James Barber - History of Witness Lee

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Freedom

Ohio referred to James as someone full of zeal. After I listened to the recording, that is the view of James that I walked away with. Ultimately, extreme personalities are what it takes to create a movement like the LC. I'm not here to try to determine who to blame for the more bizarre aspects of the LC, but it took more than Lee to make it all happen. A lot has been said about the strong 'Texas' influence in the beginning of the LC. I think that was definitely a factor.

One brother, whom I knew in Cleveland and Columbus in the mid-70's, who took it on himself to "perfect" me, often would tell me about "those Texas brothers, who were 'absolutely one' with WL." From my earliest days, there was definitely an undercurrent of these more zealous brothers in the GLA, who had come to view TC and the GLA leadership with suspicion, as if they were "diluting Brother Lee's burden." Looking back, I do believe that Lee himself solicited this kind of fleshly behavior, with brothers around the country vying with one another for Lee's approval.

Most of the leaders in the region, however, saw this radical zeal exhibited in conferences and trainings, replete with endless winds and waves of fleshly movements accompanied by suspicions towards the "more reserved," and felt TC was like an "umbrella" to protect the region from all the storms and nonsense emanating from Anaheim. The real dilemma here was their inner "disconnect." TC had always conditioned them to believe that Lee's burden was pure and from the Lord, and it was always those around Lee who "messed things up." How could that be? Yet, that's how we all were. For years the GLA leaders operated under the paradigm, "WL good, BB bad."

James would say this was impossible,

"With the tongue we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made according to the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing. These things, my brothers, ought not to be so!

Does the spring of water, out of the same opening, gush forth both sweet and bitter? Can the fig tree, my brothers, produce olives, or a grapevine bear figs? So, neither can saltwater produce sweet water.

Is there anyone wise and understanding among you?" -- (James 3.9-13)

[Ohio]

This may give some insight as to how James felt before he died. Extracted from

http://www.laymansfellowship.com/pub...opleChange.pdf
Brent Barber
...A bigger unrighteousness which no one else has discussed is the fact that Philip Lee and the grandsons of Lee had fat Swiss bank accounts which were slush funds from the Living Stream. I know this because my dad told me directly. By the early 80's just before he died, my dad had grown so weary of Philip's shenanigans that he openly discussed it. I was living in Anaheim just before he died and he would stop off at my place when he came into town for the big "elder’s" conventions they had in those days.

He would rip into all the phony pretension and strutting around going on [per Philip]. He could not have been more bored and disinterested. He yucked it up with me a lot during that time and it was the only period when he was honest about everything. He died later that year. I know that he was severely disappointed and disillusoned at the way his dream had turned out. He saw it was a sham, but had nowhere else to go.

Did Brent write that article "People Change?"

[NewManLiving]

Brent's statements are just part of that article. The People change statements were made by Lee. There is also the entire Reconsideration of The Vision in that article which really should be reposted here in its entirety again. It is quite revealing about the whole foundation of the LSM enterprise. Not sure who submitted the article. Possibly Steve???

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Did Brent write that article "People Change?"

I am told that Indiana wrote this article.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Freedom

I am told that Indiana wrote this article.

Thanks, I guess I should have guessed him.

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by Ohio

One brother, whom I knew in Cleveland and Columbus in the mid-70's, who took it on himself to "perfect" me, often would tell me about "those Texas brothers, who were 'absolutely one' with WL."

As I have become aware of the Texas dynamics in the early days of the LC, it has helped me to better understand why the LC turned out the way that it did. Something that James mentioned is how so many of the Texas brothers knew each other at Wayland Baptist College. Apparently a large group of students came into the LC from this college. I think that this is an important detail in the formation of LC in the U.S.

It’s not every day that you convince a large group of students to drop their Southern Baptists affiliation and pick up something completely different. For whatever reasons James and Benson had the ability to make this happen, they could get the students reading Nee, and they could have their hand in Major Ian Thomas visiting the campus.

