In the mid-1970s a very negative influence entered into the Lord’s recovery—an adversary from within. With this as the background, in December 1978 Brother Lee alluded to what would become the beginning of the rainbow booklets in the Lord’s recovery. He says,

Over these past two years many treasures have been “stolen” from our home without our awareness of it. As we look back now, we can see that we were under a deceiving cloud. During that period there was no proper word given in the church meetings…The church meetings were mainly shouting, releasing, playing guitars, and singing…Much was going on secretly.

Many of the riches that the Lord brought into the recovery through the ministry these past fourteen or fifteen years have been “stolen.” The young people do not know how to get into the Word, nor have they been taught how to pray.

There is a need to pray and ask the Lord to bring back all the riches of His recovery. These riches are found in the books that we have put out…The brothers in Texas have told me that they are burdened to put each of the main items covered in the books and Life-studies into booklet form. There may be fifty or sixty different items, like regeneration, fellowship, prayer, and the anointing. Have you noticed that the Lord has brought us back to the Word in this clearing-up stage? Many saints throughout the country have told me how much it has profited them to turn back to the Word.

Pray for the restoration of the practical treasures in the Lord’s recovery. Do not think that these are old items; some of them will remain for eternity. (The Collected Works of Witness Lee (CWWL), 1978, vol.1, pp. 237, 238)

That was the beginning of the rainbow booklets. Eventually, the brothers in Texas produced 546 rainbow booklet titles. They edited the Life-study messages, printed them, and made them available to all the churches.

Brother Lee felt that these booklets would be very useful to the saints. One important use was for dealing with the opposition. He says,

In order to deal with the opposition in a positive sense, we should produce tracts and booklets that state our belief concerning the essential items of the Christian faith, present the unsearchable riches of Christ (Eph. 3:8), and condemn heretical teachings. We should publish such tracts and booklets and encourage the saints, especially the young ones, to distribute them to their friends, relatives, neighbors, colleagues, and classmates. We should distribute them as widely as possible in order to saturate the United States with the divine truths that the Lord has shown to us…We should focus on distributing our publications throughout this country. Those who read our publications will be not only supplied with the riches of Christ but also inoculated against the poison of false accusations. Dealing with the opposition in a wise way will pave the way for us to gain the increase.

The churches need to bear the responsibility to spread the gospel and minister the truth by distributing these booklets…In spreading the divine truths, we should not expect to have quick results. Rather, we should expect to carry out this work consistently for several years before seeing definite results. (CWWL, 1979, vol. 2, pp. 529-530)

Thus, there is a need for patience and perseverance in our propagation of the truth. Our brother had the faith that in time the distribution of the ministry would bear fruit. In another place, he says,

All the saints in the recovery, old and young alike, need to go out. Go to visit your neighbor with…many of the rainbow booklets we have published…for the purpose of distribution.

Please note that the emphasis here is on distribution. He is not saying to go preach the gospel or to go and try to convince your neighbor to meet with us or even to speak that much to them. He is urging the saints to simply distribute the booklets. He continues,

We have thousands of copies of these booklets in storage and are continuing to print more, but many of the churches have not picked up the burden to carry out the distribution. It is not a requirement for you to read all the booklets…Put some booklets into your pocket and go to your neighbor. The booklets you choose will sovereignly be the right ones for your neighbor. The titles of these booklets are capturing. By reading some of the titles of the booklets to a new one, they will be attracted to the truths contained in them…If you would spend five minutes with your neighbor to give him these booklets and read the titles to him, you have done a marvelous job. We should go out to saturate all the homes with these booklets, and we have to do this to the uttermost. We should fill, saturate, and soak the homes in our localities with all the truths we have in our hands, in our hearts, and on all the tapes. The publications are the weapons and the bullets to fight the spiritual warfare,…but we need some soldiers to use them. (CWWL, 1985, vol. 5, pp. 486-487)

It is amazing how much faith and confidence Brother Lee had in the written, published words of the ministry. Surely this was the issue of a lifetime of experience.

