Correction: Regarding tithing. This is just one instance of the Holy Spirit’s guidance in my understanding of the true meaning of tithing. I recounted the entire five-fold process in “1142 True meaning of tithing and don’t acknowledge Satan as father.” I haven’t updated the individual parts of the corresponding articles or on YouTube. Instead, I’ve included the corrected version of “1142” and preserved the process, hoping others won’t make the same mistake I did. The rest of the content is fine. Thank you.
Because I really wanted to see that God grants a revival to Brother Yu’s church, I met with him in the church for about an hour. We basically talked about four things. I will use the second to fifth sections to talk about these four things, describing what the Bible says and some of his responses that I remember. Someone told me that he had read the article, “1096 Yu Hongjie’s Discipleship of Newself – Unbiblical Places (1)” in Chinese, but he did not see the mistakes the book made mentioned in the article. I guess that person did not read the second half carefully at that time, because in “3. There is a big difference between looking at things from a human perspective and looking at things from a divine perspective,” we talked about the mistakes made at the beginning. The arrangement of that article is to talk about the correct concept first, and in the process of deriving the correct concept, we will see quite clearly where the mistakes are. In “Unbiblical Places (1)”, I mainly discussed the definition of sin. This definition is consistent from the perspective of the present world and the previous world. In fact, I have been trying to avoid pointing out a common mistake in that class. I think that the time has come and I can no longer avoid it, so I’ll discuss this point at the end.
First, let me talk about how I got to know Brother Yu in the Lord, and we also discuss some related matters in this article. In the second one, he once again confirmed the importance of discerning whether it is right or wrong about when feeling the work of the Holy Spirit in one’s mind. Third, we discussed whether Adam had a share in holiness when he was created. He believed that he had no share, but the Bible says that he did. If a person believes that he had no share, he will see that there is a logical problem. Fourth, we discussed what it means things being beyond all that we ask or think, and found that many of the examples basically have logical problems, except for those who have actually experienced situations that truly exceeded one’s expectations. Fifth, we discussed the true meaning of tithing. From the perspective that “what God tells us through the Bible is consistent,” we know that the message of the Bible is not ambiguous about tithing in the era of New Testament. Finally, a common mistake is pointed out, which is also made by the book in its definition of sin.
1. How to know Yu Hongjie in the Lord
I remember that many years ago a sister sent us a device called Faith, Hope and Love F166, which has only audio. It contains a sermon from a special conference in China that Yu Hongjie started his sermons on August 13th, 2001. Before this, I had never heard of Yu Hongjie’s name. While I was listening to his audios, a thought in my mind asked me if there was anything wrong in the talk. I answered very honestly in my mind that there was nothing wrong to me. Then, I don’t know when, I stopped listening to his audio before I finished it. Listening to the same audio again now, I can tell that there are indeed something in his sermon at that time that are inconsistent with the Bible.
Later, after listening to some of his sermons online, I learned that the church he pastored was in Silicon Valley, and I also knew how much he hoped that God would grant their church a revival. This church is indeed the one, among all the churches God has led me to, which pursues the Lord the most. I really hope to see God grant this church a revival. However, judging by the current direction of the church, it is not yet at the level of revival. This is not a judgment, but a discernment based on the words of the Bible. Why do I say so? Because at least the church needs to be able to teach according to the Bible by correcting some errors, such as the definition of sin mentioned in “1096 Yu Hongjie’s Discipleship of Newcomers- Unbiblical Places (1).”
The most important thing is to repeatedly emphasize that the purpose of reading the Bible is to have life, and life can only come from God. Do not extinguish the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Let the Holy Spirit guide your Bible study so as not to interprete wrongly the Bible. Even without the guidance of the Holy Spirit, that is, when the Holy Spirit wants you to take the first step, you must still stand on God’s side. In this case, even if you make mistakes, the Holy Spirit will correct you. In other words, this is a learning process, learning how to understand the will of the Holy Spirit. No one is a Christian from birth, and similarly, no one can fully know the will of the Holy Spirit after believing and being baptized.
