The Recovery of the Local Churches

Watchman Nee’s Seeing of the Truth Concerning the Ground of Locality

Watchman Nee and his rich ministry were crucial factors in the recovery of the vision and practice of the local church. After being called by the Lord, Watchman Nee, through his personal observations of other Christians as well as his thorough study of the New Testament and church history, saw the truth regarding the ground of locality: The only basis for believers in a locality to meet together is the fact that they are believers living in the same locality. He also saw the practice of meeting together to speak in mutuality as revealed in 1 Corinthians 14. Witness Lee says:

Actually, throughout the history of the church, some of the seeking saints saw certain things concerning how to serve, how to meet, how to function, and how to preach the gospel to save sinners. They saw the truth concerning such things as baptism by immersion and the administration of the presbytery, the eldership, in the church. A big advance concerning the practice of the church life was with Zinzendorf and the Moravian Brethren in the eighteenth century. Then in the nineteenth century, the Lord raised up the British Brethren to recover more. In the twentieth century, the Lord brought us in mainland China into His recovery through Brother Watchman Nee. He took the lead to read about the history of the church and to read the main writings of the seeking ones throughout the centuries. We put many of the things we saw into practice. Later, we found out that some of the things in our practice were not so fitting. In 1931 the Brethren sent some saints to visit us in Shanghai, and their visit caused a lot of trouble. Brother Nee went abroad to visit them in 1933, and he saw the real situation among them. Through that visit, he saw the shortages in the practice of the Brethren. Then he saw the boundary of the local church and the local ground of the church to keep the unique oneness of the Body of Christ. The Brethren did not see this.

(Witness Lee, Summary, 21-22)

At the beginning of 1937, Brother Nee began to see not only the boundary of a local church but also the ground of a local church. Because of the confusion in Christianity, Brother Nee went back to the New Testament to research the truth concerning the practical expression of the church. According to his study and research of the New Testament, he found out that one city should have only one church. A local church is a church in a city. The ground of a local church is the ground of unity, which also may be called the ground of locality. If we are in Los Angeles, we should meet as the church in Los Angeles. If we are in San Diego, we should meet as the church in San Diego. This is not only scriptural but also logical.

Brother Nee gave the messages concerning the ground of locality in 1937. I and other workers were working in Tientsin, the biggest port in northern China, when we received a cable from Brother Nee in Shanghai asking us to come on New Year’s Day for an urgent conference with him. At that time he gave the messages that are now contained in the book The Normal Christian Church Life. The Chinese edition was entitled Rethinking Our Missions, and the English edition was entitled Concerning Our Missions. During this conference in January of 1937, Brother Nee became sick. Therefore, he repeated the messages in September and October of that year after the Japanese army had invaded China. Many of us retreated to the interior of China, and we assembled at Hankow where Brother Nee gave all the messages again to a greater number. At this point we became so clear about the church within and without. We became clear about the contents of the church and the practice of the church.

(Witness Lee, History of the Church, 50-51)

Watchman Nee was a faithful student and defender of the Bible. One of the central matters that he saw in the Scriptures and faithfully practiced was the matter of the local church. He realized that all the believers in each city must be one in practically by meeting together as the local church, the church in their city. Through his ministry and faithful service, hundreds of local churches have been raised up across the globe since the early 1900’s.

Main

The Reformation

The Moravian Brethren

The Plymouth Brethren

A New Beginning

Watchman Nee’s Calling

Watchman Nee’s Revelation

Watchman Nee’s Care for the Local Churches

The Local Church in Foochow, China

Witness Lee’s Revelation

The Spread of the Local Churches

Bibliography

Links