[aron]

Originally Posted by Amcasci

Yes...no doubt in my mind that Lee preached another Jesus. Galatians is indeed central in this discussion. What was the heresy? It was that the obedient life, suffering and death of Jesus is necessary but is only the jumping off point for bigger things. It is not enough to trust in Him alone, you must add something to this Jesus in order to be a first class Christian. In the Galaian context it was that one must also become a Jew to be a first class Christian. A gentile converted by Paul needed to become complete by being Jewish. Lee and so many others in holiness and deeper life mode see the work of Jesus as a necessary jumping off point to something greater. In Lees case it is the local ground, membership in the local church, and thus being an overcomer. In holiness movements it is to be "sanctified" which is taught to be something different from being justified in christ. In Pentecostalism it is speaking in tongues and on it goes. It is the Roman Catholic error all over again. Christ plus something else equals a higher level of Christianity. The rest of us are just "saved" but we will suffer the loss of the 1000 year millennial thing.

The result guilt, arrogance, sectarianism...those who buy into this two tiered faith will always be in doubt about where they stand with christ. It is hard work being an overcomer. You will always wonder if indeed you're an overcomer even if you're in the movement.

Those of us who are only "saved" must do our 1000 year purgatory.

Again I say it is Rome all over again. In roman theology Christs work takes away original sin and now that you are back to a neutral condition, except for a little concupiscence, you must work together with Christ to be justified. Since you will not likely make it, there is purgatory as an ironic safety net.
This is another Jesus just as Lee has another Jesus. Anyone can be saved but only the few, the brave and the local church adherents will be in ..

This is worth bringing forward, because Amcasci is referencing the argument for being "God's best" that I see Trapped mentioning.

Originally Posted by Trapped

I know this is anecdotal, but it is, much to my utter depression, absolutely my experience in the local church. This is from "growing up in God's best", and being "in the center of God's move on the earth". I was cheated out of years and years of a happier life, and moreover I was cheated out of years of a positive relationship with the Lord.

The case against the gospel of Nee & Lee, in this vein, is twofold: first that one must add some extra "holiness" to make it. So you get a two-tiered system, of 'overcomers' and the 'just Christian' folks who only sit quietly in the pew and hear defective "low gospel" messages on Sunday morning. In this case Nee was affected by Keswick and the continental mysticism; through Nee, we got a mystical, subjective Christ. But this subjectivism was probably heavily distorted by the fallen human soul. (I think the operative question is - how deeply? How to measure how deeply? Can only God make this assessment, ultimately?)

Second issue, and related, is that Jesus taught that you should take the least place, and consider yourself "less than" your peers; let God elevate you in due time. Don't be presumptuous for some pride of place that sin may yet defeat you.

Consider, for example, the supposed "apostle of the age" who put his admittedly nonspiritual son in charge of the ministry business affairs, who ran the local churches with an iron fist, and when wrong-doing was discovered, it was covered over and involved parties and witnesses were either whitewashed, shipped out of town, or black-balled and expelled - so the fruit of this teaching is seen, with pride of place giving way to egregious ongoing sins. The subjective "holiness" folks ironically get the least transformation (at least that is what it looks like from the outside)

Lee, who took care to call Christianity "deformed" and "darkened" and "satanic" and "Christless" - and of course he and the Little Flock/Local Church were not - now gets lumped in with the "different gospel" folks - the pseudo Christian groups like the JWs and LDS and SDA. Whether or not this is objectively provable or not, I think that's what we see Amcasci presenting.(And it's behind the complaint against Nee & Lee on the Faith Saves website that recently Ohio queried about. . . about where Nee went to Keswick with Miss Fischbacher).