soul searcher

Great stuff. My personal opinion: it's not really gospel and it's not really blues -- it's more like early rock and roll.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe She does a neat solo at about 1:30. (I don't imagine the church elders approved of it.) (Check out her white Gibson SG custom with three humbuckers.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xzr_GBa8qk

LOL Actually, now that I think about it, popes don't seem to receive more protection from God than any other mortal human. From a statistical standpoint, if popes as a group somehow received warnings of, or were protected from danger more than anyone else, you would expect them to have very long lifes spans -- or at least significanly longer than the general population. But I'm sure that's not the case. Digressing here...I find it interesting that God set man's years to 120 in Genesis and it seems that only one person has ever exceeded that, at 122 years old. See link... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oldest_people#Ten_oldest_people_ever BTW, did anyone ever live more than 120 years after the flood in the bible? Sorry to go off topic.

Nice comeback. I've been wondering of late about the halo...where did it come from? My uneducated guess is that the artists from the middle ages and renaissance (sp?) first employed it as a device to distinguish Jesus Christ from the all the other men in a scene. And then it just caught on and became the standard way of representing JC in paintings. Am I totally out of line?

From Kathleen Parker, a conservative columnist, in the Washington Post... http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/15/AR2010011502420.html?hpid=opinionsbox1 The "deal with the devil" is complete and utter bullshyte.

Easily it's Limbaugh. I think Pat Robertson is one of the more likeable religious conservatives, despite his propensity to say dumb things. I guess I have a soft spot for likeable TV evangelists. Limbaugh, on the other hand, is pure vitriol. He is one the worst pieces of dange on this planet. I question the very judgement and intelligence of some of my own friends that listen to him.

I still have lots of questions. Here a few of them... Why was Irael set apart? Didn't God create all men? And when the first humans didn't behave the way he wanted them to he wiped them out with a flood. But there was still lots of punishment in store. Any chance you could point me to a chapter or verse? I'm not sure what section you're referring to here. What was that purpose? Did He forget about that purpose during the holocaust in WWII? Or did he just forget about his chosen people? And what about nowadays? The Jews are continually subjected to violence and hate from the Palestinians. Who are God's chosen people today? I don't see any evidence of that. Just reading all the heart-wrenching prayers posted in this forum that don't get answered (posted by individuals with more faith than me) makes me question the power of prayer. He did? Nobody told the Israelites to run for their lives when Moses and the Levites came with their swords to kill 3,000 brothers, friends and neighbors. And as if that wasn't enough He then caused a plague -- with no warning. Doesn't seem fair to me. Geisha, I'm not saying all this to argue with you. You may be right about everything. At any rate, I don't expect you to answer my questions, or even reposnd to my post (unless you want to), I'm just letting you know some of the things I wonder about as I read the bible.

Actually, you do a fine job articulating. I'll react to your post tomorrow.

Ah yes, idols. Let's talk about the golden calf for a minute. (Please turn to Exodus 32 in your bibles...) What lesson are we to draw from this account? Moses was gone for while and the people got restless and wild. Then it was Aaron's idea to melt down everybody's gold and create a golden calf. God was understandibly angry and sent Moses down to straighten his people out. Moses pleaded with God on his people's behalf and God relented. Fine. But then as Moses approaches the camp and sees that everyone is out of control, he gets ....ed off himself. Aaron told him what they had done and so Moses has the Levites go in and kill 3,000 "brothers, friends and neigbors." Harsh, but okay. The next day Moses admonishes the people for their sin and says he'll go and try and make it right with the Lord (never mind that 3,000 were executed already). But instead, Moses's plea only seemed to remind the Lord of what happened, so the Lord struck the people with a plague. And Aaron lived. Maybe I'm oversimplifying it?

I'm reading the bible for the first time (without any colored glasses on) and finding out that I have a lot to learn about God. I'm reading the OT and NT at the same time, and it seems to me that the God of the OT isn't just different from the one in the NT, but the OT God didn't seem to be internally consistent or fair in doling out punishment. Was the Sabbath Day wood-gatherer in Numbers who was stoned to death on God's order the only person to ever gather wood on the sabbath? I don't think so. Yet Moses (it was Moses, right?) goes through the trouble of telling us about that one guy. So far, I don't remember any other Sabbath Day wood-gatherers getting summarily executed for his or her transgression.

I found that bargaining routine somewhat odd -- and fairly entertaining, I must say. So they couldn't find ten righteous people in Sodom? There were no innocent women and children? Of course there were. But where was God's love and mercy?

Great stuff.

Thank you. LSD was the best drug I ever did (although it's clearly not for everyone).

