Treasure in Clay

“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the exceeding greatness of the power may be of God, and not from ourselves;” — 2 Corinthians 4:7 (ASV)

Charity died before her husband. The news reached Nee in confinement, and reports describe him as deeply grieved. Grief in prison is grief without any of the usual comforts: no funeral, no shared home, no long talks with family, no grave to visit. Paul says Christians “sorrow not, even as the rest, who have no hope.” Notice that he does not say they don't sorrow.

On 30 May 1972, Watchman Nee died in Anhui province, still in state custody, nearly twenty years after his arrest. He was sixty-eight. Accounts of his last hours differ; some say he died while being moved for medical care. There was no final sermon, no chance to revise his books, no chance to answer his critics or explain the disputed charges. History often denies us the ending we would write. The world outside had changed completely while he was inside: he died in the same year that the American president Richard Nixon made his historic visit to China.

His family preserved a short written statement of faith associated with his last days, reportedly found under his pillow. Different English versions circulate, so nobody should pretend to know every word. But its substance is clear: Jesus Christ is the Son of God, he died for sinners and rose again, and Nee died believing in him. It contains none of his famous vocabulary. Nothing about spirit and soul, or one church per city, or authority. At the end, the faith was simple.

Was he a martyr? Many Christians call him one, and the full-length biography understands why: he spent two decades in prison and would not give up Christ. It also notes that the charges against him were political and economic as well as religious, while the controlling context was the state's campaign against independent religious leadership. And it adds that being a martyr doesn't make every opinion or decision right.

His influence after 1972 was enormous. His books, many of them gathered from spoken messages, spread around the world and are read by Christians of many kinds. Witness Lee built an international network of local churches outside mainland China. Inside China, gatherings descended from the Little Flock carried on in registered and unregistered forms. They were one important strand, though not the only one, in the growth of China's house churches.

So what do we do with a man like this? The biography's answer is Paul's verse about treasure in clay jars. The treasure is Christ; the vessel is human and breakable. We don't need to pretend the vessel was flawless to value what God gave through it. And we shouldn't get so fascinated by the vessel that we forget the treasure. “Let no one glory in men,” Paul says. Thank God for what Nee saw, learn from what he suffered, question where his ideas outran Scripture, and don't build your identity on his name.

His deepest message is simpler than any system: stop trying to make Christianity work out of your own strength, and come back to Christ. He chose the name Watchman as a young man who wanted to wake sleeping Christians. Paul's call still sounds: “Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall shine upon thee.”

The watchman dies. Christ remains.

One thing to do this week: write your own short statement of faith, four lines at most, with no religious jargon. What do you actually believe about Jesus? Keep it somewhere you'll find it again, maybe inside the cover of your Bible, and read it on a hard day.