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The Normal Christian Life Mass Market Paperback – November 4, 1977
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- Print length285 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherTyndale House Publishers
- Publication dateNovember 4, 1977
- Dimensions4.2 x 0.9 x 6.7 inches
- ISBN-100842347100
- ISBN-13978-0842347105
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Product details
- Publisher : Tyndale House Publishers; Reprinted edition (November 4, 1977)
- Language : English
- Mass Market Paperback : 285 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0842347100
- ISBN-13 : 978-0842347105
- Item Weight : 6.1 ounces
- Dimensions : 4.2 x 0.9 x 6.7 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #16,398 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #71 in Christian Discipleship (Books)
- #71 in Inspiration & Spirituality
- #558 in Christian Spiritual Growth (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Watchman Nee is considered one of the most important indigenous church leaders and thinkers in the history of Chinese Christianity. There are few leaders in the history of Chinese Christianity whose influence is as prevalent as Watchman Nee's.
Nee produced more than 40 volumes of devotional, sermonic as well as theological works. His writings were translated into many Eastern languages such as, Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Tagalog as well as Western languages, such as English, French and Spanish. His books continue to influence many Christian groups ranging from charismatic renewal groups to mainline churches all over the world.
He is the founder of the "Little Flock", the largest Protestant Christian denomination in China at the time of the Communist regime in 1949. The "Little Flock" began in 1923 with a few members and in less than 20 years grew to become more than 700 congregations with 70,000 members. At that time some estimated that out of the 700,000-1,000,000 member Protestant church community in China, the "Little Flock" had 100,000 members. Regardless of the numbers, this 20-year-old Christian movement proved to itself to be a tremendous achievement. Even under Communist oppression and persecution during the 50's and 60's, the "Little Flock" continued to grow. And today, the movement is still active throughout China. Moreover, the distinctive "Little Flock" theology, practice and spirituality is rooted in many Chinese Christian circles whether in China or overseas.
Watchman Nee was born into a family with a Christian heritage. His grandfather, U Cheng Nee, was the one of the first ordained Chinese ministers of the Congregational missions in the Fukien Province of China. Nee was the third child of nine, but the first male child. Since Chinese tradition favors sons, relatives despised families with no male children. When Nee's mother was expecting the third child she prayed to God earnestly asking for a son and dedicated this third child to God similar to Hannah in 1 Samuel 1:1-20. God heard her prayer. On November 4, 1903, Nee Shu-Tsu (later known as Watchman Nee) was born. Nee later changed his name to "Duo Sheng" ("Watchman" in English) meaning, "sound of the gong," or a watchman to raise the people of God for service.
Throughout his youth, Nee attended schools founded by the Church Missionary Society in Fuzhow, China. And in all areas he showed extraordinary intellectual promise. When he was 18 years of age, Nee dedicated his life to Christ through the preaching of Miss Dora Yu, an ex-medical student, who forfeited a lucrative occupation and dedicated her life to the preaching of the word of Christ. Nee, at that time, knew it was all or nothing. When he was baptized, he declared, "Lord, I leave my world behind. Your cross separates me from it forever, and I have entered into another. I stand where you have placed me in Christ!"1
Nee and other students who had a common zeal for the spreading of the gospel among the young people in their town and local schools and colleges gathered in prayer and Bible study. They set up their own meetings and engaged in vigorous street evangelism. Between the years 1923-1928, Nee published the magazines Revival and Christian, as well as the book The Spiritual Man. Nee was instrumental in the spiritual revival among students at that time.
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Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2022
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In the 1970s, audiobooks (also called "talking books") were virtually unheard of unless you were blind. Thank God sighted people can have them today and there now exists the recording I longed for. There are even two editions; I own both for variety, rotating a copy between my house and my car. The readings are clear and generally rightly nuanced, and the narrators' voices can be listened to repeatedly without becoming annoying (at least to me). They are doing a narration, not preaching a sermon. A slight thing I noticed is that although Nee was Chinese, both he and his editors spoke and wrote in a British style of English. Yet the narrators sound American, like me; to hear them speak of "shillings and sixpence" with an American accent is a little amusing but certainly not distracting. The message is so wonderful that focusing on THAT will be rewarding forever!
The audiobooks encouraged me to meditate again on the printed version, which includes helpful footnotes by editor Angus I. Kinnear who prepared the book for its first publication in Mumbai, India in 1957. There's also a study guide by Harry Foster published separately in England in 1976 available on Amazon. Both Kinnear and Foster heard Watchman Nee deliver the original late 1930s spoken addresses on which the book is based.
Watchman Nee has been criticized in some circles because of the doctrines and practices of some of his disciples and colleagues - "guilt by association". It is no more legitimate than criticizing the apostle Paul for Hymenaeus, Alexander, Phygellus, Hermogenes, Philetus, Demas and "all who are in Asia" who had been Paul's associates and followers but decided to "distance themselves from him" (I Timothy 1:20; II Timothy 1:15; 2:17; 4:10). Some of them became proto-Gnostic heretics who claimed Paul as their hero while totally perverting what he actually said. Unlike them, Watchman Nee sometimes extrapolates beyond the Scriptures in a few of his other books but not in what we would think of as outright heresy. "The Normal Christian Life" has only one prominent mistake I've noticed: he applies Luke 17:26-37 ("one shall be taken, the other left behind") to the doctrine of the Rapture found in I Thessalonians 4:13-18; but the context of Luke's passage actually refers to the flood of Noah and the judgment on Sodom "taking away" the sinners, not the saved. Nee is not alone in this traditional misapplication. Just ignore his mistake here and don't let it rob you of the wonderful benefits of everything else he has to say.
The message of "The Normal Christian Life" is not just for a few Christians who might enjoy it as their own particular interest or emphasis. Rather, it is the core of what it means to be a Christian. This is far different from what the average person thinks, or even the average Christian thinks. Had I read this book when I first believed in Jesus it would have put me on the right track and helped to save me from the will-power moralism of average Christianity. Nee's message may seem radical or strange, but that's only an indication of how far we've drifted from the Gospel of the Grace of God as it was revealed through Paul by the ascended Lord, Christ Jesus. The late Francis L. Patton, godly and able president of Princeton University (as quoted by William R. Newell in "Romans: Verse-By-Verse," 1938) said, "The only hope of Christianity is in the rehabilitating of the Pauline theology. It is back, back, back, to an incarnate Christ and the atoning blood, or it is on, on, on, to atheism and despair". I have found this to be true in my own life. May Watchman Nee's "The Normal Christian Life" help you as it has helped me, to deeply experience faith, hope, and the love of God!
A Warning though: If you are looking for a light easy read, this book may not be for you.
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