chockfull

Totally. In fact studying history such as ours make us less doomed to repeat it ;) For me it is necessary to close the cycles.

So revisiting this. I actually have some more information from reading through the R&R live broadcast Q & A on Facebook. Apparently, Rico not only told Rosalie that she was to step down, but that God told him that he Rico should be the President. This happened right before a Sunday Teaching Service. Rico was escorted out, they moved to Florida, all the Way people there were in an uproar and JY De Loser had to fly out to meet with them. He taught scripture but did not answer any questions. Again, just saw this info posted up on an answer to the R&R broadcast Q & A.

I think we all struggle with what we should believe. A friend of mine on social media posted this quote from Paulo Coelho, a famous Brazilian author. To me it fits this struggle.... "None of us can be in the present and the past at the same time, not even when we try to understand the things that happen to us. What has passed will not return: we cannot for ever be children, late adolescents, sons that feel guilt or rancor towards our parents, lovers who day and night relive an affair with someone who has gone away and has not the least intention of coming back. Things pass, and the best we can do is to let them really go away. That is why it is so important (however painful it may be!) to destroy souvenirs, move, give lots of things away to orphanages, sell or donate the books you have at home. Everything in this visible world is a manifestation of the invisible world, of what is going on in our hearts - and getting rid of certain memories also means making some room for other memories to take their place. Let things go. Release them. Detach yourself from them. Nobody plays this life with marked cards, so sometimes we win and sometimes we lose. Do not expect anything in return, do not expect your efforts to be appreciated, your genius to be discovered, your love to be understood. Stop turning on your emotional television to watch the same program over and over again, the one that shows how much you suffered from a certain loss: that is only poisoning you, nothing else. Nothing is more dangerous than not accepting love relationships that are broken off, work that is promised but there is no starting date, decisions that are always put off waiting for the "ideal moment." Before a new chapter is begun, the old one has to be finished: tell yourself that what has passed will never come back. Remember that there was a time when you could live without that thing or that person - nothing is irreplaceable, a habit is not a need. This may sound so obvious, it may even be difficult, but it is very important. Closing cycles. Not because of pride, incapacity or arrogance, but simply because that no longer fits your life. Shut the door, change the record, clean the house, shake off the dust. Stop being who you were, and change into who you are." Paulo Coelho

Okayyyyyyyy............... I also suffered through the entire hour of this video. And let me tell you, sticking with Ed Horn3y's 3rd grade rhetoric explained over and over again different ways real slow certainly convinced me I got off the short bus years ago when I left the Way. All dubious repeated accounts of how the BOD has been confronted and hasn't responded. Or they did respond, but not in an Acts 15 council way, they wanted to meet with couples alone. Boob didn't want to subject themselves to this. When a question was asked "what specific details" complained about, Shelton says he was a VP and as such was under an NDA so can't discuss the specifics. They vaguely refer to the letter, which as you can read has about one point. Rosalie is usurping authority, needs to step down. Democracy in the ministry I guess is the underlying point. Which has never been there in any format since the Youth Caravan Chimes Hour chimes player asked VP if he could play a solo and VP told him no. Next, all sorts of crapola about how they are working within the Way to reform and revitalize, and haven't even thought of the next step, but they will all be believers. Then Doody quoted the "I know who holds tomorrow" poem and I just about tossed cookies. Again, like the paper, have never seen so many people speaking while saying so little. They closed out with someone asking Boob how they were planning to do reform after he was marked and avoided. They all laughed. Then they closed observing they couldnt' do reform while marked and avoided, and this was the first step. All in all, apparently nothing they covered all the Corpse didn't complain about 10 years ago. It didn't change. Thankfully, I've now only lost an hour of my life, not 10 years. Carry on.

JayDee, please check CFFM references. Wayne Clapp stepped down from main clergy responsibilities there because John Shroyer promised the ministry to Tonya whether or not she was his daughter or daugther in law. Kevin G still works there part time but the main responsibility transferred to Tonya because she convinced Wayne of John Shroyer's promise. I am not mistaken here.

