Ham

If he was up to bat, you would be accurate in saying "good eye".

Well, one-eyed jacks are wild. In some games, anyway.

I find it interesting that God does not really outline what the good works in Ephesians are, at least the good works that we are called to do- just that they are prepared for us. Before I greatly offend, or offend further- let me say that if your full-time calling is to herald the gospel- run classes, do this, do that- so be it. Personally, I can't object with that. But I heard a local preacher several sundays back- he said something almost "revolutionary"- that maybe God calls the vast majority of his children to a SECULAR calling. Chemists, engineers, etc. etc. and that if they have the impression that they are somehow a second rate christian for doing it, the church has failed to get the true message to them. We love to tell the story, but maybe God wants us busy doing something else along the way..

"Grace based works"- now there's a novel concept, heh heh. But that really is a pretty good observation, Temple Lady.. Sometimes I ask that question: what are you DOING with your redemption? I see a LOT of action going on that does not involve going door to door witnessing, running classes and generally being an over-zealous religious bigot in Christ's name. "And the result of this is we put our trust and lives in God's hands knowing that if the answer to our requests is no or not exactly what we expected it is becuase the answer is part of a larger and greater plan GOd in His wisdom has for us." Usually this is gold instead of the brass we were trained to yammer about claiming all the time..

One poor guy here was screamed at for hours for- guess.. Singing too loud. Showed he must've been egotistical or something, they said. And NO ONE was allowed to sing any harmony. Everybody had to sing the same dreadful melody.. What were they thinking? I didn't put up with that long, it was only a matter of weeks before I left for good.

For me its been about eighteen years- but boy, does that bring back a few memories, and smells- whoo. For such moments I threatened (lovingly of course) to take the rascal down to the river and dunk said stinky end in the river, all while singing "lets all go down to the river"

I read several accounts where the guy involved did not know what to do with it after he received it until after he received it. "Go, and sin no more", "Tell no man", "go make the offering Moses commanded.." All well AFTER the big event took place. So maybe having all this stuff lined up to pry a miracle out of God's hands isn't quite so right. Even believing. Sure, believing "works". "Whosoever shall say to this mountain..." but what if the Almighty likes the mountain right where he put it? Nothing's gonna happen. I think believing, or even more properly faith- has more of a spiritual nature. Not so much an action of the human mind, but that is obviously a necessary part. As corny as it may sound- and opposite to what I learned in PFAL- I think there is a little bit of truth in the statement the God gives faith to be healed, or to work miracles- if God does not energize it, all the mental gymnastics in the world is not going to produce the results you think God "owes" you.

Sure that was the auditorium? Sounds more like a guy in a sanitarium.. Maybe that would explain it. The guys in the little white suits explained it all to Loy..

Or when hook shots finally reigned supreme..

Maybe it was when he realized that he finally got an upside down W on every major street corner..

Maybe he got tired of waiting for them to carve his face in granite at Mount Rushmore, called it good enough..

Probably because both names of him and his organization were in every cult book labelled from A to Z..

Who knows- maybe reality will come like a flash- "You mean to tell me that they actually will PAY us to put up with the abuse???" Heh heh.

Ah yes. And the pay scale is so much higher..

Got thinking about this on another thread. The five sacred keys we were taught, know what's available, how to receive, what to do, need and want parallel, and God's ability equals Gods willingness- I now have more of an opinion that these are not actual keys to receive ANYTHING. At best, they are five OBSERVATIONS. One or more can be observed in biblical accounts, but where does it say if you mimic these OBSERVATIONS that you can acquire the moon, or anything else for that matter? No, I'm not trashing them entirely. I still think there is something to be learned in all this- just not quite what it was hyped up to be. Maybe it's kind of like a traffic accident. You may observe that the driver ran a red light, or was driving on a slippery road. Another driver may have been preoccupied with hellions in the back seat or a cell phone conversation- or maybe another incident, the tires had no tread left. OK. Suppose you are out on a slippery wet night, screaming at the kids in the back seat, all while trying to listen to your buddy on the cell phone, and you inadvertantly blow through a red light, squealing on bald tires. Does this GUARANTEE that you will have an accident? NO, not in my opinion. I would venture to say that in MOST of the miracles recorded in the bible, the folks involved did not have the luxury of five or ten seconds to figure all this stuff out. I put forward that perhaps these are not the "keys" that they were touted to be. Perhaps good observations, but observations nonetheless.

I have DREAMED of the day the former limb guy here walks up to "witness" to me in a public setting, heh heh. But I never received any of these famed letters of threat. Probably was far enough outside of the inner circle that they thought it might get them in trouble.

That's the scary part of it- they are about all that's left in any kind of leadership positions. "No $**t, it was THE M*rk W*ll*ce of Way International fame, who held a managerial position with Orkin here in the Cleveland area just prior to taking on the Region job." Small world, Catcup- heh heh.

Galen, at least that explains half of life, heh heh. Interesting that He "sends" it. My understanding was that sun and rain are GOOD things.

Underneath all this ridiculous exterior, I guess something good has to leak out sometimes, heh heh.

Rascal, now I'm really blushing, heh heh.

"I don't know why" would be more than acceptable to me. And I'd still not blame God, or the Bible.

Awww, shucks, thanks Belle. Maybe I "arrived" after all, heh heh heh. I think a lot of where I insisted on God doing this or that- I was doing exactly the opposite of the true intent of the "keys" if you can even call them that. Just putting God in a box. Telling Him what to do- insisting on brass when He really wanted to give me GOLD.

I dunno. I can believe quite a lot of things, heh heh. Seriously though. The guy with the withered arm. Do you think when he was in the synagogue with Jesus, he had time to go back in the files of his mind, "well, lets see. What do I need to know first, well, whats available. Lets see.. what am I gonna do with the arm when I get it.. etc., etc.." The whole deal was over in less than five seconds. No time to figure it out. Honestly, I think any time a miracle did indeed occur, these five little "keys" were more of a DESCRIPTIVE concept. Sure, they knew what was available, how, what, etc. But only by applying the keys as an AFTERTHOUGHT do you see that they indeed were there. I will admit that several good things came out of it. At least some of us quit asking God to do stupid stuff like kill people and worse. Not available. Some never learned this lesson. They think they can, at their slightest whim or petty annoyance, give us to devils or something to this day. Still not a greasespot, here anyway.. If the keys are so simple and infallible, you have to explain away the ninety-nine failures when you boast over the one "success". I have been thinking a little more about some of this stuff- "God is no respecter of persons". Suppose you do work a miracle, and your neighbor can't come up with one if his life depended on it- keys or not, believing or not. Ever think that maybe in the big scheme of things, life is really not about YOU? "But God's just GOTTA give it to ME" me, me me. Ptooie. These "infallible" keys seem to cater to the immature, in my opinon. And yes, the finger points at me too, at least at one time, probably even some to this day.

You can't argue entirely with that. But my point is: yes, YOU have a part in all this, you believe, but if the Lord isn't behind it, the mountain will not move, ever. I think it was taken too far. Somehow, with the proper keys, and with "the magic of believing" we were supposed to be able to turn into mini-Moses's and go around parting seas all over the place. Apparently, it does not work quite like that.

Steve!- actually, I was nuts enough to try to take somebody on even when I was full of ..... Like a bull and a red flag I guess.. But I agree - he's not coming, ever. No balls, no valiant for "the truth", nothing there- LITTLE truth. Gads. He'd lose a debate trying to justify why TWI can give money to a charity NOW. They are so convuluted on just one little issue that you could screw them in the ground, heh heh.