The History of the Church

Commencement and Continuance of Recovery∗

Commencement of Recovery—Martin Luther

God’s recovery began with Martin Luther. This is not to say that in Luther alone was there recovery, for at that time there were other people who had the same insight. Nevertheless, he appears to stand as the representative of that period of recovery. By that time truth had become tradition and apostolic ministry had turned into papal authority. Moreover, the unity of the Church had degenerated into a Church federation, while spiritual authority had transformed itself into political power. In short, the Church had been taken into Babylonian captivity.

The human concept during that age had come to be understood as the Church controlling the world. Indeed, the Church declared that the entire world belonged to God. As a consequence, the Roman Catholic Church now brought the unsaved into the Church. All Roman citizens automatically became members of the Church. Naturally, therefore, the rite of infant baptism was created. But there was yet another development which resulted from the marriage between the Church and the world. Formerly, Christians had been a company of saints that practiced voluntary poverty. The poor and the Christians were one. After the Church brought in the world, however, voluntary poverty vanished: the Church had become rich. In the Church there should be only two classes of people—both of them poor: the naturally poor, and the voluntarily poor. Nonetheless, by the time of Luther and even earlier, the Church had only the first class of the poor, the second class having well-nigh disappeared from the scene: apart from the naturally poor the Church was now well populated with the rich. Yet, though these latter folk were rich in wealth, they were poor in faith.

The sad consequence of all this was that there were fewer and fewer spiritual riches in the Church.

∗Delivered at Hardoon Road, Shanghai, 12 April 1948.—Translator

The Recovery of Voluntary Poverty

From the time of Clement, truths gradually grew dim. People could analyze and expound, but spiritual life was missing. There was no grace and very little righteousness. Even during the days of Augustine, truths were very unclear. In its history the Church continued to fall further and further till a reaction appeared in the Roman Catholic Church. Francis of Assisi, himself a Catholic, was one of those who reacted. He was dissatisfied with the outward riches of the Church. He himself was a man of wealth, at least he was the son of a rich man. But soon he sold all that was his and gave to the poor. Thereafter he began to live a life of voluntary poverty. Though we can hardly approve of all his writings, his practice of voluntary poverty was right.

In the Church the principle to be followed should be: “He that gathered much had nothing over; and he that gathered little had no lack” (2 Cor. 8.15). To gather much is not sin, but to gather much and have bounty left over is sin. A person who knows the Lord will invest in the Lord. If he says he loves the Lord and yet refuses to invest in Him, his love is false. The Lord Jesus once said, “The poor ye have always with you” (John 12.8). Yet please note that He did not say that there would always be poor brothers in the Church. What He said was that the poor would always be with us. It is not a difficult matter to solve the lack among the Christian brethren. For if the brethren will give away their bounty, the poor in the Church will disappear. To retain is not the principle of the Lord; to give is His principle. If we should all give, then there shall not be any unwanted wealth. It is an abnormal phenomenon to have too rich a people in the Church. What is left over should be given away. The world loves money more than life. But God demands our lives. No Christian can afford to be careless in this area. God is careful to have our lives far much more than to have our wealth.

Much later after Francis, God raised up Count von Zinzendorf in Saxony, Germany. He belonged to the nobility and was highly educated. For the Lord’s sake he opened his estate in the early eighteenth century to receive the saints from Bohemia, Moravia and other lands—especially those who were being persecuted. Through him, in fact, the Moravian Church was revived after nearly being exterminated a century before. And from that Church more men and women would be sent out as missionaries than from any of the other Churches. Indeed, the ratio of Moravian missionaries to total Church membership was even higher than could be found among the other Church organizations. Still later there was Sister Eva. She was a German. She too chose the way of voluntary poverty.

A century ago the Brethren of Great Britain were raised up. They were strong in truth but also strong in another area. Though they were hesitant in telling about themselves, many leaders among them sold all they had and followed the Lord. This issue of money and wealth must be resolved in the life of the Christian. The Lord will have no outlet if this area is unresolved among Christians. Wherein does the Church fall? It falls when the worldly principle of economics seeps into the Church. For wherever that principle is operative, everything comes under the scrutiny of cost. And thus, the Lord’s way is blocked.

Deficiency of the Reformation

In Luther we see the recovery of faith. He is not very clear on righteousness. History tells us that he chastised and beat himself in order to be justified before God. In Rome on one occasion he even climbed on his knees the entire lengthy set of stairsteps of what was called Pilate’s Staircase—so that he might be justified. Ultimately Luther was shown that man is not justified by works but rather by faith.

