[ACuriousFellow]

This brings me to my second point. You see many people gathering in many churches, or assemblies throughout the New Testament, even within their respective cities. The church in Corinth existed, but so did the church in Cenchreae, a port district in Corinth (Romans 16:1). Further still, we have the church in Phoebe’s house (Romans 16:5), who was a deacon in the church in Cenchreae, which was part of Corinth and therefore part of the church in Corinth, which were one of the churches of Christ (Romans 16:16). In the same manner, we have the church in Nympha’s house (Colossians 4:15) and the church in Philemon’s house (Philemon verse 2). We see many layers within the church life, but not one of them defines our ground oneness save for the name of Christ. Whether you are the church in Phoebe’s house or the church in Cenchreae or the church in Corinth, you are only the church when you gather in the one name of Christ. Our ground of oneness, that which makes us the true body of Christ, is the one name of the Lord Jesus Christ. As the man in this video pointed out already, what the scripture says unites us as believers is the one Spirit, for we are called to one hope with one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father of all (Ephesians 1:4-5). It is not the city in which we meet.

This pattern is established for convenience, not so that we should make it law, and even then this pattern is not based on the cities that the assemblies are found in, but which portion of the body of Christ the author is referring to. If the author was referring to all the saints in Corinth, they referred to them as “the church in Corinth.” If they were referring to all the saints found in the district of Corinth known as Cenchrea, they would refer to them as “the church in Cenchreae.” If they were referring to the saints in the household of Phoebe, they would refer to them as “the church in Phoebe’s house.” If the Lord truly cared so much about “locality” as Witness Lee claimed, if indeed this doctrine and principal of naming and location was so crucial and necessary for the proper establishment of a church, then the Lord would by no means have allowed one of his apostles to break the pattern as he did, and several times at that! As such, you find here a pattern. It is by no means a bad pattern, yet it is not a command. It is not worth condemning other churches solely based on the names of their meeting halls and refusing fellowship with them because of such a thing. It certainly does not merit Lee’s delusional accusations of rebellion that are heaped upon a congregation based solely on what they call themselves. It absolutely does not justify the divisiveness that is encouraged by Lee and the current leaders of The Lord’s Recovery.

Lee’s particular doctrine of the ground of the church/oneness/locality is not sound. It is not biblical. It is not healthy for the churches of God.