Lee and LC: Home Runs and Strikeouts

[Drake]

Originally Posted by Igzy

So the love he is talking about for the self, which we are supposed to use as a model for how to love our neighbor, must be pure and of God. How does God view us and want us to view ourselves? As precious and good creations of his! Once you see that he wants us to see ourselves that way, we can then go on to view others that way. In some cases, it is the reverse. Sometimes we see how much God loves others and how much he wants us to love them, and then we see we can love ourselves in the same way. This is healthy, holy self love.

God loves himself. We are in the image of God. If we are to be like God we must love ourselves too, not in the fallen selfish, me-first way of the world, but in the pure, holy way God loves himself.

Further, you cannot truly love your neighbor if you don't love yourself. Self-loathing people are crippled when it comes to loving others. A person who likes and loves himself in a holy and healthy way is gracious and giving. He knows he is rich and has much to give.

The self love the Bible condemns is the fallen, me-first kind. That is not holy self love. Holy self love sees oneself as a precious creation of God, and loves oneself the same, neither better nor worse than all the other precious creations of God.

There are several errors in this line of thinking. I'll address just three in this post.

First, the Bible does not teach ""Love yourself as your neighbor." The Bible teaches that we should love God, love the brothers, love our neighbor, etc. but it never teaches that we should love ourselves. What Igzy has done in this case is flip the clear teaching of the Bible to fit his private interpretation, philosophy, or opinion. On the contrary, the Bible teaches that we should not love ourselves even unto death (Rev 12:11). The Lord stated even more forcefully this way:

"If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." Luke 14:26

The Lord was not practicing a form of self-loathing or asceticism, rather, He was stating a fact that concerns all those of Adam. This is the second point: It is the same experience Paul observed:

"For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not." Romans 7:18

Why? Because....

"Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." v17

Igzy's teaching of our position as God's created beings as its basis fails to recognize and omits to factor in that since the fall of man, we His created beings, are absolutely fallen... to the extent that God has judged the flesh, the self, and crucified the old man (Galatians 2:20). Therefore, his teaching ""Love yourself as your neighbor." is not a biblical one and will not be found in scripture because it isn't there. It lacks the revelation of God's Word. Igzy has assessed that the way to find your soul, the way to glorify God is or begins by loving yourself. We should rather trust God's assessment of our situation. To be perfectly clear, Igzy's teaching about loving the self is a worldly teaching, something one might receive in psychology or therapy sessions. It's not what the Bible teaches.

The last point I will address in this post is about the practice or manifestation of Igzy's teaching. He says "Self-love which conflicts with loving others is not real love. It is fallen self-obsession. ". The Bible says

"We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death." I John 3:14

The reader will have to decide if Igzy's teaching has any reality to it by reading his posts, but from my point of view, one who rails against, berates, and slanders brothers in the Lord day in and day out in a public forum as he practices here in this one has not passed out of death into life in reality. His practice even falls short by his own teaching standard "...not loving others is not real love. "

Drake

[Cal]

Yep, that's right. Readers will have to decide whether they prefer the honest guy or the phony guy.

[Cal]

BTW, Drake, I don't really care about your claims of me being a bad Christian.

Save your breath, because it has absolutely no registration with me. And until you start being honest about the real abuses of your favorite sect you have ZERO credibility with me.

Gnats and camels. You defend sexual abusers and other life wreckers and then try to make hay out of my admittedly STRONG approach to you. Gnats and camels. What a joke!

Anyone who can't see through that, I probably can't help anyway. So if they side with you, God help them.

[Drake]

Originally Posted by Igzy

BTW, Drake, I don't really care about your claims of me being a bad Christian. .

I didn't claim you were a bad christian, Igzy.

I said your teachings about loving the self were in error and not based in scripture. I said they therefore appeared as worldly teachings as one might hear in therapy or psychology. I also don't think they are uncommon among many believers but, even if every christian embraced them as you do they are nevertheless in error according to the Bible.

I also said that you omitted in your teaching a most important fact: That God has judged the flesh and crucified the old man on the cross and that sin dwells in our flesh.

I'd welcome a bible-based response on this topic but to do so you'd have to come down off the high horse you rode in on, stop engaging in personal attacks against people you disagree with, and crack open your Bible.

Tell me why my first three observations about your teachings are incorrect. Go for it!