True, Luther came out of Babylon, but he failed to enter Jerusalem. He brought in the power of politics to help the protesting or Protestant Church, not realizing that such political power would in the end damage the Church instead of help her. The result from Luther’s action was the creation of the national church that in essence was the unequal yoking together of politics and believers. One gives the nation while the other gives the doctrine. The fruit of this combination came to be called the national church. In Germany, for example, the Lutheran Church became the national church of that country. The reason for having accepted secular political influence was to provide a counteraction to the strong power of Rome. Yet, this led to national reform, not Church reform. For as a consequence, the Church of Rome was replaced by the Church of Germany, that is to say, the Protestant German Church. In England it became the Church of England (or Anglican Church). This meant that all Englishmen would henceforth belong to the Anglican Church, in that they would be baptized into that Church when they were born. The question then asked is not whether the person is born again but whether one has English nationality. The resulting implication was, therefore, that as long as one is born in England or has English nationality, he is a member of the Anglican Church. For this reason, the tradition of infant baptism continued to prevail.

Birth of Independent Churches

The rise of these Protestant national churches aroused the dissatisfaction of many who loved the Lord with a pure heart. They were not willing to remain in these national churches. As a consequence independent churches came into being. Not long after the Reformation, in fact, there came to exist more than two thousand independent churches. In Switzerland alone there were more than two hundred of them. During this period, the Roman Catholic Church persecuted the Protestant Church, and the Protestant Church persecuted these small independent churches. For instance, in order to check the growth of these small churches in Britain, the British government passed an ordinance calling for the unification of all churches in the country. And the result? The Nonconformists appeared. These were the people who loved the Lord intensely and who were raised up by God as His faithful ones. They refused to cooperate with Governmental control. So the Government put pressure on them, forbidding their ministers to return to within five miles of their former church parishes. Nonconformists were also barred from taking part in government service. All such who were bona fide civil servants were now relieved of their positions. Whoever violated any of these restrictions would be condemned.

Recovery of the Truths of Believers’ Equality and Baptism

In time the Mennonites appeared. They were the first who saw the error of Sacerdotalism [the belief held by the Roman Catholic and other sacerdotal-minded Churches which assumes that an authorized priesthood is required as mediator between man and God, between man and his divine needs and aspirations—Translator]. They therefore restored the calling or addressing of each other simply as brothers. Some of them even went to Russia to preach the gospel. Beyond these believers, the Baptists were also raised up. They recognized the error of infant baptism. In Baptist congregations people were now immersed, and done so only after they were clear on the truth of salvation and regeneration. Accordingly, many were nicknamed the Anabaptists [meaning rebaptizers; i.e., rebaptizers of adults formerly baptized as infants—Translator] and they were severely persecuted. Nevertheless, the above-mentioned events and groups had mostly to do with the external recovery.

The Recovery of Inner Life

Yet apart from these areas of external recovery, there was also a recovery of the inner spiritual life. Numbered among those involved in this spiritual recovery were Madame Guyon, Father (later Archbishop) Fenelon, and others. These people were commonly labeled as mystics. They learned to deny themselves. They joined themselves to God against their very own selves. They would not excuse themselves, nor would they plead to be spared. And in each age since, there have been those who have followed in their footsteps. But God also raised up other people of the inner life called the Pietists and the Quietists.
Following these saints, the Puritans, too, were raised up. Numbered among them were some brethren from Holland and England who migrated to the North American continent. The “Mayflower” was the now famous ship which carried these emigrating Puritans to America.

The Brethren Recovery

In the preceding century to our own, God engineered a special recovery. This came through the Brethren movement. God began to raise up believers who saw the heavenly calling of the Church. Unlike the children of Israel in the Old Testament period, the Church—these Brethren believers began to see—should not expect earthly blessing since she has a heavenly calling. Their goal, they realized, did not lay in reforming society, for the people of God are nothing more than pilgrims on the earth. They are those who entertain no hope for the world, since the world will soon pass away and all on earth will be judged. The Church, they believed, should hold different views from those of the world: what the Church expects is heaven, not the advancement of this world.

These words, of course, are quite familiar to our ears today. But near the beginning of the nineteenth century, they represented a tremendous recovery; indeed, in their day they constituted a radical departure in Church thinking and approach.

