according to His heart of love. Love covers many sins. To uncover is not love. Covering brings in blessing, but uncovering brings in a curse. The next three messages in this issue are Messages Seven, Eight, and Nine from the Crystallization-study of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which were given in the Living Stream Ministry’s Summer Training of 1998. Message Seven emphasizes the main point of Christ being our High Priest—He ministers God into us. Message Eight stresses the wonderful fact that Jesus as the Apostle came to us with God to share God with us that we might partake of His divine life, nature, and fullness so that we might be formed and constituted into His church, the house of the living God. The subject of Message Nine is the Sabbath rest, which is simply God’s satisfaction in His heart’s desire. When man is on earth expressing and representing God, God’s desire is satisfied. Lastly we include a report concerning the use of the Internet to spread the Lord’s ministry and a letter from the co-workers in the former Soviet Union concerning the usefulness of the training in the Lord’s move throughout the former Soviet Union.