I think that James might have downplayed the amount of influence that he actually had at that campus, but it is not hard to put the pieces together. He was the one who introduced Benson to Nee/Lee. Obviously James easily fit into a leadership role, and had the type of personality that could influence people. I think that Benson was the zealous busybody who quickly became the example for everyone to follow. As I see it, the elephant in the room is the factor of personality at the roots of the LC. What Don R. has to say about Benson is very insightful (emphasis mine):

Originally Posted by Don Rutledge

Another practice he [Benson] had was to never be discouraged or downhearted…

Benson was very generous with his money and his possessions and his time. He never shirked from pulling his share of the load and then some. This was in spite of his physical limitations. At one point in the first few months in Houston, a brother learned of some box cars that needed to be loaded... Only Ray Graver could keep up with him as he labored furiously night after night loading the box cars. We were paid by the box car not by the hour. He became the acknowledged leader among us because of his character and ability to inspire others by his example.
…
Benson had an intensity that far exceeded any of the other brothers. He was always considering what was needed to establish and to build up the local churches.

I know that James moved to LA early on, but it seems that in the meantime, an intense atmosphere developed in Texas, those who were leaders raised a high bar than everyone needed to meet. It appears that zeal was projected onto others right from the very get-go. I don't condemn anyone for being zealous, but I do take issue when they expect others to match their self-made standard.

[Ohio]

It’s not every day that you convince a large group of students to drop their Southern Baptists affiliation and pick up something completely different. For whatever reasons James and Benson had the ability to make this happen, they could get the students reading Nee, and they could have their hand in Major Ian Thomas visiting the campus.

There was at that time a genuine move of the Spirit of God among millions of young people. I personally was saved at the tail end of this period.

When I hear or read about people's dismay at the LC stories from those days, I can only say that "things were different." American society as a whole was much more trusting towards other people. For example, I used to hitch hike home from high school every day, and always got good fast rides. I was never worried about a bad ride, especially in the middle of the day. Christians would get radically saved and then hitch out to a commune someone would tell them about. As soon as I met another Christian, I felt closer to them than my own family.

Jonestown had a tremendously negative impact upon all of America. Personally I feel it signaled the end of the move of the Spirit. Suspicion mounted towards Christians as potential cults. The war in Nam ended and racial tensions over MLK had subsided. Watergate made us all the more suspicious of politicians. Cheap drugs and free sex moved in to replace the joy of the holy Spirit.

[JJ]

Did anyone listening to James Barber's "history" notice how he talked about "the one flow", referring to Witness Lee's ministry in the 1960's and it being a continuation of Watchman Nee's ministry?

I recall such a concept being in the recovery literature from the very beginning.... "The Divine Stream".

It seems to me that thought just grew and grew until it caused us to totally loose sight of Jesus, the real source of any flow, choking out whatever flow we initially had. And, keeping "the flow" contained to just ourselves dammed off any outflow, and drowned us in the dead sea.

Has anyone done a critique of this thought?

I did a Bible Word search on the words stream and river, and didn't find support for the stream or river of God belonging to only one or two ministers of God. But, I'd like to hear from others on this.

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by JJ

Did anyone listening to James Barber's "history" notice how he talked about "the one flow", referring to Witness Lee's ministry in the 1960's and it being a continuation of Watchman Nee's ministry?

I recall such a concept being in the recovery literature from the very beginning.... "The Divine Stream".

It seems to me that thought just grew and grew until it caused us to totally loose sight of Jesus, the real source of any flow, choking out whatever flow we initially had. And, keeping "the flow" contained to just ourselves dammed off any outflow, and drowned us in the dead sea.

Has anyone done a critique of this thought?

I did a Bible Word search on the words stream and river, and didn't find support for the stream or river of God belonging to only one or two ministers of God. But, I'd like to hear from others on this.

