Quote:
Originally Posted by NeitherFirstnorLast
In his commentary The Epistles of John, John R. W. Stott notes the need for Christian communities to evaluate their teachers using Scripture as their base. Focusing on 1 John 2, Stott recommends the application of three tests, two of which are a social test and a doctrinal test. These enable a Christian community to recognize the sometimes alluring falsities of pseudopraxis and heterodoxy among it's teachers.
..1 John 2:9 "The one who says he is the light and yet hates his brother is in the darkness until now. The one who loves his brother abides in the light and there is no cause for stumbling in him." An instructor whose relationships within the Christian community are consistently abrasive and fraught with strife, has, by biblical definition, run askew."
...1 John 2:24-25 "let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son and in the Father." ...the apostle John required Christians to measure the teachings of their instructors by the apostolic teachings."
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It cannot be argued that Witness Lee and the Local Churches certainly have poor relationships with outsiders. Christian brethren have not only been the target of attacks from within Lee's writings, but also in the real world. I have heard stories of LC youth marching on Moody Bible College, telling them that "Babylon is falling", and we all know that the lawsuit launched against SCP was not the first and not the last LSM has cooked up. The authors have not cited any of these incidents - and I believe that's because they want the reader to look for themselves at their own teacher and his movement.
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I think these verse references are applicable and I think this forum is a testimony that we evaluate both the teaching and the practice.
That said I don't think it is an effective practice for the pot to be calling the kettle black. As for my personal experience there was no basis to say that we provoked a bad relationship with the Christians on my campus. The way in which this book was used on that campus would have been objectionable to anyone. So again, here they are pointing their finger at us and yet they have three fingers pointing back at themselves.