Thanks
Drake

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Drake

Tell me why my first three observations about your teachings are incorrect. Go for it!

Not until you post a video of yourself in a full-body duck costume hopping around and quacking "The Recovery is a hoax! Quack! The Recovery is a hoax!"

[Cal]

There's no point in discussing anything with you, Drake. You aren't a person of good faith. You're like the boy who cried wolf. Eventually people get tired of it.

I invited you to come back and debate. I hoped for the best. But you did exactly what I said you would do. You disappeared for a while then came back with the same obtuse attitude you've always had, like nothing had transpired. And then it starts again. Going round and round in circles, like a freaking broken record. Like Groundhog Day.

You aren't fooling anyone anymore. You're just boring everyone. Get some therapy. Seriously, dude.

[Drake]

Originally Posted by Igzy

There's no point in discussing anything with you, Drake. You aren't a person of good faith. You're like the boy who cried wolf. Eventually people get tired of it.

I invited you to come back and debate. I hoped for the best. But you did exactly what I said you would do. You disappeared for a while then came back with the same obtuse attitude you've always had, like nothing had transpired. And then it starts again. Going round and round in circles, like a freaking broken record. Like Groundhog Day.

You aren't fooling anyone anymore. You're just boring everyone. Get some therapy. Seriously, dude.

Igzy,

Sorry to disappoint you.... but....

This topic and some others are a matter of standing for the truth...orthodoxy... and standing against errors in teaching. Normally, I don't engage in discussing such errors until someone compares them with the teachings of Watchman Nee and Witness Lee as you did. That is what the stated mission on this forum is after all.

Therefore, more of your statements here and elsewhere need to be examined according to scripture. I don't disagree with everything you say, and I don't feel it necessary to address every perceived error on your part, but occasionally I feel the prompting of the Spirit to address something as I did in this thread. Therefore, whether you respond or not is not crucial because you are in a sense only the instrument or channel of the error. It's not about you... nothing personal toward you. I hope you do respond with a compelling scriptural explanation but if you don't that is okay too. You reserve that right and I respect it.

Drake

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Igzy

Not until you post a video of yourself in a full-body duck costume hopping around and quacking "The Recovery is a hoax! Quack! The Recovery is a hoax!"

Drake complies!!

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1lI...RTvic_tPdgyIwj

(Nice moves. Not enough quacking, though. Try again.)

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by Igzy

Drake complies!!

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1lI...RTvic_tPdgyIwj

(Nice moves. Not enough quacking, though. Try again.)

That Drake always being dishonest. Don't worry Igzy, I know LC tactic defense.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Igzy

Not until you post a video of yourself in a full-body duck costume hopping around and quacking "The Recovery is a hoax! Quack! The Recovery is a hoax!"

Perhaps we have already seen him in the AFLAC commercials?

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Perhaps we have already seen him in the AFLAC commercials?

Hmmm, yeah Anaheim is not that far from Hollywood.



"You were bought with a price, never become slaves of men." (I Cor 7.23)

Powerful!

[Trapped]

Originally Posted by Drake

There are several errors in this line of thinking. I'll address just three in this post.

First, the Bible does not teach ""Love yourself as your neighbor." The Bible teaches that we should love God, love the brothers, love our neighbor, etc. but it never teaches that we should love ourselves. What Igzy has done in this case is flip the clear teaching of the Bible to fit his private interpretation, philosophy, or opinion. On the contrary, the Bible teaches that we should not love ourselves even unto death (Rev 12:11). The Lord stated even more forcefully this way:

"If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." Luke 14:26

The Lord was not practicing a form of self-loathing or asceticism, rather, He was stating a fact that concerns all those of Adam. This is the second point: It is the same experience Paul observed:

"For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not." Romans 7:18

Why? Because....

"Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." v17

Igzy's teaching of our position as God's created beings as its basis fails to recognize and omits to factor in that since the fall of man, we His created beings, are absolutely fallen... to the extent that God has judged the flesh, the self, and crucified the old man (Galatians 2:20). Therefore, his teaching ""Love yourself as your neighbor." is not a biblical one and will not be found in scripture because it isn't there. It lacks the revelation of God's Word. Igzy has assessed that the way to find your soul, the way to glorify God is or begins by loving yourself. We should rather trust God's assessment of our situation. To be perfectly clear, Igzy's teaching about loving the self is a worldly teaching, something one might receive in psychology or therapy sessions. It's not what the Bible teaches.

