The local churches and the ministry of Watchman Nee and Witness Lee have been the subject of controversy in two major areas over the past fifty years.
To a large extent these controversies stem from the rapid increase and spread of the local churches in the United States in the 1960s and early 1970s.
[7] In 1969 Campus Crusade launched what became Christian World Liberation Front (CWLF)[8] at UC-Berkeley as an attempt to reach the young people in the counterculture.
[13][14][15][16] Braun, who had a bitter split with Gene Edwards and left his group, joined with Sparks and five other former Crusade leaders to establish the New Covenant Apostolic Order (NCAO) with themselves as apostles.
[20][21] In early 1975 Sparks asked a young CWLF staff member, Alan Wallerstedt, to prepare a manuscript critiquing the teaching and practices of the local churches.
[40] InterVarsity Press, the publisher of the second edition of The God-Men, received a response including over five hundred pages of supporting documentation refuting the book's charges.
[44] In China the Three-Self Patriotic Movement commissioned two men to write a book to provide justification for a nationwide persecution against the local churches.
Although the local churches strongly protested that both The Mindbenders and The God-Men misrepresented their teachings, the issues raised in the lawsuits were not theological but were based on the books’ false and defamatory accusations of sociological deviance.
[51] Discovery in The Mindbenders case revealed that Gillquist had used his position within Nelson to push for publication of the book over objections from internal staff and outside reviewers of the pre-publication proofs.
All defendants signed an agreement that stipulated financial recompense for damages and that Nelson issue a retraction[55] to be published in major newspapers and Christian periodicals nationwide.
[67][68][69][70][71] Elliot Miller, Editor-in-Chief of Christian Research Journal, later described the countercult community's rejection of the court's decision as “suppressing truth for the sake of a common cause and camaraderie among colleagues.”[72] As a result, The Mindbenders and The God-Men shaped others' perceptions of Witness Lee and the local churches for many years.
Among those who disagreed with these publications was Dr. J. Gordon Melton, who published an open letter in which he faulted the research and apologetic method of The God-Men and stated that Witness Lee's teachings had been grossly misrepresented.
Weldon had written a draft for a proposed encyclopedia in the early 1980s as part of a “doctoral dissertation” at Pacific School of Graduate Studies, a now defunct diploma mill.
Harvest House sued the Church in Fullerton on December 14, 2001, in an Oregon court, claiming that the letters of protest and accompanying documentation sent to them were a form of harassment.
[76] Because Harvest House refused to sign a tolling agreement to extend the statute of limitations, ninety-nine local churches and LSM initiated a libel action against the authors and the publisher on December 31, 2001.
[78] The churches’ complaint alleged that ECNR characterized the groups identified in the book as being guilty of criminal and sociological aberrations, including “subjecting members to physical harm,” “fraud or deception concerning fund raising or financial costs,” “acceptance of shamanism,” “participating in drug smuggling and other criminal activities,” “murder,” “encouraging prostitution,” “child molestation,” and “practicing black magic and witchcraft.”[79] The complaint was based on the structure of ECNR, which was in three parts: The complaint alleged that by identifying characteristics of cults and then naming the local churches as a cult, a reasonable reader would apply the defined characteristics to the local churches.
The trial court rejected multiple summary judgment motions from the defendants, ruling that a jury should decide how a reasonable reader would understand the book.
Their opinion stated that a reader could not reasonably construe the “Characteristics of Cults” as itemized in ECNR’s Introduction as applying to every group discussed in the individual chapters.
[86] Hank Hanegraaff, representing CRI, an early critic of Witness Lee and the local churches, wrote, “The result of our primary research is encapsulated in the following three words: ‘We were wrong!’”[87] The issue contained a seven-part article by Elliot Miller reassessing the local churches and responding to the 2007 open letter.
The issue included two statements by Hank Hanegraaff and an article by Gretchen Passantino in which she explained why she reversed her earlier critical opinion.
In early January 2010 Norman Geisler authored a rebuttal, co-signed by Ron Rhodes, in which they made numerous accusations against both CRI and the local churches.
[89] In July 2010 Defense & Confirmation Project (DCP) began publishing a series of fourteen articles responding in detail to Geisler and Rhodes’ statement.
According to modalism (a heresy condemned by the early church) the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are not eternally co-existent, but are three successive manifestations of God.
Similarly, because of his reading of Isaiah 9:6, which says that the Son given to mankind will be called the eternal Father, Witness Lee has been accused of teaching patripassianism (a subcategory of modalism).
The first issue of the LSM journal Affirmation & Critique (A&C), published in 1996, discussed the local churches’ view of biblical trinitarianism.
[120][121][122][123] Witness Lee's view of God's organic salvation is related to his understanding of Christology, specifically, the relationship between the divine and human natures in Christ.
Witness Lee cited the example of the meal offering in Leviticus which is composed of oil mingled with fine flour (Lev.
2:5), a type that other Bible teachers, including the Plymouth Brethren, also understood to refer to the dual nature of Christ, that is, His divinity and His humanity.