THE
LITTLE FLOCK MOVEMENT
The
late Watchman Nee was the Chinese
founder and leader of the
assembly-type movement named after the
Brethren The Little Flock
hymnal--although it had no connection
with the Plymouth
Brethren movement. Having
emerged in the early 1920's, by 1950
there were some 200 assemblies
established in China, with numbers of
them spreading later into Taiwan and
other parts of Asia.
Nee
sought to pattern the assemblies after
the New Testament, and they turned out
to be a combination of his extreme
views, Darby's closed views, Muller's
open views, and T. Austin-Sparks'
moderate views. The stress was
on locality--each group an independent
unit representing the Church in its
particular area. In the larger
cities, each assembly was to be in a
different postal zone. Believers
were required to attend the gathering
in their particular home area or zone,
none other. Like the Brethren, a
number of the assemblies would
congregate centrally from time to time
for a weekend teaching conference.
China
being largely unevangelized, Nee
formulated an extensive year-long
program for training believers in
evangelism and soulwinning. His
further emphasis was that of growth
based on the identification truths.
His classic, The Normal Christian
Life, depicts the latter.
In
his tendency toward extremism, Nee
went into the "warfare"
teaching of Mrs. Jessie Penn-Lewis and
Evan Roberts via their dangerous book,
War on the Saints.
Hence much of the good of Nee's
ministry and writings (some thirty
volumes of his messages are in print
at present) has been overshadowed by
errors such as the Arminian
"baptism in the Holy Ghost"
for power in service and spiritual
warfare, exercise of the sign gifts
(tongues not stressed), healing in the
atonement, inner light and intuitive
revelation, demon possession of
believers, and exorcism.
Nee
also taught a split, or, partial
Rapture, i.e., the "overcomers"
will be caught up prior to the
Tribulation, the
"unprepared" believers will
experience the holocaust. All of
the, teachings mentioned here are in
his books, The Release of the
Spirit, and The Spiritual Man
(the latter in three volumes).
In
1952, as leader of the Little Flock
movement, Nee was imprisoned in
Shanghai by the Communists.
Twenty years later, in early 1972, he
was released. A few months
thereafter, at three-score and ten
years, the venerable Watchman Nee went
to be with his Lord.
In
1956 the Little Flock movement was
crushed by the people
(government-backed) as "counter
revolutionary." Several
months later the movement was
completely reorganized and formally
joined the Three Self movement.
"Three Self" stands for
self-governing, self-supporting, and
self-propagating. What it really
means to the Reds [Chinese Communists]
is freedom from imperialist control,
imperialist finance, and imperialist
"poison."
THE
WITNESS LEE MOVEMENT
A
disciple of Watchman Nee, Witness Lee
founded his assembly movement in Los
Angeles some forty-five years ago.
Since that time he and his followers
have been setting up numerous
gatherings throughout the country.
Formerly, he was active in China and
Taiwan.
A
typical feature of all assembly-type
movements is their subjection to the
domination of their founders. An
exception is the open Brethren; their
individual assemblies are usually held
in line by one or more local leaders.
But within the history of assembly
leadership, Witness Lee takes
precedence in being the autocrat of
them all, including Darby. And
as for extreme teachings, he has
outstripped his mentor.
The
large and noisy ruling assembly from
which Lee governs all is titled
"The Church in Los Angeles."
He maintains that God is present only
in the local assemblies--theirs, that
is. All others are outside the
will and blessing of God.
He stresses that Christian
"victory" is not gained by
teaching, doctrine, or prayer, but by
just four words of praise. The
assemblies often repeat in unison,
either spoken, sung, or shouted:
"O Lord, Amen, Hallelujah!"
Lee's
method of teaching and control is a
definite form of brainwashing.
All who join his assemblies are
admonished to forget all the doctrine
they ever knew, and submit to the ways
and teachings of the Leeites.
Some disgruntled open [Plymouth]
Brethren have gone over to Lee, and
because of a resemblance to the
Children of God movement, many Jesus
People have also joined the ranks.
[Provided
below are excerpts from the written
teachings of both Nee and Lee which
will provide support for our
evaluation and conclusions.]