Former Trunk Coordinator during LCM years. Was banished by Craig, moved to Indiana, and now works for a way person there. Wife is Howard Allen's daughter. Has been a branch coordinator in Indianapolis since late 90s.

Hello my friend. Thank you for stopping in to the 'Spot. I'm sorry nobody remembers you. I remember you, although we were not friends then. I too experienced pain of silence after leaving. Have a cup of java on the house and PM me if you want.

JCS, I totally sympathize with you needing to vent. That is total creepster material with VPW there. I never even heard that before or that phrase. I had to look it up in the Urban Dictionary - sorry to be naive. Apparently this seems to be part of an overall rapist mindset that VPW had in general. Pathological. One more nail in the coffin that apparently is being constructed by Jesus on another thread. You Jr. Corpse have my sympathies in general. Communal oversight always looked to me to be somewhat abusive.

Haha. Now this is where the Way has gone really downhill. I mean first you have a guy with a cereal box send-in PhD in homiletics, followed by a jock-type illogical homophobe screamer, followed by the southern drawl you to sleep obsessive retired English teacher whose skills lend more towards the Dewey Decimal system and library management rather than actually being seen or heard in public. Push from behind paper. A definite decrease going on here. A denouement. Will you squeak out loud, little new President mouse? Or only from behind closed doors? Will you be like those Proverbs 6:13 speaks about, a worthless person who winks with his eyes, signals with his feet, who points with his fingers; who with perversity in his heart continually devises evil, who spreads strife? Will you live your life a good little marionette puppet whose limbs go where the puppetmaster's strings pull them? So far you are ferocious one on one marking and avoiding people. A lion in the dark. Yet a mouse in the light.

Commenting on the REV. The major flaw I see in it is its roots. What roots you say? The roots of scholarly modeling what VPW did in his works. What scholarly model you say is this? Why, plagiarism, lack of peer review, lack of source citation, lack of collaboration with educational entities of the day and time, and other such egotistical and isolationist flaws that in our modern world consist of red flags to a genuine scholarly work. In it's least common denominator it is a commentary. Is it wrong to like a commentary? No, different strokes for different folks. Controversial stories and commentaries on the Bible and Christ have been around for a while. I'm thinking right now of a work, "The Last Temptation of Christ" - a historical novel by Nikos Kazantzakis. The novel, published in 1960, was later the inspiration for an equally controversial movie adaptation in 1988 released by Martin Scorsese. I know that has nothing to do with the topic - consider it added color commentary :)

Haha. Preach it brother. Absolutely. the FACTS would astound all. Many of them are buried within threads on this forum. And trail back decades. I mean wasn't Boob the original yes-man replacement when VP wanted to get rid of was it Heefner? Or Doop? All the way back to early 70's groovy Christians. Serial adultery. All your points are right on. What was the trigger here? Was it baby Brian falling out of favor and Ch@ndler Greene falling in favor? And forced retirement for all except the queen bee of the colony? I always look for a personal selfish reason many of these people I've seen as sycophants for decades are now turning into martyrs with a soul. I 100% agree with you. The answer is not current BOD step down to "preserve the mystery". The answer is burn it all to the ground, dismantle the organization, get rid of the $$$ and assets that have caused leaders for years to protect their filthy lucre with Machiavellian predictability. Give it all away to charity. If you want a new ministry, ministries, church, churches, or genuine God movement, get rid of the name "the Way". At this point all that name has done is anti-Christ - to replace Christ - the real way, with a false way consisting of moral midgets with lofty titles standing in the place where Christ should be.

Normally I would say yes there is a chance. But we are talking about Rico here. I highly doubt he was being sarcastic. Also, I don't see Rico's name on those letters. He may not be involved long-term with that group, and is just sorting life out with his family, like many of us did when we left. While I give him no quarter, I do wish the best for him and his family - Robin's got a level head and they will pull through it.

