Quote:
Originally Posted by Nell
Coming soon! “Ministry Meetings” which would be shared, not in the meeting hall, but in a nearby rented facility. In Austin the meetings were held in a community room of a nearby shopping mall, near the rented hall in north Austin. George Whitington (the “most leading brother”) shared all the messages which were called the “Life Study of Genesis”. Each message later came out in booklet form and sold for $.25 each.
We were told that “the ministry” belonged to Witness Lee. It was HIS ministry and he could handle it any way he wanted because it belonged to him. The “ministry meetings” were NOT church meetings and were therefore NOT to be shared in the church meeting hall/s. The ministry was “for the church”. The church was not “for the ministry.” This was shared several times and the leadership in Austin was adamant that these “ministry meetings” should not be considered church meetings...hence the offsite location. The “ministry” was a help to the church, but was NOT the church.
Someone who was in Austin might recall, but I believe it was about the time that Austin bought its current property on S. Congress Ave. and built a hall that the next change occurred. The message was something like “Oh. Never mind. The ministry meetings will no longer be held offsite but brought in to the church meeting hall.” I guess the unspoken was that the church and the ministry of WL are one in the same. The hall in Anaheim on West Ball Road was built with volunteer labor from all over the globe. The church met in this hall and the Living Stream Ministry presses downstairs began to roll out books, starting with Life Study of Genesis booklets.
Nell
|
Sounds like Don Looper was one in charge in Austin and being very careful with the idea of Ministry Stations and their influence on localities and local leadership. Ministry stations began in January 1974. And, in 1986 brother Lee was talking about Gideon and his leadership of 300 men. In response, this was written in Deviating from the Path in the Lord's Recovery.
"Gideon only needed three hundred men and the rest could go home. This was the spirit of “the Lord's new move”. There was to be "no uncertain sounding of the trumpet" for the army to follow with Brother Lee as its unique leader. He had the burden to train this army to get into the truths of God's New Testament and propagate them throughout the earth.
"Three hundred men had a special oneness with Gideon. This special oneness was essentially different from the common oneness of the nation of Israel. In the same way, Witness Lee called for an army of followers, pointing out that “those who followed Gideon to fight against the Philistines defeated them and rescued the entire nation of Israel”. He spoke the following clear and important word about this special oneness.
"Whether or not a certain church takes the ministry does not decide whether that church is a genuine local church. The title of this message does not say “no uncertain sounding of the trumpet in the Lord’s recovery” but “in the Lord’s ministry.” I am not talking about something in the Lord’s recovery, but I am talking about the ministry…. The ministry is altogether filled up with a fighting spirit. I do not control any church. All the saints who have left the denominations, the divisive sects, and stand on the proper ground are a local church in their locality. They can express their opinions, but they may have nothing to do with this ministry. (Elders’ Training, Book 7: One Accord for the Lord’s Move, pp. 81-82)
The Work and the Church Mixed
"In the new way, however, the work and the church became mixed, or blurred. The one trumpet in the Lord’s ministry became the one trumpet in the Lord’s recovery. The special oneness with a ministry became THE ONENESS in the recovery. This surely changed the nature of the recovery and became the underpinning for a new center of focus in all the churches – THE MINISTRY. That focus led to division and the loss of hundreds of saints in the 1980s. (Deviating from the Path, 2008)