Thanks, geisha. Nice post. Lots to think about there. (I was betting that you wouldn't trot out the "idiom of permission" thing, and I was right.) So...I'm thinking...thinking...a couple of things come to mind: #1 If I understand you correctly, you're saying that the large hailstones I mentioned (and, by extension, the ten plagues, fire raining down on Sodom, etc.) were evidence of God's wrath against his lovd ones -- similar to the wrath a parent might exhibit against a problem child, is that right? I'm not trying to corner you -- just asking. #2 Have you ever given thought as to how a hypothetical Jesus might advise a U.S. president on how to react to and defend against the threat of radical islamic terrorists? I think even a pacifist (of which I am one) can see that the U.S., Israel, and other nations need to defend themselves. That need requires action and, in all probability, violence and war. I don't think Jesus discussed "war" outside of Luke 14:31, unless there's something on the topic in the Book of Revelation (which I've never read.) Nor do I recall anything about the need for a person or a nation to defend itself against agressors. Gotta get to work. More later.

I think we share similar tastes in music. Does your location quote the song "One Way Out"?

I was recently introduced to those "teachings" on classes from CES/STF and CFFM and I have to tell you: it doesn't do it for me as far as explaining the difference between God's behavior in the OT vesus the NT. And I wonder how much of what you just described is original WAY doctrine and how much of it came from other places? The dispensationalism, for example (along with four crucified and six denials) comes from Bullinger, no?

Everyone fails -- some more miserably than others. Jesus told us, "But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. (Luke 6:27-29, NIV) Who practices this? Who even tries? Survival is a basic instinct, even among Christians. What about this from Joshua 10 on the battle against Gibeon? As they fled before Israel on the road down from Beth Horon to Azekah, the LORD hurled large hailstones down on them from the sky, and more of them died from the hailstones than were killed by the swords of the Israelites. (Joshua 10:11, NIV) The Lord helped avenge the Israelites time and again. And he didn't fool around -- most of the time He made sure that everyone (including women and children) was killed, even those that got away. So... Love your enemies? Turn the other cheek? According to Jesus or according to the LORD? I know this is off-topic but your comment about emulating Jesus caught my attention. Is there a thread that discusses the God of the OT? Because I have lots of questions.

Ha ha! You have a way with words, man. Did VPW smoke pot and take LSD, too? I don't get the "tartrate-25" reference.

I took it to mean people of lower education and/or lower socioeconomic status who ascribe to a theology that they don't really understand. Of course, I could be wrong.

Man, waysider, you definitely have a book or two in you. Seriously. Great insight. You are the anti-TWI! lol

I have that problem, too. I thought it was my stupid workstation. On top of that, none of those formatting icons work on this computer.

Thanks, Pen. I've see KA's books on Amazon.com. I'll be sure to check then out.

Thanks geisha, great post. In a class from CES/STF that my ex-Way friend sent me, the instructors demonstrated their tongues, gave instruction on how to do it, and even told us to call the STF if we needed "technical support" (my term) on SIT. They said that God wants us all to speak in tongues all the time. (Incidentally, my EWF speaks in a very pleasant, flowing, nice-sounding language -- although I think is completely meaningless since she doesn't know what she's saying.) So I gave this SIT business a try and I must say that what came out of my mouth was fairly impressive. Once I got going, it was easy. That is to say, it was easy to utter fairly articulate nonsense syllables that bore little or no resemblance to any language that I know of. But although it had a calming effect on me I saw little purpose in continuing to do it on a daily basis -- I wasn't getting anything out of it. At least when I pray in english, I know what I said. I may not always be praying for the "right" thing but so be it -- I'll fgure that out down the road. Just for fun: a minister who writes in the "Faith" section of our local newspaper likes to say (somewhat jokingly) that there are basically four types of prayer: 1) Thanks, 2) Oops, 3) Gimme and 4) Wow. Which category would SIT fall into?

In the name of good forum citizenship, I posted a reply here:

I think the 1 Corinthians verses are pretty strong support in and of themselves for the argument of "to each, his or her own gift." It's pretty clear to me that not everyone manifests all the gifts of holy spirit. Even common sense tells me that -- anyone can see that individuals in this world have various talents and gifts. Also, consider Romans 8: 22We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? 25But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. 26In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. (All quotes from NIV, bold is mine) So a "groan" here seems to serve a similar function as SIT: prayer that is uttered when one's native language is insufficient to convey the desired meaning to God. And think about the "ommmm" mantra that some eastern religions use during meditation to achieve mental clarity and enlightment. Can't SIT can be considered a form of this type of vocalizing? Why does SIT have to sound like the flowery, glossolalic mix of French and Portugese that my ex-Way friend speaks?