Crystallization-Study of Job, Proverbs and Ecclesiastes
Message Nine
Reading the Book of Proverbs with a Praying Spirit
So That It Will Render Us Nuggets and Gems
to Strengthen Our Life of Pursuing Christ
for the Fulfillment of God’s Economy
OPENING WORD OF THE PROPHESYING MEETING
Reading the verses in each day.
Reading the main points in the outlines.
Pray-reading the verses:
John 6:63 It is the Spirit who gives life; … the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.
Eph. 6:17 And receive the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God, by means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit and watching unto this in all perseverance and petition concerning all the saints.
Word of Appetizer
Proverbs teaches man how to behave and build up his character in his human life; what kind of persons should we be and by what way should we take it?
We must reject self-cultivation, condemn the building up of the natural man in the old creation, and come to Proverbs as a regenerated man in the new creation by exercising our spirit with the Spirit to contact the word in the spirit of prayer so that the word in Proverbs will become spirit and life to us.
When we come to the book of Proverbs, we need to turn ourselves from the mind to the spirit by praying in our spirit; if we come to Proverbs in this way, we will be touching the Word by the new man.
Spiritual Burden
We must be persons who love the Lord and pursue Christ, not self-perfection, and who love the Lord’s word in the entire Bible and read it with a praying spirit, not to seek the doctrine of letters but to seek the Spirit and word of life; we should read Proverbs not to gain any help for self-cultivation but to nourish our
spirit so that we may live a Christian life that is perfect in the divine virtues, which are the expressions of the divine attributes.
Concluding Word of the Prophesying Meeting
The Revelation of the Truth
Proverbs is a collection of the words of the wise; it stresses the wisdom that man receives of God through his contacting of God, and it teaches man how to behave and build up his character in his human life.
Proverbs has a particular character; that is, it presents to us the words of wisdom by many ancient wise men, which is unanimously considered good by all the people who read it; but we have to realize that what the book of Proverbs is to us depends upon what kind of persons we are and by what way we take it.
According to God’s economy, the big proverbs, like nuggets, and the small ones, like gems, are not for us to build up our old man; rather, they are for us to build up our new man to strengthen our life of pursuing Christ for the fulfillment of God’s economy in producing and building up the Body of Christ, which consummates the New Jerusalem as God’s heart’s desire and ultimate goal.
The Experience of Life
Heb. 4:12 For the word of God is living and operative and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit and of joints and marrow, and able to discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Whatever we see under the shining of God from the word of God is killed by the light; the dividing of the soul and the spirit comes from the shining; the dividing of the soul and the spirit occurs when God’s word illuminates us, shining within us to reveal the thoughts and intentions of our heart.
As we read Proverbs, we need to inhale all that God has exhaled, all that He has breathed out; by inhaling the divine breath in Proverbs, the more we receive the breath of the speaking God, the more we will enjoy Christ.
Practice and Application
Because the Scriptures are the breathing out of God, the exhaling of God, we should inhale the Scriptures by receiving the word of God, including the book of Proverbs, by means of all prayer; we need to receive the living and operative word of God with a praying spirit so that we can build up our new man and so that we may be able to discern our spirit from our soul.
We need to live a life of putting off the old man and putting on the new man; according to God’s economy, Proverbs should not be used to cultivate and build up our old man but to cultivate and build up our regenerated new man; we need to turn the Bible from a book that apparently teaches us to cultivate the self and to build up the natural man into a book that actually is full of light, life, spirit, and spiritual nourishment by receiving it in a spirit and atmosphere of prayer.
PROPHESYING TOPICS—
TWELVE TOPICS PER WEEK
Day 1
T1: The theme of Proverbs is that this book consists of words of wisdom teaching people how to behave and how to build up their character in the human life (Prov. 1:1-4).
(Please explain that Proverbs, as a subsidiary to the law, helps God’s people to keep the law.)
T2: What the book of Proverbs would be to us depends upon what kind of persons we are (Rom. 8:4-5).
(What the book of Proverbs would be to an ethical person？）
Day 2
T1: What the book of Proverbs would be to us depends upon what kind of persons we are (Psa. 119:48; John 6:63).
(What the book of Proverbs would be to a person who is a law-keeper and who loves the Lord and pursues Christ?)
T2: We should realize that Proverbs is the breath of God for us to breathe in that we may receive the life supply from God (2 Tim. 3:16).
(Please explain that we should read Proverbs by being in our spirit, in the New Testament Spirit of life, with our regenerated spirit, and by pray-reading.)
Day 3
T1: A believer in Christ has two men—the old man and the new man (Eph. 4:22-24).
(Please explain according to your own experiences if your daily life is a life of the new man or a life of the old man.)
T2: We need to turn the Bible from a book that teaches us to build up the natural man to a book that is full of life and spirit (John 6:63).
(Please explain according to your own experiences that if we touch the Word by the new man, it will become to us a book of Spirit and life.)
Day 4
T1: To read the Word prayerfully actually is to pray-read the Word (Eph. 6:17-18).
(Please explain according to your own experiences that when we come to the Bible to contact God, we should not only read but pray-read the Word.)
T2: Pray-reading changes the Bible from letters to Spirit and life (2 Tim. 3:16; Eph. 6:17-18).
(Please explain according to your own experiences that when we pray-read the Word by exercising our spirit, the word in black and white immediately becomes the Spirit.)
Day 5
T1: Discerning our spirit from our soul (Heb. 4:12).
(Please explain that to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart equals the dividing of the soul from the spirit.)
T2: Walking in all things according to our spirit (Rom. 8:4; 2 Tim. 1:6-7).
(Please explain according to your own experiences what kind of exercises can help us to walk according to our spirit.)
Day 6
T1: Faith comes out of the hearing of the word (Rom. 10:17).
(Which three aspects does the word have?)
T2: The written word, the living word, and the applied word—refer to God Himself (John 10:35; 1:1; Eph. 6:17).
(Please explain according to your own experiences how we should exercise to let this written word become a living word and then an applied word to us right away.)
