When a person commences to speak, his spirit, right or wrong, will soon
2. Where man's strength is. When a person commences to speak, his spirit, right or wrong, will soon come forth. As his spirit emerges, his inner condition is revealed. In listening to a person, attempt to find out where his strongest point is. Ask yourself what impression he has given you. Ferret out which part of that man is the strongest. If your spirit is open and tender before God, it will sense where his strength truly lies. As his strength is revealed, he makes a deep impression in you. He may be a subjective person or a stubborn person, and so as he speaks he will let his strong point be exposed. And in so doing, he will leave a distinct impression in you. A gentle person, as cited in James 3.17, is easy to be entreated. But with someone else you may beg for half a day and still not easily get an answer. A person who is subjective and strong-willed is difficult to be entreated. Someone may be a strongly emotional person who can easily be swayed. He may say words of love, but it may not be genuine love. If your spirit is clean and gentle you can quite easily touch a person's strong point, which more often than not will turn out to be his fundamental problem; and as such it is where he needs to be dealt with. We must therefore use our spirit to touch people's predominant characteristic and so come to know what kind of person we are dealing with.
3. Whether the spirit is closed. Usually when you converse with a brother, you can touch his spirit. But sometimes man's spirit does not come forth. Even after holding conversation for quite a long while, you still are unable to touch his spirit. His real person is in hiding, where you cannot apprehend him. His real self is concealed so well that you just cannot figure him out. Such a person must have a serious defect, since God's people should be easy to contact: they live, or should be living, according to "the principle of amen." That is, whenever they act or speak, it causes the spirit in others to respond with an amen. Such should be the "natural" state of a Christian. Nevertheless, there are some people who always seem to be hidden or are shut within themselves, and so much so that others cannot say much. These are hidden ones. Nobody knows them, nor do they fellowship with anyone. This constitutes a very serious situation. Their isolating individualism is so strong that no one may touch their real person. They are thus severed from the fellowship of the Body.
True, a Christian should be deep, yet he must also disclose his real state and allow people to touch his spirit. He who forbids his spirit to be touched