Please note that this does not mean that you always have to take the first step, but it is not like some teachings say that you cannot take the first step without the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. The question is ‘how do you know that it is not the Holy Spirit waiting for you to take the first step?’ Anyway, you still have to be quite sure in all aspects that it is the Holy Spirit who wants you to take the first step before you take the first step. At least afterwards you can know whether it is the Holy Spirit who wants you to take that first step. Because the Book of Deuteronomy says very clearly, “When a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which the LORD has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.”(Deuteronomy 18:22) If the future events you are about to experience are from God, they will definitely come to be true, so this is a learning process. If you make a mistake, you can look back and see where the mistake was.
These are what the scriptures say, and some relevant scriptures are quoted below. Regarding the purpose of reading the Bible is to have life: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.”(John 5:39-40)
About life that can only come from God: “I (Paul) planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth.”(1 Corinthians 3:6-7)
Regarding the guidance of the Holy Spirit: “Do not quench the Spirit.”(1 Thessalonians 5:19)
About not wrongly interpreting the Bible: “…our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.”(2 Peter 3:15-16)
About the Holy Spirit asking you to take the first step: Isaiah said in the Old Testament, “Although the Lord has given you bread of privation and water of oppression, He, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher. Your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right or to the left.”(Isaiah 30:20-21) When you take the first step and make a mistake, your teacher is behind you and tells you the right direction only afterward.
One such instance in the New Testament is recorded in the book of Acts, “They (Paul and Silas) passed through the Phrygian and Galatian region, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia; and after they came to Mysia, they were trying to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them; and passing by Mysia, they came down to Troas. A vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing and appealing to him, and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” When he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.”(Acts 16:6-10) You see, didn’t they take the first wrong step, and then the Holy Spirit led them? Once again we see what God tells us through the Bible is consistent. In this case, what in both Old Testament and New Testament is consistent.
You know, “He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the sons of Israel.”(Psalm 103:7) We must emphasize the ways of the Bible and not be like the Israelites at that time. When God was working, everyone seemed to have great faith, but when God stopped working, they did not know what to do. Because the Bible is inspired by God, we believe that “what God tells us through the Bible is consistent.” Without discounting the words of the Bible, we will find how consistent the Bible is with logical principles. We have shared before that the principles of logic can be divided into two parts, namely axioms (facts that are acceptable to everyone in a certain field and are valid even for an unlimited period of time) plus objective logical deductions. If this principle is applied to individuals, axioms do not refer to what is accepted by the public, but to personal views, which will change with time and experience. It should be noted that logical deduction is objective and applies everywhere. Regarding this point, we discussed why the Bible has obviously contradictory revelations in “1111 The True Meaning of Biblical Inerrancy.” Please go to the website “https://a-christian-voice.com/” and click on “Understanding of Spiritual Life” to find this article. Thanks.
If everyone in the church can be united with God, the church can have true unity, that is, it can achieve what Paul said, “make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose.”(Philippians 2:2) This is because those are only the same as what Jesus has due to the unity with Him. Of course, everyone has different role in the church, “For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.”(1 Corinthians 12:12) We also see that there is only one Church of God, the gathering of all those who have accepted the Triune God, and it does not refer to different buildings on earth. We see, “But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired.”(1 Corinthians 12:18) It is clear that God is an absolutely sovereign God.
How I hoped that this church could be revived. I felt a burden to communicate with Brother Yu about how it could possibly reach the level of revival. It was because of this burden that we met for the only time in his church. Here, I would like to mention the process of agreeing a time with him. In order to maintain my anonymity, I first sent an email to the church’s office secretary, asking only to talk to him on the phone. As I did not receive a reply, I had to go to the church in person to arrange a meeting time with him. After meeting him, I found out that he basically did not reply to such emails. The appointed time was changed due to his illness and he had to go out, so it was about five months later when I actually met him again. The reason I described the meeting process with him in such detail was not to complain about why I had to wait so long, but to thank him for taking the time out of his busy schedule to meet with me, whom he had never heard of before. More importantly, I believe that the arrangement of time is in the hands of the Lord. I must learn to wait for the time He arranges. All I can do is work with God.
