satori001

Thanks. I have Rhapsody too. And I've used it. Windows Media has a few features I like. I can play songs at half & double speed if I want, which is great for musicians. Maybe the others have similar features but I'd rather just go with what I already know. My Musicmatch software now crashes when I use it, so while it will recognize the licenses, it just won't play anything.

So it all comes back to: How do we know our "dogma" is what God intended to say? Here's one way! It's always 100% reliable. Just believe (which is easy), and you get whatever you want from God's infinite storehouse of love and riches. Is dogma what's required, anyway? Or is it something else that is lacking? If believing is not so reliable, maybe it's not God, or us, but our understanding of what the bible is saying. In other words, maybe we are following the directions perfectly, but the directions are wrong. Or maybe it's something else.

Mr H. My point to all of this, with respect to your posts, is that the emporer has no clothes. You begin by attributing much to God, and by the end of all the exusing, there's little or nothing but "stress management" and a better diet to go on. I'm hearing, "Houston, we have a problem." Yet so many go on blithely thinking the dogma is impeccible. It's the application that is lacking. They are "blowing it" on believing, or principle, or stumbling at some other hoop through which we must jump. I suggest the dogma is the problem. We are so, so far off base in our understanding of the bible, that we are (I'm invoking a baseball analogy here) out in left field wondering why the pitcher isn't pitching to us. More likely, we're not even in the stadium, or even the parking lot. The Pitcher is throwing a perfect strike every time. We're just not anywhere near the ballpark, much less behind home plate. Or maybe we're just sitting on the bench. Would it matter how "close" we were? When something does hit us, it's far less likely to be a ball, than a bird. If it is a ball, it's probably a wild pitch, or intended for someone else, and we got lucky. Call me cynical.

I've used MSN Music, musicmatch, iTunes, and a few others to buy tunes I wanted or needed for some reason. The sound quality is pretty good. Good enough in the post-analog, digital infidelity age, anyway. Recently, my Windows Media Player can't acquire the license for my non-MSN tunes. In one case it says I need to install Musicmatch 8.5 or higher. I have version 10 installed, and I've reinstalled it twice, just to make Windows happy. But there's no pleasing Windows, apparently. It's always worked in the past. CD-ripped tunes don't present any problem. I can't tell if it's just Bill Gates trying to screw the competition, and Windows users too, as usual, or if I've gone and done something I oughtn't. Any of you familiar with managing a fairly large collection of tunes from different sources on your PC? The vast majority have been ripped from previously owned CD's, but there's a considerable on-line investment too. I have the option of "backing up" my licenses, but they back up to a prior folder, and I don't trust it not to delete licenses it no longer holds current. NONE of them should have expired, but recovering them would be next to impossible. I don't see any "primers" out there on this topic. Still looking. Thanks. PS To moderators, mitigators or medicators as the case may be: this is a computer question, yes, but it is also a general music question and might be overlooked if I put it in the computer question or music forums.* -- *Here's an unrelated forum question: Would it be possible for certain threads to exist in multiple forums simultaneously? There might be more advantages than drawbacks.

What if you believe in the law of believing? If you do, you believe that "the issues of life" are the result of believing. You must also believe that death is the result of believing. If that's what you think, wouldn't you want to warn someone? Wouldn't you want to teach them, so they don't suffer again? I'm not saying that was TWI's motivation. Only that people stuck in TWI doctrine may have behaved badly, but with good intentions. I think it was more a matter of how they said it, than what they said.

Okay Bob. I take it Henry Lincoln never took PFAL? This is fine. But how does he determine his facts? How does he "know" what he knows? He must have a lot of theories. Will he test those theories? Rely upon them? Or just upon facts? He doesn't know the sun will rise tomorrow. Will he stay up all night and party, or rest up in case he has to go to work?

Mr. H, You ask "What more do people think they need?" Is that a serious question? What about a 2-way relationship with their Heavenly Father? How about a modicum of the wisdom and power we associate with Christ? How about the ability to heal your friends, feed the masses, and other selfless, benevolent, and really neat stuff attributed to the spirit of God? -- I have invented a pill. If you take this pill, you will be in excellent condition and lose lots of weight, guaranteed. All you need to do is follow the instructions. Instructions: 1. Buy my pills 2. Take a pill 3 times daily with water 3. Exercise 3-5 times a week with aerobic and weight training. 4. Eat a low cal, low carb diet 5. Follow instructions for 6 months. Guaranteed.