Eph 4:4-6 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

I'm going to split this up into two posts. Regarding the matter of the one flow/stream, I don't see where they would have found that in the Word. What seems to be the case throughout LC history, is the tendency to try to simplify everything saying that it needs to be "one". "One flow", "one divine stream", etc. The verses above are frequently mentioned in the LC, and they like to refer to them as the seven "ones". The reason I make mention of this is because from what I've seen, LCers don't care much about what these "ones" actually are. For all they care, the verses can read something like "one, one, one..."

WL's logic was along the lines of since the word "one" occurs so many times, it shows how important "oneness" is. And they will talk about "oneness" all day long, but at the end of the day, they don't really care for what these verses actually talk about. If they really saw that there is "one Body", then they wouldn't dare to call only themselves the "one Body" and purposely separate themselves from everyone else. If they really saw that there is only one faith, then they wouldn't dare belittle and mock other Christians saying that they only believe in a "low gospel". None of this matters to those in the LC. These verses primarily serve to give them an excuse to emphasize their own set of "ones": one flow, one ministry, one publication, one trumpeting, etc. I'm still looking to see where these "ones" are to be found in the Bible. I haven't found them yet.

[Freedom]

Back on the subject of James' history, I also noticed the part where he went into the matter of the "one flow". It struck me as a bit odd, but I guess I didn't really think about it until now. What I find to be the most interesting is how James (and others) have tied LC history to these ideas like "one flow" or "one ministry". The more common perception of LC history might just involve the understanding of what everyone left behind and dropped to be a part of the LC. Some left the Southern Baptists, others left other affiliations. Seemingly that understanding should be sufficient for a LC history, right? Wrong!

Even from the beginning of the LC in the U.S., it was never completely about simply dropping denominational ties and coming together to meet as the church. There was the simultaneous issue of who they were following and what external affiliations were present. Since they were so busy criticizing hierarchy, central control, denominational ties, etc. they certainly couldn't have the appearance possessing such characteristics. Herein lies an interesting predicament. There was really only one thing distinguishing the early LC from other groups like those associated with TAS, and that was Nee's teaching on the ground of the church. Unless someone had fully bought into that teaching, the similarity between some of these groups meant that someone could have been a part of other groups and still got along with those under Nee/Lee. I have read that Lee got his "God's economy" teaching from Sparks. At one point in time Lee had been willing to share the stage with Sparks.

Over time, I think Lee started wanting to find ways to distinguish himself from other groups that he had much in common with. That's where the whole idea of him being Nee's "continuation" is rooted. He wanted to find a way to discredit others. Part of that came by developing these notions of their only being "one flow" or "one ministry" and it came to be that only what Lee was doing was the "one ministry" and "one flow".

He got everyone's guard down by claiming that he was only continuing Nee's ministry (a ministry that many already trusted). It couldn't have been a more convenient tool for WL, because everyone bought into it. And it wasn't even until the late 80's and mid-2000's that everyone got to see how ugly this teaching really was. As it turns out, "one flow" wasn't enough. They went so far as to insist on one publication. Things just got narrower and narrower over time. It used to be that they could work with those who didn't even share the sentiment on the ground of the church. Now they can't work with someone who doesn't choose to exclusively utilize LSM publications.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by JJ

Did anyone listening to James Barber's "history" notice how he talked about "the one flow", referring to Witness Lee's ministry in the 1960's and it being a continuation of Watchman Nee's ministry?

I recall such a concept being in the recovery literature from the very beginning.... "The Divine Stream".

It seems to me that thought just grew and grew until it caused us to totally loose sight of Jesus, the real source of any flow, choking out whatever flow we initially had. And, keeping "the flow" contained to just ourselves dammed off any outflow, and drowned us in the dead sea.

Has anyone done a critique of this thought?

I did a Bible Word search on the words stream and river, and didn't find support for the stream or river of God belonging to only one or two ministers of God. But, I'd like to hear from others on this.

Remember Lee boasting how "one" he was with WN, and how it's fine to "follow a man" as long as he "leads us to God?" Somehow the Blendeds got stuck on the first part, and forgot about God.