2. Discerning what is the work of the Holy Spirit
My heart was moved during that meeting, and I remembered the first question, which was in the Chinese “Interview with Pastor Yu Hongjie and his wife: Our Story” at about 31:50, when Brother Yu said, “Look, I am proud again.” At that time, I felt in my mind that the Holy Spirit was working in him, otherwise he would not have said that. Especially since I considered him to be a spiritual elder, I agreed at the time that this must be the case, but I was never 100% sure. Since only he could tell me the answer, I agreed in my mind to ask him about whether he was moved by the Holy Spirit at that time. Then I was surprised to find out that he was just joking. Obviously, the feeling I had at that time was wrong. Although I had some such experiences before and knew that I had to make discerning, I was wrong again this time! Therefore, I know that I have not grown up spiritually, because “…solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.”(Hebrews 5:14)
I still remember his response was that if I didn’t like him saying it, he would not say it again in the future, so I had to tell him that this was not the reason I asked him the question. In this matter, I truly realized that, “No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.”(1 John 3:9) He could have chosen not to answer or to lie for the sake of his reputation, but he chose to honestly answer this question that probably no one had ever asked before. He did not commit a sin in this matter, and it also allowed me to finally know for sure that it was not the Holy Spirit who was working at that time.
From this I thought of and pointed out that he had testified that sometimes things happen exactly as the result of prayer, but sometimes it is just the opposite, so sometimes you know it in advance. Because I had similar experiences and knew about it beforehand, and I thought that he was a spiritual elder, so I felt that it must be so, and I said positively that this was the right thing to do. It was not until I came back that I remembered what was said in the Book of Deuteronomy: “When a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which the LORD has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.”(Deuteronomy 18:22) Only then did I realize saying about this is sometimes right and sometimes wrong is not right. The Triune God is training us to discern whether it is the work of the Holy Spirit, the old self or even the work of evil spirits. I just don’t know if he understands it this way now.
3. Did Adam have a share in holiness when he was created?
He believed that Adam had no part in holiness when he was created, but the Bible says differently. The Bible says, “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”(Genesis 1:27) Some people may raise questions, because “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; …”(Genesis 1:26) Why do we only talk about image and not likeness? Because image and likeness are two different words and must be discussed separately, otherwise there will definitely be logical problems.
For example, someone may say, ‘I still feel that holiness only exists in God’s life. Adam was created in the image of God, which means that Adam has a spirit. Jesus became flesh and took on human form, which means He had a body like a human. I think these are two parallel concepts. According to your inference, since Jesus took on the image of a human being, he should also be sinful.’ If you think like this, there will be a logical problem. The problem is that it assumes that taking on the appearance of a human means being exactly the same as a human. No, because the Bible says that Jesus “but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant (G3444), and being made in the likeness (G3667) of men.”(Philippians 2:7) So it’s just the likeness! The image is different. The Lord was conceived by the Holy Spirit and did not sin throughout His life. This is the image of the Lord. During His incarnation, He indeed took on the image of a servant, a servant of God the Father, and He obeyed God all His life. Our image is the image of Adam after he sinned.
Let’s briefly talk about the difference between image and likeness here. Paul said, “For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren.”(Romans 8:29) Please note that he only said to be conformed to the image of Jesus, not to be conformed to the likeness of Jesus, because Jesus took on the form of a man, so we already have the likeness of Jesus. Because we just said “according to our likeness” in Genesis 1:26, we know that the likeness of man is the likeness of the Triune God. Although the Bible does not explicitly state what the likeness of the Triune God is, we know that the form is fixed and cannot be tainted by sin. If it were possible to be tainted by sin, then it would be impossible for Jesus to “…offered Himself without blemish to God, …”(Hebrews 9:14) Because in this case His likeness was tainted by sin. So it is the image of Adam that is tainted by sin. Like Adam, our image is tainted by sin.
The image of God absolutely includes holiness, “Speak to all the congregation of the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.”(Leviticus 19:2) People will ask, since Adam was holy, how could he sin? This is because Adam had free will and could choose to disobey God and eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The definition of sin is disobeying God. Although he was holy, he could sin. His holiness is different from God’s holiness, “…for He (God) cannot deny Himself.”(2 Timothy 2:13) How can God not obey Himself? Therefore, God’s holiness is a holiness that cannot sin.