The last point I will address in this post is about the practice or manifestation of Igzy's teaching. He says "Self-love which conflicts with loving others is not real love. It is fallen self-obsession. ". The Bible says

"We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death." I John 3:14

The reader will have to decide if Igzy's teaching has any reality to it by reading his posts, but from my point of view, one who rails against, berates, and slanders brothers in the Lord day in and day out in a public forum as he practices here in this one has not passed out of death into life in reality. His practice even falls short by his own teaching standard "...not loving others is not real love. "

Drake

I know you're being obtuse but I'm writing this response for myself (OH NO not my SELF!?!?! Yes...... myself), not to seriously engage you.

The commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. If we are to hate ourselves, but love our neighbor as ourself, this translates into hating your neighbor. Whoops. I guess we do need to love ourselves so that loving our neighbor as ourself translates into actual love.

If I am the neighbor that my neighbor loves, then why should I not love that which God has commanded others to love?

You called attention to the hating your own life in Luke 14:26. Obviously part and parcel of this verse is the hating of your father and mother, but..........if we are commanded to honor our father and mother, how can we hate them? Obviously there is a little more subtlety going on here, and hating yourself isn't totally literal. Whoops.

God loves me. Should I hate what God loves? I am part of the church, His Body, which He loves. Should I not love what God loves, both in part and in sum?

Romans 12:3 says not to esteem yourself more highly than you OUGHT. This means there is an "ought" to which you should esteem yourself.

As far as Revelation 12:11 teaching that we should not love ourselves even unto death......I'm glad to be corrected here but that verse is referring specifically to believers during the tribulation, is it not? It is also not a "should" verse, as Lee and minions love to twist everything into, it is a statement. It is simply stating that those believers at that time will be willing to be martyrs. I'm not saying that we shouldn't ourselves, but I don't see that that particular verse is "should-ing" us into it.

Lee touted the "highest standard of morality" while failing miserably himself. If you want to try to discount the measure of the veracity of anyone's assertions by pointing at their actions which have nothing to do with the truth behind their posts, the only one qualified to post on here is Jesus.

Thanks for your post. They always help clarify things for me.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Trapped

The commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. If we are to hate ourselves, but love our neighbor as ourself, this translates into hating your neighbor. Whoops. I guess we do need to love ourselves so that loving our neighbor as ourself translates into actual love.

If God loves me. Should I hate what God loves? I am part of the church, His Body, which He loves. Should I not love what God loves, both in part and in sum?

Romans 12:3 says not to esteem yourself more highly than you OUGHT. This means there is an "ought" to which you should esteem yourself.

Yep. Yep. Yep.

As I said, Drake's teaching is designed to keep you down so that others (like him) can control you.

Proper humility? Yes! Self-loathing? A doctrine of demons!

[Drake]

Originally Posted by Trapped

I know you're being obtuse but I'm writing this response for myself (OH NO not my SELF!?!?! Yes...... myself), not to seriously engage you....

Okay. Sure. You had some interesting points. Maybe some other time.

Thanks
Drake

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Trapped

I know you're being obtuse but I'm writing this response for myself (OH NO not my SELF!?!?! Yes...... myself), not to seriously engage you.

The commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. If we are to hate ourselves, but love our neighbor as ourself, this translates into hating your neighbor. Whoops. I guess we do need to love ourselves so that loving our neighbor as ourself translates into actual love.

If I am the neighbor that my neighbor loves, then why should I not love that which God has commanded others to love?

You called attention to the hating your own life in Luke 14:26. Obviously part and parcel of this verse is the hating of your father and mother, but..........if we are commanded to honor our father and mother, how can we hate them? Obviously there is a little more subtlety going on here, and hating yourself isn't totally literal. Whoops.

God loves me. Should I hate what God loves? I am part of the church, His Body, which He loves. Should I not love what God loves, both in part and in sum?

Romans 12:3 says not to esteem yourself more highly than you OUGHT. This means there is an "ought" to which you should esteem yourself.