Lee often talked about the "one flow" from the throne. At one point during the "new way" takeover of the LC's, brothers came to Dallas speaking this nonsense, "First the Father, then the Son, then the Spirit, then WL ..." A brother then asked facetiously, "who then is no. 5?" But no one dared to say Philip Lee, since it was doubtful he was even saved.

[Freedom]

I did a text search in the Life-Studies for “one flow” and there is little to be found that was said by WL in effort to support his teaching of “one flow”. He, however, spared no expense in detailing what he thinks the “one flow” means and what it should mean to members. This first excerpt demonstrates the extent to which WL used scripture to support his teaching. Suffice to say, he really didn’t put much effort into it at all:

The basic numbers in New Jerusalem are the numbers twelve and one... There is one God, one city, one throne, one street, one river, and one tree of life... This is not my concept; it is Paul's concept in Ephesians 4:3-6, where he speaks of one Body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father. We have just one God, one throne, one administration, one authority, one flow, one way, and one tree.

Witness Lee, Life-Study of Revelation, Message 66, p. 758

In the LS of Genesis, WL uses himself as an example to demonstrate how LC members should follow his teaching:

ONE FLOW

One day Brother Nee told me that he and the other co-workers were burdened that I move to Shanghai… the Lord showed me from the book of Acts that in His move on earth there is only one flow... The Lord told me that for His move in China there should not be two flows or two origins. I had been burdened for north China… But although I was definitely burdened for north China, Brother Nee and the co-workers felt that I should move to Shanghai, stay there, and work with them. At this time the Lord showed me that I had to get into the one flow that had started from Shanghai…

THE MINISTRY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE FLOW

Because I knew I was in the Lord’s flow and that this flow had already started, I also realized that there was a ministry responsible for that flow. As the result of seeing this, I strongly decided to forget all my past learning and experience. The fact that I had been able to conduct a detailed study on Song of Songs indicates that I had some knowledge and that I could do something... Moreover, a church had been established through me. Nevertheless, I realized that the Lord’s flow on the earth must be one, that the flow had already begun, and that there was a ministry carrying on this flow...
…
The Lord is flowing in His move on earth. This flow was not started by you, but by others. Furthermore, there is a ministry responsible for the flow. It is difficult for me to speak about this because now the matter is very much related to me...

Witness Lee, Life-Study of Genesis, Message 88, pp. 1137-1138

So what can we collect from this excerpt? It seems like Lee intended to use himself as an example saying that instead of doing what he wanted, he instead chose to put himself under Nee and to not do anything on his own. I don’t know how much this was really true about WL’s work in China, but it interesting how he called Nee’s work the “one flow”. Obviously this came up later in the U.S. when Lee so presumed to call his work the same thing. In the last paragraph of this excerpt, Lee does just that. He proceeds to liken his own ministry to the “one flow”. He goes as far as to say the following: “this flow was not started by you, but by others”, “there is a ministry responsible for the flow”, “the matter is very much related to me”. I just have to shake my head when I read this. It’s just so obvious what WL’s real intentions were behind a teaching like this. If I might put it frankly, it was just another way that WL sought to spiritualize his control of the churches.

Finally, I want to end with a quote that really makes one wonder if WL even meant what he said in the first place:

In chapter seven the Lord goes somewhat further, saying that anyone who drinks of Him will have the flow of the rivers of water of life. The Lord did not speak of just one flow but of rivers. The unique river of living water is the Holy Spirit.

Witness Lee, Life-Study of John, Message 18 , p. 218

[NewManLiving]

Quote:
The basic numbers in New Jerusalem are the numbers twelve and one... There is one God, one city, one throne, one street, one river, and one tree of life... This is not my concept; it is Paul's concept in Ephesians 4:3-6, where he speaks of one Body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father. We have just one God, one throne, one administration, one authority, one flow, one way, and one tree.

