Mark Clarke

I wouldn't call them the "ultimate." Have you read church history?

They did the year I was there (1980-81). Not that the rest of the curriculum was not below the usual standards of Christian colleges, though. * * * But on the subject of ordination, a couple of people on this thread (I forget who now) made the excellent point that ALL members of the Body of Christ are called to the same calling, and the whole idea of clergy being somehow above the "normal" believers is not Biblical. It sets up a subserviant attitude and relationship that is very easily abused, and not just in TWI. (The RC Church has done it for centuries.) If I remember correctly, the only references to ordination with laying on of hands in the New Testament was for specific tasks or positions. The ones who were ordained to serve tables in Acts (including Stephen) is one example. And there are references to people being ordained as overseers of the churches in a given city. But this notion that certain people are "ordained for life" and have a special calling that sets them apart from other believers is simply not Biblical. I still cringe a bit when I see people stick "Rev." in front of their names.

So what heve you found regarding WHY they believe this way? What I have found is that the Bible doesn't guarantee perfect physical wholeness at all times in this life. You begin to see this when you realize how big a deal the hope is. God promised a kingdom on earth where there will be perfect health, and if we get healed now it's only temporary anyway. Eventually we will die unless the Lord returns first. But when we are resurrected, we will have complete wholeness for all eternity. God's view is in light of the ultimate goal. Sometimes God lets us go through things in this life in order to learn to trust Him. This is seen in the New Testament as well as the old. If you want to consider this, check out what I wrote at length on my website: http://godskingdomfirst.org/MoreAbundantLife.htm

Me too. I felt nauseated and wept at the same time. Not sure why it evoked such strong emotions in me, as I'd heard about what he did before.

A priest, a minister, a rabbi, walk into a bar, followed by an Irishman, and Italian, and a Polish guy. The bartender says, "What is this, a joke?" That's nuts! (Or were you just pulling my legume?)

That passage refers to Him being a just and righteous judge, which He is. But the Bible also says that He is "compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin." (Exodus 34:6-7). I believe God is good, as demonstrated by the fact that He gave His only Son for us when He didn't have to, and offered us a part in His Kingdom program when we didn't deserve it.

Hard to say. It's not even clear whether it is figurative language or not. I agree with year2027 that the name Lucifer is referring to the King of Babylon (though I think it could be a future King too). It is the only verse in the Bible where the name Lucifer occurs and nowhere says that he was an archangel who became Satan when he fell. Anything could be a sin if it comes before God. The Bible doesn't say. But the purpose of creation seems to be God wanting a relationship with man, and designing a plan to bring to pass His Kingdom on earth. If people are looking to aliens from space as the source of this planet's enlightenment or the solution to our problems, you can see why the devil might want to promote such a thing.

Yes, I always did think it was odd that they would have that stuff on a table for anyone to handle, since they were the ones that taught that stuff like that can "carry devil spirits."

How do they do it in other churches? I haven't been to a Pentecostal church.

Several classes were video taped at the same time in the mid 70's. These included VP's Intermediate Class and "Christian SEX (and oh yeah, family)." Also at that time: W@lter C#mm!ns did the original video "Dealing with the Adversary." That was later replaced by "Our Spiritual Contest" which he and LCM did at Living Victoriously, combining the Athletes of the Spirit stuff with Dealing with the Adv. Later when he left TWI, LCM did a new "Defeating the Adversary" class. W@lter also did "Renewed Mind," and I don't know if that was ever redone. D0nnie Fug!t did the original "Witnessing and Undershepherding" class, which was later replaced by a new one that was also taped at Living Victoriously. It was taught by D0nnie, V!nce F, and R@lph D. Donn@ R@nda!! did the original "Basic Keys to Research" class in the 70's, and later in the 80's W@lter did "Fundamentals of Biblical Research" which was something you could buy and do at your own pace at home. J0nnie T0wn$#nd did a "Way Tree" class, which I don't think was ever redone. I seem to remember being told that LCM's "Rise and Expansion" class was meant to replace it. Later in the 80's there were a few new ones like E@rl's new Intermediate Class, T0m J's government class, and Fr@nklin S's financial class. The financial one was later recalled when it was discovered that most of it was plagiarized. Why they didn't recall PFAL I don't know.

When I was at Emporia, we were all going to the Kansas limb meeting, and they instructed us before hand to give a standing ovation for the song "Freedom's Soil." Now I liked that song anyway, and it usually got an enthusiastic response. But there was something phony about being told ahead of time and staging a standing O as if it were spontaneous.

I know that some people knowingly fake it, or have faked it. But I also think some people that believe they are doing it are not really speaking a language. I think people can pronounce syllables that sound to us like a language, and actually believe they are speaking in a tongue, because they have been taught to do so. But in fact are just repeating nonsense syllables. Scientific tests have been done, and they have never proven that it was a real language. Having said that, however, I will add that I think there is a possibility that a few instances are genuine, if God deems it needful. There was more of need for such signs in the first century Church. But Paul makes it clear that not everyone speaks in tongues. The old "all nine all the time" notion is not Biblical. And because there are so many people who are not genuinely speaking in tongues (not just in TWI) the genuine instances are probably very few and far between. With so many counterfeits around, it is not a very effective sign anymore.