The next thing recovered was the unity of the Church. Due to their seeing the oneness of the body of Christ, these Brethren viewed the Church of their day as having fallen into ruin. Bible expositors among them such as J. N. Darby and R W. Grant believed the present Church to be in ruin.

Recovery of Sanctification by Faith

Apart from the recoveries among the Brethren movement, John Wesley was also raised up by God. Through him the doctrine of sanctification was recovered. Man is not only justified by faith, he is also sanctified by faith. Wesley was a true servant of God and was greatly used by the Lord. He is our brother, and his witness is true. Though he used the wrong Scripture to prove his point, his doctrine is nonetheless correct. For example, Wesley quoted 1 John 1.7 as proof for sanctification. Some people have rejected his doctrine because of his inaccurate citation. This is over-reacting. For Scripture may be misquoted, but if the man is right and his doctrine is right, his mistake is not decisive. On the other hand, if a person’s quotation is correct but his character is questionable, the problem is more serious. Rather is it better to be the right person with the wrong quotation than to have the right quotation but be the wrong person. Even though his Scripture may be misguided, the person can nonetheless be sanctified by God.

After Wesley came Robert Pearsall Smith, husband of Mrs. Hannah Smith who wrote The Christian’s Secret of a Happy Life. He was a porcelain merchant. At that time people were not very clear on the teaching of holiness. God raised up brother Smith to preach especially on consecration. Sanctification is not just by faith, preached Smith; it also needs consecration: man needs to be sanctified by consecration as well as by faith.

Then there arose the Keswick movement. Among those involved were Evan Hopkins of England, Theodore Monod of France and the aforementioned Smith of the United States. Andrew Murray was also being raised up. These brothers stabilized the work of recovery. At the same time the hymns of Frances Ridley Havergal enriched the recovery.

Recovery of the Crucifixion of the Old Man

Hence in the past century, through all these brethren God caused people to see consecration and its importance. Nevertheless, what they saw still did not go deep enough. This was because consecration is more than a kind of exchange—more than an offering up of all we have in exchange for what God has and is. For example, Darby noted that consecration is based on the putting off of the fleshly man: the aim of the gospel is more than the forgiving of the sins of the sinner: it is also the crucifying of the sinner himself: that is to say, the gospel is also for the co-crucifixion of the sinner. How careful must we be in preaching the gospel lest we preach wrongly. The gospel gets rid of the “old man” in the flesh as well as the sins of the flesh. He who is going to heaven is a new man, not an old carnal man. All spiritual lessons—such as obedience, service and so forth—must be practiced in accordance with this principle. Even the lessons learned by such a spiritual person as Madame Guyon must be sought for according to the principle propounded by brother Darby.

Romans 7 mentions that we were made dead to the law (v.4). Hence, we can be married to Christ. We are not just dead to our sins, we are even more so dead to ourselves. It is illegal for anyone who is not dead to self to be married to Christ. Else this would make that person an adulteress. Being dead to self, one is no longer the same person, since the cross has put that person away (Gal. 2.20). Today, whoever is dead to sin is a dead old man (Rom. 6.6). The cross has put away the old man. Such, then, is the gist of Darby’s preaching.

Mrs. Jessie Penn-Lewis was then raised up to proclaim the truth of the cross. She told people how to deal with the old man. Her understanding was more advanced. Yet our understanding of today even surpasses hers.

Recovery of the Truth of Resurrection

Following Mrs. Penn-Lewis, brother T. Austin Sparks saw resurrection in a clearer light. We ourselves have preached resurrection for a number of years, yet I am afraid we were not sure just what resurrection really is. Mrs. Penn-Lewis herself wrote two books on resurrection, but neither was clear on the matter. Not till 1926, when brother Sparks wrote on the subject in “The Overcomer” magazine did the world for the first time see what resurrection truly is. When Miss Margaret E. Barber and I saw the writings of brother Sparks, we were immediately captivated by their message. Many—including ourselves—have talked and preached about resurrection in the past, but the reality of resurrection was not truly known. But when brother Sparks spoke and wrote on resurrection, clear light was finally released.

What, then, is resurrection? Resurrection is life entering into death and coming out of death. In other words, what can die dies; what cannot die comes forth. It is that which death cannot swallow. And such is resurrection life. (W. Nee, Revive Thy Work, CFP, read the rest of the History of the Church)