WordWolf

"I remember one meeting of the Evangelical and Reformed ministers in the early days of my ministry. This is about six--seven months after I was in the ministry. I was asked to speak to this group, meeting up North. And I spoke to them what I believed was the truth of God's Word, and that is that "The least a Christian could do was to tithe." And being a young minister in the church, those ministers almost laughed me out of the meeting. They said, "Well, Wierwille, are you that stupid that you think that we, as Christian ministers, should still tithe?" And I said, "Yes, don't you?" And they said, "No, we don't tithe." One minister in that whole group tithed--and Anna Shwere you'd know who it was if I named him. He was in that meeting--only one, and he said--he said, "Well, I've tithed ever since I've been a Christian." But all the rest of 'em said, "No, we don't give our tithes." And that shook me, it hurt me, because I thought, certainly the ministers, if they were going to head up the congregation would do as much or more than they would ask their people to do. That was shock number one, and it was a dandy--it didn't leave me--it left me numb and never got me back to my senses for about four weeks, I just couldn't imagine. " ----------------------------------------------------- There goes the "all other ministers are incompetent and insincere" thing. Supposedly, a roomful of ministers, and only ONE tithed, and the others said it was STUPID to think they would tithe. Sorry, I think this is one of those examples of something vpw did quite a bit called a bald-faced lie. I don't think this meeting ever happened, and those insincere ministers never existed. But this made-up story is an excuse for vpw to leave his denomination and claim he "had it" and they did not.

Ok, let's see. It's important enough that Mike suddenly won't shut up about it, yet Mike insisted on burying the requests to read it in one thread not about it, and the original post was buried in a DIFFERENT thread not about it. Somehow, I think Mike doesn't want us discussing it OPENLY. ==============================================

It fascinates me that Mrs W said he told NOBODY of this until the early Corps. That would have been several years after the supposed date for this tape. I believe her over proven liars.

"And so, all of this stuff began to build. And so finally, as I kept praying, I just said to the Father, I said "Father, teach me the Word--teach me the Word." And one night, something happened, which to me is the greatest thing I don't--I see only one experience that perhaps is greater than this in the Bible, and that's the Apostle Paul's experience on the road to Damascus. Outside of that, I see nothing in the Word that equals how God revealed Himself to me and talked to me and told me as plain as day: "That if I would study the Word, He would teach me the Word like He had not been able to teach it to anybody since the first generation." And of course at that time I thought, "Now that's a dandy!" "Boy, if I learned this Word of God, everybody'll listen to me, the whole church will be blessed. My denomination will grow by leaps and bounds because we'll have the Word of God." And I thought that was terrific! Butduring the process of that revelation--and I can't tell it all to you because we're already closing off; but during the process of it, I said: "Father, how will I know that this is You and that You'll really teach it to me?" Because I had worked the Word in commentaries and the rest of it and I couldn't understand it--couldn't get it to fit. It happened to be bright sunshine like today--like it's been today and yesterday--what we people refer to, I guess as "Indian Summer"--beautiful day. And the sun was shining brightly; it was in the Fall of the year--gorgeous! And there wasn't a cloud in the sky. And just on the inside of me it seemed to say, "Well, just say to the Father, Well, if--if it'll just snow--right now, you'll just know that this is God talking to you." But, you see I'd never had much experience with God talking to me, and this business of He saying to me, just as audibly as I'm speaking to you, that He'd teach me the Word if I'd teach it, sort of shook me. I'd been expecting to hear from heaven for a long time, but I hadn't heard that way before, you know. Ah, my ears were perhaps clogged up, since that time I've heard a lot of things--from Him. But, then I said, "Lord, if this is really true, I'd like to see it snow." And I opened my eyes--must not have been over three seconds, and I was sitting in front of the window looking East, the sun was--ah, West. The sun was in the West and there wasn't a cloud in the sky 'cause I could see the whole area. I closed my eyes when God said to me that He would teach me the Word if I'd teach it. And I said, "Lord, to know that this is true, I'd like to see it snow." And I opened my eyes and it was pitch--almost pitch black outside and the snow was falling so thick, I have never seen it fall that thick since that day. " ======================================== -So, here's another phrasing of the 1942 Promise. This one leaves out the "IF I WOULD TEACH IT TO OTHERS" part. -As has been mentioned before, he said his very first thought was that now "EVERYONE WOULD LISTEN TO ME". Interesting priority there when hearing from God Almighty. -In this account, right when he heard, he asked for the snowstorm- in another account it wasn't the same day. -Here the snow is BLACK. In his first 2 accounts, the snow was BLACK. In later accounts it was WHITE- as if he found out what color should actually have appeared and his account changed to match it. He didn't mistake WHITE for BLACK. -Here he described the moment's weather as "INDIAN SUMMER." This doesn't contradict HIS accounts, but diehard vpw disciples claim that the weather was colder and a freak BLIZZARD would have been likely. vpw disagrees with them, but what else is new? Secret doctrines of twi don't get traction. One frequently has to completely discard what vpw himself says in order to believe that vpw, who set himself forth as some great one.

