There is a hymn which describes the joy and glory of a gospel preaching life and also shows us God’s commission for us and His heart’s delight.
1.
New Testament priest of the gospel,
My duty to bring sinners to God,
Go to houses seeking sons of peace,
Flowing out the life of God;
Preach gospel saving sinners,
As sacrifice offered God,
Thus heavenlies exalt and rejoice,
Satisfied too is my God.
2.
New Testament priest of the gospel,
Laboring in bringing man to God,
That man willingly offer themselves,
As living sacrifice to God;
Proclaiming Christ as supply,
Exhort, teach, perfect man,
Until the man in Christ is offered
In maturity to God.
Chorus:
What glory! This kind of working,
Makes me vital new each day,
What wonder! This kind of living
Makes me bear new fruits always.
Here we would also like to mention the point of distributing gospel tracts, let us see what Brother Watchman Nee says.
Tracts Not Being Limited by Man’s Speaking
The first advantage of distributing tracts is that they are not limited by man’s ability to speak. Many people cannot speak well. They do not have the eloquence or the gift. Others are naturally shy. However, even if a person is slow or shy, he has to open his mouth to testify for the Lord as soon as he is saved. He cannot remain silent just because he says he is not eloquent. The church should encourage the believers and should provide them many opportunities to speak. They have to learn to speak for the Lord. Even those who do not have the gift of speaking should speak for the Lord. Having said this, the truth is that speaking is still a hard task for some people. Either they are short of truth or they are short in experience. Some sinners need to be told the vanity of the world. Some need to be told of how the evil and power of sin robs a person of all peace. Some people need to be told about repentance. Many people do not know what to say when faced with such needs. At these times they can pass out tracts. When a person finds it hard to open his mouth to preach the gospel, tracts become an important tool. A tract distributor must first know about the persons to whom he is giving the tracts. If the receivers are his relatives or friends, he will understand their needs and be able to find the right tract to give to them. If, in addition to the tract, he presents his own testimony, he will have a very good presentation of the gospel. In preaching, it is easy to be affected and restricted by one’s own condition. But tract distribution is independent of a man’s own personal condition. In fact, many times the tracts speak more clearly and accurately than a man can speak. This is the first advantage of tract distribution. It makes up for a person’s lack.
Tracts Being Able to Be Sowed Anywhere
Another advantage of tracts is that we can sow them anywhere. In Ecclesiastes 11:1 and 6, Solomon said, “Cast your bread upon the surface of the waters….In the morning sow your seed, and in the evening do not hold back your hands.” It is all right to sow randomly, because we do not know which of the seeds we sow will prosper. The apostle Paul said that he who sows with blessings shall reap with blessings (2 Cor. 9:6). In order to sow en mass, there is no better way than tract distribution. Anyone can sow with tracts anywhere. If we have to preach to three, five, or ten persons today, we have to spend much time with them. But it is not a problem to distribute one thousand to two thousand tracts a day. Some brothers have distributed more than one thousand tracts a day for over three years. This is mass sowing. No other method can be as easy as tract distribution when it comes to mass sowing of gospel seeds. No other method is as convenient. Many servants of God love to distribute tracts. They do not even waste their walking time; they seize this opportunity to pass out tracts everywhere. If one person is saved through the tracts that we pass out in one day, we have done a great job already. A new believer has to learn to pass out tracts in bulk. It is a pity if we do not take advantage of tracts effectively.
Saints, the age that we live in today is already a paperless age. The electronic tracts that we send out today are similar to what our brother mentioned, where we use these tracts to rise up to testify for the Lord and to preach the gospel, to break through all limitations whether sowing or reaping, that the gospel of the kingdom be spread out vastly. This is a divine commission, a commission of eternal value. For the exercise of all the saints, we have already fellowshipped regarding the matter of gospel preaching the the letter last week. This week we would like to reiterate the user guides for the online gospel put out by the church. We hope that every saint, every family, every group and every district rise up to practice these four steps below:
Step 1: Pray for the gospel, may we be filled with the burden of the gospel and live a life of the gospel.
Whether in our personal prayer, our prayer meetings or even our prayer groups, we really need to pray more for the gospel and for gospel preaching. How much we need more sinners to confess their sins and repent, even renewing their consecration. The more we pray the more we should be filled with the Lord, to be a vital person, a labouring priest of the gospel. The gospel may be the power of God but if we do not empty ourselves, if we are not filled by Him, we will not have any power. Gospel preaching is not merely a question of what we do, but much more what we are. May we be ones who constantly turn to the Lord, who remove all barriers inside of us, to recover our fellowship with the Lord, that we may pray for the gospel.
Step 2: List down the names of our gospel friends. We suggest three to five contacts.
The church has led us before that we need to bear people on our hearts and even with our feet. Today, under countless restrictions upon us, we not only have to continue to practice this, but even more so strengthen our practice. It may be that we have many contacts potentially open to the gospel, but for the sake of consistent prayer and shepherding, we must first start with three to five specific ones. Some saints may feel that they have no gospel contacts, or may not know whose name to put down. We encourage these ones not to lose heart. If we are willing to come
before the Lord and entreat Him, He will put some names in our hearts. Even though it may be just one name, we can start by prayer for this one. We can also coordinate with another saint to preach the gospel together, thereby having the same name on both our name lists. No matter what, we just need to practically carry this out, to know specifically the three to five of our gospel contacts. Furthermore, we also encourage taking families as a unit for our gospel. There are families everywhere with three to five members. If we list down one member of a certain family, we can also go by the principle of “you and your household” and list them all down as our gospel contacts. (Acts16:31)
Step 3: Sending a gospel video clip every week.
We can all send them a gospel video clip every week. It should not be too much, just one a week will do. Along with the clip, draft a short greeting. Eg: “XX, I would like to share this short video clip. I was quite moved by it. I hope you can also spend three minutes of your time (based on the length of the video) to watch this. Have a good day. (From XX)” For these three to five gospel contacts, we must give them food at the proper time, and also individually, holistically shepherd them. The purpose of us doing this is in hopes that they will see it, read it and even respond to it (for example, a reply). By sending out too many, it may cause them to feel a bit overwhelmed. Not only will they ignore it, they may even habitually just delete the messages and videos we send to them. We hope everyone of us be in the spirit of prayer, and are able to learn to provide them with the proper materials at the proper time. We are in charge of planting and watering, and God will cause the growth. Regarding the gospel video clips, we have specific small groups serving in this, and it will be sent to all the saints regularly, with both English and Chinese. These clips are all filtered through and selected, to be appropriate for them and also very inspirational. The saints just need to send them out at set times.
Step 4: Invite our gospel friends to join our online gospel meetings
After 8 weeks, we will have sent out a total of 8 gospel video clips. We can then invite this gospel friend to join our online gospel meetings. We will organise an online gospel meeting. In the meeting there will be hymns, messages, testimonies, and etc. Further details will be announced soon. Of course, if our gospel friends show a positive response throughout the eight week period, we can also arrange some home meetings or visiting, to go online to shepherd them at set times. Do not be in a rush to invite them for our Lord’s Table meetings. We must see the importance of one on one shepherding, and take care of them with the help of our family. This kind of practice will surely cause us to pray more fervently. We can also fellowship with saints in our groups and districts on how to shepherd them. Eventually, they would have not only attended our online gospel meetings, but after one step further into the hearing of faith, they will be saved and be a remaining fruit in the church.
The grace of the Lord be with you all.
The responsible brothers of the Church in Kuching
May 15, 2020