Later the same year, Brother Lee spoke a faithful and honest word concerning our lack of bearing this burden concerning the distribution of the rainbow booklets. He says,

All these points that we have fellowshipped should be a mirror to us to “see what is on our face,” to see where we are. An example that may help us to further realize where we are is our lack of bearing the burden to distribute the rainbow booklets, which contain a slightly edited version of the Life-study messages. A few years ago many of the churches agreed to distribute these booklets. Initially, the distribution was quite encouraging, but it soon began to wane. Eventually, in nearly all the churches the rainbow booklets have hardly been distributed at all…We may say that we have no time or burden to spread the truth. We may have many excuses, but when we appear before the judgment seat of Christ (2 Cor. 5:10), the Lord will settle accounts with us (Matt. 25:19). Could you tell the Lord at His judgment seat that you had no time and no burden? I do not think He will take our excuses. (CWWL, 1985, vol. 5, p. 541)

We all need to consider “where we are” in regard to the distribution of the ministry and what we will say when we stand before the Lord. He continues,

I hope that this fellowship can be used by the Lord to open our eyes to see that the way we have been taking is not the right way…We cannot take anything as an excuse. We cannot say that many have been poisoned against us or that our particular area is a place full of Christians. We must ask ourselves how much time we have spent in visiting others with gospel tracts, with the Bible, and with some of the rainbow booklets. If you try this week after week and even day after day, you will see the result. The Bible tells us that the husbandmen, or farmers, should labor with patience, expecting to see the gathering (1 Cor. 9:10; 2 Tim. 2:6). You cannot say that it is hard to reap a harvest before you have even sown something. That is not fair. You have to do the sowing, the cultivating, and the watering to help the crop grow. After a certain time according to the natural law, something will grow up. We all must ask ourselves whether or not we have done our duty. We have to realize that some day we will stand before the judgment seat. (CWWL, 1985, vol. 5, 542-543)

This is a very sobering word.

The following portion is from Brother Watchman Nee. He says,

If we label one brother as useless and another sister as unsuitable, sooner or later all the brothers and sisters will become useless and only we will be useful. We have to perfect others to serve. We have to make the useless ones useful. The church is the Body of Christ, and all the brothers and sisters are members of this Body.

The Lord has given every saved person at least one talent. If we say that we have received less than a talent, then we must not be saved. Since we have a talent, we should serve in the capacity of a one-talented member. This is the reason the elders must exercise overseership. They must not allow anyone to bury his one talent in the ground.

Whether or not a church can go on depends on whether all the one-talented ones are mobilized. I am shouting here: All the one-talented ones have to be mobilized! No power on earth can withstand the force of all the one-talented ones rising up together. No matter how “useless” a person seems to be, every person has to be used. We have to use everyone, unless we have the thought that some members in Christ’s Body are lame. (The Collected Works of Watchman Nee, vol. 61, pp. 212-213)

This section is very touching. Although we are no longer speaking of Nuggets and Gems from the Bible, we need to be impressed with the need to simply go forth as one-talented members and present to others the Lord’s word and the ministry contained in the publications. All the one-talented ones need to rise up. Once Brother Lee was home on a Saturday night, and he was considering, “Where are the saints? What are the saints doing on Saturday night?” The one-talented slave buried his talent in the earth, that is, in the world. Perhaps much of our time is occupied with things not of the Lord. We need to deal with the Lord concerning how we use our time.

In conclusion, the main burden here is not the Nuggets and Gems from the Bible booklets. Although they are excellent, the main burden is that all the saints would spread the truths that the Lord has given to His recovery, which truths are in the ministry publications. We need to go out with the ministry publications. There is a great need for us to go out with the publications in every form. We will cover some of the more up-to-date forms in another article.

Our going out in this way has great benefits. The first benefit of going out is that it vitalizes the ones who go out. They become vital members in the Body, functioning one-talented members. It is difficult to go out and contact people and not get revived. This will save sinners, this will overcome all our opposition, and this will shepherd and perfect the saints to do likewise.

All the saints, the one-talented ones, must rise up to function in their measure. Surely this is what the Lord is waiting for before He can return. Brother Nee said that the hardest portion in the Bible to be fulfilled is in Ephesians 4—the perfecting of the saints unto the work of the ministry, unto the building up of the Body of Christ. We need each one part to cause the growth of the Body unto the building up of itself in love. The Lord is waiting for this. Matthew 24:14 says that the “gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole inhabited earth,” but the verse does not end there. It continues, “For a testimony.” It is not merely a matter of preaching the doctrine of the gospel of the kingdom; our speaking must produce “a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come.” For this preaching, we need to use the ministry publications.

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Please note that the Nuggets and Gems from the Bible booklets are available for free in electronic format. These can be gifted to your friends, relatives, colleagues, and neighbors. For a video describing these new features, go to: https://newsletters.lsm.org/having-this-ministry/issues/Oct2021-006/videos.html