Quote:
Originally Posted by aron
If God's economy per Witness Lee was what Paul meant in 1 Timothy 1, wouldn't there be some explanation by Paul corroborating this? Instead it was conceptual fabrication by WL..... "eating the processed and consummated Triune God to become God in life and nature."
WL made his idea the cornerstone of his ministry, but if Paul did likewise, he surely didn't do so in writing.
|
I'd like to bring forward a comment I made on another thread. But I was already off topic, so will continue here.
Quote:
Originally Posted by aron
... the burden of proof is on Witness Lee to show that "God's economy" was what he said it was. Where does Paul or Jesus or anyone say "God's economy is this Processed Triune God and spiritual dispensing"? No, it was stitched together out of disparate pictures and types.
I only offer my alternative as a reply to one who says, "Well, what else could it possibly be?" It could be something like what I have briefly outlined. Or it could be something else. But there's no proof that it was what Lee said it was. And Lee's version was self-oriented, which makes me doubly suspicious. My version is more closely aligned with the great command "Love thy neighbor as thyself". As are all the examples which I cited above.
|
My critique of the WL model of "God's economy is threefold: first that it has no basis - nowhere did Paul say, "God's economy is 'X'" and WL continued or fleshed this out. No, WL simply said, "God's economy is 'X'" and fleshed out his interpretation with various homespun analogies. Man is like a water bottle. Made to be filled. Man is like a glove, needs a hand inside. All these analogies may have some merit but I wouldn't build doctrine on it.
Second is that it gets the believer to focus on self. "Am I going to make it" was the watchword. First they start out with your "enjoyment" and then they go to anxiety, which can only be relieved (temporarily) by succumbing to ministry machinations. You are set up for a dysfunctional co-dependent relationship.
Third, to hold it together it seemed that Lee had to pan great swaths of scripture as "low" and "dead works" etc, which seem to include works by Jesus and Paul. See my previous posts.
My advocacy of an entirely different 'economy' which I encapsulate in Galatians 2:10 -- "They (the Jerusalem elders) asked me to remember the poor, which I was eager to do" -- is based on three things. First, it better aligns with the mass of scripture, both OT and NT. So both the apostle to the Jews (Peter) and the apostle to the gentiles (Paul) agreed that this was a desirable aim, and one sees Paul carry this out, in detail, in his epistles and the Acts.
Second, it lines up better with the Great Command: "Love thy neighbor as thyself" and not focus on your own things.
Third, my experience, however tentative and fraught with failure, bears this out. When I was in the LC, I got euphoric rush hollering, "OHHH Loooooord Jeeeeezusss!!" with the crowd. But eventually I found myself with the same issues I came in with. The elders didn't want to deal with me. So I left. Then followed the proverbial 'wilderness' experience. One day, I had an epiphany -- I was here to serve others. God gave me the Servant Heart of Jesus. Suddenly I realized that I was here, not for myself, but to serve others. It completely transformed me. Suddenly everything changed. And as I began to focus my energies to care for others, God began, slowly and fitfully, to heal me.
As long as I was oriented on self - "making it" - I had misery and discontent. As soon as I found someone to minister to,
not caring for any return, I felt the Spirit come alongside. Occasionally I still call "Oh Lord" but it's the doing that really matters. It is truly better to give than to receive.
And to me, that is God's economy.
2 Cor 8:15 as it is written: "The one who gathered much did not have too much, and the one who gathered little did not have too little."
Luke 6:38 "Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."