[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Gubei

The case of South Korea gives us a very meaningful insights surrounding “only apostles can appoint elders principle”. At first sight, this principle sounded very convincing and plausible to me 30 years ago, but as time went by, I realized that in reality this principle cannot be applied as intended, because in order to strictly abide by this principle we first have to trace back to the qualification of anyone’s apostleship which usually leads us to nowhere. In case of Seoul, who was “the” apostle? Mr. Kown (also called Mr. Wang)?, Mr. Y? Mr. S? WL? AY? RK?

Regarding Nee's teaching, based on Acts 14.23 and Titus 1.5, the most we can conclude is that it happened. The Bible described what happened, yet never prescribed that it must happen this way. There is no teaching that demands that the apostle alone can appoint elders.

This errant teaching can only work for initial church startups. What happens when the original apostle passes away? What about the subsequent centuries? Are we then at the mercy of self-appointed apostles who appoint elders whose only qualification is loyalty to headquarters? Unfortunately that has happened far too often. Yet the Bible never tells us that the church belongs to the apostles, rather the church is of God and is of the saints.

Originally Posted by Gubei

In my business office, one senior used to ask his juniors jokingly “what is a leader?”. There were a lot of answers from the juniors like a guy with vision for business prosperity, a guy who knows well how to operate, a guy who has a charisma etc… he just listened to those, and finally gave us his answer. “A leader is the guy who has his followers”. An analogy is possible with apostleship. Apostleship needs those who accept it.

And this is why LSM manipulates LC elders and workers. I watched many gifted brothers in the LC's get drafted as workers, and then are forced to migrate away from their home church. This creates a ministry "vacuum" in that church, that only LSM can fill. Then LSM will send their workers to that church to minister. This is how these false apostles create needy "followers" in these LC's.

Originally Posted by Gubei

Then, why was it possible for AY to have appointed elders in Seoul? In fact, even WL didn’t dare to do that when he was alive.
An possible explanation I can conjecture, and I think this is most likely according to my observation and other sources, is that AY could behave like an apostle because there are some Korean leading brothers who aimed at “political benefit” when they admire AY as an apostle. In return, the admirers’ control power in Korea grew strong accordingly. In worst case, this is a dark bargain, and in a moderate case, this is irresponsible power struggle, at best?... might be ignorance of the truth and thoughtlessness.

You are right. LSM can make promises to certain local leaders. Let's be honest, some elders are vulnerable to bribes of various kinds.

Before Titus Chu was quarantined, two leaders in Chicago of the Midwest region in the USA were "bribed" by the blendeds at LSM. Money was given to them in order to pay for their meeting hall expansion. They compromised the truth for financial gain. Then they agreed to turn on Titus Chu, and agree with the evil quarantine. Dirty politics at its worst.