Responsible Brothers
Protect the Church from Death
In that gathering of leaders in Ambato, Ecuador, 2008, Ron Kangas said, “This meeting is for responsible brothers, and I assume you understand yourself to be a responsible brother. What are you responsible for? Well one thing is to protect the church from death. The Lord said the gates of Hades will not prevail, but that means they will attack. If you don’t know life and death, how can you protect the church?
Ron, this should be my last year, if not my last week, of striving to bring attention to the truth of our church history and the major sources of the spreading of death among us. You do not recognize my work of 12 years as legitimate and true but state rather that my writings spread death and are therefore of the devil (Heb. 2:14).
It is not that my writings spread death, but they certainly tell the story of the spreading of death and the "agents of Satan" responsible for the spreading. You, in fact, unwittingly, are one of those agents. Andrew Yu is another. And, of course, Philip Lee was one with Satan as the LSM office manager, and LSM itself joined forces with Satan to make havoc in the churches and also make sure Philip and LSM were kept out of local church history books, thus completing their cover-up of Philip Lee and LSM’s major role in causing division.
You remember this, Ron, do you not, the dalliance that elders and co-workers had with the devil and Philip Lee? Both were welcomed into the church with wide open arms in the era when the churches began (1974) to align themselves with “the office”, and become ministry-centered churches under Witness Lee. (Refer to Appendix 1)
Dalliance with the Devil
Besides his usurpations of elders, his violations of principles of oneness in the Body of Christ, and the exercise of his evil temper around the saints, Philip Lee was an immoral, fleshly, and fleshy person acting as manager of LSM, with top elders and co-workers answering to him, and coming under his sway and sphere of influence. His relationship with the elders corrupted them. His relationship with sisters in LSM corrupted them. It was a huge mistake to hire him. It was also a huge mistake not to fire him sooner. His tandem leadership relationship with his father damaged Brother Lee and spread corruption throughout the whole recovery. Benson Phillips and Ray Graver followed this person and strongly and persistently encouraged other leaders to do the same.
Witness Lee’s hiring of his own non-spiritual son and his reluctance to fire him amid growing confirmed reports of his moral violations and his interferences in the churches was both bizarre and inexplicable, bringing immorality into the office, chaos into the church in Anaheim, corruption into the churches, and major division into the recovery.
But you won’t hear about this in official LSM annals. All this is missing from the records, as the cover-ups and disingenuous reporting prevail to this day in the churches.
Yet, voices of truth do speak. John So sums up the difficulties of conscience in dealing with the problem of Brother Lee and his son during their tandem leadership reign in the churches, as John put the concerns of brothers in Europe into print in a letter to Brother Lee, thereby avoiding the dalliance with the devil and Philip Lee that others succumbed to in the Lord’s recovery.
link to copy of original
LETTER OF DISASSOCIATION
http://www.unfaithfulwitness.org/Eur...Depart1989.pdf
“Dear brother Witness Lee,
It has come to our attention recently through several witnesses that gross immorality and some other sins mentioned in 1 Corinthians 5:11 have been committed by your son Philip Lee (who is identified as your Ministry Office) on more than one occasion over a long period of time. This deeply disturbs us. It grieves us even more that you and some of your close co-workers were aware of the situation and yet not only tolerated it but covered it up. What is worse is that, while this was happening, you and your co-workers were promoting and exalting him to the extent that he was able to intervene in the churches’ affairs in recent years. The peak of this promotion was evident at your elders’ training in Taipei in June 1987. Some of your co-workers were not only themselves under the influence and control of Philip Lee, but were also openly bringing elders and young people of many local churches to come under the same influence and control of Philip Lee in your name and for your sake. The five brothers whom you and your Office sent to Europe in your place in May 1986 were trying to do the same here. Our young people who went to your training in Taipei have also testified of the same.
Before God, before the brothers and sisters in the local churches, before the Christian public, and for the sake of the Lord’s testimony, we are compelled by our conscience to fully disassociate ourselves from such sins and behaviour in your work.”
(the signatures of twenty-one brothers from nine churches in Europe who withdrew from the recovery on September 17, 1989 are on the original letter.)
Speaking Up or Covering Up
Responsible Brothers speak up instead of cover-up. They speak up to protect the church; they do not cover up to protect a man and a ministry. John So spoke up to protect the church, as did Bill Mallon in statements in his letter to Brother Lee, saying, “I believe that a kind of blind loyalty has been promoted, which issues into a propensity to obstruct truthfulness and single hearted faithfulness. Blind loyalty is very much of the soulish, natural life. It blinds us to honesty and reality, leads us down a narrow and false pathway, and protects our self serving ambitions from challenge and criticism.”
But Ron Kangas, as a head of a movement for a man and a ministry that began in 1974, deems all such fellowship as death and will not speak up but only cover-up, saying to those men who read such writings,
“Why do you need to know so much?"
Appendix 1
Former well-respected elder from Texas speaks out on the critical juncture the churches came to in 1974 that changed the direction and nature of the recovery.
Don Rutledge ~ In January 1974 Witness Lee and Max Rapaport launched the movement. It was boldly declared that the churches would use WL as the exclusive source of teaching and MR would serve as the coordinator to bring the various churches with their elders into a unified movement. Ministry stations began in several key cities where local brothers repeated Brother Lee's message each week that was given in Anaheim. The official list of men who could give conferences was announced. From that time on, the individual churches would be called to account if they were moving “independently.” In addition to coordinating the elders and churches to act in a single direction, MR was charged to assist the various churches to be more effective with gospel preaching and outreach. Thus the Movement was launched.
