Rocky

I find it intriguing that we can joke or try to understand what's going on by use of current popular culture... but have you considered that we may not really have adequate understanding of the popular culture of Biblical time(s) to grasp what the prophets really meant back then? And it's probably fair to consider that the culture in Moses' time wasn't identical to the culture in Paul's era.

No, No and No. I am saying we don't adequately understand the culture(s) in which these STORIES emerged. Your questions suggest the stories must be taken literally regardless of the cultural context. That's definitely not the point I was making. Thanks for asking.

God loves you and has called you... but somewhere along the line, if you step out of line, you lose your salvation.

Wierwille (and Pillai) may have been on to something with the concept of Orientalisms. Except they focused to narrowly on individual phrases and expressions. Why did they not or would they not consider the entire culture from which the Old and New Testaments emerged and try to grasp the overall (i.e. the 30,000 foot view) in the first place? Just sayin'.

Read this WaPo story without charge because I have a subscription and provide the link because of it. Leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention on Sunday released a major third-party investigation that found that sex abuse survivors were often ignored, minimized and “even vilified” by top clergy in the nation’s largest Protestant denomination. The findings of nearly 300 pages include shocking new details about specific abuse cases and shine a light on how denominational leaders for decades actively resisted calls for abuse prevention and reform. Evidence in the report suggests leaders also lied to Southern Baptists over whether they could maintain a database of offenders to prevent more abuse when top leaders were secretly keeping a private list for years.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Heck, I never realized it was fake until the discussion came up on GSC. Your premise was actually a good conclusion to your post. I had been set up with expectation that someday I would SIT from two years or so before I took the PFLAP class. A HS friend witnessed to me less than a year after we graduated HS. I went to church with him for a couple of months and then shipped off to USAF basic training. In tech school in Biloxi, MS, I got in with a charismatic christian group. I was in MS for about 7 months then got stationed in the Azores. Roughly six months after landing there, I met up with a Military WOW. It took another 9 months to meet the numerical requirements to run the class. All of THAT time, I had been "trying" to receive the Holy Ghost. Never happened until session 12 in July 1975. Then I moved my mouth, and tongue and lips... etc. Now, 47 years later, I have a much better idea of why I couldn't let the spirit move me in the first place.

Twi's sense of belonging seemed to be predicated on claims by Victor Wierwille that only he had the RIGHT way to interpret scripture and therefore everything about life. Perhaps questioning EVERY thing about TWI is the beginning of the FREEDOM that comes from actually approaching TRUTH/FACTS/REALITY.

This Hulu series was... gah... yuck... I watched less than five minutes of it. Teal Swan is indeed MESSED UP. Her followers are needy and insecure. No thanks.

Your link seems to lead to background information about the subject of the Hulu documentary. THIS LINK is to the Hulu documentary (trailer). Hulu says The Deep End premiers on May 19.

Thanks Monte, I'll take door number two.

Ah, but it was an observation of a phenomenon that was easily and often scientifically repeated ...

Broadcast from Flagstaff, AZ

A former rocket scientist reveals the habits, ideas, and strategies that will empower you to turn the seemingly impossible into the possible. Rocket science is often celebrated as the ultimate triumph of technology. But it's not. Rather, it's the apex of a certain thought process -- a way to imagine the unimaginable and solve the unsolvable. It's the same thought process that enabled Neil Armstrong to take his giant leap for mankind, that allows spacecraft to travel millions of miles through outer space and land on a precise spot, and that brings us closer to colonizing other planets. Fortunately, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to think like one. In this accessible and practical book, Ozan Varol reveals nine simple strategies from rocket science that you can use to make your own giant leaps in work and life -- whether it's landing your dream job, accelerating your business, learning a new skill, or creating the next breakthrough product. Today, thinking like a rocket scientist is a necessity. We all encounter complex and unfamiliar problems in our lives. Those who can tackle these problems -- without clear guidelines and with the clock ticking -- enjoy an extraordinary advantage. Think Like a Rocket Scientist will inspire you to take your own moonshot and enable you to achieve liftoff. ----- Maybe someone in R&R will explore ways to think outside the incredibly small box that they "grew up" (spiritually) in and realize it couldn't hurt to actually try new things.

That's a remarkably remarkable remark.

And what I presented was/is an alternative perspective.

Somehow, I doubt that. Denial is a very powerful emotional defense mechanism.

no big deal.

If he WOULD? Would he if he still could... btw, he demeaned a LOT of people... anyone who disagreed with him or disobeyed or disappointed him in anyway, as I recall.

Ask Mike. (j/k)

Back in the day (1990s?) I would go into a Borders bookstore and imagined it as an encyclopedia on steroids... Then there was Amazon. And of course, the interwebs. I'm not so sure it will make human brains shrink but it has made possible massively accelerated innovation.

In the opinion of the writer. Frankly, it's not worth my time to verify his "biblical research" but I both find -- the notion of the "gathering together" aka the Rapture, AND his claim that it was introduced as an excuse not to have to obey God -- dubious (i.e. magical thinking). However, I agree with this sentiment. It's natural for humans to contemplate the meaning of their lives. Memento Mori is good to keep in mind.

Memento Mori The philosopher Democritus trained himself by going into solitude and frequenting tombs.[5] Plato's Phaedo, where the death of Socrates is recounted, introduces the idea that the proper practice of philosophy is "about nothing else but dying and being dead".[6] The Stoics of classical antiquity were particularly prominent in their use of this discipline, and Seneca's letters are full of injunctions to meditate on death.[7] The Stoic Epictetus told his students that when kissing their child, brother, or friend, they should remind themselves that they are mortal, curbing their pleasure, as do "those who stand behind men in their triumphs and remind them that they are mortal".[8] The Stoic Marcus Aurelius invited the reader to "consider how ephemeral and mean all mortal things are" in his Meditations.[9][10] In some accounts of the Roman triumph, a companion or public slave would stand behind or near the triumphant general during the procession and remind him from time to time of his own mortality or prompt him to "look behind".[11] A version of this warning is often rendered into English as "Remember, Caesar, thou art mortal", for example in Fahrenheit 451.