In any kind of labor, all parties must concur on both the goal of that labor and the way to carry it out. This goal and this way issue from the vision that governs that labor. If the parties’ visions differ, serious problems will inevitably arise. The goal of the Lord’s recovery is the building up of the Body of Christ (Eph. 4:16), consummating in the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:2). According to the vision of the Lord’s recovery, the way to accomplish this is to recover the experience of Christ, the functioning of all the members of His Body, and the practical testimony of the oneness of the Body of Christ in local churches. This goal and way direct, govern, and restrict all of our work. If we would co-labor with others who do not share this same vision, our joint labor, regardless of how positive it may seem, will cease to be the work of the Lord’s recovery. As we saw in part 2 of this series, Christianity, with its substitutes for Christ, clergy-laity system, and denominations and divisions, is contrary to the vision that we have seen and according to which we must labor. Since this is the case, any work that we engage in with those who are laboring under another vision will ultimately damage both our work and theirs. The following article from Shepherding Words, the last in this series, details the reasons why the work in the Lord’s Recovery should not be not entangled with others’ work.
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