[Ohio]

Originally Posted by OBW

I think that the problem is that, on the whole, John's book puts too much of the LRC experience and doctrine in a less-than favorable light.

The real reason is that John Myer has exposed GLA leadership to be little different than Anaheim. This last chapter of his is by far the most indicting at all, pay attention to his comments about GLA leadership here ...

Aside from adjusting the source teaching that overly indulges the idea of spiritual authority, accountability is a key factor here. What would happen if a number of influential elders set a policy for leaders: “You will not be given free pass for rude, abrasive remarks and public shaming. Insults from the podium will no longer be treated as the Lord’s Word from an angry prophet. Instead, it will be seen as sinful human weakness and will be met with censure. Outbursts of anger are works of the flesh. It is simply childish to insist on something and then make snide remarks (especially from the pulpit!) when you don’t get your way. If you continue to act out in unchristian ways, regardless of your elevated status and past history, you will be asked to step down.”

What would happen if such policies were adopted? No doubt, it would be called rebellion. Yet spiritual authority does not offer someone a deferment from virtuous conduct. It certainly does not sanction manhandling ministers and neutralizing them.

As long as questionable authority patterns persist, promising brothers will continue to disappear, after years of training and comradeship and possibly after many years of faithful service in the church. No one is innocent here. Local leaders who passively accept these situations are as complicit in the deed as if they had directly done it themselves.

John Myer does not mention names here, but every GLA reader knows exactly who he is referring to. The reader knows that TC alone is "given free pass for rude, abrasive remarks and public shaming." The reader knows who are those complicit senior leaders in Cleveland, like JY and TM, who are spineless in front of TC, "complicit in the deed as if they had directly done it themselves," thus endorsing TC's abusive ways. The leader also knows of the trail of wounded and departed brothers, many richly gifted by God on behalf of the churches, those promising brothers who have disappeared over the years, "after years of training and comradeship and possibly after many years of faithful service in the church."

Their only reason for leaving -- "they had a problem with Titus."

These GLA LC's are not "of God, of Christ, and of the saints." They are "of Titus." That's what the Bible says, and that's why so many precious brothers have had no other recourse but to leave when abused, and they so-called had a "problem with Titus." Actually none of them had a problem. It's TC who had the problem, but those surrounding TC will never admit this, and that is why Myer took so much heat from Cleveland with his early chapters. Tensions have never subsided since then. The owner of that Concerned Brother website in the Chicago area is very favorable to TC, and will not post any articles which are not favorable to him.