I have a handful of comments (hopefully short this time), but I will start with this comment by Truth.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Truth
I don't think WL's entire ministry was invalid just because of his behavior (lack of control over his sons, not apologizing to the saints, ex-communicating innocent saints, etc...). And also, I don't think WL's entire ministry was invalid just because some parts of his ministry may be wrong.
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You are at least partly correct. WL's sons do not disqualify him. Neither do some kinds of errors in teaching. I would presume that, given our general lack of certainty concerning at least some parts of scripture, no one's teaching is entirely correct. But most are materially correct.
And when I say materially correct, I mean that the core components of the faith are correctly included.
So, for me, to dismiss Lee as a teacher is more about the overall quality of his emphasis than on some kind of weighing of good v bad teaching. He included the sound, orthodox core of the teaching of scripture. But the things that he majored on were too often questionable, at best. He majored on teachings that created a divide between the LRC and the rest of Christianity. He drilled this divide into his followers and then chastised Christianity for lack of oneness or unity. At this point, it would seem that completely separate denominations get along much better than some portions of the LRC, yet they claim to be imbued with special blessing by God for their unifying stand on the basis of political boundaries arbitrarily created by man.
Lee did not need to control his sons. He needed to expel them from contact with his ministry or with the churches. He was guilty of the very thing that Eli was condemned for in 1 Samuel.
As for the book of James, this little letter never contradicts justification by faith. It simply questions whether claims of faith are legitimate where there is no evidence that the supposed believers are actually obeying the one that they claim to have come to believe and follow. The evidence does not save you. But lack of evidence seriously suggests that claims of belief are nothing more than rhetoric . . . agreeing with terms and phrases but not having a real belief that changes you.
As for the suggestion that the police be called on Lee's sons, I am not aware of any situation in which the activity was criminally forced. The "law" that takes these things "very seriously" is civil law, not criminal law. You do want to make an account of the events, but the police are not necessarily the best choice, and have no responsibility to arrest anyone unless there is reasonable suspicion of physical force being applied to gain compliance.
In the corporate realm, what is now called sexual harassment generally is not something that you call the police about, but you call a lawyer. It is not a crime for which incarceration can be imposed. But there can be monetary penalties awarded in a lawsuit, as well as loss of employment for the perpetrator (assuming that the employer is righteous). And a stigma that will follow you.
It is interesting that one of the women who was involved was the wife of an Anaheim police officer who had to be talked-down from simply going and doing some kind of bodily harm to PL when he found out. The problem there is that the only one that would potentially go to jail for such an act would have been the policeman.