MR began to travel and meet with the churches and in particular with the elders. He began to sort out the elders. Those who would not be good movement men were pushed aside if possible or moved somewhere where they would be out of the way. On several occasions MR told me how he was working to bring the elders and churches into one coordination for the purpose of carrying out the burden of WL. He told me several times that only he could “put the whole thing together.” After he left, he told the elders in Denver that the elders and WL would ask him to return because only “he could put the whole thing together.”
Of course I can give great detail regarding the above but will save that for another time. I am not attempting to call into question the motives of WL or of MR. WL did some very good teaching during this time. MR did some very good gospel work during this time. But what did happen is the nature of the various “local churches” changed from being local in administration and spontaneous in actions to being directed from a center with clear administrative leaders and directors.
Things were definitely not the same. I have heard some in the Mid-West say “the time of Blessing had passed.” Some have said we changed our vision or words to that effect. Some have said the moving of the Spirit left. Some said teaching and doctrine and methods replaced life.
It was this time, the time of becoming a movement that opened the door to Philip Lee and set the stage for the current BBs. This time ended with a split between WL and MR. It was a power struggle not a matter of Philip Lee’s unrighteousness. MR had his followers and WL had his. WL won out.
After the split with MR, there was a pause in the development of the movement. WL began again to start up the movement consolidation in 1981. He bought property in Irving Texas and began making plans to strengthen the movement.
By 1984 the first round of law suits had been won. WL declared that the boulders were off the road and the “Lord’s Recovery” could proceed. 1986 put the final pieces in place. The movement looked nothing like the early days of Elden Hall, Ohio, the Northwest or Texas or other places.
Appendix 2
Handling Matters In House in the Local Churches 2008
Hello everyone,
I had to “laugh” when an elder told a brother recently that I should have handled matters of our past “in house” and not publicly on the internet. This brother evidently doesn’t understand that there is no such thing as handling matters “in house”. It has been over seven years since I initially presented my burden “in house” about matters of our past and was placed in shackles as a result. The shackles remain to this day.
There was no fellowship then, and there is none now. The brothers were afraid because I put the matters of my concern in print; albeit, I did so seeking first their fellowship over the points made in the book.
I provided six hard copies to elders for their serious contemplation and did the same with six other saints – all for sake of having fellowship “in house”.
My thought was to build a bridge of communication to the many that left the churches. When I found that I was on my own with this idea and the brothers were not going to be supportive, (“jailing” me instead), I sent out copies to others by email. Later, after acquiring much more understanding of the facts of local church history, and asking the brothers for fellowship along the way and being ignored, I placed pertinent information in abundance on the internet that would help leaders and other saints, past and present, understand local church history according to facts, not the myths and fabrications of LSM lore.
(I said earlier I had to “laugh”; more accurately I was mainly incensed about the elder's statement about keeping matters "in house". Leading brothers in the churches don’t get facts straight and never will as long as they remain closed to them and regard their "one accord" even above truth.
The lies and misrepresentations continue in the recovery as blind brothers follow the lead of other blind brothers in avoiding forthright dealings with serious unrighteous matters of our local church history.)
Here is my initial letter to Dan Towle. (I could not have been more naïve, even after being warned about the impenetrable wall I would encounter addressing such brothers. I genuinely thought I could find men with a conscience in the leadership. With regard to my motive, intention, and purity in this cause, I was like a lamb. A very dumb lamb, on his way to the slaughter.)
"Dear Dan, (January 28, 2001)
I have written a little book for the sake of fellowship, mainly with leading ones, concerning our past sixteen-year history of the new way. I think this period of time in the Lord’s recovery warrants our careful study of both the benefits and the costs to the church in what was such a highly controversial move among us in those beginning years.
I wanted to come to you because I feel it is safe to do so. If I am inaccurate or unfair in some way, perhaps you are the most qualified one to catch me that I could either make an adjustment or terminate the proposed fellowship.
I hope we can have a good, thorough, and upright fellowship over this booklet called In the Wake of the New Way, while remembering the Lord’s prayer ‘that they all may be one’ and the repeated petitions from our brother Lee, not only to heed the trumpet call for the Lord’s new move, but also to respond to the call for the rendering of care to every member for the building up of the Body in love….
I would welcome your phone call or e-mail message at ………… and don’t intend for this booklet to be widespread; rather, I hope that ones who do receive it could do so in the Lord, with a holy regard and respect given to those who left the recovery, and a godly consideration rendered to those who remain, but who are in need of more significant care...."
This was only the first of many attempts to handle matters “in house” with several brothers over a seven-year period. At my three-year point, the hidden matters of our history spilled over to the internet, only after the brothers took issue with Harvest House about a book they felt was defamatory. I then presented our history on the internet as a parallel story and as our own far more serious case of defamation. Since there was NO FELLOWSHIP “in house” and since I was continuing to be held in a disciplinary mode, (in shackles provided by leaders in Bellevue and Seattle), I changed my approach.
I have several documents showing these attempts at fellowship. What a misrepresentation for an elder to say that I should have handled things “in house”. It could not be done! Others have also experienced the impossibility of having genuine fellowship with most leaders in the local churches. Eventually, you must just proclaim. And, this is what I have done. And, all the time with the hope for the cooperation, meaningful dialogue, and genuine mutual fellowship of local church leaders.
08-30-
2008