New
To The Word --
In no area of your
Christian life is it more essential to
be centered in the truth of the Word
than in your fellowship with the
Father. This is especially so as
you behold from your position the
glory of the Son "who is the
image of the invisible God" (Col.
1:15).
You
can best study Him from your position
in the heavenlies, in His very
presence; but you must behold
Him in His proclamation, in His Word
of truth. It is within the realm
of the written truth alone that the
Spirit of Truth will conform you to
the image of the One who is the Truth.
"For the fruit of the Spirit
is in all goodness and righteousness
and truth"
(Eph. 5:9).
True
To The Truth -- Your
knowledge of the Lord Jesus, your
beholding His glory, can never be
based upon imagination, nor upon the
imagination of others in their
writings and artistry. No, not
even Sallman's "Head of
Christ!" If you are going
to know the reality of personal
fellowship with the Lord Jesus, if His
blessed life is going to be manifested
in your mortal body, you will have to
remain a doctrinally sound and
biblically centered believer.
What
John said of his converts, he says to
you: "For I rejoiced greatly,
when the brethren came and testified
of the truth that is in thee, even as
thou walkest in the truth. I
have no greater joy than to hear that
my children walk in truth."
"Whosoever transgresseth, and
abideth not in the doctrine of Christ,
hath not God. He that abideth in
the doctrine of Christ, he hath both
the Father and the Son" (III
John 3,4; II John 9).
Doctrinal
Discernment -- Every
aspect of your Christian life is
totally dependent upon the written
Word of God and the doctrine that is
true to it. Sound doctrine is
that teaching which is based upon
scriptural principles. It is in
the realm of doctrine that you can
most readily discern whether or not a
speaker or writer is safe and sound.
"Now I beseech you, brethren,
mark them who cause divisions and
offenses contrary to the doctrine
which ye have learned; and avoid
them" (Rom. 16:17).
WATCHMAN
NEE BOOKS -- Since the
principal mode of ministering the
growth truths today is literature, it
may be helpful for us to examine some
of the contents of several books
produced by one of the better known
"deeper life" leaders.
We refer to Watchman Nee, concerning
whom we have shared above.
THE
SPIRITUAL MAN
This
three-volume work of Nee's is the only
thing he ever wrote for publication.
This was written but eight years after
he became a Christian, and in it we
find the inception of his "INNER
LIGHT,"
"INNER
VOICE,"
and "REVELATION"
INNER LIGHT,"
"INNER
VOICE,"
and "REVELATION"
teachings.
Volume
I, page 32 -- "INTUITION"
-- Nee says:
Intuition
is the sensing organ of the human
spirit. that knowledge which
comes to us without any help from
the mind, emotion or volition come
intuitively. The revelations
of God and all the movements of the
Holy Spirit are known to the
believer through his
intuition."
Volume
I, page 149 -- Again he states:
Spiritual
life is maintained simply by heeding
the direction of the spirit's
intuition. The believer will
wait quietly for the voice of
the Holy Spirit to be heard in his
spirit, intuitively. Upon
hearing the inner voice he
rises up to work, obeying the
direction of intuition."
Volume
II, page 31 & 74 -- Here Nee says:
Well
do we begin if we follow intuition
instead of thought. To perform
God's will a Christian need simply
heed the direction of his intuition.
There is no necessity to ask others,
or even to ask yourself.
When
Nee gives this "intuition"
first place, the mind and thought are
thereby relegated to a secondary
position. In doing so he gives
his "inner
light, " "inner voice"
and "revelation"
first place and consequently consigns
the Word of God to an inferior role.
Volume
III, page 23 & 24 -- Here he
leaves no question:
The
believer must follow the revelation
of his intuition, not the though in
his head. He who heeds the
mind is walking after the flesh and
is accordingly led astray.
Nevertheless, we have not said that
the mind is entirely useless.
True, we make a great mistake if we
elevate the mind as the organ for
direct fellowship with God for
receiving revelation from Him; yet
it does have a role assigned
to it. That role is to assist
intuition.
This
is a far cry from Paul's Bereans!