One of the moving targets is, obviously, what WAS the supposed 1942 Promise? I think most of us would agree, if God Almighty, The Creator of The Heavens and The Earth, were to communicate audibly to us with a specific, personal message, that we would find that singularly important in our lives- and obviously would remember all of it in exacting detail. With the supposed 1942 Promise, however, vpw can never seem to keep the specifics CONSISTENT. Specifics of the promise change, his response changes, the supposed miracle changes...... Here was vpw, supposedly expounding on it in 1965, SNT 214, "Selling Plurality" (aka "Light Began to Dawn.") =================================================== "And so, all of this stuff began to build. And so finally, as I kept praying, I just said to the Father, I said "Father, teach me the Word--teach me the Word." And one night, something happened, which to me is the greatest thing I don't--I see only one experience that perhaps is greater than this in the Bible, and that's the Apostle Paul's experience on the road to Damascus. Outside of that, I see nothing in the Word that equals how God revealed Himself to me and talked to me and told me as plain as day: "That if I would study the Word, He would teach me the Word like He had not been able to teach it to anybody since the first generation." And of course at that time I thought, "Now that's a dandy!" "Boy, if I learned this Word of God, everybody'll listen to me, the whole church will be blessed. My denomination will grow by leaps and bounds because we'll have the Word of God." And I thought that was terrific! But during the process of that revelation--and I can't tell it all to you because we're already closing off; but during the process of it, I said: "Father, how will I know that this is You and that You'll really teach it to me?" Because I had worked the Word in commentaries and the rest of it and I couldn't understand it--couldn't get it to fit. It happened to be bright sunshine like today--like it's been today and yesterday--what we people refer to, I guess as "Indian Summer"--beautiful day. And the sun was shining brightly; it was in the Fall of the year--gorgeous! And there wasn't a cloud in the sky. And just on the inside of me it seemed to say, "Well, just say to the Father, Well, if--if it'll just snow--right now, you'll just know that this is God talking to you." But, you see I'd never had much experience with God talking to me, and this business of He saying to me, just as audibly as I'm speaking to you, that He'd teach me the Word if I'd teach it, sort of shook me. I'd been expecting to hear from heaven for a long time, but I hadn't heard that way before, you know. Ah, my ears were perhaps clogged up, since that time I've heard a lot of things--from Him. But, then I said, "Lord, if this is really true, I'd like to see it snow." And I opened my eyes--must not have been over three seconds, and I was sitting in front of the window looking East, the sun was--ah, West. The sun was in the West and there wasn't a cloud in the sky 'cause I could see the whole area. I closed my eyes when God said to me that He would teach me the Word if I'd teach it. And I said, "Lord, to know that this is true, I'd like to see it snow." And I opened my eyes and it was pitch--almost pitch black outside and the snow was falling so thick, I have never seen it fall that thick since that day. " ========================================

