Quote:
Originally Posted by aron
Re: Brother Lee Not Open for Fellowship
...why disparage the testimonies? Why reject Peter, James, Jude, Job, and the Psalms? Because they don't support the narrow, Paul-centric "God's New Testament economy" template that was supposedly the culmination of the present recovered truth. And eventually you get the discouragement felt by Ingalls, Rutledge, and so many others...
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John had quoted Psalm 69 in the second chapter of his gospel: "Zeal of Thy (the Father's) house has eaten Me (Jesus) up." The coming Messiah is revealed in the Psalms, according to the NT revelation. A true and righteous man, once briefly shadowed in the Psalmist but eventually fully expressed in the incarnated Son of God.
Now, do you suppose that only that one verse in question references the coming Christ? That the rest of the chapter are the words of a vain, soulish man who is trying to be good? And that the same rule applies in John 19:36 with reference to Psalm 34? And so on and so on?
Do you suppose that the noble Berean Jews in Acts 17, when examining the scriptures, only found those cited verses, and concluded that the rest were fallen concepts? Why not? They had the New Testament ministry of Paul right in front of them, right? Why not conclude, a la Lee, that the bulk of the text in question was merely natural, not revelatory of Christ?
Pity for them that they only had Paul and not the "rich ministry of Witness Lee". They wouldn't have wasted their time "eagerly examining the scriptures every day" because Lee would have saved them from all of that.
What we see here is a feedback loop. The leadership of Lee was unquestionable. John Ingalls testimony, and others' makes this clear. So Lee could interpret the scriptures any way he saw fit, and nobody could raise a hand and say, "Excuse me, sir, it says here..." If you did that you were called "rebellious" and "negative" and when you came to the next meeting you'd find, like Ingalls, that your seat had been filled by someone more "positive".
And, Lee's teachings showed Paul as the culmination of all ministry (never mind that once Paul had departed, we could still see John, and better yet, functioning as a
prophet [Rev 1:3, 22:18]). All Lee had to do was "imitate Paul" and voila, he had the ministry of the age.
So Lee controlled the scriptural understanding, and the scriptural understanding (per Lee) said that to maintain good order in the church he must be the lonely guy at the top, and accountable only to God. It's tough at the top, but I guess someone has to do it. Right?