Additional Quotes about the Local Church by Witness Lee and Watchman Nee

The Lord has revealed through Watchman Nee that believers must be practically built up with others in the local churches under the authority of the church. This kind of building is a test to genuine spirituality. If one cannot be built up with others in a local church, his spirituality is questionable.

(Witness Lee, Seer of the Divine Revelation, 165)

Regardless of how many visions someone has seen, he has no right to build up any division. I hope that we all can see this. Paul and Peter encountered the trouble concerning circumcision recorded in Acts 15, but they did not have any division. They tried their best to get the problem solved in order to keep the oneness of the Body of Christ, that is, the oneness of all the local churches in both the Jewish and Gentile territories. Thus, the churches kept the oneness, and there was no division.

Even if these divisive ones move to a city in which there is not a church, they have to be checked concerning what kind of relationship they have with the other churches. One of the tests of a genuine local church is that it should have universal fellowship with all the other local churches.

(Witness Lee, Further Consideration, 26)

Just because a group of believers are meeting in your locality, it does not mean that the Body is there. Today on this earth, there are many Christian groups. You may have the thought that your local church has nothing to do with other churches and should not be in any connection with other churches. This thought isolates your local church, making it no longer a part of the Body of Christ. The Body is unique in the whole universe. There may be thousands of local churches, but there is still just one Body. All the local churches are the one, unique universal church, the one Body of Christ.

(Witness Lee, Further Consideration, 14-15)

In the living of the church life in a locality, our living is local, but our fellowship should be both local and universal (Rom. 16:1, 16b, 22-23). We should fellowship not only with the brothers and sisters in our own locality, but also with the brothers and sisters in all the other localities. In this way our fellowship is universal. If I live in Yorba Linda, I should fellowship with all the churches in southern California. The church life is both local and universal. But it is universal to a greater extent than it is local. In the churches, we must exercise to have fellowship with Taipei, London, New York, Zurich, and all the churches around the globe.

(Witness Lee, To Be Saved, 32-33)

“With all those who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in every place”—this long phrase indicates that the church which is genuine is related with all the saints who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ in every place around the globe.

(Witness Lee, Genuine Church, 3-4)