Everything we do must be According to the Leading, Working, and Speaking of the Spirit

Everything that we do in our Christian life – and especially in what relates to our bearing the ultimate responsibility for the Lord’s ultimate move – must be according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

Even the best thing that we can do for God can be religion to us if it has nothing to do with the Spirit.

In this last week in the morning revival on, Special Fellowship concerning the World Situation and the Lord’s Move, we come to a very long topic that brings us into the practicality of taking part in the Lord’s move.

We need to do everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit, we need to honor the Lord as the Head of the Body for His unique move, and we need to be balanced by the Body to be kept in its unique oneness.

We need to pray that the Lord would cause the word of God to become rhema – living word – to us, so that we may have His instant speaking. We need the Lord’s shining, unveiling, enlightening, purifying, purging, exposing, convicting, killing, and supplying word.

The light that He shines on us through His word is the light of life, and on the one hand He exposes negative things and situations in us, and on the other, He supplies us to get rid of these and go on with Him in life.

Whatever we see under the Lord’s shining it is automatically killed by the light. When we see our shortcomings under the Lord’s shining, they are immediately terminated. This is the most wonderful thing about our Christian experience, having the Holy Spirit enlighten us and deal with us by His shining, which is at the same time a supplying.

Revelation is God’s way of operation, even God’s operation itself; as soon as God’s light reveals something, it kills it. What we see under the Lord’s shining, realizing that God condemns it, it gets immediately terminated.

The greatest thing in our Christian experience is the killing that comes from the light, which is followed by His bountiful supply for our growth in life and further cooperation with Him for His purpose.

Everything we do must be According to the Leading, Working, and Speaking of the Spirit

Everything that we do in our Christian life and church life must be according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit, for even the best thing we do for God becomes a religion if it has nothing to do with the Spirit.

We need to allow the Lord’s light in His word to shine on us and expose us regarding our lack of living according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

We want to be those who participate with the Lord in His move and bear the ultimate responsibility in a pure way, so we need to let His word purify us and keep us in the way of God’s economy in the purest way possible.

We need to see the Spirit and the Body, being those who do everything in the Spirit and for the Body. If we don’t see the Body, we will merely have social gatherings with good Scriptural content when we meet with the saints.

If we don’t see that the Spirit produces the Body and the Body is baptized in the Spirit and drinks of the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13), our Christian life will be empty. The Body of Christ comes out of the Spirit; we all have been baptized into one Spirit in one Body, and now we are all drinking of this one Spirit.

When we speak of the Body of Christ, we need to have a deep realization that the Body is uniquely one, and for us to be in the Body in reality we need to live according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

If we don’t do everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit, we may live a religion and not a genuine Christian life in oneness with the Lord. To be religious is to do something for God yet without the Spirit; it is to do a good thing “for God” or “in God’s name” apart from the Spirit.

Although a certain thing we do for God may be very good, it can be religion and rejected by God as long as it is not done according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

For example, it is very good to read the Bible, but if we read the Bible apart from the Spirit – without the exercise of our spirit to touch the Divine Spirit – then we are merely practicing religion.

The Lord Jesus told the Pharisees, You search the Scriptures, thinking that in them you find eternal life, but you are not willing to come to Me, that you may have life (John 5:39).

Many believers read the Bible without the Spirit, without coming to the Lord in their spirit, and so they get mere knowledge from the Bible, but they don’t get life; they practice a religion, but they don’t live and do everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

Every time we come to the Word of God we need to come to the Lord, and His word will become Spirit and life to us.

Furthermore, even our prayer to the Lord may be something of religion.

In Luke 18 there was a Pharisee and a tax collector praying; the Pharisee prayed to himself, Thank You Lord that I’m not like this tax collector; I do this and I do that… We may not pray like this, but if we pray merely as a religious exercise, we do not touch the Spirit and we merely practice religion.

The tax collector was repenting before God, beating his breast….and he went home being justified. We should not babble empty words when we pray, like the Gentiles do, for they think that in the multiplicity of their words they are pleasing to God.

We need to pray not in multiplicity of words but according to the leading of the Spirit. Apart from the Spirit we “babble” in our prayer, and that is religion.