Okay. I read through this long-winded snoozer. I swear I have never seen a document that says less in more words. What is the problem? Rosalie took over the cult in the same fashion it was modeled by the former 2 presidents. As opposed to how she promised she would with distributing the balance of power. Totality of control. Totality of decision making power. This reminds me of the challenges raising kids. They don't listen to what you say. But they model what you do 100% perfectly. These leaders don't know to do anything different than start another cult. They never have had anything different modeled. All they have really experienced through modeling is how to run a cult, not how the true body of Christ interacts. As a result of that, I would like to comment on what I would consider the best of the splinters. CFFM. Started out to preserve "the truth" of the ministry but correct the practical error. I'm sure they still do that to a certain extent. But go read one of their publications now. You've got Tonya S in charge now because her dad who founded the splinter promised it to her as an inheritance basically. Now the language of the publications is changing slightly to emphasize the structure of the group, coded language is being invented - state contacts - regional contacts, etc. Do you think in another decade or two there is any way they will avoid the same "the purpose of the twig is to carry the heart of the BOD to each leaflet on the tree" type of logic??? In that document I love how Way leaders always over-inflate their own importance by talking about how we are going to lose the "Great Mystery" TM in practical application. First off, it's not rocket science that Christians should work together. In fact, most churches in your own city have done a better job of this than the Way for decades. They collaborate to feed the homeless, help the downtrodden, and pair up with other ministries doing things like working to end sex slavery with groups like Exodus Road. Actually, most churches in your own city - to be better than the Way, all they would need to do is not have their community neighbors hate them. The whole fact that this is such a revelation to people wanting to leave the Way is a testament to the destructive isolationist mindsets taught with the whole "household versus body" teachings. They are emerging with a slanted perspective on this here. I mean, HELLO, you already lost the mystery a long time ago functionally. And in reality, if what you mean by the mystery is Christians collaborating and working together for a common cause, it was never there in the Way ministry to start with. The Way is a separatist cult, not looking to collaborate with the rest of the body of Christ, but to isolate believers off from the body of Christ. And its leaders know nothing different. When there is dissent, what do they do? Redefine what the word "household" means, and circle the troops. Now, "household" to the Way members means all of those people not associated with "Revival and Restoration". In all actuality, if you want to get real about what "the household" is, it is whatever group of people that is currently in the BOD good favor. So what are these people doing to fix it? Ensuring that they get marked and avoided, and leaving while trying to draw the most amount of people away with them. Are they going to be better than the cult? Sure they are. They have all the same great intentions of other splinters. I'm sure everything will be fine. After all, they have one thing down already. Being able to produce a bunch of hot air with little substance.

And Rico thought that Rosalie would listen to audible revelation? Where has he been living the last 20 years? And why would God need to give audible revelation for information that was easily obtainable through observation and reasoning? The only thing that makes any kind of remote sense with that story is that Rico was so enveloped, encrusted, and ensnared by the Way and his position in the Way that God had to yell at him to wake him up audibly. If that happened to me, I would be ashamed, not using it to blame God for my actions that I should have taken and knew to take 2 decades ago. Rico gets no quarter from me. Now make no mistake I am glad that he, Robin and family have escaped the clutches of the cult. But it's coming up on more than a decade as Corps Director under this regime. All with a funded high salary, a house in NK paid cash for, and all the perks of the position. Most of the secrets the BODummies knew, you also knew. God shouldn't have to yell at you. Especially after having seen so many lives decimated while not uttering a peep. Rico was always the zealot's zealot. Run to serve. When they say jump he says how high. When Rosalie said work the Word on debt, he complies, producing one of the most convoluted cr@p teachings on the topic ever known to mankind. I mean half the d@mn debt policy is constructed off that workmanship of the Word produced by Rico. Great piece of kiss-@$$ work there. I especially liked the bit about how some universal truths transcend administrations, like debt and tithing. So appropriate for keeping the thumb on the head of all the little people. So my advice to Rico is once they start that next little VPW worship splinter group, the first thing he should do is publish an update to that piece of cr@pola. And don't try to sell me any old wineskins, I'm not in the market.

