Jbarrax

Perhaps I didn't make my point clearly. All that stuff I added about inspiration and revelation wasn't specifically about Paul. I was addressing the point of view that if the Bible is God's Word, it can't contradict itself. I included it in the brief remark about Paul referring to himsekf in third person and apparently muddied the waters of discourse. Sorry. Now, about II Corinthians. I think the context makes it fairly clear that Paul is actually writing about himself. Check out verses 5-7. emphasis added. "...the abundance of the revelations..." seems to refer back to the things seen and heard in the third heaven, which would make it clear that the man Paul knew in Christ was in fact him. Although it's not nearly as dramatically written there is at least one other instance of Paul referring to himself in third person. It's verse 9 of Philemon. This is a not too delicate reminder to Philemon that the main reason for this epistle (a request that Philemon forgive a runaway slave) may be unusual for the culture, but it was coming from an esteemed man of God whose opinions and requests should be treated with gravity and respect. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any others. Peace JerryB

Personally, I have no problem with the interpretation that Paul was speaking of himself. He may have used the third person specifically to keep from distracting the reader from his intended topic which was the glory of the Lord. But Weirwille the self-acclaimed master of Biblical research should at least have explained why he changed "a man in Christ" to "Paul" rather than doing it automatically and without explanation. Now here's an idea I've been tossing to and fro in wee hours of the night. Suppose---just suppose--that VP's distincition between revelation and inspiration is invalid. First a referesher is called for. In the Advanced Class, we learned The Great Principle. God, who is spirit teaches His creation in you which is now your Spirit and your spirit teaches your mind. (God help me, I still remember it). That's VP's definition of the mechanics of revelation. Inspiration, on the other hand, was loosely described as 'in-spirit action". Step One: The implication was that revelation is straight from the mouth of God, while inspiration is an indirect, less precise proclamation. So we placed speaking in tongues, interpretation and prophecy in the inspiration category, and put word of wisdom, word of knowledge, and discerning of spirits in the vaunted revelation category. But the Bible does not make such a distinction. In fact, the Bible doesn't even use the words "inspire" or "inspiration" (Remember the phrase "given by inspiration of God" in II Timothy 3:16 is translated from the Greek word theopneustos). So the distinction between revelation and inspiration is entirely a construct of TWI or whoever VP learned it from. In reality, the words could be as distinct in meaning as allos and heteros, which is to say, not at all. Step Two: What do we know about the linguistic and hermeneutical precison of inspired utterance? Well those of us who have spoken in tongues and interpreted should know that the interpretation is "the gist sum and substance" of what was spoken. Anyway, we know it's not very precise. Here's something else that I have observed about inspired utterance. It is affected by what you believe and what you expect. Agnostics and atheists among us will no doubt offer this as proof that it's not a manifestation of holy spirt at all, but let's not get distracted with that tangent right now. I have spoken to people who went to CES fellowships and were taught that interpretation of tonges is a prayer, not a message from God. After being presented with this teaching, they were asked to speak in tongues and interpret and voila! Out came a prayer. I attended a fellowship of ex-way folk here in Lexington for a while that is pretty much pro-PFAL and not the least bit inclined to change anything VP taught. When they interpret or prophesy it's all about "My word"' this and "My Word" that. When I interpret or prophesy, that phrase NEVER came out of my mouth. Instead of 'the Word' the focus of my messages was always God himself. Because I no longer believed in the perfection of "the Word", I was never inspired to use that phrase. I have concluded from these and other experiences too numerous (and boring) to specify, that inspired utterance is affected by the beliefs of the individual speaker. It's filtered through our concious and subconcious minds. Step Three: Since there is no Biblical distinction between messages received by revelation and inspiration, and we know that messages we have been taught come from "inspiration" are affected by the mind and belief of the user, why would it not also be true of revelation? Couldn't the revelation of 'The Word of God" have been filtered and colored by the beliefs of those who spoke and penned it? This is actually not as heretical as it may sound. VP himself in PFAL taught that the men of God used their vocabularies to write the Scriptures. "Amos was a herdsmen". John had "that beautiful P.H.D. language" and so on. So if our father in fundamentalism who said God has a reason for everything He says, where He says it, how He says it, when He says it, and to whom He says it, also taught that it got somewhat distorted and affected by whom He says it, it should not be a radical idea to take that notion one step further and posit that the Bible can be the Word of God....but still be flawed and somewhat self-contradictory. Because it was filtered through the limited vocabularies, minds, and beliefs of people. And people are flawed and somewhat self-contradictory. Didn't the Apostles have arguments? Of course they did! Then why should it be anathema to think that their collected writings should reflect some of those arguments--and still contain the words of life? Perhaps this is why what Matthew wrote about eternal life doesn't agree with what John wrote about eternal life. (Matthew 19:16-29 vs. John 3:15 & 16). Perhaps this is why what Paul tried to communicate about the spiritual body contradicts some of what Luke tried to communicate about the words and deeds of the resurrected Christ (Luke 24:39 vs. I Cor 15:44) . Does the Bible assert that no Scripture contradicts any other Scripture, or did somebody just decide that if it's the Word of God it can't contradict itself. I'm sure VP didn't come up with that on his own. Either it's in the Bible--personally, I've never been comfortable with II Timothy 2:13 as the "proof text" of that creed---or it's a man-made condition. If the latter, perhaps we should reexamine it and consider another option. Maybe the Scripture is the written Word of God and maybe it does contradict itself. Maybe that's part of why we still see through a glass darkly and look forward to seeing face to face. Maybe that's just an intellectual dodge form an analytical person who sees the Scripture's inconsistencies but doesn't want to abandon the concept of the of God's power being resident therein. Maybe it's a cop-out. But maybe it's worth considering.

