Broken Arrow

I don't know if this is true, but someone once told me that VP said if you were raped it was your own fault.

And replace her with who? Someone you're going to like better so you can go back or something? Why does anyone care who is in charge of TWI? If they replace Rosalie, won't they just replace her with somone just like her? I couldn't care less if they put Captain Kangaroo in charge of TWI. By the way, it wasn't Jezebel's daughter was it? It was Jezebel herself I believe that was thrown from the wall. Not that it makes any difference in this context.

Ah yes, Uncle Harry day. That was the day my mother decided to burn my Beatles records; I had them all. Also the Doors, the Stones, Santana, Dylan, Lovin' Spoonful and more. It was a dark day in the life of Broken Arrow. But at least the house was rid of them devil spirits. You know, the Beatles were seed boys. So were the Dave Clark 5 I think. Also, Barbara Streisand and any other secular musician you liked unless they were a country singer.

I don't think you're being argumentative. I don't think anyone else does either. I made a statement without looking up the word and you corrected me. Nothing wrong with that.

Oh.

I don't think the thread is derailed. It's about under-shepherding, as in shepherding sheep. You know, bah bah bah. Sheep. I'm trying to strike a parody here. Since we were undershepherded we sing, "We are little lambs...". Man, I better find a job soon, I think my brain might be turning to mush! By the way, there is no such word as "undershepherding". It was invented by TWI and quite frankly, it makes no sense. I mean, how does one "shepherd under". It's kind of gross if you think about it.

Thanks Waysider! I couldn't find one worth posting on Youtube. I didn't see the one from the Muppets.

When I sat through PFAL the first time I was not impressed, and I didn't really like it. I was 17 years old, and sitting through 3 hours of lecture was tough. All the grads acted excited, though and since I wanted to belong, I acted excited too. Wimpy, I know, but at 17 one is very concerned about belonging. I made mysef like it, and soon, I really did. The first time I was around VP for any length of time was when I was College Division. I didn't like him. I thought he was a grump and a smart aleck. I'm sure some of that had to do with my own problems with my dad. Nevertheless, as the year progressed, and I heard Craig, Del Duncan, and others talk tearfully talk about our "father in the Word, I began to look on him as THE Man of God, the only hope for mankind. How exciting! Now I was part of something real and important, or so I thought. It's funny, but my initial instincts as a very young man were correct. I totally shut them down. I took years before I was able to see it for what it really was. So, I did the whole program including W.O.W. and Way Corps. By the time it was over, I too was lauding VP and also getting choked up as I thought of him as my father in the Word. After 15 years of ministry involvement, I found myself holding nothing but a handful of sand. I'd been duped.

That, and they wear these really big hats.

This topic brings to mind the song, "We are poor little lambs, who have lost our way...bahhhhh, bahhhhh, bahhhhh".

For what it's worth, TWI did, in fact, get this terminology from either Charlie "Tremendous" Jones, or Zig Ziglar. I can't remember which. As far as "would it bless you to....?" Another one was, you're sitting at a picnic, or a meeting. The meeting is over and you're kicking back and relaxing when someone comes up to you and asks, "Wanna get blessed?" No, you idiot, I wanna stay eternally depressed so do the dishes yourself.

A doctor is examining a patient when a nurse pokes her head into the room and says, "Excuse me doctor. There's a Mr. Smith out here who is demanding to see you, he says it's an emergency." The doctor asks, "What seems to be the problem?" "He's invisible, Dr." "Oh, tell I can't see him."

Just because you can think of someone who went through something worse doesn't make what you went through any less significant. Most of the time when we're suffering we try to think of somebody in more pain so that we can ignore our own suffering. You can't blame someone for doing that. In the case of sexual abuse, it's difficult to make sense of it because that kind of hatred leveled against us makes not sense. Moreover, sexual abuse inflicts damage to the person's sense of self. When you say, "...ultimately it WAS small stuff...." No it wasn't, it's a pretty significant event for you. stuff".