"These were more noble that
those in Thessalonica, in that they
received the word with all readiness
of mind, and searched the scriptures
daily" (Acts 17:11).
Paul also said, "Be ye
transformed by the renewing of your
mind, that ye may prove what is that
good, and acceptable, and perfect,
will of God." "Let
every man be fully persuaded in his
own mind" (Rom. 12:2; 14:5).
Someone
has well said, "Believing is a
mode of thinking. It is
that particular manner of thinking
that is guided to its object by the
testimony of another, or by some kind
of intermediation, such as the Bible.
It is not intuitive."
"Give attendance to reading,
to exhortation, to doctrine" (1
Tim. 5:17).
Volume
II, page 195 -- "PERFECTIONISM"
-- One basic error leads to another.
Whoever
genuinely desires to be perfect must
let the Cross cut deep into his
emotion.
On
page 256 Nee goes on to say that
when
a believer has experienced the
practical treatment of the Cross he
finally arrives at a pure life.
His soulish life has been terminated
and the Lord has granted him a pure,
restful, true and believing
spiritual life. That which is
soulish has been destroyed but that
which is spiritual has been
established.
Volume
III, page 149 -- Finally Nee writes:
They
forget that unless all nerve
responses, sensations, actions,
conduct, words, food and speech
which belong to the body are utterly
for the Lord, they can never arrive
at perfection.
"THE
BAPTISM,"
"WARFARE," &
"DEMONISM" --
Watchman Nee's faulty foundation due
to lack of sound doctrine led him into
"the baptism in the Spirit for
power and spiritual warfare," and
inevitably on into
"demonism" as taught by
Jessie Penn-Lewis and Evan Roberts.
He followed to the letter and quoted
without question their dangerous
textbook, War on the Saints.
Volume
II, page 39 -- "THE
BAPTISM" -- In The
Spiritual Man we can see the
beginnings of the familiar
Pentecostal-type pattern.
In
seeking the might of the Holy Spirit
we must keep our mind clear and our
will alive, thereby guarding
ourselves from the enemy's
counterfeit. We must also let
God purge from our life anything
sinful, unrighteous or doubtful.
We then should 'receive that promise
of the Spirit' by faith.
Should
there be delay, use the opportunity
for closer scrutiny of your life
beneath His light. Gladly
accept any feeling which does come
with power; for if God deems it
suitable not to accompany power with
feeling, simply believe He has
indeed fulfilled His Word. How
does one judge whether he has
received the promise or not?
By looking into his experience.
He who has received power has his
spiritual senses sharpened and also
possesses an utterance--not of this
world--to witness for the Lord.
Volume
II, page 55-57 -- "WARFARE"
-- Penn-Lewis and Roberts found to
their sorrow that what they considered
to be the best, turned out to be the
worst. The "baptism"
inexorably leads to
"warfare." In this Nee
was no exception.
Upon
experiencing the baptism that
believer's intuition becomes acutely
sensitive and he discovers in his
spirit a spiritual world opening
before him.
Now
it is just here that spiritual
warfare begins. This is
the period when the power of
darkness disguises himself as an
angel of light and even attempts to
counterfeit the person and work of
the Holy Spirit. It is also
the moment when the intuition is
made aware of the existence of a
spiritual domain and of a reality of
Satan and his evil spirits.
Spirit-baptism marks the starting
point of spiritual warfare.
Volume
II, page 60-64 -- TO THE "BATTLE"
Even
now a battle is raging in the world
of the spirit. Though
unobserved by the eyes of the flesh,
it is sensed and proven by those who
are seeking heavenly progress.
Many who are deceived and bound by
the enemy need to be released.
When the evil spirits succeed in
their deceptions they gain a
foothold in the believer.
Now
obviously he who himself is bound
cannot possibly set other free.
Only when wholly freed
experientially from the powers of
darkness can the believer himself
overcome the foe and rescue others.
The incidence of the danger of
deception increases in proportion to
the numbers of those who experience
the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
If
the believer forgets that the enemy
may influence his spirit as much as
the Holy Spirit can, he unwittingly
may accept every moving in his
spirit to be from the Holy Spirit
and thereby cede ground to Satan for
pursuing his aim of destroying the
moral, mental, and physical
well-being of the saint.