Hi Evan. I'm sorry, I misunderstood the context of your remarks. You're right of course. miracles are entirely God's doing. Acts 8 something or other says Phillip did the miracles that astonished Simon the Sorcerer. VP made a big deal of that, but I can't see Phillip deciding on what miracle he was going to do and then believing to make it happen. I think God decided what He was going to do and gave Phillip simple instructions. God did the miracle as Phillip acted. I could be way off base but it makes sense to me.

HI Evan! At the risk of sounding hard-hearted, proud, and/or mean, I have to disagree. I do think we have a role to play in what happens in our lives. The Bible and my experiences have lead me to believe that faith, wisdom, and obedience are critical ingredients in the quality of our lives. Wisdom and faith can appropriate blessings, but disobedience or the lack of wisdom can cause problems that faith can't fix. I know we've all debunked VP's "Law of believing." It was overwrought and flawed the way VP presented it and the way TWI practiced it, but the Bible does say repeatedly that when Jesus healed someone, he told them it was because of their faith. When his Apostles were terrified of drowing in a storm at sea--an understandable reaction to a dire situation--he chastised them for having little faith. In my own life I've seen instances where I did and didn't receive answers to prayer for healing and I know that the difference was the focus of my faith. There's more to it than that, but I will say that TWI taught this backward and caused a lot of hurt and confustion. I didn't hear it straigthened out until the WV LC Gary C## taught it to us about a year after the P.O.P. It made a trememdous difference in my life. But I digress. But let me stop right here and say that faith is something we all have in different levels. TWI spoke of "longsuits". For lack of a better word, I'll use it here. Some have a longsuit in faith, others have it in love, patience, kindness, wisdom, intuition or something else. I may have a "longsuit" in faith, but it's more than offset by the fact that I make lousy decisions under pressure. To put it biblically I suppose it's a lack of wisdom, a character weakness, or just plain foolishness. So I tend to get myself into bad situations because of bad decisions. And for that, there may be no fix that faith can appropriate. If I make a bad career or financial decision, my whole family may suffer for it for months or years. Perhaps LEAD was The Way making bad decisions for which many followers suffered just as my kids do when I screw up. It's not their fault. They didn't do anything wrong. But if their Dad does something stupid, they're going to share in the consequences. I have also seen dramatic changes in my life's circumstances brought about by changing from ignoring God's will to accepting and carrying it out. That of course falls in the category of obedience & disobedience. Disobedience robs us of blessings and may keep us in problematic circumstances we're praying and believing unsuccessfully to get out of. That is to say, sometimes faith is not the answer, obedience is. Sometimes we can pray for deliverance from a situation, and God will tell us what we need to do. But we don't want to do that, so we just keep praying, and "believing" and getting nowhere. Then we finally acquiesce and do what we've been told to and voila! Problem solved. Again, I don't mean to imply that HCW is disobedient. I'm only saying that it has been a factor in my life and I think the Scripture supports the idea that when we ignore or resist God's will we bring consequences to ourselves that prayer and believing may not remove. Well that's all for me. Again, I'm not trying to make anyone feel bad. Just sharing my perspective from what I've learned from reading, living, from occasionally getting it right and seeing what happens when I get it wrong. Peace JerryB

