I.　Prophesying is the excelling gift for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ; to prophesy in 1 Corinthians 14 is not in the sense of predicting, foretelling, but in the sense of speaking for the Lord and speaking forth the Lord to dispense Christ into people—vv. 1, 3-5, 12, 24-26, 31-32.

II.　Moses desired that all of God's people would be prophets for prophesying; the apostle Paul taught that we all can prophesy, and he charged us to pursue, to desire earnestly, and to seek to prophesy—Num. 11:29; 1 Cor. 14:1, 12, 31, 39; cf. 1 Thes. 5:20.

III.　To prohibit prophesying is a sin before God—Amos 2:12b; 7:12-13, 16-17; Jer. 11:21-23.

IV.　Among the three functions of the prophet, the priest, and the king, the function of the prophet is the highest, because the prophets can receive and secure the word of God directly:

A.　In the Old Testament the prophets could reprove, instruct, and teach the kings (2 Sam. 12:1-14), and they could also teach the priests (Hag. 2:10-19; Mal. 1:6—2:9); in the New Testament all the believers are regenerated to be priests and kings (1 Pet. 2:5, 9; Rev. 1:6), but to be a prophet depends upon our seeking, our desiring earnestly (1 Cor. 14:1, 12, 39).

B.　All the believers have the capacity and the obligation to prophesy (vv. 31, 24); the Spirit is always ready to speak and expects to speak with us and through us, so we must cooperate with the speaking Spirit of God by standing against our natural man with its disposition and habit (2 Sam. 23:2; Acts 6:10; 2 Tim. 4:2).

C.　Prophesying makes us overcomers; prophesying is the function of the overcomers— Rev. 1:20; 2:1, 7.

V.　According to the New Testament there are three kinds of prophets:

A.　The prophets in Ephesians 4:11-12 are those particularly ordained by God for the perfecting of the saints—cf. 1 Cor. 12:29.

B.　The prophets in Acts 21:8-9 are those who can predict for God.

C.　The prophets in 1 Corinthians 14 are those who speak for God and speak forth God in the meetings of the church for the church's building up; all the believers can be this kind of prophet—vv. 1, 5, 31.

VI.　The proper church meeting for the building up of the church described in 1 Corinthians 14:26 is a meeting of mutuality in which "each one has," a meeting in which we "can all prophesy one by one" (v. 31), a meeting in which "he who prophesies builds up the church" (v. 4); the fulfillment of this word in the Lord's present recovery is eternally significant.

VII.　First Corinthians 14:26 as a part of the holy Word needs to be fulfilled for the Body of Christ to be built up; without this organic building, the Lord's prophecy in Matthew 16:18 cannot be fulfilled, and the church as the bride cannot be made ready for Christ as the Bridegroom.

VIII.　To meet according to 1 Corinthians 14:26, we must desire and learn to prophesy and live a prophesying life by being revived every morning and by living an overcoming life every day—vv. 1, 12, 31; Prov. 4:18; Lam. 3:22-24; Psa. 119:147-148; Rev. 2:7; 21:7; 1 John 1:6-7.

IX.　We must live a prophesying life with the following qualifications:

A.　We must "bring out the precious from the worthless"—Jer. 15:19.

B.　We must love the Lord, be close to Him, and be one with Him—1:8-9; Psa. 73:28a; 1 Cor. 2:9, 15; cf. 14:31-32.

C.　We must have an intimacy with God; our relationship with God must be personal, affectionate, private, and spiritual—Psa. 25:14; S. S. 1:1-4.

D.　We must be those who bring every problem into the presence of God, contacting God to receive the word from God—Psa. 73:3, 17.

E.　We must pray for the ministry of the word—Acts 6:4.

F.　We must be ones who are always rejoicing, unceasingly praying, giving thanks in everything, not quenching the Spirit, and not despising prophecies—1 Thes. 5:16-20.

G.　We must let the word of Christ dwell in us richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in our hearts to God—Col. 3:16.

H.　We must be filled with the knowledge of God's word to acquire an adequate divine vocabulary—Luke 1:46-55; Acts 5:20; 1 Pet. 4:11.

I.　We must be filled with the consummated Spirit essentially and economically— Matt. 5:12; Acts 13:52; 4:8, 31; 13:9; 2:38; 5:32b.

X.　We must see the composition of a proper prophecy according to the way of 1 Corinthians 14:

A.　The composition of a prophecy comprises the knowledge and experience of God, Christ, and spiritual things and the utterance to speak these forth.

B.　The composition of a prophecy comprises the sight under the divine enlightenment concerning the situation and environment in which we are.

C.　The composition of a prophecy comprises the instant inspiration of the Spirit that stirs up our spirit to speak—Acts 5:20.

D.　In speaking forth a proper prophecy, we should not adhere to personal experiences, testimonies, feelings, thoughts, opinions, affections, and reactions to any persons, matters, and things—2 Cor. 4:5.

XI.　The direct building up of the organic Body of Christ is by the Body itself, that is, by all the members of Christ each functioning in his own measure, mainly in prophesying—speaking for the Lord—Eph. 4:16; 1 Cor. 14:4b, 12, 31; Heb. 10:25.

XII.　Those of us who have seen this vision will be burdened to sacrifice ourselves as martyrs so that the Lord can have a way to fulfill Ephesians 4:11-16 for the purpose of having the building up of His organic Body through each saint being perfected to prophesy, to speak Christ, so that there will be meetings all over the earth that are full of mutuality according to 1 Corinthians 14:26.