No it is not Paul's concept. It is a twist on what Paul said which had absolutely nothing to do with what Witness Lee is saying in order to get people to think that Paul is approving and lending his own signature to what WL is saying. See the cleverness here. It begins with asserting that this is Paul's concept then eases the believer into WL concepts by using agreeable terms such as one God, one throne. Once he gets you to this point he introduces his own ministry as the one flow, one way and one tree. And himself as the one authority. Gottcha!

[Nell]

Originally Posted by Freedom

As I have become aware of the Texas dynamics in the early days of the LC, it has helped me to better understand why the LC turned out the way that it did. Something that James mentioned is how so many of the Texas brothers knew each other at Wayland Baptist College. Apparently a large group of students came into the LC from this college. I think that this is an important detail in the formation of LC in the U.S.

It’s not every day that you convince a large group of students to drop their Southern Baptists affiliation and pick up something completely different. For whatever reasons James and Benson had the ability to make this happen, they could get the students reading Nee, and they could have their hand in Major Ian Thomas visiting the campus.

I think that James might have downplayed the amount of influence that he actually had at that campus, but it is not hard to put the pieces together. ...

James was the Director of the Baptist Student Union at Wayland BC...an employee of some division of the Southern Baptist Convention. Wayland was a small college (still is). A "large number of students" should be viewed in this perspective. I don't have a head count but 10-12 seems to be a fairly accurate ballpark figure.

I would be hesitant to give James and Benson the credit/blame for "making this happen" or any such "plot" as you seem to suggest...at least at this time in their lives. These were seeking students who desired to follow the Lord. They were all friends and very near the same age 18-21, James being a little older. James and Benson were not manipulating anyone at Wayland...all of this was new to them as well. In these early days I believe they were about the same as you and I might have been. We all took a wrong turn at some point.

I had family ties with some of them. When I was in high school, six or so of them piled in a car and showed up at my home, 60 miles from Plainview, to meet up for some kind of thing college students do. They were just normal college students who attended a Baptist College because of a desire to follow the Lord. Benson was a Baylor student. I don't know that he ever attended Wayland...I don't think he did.

Eventually we all got deceived.

Nell

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by Nell

James was the Director of the Baptist Student Union at Wayland BC...an employee of some division of the Southern Baptist Convention. Wayland was a small college (still is). A "large number of students" should be viewed in this perspective. I don't have a head count but 10-12 seems to be a fairly accurate ballpark figure.

I would be hesitant to give James and Benson the credit/blame for "making this happen" or any such "plot" as you seem to suggest...at least at this time in their lives. These were seeking students who desired to follow the Lord. They were all friends and very near the same age 18-21, James being a little older. James and Benson were not manipulating anyone at Wayland...all of this was new to them as well. In these early days I believe they were about the same as you and I might have been. We all took a wrong turn at some point.

I had family ties with some of them. When I was in high school, six or so of them piled in a car and showed up at my home, 60 miles from Plainview, to meet up for some kind of thing college students do. They were just normal college students who attended a Baptist College because of a desire to follow the Lord. Benson was a Baylor student. I don't know that he ever attended Wayland...I don't think he did.

Eventually we all got deceived.

Nell

I didn't mean to imply that James or Benson were manipulating anyone. I just found it interesting that the beginnings of the LC in Texas can be traced back in part to a particular group of students at a particular college.

The whole recording presents a narrative that I find to be quite troublesome. I can understand if the students at that college were disillusioned, but I don't understand how such a disillusionment automatically translated into the need to go drive to LA and hear WL speak.

[askseek]

I'm just now seeing this thread. I actually listened to Barber's message over the weekend (linked from another thread) while I was reading some threads here.

One item that really got my attention was his personal testimony of his early life, starting at the 27 minute mark. His parents divorced when he was just 5, and he indiciated it was tough and painful. No doubt. This seems to me an important part of what caused him to latch onto WL as a father figure. He certainly wasn't the only one, but did so to a greater extreme than most according to Rutledge. It's important for us to remember the ages of the principles involved -- WL was born in 1905 whereas Barber sometime in the 1940s. Similar for WL's other future deputies and lackeys. (And Ingalls and Reetzke born in 1930s or so; I surmise that WL was older than most in LA in those early days. And he clearly "outranked" Samuel Chang, another important factor.)

