I love the local church

[SavedbyGrace]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

Sir, thank you for your candor. However, do you know what the Minister of the Age taught about denominations? Do you know what the Minister of the Age taught about organisations?

I'd much rather people call the local church an organisation than a cult. Most lay people do not have any idea what 'cult' means. They just know that it has bad connotations and refuse to give it a chance.

And, I do not subscribe to everything that Brother Lee says nor do I accept that he is 'the' minister of the age. I do not see the Bible having one minister. Paul worked along with Peter, John, James and other Apostles.

I agree with brother Lee that denominations are bad. But, it seems that it cannot be helped. The good thing, IMHO, is that the local churches have a rich word, though others in this forum may not agree.

[TLFisher]

Originally Posted by SavedbyGrace

I agree with brother Lee that denominations are bad. But, it seems that it cannot be helped. The good thing, IMHO, is that the local churches have a rich word, though others in this forum may not agree.

I agree with what you said in a previous post....about practices. Having said that, it is because of practices the local churches exemplify if not denominational characteristics, then sectarian characteristics. For the most part, yes there is a rich word being spoken. Problem is the rich word doesn't carry over into local church practices.
A prime example is what afaithfulword.org published about quarantines.

[ToGodAlone]

Originally Posted by SavedbyGrace

I agree with brother Lee that denominations are bad. But, it seems that it cannot be helped. The good thing, IMHO, is that the local churches have a rich word, though others in this forum may not agree.

If denominations are bad then the LRC has much to improve upon. To me it seems like they are no more than the denominations they themselves claim to reject.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by SavedbyGrace

I'd much rather people call the local church an organisation than a cult. Most lay people do not have any idea what 'cult' means. They just know that it has bad connotations and refuse to give it a chance.

And, I do not subscribe to everything that Brother Lee says nor do I accept that he is 'the' minister of the age. I do not see the Bible having one minister. Paul worked along with Peter, John, James and other Apostles.

I agree with brother Lee that denominations are bad. But, it seems that it cannot be helped. The good thing, IMHO, is that the local churches have a rich word, though others in this forum may not agree.

I would rather call the Recovery just another denomination, because it fits the description of a denomination in every way. The most outstanding characteristic of a denomination is its controlling headquarters. In this regard, I agree with Brother Lee that denominations are bad. The Recovery has just become one of the more obnoxious denominations, condemning all other Christians, and boasting in all their own "riches."

Having an abundance of deep-sounding doctrines, however, does not provide the local churches with a "rich word."

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by SavedbyGrace

I'd much rather people call the local church an organisation than a cult. Most lay people do not have any idea what 'cult' means. They just know that it has bad connotations and refuse to give it a chance.

And, I do not subscribe to everything that Brother Lee says nor do I accept that he is 'the' minister of the age. I do not see the Bible having one minister. Paul worked along with Peter, John, James and other Apostles.

I agree with brother Lee that denominations are bad. But, it seems that it cannot be helped. The good thing, IMHO, is that the local churches have a rich word, though others in this forum may not agree.

I'm glad you don't buy into the idea that Witness Lee succeeded Watchman Nee as the "minister of the age", and that you feel the freedom to say this.

I'll let you know a little about where I'm coming from on this, I grew up learning about the "minister of the age", the "ministry of the age", the "apostles' teaching", etc. Ron Kangas and others told us that we can't "pick and choose" from the ministry of the age. They spoke about the importance of using the "proper utterance", which I believe has to do with using the same vocabulary the man Witness Lee used.

But more than this, I grew up in a church that claimed to be separate from what it called "Christianity". We were us, and words like "Christianity", "the denominations", "Christendom", all referred to the big, bad religious system -- them. Even local "non-denominational" and "community churches" were labeled as "denominational" -- the minister of the age devoted messages to explaining how "non-denominational" churches are really "denominations"!

But I think you know all this. To me, this attitude is a big problem. For me personally, it really disgusts me that I spent most of my life buying into this kind of attitude.