For 49 years [1923-1971] T. Austin-Sparks published A Witness and a Testimony. For 49 years he continuously fulfilled what God had committed to him by his writings and messages. In “A Statement from the Editor” in the March 1956 issue he wrote:
A Witness and a Testimony is a small paper in which we seek to minister to the Lord’s people every second month such spiritual food, light, and instruction as He gives.
Most of what has been published has first been given in spoken ministry, either to the local company or in the periodic conferences held usually five times each year. Some books, however, have been written directly.
It is necessary to say this, because we want it to be understood that everything is vitally related to the actual and growing need of the spiritual life of a representative body of God’s people. Indeed, it is the people who have made it necessary, given meaning to it, and drawn it out. This is surely God’s way of giving! This, then, is not just booky, cloistered, or studied matter, but ever the call and answer of living conditions.
