Category: Watchman Nee

Watchman Nee – Seeing God

Watchman Nee – Seeing God

Seeing God

“Here is a heart condition God requires for the fulfillment of His purposes of grace. Purity of heart simply means a state where there are no hindrances to seeing God. The kingdom of the heavens is here, so there is no reason why anyone should fail to see Him, unless man himself puts up barriers.

It is not necessary to place a dirty article in front of your eyes to prevent you from seeing an object; a perfectly clean article will do just as well! The “clean heart” of the psalmist has to do with the removal of unclean things; the “pure heart” of the Sermon on the Mount has to do with the removal of all things, clean or unclean. Many have no right knowledge of God because they have numerous competing interests apart from God. Purity of heart corresponds to singleness of eye. It means that God is the exclusive object of attention. From such preoccupation, there will be no loss, “Thy whole body shall be full of light.”
– Watchman Nee

“For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light”
Matthew 5:22

Crucified

Crucified

“Crucified with Christ”

“I have been crucified with Christ”
Galatians 2:20

“What does it mean for me to be “crucified with Christ”? I think the answer is best summed up in the words the crowd used of Jesus: “Away with Him!” God never allows this matter of being crucified with Christ to remain for us a mere theory, though I confess that for many years it was no more than that to me. I myself had preached the Cross in these very terms without knowing it in my own experience–until one day I saw with dramatic suddenness that it had been I. Nee To-sheng, who died there with my Lord. “Away with Him!” they had cried, and in saying it of Him they had also, unwittingly, echoed God’s verdict upon me. And that sentence of God upon me was carried out in Him. This new discovery affected me almost as greatly as did my first discovery of salvation. I tell you, it left me so humbled as to be for a while quite unable to preach at all, whereas till that day, I have to admit, preaching had been my consuming passion.”
Watchman Nee

“Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom”
T.S. Elliot

Experiential truth is the bridge between the idea and the substance, between the shadow of words and the Light of the Truth.

“For the kingdom of God is not in word,
but in power”
1 Corinthians 4:20

The Truth of His Kingdom in each of us is as real as the truth which reigns in us. The power to be is the purpose of His coming:

“I am come that they might have life,
and that they might have it more abundantly”
John 10:10

Brian Troxel

Separation and Life

Separation and Life

Separation and Life

“Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty”
2 Corinthians 6:17-18

Separation from the world is an issue of the heart; it is in itself the revelation of our salvation. We are not sanctified by our confession, we are sanctified by the living truth of Christ working within to sanctify us without.

“Sanctify them through thy truth:
thy word is truth”
John 17:17

It is in the Word becoming the truth in us, whereby we know what sanctification is. Obedience is the only path to sanctification.

“Do not have Jesus Christ on your lips,
and the world in your heart”
Ignatius

BT

Watchman Nee

Quote for Today

“And it is through conflict that God induces the believer to seek and to grasp total triumph in Christ.”
– Watchman Nee

“But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ”
1 Corinthians 15:57

Quote for Today – Watchman Nee

Quote for Today

“What he needs is not increased spiritual teaching but an obedient heart which is willing to yield his life to the Holy Spirit and go the way of the cross according to the Spirit’s command. Increased spiritual teaching will only strengthen his carnality and serve to deceive him into conceiving himself as spiritual”
– Watchman Nee