As far as Revelation 12:11 teaching that we should not love ourselves even unto death......I'm glad to be corrected here but that verse is referring specifically to believers during the tribulation, is it not? It is also not a "should" verse, as Lee and minions love to twist everything into, it is a statement. It is simply stating that those believers at that time will be willing to be martyrs. I'm not saying that we shouldn't ourselves, but I don't see that that particular verse is "should-ing" us into it.

Lee touted the "highest standard of morality" while failing miserably himself. If you want to try to discount the measure of the veracity of anyone's assertions by pointing at their actions which have nothing to do with the truth behind their posts, the only one qualified to post on here is Jesus.

Thanks for your post. They always help clarify things for me.

Brother Trapped, you really need to change your name!

This is one of the clearest rebuttals I have read. If your mind is this free, then you are no longer "trapped," but the Lord's "Freedman." (I Cor. 7.22)

In regard to Luke 14.26, if LC teachers can so quickly exhort their members to "hate father and mother ...," what does that say about our relationship with some book publisher in Anaheim? What about, "If you cannot hate LSM, you cannot be My disciple?" Concerning these Blendeds, and their sycophants, never forget Paul's exhortation, "You were bought with a price, never become slaves of men." (I Cor 7.23)

[Trapped]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Brother Trapped, you really need to change your name!

This is one of the clearest rebuttals I have read. If your mind is this free, then you are no longer "trapped," but the Lord's "Freedman." (I Cor. 7.22)

In regard to Luke 14.26, if LC teachers can so quickly exhort their members to "hate father and mother ...," what does that say about our relationship with some book publisher in Anaheim? What about, "If you cannot hate LSM, you cannot be My disciple?" Concerning these Blendeds, and their sycophants, never forget Paul's exhortation, "You were bought with a price, never become slaves of men." (I Cor 7.23)

Hahaha.....thanks. Oftentimes Drake's posts so succinctly bring together the being-crushing lies that were passed off as truths to so many people that it is a delight to post a response to force me to get my own thoughts in order about a particular false neutron-star-heavy jet-black tar baby that has been clinging onto me for so long.

I wish I had found this forum earlier so I could have had the tools and utterance to help another adult church kid I encountered years ago. They were struggling with self-esteem issues (possibly typical human ones unrelated to the LC, possibly LC-based, I don't know) and going to LC meetings was an almost impossible demand on them since being told that the Lord can barely tolerate us because of how horrible we are made them feel 20000 times worse than they felt in just a typical day of life. To feel that God is repulsed by you left them absolutely nowhere good to go, in every way, and they used all kinds of destructive things to try to run from their torment.

Strangely enough, and maybe more tragically enough, in my own life I still operate according to the opposite belief of much of what I wrote......so "Trapped" will have to remain, in order to be truthful. In other words, I'm still newly and continually coming across things, concepts, and thoughts I didn't know I had and I didn't know were trapping me. So while I can put together a post I am happy with, there is still the time - weeks, months, maybe more - needed to wash off of the dirt of those lies that just doesn't disappear with the snap of a finger. Maybe "my chains fell off" is some people's experience, but for me it's like I've been given bolt cutters and I'm having to snip each link off one by one. But Freedman is a great idea for what I have a little hope is coming down the road at some point.

The other point I just thought of now is that in 1 Corinthians 12, talking about giving more abundant honor to the uncomely members...... Well, one thing I noticed is that there is no definition of comely or uncomely in those verses, so how do we know who is comely or not? If I'm sitting in a meeting I sure know who I think is uncomely.....but my own opinion certainly isn't the standard for determining that. This is my own interpretation, but I think it's because each of us is comely to some people and uncomely to others. And this way, all of us, being uncomely to at least someone, can be recipients of more abundant honor in the Body. While this doesn't speak to loving ourselves directly, it speaks to the value each one of us has and the care we are worth receiving. (Again, worth just according to the "ought" level.....not elevated worth).

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Trapped

Strangely enough, and maybe more tragically enough, in my own life I still operate according to the opposite belief of much of what I wrote......so "Trapped" will have to remain, in order to be truthful. In other words, I'm still newly and continually coming across things, concepts, and thoughts I didn't know I had and I didn't know were trapping me.

"As a man thinks of himself, so he is ..." -- Proverbs 23.7

Something to think about.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Ohio

"As a man thinks of himself, so he is ..." -- Proverbs 23.7

Something to think about.

I have to Amen that!