This is exactly what has happened to
many who have experienced 'the
baptism in the Holy Spirit.'"
Volume
III, page 120, 126, 131 -- "DEMON
POSSESSION" -- Shades of
the instigators of this error, Mrs.
Penn-Lewis and Mr. Roberts. And
the end is not yet. Now it has
come to demon possession of believers!
Deception
unlatches the gate for evil spirits
to rush in; passivity provides a
place for them to stay; and the
result of these two is entrenchment.
The
powers of darkness pay no attention
to one's resolve, but should he
choose with his will to oppose them
through the power of God then they
will most certainly flee. Just
as in the beginning the believer
permitted the evil spirits to enter,
so now he chooses the very opposite,
the undercutting of any footing of
the enemy. Everything hinges
on the volition. The evil
spirits will withdraw if the
believer's volition withstands them
and forbids them to occupy his
organs any further.
Volume
III, page 224, 225 -- "VICTORY
OVER DEATH" -- Having
gone this far in his doctrinal
deviation, it was but a step for Nee
to follow Evan Roberts in his teaching
on "overcoming death."
Nee finally writes,
The
Lord will enable you to overcome
death. So lay hold of
the promise of God has given you,
ask for life, and trust that nothing
can harm you. Do not concede
to the power of death, or else it
will touch you.
For
instance, you may be staying in a
disease-infected area; yet you can
withstand all diseases and not
permit anything to come upon you.
Do not let death attach you through
sickness.
No
longer can we wait passively for the
Lord's return, comforting ourselves
with the thought that we will be
raptured anyway. We must be
prepared. Death must be
singularly resisted and rapture must
be claimed wholeheartedly.
THE
RELEASE OF THE SPIRIT
Publication
Data -- Watchman Nee was
saved in 1920, at the age of
seventeen. In 1928 he wrote The
Spiritual Man in three volumes.
The edition we have referred to in the
previous section was published in 1968
by Christian Fellowship Publishers,
Inc. This organization is
composed of devotees of Watchman Nee
and his disciple, Witness Lee.
It is now [1974] located in
Washington, D.C.
At
the beginning of Vol. I, in the
publisher's "Explanatory Notes,
" is this startling statement:
Long
after this book's initial
publication in Chinese our brother
Nee was once heard to express the
thought that it should not be
reprinted because, it being such a
'perfect' treatment of its subject,
he was fearful lest the book become
to its readers merely a manual for
principles and not a guide to
experience as well.
There
was no need for brother Nee to fear
that which he considered to be
perfect, but rather should he have
realized and feared the book's
imperfections--errors of a very
serious nature, as we have seen.
The
Normal Christian Life --
In the late 1930's Nee visited England
and came in contact with some of the
Exclusive Plymouth Brethren leaders,
as well as Mr. T. Austin-Sparks of the
Honor Oak movement. The
brief but effective influence
of these associations, especially that
of Sparks, is reflected in a series of
messages Nee gave to a group of his
co-workers upon returning to China in
1938. We have this material
today in the form of Nee's classic, The
Normal Christian Life. The
overall message of this book is
practically without peer. It has
good doctrinal content, and the
identification truths are presented
clearly with the Cross central and the
Christ-life predominant.
The
Release of the Spirit --
ANTI-DOCTRINAL -- However, nearly ten
years later--in 1947--Nee gave a
series of messages at a co-workers
conference, and these were
subsequently published under the title
of The Release of the Spirit.
Here we have the errors of The
Spiritual Man confirmed and
compounded.
Our
reference is to the 1965 edition
published by the Fromke holiness
group, Sure Foundation Publishers.
Here we will deal with Nee's
anti-doctrinal attitude, without going
into the book's strange and dangerous
teaching of projecting one's spirit to
touch the spirit of the Bible, the
spirit of others, etc.
PAGES
17, 88, 90 -- On page 17 Nee says:
Doctrine
does not have much use, nor does
theology. What is the use of
mere mental knowledge of the Bible
if the outward man [the soul]
remains unbroken?