You know what else is inspiring? LOL - Domain Name: REVIVALANDRESTORATION.COMRegistrar: TUCOWS DOMAINS INC.Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 69Whois Server: whois.tucows.comReferral URL: http://www.tucowsdomains.comName Server: DNS1.P06.NSONE.NETName Server: DNS2.P06.NSONE.NETName Server: DNS3.P06.NSONE.NETName Server: DNS4.P06.NSONE.NETStatus: clientTransferProhibited https://icann.org/epp#clientTransferProhibitedStatus: clientUpdateProhibited https://icann.org/epp#clientUpdateProhibitedUpdated Date: 05-mar-2017Creation Date: 09-sep-2016Expiration Date: 09-sep-2017

Phenomenally normal. The only thing missing is listening to some good country music. But everything in moderation, you know, because if you listen to way too much country music then eventually you will have to listen to it backwards so that you can get your car back, your house back, your girl back, and your job back.

Oh, yes. I mean there's no telling what spiritual enlightenment I might have experienced on that Q & A session. I mean, look, it's inspiring Rocky to come up with ancient Greek fable paradigms and all.

It's like Joseph Smith or something. I mean the cult MOG impression VPW left was branded so deep like Joseph Smith that every jack Mormon who wanted to start his own harem and own land would branch out at the root and denounce the heavy hand of the authoritarian LDS leadership and cite Joseph Smith. I know a fair majority of that R&R group (even though was blissfully unaware of their collaboration and development). They are all complicit in the Way's atrocities and have participated in one way or another for years. Now that it affects them they start an uprising. Not when they were tools in affecting others. Then they were all on R&R - turning a blind eye, enjoying the fruits of all their developed relationships within. What follows next? A means to continue the revenue stream so that slinging BS can continue as a profession. CFFM2. STFFi4.0. Another V2P2 ranch. Gag me with an old wineskin. Oh and the Way? Whenever an enlightened fool arises and departs , there is always another unenlightened fool ready to step up and be another brick in the wall.

Dang it!!! Missed all the fun.

That has to be the nicest way of calling someone a complete @$$ - ki$$er I have ever heard in my life.

Hot d@mn. Seems to be the cycle of human stupidity coming back around for another pass. What have we got here? The "Unpassing of the Matriarch" ??? Sounds like a flow problem. You know, kind of like the Dead Sea?

Hey with this and your "fair enough" comment I think I am going to peace out on this discussion for a bit. I do agree with you when researchers take the catalog of audio files of purported recordings of SIT and organize them into language constructs somehow that more can be learned at that time. What I learned from this discussion and the previous 86 page one is that VPW made a claim in one of his classes "nobody can fake SIT". I've found that statement to be totally and absolutely wrong. And before this discussion I would probably have believed that VP statement without questioning it.

One other point I want to make on this thread entitled "Questioning Faith". I have encountered no other Christian church, organization, ministry that produces this kind of deep level rejection of basic common tenets people all had when joining the organization. The Way ministry is anti-Christ just looking at the fruit of it on these 2 threads about questioning faith and prayer. When people leave the Way, many times they reject all Christianity. And the Bible. I have encountered no other Christian church that has this effect on people. To the Way ministry and JY de Loser. This is your legacy. And it extends to the bema.

Raf, my feelings are that there is no testable claim being made. I have a private prayer life. I have a way I interact with God. You don't like it, and think I'm either lying to all you, or am deluded and believe fiction. I used to get tweaked by you claiming things about my life, but then realized that it's a free country, God made humans with free choice, and I need to not be offended by the exercising of another human's free rights, whatever their belief about me or opinion about me is. I 100% disagree with you about SIT being a matter of faith. But of course I would. I believe there is a God. You do not. So what other conclusion would you have about me than I am talking to a fictional friend?

Raf, I'm not trying to win a debate. I ceased posting on the topic after 86 pages before, and I saw this being resurrected. I can totally appreciate it is part of a fact-based approach to sorting out our common past. I'm kind of sensing we are approaching that impasse in major premise again. I just have a different perspective from you, and hope that my contributions to questioning faith and SIT will also help some members recover from the Way that your approach to it can't connect with.