Quote:
Originally Posted by Freedom
It is quite telling that LSM would claim that discernment is something other than what the word discernment is understood to mean. Obviously, what Ron speaks about is outright absurd. Out of curiosity, I took a moment to see what Nee had to say on the subject, and what I found was that he approached it a lot more subtly than Ron did:
Here Nee doesn't necessarily reject discernment of good and evil as being 'death' like Ron does, but Nee does insinuate that discernment of good and evil would be limited to those with "good minds", implying that it's too complicated for the average person. It's a subtle argument, because it fails to recognize the fact that many issues are not complicated. Just as much as we need to recognize good and evil we must also be willing to act accordingly. The latter is the difficult part, and probably where we actually tend to struggle.
Quite surprisingly, Nee then goes on to say that wisdom shouldn't be utilized to assist in knowing good and evil (because God supposedly has condemned wisdom). This directly contradicts the Word. We can and should utilize wisdom, and if we are lacking in that respect, it's as simple as asking for it:
James 1:5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
Towards the end of the excerpt, Nee moves his argument towards an esoteric "inner sense," which has since been relabeled as the "sense of life." I should say that I'm not against discernment in a prayerful way, but it the case of the LC, it is nothing more than an excuse to bypass common sense and solid principles. Of particular concern, Nee says "This is why sometimes we can conjure up no logical reason for opposing a certain teaching, yet in the very depth of our being arises a resistance." I find this to be highly objectionable. If a personal 'resistance' is to be the metric for discerning teachings, that throws everything else out the window. If I have a personal resistance to my alarm clock, does that mean that I can skip going to work? Of course not. It's a stupid example I know, but that illustrates how easy it is for things to get skewed with something 'inward' and esoteric comes into play. Frankly speaking, if someone says that they have a certain 'sense' about something, I'm not going to question it, but that does not mean it is something they should turn around and project on others.
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In my experience we need both knowledge/wisdom and the Spirit's leading, and they work together. Knowledge and wisdom give us the general parameters, and the Spirit does the fine tuning. We know, for example, to be humble and kind toward people we meet. That's a given, and we proceed that way in our daily lives. But as we are carrying out such standard behavior, the Spirit may lead us to say or do something more specific to the situation. We may be having a conversation with our neighbor, and feel led to offer to help him fix his fence. We probably wouldn't have even felt this leading if we hadn't held a general attitude of charity toward him in the first place.
So if we don't have the general standard behavior the Bible teaches us to maintain in our relationships and privately, then the Spirit cannot do such fine tuning. He can only try to rebuke us. It's like the difference between a horseman riding a fine show horse and riding a stupid mule.