Did Witness Lee believe his teaching on "One city one church"?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Much has been said about the "one city - one church" ground of locality promoted in the Recovery for 70 years. The Bible not only does not prescribe this format, but several verses (i.e. Acts 9.31, Rom 16.5, Col 4.15) have been shoe-horned into saying what a simple reading indicates to the contrary. Before leaders establish their church based on certain premises, at least they ought to have some definitive scripture to support them.

Since you have to "shoe-horn" your teaching into the verses doesn't that suggest that WN and WL did this knowingly?

Originally Posted by Ohio

Personally, however, I believe that the corollary to this teaching, i.e. the one eldership in each city has been more destructive. Based on Acts 14.23 and Titus 1.5 the entire Recovery operates under the basic premise that there can be only one eldership per city, and that eldership must be appointed by the "apostle." It is this teaching, coupled with errant notions of deputy authority, which gave both Lee and Chu tremendous power over their satellite churches. Thus the very basis of authority vested in the local eldership has nothing to do with the authority of the Head walking in the midst of the church, nor the approval and recommendation of her members. Sole authority to direct elders, appoint elders, move elders, or remove elders lies remotely in the hands of a man deemed to be their "apostle."

I think it has to be obvious to many besides us that this teaching was destructive. Certainly WN and WL had to realize this was a destructive teaching. Therefore if "they had proved by testing what the perfect will of the Lord was" I would have expected them to correct this teaching. Since they didn't I wonder if they were truly walking by faith.

Originally Posted by Ohio

The history of the Recovery is littered with incompetent elders whose sole qualification is zealous loyalty to a remote headquarters. They serve their office solely at the pleasure of the one who appointed them. Their ultimate loyalty is neither to the Head of the church, nor to the members of the church, but to him who sent them there. In truth, both Lee and Chu thus operated more as Bishops then apostles. Apostles were travelers, while Bishops resided at some headquarter church. Apostles preached the gospel to the unsaved, while Bishops mainly trained elders.

Once again I have to believe that WL and WN realized these elders were incompetent but valued their allegiance higher than their stature. I saw this first hand in Taipei when all of the elders were replaced by young men who wouldn't stand up to WL. Therefore, based on the works of WL I have to conclude that this destructive heresy was brought into the church intentionally by him.

Originally Posted by Ohio

When one looks at the descriptions Ignatius gave to the bishops, it readily becomes apparent that the relationship in the Recovery between the leaders and the members far more closely models the teachings of Ignatius than the teachings of the N.T. apostles. It is one of the Recovery's greatest hypocritical inconsistencies that Ignatius could at the same time be so maligned and yet so readily modeled.

"A hypocrite with his mouth destroyeth his neighbor". To me this sums up the works of WL. This is not the work of faith but the work of a hypocrite.