WordWolf

I'd second all of that. Ask lots of questions. Use an impartial observer-emotions and hormones do NOT an objective viewpoint make. Watch how nice they are-until they're clear you are NOT interested in giving them 15% of your income, signing up for paying classes, giving huge blocks of time in the future, etc. Then you're considered a drag on their time. You're not valued because you're a person-you've valued for your income. If they could get your money without you, they'd prefer that. Typical social pressures will be placed to get you to conform. BTW, find out what they say about all OTHER Christians. It's not pretty. THEY are the ONLY ones with the truth. For fun, look into the origin of the group. VPW claimed that, in 1952, God Almighty told him that if he taught it to others, He (God) would teach him His Word like it hasn't been known since the First Century. God confirmed this, he later added, by showing him a vision of a snowstorm. Mind you, the practices and structure he built bore little, if any, similarity to those First Century Christians. (Let me know if you need a breakdown.) Further, vpw has been shown to have taken nearly everything he taught from a handful of other writers (whom he failed to credit-which is "plagiarism".) Therefore, everything he "learned" was already known, and not newly taught to him since the First Century. The autocratic structure of twi was his brainchild. Whosoever holds the top office wields near-absolute power and there are NO "checks and balances". This allowed him to be so sweet in public, and in private, set up a little network (with locations) to allow him to rape and molest impressionable young females. His hand-picked successor (not chosen by the assembly like in Acts 1) learned his lessons well about what you can get away with, but failed to learn to cover his tracks as well, and made the mistake of buying into his own propaganda of omniscience. This meant he was caught and sued a few times, which is why twi finally had to ask him to step down as president. They pretended to be surprised by all of it, as if they were not complicit in his (and vpw's) evil deeds and rapes. (It takes a few people to keep a conspiracy "secret".) Mind you, they have their own sins to account for, but they were more clever in committing them and covered their tracks. ======== Take a look around the site. Check out all the Editorials and Documents and stuff. Check out the "About the Way" forum and "Greasespot 101". Make an informed decision after you've looked around a lot. ================= BTW, if you want to see what exposure to twi can result in, there's a "minority viewpoint" around here, and "Mike" is its most prominent poster. Look over his posts and threads, and you'll see one possible result of placing all your trust in this organization and/or its teachings.

This explains a LOT, and I didn't want the FIRST PARAGRAPH to get lost. This is the first I'd heard of that. I think it should be noted, incidentally, that the predictions of POP, whether from vpw or cg himself, failed to come to pass, so we know the one source they did NOT come from was GOD. Me, I interacted briefly with cg, and I did not have the painful, manic experience so many of you did. In fact, I'd be suspicious we were talking of different people if I wasn't aware how some people *cough vpw cough* were experts at having a sweet public face and an evil private face. Or, to quote Hamlet, "One may smile, and smile, and be a villain."

Changing "all without distinction" to "all with distinction" may not be a MAJOR doctrinal change, but it IS a doctrinal change. It was also done extremely quietly. In pfal, it's one way, in some books, it's the other way. You weren't supposed to notice that doctrine had changed.

He believed his own press, and he thought he could do no wrong, to boot. Dismantling all the programs was largely so that he could put his own personal brand on all of them like vpw had. (He had a headstart-he'd appeared on High Country Caravan, he'd sold his own song-and-dance as a 2-hour video....)

He didn't "pick" her. She OUTSMARTED him. She knew how to play the game-the lies to say, the image to portray, the things to keep silent on. Further, she was complicit in the evil deeds that he was sued over. lcm was never as smart as he thought he was (he bought into his own hype.) Further, put not-that-smart together with an ego that big, and it's not hard to flatter and ingratiate your way into the inner circle. Then, all she had to do was wait......

I disagree with Ex10. I do NOT believe vpw was "out-of-control".

I didn't have an opinion of Mal George as a prophet BEFORE, but, based on that "prophecy", I have one NOW....

But hello, and enjoy your visit. :)-->

Actually, When they ARE bitten, mongeese are highly resistant to snake venom. It's been shown that the amount of venom that would kill one mongoose, if rabbits were bitten instead, would kill TWENTY rabbits. Folklore includes things like "the mongoose digs thru the ground for antidotes."

Mike, November 30, 2004, 12:24pm. Top of Page 2. Mike was unclear when he posted this, so in the interest of clear communication, I shall clarify something. If an average poster refers to "the team effort that produced the writings", they might mean "vpw, plus the editing staff, plus the proofreaders, plus those who did the original research that went into the books, BG Leonard, EW Bullinger, JE Stiles, EW Kenyon." A few others, if they said "the team effort that produced the writings", would mean "vpw, his photocopy machine, his exacto knife, and the books by EW Bullinger, EW Kenyon, JE Stiles and BG Leonard, which were reassembled to compose the books." When Mike says "the team effort that produced the writings", he may incidentally reference the proofreaders and typsetters, but that's almost incidental. What he primarily refers to in "the team effort" is vpw and GOD ALMIGHTY, who, according to Mike, oversaw the entire process. "Plagiarize THIS sentence from THIS writer, then THAT sentence from THAT writer." Mike prefers I not use the word "plagiarize" for the process of using another writer's material and passing it off as your own, but I'll go with its usage as consistent, since that's consistent with all collegiate dictionary and encyclopedia, and the courts of the United States of America. However, except for that one word's appearance, that's what Mike meant, but he may simply have forgotten to clarify that point. Carry on, everyone.

Mike, November 28, 2004, 10:28pm (page 1). Those of you who arrived late and are new to Mike might want to review this. It's pretty representative of his POV, his position, his beliefs. I clearly indicated where I edited for brevity, so you can skip what's not quite so on-topic. I also clearly indicated where the unedited post is, so you can review it and check if I've unfairly represented him. (Unless Mike later edits the original quote-which will be exposed if he does-edits done other than at the time of the post are noted at the end of a post.) Carry on, everyone.

