[TLFisher]

In the summer of 1986 there was some friction between John So and the ministry office. The friction gradually worsened, and it reached its height at the end of 1986. Prior to this I was not aware of some of the things regarding the friction; consequently, it did not gaim my full attention. My regard for him and trust in him remained the same until July 1988, because I did not consider the matters that I was then aware of and that caused the friction as something crucial.
The Fermentation of the Present Rebellion page 40


During the summer of 1986, an arrangement was made between the brothers in Stuttgart and the Living Stream Ministry office to have the German books printed in Irving. At the same time, the Living Stream Ministry also decided to set up a branch office in England. In two letters to me, one dated August 18, 1986 and the other January 11, 1987, he expressed to me his unhappiness with that arrangement.
The Fermentation of the Present Rebellion page 41

Below in John So's response.

Well, the question is this: I was accused here [in the book] of pretending to be one with them. but really against them. Tonight let me say a word. I don’t want to vindicate, but I just like to share at least the way we look at it. Everything has two sides. I’m sorry to say it’s not that I’m pretending, it is because the LSM office really has a double standard. There is a public declaration that the office is only for the business side to print books, to duplicate tapes, to serve the churches to send out on the business side. But to my realization, I began to realize that there is another aspect expected of us. During the visit of these two brothers, I’m sorry—these 5 brothers in Stuttgart, two of them stayed with me in my home—two of them. And these brothers began to somehow fellowship with me concerning how that the office is really brother Philip Lee and that brother Philip Lee is the closest and most intimate co-worker of Witness Lee. And that I need to get into the fellowship and that our brother, Witness Lee, he needs his son. And almost after every meeting in Stuttgart, there was a long-distance call to report everything that is happening to the office. To the office.

I was, in short, expected to do the same. I told the brothers in a very good way—we were not fighting—I said, “Brothers, I’m sorry, in short, I just cannot do that. You have the grace to do it, that’s fine, but I just cannot do that.” I told the brothers maybe some other German brothers, like Jorn Urlenbac could do it. I was told, “No, no, no, you are the right person to do it. I said, “Thank you, but I can’t do it.” This to my realization caused problems. This had become a problem. Looking back, it had become a problem. I didn’t realize it at the time, but as time went by, we had problems. Listen to this, dear saints. When I encouraged the brothers to follow the office and to cooperate with the office 100%, I meant it. And we did. We did. The office wanted us to stop printing books and send all of the camera-ready pages to Irving to be printed and then they will print the book and send it back to us. Which according to our feeling, the Germans are very logical people, you know, it was not logical because we have the whole facilities right there in Stuttgart, right next to it, you know, it’s just like in the kitchen, you knead the dough—after you knead the dough to make the bread—the oven is right there, you pull it out and you bake the bread. But we can knead the dough, but we can’t bake the bread. We have to send the dough, the kneaded dough, somewhere to South Africa, I don’t know where, to America, and then they will bake the bread and send it to us, you know. For a German mind this is a little bit illogical, you know the Germans, right? They are very systematic, they are very logical. We did it, believe it or not, we did it. In fact, at that time, some brothers are slightly irritated. I told them, I said, “brothers, listen. “All the books bears Witness Lee’s name, he is the author. It does not matter where the books are printed.” You may not believe we sent within a year and five months, four thousand, one hundred some pages of camera-ready pages to be printed. We did not get an answer, we did not get at that time one page printed, nothing…nothing…!

I’m not following the chronological order any more or what I’ve written down. Maybe it’s better that way, in fact, brothers, listen, in spite of our hearing nothing from them, the brothers wrote a letter to Philip Lee on March 2, 1987. You see, when I say follow the office I meant what Witness Lee publicly said about the office—I do it 100%. The brothers wrote to Philip Lee himself because Witness Lee says, “Please don’t come to me concerning the books. Concerning the books, you all have to go to my son, Philip Lee.” So they write, “Dear brother Philip: We would like to fellowship with you briefly regarding the future publication of the ministry in European languages here.” You could read this. You could really read this. In spite of sending already at that time so many pages and yet we heard not one word, the brothers called. Nothing happened. No acknowledgment of receipt. We still sent a letter to brother Philip Lee. Let me just read a little bit. Okay we reported to them all our activities, pending until that time, because we were already in the program we want to finish that and then we want to ask them what is next. What should we do next?

In point 5 I would just like to read that. “We are concluding the translation work of the following books which were started earlier and we hope to complete them by the end of April, Life-study of John, Message 1 to 51. Life-study of Hebrews, Message 1 to 69, Life-study of Romans, Message 1 to 31, Life-study of Philippians, Message 1 to 31. We would appreciate your fellowship with us concerning the books we should start working on after this time. If you have the time to see us, we would be happy to meet with you for further fellowship. We hope to hear from you soon.” The brothers are even willing to go all the way to Anaheim to see this brother to coordinate with them concerning the books. No reply. This is written on March 2, 1987 until this very day we did not receive the reply from this person, from the manager of the office. So you cannot say that on one hand I say I am for the ministry office, on the other hand, I am not doing it. But I like to let you know something more is expected of us. Let me come back to this.


John So’s March 1990 Testimony Pages 2-3



I got the shock of my life. I was already shocked, but this thing shocked me a little bit more, okay? I thought I am already quite shocked, but then another shock wave came and I was shocked again. I wrote Witness Lee a letter. Remember, brothers, at that time, the Lord knows, I still respected brother Lee. But I am beginning also to boil. I am not a superman, you know. I am not the first class apostle that cannot shed tears. I wrote him a letter, and this is the letter. I wrote him a five-pages letter: one, two, three, four, and five. Four and a half pages, okay? To explain to him, and I did not expect an answer from him, because I still respected him. At that time, I still thought, maybe, he didn’t know exactly what was going on.

Let me backtrack a little bit before I go on, let me finish this, let me finish this. We can make a movie of this, you know. Forgive me, I have to let out some air, you know. I wrote him the letter. I answered quite a few of his charges. He showed this letter in the video. I didn’t see the video yet, because I don’t think I can stand to see it. But I know that this was shown. Out of five pages our dear brother showed five lines to give picture, to give a wrong picture. A wrong impression: “You see, you see, he changed, he changed. Look, he changed.” Why you just show five lines? I wrote five pages. If you want to show, show all the pages.

Then Witness Lee called me about two months later. This paper was written January 11, 1987. It was written there to him. When Witness Lee called me on the phone. That was the end of February. He said, “John,” Oh, the misunderstandings are so numerous, it is impossible to clear up.” I told brother Lee, “I wrote you this letter just to keep the record straight and that’s it. I don’t expect you to answer me.”

“Yeah, yeah, I knew you would say that, I know you would say that.”

That’s it. I was not going to make any more issue out of that. Something was definitely fermenting. But at that time, it was no longer just fermenting. I don’t know what’s happening. And I don’t know on which side it’s fermenting.


John So’s March 1990 Testimony Pages 14