Quote:
Originally Posted by Zezima
The counter argument here is the pattern through out the Bible, Abraham, Noah, Moses, Daniel, Jeremiah.. etc. the Bible doesn’t say it explicitly, but it’s clear God uses specific people for specific things.
Did Lee ever call himself the minister of the age? Or was that what the “brothers” crowned him with?
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The counter to that counter argument from LSM is that all of those were leading up to one man - Jesus. They were all for a time, and some of them were explicitly types/shadows of Jesus.
But once Jesus came, He's the fulfillment. All authority was given to Him. If they try to say that there are more singular figures after Jesus (which they do, as they try to continue that line through the NT and after and onto the present day), then Jesus wasn't really the fulfillment.
The hilarious part is that they create this line of unique ministers one successive one after the other, and yet try to pretend that it's not something exactly like a papal lineage. It's classic "when they do it it's bad, when we do it it's God". The co-workers logical gymnastics is just a clown show.
Wrapped up in the concept of the minister of the age is the sibling of a teaching that the co-workers try to claim that God has "deputy authorities" who act as God's delegated authority on the earth. The very glaring problem with this is simple - neither God nor Jesus ever granted their authority to anyone else. God gave all authority to Jesus. And Jesus gave the disciples power and authority to cast out demons and heal disease (Luke 9:1). But that's authority over demons and disease. Jesus never granted His authority to anyone to be over anyone. The biblical record of that kind of thing is just not there. There is no pyramid structure. We each are connected directly to the Lord.
If you read Lee's
The Vision of the Age, Lee traces his way through his contrived MOTA lineage, through the OT giants, into the New Testament, touching on Jesus, moving on to Peter, Paul, etc, through Luther, Wesley, etc, and finally, no joke, Witness Lee literally says "I'm not selling myself here, but....."
*side eye*
Says the man with a lucrative publishing business that makes more money the more people think he's special.......
As is typical for Lee, he didn't say it outright. But he built the house, laid the pathway, walked you up the pathway, and expected you to walk right through the door. So yes, he ultimately did claim it himself.
Numerous issues with MOTA teaching:
1. it's a known teaching often found in cults (different title maybe, but same concept)
2. it's too convenient that Lee crowned himself minister of the age, and the support for it came from his closest followers and subsequent followers after that. No one outside of Lee's controlling group thinks he's the, or even a, minister of the age. It's entirely of his own making.
3. New Testament support simply isn't there. Peter gave Paul the right hand of fellowship. Peter was an apostle to the Jews, Paul to the gentiles. Concurrently. The co-workers somewhere have Jesus nestled in the list of MOTA's like Jesus is just some regular MOTA chilling with the other MOTAs.
4. In the LC's case, the MOTA doctrine sticks a crowbar between believers and the cross of Christ. Witness Lee says if you don't follow the MOTA (or, if you don't follow the vision released by the MOTA, and, oh by the way, the way to follow the vision is to follow the one who releases the vision....the MOTA) then your service isn't accepted by God. The teaching makes your right-standing with God contingent on following Witness Lee! It's dead at the start line.
The co-workers have injected steroids into the teaching and have said some wacky things the past few years. Ron in particular. It's sad to think of all the people trapped in the LC who have been unduly influenced to believe it.
Trapped