What is the spiritual highlight of your migration?
My wife and I have had the experience of migrating 3 times in 4 years. We first migrated from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Cypress, CA, in 2008 to serve full-time. In 2010 we migrated to Sao Paulo, Brazil, to continue serving full-time but due to practical reasons we had to return to Cypress 10 months later. Shortly after returning we felt the Lord’s leading to get jobs and at the same time moved to Orange, CA, in December 2011 with the burden of being one with this new church.

Each time we have migrated it has been a blessing for us. Each time it put us in a situation that forced us to open to the Lord in a deeper way and allowed Him to touch things He had not been able to touch before. Also, each time our vision of the Body increased a little more and we also learned to receive the supply from all the saints. Finally, we have also seen that each time we learned to function, and be perfected as we do it, in different areas of the church life.

To encourage everyone to participate in this reading program with their companion(s), we recommend a website called “Excellent Believer“, which is designed specifically to facilitate Life-Study reading in groups. Please click here for details.

We pray that the Lord will reconstitute us with the ministry of the age embodied in these rich messages.

From that time onward no one but the priests were allowed to behold the expression of God directly, for the glory of God was restricted to the temple and the tabernacle (Exo. 40:34; 1 Kings 8:11). Even when the Lord Jesus, who was the effulgence of God’s glory (Heb 1:3), came as the living tabernacle and habitation of God on earth (John 1:14; 2:21), the glory of God was concealed within His flesh, only being revealed once to the disciples (Matt. 17:2).

It was through the glorification of Jesus by His death and resurrection, that His glory was released from His human shell (John 12:23-24; Luke 24:26). This process produced His many believers as His increase and expression (John 14:2; 15:1-5; 16:21).  Thus, like the firstborn Son of God, we who are His many brothers possess the Father’s life and nature and can express Him as glory (2 Thes. 2:14; John 17:22; Rom. 8:29-30). We have been called into this glory (1 Pet. 5:10), and we will ultimately be brought into it (Heb. 2:10), being fully glorified with Christ to bear the glory of God for eternity in the New Jerusalem (Rom. 8:17; Rev. 21:11).

In order to reach the glory that is our destiny, we are now in a day-by-day process of being transformed into this glory by degree. The phrase “from glory to glory” in 2 Corinthians 3:18 reveals an ongoing process in our Christian lives in which God dispenses Himself into our spirit, spreads into our soul, and eventually saturates our body. As we in prayer behold the glory of Christ, who is the embodiment of the Triune God, we receive the dispensing of Christ as glory into our tripartite being and go on from one degree of glory to another (Eph. 1:17; 1 Cor. 2:8; 1 Pet. 4:14; Col. 2:9). Thus God’s glory is no longer restricted to an earthly building or concealed in an individual man. Rather, God’s glory is increasingly displayed through the saints in the church (Eph. 3:21)!

“The believers’ being transformed in the divine life today is God’s being expressed in the believers as glory; hence, this daily transformation is from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:18b). The practical subjective glory of God in us is a glory that progresses from one degree to another degree. This expressing of God is progressing and advancing; hence, it is from glory to glory.” – Witness Lee, God’s Salvation in Life, Chapter 4

Further Reading:

Witness Lee, God’s Salvation in Life, Chapter 4 (Nook, Print).

Witness Lee, Crystallization-Study Outlines – The Gospel of God, Message 6 (online only at ministrybooks.org).

(Most references in the Further Reading can also be viewed on www.ministrybooks.org.)

Dear saints,

We want to share with you an important and strategic endeavor BfA is undertaking. We hope you take the time to read this e-mail not only to find out about it but also to receive a burden from the Lord.

For the first time ever, we are offering a free two-book set of The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee and The Economy of God by Witness Lee.

Why these books?

• Christians today desperately need the truths and practical applications in these two life-changing books.

• Many saints first touched the ministry of the age through The Normal Christian Life, which revolutionized their understanding of the Christian life.

• The Economy of God is known by few outside the churches in the recovery, yet it is important and powerful in guiding believers into the deeper dimensions of the Christian life.

• People should not be deprived of the help and revelation in both The Normal Christian Life and The Economy of God.

Why together?

• Watchman Nee is received, praised, and respected, while Witness Lee has been attacked, and at the very least, unappreciated. This disparity has been fueled, in part, by the baseless assertion of some that Nee and Lee are different in their ministries. We hope presenting the books as a set will join these two brothers in the public’s mind.

• We believe one way to correct the erroneous claim that Nee and Lee are different is to put both books before people so they can taste for themselves the one ministry presented by these two faithful servants of God. As they read, people will discover that these two brothers are one, and that their ministries are one in their revelation of Christ as life and the church as God’s purpose.