For some reason, Mike would rather derail existing threads with his message, and scatter it all over the middles of other threads, than make one thread to make clear points where people can see them. Since this is contrary to the board's interest, I'm starting the thread he should have. For those whom vpw has not lost all credibility (by virtue of being a chronic liar, plagiarist, and everything else), it might be of particular interest to find out what he's said on twi history. The rest of us may find it's interesting to see where the disconnects are between what he SAID happened, and what happened and what everyone else said happened. So, Mike keeps buried his partial transcript of a tape called "Light Began to Dawn." So, The "Light Began to Dawn Transcript." ake the "Selling Plurality Transcript", aka SNT 214. The Wierwille Legacy: Who Will Write The Book? - Page 10 - About The Way - GreaseSpot Cafe Mike: I've mentioned a SNS tape from 1965 a few times here, and it occurred to me it is spot on with the thread's topic. This is how VPW cited his sources in 1965: Excerpt from SNS Tape #214 Selling Plurality: Acts 4:34 (sometimes called "Light Began to Dawn") I remember the time when we began working this Word of God, and light began to dawn on it. That, as we got more and more light, we got less and less people. Because the background of this ministry has a great deal more in it than most of you people know today who have just come into this ministry in the last five to ten years. Because you can come into a beautiful auditorium like this--and by the way, we laid a new sidewalk for ya' this week. Did you notice it? Now it can snow 'cause you can all get in with dry feet and clean feet and so forth. Well, Doc--he formed it up good and Bob and he poured it and Rueben helped and a couple ladies to help and, boy, everybody worked--to get 'er done. But, how'd I get on sidewalks, what were we talking about? Okay, what were we talkin' about, Thelma? Oh, yes--you see all of this and you walk into a comfortable building that's air conditioned in summer and heated occasionally in winter, and all of these other wonderful things we have here, and you say, "Boy, isn't this something?" But, in order to make available what's here tonight, there's some of us who have had to stand through thick and thin; through a lot of talk, a lot of persecution, a lot of bickering and a lot of laughing. And at times we have had to take a stand when even our best friends moved away. I remember the day when there were no more than two or three people would come to a Bible study on Wednesday or Thursday night in the week. And I suppose today, if we only had two or three people, we--we'd think the world came to an end. But I remember those days, and here in the auditorium again tonight--I don't know if you people knew I was gonna teach on this, that's why you all came, huh? But here sit the Kupps from Convoy, Ohio, the Permins from Ft. Wayne, Indiana, the Ira Joneses from Van Wert, Ohio; three couples who have stuck with us down through the years. And boy, this is something. I don't know if you people realize how it blesses my heart on a Sunday night or any night of the week, when I'm teaching or something is open here at the headquarters to help everybody--and you see people like the Joneses, the Permins and the Kupps. They drive in here every Sunday night from Convoy, from Ft.Wayne, from Van Wert--almost every Sunday. Once in a while Eldo has to take an evening off to go fishin' and ah, Herman has to do something, Jones have to take a little trip out to fish. In the Jones family, Mrs. Jones fishes, Mr. Jones just drives the car. Ah, in the Kupp family it's the opposite, Eldo drives the car, he does the fishin' and Grace just rides along. So, I could tell ya' lots about a lot of these people--but it's all good--it's all good. Ah, Eldo just brought me a hunting knife tonight, I lost the one he gave me last year, so he brought me a new one tonight. Ah is it sharp? It--aha! Yeah--he said he got me a wet stone it was--it oughta be sharp 'cause he-he sharpens knives over there in Convoy--among other things. He-he's worked at ah, you work at Goodyear didn't you--no, not ah--Harvester. I get St. Mary's and Fort Wayne mixed, but he-he's worked at Harvester for how many years? Thirty-six years, and when he started working there--what'd they used to pay an hour down there--when you started? Fifty-two cents an hour, and he's been there thirty-six years and ah, has a wonderful job. And I think they like him but they're gonna retire him some of these times, and then he--of course he'll be able to ah, come to The Way more often than he's even doin' now. But people like the Kupps and the Permins and the Joneses, when I teach here on Sunday night, many times the things that I teach, they may have heard a dozen times. They may have been in on the first services when some of this stuff began to brew within my soul and I used to teach this thing in Van Wert. And as this ministry began to grow, the knowledge of God's Word began to grow in my heart, I shared it with people. And most of the people that I've shared it with, we still have wonderful friends, they have a good feeling towards you; they're thankful that they knew you and they're thankful for what's going on. But to stand with the ministry, except to be thankful--that's better than havin' stand the other way, for which I'm grateful, they--they don't do anything concrete for the ministry, like these people do. Occasionally they come, but not systematically. And as I look back over the years, to think how this ministry really started, it began at a place that's almost impossible for people to realize. Because when they look at the ministry, or they look at my life, here in the local community and every other place, they simply say, "Well, why didn't he stay where he was?" "Why didn't he stay in the denomination?" "Why didn't he move it?" "Can't a man work there?" There's a lot of answers and a lot of things to be discussed in that category. But it began because of the hunger in my heart for a knowledge of God's Word--that's where it began. I had read commentaries upon commentaries, I had read books upon books, and yet, I could not understand the Word--I couldn't put the Bible together. There were things that did not fit, and what one person said about a certain verse of scripture, another equally intelligent person contradicted what that person said. And when I went into the ministry in Nineteen Hundred and Forty One (1941), in Payne Ohio--and perhaps the finest people that we still have left from Payne, Ohio are Mr. and Mrs. Cleon White, who come here occasionally from Van Wert. But Cleon White was the man who met us at the time when we first went to Payne, Ohio. And we took that little church there and, it was in Nineteen Hundred and Forty One that we started out there. But by Nineteen Hundred and Forty Two, I realized that the things that I had learned in the seminaries were wonderful; I enjoyed the--the--the mental gymnastics of the theological seminaries; I enjoyed the keenness of the Theologians; I enjoyed all of these things. But, what I learned there wasn't good in practice--it did not work with the people who had a need. For those people who came to church every Sunday and who bought the bricks in that place, and who wouldn't go away if the Devil himself preached there, they still hold on to the church, they came every Sunday anyway. I knew--I-I saw this the first year. They'd come no matter what you taught in that place, they'd come because they got their money in the bricks or in the boards or in the sidewalks and therefore they hold on to it no matter what's taught. But, the first year in my ministry there, I found out that when there was real need, not among that group, but among the others who occasionally came to the church--or some who never "disgraced the place" as they called it, with their presence--I couldn't help 'em. And this