[Indiana]

Unto Him,

Thanks for sharing your concern.

Don Rutledge (Hope) at least received drafts of this book, and did not indicate any problem he had with my including his writing on Church History in the book. He asked me to edit his writing, which I did in late 2007 and early 2008. With his permission I started the thread and posted his first chapter onto the Bereans forum Feb 2008. I had edited the second chapter and it was initially placed on Matt Anderson's website then onto the forum, perhaps by Matt. Both chapters were transferred later in 2008 to your forum when everyone was moving to it. Here is the first post on Don's history,

Don Rutledge on the History of the Local Churches in the U. S.

"His Glory Broke Upon us when we saw HIM in the church"

This former well-reputed elder from Dallas, Texas, among other places, has been preserved by the Lord to speak the truth concerning the blessing, the glory, and the marvelous beginning the Lord had in His recovery in the U.S. and also what the factors have been leading to a loss of blessing and testimony in the local churches since 1974.

Many could attest to the earlier years in the church life being “joy unspeakable and full of glory”, with focus on the enjoyment of Christ in all His riches for the building up of the church, (His Body). New ones were simply added, even streaming into the churches at times. Migrations to other cities were the natural outflow and result of such an enjoyment and focus in the churches, for the cities and the earth. Nothing was forced.

Today, after having accumulated many hindering factors in the churches throughout the years, the churches haven’t had a natural outflow for migrations, a top sign of life and blessing, which we once had. And, we haven’t had it for over thirty-three years!

Brothers and sisters, do we have the will to understand why this is so and will we consider soberly the factors of blessing the churches once enjoyed; and the factors that led the churches to a loss of such blessing? We have that opportunity now, to make such a study.


Please link to Don's Book Chapter 1 for the Introduction and First Chapter of a book by Don Rutledge, which will be presented chapter by chapter as Don completes them. And, let us have some fellowship together in the Lord and before Him as responsible members of His Body, seeking Him, and our need for a proper understanding.


Steve Isitt
February 1, 2008
Last edited by Matt Anderson; 05-08-08 at 20:18.

Stevie is offline [They had to change my name to Stevie over there when that forum started mis-functioning.]

For the book on the Nee and Lee eras today on this current thread, I initially used a link to Don's church history, rather than printing it into my book, but Amazon needs at least 24 pages or they don't print. I don't mind my document being 12 pages. But they do. I said what I wanted to say in 12 pages, along with the two timelines of Nee and Lee (the pages of which are not counted by Amazon), and I had to add something and thought Don's history is a nice fitting piece of invaluable material to follow those timelines.

I refer to Don again and again in my writings because he is a breath of fresh air and a rare source for balanced truth-telling, which is my interest in being on the forum.

I hope we can focus on the content of the book I have posted here. There is a lot there, and a lot of thought and effort went into producing it since January, off and on, this year. Steve I. Dec 2014