Lord Jesus, save us from doing anything that is religion, that is, anything that is apart from the Spirit. We want to exercise our spirit and do everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit. Amen, Lord, we love You, and we come to You as we read the Bible and pray to You. We open to You, Lord, and we reject any religious practice. We just want to touch You as the Spirit and live according to the leading of the Spirit, be under the working of the Spirit, and speak in the speaking of the Spirit!

How the Disciples in Acts did Everything According to the Leading, Working, and Speaking of the Spirit

What is really striking in the book of Acts is that the disciples didn’t do anything, didn’t start anything, or didn’t intend to do anything, but they did everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

At the beginning of the book of Acts, the 120 didn’t form anything, start anything, or initiate anything; all they did is get together and pray in one accord for ten days (Acts 1:14), and their prayer was absolutely in Spirit. They prayed themselves into the one accord, and this one accord was the landmark between the Gospels and the Acts.

The one accord is the master key to every blessing in the New Testament; if the Lord leads us to go anywhere for His ultimate move, we need to keep the one accord and do everything according to the leading of the Spirit and in the Body.

If the Lord leads us to go to Germany, we should not go there with our opinions but go with Jesus and keep the one accord.

The disciples didn’t initiate anything but prayed themselves into the one accord in Spirit, and to their surprise, the Spirit was poured out upon them, and they became a people wholly in the Spirit!

From that time onward, whatever the disciples did, whatever they said, and wherever they went, everything was a matter of the Spirit!

On the day of Pentecost, when Peter stood up with the eleven disciples and spoke, he didn’t speak without the Spirit; rather, Peter was filled with the Spirit (Acts 2:2-4, 14).

Whenever we stand up to speak in the meeting or we speak to others, we need to ask the Lord, Lord, fill me with Your Spirit! And then we need to speak in the principle of the Body, being supplied and supported by the Body.

In Acts 4, when Peter spoke to the religious leaders, he was again filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts 4:8). Stephen, who was one of the practical serving ones chosen by the saints to serve at tables and make sure all saints receive the food supply, was also a man filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts 6:5).

No one was able to withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which Stephen spoke, for he was a person living, speaking, and ministering in the Spirit.

Later in Acts 8 we see Philip who preached the gospel in Spirit; he didn’t determine or make a decision to do this preaching, but he simply walked and lived in the Spirit, and the Spirit told him to run and join the Ethiopian in the chariot (see Acts 8:29-30).

After Philip had preached the gospel to the eunuch and baptized him, he didn’t intend to go away, but the Spirit “caught Philip away” (v. 39).

Philip didn’t depend on his decision or feeling concerning where he should be or speak; he depended on the leading of the Spirit, and the Spirit led him to speak to the Ethiopian, and then the Spirit led him to go away after he spoke.

For us to cooperate with the Lord in His ultimate move today, we need to do everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit.

Lord Jesus, we want to cooperate with You in Your ultimate move by doing everything according to the leading, working, and speaking of the Spirit. Save us from our opinions, feelings, and decisions when it comes to cooperating with You for Your ultimate move. We want to be those who depend on the leading of the Spirit and who seek to be filled with the Spirit when we speak or do something. Amen, Lord, we want to be those living, speaking, and ministering in the spirit, being filled with the Spirit!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Ed Marks for this week, and portions from, The Spirit and the Body, ch. 1 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Special Fellowship concerning the World Situation and the Lord’s Move, msg. 5 (week 5), Doing Everything according to the Leading, Working, and Speaking of the Spirit, Honoring the Lord as the Head of the Body for His Unique Move, and Being Balanced by the Body to Be Kept in Its Unique Oneness.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Breathe Thou, O Lord, on me / Till filled with Thee, I plead, / No longer I that live, but Christ / In thought, and word, and deed. (Hymns #842)
  # Pray with one accord in spirit, / Not according to our thought, / But alone by the anointing, / As the Lord has ever sought. / Pray with one accord in spirit, / By the cross deny the soul; / All desires and all intentions / Let the Spirit now control. (Hymns #779)
  # Oh, how glorious! Oh, how precious! / Now the Spirit dwells in me. / Life imparting, truth revealing, / Shining, leading constantly. / Fill me now! Fill me now! / Fill me with Thy Spirit now! / Strip me wholly, empty thoroughly, / Fill me with Thy Spirit now! (Song on the Spirit)