began to bother me. Why was it that a man could go through four years of college and about five years of seminary, at that time; have a bachelors of arts, a bachelor of divinity, a masters of theology and all of my work finished for a PHD with the exception of about seven credits--being out there in the ministry and not being able to get the job done? I saw my farmers out there farm, they got the corn crop, they got the wheat, they got the oats, they got the corn, but inside of the church, I couldn't see any results. Oh, it was nice to have the chicken dinners and the little family affairs you go to, you know, and the women's guild that--men's brotherhood, all of that, but no real results. And I got sort of sick in my heart, and I began praying that God would show me how this Word was put together--because all I did was what the average person still does; he just reads a verse of scripture and then reads a commentary on it and preaches what the commentary says. Or he gets an idea of what it means but never able to fit the scripture from Genesis to Revelation. And I had read so many books and saw so much contradiction that it was impossible for me to be able to teach the Word. I remember one meeting of the Evangelical and Reformed ministers in the early days of my ministry. This is about six--seven months after I was in the ministry. I was asked to speak to this group, meeting up North. And I spoke to them what I believed was the truth of God's Word, and that is that "The least a Christian could do was to tithe." And being a young minister in the church, those ministers almost laughed me out of the meeting. They said, "Well, Wierwille, are you that stupid that you think that we, as Christian ministers, should still tithe?" And I said, "Yes, don't you?" And they said, "No, we don't tithe." One minister in that whole group tithed--and Anna Shwere you'd know who it was if I named him. He was in that meeting--only one, and he said--he said, "Well, I've tithed ever since I've been a Christian." But all the rest of 'em said, "No, we don't give our tithes." And that shook me, it hurt me, because I thought, certainly the ministers, if they were going to head up the congregation would do as much or more than they would ask their people to do. That was shock number one, and it was a dandy--it didn't leave me--it left me numb and never got me back to my senses for about four weeks, I just couldn't imagine. And so, all of this stuff began to build. And so finally, as I kept praying, I just said to the Father, I said "Father, teach me the Word--teach me the Word." And one night, something happened, which to me is the greatest thing I don't--I see only one experience that perhaps is greater than this in the Bible, and that's the Apostle Paul's experience on the road to Damascus. Outside of that, I see nothing in the Word that equals how God revealed Himself to me and talked to me and told me as plain as day: "That if I would study the Word, He would teach me the Word like He had not been able to teach it to anybody since the first generation." And of course at that time I thought, "Now that's a dandy!" "Boy, if I learned this Word of God, everybody'll listen to me, the whole church will be blessed. My denomination will grow by leaps and bounds because we'll have the Word of God." And I thought that was terrific! But during the process of that revelation--and I can't tell it all to you because we're already closing off; but during the process of it, I said: "Father, how will I know that this is You and that You'll really teach it to me?" Because I had worked the Word in commentaries and the rest of it and I couldn't understand it--couldn't get it to fit. It happened to be bright sunshine like today--like it's been today and yesterday--what we people refer to, I guess as "Indian Summer"--beautiful day. And the sun was shining brightly; it was in the Fall of the year--gorgeous! And there wasn't a cloud in the sky. And just on the inside of me it seemed to say, "Well, just say to the Father, Well, if--if it'll just snow--right now, you'll just know that this is God talking to you." But, you see I'd never had much experience with God talking to me, and this business of He saying to me, just as audibly as I'm speaking to you, that He'd teach me the Word if I'd teach it, sort of shook me. I'd been expecting to hear from heaven for a long time, but I hadn't heard that way before, you know. Ah, my ears were perhaps clogged up, since that time I've heard a lot of things--from Him. But, then I said, "Lord, if this is really true, I'd like to see it snow." And I opened my eyes--must not have been over three seconds, and I was sitting in front of the window looking East, the sun was--ah, West. The sun was in the West and there wasn't a cloud in the sky 'cause I could see the whole area. I closed my eyes when God said to me that He would teach me the Word if I'd teach it. And I said, "Lord, to know that this is true, I'd like to see it snow." And I opened my eyes and it was pitch--almost pitch black outside and the snow was falling so thick, I have never seen it fall that thick since that day. And I sat in that little office and I cried like a baby, because I guess it was about my time to cry, because I'd grown up but didn't know the Word. And from that day on and He'd promised to teach me the Word, I have tried with all my heart, from time to time--all along, to learn this Word. One of the reasons there are sections of the Word perhaps that I--I don't know, because I do too much cement pouring and a few other items that have to be done and that have to be taken care of. But I am absolutely confident that there is no portion of God's Word that God would not teach me and unfold to me if I studied the Word to show myself approved unto Him by rightly dividing it. And that began the ministry that has cost me, sense-knowledge, more than anybody will ever realize--except those of us who've gone through it. It gives ya' a whole set of new friends. It caused people, heads of my denomination, through various times when I appeared teaching, like in India, even to write letters against me that I was not a member of the denomination at all--and I'd been born in the lousy place. Isn't that something? And I have them on file--have them in my files, you ought to see 'em, I got a sheet this big. These are prices you pay. Then you say, well, why don't I reciprocate? Because, people, you can't fight and work the Word too. You can't be fighting all the time and trying to defend yourself against the unbelievers, because the unbelievers are many more than the believers. And we've got only one job to do, as far as my life is concerned, and that is to teach the Word. Whether anybody believes it or not, that's not my responsibility. But to teach it is my responsibility, because He said He'd teach me the Word if I would do one thing--teach it. Now in order to teach it, I have to study the Word; and when I study it, He shows it to me, then I can teach it. I think a lot of you people know these Bible students that are in here tonight, and we have among our people gathered here tonight, like almost every Sunday night, some of the finest Bible students in the world today. We have Bible students in here to whom no theologian in the entire world can hold a candle when it comes to the rightly dividing and the understanding of God's Word. I think every person in here knows that they can work the Word and they do work it. They get wonderful light and they contribute a great deal to The Way ministry and the light that's taught out of The Way ministry. But when these people bring their light on the Word to me and I have the opportunity to hear it--it doesn't take me but one reading or one hearing and I can, usually, without working it too far, I can pick out the error or pick the good that they bring and fit it right in. But this is what God raised me to and when He gave me that revelation, and that was a real