But
God says, "All Scripture is
given by inspiration of God, and is
profitable for doctrine, for reproof,
for correction, for instruction in
righteousness" (II Tim.
3:16). On page 88 Nee states:
We
must clearly understand what is
meant by being edified.
It cannot mean expanded thoughts,
nor improved understanding, nor
greater doctrinal accumulation.
While
on page 90 we see:
Do
you not realize that edification is
not a question of doctrine, but of
spirit? If your brother speaks
through his spirit, you will be
washed and cleansed each time his
spirit comes out and touches you.
Any teaching of doctrine which does
not result in reviving the spirit
can only be considered as dead
letter.
In
direct contrast to such erroneous
teaching the Scripture makes it plain
that growth and edification are
dependent upon sound doctrine--the
truth of the Word. (This is not
to be equated with the doctrinal
emphasis of Colonel Thieme). Thou
shalt be a good minister of Jesus
Christ, nourished up in the words of
faith and of good doctrine, unto which
thou hast attained. Speak
thou the things which become sound
doctrine. In all things showing
theyself a pattern of good works; in
doctrine showing uncorruptness. (I
Tim. 4:6; Titus 2:1,7).
There
is only one result of depised doctrine
and that is despicable error.
Again on page 88 Nee says:
When
there is the flowing of the spirit
we will forget the theology we have
learned. All we know is that
the Spirit has come. Instead
of mere knowledge we have an 'inner
light.'
But
Paul says to "preach the
word; be diligent in season, out of
season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with
all long-suffering and doctrine (II
Tim. 4:2).
MAN
OVERBOARD! -- In this
book Nee substitutes his "inner
light of revelation"
for the Scriptural work of the Cross.
He makes the following radical
statement on page 78:
Whatever
is revealed 'in the light' is slain
by it. Right then and there
your pride, your self, your flesh
wither away and die with no hope of
survival.
There
is more of the same on page 74:
As
soon as the light strikes, the flesh
is dead.
Dear
friend, beware of any teaching, no
matter what the source might be, that
denigrates doctrine and practically
deletes the Cross. Take heed
unto thyself and unto the doctrine;
continue in them (I Tim. 4:16).
There
are thirty or more books composed of
Nee's spoken messsages, and it is true
that they contain much that is good.
However, his material includes too
much abject error for him to be
considered "safe and sound."
The
following are excerpts from Witness
Lee's magazine, The Stream.
Lee, chief disciple of Watchman Nee,
reveals herein what it means to follow
Nee. Like leader, like disciple.
For the time will come when they
will not endure sound doctrine (II
tim. 4:3).
Then
the fourth thing that we must see in
order to participate is life!
We all must know life.
Revelation is a book of life.
Do not pay attention to the forms,
the regulations, the teachings, the
doctrines, Christianity and
religion. No, we must pay our
full attention to life.
Today,
if you were to ask me how to be
victorious, I would tell you that
there is no need for you to try to
be victorious. Just say from
deep within, "O Lord, Amen,
Hallelujah! O Lord, Amen,
Hallelujah! O Lord, Amen,
Hallelujah!" and you will be so
victorious.
If
you would go to the Lord and praise
Him in this way (above) for five or
ten minutes, you will be over all,
and strengthened in your spirit.
Why? It is because you
contact the living Lord! It is
not a religion, a Christianity, a
lot of doctrines, or a set of
teachings, forms or regulations.
No!
We
do not need the Bible study classes;
we need the weeping classes to weep
for the spiritual poverty and
deadness. We must listen to
the Spirit--not just read what is
written. We must listen to the
present, instant speaking of the
living Spirit.
Why
have Christians been divided?
It is simply because of the
different teachings and doctrines.
The more teachings there are, the
more divisions there will be.
All the various teachings and
opinions have done much damage to
the recovery of the church. I
fear that some of us are still under
the influence of the Babylonian
doctrines. May the Lord have
mercy upon us that we may forsake
all of those teachings, regardless
of whether they are right or wrong.
Let us go back to Jerusalem with the
Spirit. We all must have our
"heads cut off."