Also interesting James' son mentions the Swiss bank accounts for Lee family. An important detail I'm just now learning. No surprise, of course, but good to know.

And here's a repost of an excerpt from the thread I made yesterday (which also has other info about JB beyond this one post).

Originally Posted by askseek

Don Rutledge on James Barber

As we all desire to sort through our journey with Christ and our common experience in the LC, it is important to consider James Barber. Few brothers had such a defining influence on the LC. I spent much more time with him than I ever did with WL. In fact during the critical time period of 1973–78, I spent much more time with Max Rapoport than I did with WL.

James was a very peculiar person, and his staunch advocacy of exalting leaders, aka deputy authority, caused a lot of abnormal development. The same can be said of other leaders, such as Ray Graver, Patsy Freeman, etc. Most of the extreme LC problems are associated with a few personalities. Particular personalities gaining dominance combined with the deputy authority thing caused too much hurt.

Almost from the beginning, James was in a struggle for the hearts and minds of brothers and sisters outside of L.A. Later Max also was in a struggle to be the most influential person in the LC network. They battled each other. I know because I was an object of their fight and heard from both of them about the other brother and what he was doing. James was a very significant player in the downfall of Doug Krieger in Berkeley. Then he was working to bring down Max and vice versa. Max won and James went to OK City where he would have little influence over WL or the work in Anaheim and a diminished role nationally.

James was the number one advocate for putting meetings and church functions above family. He despised saints who only came on Sundays. He had invented a smear "SMOs" (Sunday Morning Only). I heard him use this countless times to slander some of the brethren in L.A. He constantly admonished elders in private fellowship to limit the SMOs. Sometimes I heard him concede to a brother about caring for the SMOs with the statement, "well at least they are good for numbers."

No one was ever more critical of others both in the LC and in Christianity than James. This was a point Max successfully used against him as nearly everyone was consciously or unconsciously bothered by James' unending put downs. (I hear the same kind of mocking derision in the Barber sons. I must believe they learned it from their father.) Since James represented WL and always made sure all realized that he had come from WL, his behavior and speaking was the equivalent of WL's speaking and behavior. At the time, I was too naive. Until Max made it clear that James was not necessarily a spokesperson for WL, it was hard to see how much was actually James. Of course, I do strongly believe that James was to a great extent a product of the shaping of WL.

Now, James truly loved Christ and desired to serve the Lord. He was a very gifted teacher of the Bible and somewhat an evangelist. We all received spiritual help from James. Otherwise his negatives could not have taken hold.

His family is a big testimony of his negatives, which included church activities over caring for the family, the meetings and ministry take care of everything, don't have opinions, don't think, don't criticize the ministry, and the big one: WL is God's anointed, today's David, and thus God will bless whatever WL does.

James died of cancer in the late 1980s. He was in Irving living with Benson seeking to get help from alternative treatments. During this time no one had much contact with him. Before this I had pretty much dropped contact with him. He was becoming more and more odd. I attributed it to nothing in particular. Perhaps it was due to internal conflicts about the LC. He suffered greatly over the whole thought of the video messages. He complained to me that "we ministering brothers" may as well get a popcorn machine and sell it during the videos. It was obvious to me that he saw his role in the recovery was pretty much over and WL was going a different direction with different people. James could have certainly been disappointed. I never heard him criticize WL, but he was not happy at the end.

Jane Anderson on the Barber family

I was told about Lee's bad treatment of James directly from his wife Virginia, about 10 years after James died. I can't remember the details about how James ended up in OKC, but I remember that it was not a result of his burden, but Lee's directive. She said Lee was very abusive and that his treatment of James tore him up because he considered Lee a father figure. She and the boys hated to see him go to a training in Anaheim because of the state he would be in when he returned, after having been mishandled (she said "abused") by Lee while there. She said the family usually took the brunt of his upset.