Originally posted by Mr. Hammeroni: Yes, no, and maybe. So much for "certainty." Wouldn't God be able and willing to be more consistent for his children? Lets see.. if the book is true, we are already heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ, have access to God's presence. What more do people think they need? I don't think God owes us another stinking thing. Not entitled to be a prophet, a healer, a this, a that.. "Joint heirs" stand to inherit something in the future, upon the death of a benefactor. You wouldn't be able to spend an inheritance until you'd received it, so I'm good with that. But what about this "direct access" stuff? What does this mean? If God is omniscient, and knows everyone's innermost thoughts (believer and unbeliever alike), how is being a Christian improve your "access" to God? In what ways? But in a broad sense, I think we are entitled. Entitled to live a healthy life, to prosper, to enjoy life- or in other words, be joyful. In some ways, I think this is up to us. In other ways, obviously not. Nothing's "obvious" to me. You need to give an example or two. As for the part that is up to us, I'm talking about entitlement as a Christian child of God. What part of that is up to us? And by what means to we accomplish it. How is it different from the unbeliever's experience of health, prosperity, joy...

duplicate post

Originally posted by Mr. Hammeroni: Well, I don't think to teach it was THAT easy. Perhaps "skillfully crafted" would apply. I call this "shooting the messenger." Many of the verses quoted lead us to think it is "easy." I think we got a homogenized blend of muck composed of faith, believing, blind obedience, and every promise conceivable, carefully wrapped and even tied with ribbons. Too many vague generalities here - in the same number of words, what do you mean? A quick example? I still think believing works, specific only to context. Not the promise you the moon if you can believe big enough to get it nonsense. What do you mean by "works?" Which context(s) to you refer to here? Why would physical dimensions be a limitation on God's "promises" or power? Wasn't that the message of Jesus' mustard seed / mountain example?

Is this sense of "entitlement" wholly unjustified, or do you think the bible (in current form) may lead us to feel that way, with words like "whosoever" etc?I find that religion begins with evangelism, promising much without qualification. But the longer you're there, the more its "leaders" retract, often with shaming remarks like, "'Well, God just OWES it to me- me, me, me..' ah, the ego of man.. " -- Religion speaks: To the unsaved: "You are special to God, He just loves you and would do anything for you!" To the saved: "Is God supposed to treat you special or something?"

My initial post was somewhat more detailed than the rest will be. If you answer, try to do so in a way that allows your post to stand alone and be understood without re-reading the first one, but also briefly.

What, briefly, is meant by "both?"And, briefly, why? Is it a failure on God's part to make it more accessible to the average modern Christian?

Also, if it isn't "easy," why would certain verses in the bible make it so easy for Wierwille (and an unholy host of others) to teach believing, straight from the bible? This is to any or all, not just Mr. H.

Isn't this saying that God is a respecter of persons? What does "respecter" mean, anyway?Remember the brief thing...

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;.." -- First Amendment -- This one would be hard to get around. It's why we now have witchcraft covens in the military, and similar fringe groups asserting their rights everywhere. I don't believe the 1st Amendment alone should entitle them to be tax-exempt, but maybe it's guaranteed somewhere else.

Do you generally accept that there have been "real" prophets, and there exists a "real" spiritual realm? 1. If no, then "blame" passes to the con-artist, and some to ourselves, for not being more like those who gave PFAL the "sniff test" and walked away. 2a. If YES, then who's fault is it, NOT that we were convinced, but that it did not WORK for us, even though you accept the reality of "spirit?" 2b. Is it our failure to believe (whatever that is), or our failure to understand, and therfore to practice, what believing is?

George, what is your basis for "believing" in known laws of physics?Some of those laws we experience, like gravity, and the behavior of light. Others are only accepted (and demonstrable, if not provable) theory. What constitutes what you know, versus what you believe? Is there a scientific consensus you accept as "gospel?"

This isn't about offering yet "another gospel," of which there are too many to count. It's about asking, "Have you ever really heard what the gospel is saying?" How do you know? Are you too old or too tired to ask yourself?

Sunesis, VP did care about money, but for him it was a means to an end, not the end in itself. We shouldn't minimize its importance to him, but how did he use it? If it were his primary motivation, wouldn't he have died "owning" far more than he did? He may have thought of plenty of schemes through the years, and might have been far more successful in business (unlike Martindale, who only thought he could) by the force of his personality, but he remained in TWI because "the world" treated him as just another fundamentalist preacher. He didn't want to be just another rich guy, in my opinion. Within The Way International, he was literally "the man of God." He could be defined, not by his accomplishments, but by his ambitions. He was the new apostle (something he cleverly never said directly, but allowed us to "guess"). He would take God's Word over the world. Money doesn't buy that kind of prestige. To me, that spells e.g.o.

Oh, about the thread title. "Fault" is our word for responsibility, when there's a problem. Responsibility means we "caused" the problem. This thread is an invitation to glimpse the circus of our life from outside the rings, so to speak. Yes, I'm your host clown. -edited for grammar-

If anyone is inclined to venture in, try to keep your replies short, as I will too. I don't want this thread to get bogged down in the usual morass of metaphysical muck, which these discussions generally become. Regards...

