Matthew 18:20 For where there are two or three gathered into My name, there am I in their midst.
In order to have a proper church meeting, we need to be gathered into the name of the Lord. Before the meeting, however, we may be occupied with other things. Therefore, when the meeting time comes, the Lord Jesus gathers us out of these preoccupations into His name. We turn our heart to the Lord and call upon the name of the Lord from deep within our spirit. As a result, we get into the name, the person, the Spirit, of the Lord. In such a Spirit, under such a condition, we gather together for a church meeting.(The Conclusion of the New Testament, Msgs. 205-220, by Witness Lee).
The meetings of the believers are initiated by the Lord, who calls the believers out of all persons, matters, and things that occupy them and gathers them together into His presence. Such a gathering of a few people, of two or three, implies one of the ways for the church to meet locally. Such meetings of a few people must have been held in the believers’ homes, as mentioned in Acts 2:46 and 5:42, for the purpose of prayer (v.19; Acts 12:5, 12), fellowship, the breaking of bread, teaching, or preaching of the gospel (Acts 2:42; 5:42). Many such meetings may be held separately in the locality, yet they are still the unique church in that locality (v.17). Otherwise, they are not separate meetings but divisions, and they become sects (Gal.5:20) – Matthew 18:20, Footnote 2 in the Recovery Version Bible.