It was the 80's. Those stone tablets were too heavy to carry in our backpacks.

It's sad indeed. It was a stupid idea to start with but when someone actually died, that should have been a wake up call. Remember the 5th Corps guy that was doing the "cleanse" and left HQ grounds one day to buy cookies and was killed in a car accident? From what I remember, they did away with The Colon Cleanse for that very reason. Yet when it came to L.E.A.D. they didn't have the sense to cancel the hitch hiking. Go figure. The incident in the 11th Corps was when they were transporting the L.E.A.D. participants to the road after a session. People were riding in the back of a pick up which was also pulling a trailer. The truck got hit by a crosswind and went off the road spilling people as it went plus I believe the trailer struck some people. Again, young people deliberately put in peril. One is not supposed to ride in the back of a pick-up unrestrained for obvious reasons. Yet, TWI did not alter their program one bit. Probably blamed it on the believing of the participants.

I'll also vouch for George Jess. I worked with him once. He, at least with me, was a man of few words, though I heard later that he would talk your ear off about the Cincinnati Reds. He was the type of worker who didn't particularly move all that fast, but he was so efficient that he accomplished things quickly. He was a peaceful guy to be around. Frankly, Howard Allen, VP, and Donald were always nice to me. I'm not defending them nor am I saying they didn't commit sin. To me, though, they were always nice and respectful. Sometimes VP gave me the "willys". I was College Division so I had opportunity to spend time with Don. I was a young kid of 18 and like a lot of guys in my generation, I didn't have a whole lot of men that gave me much attention. Don W. did, and he took a very strong interest in my education, seriously. When he became V.P. we didn't get to talk as much.

I understand that in the 40's & 50's hitch hiking was fairly common, especially if one was a returning veteran. Things started getting nastier when more and more people started driving. Hitching is wrong on so many fronts. For one thing one is "mooching" from another. When I did it on my LEAD tours, we weren't treated very well by people. I recall being run out of truck stops just because I was hitch hiking. Hitching was a miserable experience for me. The thing is, thumbing did not even really need to be a part of the program. The point was to challenge people, right? Well, there are a lot of other, more effective ways of doing that especially in a wilderness setting. It would not have been that expensive to run a mini-bus back and forth to Tinney. Even if it were, wouldn't the safety factor been worth the cost? Naw, Waysider's right, they didn't give a hoot about the people. I've often wondered if VP didn't get some kind of thrill out of it. No, but then he wishes here were the man he knew to be.

What about Dr. Pepper? Don't forget about Dr. Pepper! Do you remember "Dr. Dimento"?

It was illegal in Kansas too where most of the corps hitched to LEAD. I remember early in my first year a couple actually got arrested and they had to be bailed out of jail. Then they still had to hitch to LEAD and be there within the time frame that everyone else was...36 hours from a particular time. What a bunch of jack rabbits. They still made it in time, but really, that should have been a wake up call. They probably got yelled at for not believing properly. All I know is, the female of that couple left the WC eventually. I don't remember who the guy was.

Okay, I'll take those. I didn't know this at the time I picked my handle. If only I were that clever.

If my memory serves me, didn't VP slam this type of practice in pfal? I don't recall Donna ever doing that good of a teaching. Whenever I heard her she seemed angry.

Well put, very well put. Establishing blame for something engenders a false sense of control. If we can affix blame, then we don't have to face the fact that something is broken within our system. We also don't have to deal with the fact that the world is unpredictable and sometimes bad things happen even when you do everything "right". That's a hard fact to face. I would only add that blame falls not only on the most convenient, but on the one least able to defend themselves. Rarely does the blame go to the organization or the "top dog".

What helped me when I came out of TWI was reading other Christian authors besides TWI material. Also, using a good devotional has been helpful. You don't have to agree with everything, just read it like you'd read a novel or something.

Thanks!

What letter are you referring to? I never heard about that.