I've been in the recovery for 41 years...

[Lisbon]

I've been in the recovery for 41 years. Came in during the Max, Day Star era. I "invested" $1250 in the DS and tennis rackets with the full expectations of losing it all. Some young brothers said we are going to fleece Egypt and of course it was us who got fleeced. I never have had a lot of money but the loss was not that big of a deal to me. The secrecy was. There was too close to nothing said when DS went belly up. BP visited me in person and told me the sad news. He was concerned that the others might have a conscience problem and I wondered why. Well a little later I got a receipt signed by WL thanking me for my gift of $1000 to Stream Publishers. I had not ever given them anything so just figured he was giving me an out for my income tax. Nothing else was said. I kept the receipt for a momento to this day.

I remember very distinctly thinking in those first years even though I experienced the so called honeymoon that if both BP and WL were imprisoned for a couple of months and released, we would never hear of it. Just a fanciful thought. Not unhappy. The secrecy thing has always been a hang up and it never changed. I did not really know anything about PL untill about ten years ago and did not know any details until I started reading this forum. I'm quite sure the normal saint in Dallas knows nothing of the Anaheim mess and if anything was said they would say it was just lies and loose unGodly talk. Recently I was sort of baited to ask a simple question of 'our faith' and the two just smiled and we parted.

I began having real problems with WL during the Psalms videos. I sat beside Raul Bajandas and when WL started hatcheting psalm after psalm we just roared with laughter. There I was a 50 yr old man raised in a Christian and even heard WL quote all scripture is God breathed and here WL is hatcheting the Word right and left! And then not too much later I was talking with an elder and he said that the feeling now was that there should be just one interpretation of the Bible. Pope? Not long after I was listening to RK and he was very unhappy that someone had accused them of being popish. That was hard to believe. I met with RK for around three years and he seemed to be a very sober and of course smart person so I could not understand why he could be unhahppy with the characterization pope. What else would we think.

I must close but I wish to answer a new one I read a month or so ago questioning about the street car judgement if yo left the ministry. The first training I attended in the Anaheim convention center on Romans, JI told that story of getting run over by a trolley. It didn't scare me too much for I had heard the story 25 years earlier. My dad used to say those stories came out of Noah's ark. I never heard the story again. I have heard the story of leprosy though many times thru the years.

I do appreciate your articulate posters and I am hoping they are all right. There are real problems in the LC and it would seem they would all prefer to put head in sand.

Lisbon

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Lisbon

Some young brothers said we are going to fleece Egypt and of course it was us who got fleeced.

Had to laugh at this one.

My first contact with LC saints was in June of 1973. They had just migrated to Cleveland from Akron.

If I had to summarize the one thing about Witness Lee and LSM, that bothers me the most, is their lack of integrity.

If I had to summarize the one thing about Titus Chu and Cleveland, that bothers me the most, is their abuse of power.

[aron]

Originally Posted by Lisbon

I began having real problems with WL during the Psalms videos. I sat beside Raul Bajandas and when WL started hatcheting psalm after psalm we just roared with laughter. There I was a 50 yr old man raised in a Christian and even heard WL quote all scripture is God breathed and here WL is hatcheting the Word right and left!

Amen. "Hatcheting" is an appropriate characterization. How can you say that you are cutting straight the word of God, when you maul it so severely?

Look, on the day of Pentecost Peter stood up with the eleven, and quoted Joel once, and quoted David twice. See vv 25, 34: "David said about him..." Where did Peter dredge up those quotes? From reading the word, of course.

Now, here is the sixty-four dollar question: where did Peter, or anyone else for that matter, disparage the word of David as "fallen"? Where did he or anyone else warn us that only some of the Psalms were profitable for teaching, for reproof, and instruction in righteousness, while the bulk were vain and unprofitable words of natural men?

Again and again the NT writers and speakers referenced the Psalms as the basis of their revelation of Christ. Look at the epistle to the Hebrews for instance. Nowhere that I can see any of them putting a 'hatchet' to it like WL did. Case closed, for me: WL stands alone. He wasn't 'steadfastly following in the teachings and fellowship of the apostles'. By doing a hatchet job on God's word he not only went astray but led others astray as well.

The Bible reveals to us Christ Jesus our Lord. To disparage it thus is to turn away from the very Christ sent by God, and revealed, sometimes plainly and sometimes in shadow and type, in the pages of scripture itself.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by aron

. . . while the bulk were vain and unprofitable words of natural men . . . .

An interesting little bit, taken out of context, but very revealing.

"Vain and unprofitable words of natural men."

Sounds a lot like the words recorded by the LSM, the DCP, and reworked endlessly by the BBs.

[aron]

Originally Posted by OBW

An interesting little bit, taken out of context, but very revealing.

"Vain and unprofitable words of natural men."

Indeed; I'll take the testimonies of both Simon Peter and King David any day of the week, as being revelatory of Christ, if set against the expositions of WL.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Lisbon

I did not really know anything about PL untill about ten years ago and did not know any details until I started reading this forum.

I began having real problems with WL during the Psalms videos. I sat beside Raul Bajandas and when WL started hatcheting psalm after psalm we just roared with laughter.

When the Psalms and James got "hatcheted" by WL, neither I nor any of the brothers around me thought any thing was wrong. I actually thought that WL was "rightly dividing the word of God" like no minister in history had ever done.

We left the Local Church in August 2005 and quickly decided to move out of the city, so that the "guilt" of attending some denomination would not haunt me, since I had to pass the meeting hall every time I left my house. It took me a long time to be purged of the "one city, one church, one eldership" leaven of Nee and Lee.

While spending lots of time on the internet looking for houses, I came across that old Bereans forum. I remember how shocked I was upon learning that the entire "storm" of the late 80's was initiated by Philip Lee molesting sisters at headquarters. Talk about Daddy's little secret. I read John Ingall's book at least twice. I lost a lot of respect for Witness Lee after learning that he was capable of anything, including lies, slanders, and criminal coverup, just to protect his profligate sons.

[aron]

Originally Posted by aron

... here is the sixty-four dollar question: where did Peter, or anyone else for that matter, disparage the [witness] of David as "fallen"?

Where did he or anyone else warn... that only some of the Psalms were profitable for teaching, for reproof, and instruction in righteousness, while the bulk were vain and unprofitable words of natural men?

Or put it another way: if you want to start going around saying that some of the scriptures are of no avail, in revealing Jesus Christ to us, you'd better bring some big guns with you. Because if the only thing you are basing this assertion on is your own logic, or your so-called revelation, you are not going to get very far with the discriminating Christian public.

Christ is the Word of God, incarnated to us and for us and now in us. His faith, his Spirit, his person, and his work is the rock upon which we boldly stand - "He (Christ) trusted in Him (the Father); let Him (the Father) save him (Christ) now" (Matt 27:43; Psa 22:8). If you dismiss this Word as merely a contrivance of fallen human imagination you risk the prophecy: "Anyone who falls upon this stone will be broken to pieces". (Matt 21:44) I saw WL trash the Psalms, and it was like watching his ministry implode right in front of me.