phenomena or phenomenon. From that day on--this was in Payne, Ohio where this happened, light began to dawn. But you can't learn the whole Word in one night. Therefore, you study the Word--you study it. I suppose I read Genesis chapter one through eleven a thousand times. I don't know how many times you've read it, but I imagine a thousand times is a low number that I have read Genesis, chapter one through eleven. Because I was taught that Genesis one through eleven had at least four or five different authors--you know, the J-P-D documents, this kind of stuff. I'd been taught all of this. And so I'd read the Word; I'd read it--I'd read it. Then I'd work, start looking--start working, and as we began working this Word of God, is when light began to dawn. And wonderful things that God did for us, He brought men and women across our paths who came just at the right time to help us in our light--men who had gone so far, but no further. But God brought these men so that we could go further because these men brought light. Men like Rufus Mosely; men like E. Stanley Jones; men like Albert Cliff; men like Star Daley; God brought all of these men and others--many of them, across our pathways, just at the right time to add to this revelation and enable us to walk on the Word and understand it. Perhaps the greatest one to move in the category of what I learned here in Acts four and five, to start the greatness of this thing, was a woman by the name of Rosalind Rinker. Some of you people were--will know her today because she was here in Lima, Ohio less than a year ago--or a year and a half ago. Ah, she travels and works with a woman named Jeanie Price. Jeanie Price is quite an author--writes books that are published by Zondervan, if I remember correctly. Rosalind Rinker had been on the mission field in Korea, if I remember correctly--someplace out East. Korea doesn't sound right to me, I've forgotten now where she was. Where? Was it China? I think you're right. And a lady by the name of Aletta Yacob had come through from Africa and stopped on her way back to the United States in China. And, this woman, Aletta Yacob, had been filled with the spirit in Africa, and had been operating manifestations of the spirit and things were booming. You know, light was dawning, and people were getting saved and other things happening in Africa that were just beginning to swell--the thing. So she stopped in China, and had a series of evangelistic meetings there and all she allowed to come--or all they allowed to come, were the missionaries, their wives and their children. And they had oodles of conversions among the missionaries, their wives and their children. One of those women who got converted, was Rosalind Rinker who'd been on the mission field for sixteen years--before. By the way, Aletta Yacob left China, started back home and her ship was bombed in the Pacific and she lost her life. But Rosalind Rinker came back from the mission field and I was doing a monthly piece of writing for a magazine out of Indiana. Remember the name of the magazine? In Butler, Indiana--I forget the title of the magazine; I used to be a regular contributing editor toward it, each week--each month. Pardon? No, it wasn't Christian Advocate. I forget the name of it. But anyways, it was the Higgley Press at Butler, Indiana--it's still there by the way. Ah--Pardon? No, that was Bloomfield--I was with that too, that was Dr. Bloomfield. Ahm, I was in Butler, Indiana at the Higgley Press with my article and talking to the boss, Mr. Higgley, and when we walked back through the building, he introduced me to this woman, Rosalind Rinker. And, we got acquainted just in a brief period of time and somehow or other, it gelled within my heart to say to her "Well, why don't you come over to our house and spend a week?" And she said, "Well, I'll just do it." And that was a surprise to me because the average person who had a depth of religion usually said to me, "Well, I'll pray about it." Ah, that was the usual attitude that I'd run into, by this time. But, you know, if they had any depth of spirituality, like the boys that graduate from Moody, Wheaton and the rest of them, they would always say to me, "We have gotta take time out and pray about it." But this woman, had found something out there under Aletta Yacob. She had tapped something and she knew that when somebody said to her do so-in-so, if the time was right, it was God's will for her to walk in. So I said to her, "Would you like to come for a week or so with us?" and she said, "Yes, I will." I said, "When will you come?" She said "I'll be there Saturday or Sunday" I forget what. Lo and behold, here she came. You know what we did? When she came, I wanted her to speak to our church group, but she had no interest in that. She said, "I want to talk to you." And we sat down in that same office where I'd had this revelation from the Lord; she began dealing with me in the Word. And, "Boy," I thought to myself, "how can a woman have this much knowledge of the Word?" And she told me she had learned all of this within the last six--seven months! And she took me--that had been through all these colleges and seminaries and had almost my work for my doctors degree finished--she just takes me and winds me around her finger with the knowledge of God's Word--I didn't know any of God's Word compared to her. I'd quote her some theologian, she said "That don't mean anything to me. What does the Word say?" And she pinned me down, and she took me into the Word, and showed me that it was the Word that counted and not what a theologian said or what a man said but what does the Word say? And she kept backing me up against the wall--whole week long. Just, night after night, day after day, that's all she did. So, one evening, after everybody else had gone to bed, she and I went into the church and we knelt at the pulpit chairs up in front, and we prayed together, and that was the second great night of my life. When, during the course of that week-end, she told me that God was showing her that He had something very special for me to do, and that I should teach the Word. I forget what this all is about, but it's on the flyleaf of our class on Power For Abundant Living. It is she who made that statement that's on that cover, you know, that red-green-yellow thing that we give out for the classes on Power For Abundant Living. Her statement that she--this isn't the exact words but the essence of it--of what she said is on that sheet. And that greatness of God substantiating to her, what He had already told me, corroborated something in my heart. And that just blessed my soul. This sent us on a quest, and of course, one of the reasons I'm headed for this story in here tonight is because, she took me through this fourth chapter. She didn't understand it as fully as I understand it now. But she understood enough of the fourth and the fifth chapter of Acts that she made me sit up and pay attention and know that God's Word was more in here than what I was doing or asking my people to do. But in order to complete something here that God would have me to say now; was at--many years later, along towards forty-six, forty-seven--forty-eight, forty-nine--those years when I was so hungry for God's Word. I used to run anyplace where there was knowledge on God's Word. If I heard of a meeting in--in Arkansas where they were having a meeting along the line of God's Word, I'd jump a plane or take a train to go there. And I had a wonderful group of Elders in the church in Van Wert at that time. All I would do is call the head Elder and tell him, "I won't be there on Sunday, I've asked Reverend so-in-so to come." Many a time I did this on Thursday night or Friday of the week, and tell him I wouldn't be there on Sunday morning. How would you have enjoyed to been a member of my congregation? You'd never know who your preacher might be next Sunday morning. I was off and runnin' again. But there was a hunger in my