"Against the Tide" by Angus Kinnear

[OBW]

First, and aside. I think that maybe "Against the Tide" was an appropriate title since it now appears that Nee's goal was not something so truly spiritual, but rather something that was different from the foreign mission boards and denominational HQs. Something unique. Never seen before.

Should all be red flags.

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For me, I had already begun to see the theological flaws in Nee's writings. I did not need to have his personal life reexamined in such a severe way to start that process.

But as that is now happening, I think that (once again) some of the warnings of Paul come to mind. If you see evidence of self-serving in living, don't even listen to them teach. If they are coming with flowery words designed to tug at your heart, question it even harder. If they are caught in sin, reject them.

I don't think that Paul was simply trying to get rid of people whose living made a lie of the gospel. He was rejecting the very idea that what they said could be of value. And that is one of the things that so bothers me about those of us who continue to talk about how much Nee was gifted and had wisdom. I think that Paul would have disagreed. He would have said to reject them outright. He would have considered their error to undermine and negate anything that might have been true.

"Reject them. Refuse them. Don't keep reading their books. They were lying to you all along. You'll never figure out where truth ends and error begins. So don't bother."

And I think that pointing to the flawed leaders of Israel in the past — David being among the most notable — there is nothing in the NT record that suggests that such a dichotomy would be allowed in leadership.

David is an excellent example of how it is that we may have such a heart of God and still be so unrighteous in our living. But David always repented — often with bitter tears and terrible consequences. And he did it in the public's eye, not just in private. (I sometimes think that Jimmy Swaggert was trying to play David when he did that tearful confession of his sin on TV. But David took his lumps. Swaggert was trying to play to the public's sympathies as he thumbed his nose at the hierarchy of his denomination (Assemblies of God, at the time) and refused to step down — even for a time.)

But in the NT scheme, Paul advised that teachers who do these things are to be rejected (as teachers, not necessarily as believers — not necessarily some kind of excommunication). Elders were to be made examples of, not swept under the rug like Lee's version of Noah's sons backing into the tent with a blanket to cover their father.

But without any suspicion of wrongdoing, Nee's words were already failing in terms of rightly handling the Word or truth. Add to it the almost overwhelming evidence of some serious sins and we shouldn't even be discussing his words. Paul's more weighty words should have turned us from them. We should have reburied them in the pit of pseudo-Christianity from which Nee dug them.

Maybe it's time for an old-fashioned burning. At least a theoretical burning. Discard the respect. Don't read another page unless it is to help someone see the errors of his teachings. I'm sure that Paul would have discouraged the keeping of any scrolls of teaching from the "refused" ones.

If there is anything that is truly worthwhile in any of Nee's or Lee's writings, let a group of respected Biblical scholars do the dirty work of finding it. Let them publish it void of the chaff of culture and national pride that set the whole Little Flock and Local Church movement in motion. Without the arrogance of self-proclaimed oracles and unique ministers of the age.

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Stepped on a few more toes. Probably a few more enemies. Alas, that seems to be my plight.