Well, I feel like a "lightweight" for posting this after hearing from HCW and Biker Babe. But I was miraculously healed of sudden onset asthma. My wife (fiancee at the time) was a W.O.W. in Cleveland and I was attending Marshall University in Huntington, WV. During winter break in January, I travelled from Huntington where it was unseasonably warm, to our home in Wheeling, WV. where it was typically wintery weather. The sudden climate change triggered an asthma attack. I had suffered these from early childhood. I would just lay on a chaise lounge for days laboring to breath. Each breath was a struggle and sometimes I wondered if I was going to be able to keep it up. But generally, the attack would fade after a few days. Such was the case in Wheeling. I spent about two days wheezing and then travelled to Cleveland to visit my sweetie. Unfortunately Cleveland was even colder than Wheeling so the first morning there, I awoke (on the couch) weak and wheezing. Deb came over and ministered to me and prayed for God to heal my bronchial tubes. As she prayed it felt like someone was pumping fresh air into my lungs. The attack ended immediately--something that had never happened before. That was 22 years ago and I've not had another one since. I consider that a miraculous healing. I've been healed of other things before, but not immediately. So I guess I still hold to TWI's distinction between a miracle and a healing. But the bottom line is, I've been delivered from asthma, for which I thank God! Peace JerryB

Join the club Rascal. I've been ignoring Mike for about a year now.

Hey dig that groovy new quote function.! :D

Yes, I remember hearing him mention the "magic of believing" during the class.

I didn't start this topic. Nandon did. Something must have gotten scrambled in the transition. Oh well. Welcome to the new improved Greasespot Cafe!!!!! Weehoo!!

Nice Digs! Good job Paw and Bob! Thanks for keeping open a place of refuge for those us ex TWI castaways and a lighthouse for those looking for a way out of the mental fog of Wayworld.

...And, if you will recall, during PFAL, he talkec about all the scholarly books he had read and said that they didn't help him because he was reading "around the Word." Then he carted them all off to the gehenna and burned them, and began to read nothing but the Word day and night, year after year. He regretted that he didn't keep all those books because people would see them and be impressed. So you see Oldiesman, although VP admitted to having read the works of Bullinger, Stiles, Kenyon et al, he presented his class as if all of those men were WRONG and that only by discarding their work did he arrive at the rightly divided word of truth. GLOW-RY! So you can "see it" any way you want. The fact is, Weirwille presented PFAL as the fruit of HIS relentless dedicated personal research. Which is of course, a crock; a double deception. Not only is it not the fruit of his diligent research, it's not even rightly divided. Peace JerryB

I got my Email a few hours ago. Oh boy a new forum. I can hardly wait! Will there be red drapes on the windows? JerryB

Good observations there Def. Peace JerryB

Hi Def. Hey are you an expensive TV set? Sorry, that was a lousy pun. The context of Galatians indicates that the other gospel Paul referred to was the concept that saved Gentiles needed to be circumcised despite the fact that they had received holy spirit. Paul vigorously rejected that line of thinking. Galatians 5:1-3 summarizes his position thusly; According to Paul, the "other gospel" was a sneak attack designed to drag believers back into the bondage of the Mosaic law. Part of the reason it had gotten so much traction in Galatia was because it was being advocated by some of the original Twelve Apostles and James the Lord's brother. That's why Paul laid out his case in such dramatic language in the opening of the epistle So the "other gospel" was legalism; specifically circumcision. Peace JerryB

I stand corrected Wordwolf. I should have said, "I wish we all knew that already". Cool Raf. I believe in beleving God too. But my Mom doesn't get the law of beliving. She's an unbelieving believer. How about if you believe with me to get my believing up so I can manifest a more abundant life so my Mom will stop believing that I'm in a cult and then she'll be a believer too. :-)