This is closely related to us in the era of New Testament era. In this era, we believe that “…He (God the Father) rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son.”(Colossians 1:13) The kingdom of His beloved Son is a holy kingdom. We are also holy in Christ, but we also have free will and can sin like Adam! This is different from what many people think, that if they are holy and thus they will not sin. This is not true. The key is to “Do not quench the Spirit.”(1 Thessalonians 5:19) That is, obey God. God is not a God who commands an action always, so even when there is no inspiration from the Holy Spirit, we must stand on God’s side.
4. Beyond what we ask or think
The Bible clearly states, “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us.”(Ephesians 3:20) So I then asked Brother Yu regarding what is it that is beyond what we ask or think? Because from his preaching, I know that he has not experienced anything beyond what we think. This definitely does not refer to things like being healed of a disease. Being healed of a terminal illness is more than what one asks for, but not more than what one thinks. What is beyond what you think is something you can’t even think. How can you ask for it if you can’t even think it? Only the Triune God can take the initiative for that.
I told him that I didn’t remember what example he had given about things that were beyond what one could ask or think, but that the example must be wrong, and he quickly realized that it was logically wrong because that example fell into the category of what one could think. Unless it was as Jesus prophesied to His disciples at that time, that He would die and be resurrected, and Jesus also said, “For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, …”(Matthew 16:27) This was definitely beyond what the disciples and the people could think at that time. So it’s not that we can’t use what’s happening now as an example, but we have to make sure that the example is beyond what everyone thinks. In “1123 God reveals His existence through objective facts that are visible to others,” an example is given in which God reveals His existence by using the records of the online medical system. Because the use of the Internet has only been around in recent decades, and God hasn’t done this for about two thousand years, how can such doing be not beyond what we can think? If you are interested in this, you can go to the website “https://a-christian-voice.com/” and click “Understanding of Spiritual Life” to find this short article.
5. The true meaning of tithing
At the time we met, I thought that the Bible did not clearly state whether or not to tithe, but I still told him that the New Testament did not mention the need to tithe. His response was to quote this verse, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.”(Matthew 23:23) I mainly use the Chinese Union Version. With its translation, I thought that things like justice are necessary. So I didn’t see that it says tithing is necessary.
After I came back, I checked many English versions and the original texts of this scripture in Strong’s Concordance, and found that it indeed saw that it was telling the Pharisees to tithe, but in the end I also realized that Jesus had not yet died and resurrected and ascended to heaven, and that these words were spoken to the people in the era of Old Testament. In the New Testament, Jesus only commended the widow who gave two small coins (see Luke 21:1-4). Judging from the fact that “what God tells us through the Bible is consistent,” Jesus will not ask us in the era of New Testament to keep the Law of tithing! Jesus Himself kept the true meaning of the Sabbath rather than the Law, so how could He ask us to keep the Law! A person who loves the Lord will naturally consider the needs of God’s house and do his best to provide food for it. If a person who loves the Lord has the power to give more than the tithe, he will definitely give more than the tenth. If a person who loves the Lord does not have the ability to offer a tenth, his offering of less than a tithing will still be accepted by the Lord because he has willingly done what he can to the best of his ability.
The most difficult thing for the Brother Yu’s church is probably to no longer advocate tithing according to the Bible, because a realistic problem will be faced by that, that is, whether it can be the same as at the time when the church was first established, at that time everyone loved the Lord so much and God led them to accomplish a church building plan that seemed impossible to achieve.
6. A common mistake
On page 54 of the first volume of ‘Yu Hongjie’s Discipleship of Newcomers,’ when discussing the definition of sin, the first thing cited is the basic theology by Dr. Charles C. Ryrie. According to the description in the book, Dr. Ryrie is considered by many to be one of the most influential basic theologians of the 20th century. I have not read his book, so I have no comment. But we must understand that his book is also a human work and cannot be compared with the Bible. We should see what the Bible says. When it comes to definitions, we should see whether the Bible says so or whether there is such a concept like Triune God. What we should quote is what the Bible says, not what people say.
On the definition of sin, his definition is inconsistent with the Bible, so there must be logical errors, just as the Bible clearly says, “You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit.”(Matthew 7:16-17) However, I will not read his book and point out the logical errors because it is not my responsibility.
(Verses refer to those in NASB95 unless otherwise specified.)
(You can get all articles in “https://a-christian-voice.com/” under “On spiritual understanding about life.”)
aChristianVoice 一個基督徒的聲音 