[OBW]

ZNP,

You are far from the only one that brought out my comments on colored glasses being altered from Lees into some version of old LRCs. But your dissection of Albert Zehr’s 1989 analysis misses the place from which he wrote.

Yes. In a church the size of Houston, or Dallas, there is a breadth of both belief and practice. But while that breadth may be tolerated, it is not the official position of the group. And despite the breadth of the belief and practice of the group, if you took a poll, you would find that the fact that the poll was taken causes the breadth of the group to shrink to more nearly match the official position.

So the official position is what the leadership says it is, not the broad spectrum of variation in belief. And that is not necessarily bad, unless what is officially believed and practiced is itself bad.

You keep speaking of your experience in Houston as if it is proof that the LRC is not just what some others say, like what Albert Zehr has said it is. Yet even in Houston, virtually everything he said was going on and spot on. It just wasn’t a 100 percent experience because not everybody was 100 percent “sold out” to the mainstream LRC position. That would include you.

To give you an example, I know a brother who attends the assembly that I attend. He, like me, left the church many years ago. But his last “tour of duty” was also in Irving and he worked in the media group handling aspects of video and audio taping. During the time he was there, my father, mother, and sister were also in Irving. This brother overheard some of the Irving leadership discussion people and there comment about my family was “they are marginal.” And they were/are right. Yet they were/are wrong.

They are marginal in that they will never simply jump into the middle of the latest move and be swept away. My dad has even very clearly articulated that the teaching concerning the tripartite man is really mostly baloney since man is a unit, not independent parts. They were not on board with the Harvest House lawsuit and thought someone else was wasting a lot of money. Yet if you suggest that Lee made some serious error, they would be quick to defend. They even articulated that they really couldn’t understand the Bible without Lee’s interpretation.

But if you want to remain in the Church in Dallas, or the Church in Houston, etc., you will do as the leadership says, or within leeway that they permit. You may have been one who did not fully follow the ways. But you did not buck the source. You said that you would not quote Lee for a testimony. But you said nothing that would put his teachings in a less than favorable light. So you were considered harmless. You probably kept others who were for the “truth” but not necessarily foot soldiers happily following along.

But AZ was right about what was going on. Even in Houston. Those who truly toed the line in most all ways were constantly faced with teachings that were grossly violated in practice. And for every violation, there was a carefully crafted explanation to keep them sedated and not frantically running for the doors. Things that we now reduce to “don’t worry about right and wrong, just the spirit,” or “a deputy authority can do no wrong,” were given more robust defenses at the time.

My experience was somewhat like yours except that I was never going to be asked to teach in the FTTA. Or become an elder. But I bet that our family was referred to out loud as one of the pillars in Dallas. Yet we were “marginal.” I bet that your little bit of rebellion was tolerated because they saw you as “sold out” enough for the way that it would keep you in line even if not 100 percent so. Looks like this one who once wanted to marry an elder’s daughter and even butted heads with that elder still managed to go teach in the FTTA.

No. AZ does not speak for everyone. But he speaks for the ones that are the true core. The elders, coworkers, and the fully committed core. They constantly had to listen to the teachings that went one way and figure out how to reconcile a virtually official practice that did not match.

Your experience is your experience. It is not evidence that AZ was wrong. Or that the LRC was not really like that. It is just a perspective that looks exclusively from your own point of view. Almost two years ago I commented on a quote from a Pilipino philosopher. See it here in my blog post. I honestly believe that you are still viewing the LRC from a fixed point of reference and not looking from above, below; walking around for different perspectives; waiting for differing light. I am not saying that you don’t want to do that. But your comments almost entirely reflect the “this is what I experienced” view rather than accepting that the view of others are also valid reflections from their perspective.

I do not know where a more robust view from different perspectives might lead you. I do not conclude that you will see what I have seen or that you will agree with me. But I honestly hope that you will look beyond your perspective. And while I believe that you are trying to do that some, you respond too often with a perspective that dates back to before the hall in Irving was built when you were a brother in Houston.

And this is, for me, evidence that we are not willing to conceive of the idea that ever being in the LRC was an error. We need to find something positive that we can latch onto as evidence that maybe, just maybe, God lead us to the LRC. I will admit that it could be true. But I also believe that the proselytizers of marginal, aberrant, and near-cult groups have a pretty hard sell buried in their soft sell. They are very persuasive. They latch onto the discontent and use it to push, or nudge, in a different direction. Just because there is a lot of wholesome flour does not mean that the leaven they put in their mix is good. It may be just as worthy of warning as that of the Pharisees. You are not deficient for having fallen for it. Our deficiency is too often that we cannot believe that we were ever other than in the center of God’s will.

And all the rest of humanity, even of Christianity, just isn’t as smart or spiritual as we are.

Not pointing at you. I have already pointed it at me and concluded that it is true. I was duped. God did not lead me unless it was as a wilderness experience to extract me from the Assemblies of God. But it was not the final experience. And while wilderness experiences are important, they are not core theology. It is the promised land that I seek, not the wilderness. And no matter how exuberant and joyful the people and meetings are, it is a spiritual wilderness.

Please don’t bother disagreeing line-by-line. It reeks of self-preservation. I cannot destroy you or your faith. If you think I am wrong, just say so in full. Speak to the context and whole of my writing, not to the “fortune cookie” snippets.