You bring up a good point about "the law of believing" Hammeroni. The lc of WV did a teaching back in 89 or so that cleared that up for me. He said that the truth is that believing is a response to a promise from God, not something you decide to do on your own. Using the famous Blue Book article Release From Your Prisons, he interpreted the clear picture VP uses in his camera analogy as the Scripture. If you focus on the Scripture, or revealed will of God (in the case of revelation)you will get the result. If you focus on a picture of your own making and "believe for it" to happen, you are, in effect, playing God. But mostly you're just setting yourself up for frustration because it doesn't work! I think if you look at the Biblical use of the word pistis you can rightly understand it to be a positive response to, or acceptance of, a promise of God. This teaching literally changed my life. Receiving healing is much easier now because, instead of creating a mental picture of me being healthy, I just focus on the verse that says "...by whose stripes you were healed." I get much, much better results this way. Of course that means VP's memorable PFAL declaration, "You say it, you believe it, God will bring it to pass!" is hogwash, but I think we all know that already. Peace JerryB

I agree Hammeroni. VP says in PFAL that in each case of deliverance in the Bible, all five keys are evident. That's so far beyond exxageration, it can only be called a lie. The amazing thing is, he made this statement and then used the record in Mark chapter three (the man with the withered hand) as his proof text. There's nothing in that passage that says the man knew that God's ability equaled God's willingness. Nor does Mark say that the man had his needs and wants parallel. Does Mark record that the man found out what was available? No. He was simply sitting in the synagogue. I could go on, but I would belabor the point. VP had a terrible habit of making assumptions and then trying to find Scriptures that he could use to support them. Sometimes they fit, many times they don't. The bottom line is, the class on keys, is more accurately described as a class on half-baked assumptions. Nevertheless, there are some gems in there, such as speaking in tongues, and postitive believing (which is not a "law" but a pretty darn good idea). Peace JerryB

Hi CM. thanks for posting that. Although I think some of the autohr's distinctions are hair-splitting I believe he has a valid point. There are other indictations that Paul's gospel and that of the other apostles were not the same, at least in Paul's mind. Note Philippians 4:15 Paul's departure from Macedonia is recorded in Acts chapter 16. This had to have been several years after the day of Pentecost. Yet Paul refers to that timeframe as "the beginning of the gospel". This indicates that, as far as Paul was concerned, the preaching of the gospel didn't begin until he and Barnabus were annointed as Apostles and sent abroad by God to preach the mystery to the Gentiles. This brings up an fascinating and somewhat controversial question. What was Paul's opinion of the "gospel" that was preached by the other Apostles? Galatians chapter one indicates that it wasn't very high. Well. Any other gospel was anathema. The rest of Galatians indicates that there was another gospel being preached by "those who seemed to be pillars" of the Church, and that it was not in harmony with Paul's gospel. For a detailed and thought-provoking consideration of this issue, take a look at Dave Anderson's book, The Two Ways of the First Century Church Peace JerryB

If we take that tack Todd, we can look critically at almost the entire Old Testament. i agree with this line of reasoning. perhaps divine rules are simply seen very differently for different eras of humanities development? they dont change, per se, we just express them through different sets of goggles I think that is a very good point Todd. The rules of the game at the time of the Benjamite War may have been harsher because of the stakes involved. Remember that God kicked Adam and Eve out of the garden right after they sinned specifically to deny them access to the tree of life and immortality. Apparently having the fallen pair receive immorality was an unacceptable proposition. If we try to maintain that high stakes mindset and fast forward to Judges, we can assume, as TWI has taught, that until Jesus redeemed mankind, there was always a possibility that the Devil could find a way to prevent the birth of the Messiah or so pollute the culture of Israel as to make his ministry impossible to carry out. If this had happened all of mankind would have been lost and utterly without hope. So the stakes were much higher than they are now in the world Jesus has redeemed and it seems that God wanted evil people kept out of Israel at all costs. Hence the commandment to utterly destroy a city in which men of Belial were found. This may also explain why God commanded Moses to execute captive women and children, an act that would be seen 'through our goggles' as despicable, inhuman brutality (Numbers 31:7-35). We can be fairly certain that God would not condone the same type of behavior among Christians today, but that doesn't mean that it was unacceptable back then. Peace JerryB

I consider you a pretty good Bible student too Mark. We all overlook things when we're studying. Often I find it's not until I "share" something I've studied that I see what I missed or get a bigger picture. I think it's the old "receive, retain, release" principle in action (one of the things I think VP got right in PFAL). Iron sharpeneth iron and all that. :-) Peace JerryB

