[OBW]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Sometimes I think you are so obsessed with Lee's faults that you can't see anything objectively. Even Christian psychologists warn of the dangers of looking back with only bitterness and rancor. Doesn't God work all things for good? Are you so bothered that I would remember anything positive in my LC experience?

You mistake what I believe is reasonable warning against a truly unqualified teacher. Paul would have rejected him in a heartbeat long before he arrived in the US. And probably would have done the same with Nee before he hardly had his first little church.

Yes, God works all things for good. But continuing to comment on Lee and/or Nee as "gifted ministers" is contrary to the very declaration that Paul would make that we never should have listened to them in the first place. It is true that we had insufficient information at that time to do that. But while it is hindsight, it is valuable to those who are still there, or who might seek to return or to pine after what we think was so great about the time.

God uses all things. But that does not mean that he orchestrates them to happen so that he can use them. Surely he does at times. But very often, he just uses what he gets. I am skeptical that he intended for any of us to spend time in Lee's garlic room. That does not mean that I dispute anyone's salvation while there. Or declare that they had nothing positive within that time. But on the whole (not necessarily in every detail or situation) I do not believe that we were all positively directed to this place by God so that we could have this experience for God to use for our good. Yet surely he did use it.

And he used the experience of stopping in at the legal whore house in Nevada. But are you ready to declare that it was God's intent that whoever that applies to was there sovereignly so that God could use it? Or is in fact one of those things that God gets to use because that is what we hand him to use?

Don't like the example? It is very real. So why is an experience of being in a church that messed with our minds with respect to right thinking and practice concerning God something that we should simply declare that God intended to use for our good rather than it was just one among many things in our lives that was what he got to use? I can't find that it makes being there positive. Just an alternative way of saying that we were actually there. And yes, we really were there. So that is what God got to use.

Originally Posted by Ohio

Does it disturb you that much that I say anything good about that place? Get over it bro!

It is not just that you say anything good about the place. It is that you are among a few that continue to say that Lee was some gifted minister. He was a gifted speaker, but that is not the same as being a gifted minister of the Word. I think that we are allowing the fact that he did not simply jettison the Bible outright and teach an entirely different religion as evidence that his errors, both theological and practical, would not have Paul writing to have Lee removed from any kind of teaching role.

So I think it is worthy of a challenge. Can you accept it as a challenge and explain why you think I am wrong rather than just complaining that you don't like it? Are you unable to refute that Lee falls into the category of those who are feeding their belly in a manner that Paul points out. Or that he is teaching myths and endless genealogies along with truth? Do you think Paul would have tolerated that?

Don't bother just complaining. I think that it is a legitimate point worthy of consideration. You don't even have to respond. Just consider. And I am not just following you around. But you have provided a couple of comments I see as problematic in an environment that concerns itself with the errors of the LCM. I believe that is worthy of comment in return. Shall I ignore it just because it is you?

Get over it, bro!

Originally Posted by Ohio

And where in the world did I ever say that? I have never heard anyone say that, not even Lee. I have always said that we are saved by grace thru faith. (Eph 2.8) If you are going to refute this statement taken out of context, then why don't you also go after "the sinner's prayer." Do you really think that someone can repeat a few words off a sheet of paper and be actually saved?

just saying the sinner's prayer does not save you. And I know that there are probably some times when people who are just too nice to tell some gospel preacher to go away that they go through the words to get rid of them.

Unlike Benson Phillips (who I believe is at least one that I have heard directly say that just because they said the words, they are now saved whether they like it or not), I believe that true belief and repentance is required. While we make statements about three words, those words imply so much that it is virtually impossible to think that they could be meaningful in isolation where it does not include repentance and true belief. To declare otherwise is to strip the words of their full meaning. Satan knows and believes that Jesus is Lord. But it is doing him no good. Even the belief has to be toward Jesus as the one who saves and then stands as Lord of our life.

Originally Posted by Ohio

Read Romans 10.13 and tell me what it says. Are you telling me that no one has ever been saved during a calamity by crying out to God?

This is a classic strawman. I did not say that calling on the Lord with those three words or a close alternative cannot save you. I said that it is not necessarily so that merely saying the words results in salvation. The real crying-out to God is always responded to, no matter how many or how few words. But the repetition of words without any real thought of what it means is not a profession of belief. It is an exercise in speaking your lines in a play.

And since you bother to pull this one out, it might seem that you have now said exactly what I did not say that you specifically have ever said, but the generic "you" of the LCM. At least at the level of the teachers who decided that it was all they needed to do in those gospel meetings.

I dare say that you do not actually mean that. So I do not need you to refute it.