Why are we sharing this with you?

Your prayers, your going, and your giving are indispensable. The news of the offer must get out extensively so people can benefit from the books. We at Bibles for America can’t do this alone. We need all the saints to bear this burden with us.

PRAY

Please pray for the spreading of these books throughout the country; specifically pray that:

• People would find out about this free offer and order the set.

• Readers would be enlightened and profoundly affected, and would share what they’ve received with others.

• Many in this country would be led to the riches of this all-inheriting ministry through these books.

GO

We urge you to share the news of this free offer with those around you—your family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers. Encourage them to go to www.biblesforamerica.org/newbooks to order their free set. We hope the saints will do all they can to tell people about the offer via social media, e-mail, and word of mouth so these books could have as much impact as possible.

We’ve prepared special cards you can use to tell people of the offer. You can order the business-sized offer cards at www.lethiswordrun.com/orders.

GIVE

To support the carrying out of this burden, you can give online at www.biblesforamerica.org/support-bfa.

We in the churches can testify that we’ve benefited immeasurably from the precious ministry of Watchman Nee and Witness Lee. But we shouldn’t be the only ones benefitting. As good stewards, we are required by the Lord to be faithful to feed people with spiritual food. Let us all rise up to serve our Lord Jesus by helping others to know the riches in the all-inheriting ministry we enjoy.

Visit www.biblesforamerica.org/newbooks to read more about this new free set from BfA.

In His service,

The staff at Bibles for America

P.S. Please remember that this free offer is for the public only so that we can give away as many as possible. If you or other saints in the Lord’s recovery would like to have either of these books, you can purchase them at www.lsm.org.

What is the spiritual highlight of your migration?
Watching the church life here increase with the new ones met during the Jan 2011 Gospel Trips.

Is there anything else you would like to explain or share?
We graduated the training in Dec of 2010 and had planned on returning to Houston, but the Lord led each of us to reconsider Huntsville.  We decided to join in on the gospel trip, and never ended up leaving!

In Nehemiah 8 the children of Israel who had returned from Babylon to Jerusalem had taken a great step in their cooperation with God’s move to establish His testimony on the earth. Despite their willingness to return and rebuild Jerusalem, they faced a significant problem—their Babylonian constitution. In order to reconstitute the children of Israel to be His testimony, God inspired Ezra, Nehemiah, and the other leading ones to read the law of Moses to the assembly (ch. 8). However, Ezra and those with him not only read from the law, but they also interpreted it so that the Israelites could understand what they were hearing (v. 8). Furthermore, they did this so that those gathered could gain insight into the words of the law, to understand its intrinsic significance. In the same way, as we read God’s Word today, we should be open to receive help from godly believers who have gone before us. The Word has been interpreted so that we too can understand its intrinsic significance.

Another help we have in being reconstituted is to receive the Word of God with much reconsideration. The word muse in Psalm 119:15 implies this. Instead of merely reading God’s Word without much thought or consideration, we should muse upon it, consider it again, repeat it to ourselves (or others), and even pray it back to the Lord. As the clean animals in Leviticus 11 chewed the cud, we should “chew” on God’s word in the Bible, taking it into us initially and then going over it again and again in order to receive continued spiritual nourishment. In such a way, we can be reconstituted with the riches in God’s Word to be His testimony.

In our experience the proper interpretation of God’s Word will often be combined with our reconsideration of it. As we are musing upon God’s Word, a point of interpretation that we have heard or read may spontaneously come back to us and become clear to us. We may have initially received the point of interpretation only with our mind, but through our reconsideration it will eventually be made real to us and becomes ours (Deut. 29:29). By having such experiences during our time in the Word, we are reconstituted more and more to become God’s expression. Thank and praise the Lord for His holy Word!

Further Reading:

Witness Lee, Life-study of Nehemiah, Message 3  (iBooks, Print).

Witness Lee, Life-study of Leviticus, Message 36 (Kindle, iBooks, Print).

(Most references in the Further Reading can also be viewed on www.ministrybooks.org.)

What is the spiritual highlight of your migration?
The saints in the locality seemed very encouraged by our move here.  It has been enjoyable blending with the saints and seeing the saints going on in a living way.  We can see the Lord blessing this city with the increased number of saints moving here in the past year and even gaining new ones in the home meetings.  With the meetings becoming richer, the growth in life among the saints is noticeable.

Is there anything else you would like to explain or share?
I attended the FTT-MA in 2011 for one term by taking a 6-month parental leave from work.  Since attending, my view and appreciation of the Body has increased, and my love for the Lord has deepened.  Practically, we were also able to move in a quicker way as my wife homeschools our 6 children, and I was able to transfer to an office in the same company.