heart and God said He'd teach me the Word if I'd teach it, but I had to study, I had to work. And revelation begins--this is why I know this so well--revelation begins where the senses cease. What you can know by your senses, God expects you to know. He expects you to study the work that have already been worked out. Men like Bulinger; men like Stevie Ginsberg; God expected me to work those men and countless others. But, He taught me how to get the error out when there was any. And out of that process He taught me then, what was truth. And when there was no way of knowing it, and I'd researched to my fullest ability--tried to find out, then, if there is no other way, He showed it to me by direct revelation. Time and time again, He'd take the scripture and make it this big. I'm reading along in a verse and all at once there it is, two words, this big, for instance. Well, you have to be stupid to miss it, you know. So I began running, and people, I literally ran all over. I finally started making some trips abroad. I was very much interested in missions, foreign mission--very much. So I started to make some trips to Central America, to see for myself first hand just exactly what was happening on the mission field. And when I got out to the mission field, I found it so surprisingly revolting to me that I couldn't tell it--I couldn't tell it. When I got back to the United States, I couldn't tell it, all I could do is show pretty pictures of the buildings and the nice banana plantations. But they had no more light on the mission field than I had back in the states. Well how could they have, we graduated from the same theological seminaries came out of the same denomination. How could we have any more light there than I had back home, but at that time I didn't know that--right. So I began questing in all of these fields. And every time I quested, God showed me light--brought people around. And that's why, as the Word began to move, when great truths--like today I teach the four crucified with Jesus. You know we got people in the class--nobody in the class believes it, when I start it, nobody. 'Cause they've all seen the picture of two crucified with Jesus, nobody believes it--unless one of The Way grads has been to 'em before the class, that's all. But if they have never sat under the ministry that we represent or where our ministry has reached out, they're--they're--they're shocked at this thing, they just don't believe it. And yet, within one half hour--to forty-five minutes, every person in the class believes it, sometimes as high as eighteen different denominations, men and women of great difference in ages and mental ability. And yet every one of them sees the truth of God's Word, they stand put on it. And I remember when I first taught this, when people heard about it, I got letters back. I was a heretic. Oh, and they said such nice things about me, all of this stuff. I was lying, I was trying to tear the Bible apart. Well, what would you do? All I did was kept on working. And as I learned something, I would teach it. When I learned a little more of it, I'd teach it. And that's how we grew. That's why this ministry is among us tonight--not because, primarily of who I am, but because, primarily of what the Word represents in our day and our age. That's right. And therefore, when I knew the Word, I have never backed down on the Word of God--never--that I could remember. If I did, somebody oughta--boot me. I have stood up against my friends at times and said, "You are wrong, that's not what the Word says." I have seen people turn the other way and walk the other way, after I have told them this. But I have never backed down on the Word, and this is one reason why it has cost me so much. Because, at times, sense knowledge wise, it'd be a lot easier to back down on the Word than it is to say to someone, "This is God's Word." Right in this section where we're dealing tonight--where we're going to be dealing, as we get winding this thing up after a bit--right in here is where many people go the other way. It's just like Jesus; they didn't follow him any longer because something else happened. So it is here. But the greatness of this ministry lays in the hearts of our people who mean business for God, and if you're concerned about the accuracy of the Word. We have no axe to grind with any denomination or any group of people. We have only one Word and that's the greatness of God's Word. And, ladies and gentlemen, if we are heretics because we rightly divide the Word, I'd rather be a heretic with the Lord than be alright being dead wrong--or somethin'--I don't know how we figured that one. That's right. I'd rather be right with the Lord than with the whole bunch of you in here tonight. And I'm sure you'd rather be right with the Lord than with the whole bunch in here tonight. And the Word has to have the preeminence. And that's why you people, some of you in here again tonight--like every Sunday night, come from distant places to be in here--travel, many of you, hundreds of miles to be in here on a Sunday night for the teaching ministry. Some of you don't travel quite that far, New Bremen; New Knoxville--a few other places. You're close in but some of the rest of 'em travel a lot farther. The thing that has to live is the greatness of the Word, and this has to continue to live within you and you have to walk on it. There are very few people who can stand the pressure of time. You maybe walk on the ministry one month and the second month something gets to ya'--then it's over with. If you stay a year, somebody oughta give ya' a medal. If you can stay two years, I don't know what ya' oughta to have. But if you can stay as long as the Kupps and the Permins and the Jones's and some of the rest of ya, God must have somethin' real special in store for you. That's all I can say. Because there's hardly anybody that can stick through the pressure of the thing. Because, as all of you people know, once you start teaching the Word--in your community--really setting down the Word of God as it's accurately written, and making people say, "This is what the Word says, and not what you think or I think, or what Johnny Jumpup thinks, or Snowball Pete or Henry Boloko, but this is what the Word says," the people are gonna say "Hey, what's the matter with you? That's not the way I've been taught." Huh, huh, huh! What's the difference how you've been taught? Is it the accuracy of God's Word? When people come up with that argument, "Well that's not the way I've been taught," then you say to them, "Well, why don't you just--still dress in the same old dress Great Grandma dressed in, then?" "Why don't you still farm the same way you farmed fifty years ago, if that's the way you've been brought up." It's a wonderful thing how we can move ahead in everything else, but no person has a right to move on the Word of God--you've got to stay within the confines. It must be a "trip" isn't it? It surely is a trip. The greatest thing in the world, God's Word, we oughta walk on it. We oughta learn more tomorrow than we know tonight--day after that we oughta know more than we know tomorrow. We oughta keep growing in God's Word. One of the reasons this ministry stands today, yet, is because I have stood for the Word whenever the Word was known to me. And it has been no disgrace to me at times to say; "I don't know the Word." But when I've known it and I've stood on it, I have stayed put--and that's why it lives. This ministry would die within one month's time if we didn't stand. Somebody's got to stand. Now, this week, when we go to Minnesota again, to teach--you know what the problems will be. Be like in all the scriptures, some believe, some said we'll hear you again, some disbelieve. So what? The right that we have to teach it and the right for our people to learn it and then the people to stand, that's the greatness of it. Well, that's a little background. Father says, "That's it."--so we go on.

