Quote:
Originally Posted by Awoken
A person on my Facebook feed posted this rather striking quote from Witness Lee's "Life-Study of Job". I think this teaching deserves discussion, and I would especially like to hear from Lord's Recovery members/defenders of WL's theology about how they think this lines up with Scripture.
"To fear God and turn away from evil is not adequate, and actually this is not positive. The most positive thing is to express God. To express God is higher than fearing God and turning away from evil." (Witness Lee, Life-Study of Job, Message Two)
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Deuteronomy 17:18-20 "And it shall be, when he [the King] sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write him a copy of this law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites:
And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them:
That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to the right hand or the left: to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he, and his children, in the midst of Israel." (KJV)
17:19 says to "read therein.. fear.. keep.. do" Psalms 1 and 2 form a coherent pair showing that the "read-fear-keep-do" Deut 17 King was Jesus the Nazarene. Psalm 1 shows a man who reads and follows God's word scrupulously. Psalm 2 has this Obedient Man installed as the Anointed King, the Eternal Son of God, and who's Ruler of the kings of the earth. From this composite OT picture we see portrayed before us Jesus the Son of David, who read the law, feared God and kept the law (Matt 4:4), fulfilled the law (Luke 24:44; Gal 4:4) and fully expressed God. Because he obeyed, he therefore expressed God perfectly ("when you see me, you see the Father"), and the Father raised him to glory (cf Psa 18:20-24). Jesus is our King High Priest, perfected forever, who always lives to intercede for us. When we read Deuteronomy 17, Psalms 1 and 2, we have this composite picture before us, that shows our King in the gospels, in the epistle to the Hebrews, in Paul's letters.
WL said that Deuteronomy 17 was LC elders on the local ground who enjoyed
RecV and footnotes, Psalm 1 was vain because, "nobody can obey God", and Psalm 2 was of course Jesus, because NT citations make that unavoidably clear. WL presented an incoherent exegetical stew if you ask me. Those three chapters rather show that Jesus feared God his Father and obeyed God's commands, and thereby expressed God. Jesus was and forever remains the Incarnate Word. Our faith is in him, in his holy fear, his obedience, his expression. Did WL express God when he kept PL in charge after his wrong-doing, and the threat to church members was exposed? No, and I'm probably no better. Jesus is the One who expressed God. Look to him, and live. Any other considerations are vain.