Quote:
Originally Posted by OBW
But even at that, I can't figure out how to say that anyone else was at fault for his "falling." Unless they really didn't care about the weeping, but only about BM's apparent interest in your direction, which they took as being some kind of rejection of Lee's direction and therefore a falling away from the Lee-ordained truth.
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Hi OBW,
You are welcome.
If I understand correctly what I quoted above from you, you are thinking about why I would place any blame on the brothers for what Ben did in Arlington/Irving and later in 1990. There are several reasons I place some blame on them for what happened with Ben.
1) The first is that both Joe Davis and Ray saw their fellow elder, Ben, sobbing uncontrollably with his head in his hands. That was pretty atypical behavior for him, I'd say. Ben clearly had some kind of serious problem. It seems to me that a normal course of action would be for Ray and/or Joe to find out what was wrong and seek to help him. Did they? I don't know, but it seems doubtful.
I won't speculate about how far Ben had fallen at that time, but his tears showed that his conscience was still functioning and if they had pressed him, he might have confessed his problem. The facts that 1) they moved him to an eldership position in Arlington, where he continued to fall, and 2) his sin wasn't discovered until he was an elder in Irving, seem to indicate that they didn't discover the reason for his weeping in Houston. Of course, I could be wrong about what they did or didn't do (and even why Ben wept). I am only speculating based on the evidence I have in hand, but this is what I think and will continue to believe until I am given reason to think otherwise.
2) Secondly, when Ben's sin was found out in Irving, the involved Texas brothers are clearly to blame for not helping him at that time. Don R acknowledges this in his post. Instead, they took unbiblical advice from Lee and moved Ben away. Then they basically left him to find his own way. We know how that turned out. Only the Lord knows what happened with Ben during the ensuing years until 1990, when he made his move on the elders' wife.
So, yes, Ben's falling was his own sin and he bears the primary responsibility for it, but I believe that his fellow elders and companions of many years, who did not love him enough to go the distance to rescue and restore him, will have to give account for their failure to love him. In my view, Ben was ultimately sacrificed to preserve the reputation of the Texas Local Churches and Witness Lee's ministry. In 1990, their cover-up came back to bite them. I am not expecting others to embrace my view. I'm just sharing it. I was too closely involved in the 90s event and know too many details about that time to be able to think otherwise.
And after having said all this...if I have misunderstood your pondering and have responded in a way that is far off track, I'm sorry. Just let me know with some clarification and I'll try again
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Thankful Jane