sharing from the winter school of truth – the Bible is God’s personal letter to us!

To be honest, the Winter School of Truth is a very crucial time in which we all can come back to the Lord in His Word and enjoy Him, be constituted with Him, and even renew our consecration to Him. Every year we can just stop from any of the outward doings, any activities, and any other things – and just enjoy the Lord! There are so many precious testimonies of the young ones after the winter school – below is brother Joseph’s testimony and then sister Ayo’s testimony – short sharings from their enjoyment of the past winter school of the truth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ brother Joseph’s testimony ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Bible – A personal letter from God to his children. The Subject of the Winter school of Truth this year was the Bible, and what I enjoyed was that the Bible was a physical expression of God. God the Spirit is expressed through the Bible as His embodiment. God the Spirit resides in His Word and if we do not read it we cannot touch God, since the Bible is the dwelling place of God.

It is also very important to see that we need to have the Spirit within and the Bible without – if we only have the Spirit within we would easily commit errors, and if we have only the Bible without we would be lifeless. We can be likened to as a train – without the fuel the train cannot move, but without the tracks the train cannot run; therefore the train must have an inner aspect(the fuel) and an outer aspect(the tracks). In Conclusion we must have both the Spirit within as the fuel energising us and the Bible as a track keeping us moving in the right direction.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ sister Ayo’s testimony ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I really enjoyed 2 Timothy 3:15-17 … Before this past Winter School of Truth I didn’t take the Bible seriously and I hardly read it. But now I know that the Bible is GOD’S BREATH! It is His personal letter to us – so to know God you really need to know the Bible! Actually, knowing the Word of God will benefit us both spiritually and in our everyday life … Jesus knew the Word and He overcame Satan at the time of temptation… “A verse a day keeps the devil away“…. If we know the word of God we can defeat the enemy because he would never be able to make us doubt God…. Oh the Bible is sooo wonderful! That is why many people have sacrificed even their life for it… Oh and lastly – the Bible is the only book that can change you inwardly – try it and see!
Lord help us to know and enjoy your Word… keep us in You, Lord… And when we know this word help us to speak it out to our friends and family!!! Lord, we love You! 🙂

sharing from the 2010 Winter School of Truth – the Bible testifies concerning the Lord Jesus

The Winter School of the Truth is a one-week-long period of time when the young people come together to enter into the truth, blend together, and fellowship around the Word of God. In Europe until now the winter school has been in London, UK. This past year – year 2010 – we went through “The Bible”: below is sister Grace’s top enjoyment from this wonderful time. [Read this portion also in Spanish / Puede leer esta porción también en español, Testimonio de la Escuela de Invierno de la Verdad. Acerca de “La Biblia testifica del Señor Jesús“]

2 Timothy 3:16: “All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for conviction, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” The subject of the Winter School of Truth this year was the Bible. God expresses Himself through His Word. We need to see that the Bible is unlike any other book; it has the ability to change people inwardly. If we want to know God, we have to know the Bible. How can we please God if we do not know what He wants? The Bible is the means of God the Spirit to reach us. Whatever God does towards us and anything He wants us to do is written in His Word. This week, we saw that God has given us two spiritual inheritances: the Spirit, which cannot be seen, and the Bible, which can be seen. We have to realize that we need to use both the Bible and the Spirit. We need to be trained in our mind in order to understand the Word, and we need to be exercised in our spirit to experience the Word and to touch the Lord.

What I really enjoyed was the example given to support this. The Bible can be referred to as being the tracks of a train, and the Spirit as the fuel for the train to run. The train cannot run if one or the other is missing. The tracks are outward; this is the Word of God to lead and guide us in the right direction. The fuel is inward; this is the Spirit to energise us so that we can go. When we touch the Spirit, we get the life of the Spirit.

What is the Subject of the Bible? We saw in the Winter School that the subject of the Bible is contained in four statements: God planned and created, Satan rebelled and damaged, man fell and was lost, and Christ redeemed and built. However, the central thought of the Bible is Christ and the church. Everything was created according to God’s purpose; the church is God’s heart’s desire and should be our vision today.

Also, the Bible has many functions. First, the Bible is an expression and explanation of the Lord Jesus. The Bible also makes us wise unto salvation. The Word causes us to be regenerated. The Scriptures are our milk as nourishment, and also our spiritual bread of life. Finally, the Bible is for our perfecting. We can know the Word and be constituted with the Lord. Then we can speak life into others. The more we are filled with the Word of God, the more we life to speak and the more we have to speak; the more we speak, the more we are filled in spirit.

The Bible reveals God to us. Our God is one: Isaiah 45:5a says, “I am Jehovah and there is no one else; / Besides Me there is no God.”

God is mighty and faithful, self-existing and ever-existing, triune; He is three yet one, and He is co-existing and eternal. Why is God Triune? The Triune God is triune to dispense Himself into us, because we were created to contain God.

We need to have the burden to preach the gospel to our friends in this age, the church age. This is the age in which anyone can receive eternal life by just believing into Him. However in the next age, the Kingdom Age, we can only enter into the eternal life, it can no longer be received. In the eternal age, with the New Jerusalem, we will manifest the Triune God for eternity. Everyone is seeking something today. We live in an age that rejects God; Christianity today is filled with things that are not of Christ. God’s intention is that His will be done, and that His kingdom is made manifest on the earth. He cannot do so without the Body, the church. The church is the goal God wants to obtain in His eternal economy; each one of us who is saved participates in this goal that God may obtain His heart’s desire according to His good pleasure.

sharing from the Winter School of the Truth – we have the Bible without and the Spirit within

In this past Winter School of the Truth, I really enjoyed the example of the train – the Spirit is like the fuel is within the train, empowering the train to move, and the Bible is like the tracks without, which lead the train in the right direction. We cannot just read the Bible without using the spirit, because then we will not be able to start moving (we will be dead!), but neither should we focus only on the Spirit without reading the Bible, since this may lead to many problems, e.g. in understanding (we may be going in the wrong direction). It’s just like going on a train without tracks – the train may be moving, but it may cause many problems (even damage) 😀
We need to find a balance between reading the Bible and using our spirit! We can’t just focus on one or the other…
To be honest, before this conference I wasn’t enjoying reading the Bible as much as I do now – I think that it was one of the most important topics of the young people conferences ever and I hope that it will change our life. We have to read and understand the Bible!!!

[brother Pawel’s sharing from what he enjoyed the most in the recent Winter School of the Truth]

Bardzo podobał mi się przykład z pociągiem – że Duch to paliwo napędzające pociąg a Biblia to tory, które prowadzą nas w dobrym kierunku. Nie możemy tylko czytać Biblii nie używając Ducha, bo wtedy nie będziemy w stanie ruszyć (będziemy martwi), ale nie możemy też skupić się tylko na duchu nie czytając Biblii, bo wtedy może to doprowadzić do wielu problemów, np.: w rozumowaniu (możemy wtedy zmierzać w niewłaściwym kierunku). To jest tak jakby jechać pociągiem bez torów – niby pojedzie ale może spowodować wiele problemów (nawet szkód) 😀 Tak więc powinniśmy znaleźć zrównoważenie między czytaniem Biblii i używaniem naszego Ducha!!! Nie możemy skupić się tylko na jednym… [the Polish version of his sharing in English…]

[Read this portion also in Spanish / Puede leer esta porción también en español, Acerca de las experiencias en la Escuela de Invierno de la Verdad. “Tenemos la Biblia en el exterior y el espíritu en el interior”]