The church in Ephesus was a “good church” – it was an orderly and a formal church, but God had something against it, that it has left its first love toward the Lord (Rev. 2:4-5). We can be good Christians, church-going believers, and we may read the Bible regularly and claim we are Christians before […]
to love the Lord with the first love is to repent and do the first works
What does it mean to love the Lord with the first love? What does it mean to give the Lord the preeminence in all things? What does it mean to give the Lord the first place? When we first see the Lord and are captured by His beauty, we love Him with the first love. […]
imitating Christ and following the pattern of those who live Christ to magnify Him
The matter of imitating Christ or imitating those who follow Christ has been much spoiled throughout history, so much that many people don’t even recommend that anyone imitates a man – just follow Christ! But Paul gave himself as a pattern to the believers – he was a pattern of living Christ for His magnification […]
having a life of praising the Lord to defeat His enemy and bring in God’s kingdom
The book of Psalms is a book of praise, and our Christian life should be a life full of praise and even a life of praising the Lord. If we were to check with ourselves, did we praise the Lord every day this past week? Did we praise the Lord every day this past month? […]
the Christian living is the living and the experience of grace in the church life
Psalm 133 is a very good picture of the church life today, and a picture is more than 1000 words. Here we see “how good” and “how pleasant” for brothers to dwell in oneness, and this oneness is “like the oil” and “like the dew”. The compound ointment with which the priest was anointed typifies […]
the application of the heavenly “paint” brings us into the genuine oneness
It is the Lord’s mercy that we would see what real oneness in the Body of Christ is. The real oneness among the believers is not according to preference, taste, disposition, or culture, but it is the mingling of the processed Triune God with the believers. The oneness revealed in the whole New Testament is […]
the saints’ living together in oneness in the church life is blessed by God
This week we are enjoying the wonderful Psalm 133 concerning the Lord’s commanded blessing on the brothers dwelling in oneness. Our church life is not an individual life but a corporate life, a collective life, and our experience of the church life has at least four aspects: it is a corporate experience, an ascending experience, […]