Makes sense. After all, it re-connects the followers with their "beloved headquarters" AND it gives the staffers something to do. Nothing like a couple of in-house conferences to grease up the machinery again. skyrider Plus, it will help instill a sense of mindless zeal in the peons who are supporting them, to show them the statues, spiffy auditorium, and other amenities enjoyed by those who live on-grounds with negligible work. The idea that this is something that actually is USELESS to 95% or more of the congregation in exchange for their 15% means poor oversight of money will never occur to them. Of course, if it DOES, their name gets added to the list. (BTW, I wasnt counting the indentured servants they still have on grounds who do all the manual labor. They hardly "enjoy" any of the amenities, since they have enough "spare time" to sleep or enjoy the scenery, not both.)

That's been their policy for at least 10 years, Bob, why should they change now? They recycle the same material, slap on a new label, and all the lemmings must pay for it. Mr Hammeroni, of COURSE the price for the event will stay the same even if the overhead drops because they're holding it at hq. In fact, since most people will need to spend MORE money to get there, the amount of money they will spend will be more. Finally, they will charge as much for the dormrooms as the hotel did for full hotel rooms with full access to all hotel amenities, like Room Service and access to the restaurant and snack machines and so on. And anyone complaining they're getting hosed gets added to the list.

Hm. This is an old joke, and I missed it the first time- the ENDING is rewritten. Those of you who skimmed it because you've read it before, reread it. The old ending is "If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa Banyan that 'it will be a cold day in Hell before I give you my phone number', and take into account that I have yet to succeed in getting her phone number, we conclude Hell is exothermic and will not freeze." I won't bother posting a link, but I'm pretty sure it's on Snopes and a lot of other places.

I noticed they used HALF the previous space to host the seminar. Attendance down a little? Any connection to running it where they have to pay zero rent, maybe? No big surprise, but they're moving it to hq, where the organization pays nothing, but it's a major hassle to reach there for the attendees. At least D/FW is a major hub, and hotels are easy to reach. I'd bet money they're not going to send a shuttle bus to Dayton or Columbus for anyone, either..... "This is intended to be practice before the ACS. Let them believe God for a ride there and back."

But.....but.... They said they don't have a policy on debt and never did. They wouldnt lie about something like that, would they?

*sees the commercial* No, I don't believe we are being told the truth here. The networks would never refuse something this mild, nor would they claim to kowtow to the Federal Govt. I found the "objectionable content". It required rewinding. It's almost at the very end. The very LAST "couple" in shot, for ONE SECOND. Compared to shows they pay to air, it's very mild. They wouldn't refuse to take someone's money for that reason-and they ARE in business to sell advertising time, first and foremost. I DID find a number of references online to the UCC trying to challenge the govt or object to any regulation of tv. Further, I found their OWN articles admitted most of the public HAS NEVER HEARD OF THEM. This looks to me like something they cooked up to get their name on the map. So far, I haven't seen anyone pick up the story-the only source for this is a PRESS RELEASE by the UCC. They're a little biased-do we have an objective report anywhere? Did either network comment? Worse, conservative networks on cable supposedly agreed to air it- TV land, Nick at Nite, ABC Family-already. Either they weren't turned down, or the stated reason was completely false. It's too ridiculous to believe in its present form.

inappropriate

That is Waybrain in a nutshell. And a subtle condemnation -- i.e., if you do not receive healing, it is because you are believing the negatives of this world. If you _really_ believed, you wouldn't need medicine (interesting that it is juxtaposed with alcohol, as if the taking of any of these was a weakness).A positive outlook on life is a healthy and effective way to live, but it is a far cry from the "law of believing." Regards, Shaz Mike's immediate (proximal) response? "I'm convinced that NONE of us ever really believed..." Oenophile says on the subject, "Mike, Your formulaic concep of life is just wrong. Reality is far too complex to be reduced to 'a priori' formulas found in the PFAL class or in collaterals. Paul said that 'the letter kills but the spirit gives life.' Far too many people who struggles with difficult issues in TWI sought help only to be judged and upbraided by smug and sanctimonious 'miserable comforters' for their supposed lack of believing.' Conversely, he summation of Jesus' message: love, mercy, justice and hope which are concepts that don't lend themselves easily to trite slogans, maxims and formulas." Mike's response to this? "So you say I'm making it too simple, and Shaz thinks I make it too complex!" This illustrated Mike's difficulties with written text. Both posters came in from the same direction, and Mike declares them opposite to each other. Mike completely misread Shaz' post. Is this a difficulty common to ALL our posts, or just Shaz?

Mike, can you agree to keep it down to ONE ad for pfal and ONE unsupported claim that vpw gave divine revelation to "master pfal" and ONE claim vpw got a special unction per page? I think we all can fairly well recite your ads by now..... As it now stands, it looks like you're making the same post over and over in this thread.

I felt this was worth repeating, for those who might have been skimming.

*curses* Man, I was just thinking about him the other day. I'll keep his family in my prayers.

Since twi-ers never comprised a sizeable portion of people winning the lottery despite their "great believing", I figured this rule wasnt quite as practical as vpw liked to make it sound. As Raf has pointed out, it works as a "rule of thumb", but elevating it to a "law" that "works for saint and sinner alike", as vpw loved to do with trends or rules of thumb, makes it into something that it is not.

Uh, it's available on tape and CD.... "Arlo Guthrie, "Alice's Restaurant" ". If you listen to the tape, it's all of side one, titled "Alice's Restaurant Massacree." They also made a movie of it, as was mentioned earlier in the thread.

Don't keep us in suspence, Mstar- was the Dump closed on Thanksgiving?