This is a reply to ozbirdau's question: "If we don't get healed, is it our fault?" The answer got too long for a post, and became its own topic. Maybe some of you will find it entertaining. I do know what I'm talking about here, but I have no idea what I'm talking about. I did for a few moments, a long time ago. Done editing for now. Additional changes will be in new posts. -- The obvious answer is this: the "promises" in the bible are NOT promises as we understand them. If the "simplicity" were simple, there would be no discussion. "Simplicity" just doesn't mean anything when it comes to spirituality. Pretty much every faith teaches that the physical world must obey the spiritual world. You got cause. You got effect. Spirit is cause. The physical is effect. Everything in the physical world is the effect of something else. So there is no true cause > effect relationship here in our world. Apparent causes are just the effect of another, prior effect. Sickness is a physical affliction, so healing must be brought about either by a physical "cure" (an "effect" within the physical realm), or a spiritual decree (an external cause). Wierwille didn't teach believing in a vacuum. There are plenty of biblical references, and his teachings, mis-teachings and mistakes are discussed and dissected by Raf, Jerry Barrax, and others you can easily find. (I haven't read them because I have no further interest in Wierwille's prose and cons.) What should be OBVIOUS to everyone, including a dying, one-eyed cancer victim once known as "Doctor," or "The Teacher," or "VP," is there is nothing at all "simple" about spiritual power, if it exists. By if, I mean "spiritual power" and other such terms are terribly misleading because we have defined them in a phyisical context, as "effects." We can only define something as an effect. We live in a world consisting only of effects. Everything in our world is an effect of something else. So our concept of something spiritual is inherently wrong. Spirit may "exist," but NOT as we think we know it, NOT as an aspect of our world. Spirit does not behave as we think it should. It doesn't "behave" at all, for that matter. Behavior is part of our world, not the spiritual. What is "believing?" It is supposedly the effect of: positive confession, prayer, single-mindedness, like-mindedness, "imagineering," "walking out on the promises," and a lot of other meaningless crap. (Not meaningless in our world, but meaningless, therefore ineffectual, to spirit.) These "keys" are in turn the effect of your intention, or "will" (decision & desire in Wayspeak). They are the effect of your need, issue, problem, goal, etc. Which are the effects of circumstances, which are the effects of prior circumstances, those the effects of prior... -- What is "spirit?" If you tell me you know what it is, you're a liar. Nah, not really. You're only repeating a lie. And not really a lie, but an illusion by which we are perpetually deceived. You have descriptions, you have definitions, you have images and impressions. All are the effects of what you've been "taught" (and I use the term loosely). But you don't know jack ...., do you? And EVEN if you did, you'd know better than anyone that words fail utterly to describe what you think you know. And, class, out of what did Wierwille concoct his beliving formula? Words? Yep. What is the bible, for that matter? Words? Yep... and not original words, but the approximations, of the gist, of the substance, of the vaguest inklings the competing committees of translators had of the prophet's original inspiration, if that's what it was. And even the prophets were limited to words. The fact of the matter is, even if God had revealed Himself today, not on parchment, but in digital high-def video and Dolby 5.1 surround sound, we STILL wouldn't get it, because we live in the physical world. And we interpret everything we learn through that experiential filter. We are the effects of everything that led up to this moment. But spirit is cause. Not effect. We have no way to grasp true cause, a cause without a prior cause. We only know the chain of effect. So... We can't do .... that isn't the effect of something else. Even our free will is an illusion, the expression of our accumulated baggage, which is what we "feel." So you may ask, who am "I?" You are a little "assembly of gears," spun helplessly by countless other gears, great and small, and of which you have no knowledge. "But, that's not what God intended!" your memory banks may output in protest. "I've been programmed to 'believe' I have free will! I refuse to update my software!" You couldn't, so there's no argument, is there? So where did this idea of "free will" come from? How did it get into our software? That's where spirit comes in. We don't know what it is because our processors can't process anything original. Spirit exists beyond the machinery of our mental and physical existence. This is why we can try, try, try to make spirit do our bidding, we just can't. The effect cannot dictate to its own cause. Can it? How could the physical world command the spirit? Ridiculous. Even our little processor/brains can get that. There is a way out. Anybody care to guess? -edited to help laleo get back in alignment and harmony-

I agree with everything except the "least amount of work" part. I don't think he was afraid to work. He was corrupt, but he wasn't lazy. I think his priority was ego, followed by its expression, power, and money came last. He appreciated wealth, but cash reserves didn't seem to matter as much. He wasn't "rich" in the ordinary sense. He probably could have made more in another "field." Correct me if that's wrong. That's the impression I've always had.

I did a google search on: kosher duluth. Don't know how current the info is.