Quote:
Originally Posted by Freedom
My impression is that LC leadership doesn't necessarily deny that they are "ministry churches", however, they would take great offense if makes that claim about any LC. The way that I have seen them sidestep the issue is by taking about how "rich" Lee's ministry is, and saying that the saints feel that it is the only ministry worth using. It's a poor excuse for the real issue at hand. When the "One Publication" proclamation was made, I remember the BBs said something about how the saints knew that Lee's ministry had the right "flavor" and all other ministries (especially those that had co-existed in the LC) didn't have the right "flavor".
It's interesting to consider whether or not the exclusive use of Lee's ministry was really something that all the saints in the LC felt best about. If you took a vote, I don't know if that's what everyone really would have asked for, but I'm inclined to believe that most in the LC would go along with whatever is pushed by LC leadership. If the BB's were to start promoting a non-LSM ministry, those in the LC would probably go along with it. From the days before Lee's ministry was used exclusively, I've noticed that there is a common set of non-LSM books that many who were around in those days have. No doubt, those books were suggested reading material at a certain point in time. Therefore, I think it's deceptive for the BB's to simplify the issue by saying that Lee's ministry is the only ministry the saints feel good about.
Finally, if those in the LCM don't like the label "ministry churches", then the following questions need to be answered: 1) Why are there no recognized "local churches" that don't use Lee's ministry? and 2) Why has the LCM ceased to recognize certain churches that have stopped using Lee's ministry? The answers are clear, however, I have never heard those in the LCM give good answers to these types of questions. That is because they can't. They know the truth, but the promotion of a man and a ministry is more important.
|
Pre-church life I was given a copy of "The Economy of God" by WL and after reading a chapter or two my thought was "this guy sure repeats himself a lot" and gave it up as being too difficult to read to be useful. A few months later I asked my relative why he only read material by Lee and Nee and he said "I only have a limited time to read and only want to read the best stuff". OK, made sense to me to only spend your time on what you think is the best material...to each his own. After coming into the Lord's Recovery (LC-speak for "joining the LSM-controlled LC") I sensed that there was a strong undertow of opinion (but since it came from the elders it wasn't "opinion") that no other material was to be used in the prophecying or home meetings, or any other meeting where two or more saints were together. Oh, there were a few approved authors (long since dead) that you could acknowledge as having touched God's economy, but only in a superficial way. Something happened to my thought processes that made what I previously thought as redundant and boring writing to become what we all called "living". I think there were two parallel phenomena occurring in me. One, was a non-LSM-dependent revival of my love for Jesus fueled by a Spirit-led turning of my heart back to Jesus (I believe this could have occurred in any christian venue, but for some reason the Spirit chose for it to occur in a LC). A second thing I think was also occurring and that was a self-arousing neurotransmitter flush associated with my mind being able to "see" or "perceive" the connections among many of Lee's weird opinions, statements and beliefs. I think the best analogy is the satisfaction one feels when he learns the trick of solving a difficult puzzle or problem. Having learned the trick I could repeat it anytime when reading the ministry. From what I've read on this forum I think Awareness has the best understanding or at least explanation of this phenomenon.
I got the quote from another thread and posted my reply here because it is part of my testimony.