You have the nerve to pretend you're surprised when others call you on stuff when you post error. People are supposed to believe you somehow are the only one here who's playing by God's Rules - and the rest of us are not- when you don't even play by forum rules no matter how universal they are. You had a new topic. Rather than post a new topic, you chose to derail an existing topic, and we all know you did it on purpose. After 20 years, you know better- or have worked hard NOT to know better, which says a whole other message.

That is correct. When you have time, check out the video of the Viking Kittens doing The Immigrant Song. It's not hard to find, and it's worth watching at least once. (Rather Good did that, and also had the Punk Kittens do "Fell In Love With a Girl", the White Stripes' first hit.)

Sometimes the oddest things can REMIND you of a song, but they won't give you a correct answer, for that matter. "The VIking Kittens" may remind one of "the Immigrant Song" or "Fell In Love With a Girl", but neither song would count as "Viking Kittens" because neither was actually RECORDED with them, nor were they actually broadcast. A LOT of people have seen a video of one or the other online, but that's not the same thing.

The word "border" does not appear in the title, but "the Border Song" isn't really that far off from the correct answer. I mean, you could have tried a guess like "Ellis Island", but "Ellis Island" isn't the name of the song, either. (It only makes me THINK of the name of the song.)

Since it's beyond any REASONABLE doubt that the supposed "1942 promise" was invented by vpw out of whole cloth, and was never actually given vpw by God Almighty, it should be obvious- beyond any REASONABLE doubt- that the entire construction that has been built on it was built on sand. That construction is the delusion there was anything special about vpw's teachings, books, tapes, etc. vpw's many faults- the rapes, the druggings, the grand larceny (plagiarism over $1000, in the US, is grand larceny), the chronic alcoholism, the chain-smoking, the sudden angry tirades- all of those are supposedly not really an issue because- if the 1942 promise was real- then they would be secondary to God Almighty's Revelation. SINCE the 1942 promise was invented- and Mrs W herself said it was first told to the early corps, and that's no earlier than 1970- then all the excuses remain more obviously excuses. With many Bible verses condeming them- verses against drunkenness, wrath, gluttony, theft- one who actually cares what God Almighty says should have little problem seeing how vpw stacked up against warnings in Scripture. The alleged "reasoning" is all circular. With the 1942 promise SUPPOSED to be true- and a steadfast refusal to look at all the obvious information exposing it as a lie- then all sorts of justifications of vpw are made, all sorts of excuses for vpw are made. Yes, God condemned all that, but since vpw was so special, he gets a special dispensation for that, so he can be excused all sorts of misbehaviors, whether misdemeanors, felonies, or just plain sins. If one BLINDLY CLINGS to the delusion that the 1942 promise was a real thing, and not a poorly-phrased hoax, then all the SENSIBLE discussions will fail to convince. For everyone else, it's all obvious. So, elaborate rationalizations surround vpw. First, he becomes a remarkable person through his entire life. The reality is that he was a kid who skipped his chores around the farm, and even by his own admission he was poor at school. He was a bully and a showoff, and he considered business or music as possible careers before settling on the Bible. His own father said it was a bad choice, since he was a lazy kid all his life and the congregation needed better than laziness. He had to get special permission to graduate high school due to poor grades- which really was a "work" issue not choice at that point. A different set of letters convinced NYU that vpw was ready to be a student there immediately. He coasts along, plagiarizing all along the way, until he meets Stiles and Leonard, and rips off Stiles' book and Leonard's class. Once a devout vpw worshipper, however, is done with him- all due to dogmatic insistence the 1942 promise was a real thing and not a badly-written lie, he becomes superhuman, "overgifted."

The title's getting you because you're thinking "Norse" or "LotR" for a title, and the title doesn't sound anything like either. (And I dropped a clue when I hit the buzzer.)

When we had about 20 players, even the obscure stuff got answered pretty quickly!

Correct, and correct. (Except, I suppose, for getting a parachute to work properly.)

You mean like how vpw took the "From Birth to the Corps" required papers and used them to screen the applicants to see which women would be, in his estimation, easiest to sexually assault, and how he sometimes even had the papers in his hand when summoning her to a private location so he could try to sexually assault her? Maybe.

Jeffrey Jones Sleepy Hollow Richard Griffiths

Consider this round no longer here. FREE POST!

"Sunshine Superman", Donovan. But we're back at the previous song, still.

BZZZZZTTTT!! This was NOT "the Battle of Evermore." Do not pass go, do not collect $200. You may not cross the border.

Acts 17: 16-23 (NASB) 16 Now while Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he observed that the city was full of idols. 17 So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be present. 18 And some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers as well were [o]conversing with him. Some were saying, “What could this [p]scavenger of tidbits want to say?” Others, “He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities,”—because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. 19 And they took him and brought him [q]to the [r]Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is [s]which you are proclaiming? 20 For you are bringing some strange things to our ears; so we want to know what these things mean.” 21 (Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearing something new.) 22 So Paul stood in the midst of the [t]Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I see that you are very religious in all respects. 23 For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ Therefore, what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you. 2 ====================================================================== [When I was in twi, I was taught something specific about this incident. I was taught that Athens had SO many gods that they set up an altar to cover whoever was left out, a miscellaneous altar, and labelled that "TO THE UNKNOWN GOD." Furthermore, I was taught that after this, it was illegal, under pain of death, to bring any more gods into Athens. No citation for any of this was given. I'm now of the belief that no citation was given because there was none- somebody made up that entire explanation out of whole cloth. Apparently, historical sources agree on a completely different story. The short of it was that they wanted to stop a plague. They offered on altars for every god they knew. No improvement. So, they offered up offerings to a god they didn't know, and the plague stopped. They concluded (post hoc, ergo propter hoc, after this, therefore because of this) that "the unknown god" accepted their sacrifice and stopped the plague. So, there were some altars made up to that "unknown god." THAT's what Paul saw and commented on. So, Paul used the monument as his "conversation starter" on Mars' Hill, a point to begin his exposition and explanation. Biblical Archaeology "To the Unknown God" https://odb.org/AR/1994/03/11/to-the-unknown-god https://www.biblehistory.net/newsletter/the_unknown_God.htm I don't know what prompted people in twi to make up explanations out of whole cloth and pretend they had researched something and found that as the answer, but I've never liked that. Allegedly, in pfal, it was stressed not to say you knew if you did not, or to guess. It would have been nice if that really was the practice of twi and not just the profession of twi.

