Is it the Message, or the Men?

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Igzy

The point of this thread is that the reputation of the men and the validity of their teaching are two separate issues. The LC tries to make them the same thing.

Watchman Nee taught (not sure where) that a man's ministry ought to end with his death, based on a verse about King David (not sure which one.)

After Lee's death, Titus Chu used this teaching against the Blendeds. His point, of course, was two-fold. First, since Lee has passed, the ministry work (e.g. elders' trainings) he carried on should also end. Secondly, since none of the Blendeds had their own ministry, they should also cease to exist. The Blendeds, of course, would not let that happen, so they quarantined him.

Many brothers agreed with this. How could book editors, like Kangas and Marks, who had never even started or shepherded a church, give trainings to "perfect" the elders. But since Philip Lee had already paved the way for unsaved and immoral men to "perfect" all the elders during the new way, anything in the Recovery was now possible.

This, of course, diverges somewhat from your topic at hand, Igzy, but it emphasizes the LC mentality, that if Nee and Lee were perfect, then all their teachings were perfect, and even a caveman could use these teachings to raise up elders in the LC's.