Yes Mark, I'm familiar with the story. And I read your post. I'm not disputing the fact that the men initiated a plan of action as soon as they found out about what had happened. What I am questioning is your assumption that there was a kinder, gentler option that God had in mind and that He would certainly have revealed it if they had only asked the right question. They did pray for guidance. To assume that God only reveals his true will if we 1) pray and 2) ask precisely the right question when we do is, imho, a bit of a stretch. I realize I am essentially poking my nose into what was already a pretty good thread as a naysayer. I have a bad habit of doing that. So let me apologize for nitpicking. But..let's take another look at Judges 20:18 If God's will was for a nonviolent approach, as you say, why couldn't this passage read as follows? "And the children of Israel arose, and went up to the house of God, and asked counsel of God and said, Which of us shall go up first to the battle against the children of Benjamin? And the Lord said, "None of you shall go up for ye are all hard-hearted buttheads. No more blood shall be spilled in Israel this day. Sit ye here and pray for your brethren in Gilead that I may deliver them from the hard-heartedness of the men of Belial that be among them. " Or words to that effect. God corrected other people when they were heading in the wrong direction. I Samuel 14:36 & 37 depict a situation similar to the one you are hypothesizing. King Saul was about to launch an attack on the Phillistines, but was "out of fellowship". He asked counsel of God, just as the men of Israel did before attacking Gibeah. Because there was a fly in the ointment, God gave no answer to Saul's prayer. In response to the silence, Saul looked inward and decided to find out why God was not providing guidance. Therefore, it seems logical that if the men of Israel were out of step with God's will, he would have treated their intreaty with the same silence and caused the kind of soul-searching you presume would have changed the course of events. The other aspect of this that hasn't been addressed is the fact that the passage indicates that the root of the problem in Gibeah was the presence of "men of Belial". I don't propose that TWI's take on this term was perfect, but the use of this term in the Old Testament usually indicates men of extreme evil, and they were singled out in the law for instant execution. In fact, the law required that if "men of Belial" were found in a city in Israel, not only the men themselves, but the entire city was to be destroyed. Every person was to be killed and the city was to be burned to the ground. Thus saith Deuteronomy 13:12-16 That's pretty darn harsh in my opinion, but what do I know? The truth is, Judges 19:22 plainly states that there were such men in Gibeah and that they were the cause of the abominable chain of events we're discussing. The men of Isreal were responding to the situation exactly as the Law demanded. Lindy has questioned the interpretation of the phrase "that we may know him", dismissed the homosexual element of the passage and criticized the father for sacrificing his daughter and concubine. But to my knowledge, no one has taken note of the phrase "certain men of Belial" and tried to understand the passage from that perspective. Perhaps we should be looking more closely at what and who these men of Belial were and why the judgment of God against them was so harsh that their presence demanded the execution and utter destrucition of everyone and everything around them. Peace JerryB

Personally, I'm looking forward to visiting the Creation Museum. It's only about an hour's drive from here. I've seen Ken Lam speak and he makes a lot of good points. And, as we've already discussed ad nauseum on another thread, the theory of evolution is not the unamimously accepted bastion of Science it once was. I may not agree with everything the Creationists say, but widening the spectrum of acceptable views on how we got here is a good thing. Imo, that's the net effect of the AIG ministry. Peace JerryB

Mark Hi fellows. I must say Mark, when I read your initial post, as soon as I got to I thought the same thing Lindy has posted. If God's will was for Judah and Israel to approach Benjamin with meekness, He could have told them so when they asked "...Who shall go up first for us to battle against the sons of Benjamin?" You are assuming that IF they had approached the situation the way you would, God would have given them an answer you like. That's an enormous assumption. And I think the text supports Lindy's assertion that Israel and Judah did seek God's will before attacking the tribe of Benjamin. The Old Testament is chock full of passages that hit us hard because we've been told that God is love, God is kind, God is always nice and sweet. TWI even shoehorned it into a doctrine; the "idiom of permission" to try to blame all these unpleasantries on Satan. It doesn't work. In my opinion, it's not an honest approach to the Scriptures. I don't claim to know *why* God told Israel and Judah to attack Benjamin, nor why they weren't immediately victorious. But to declare that the outcome would have been different if they had proceeded the way we think they should have is an unfounded assumption. Peace JerryB

The saying goes, 'even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while' :-) JB

Why can we "hardly doubt" that Timothy is the angel of the Church of Ephesus? I don't see any basis for such an assumption. Too true Danny. While history concludes that many in the first century Church abondoned the Apostles' doctrine, we mustn't criticize the great names of the Bible. Those guys were all perfect dontcha know. Cynical Jerry