Well said.

I can't guarantee what it says, but- to a fair degree of accuracy- I know the essence of it. When the twi seal said "The Word over the World" in English, there was a phrase in Aramaic. From right to left, it read "word over the inhabited earth." This phrase is written differently, so that's not it. With the seal saying "the prevailing word", I'm fairly confident that the Aramaic is a phrase that's roughly analogous to "the prevailing word." The original WOW program had so many problems with it, I'd hardly know where to start. If I had to try to fix it, I'd start over from scratch and redesign it from the ground up. There were too many things wrong with the old versions, and society has moved on from "the hippies hitchhike everywhere and hope the cops don't arrest them and they don't get raped or killed." Besides, some WOW grads were raped and some were killed, so that was defective even then (not counting crippling injuries resulting from forcing the students to travel in an unsafe manner and believe God to arrive safely", a clear violation of twi's fiduciary responsibilities to their students. That one was in the corps.)

He´d been referring to himself as "The Teacher" for something like a decade before pfal, with that first series he'd filmed. He pushed it enough, here and there, that at least some people referred to him primarily as "The Teacher." I'd heard from NY'ers about a visit from him. There was a crowd greeting him. "The Teacher! The Teacher!" I was told "We always called him 'The Teacher'". If you think that wasn't entirely due to the hard work of vpw promoting himself to being called "The Teacher"..... well, I don't know what to tell you.

vpw's bait-and-switch was sometimes used right in pfal, but other times it was not. If 100% of all you knew about vpw came straight from pfal tapes/films and the books of that class, you'd be surprised to hear that vpw claimed to have been appointed by God. In pfal, vpw was specific about the holy spirit field being a field to which he had dedicated his life. Period. It was a few years after the filmed pfal class that the 1942 Promise was ever spoken to anyone, whether spoken to the early corps or put in print in "the Way-Living in Love." If you focused exclusively on the class, you might be surprised when someone said that vpw made such a claim. (I know because I was surprised, and I felt uncomfortable about it, for reasons that went right back to what vpw taught about revelation.) But lots of people were taught this- AFTER being taught pfal, and after buying into it. Second, yes, pfal ended with references to the church epistles- in the actual film. When you sat a class, the staff would advertise reading pfal materials for 3 months or more. Why was there no such advertisement in the pfal film? One, there WERE no pfal materials to study way back when the film was made. There were a few pamphlets, and that was it. LATER, we got "Christians Should Be Prosperous" - and all class coordinators were instructed- by vpw- to make sure that was read early in the class. So, I'm sure someone will insist that this was NOT something vpw pushed. I'm sure someone will suggest that- since it wasn't in the filmed class, that vpw had nothing to do with it. So, it's important to remember what he DID say on the subject. Over the years, people complained about his practice of "put aside all reading external to pfal for 3 months" thing. Did he take this moment to correct people, and redirect them to read THE EPISTLES for 3 months and chide them for switching to vpw books for 3 months instead? NO. He did take the time to address complaints. He didn't say "My detractors confuse the Church Epistles with twi materials." He talked about the complaint of 3 months of only twi materials. He DOUBLED DOWN on it. Rather thah say "It's 3 months of the Church Epistles, read your Bible!", he emphasized that people should do it. Then he got cutesy, "I'll make you a bet. If you put aside all newspapers and magazines for 6 months, when you pick them up again, they'll be just as negative as they were 6 months ago. I will add, however, that they may be MORE negative." So, once there WERE pfal books, vpw instituted the practice of having the students told to focus on THOSE for 3 months, even if the films/tapes said to focus on the church epistles. Thirdly, the final segment of pfal had a bait-and-switch built right into it. Even though vpw liked to read Ephesians 6:10 to crowds and make like he didn't want people to follow him, but rather The Lord, in pfal he did a bait-and-switch. "Finally, my brethren, I want you to be strong in the Lord.' Strong in the Lord, not strong in what a theologian might say. Not strong in what a Bible teacher may say. But if that theologian says what the Word says, if that Bible teacher says what the Word says, then you've got to be strong in what they say. " This came at the end of 12 sessions where we are all aware he'd been badmouthing all other teachers and theologians as useless for learning the Word, and putting himself forth as some great one, indeed, as the sole Bible teacher who understood what we needed, who didn't actually plagiarize others, but was the SOLE source of sound teaching. So, after 12 sessions of selling himself as the SOLE Bible teacher saying what the Word says, he said that- if you find a Bible teacher who says what the Word says- then you've got to be strong in what they say. What does all of that say, once stripped of the jargon? "God is telling you to be strong in what vpw is teaching." It's that simple, that's what he was dancing around, INSINUATING, IMPLYING, SUGGESTING, but never having the guts to say directly, leaving that for other people, all so he could say "I never said that" if asked. All of that is as elaborate a set of THEATRICS as I've ever experienced.

Nice try, but I was emphasizing how little time that was, that wasn't a clue to the title. (That was the following sentence.) I usually try not to use words from the titles in my clues- so if it seems I'm working hard NOT to say something, that's usually worth examining. Odd usages of synonyms aren't unusual in my rounds.