I believe the two covenants are both within the overall scope of the promises to Abraham. The Old Covenant was to Israel as a temporary measure until the Messiah came, when the New Covenant was ratified. But there is more to the promises to Abraham than just Jesus' death and resurrection, although those things are crucial. The whole plan of the coming Kingdom of God is the big picture. That was the gospel which Jesus and his disciples preached for quite some time before he even mentioned his death. I think that sounds about right too, although I have heard a few theories that there are some gaps in the chronology in the Bible, and the earth may be closer to 10,000 years old. I haven't looked into that in detail, but I am inclined to think the earth is thousands of years old rather than billions.

In case anyone has been looking for it, the site has been renamed with an ORG extension instead of NET. After being down since my hosting agreement expired in January 08, the site has been relaunched with the new name. The .net domain name was only renewable if I continued to be hosted by the same provider, but I found one that hosts for free. I only needed to register a new domain name, hence the change. The new address is: http://www.godskingdomfirst.org

Yes, but the point is that the title Adonai is reserved for God alone, while Adoni is used of human or angelic superiors.

You had said Adonai is "listed as a name of a person," and I just wanted to clarify that the form Adonai is used only of God, not any human person.

We also need to challenge the accuracy of the sources from which VP stole. Just because B. G. Leonard's class or J. E. Stiles's book sounds good, we can't assume that the material was good but just mishandled by VPW. We have to "try every spirit." Leonard and Stiles and Bullinger may not have been as dishonest as Wierwille, but that doesn't guarantee they were right in what they taught. We have to test it against the Bible, and in many cases the material still comes up wanting.

Interestingly enough, VPW didn't even come up with THIS on his own. The idea was first put forth by F. C. Conybeare (1856-1924) and is still quoted by various non-trinitarians, but has been refuted by other scholars. The thing is, that verse doesn't say that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three persons in one God, or co-equal, or anything else that you could prove the Trinity from. There is no need to try to prove that those words weren't in the original.

...until the resurrection. (Good song, though!)

Adon is the root word. Adonai and adoni are both forms of the root. Adonai is only used of God, while adoni is used for earthly lords.

That's no ordinary rabbit... it's a creature so foul, so cruel that no man yet has fought with it and lived! BONES of full fifty men lie STREWN about its lair ... So, brave knights, if you do doubt your courage or your strength come no further, for DEATH awaits you all ... with nasty, big, pointy teeth!! Run away!!

The point of Anthony Buzzard's examination of Psalm 110:1 was not that one verse could disprove the Trinity if the rest of Scripture proved it. But this one verse is often used by Trinitarians to show that Jesus was called by a name (Adonai) that proves he is God. But the facts are that the word used in this verse is not Adonai but Adoni. This is not something Buzzard made up, but he quotes standard reference works. A written article on his site dealing with this can be found here: http://focusonthekingdom.org/articles/adoni.htm The point is that the title "Adoni" used in Psalm 110:1 is one that is used of other human lords, and sometimes of angels, but not of God. But the title "Adonai" is only used of God. And the distinction between the words, based on vowel points, wasn't made up by the Massoretes. They simply developed a form of notation to indicate the difference in the forms of the word which were known to Hebrew speakers all along. Neither the Pharisees nor Jesus ever considered that this verse was saying that the Messiah would be Adonai, THE God. Jesus' point was to ask the Pharisees how Messiah could be called David's lord (i.e., his superior) if he was a descendent of David. The Jews never considered that the Messiah would be God. All the prophecies about him portrayed him as the promised King of the coming Kingdom, who would rule in God's behalf. He is the center of God's plan and of His creation, but he is not God himself; he is God's son.

I agree with you, Rachel. The whole "body, soul, and spirit" teaching that TWI had was incorrect, I believe. Man does not HAVE a soul, man IS a soul. A soul is a living, breathing being. He became that when God breathed into him the breath of life. When a man dies, his body returns to the earth (dust), and his breath of life returns to God. But his breath, or life force, is not his "consciousness." This is why people get confused about about someone's "soul" going to "heaven."

I don't want to get into a doctrinal debate, since this isn't the thread to do that. But there have been many writers since the Reformation that questioned the Trinity, not to mention many second and third century writers that expressed opinions contrary to what became the orthodox Trinitarian view. I think it's possible that VPW really believed that Jesus was not God, but also realized how that controversial teaching could be an effective marketing ploy as has been mentioned in this thread. It is true, though, that his JCNG was not a great scholarly work. I have read a number of more scholarly works that do a better job at making the point that Scripture presents Jesus as the Son of God and not God. Remember, VP didn't come up with anything original, so don't discount what he taught just because he taught it. He got a FEW things right (though not many). If you want to know what convinced VP of the fallacy of the Trinity, a good source would be the bibliography that was supposed to be available. If you remember, JCNG had a note that said that you could obtain a complete bibliography just by writing and asking for it. (Why they didn't just include it in the book in the first place, I don't know.) Did anyone here happen to write in for it? I've always wondered what sources were listed in it. If anyone on GS has it or knows where it can be obtained, it would be interesting to find out. And if anyone still wants to discuss the subject doctrinally, we could start another thread in the Doctrinal section (though it's probably been discussed there already.)

Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me!! <_<