Mike

More philosophy I'd like to applaud here. On another thread I might have inquired into "misrepresents" but not here.

Bravo! These thoughts by Bolshevik reflect a lot of mine. Before I got into the Word I was reading Arthur Koestler's "Act of Creation" and how mechanical some (or a lot of) creative thought actually is. Here's how Wikipedia presents it: The Act of Creation is a 1964 book by Arthur Koestler. It is a study of the processes of discovery, invention, imagination and creativity in humour, science, and the arts. It lays out Koestler's attempt to develop an elaborate general theory of human creativity.

This could very well be the case. Modern English evolved during a time of moving away from the absolute rule of monarchs, and possibly away from language like this. *** This topic is very interesting. Fiction is a genuine device we allow all human authors to engage in. I’m not upset at all by the idea that Job might be figurative. Here’s how I always looked at the scene in Job. I see it as Satan coming to ridicule God over Job’s negative believing. However, God steps up for Job though even before Satan begins, and later limits how much Satan is permitted to hurt Job. [6] Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.[7] And the LORD said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.[8] And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil? God's first mention of Job is positive. [9] Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought? [10] Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. [11] But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face. Accusation against Job. [12] And the LORD said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the LORD. “Behold, all that he hath is in thy power;” - God simply notes (“Behold”) that a power shift has taken place. God is not handing it over here, just noting that it has already been handed over. Job’s continual, daily fear allowed this. Satan came to God knowing this. “…only upon himself put not forth thine hand.” - God is quick to limit that power shift, and NOT permit Satan from killing Job. Job’s fear was about his kids, not himself.

Ouch! I hadn't considered the added stipulation of "not available elsewhere." That's real hard to do. In WLIV vpw states that most of what he taught he got from others and that very little originated with him. My thinking right now (at this late hour) is that vpw's biggest contribution to the package was deciding what to include and not include, and then how he distributed it in a way it got to me and in a way that I was able to accept it (from hippies). At that time I was moving away from Christianity as fast as I could. That crazy guy with the lie detectors and plant consciousness was JUST ONE of my wild adventures as far from Christianity as possible. My list of benefits in the class all came from other sources, but none of those sources has the mix that is best IMO. For instance: find a group that believes in eternal life, but they also believe in the trinity. Another: one group may believe Jesus is not God, but then pray to dead people. I could put it this way: It's "not available elsewhere" to find that mix. My list of benefits is unique in that way. Can you tell this is still a new topic to me?

YES! That and Medicare. I have about 4 other things in the works with my Ophthalmologist. It's been a steady healing thing, Thanks for understanding. There are so many different reasons that items in posts can get missed or ignored or lost.

Oops! Back to the old drawing board. I was thinking it was a little different. Maybe I can adapt my list to it. Like I said, I'm in no rush. I hope you aren't.

That sounds a little like the situations cataract surgeries bring in. I'm still a few years away from cataract surgery. My problem is macular edema. It's not as bad as macular degeneration; it's pimples on the retina. I was stopped by a cop a 5 years ago for weaving late at night. I had not a drop to drink and thought I was straight on. The next day I noticed that a yardstick looked wavy. I’ve been in Ophthalmologists chairs every three months ever since. The strong left eye bends up and the weak right eye bends down. I just got PRISMS installed within my glasses prescriptions that correct for this. It’s a little weird still.

BTW, Twinky, that other thread "One Thing" that you started, and then got closed? The main reason I didn't want to respond there was it was a totally new topic for me, and I didn't want the distraction from my campaign. HOWEVER, I did take your challenge to heart. I started a little note on the subject, and then slowly added items to the growing list of benefits I have received from PFAL. I'm slowly composing, in my head, some detail now. But what do I do now with this? I'm trying to wind down my involvement here to a mere trickle, but that's difficult. When I post too many responses and demands seem to always happen. Maybe later. I'm in no rush.

I did read them. There a lot of details to your posts. There's a lot of details to all the answers I'd like to compose. But THAT much time I don't have .... just tonight. If you could bring up the one biggest one that would help me a lot. I am literally limited to reading with one eye shut. I just got new glasses that somewhat help, but I'm still learning to use them. It's a stereo vision and muscular coordination thing. I can type better than I can read, but then I have to proof read. I get headaches reading too much.

Please believe me that if I had the time and energy I'd pick and choose them all. It's just beyond my abilities to answer everything. There's too much. I give it valiant efforts sometimes. Other times I have less to offer. What would you like me to address? I have a little time tonight.

Love and peace to you too T-Bone. I can see you deeply considered what I was suggesting. I'll save your post for future reference.

I thought he did wrong by strongly urging Corps members to only marry Corps. I think there were other ways he contributed to Corps elitism, and they strongly degraded the mystery on the field. But I haven't thought about my gripes against him for many years. I had to think for a long time to come up with that. I had been very lucky in insulating myself from the negatives, and as a result many have faded in memory. . .... Just remembered another one.....On a SNS tape he told of an incident where a gasoline station attendant tried to give him the wrong change or something like that. VPW said he got revelation and nailed him. I thought BS! What was the profit to the Body? I hoped the gas station attendant knew how to handle it. I mentioned weeks ago I sometimes thought he was a jerk. I thought he was corny but likeable in the film class, but in person he seemed distant at best. The last time I saw him, at an AC here in San Diego, him he looked defeated and beat.

It was just a suggestion. I wont make it again. *** BTW, So_crates, thanks for the excathedra link. Does she still come by here? We both had a pretty strict RC background, and I could see it in lots of her posts. I could relate to her on that basis. I have seen significant pieces of her story in the past, but not a whole thread. I am slowly reading penworks book. Someone mentioned she has some material on the research dept and one of the books. That gives me reason to speed up the reading. *** I've never been a subscriber of the Pure Good model of vpw. My opinion of him has gone up and down a lot, but it never went to the level of worship. Just never. I did see plenty of people who were into worshiping him back in the 70s, and in a number of ways, but I totally resisted it. It looked dangerous. I was into finding any mistakes he made, and that was my primary attitude all through. Wow! I sure got a lot of condemnation for that attitude from a few select Corps vpw worshipers. *** A theory I have is that the ones who worshiped vpw the most are probably now the ones who feel most negatively toward him most. I can understand that. How does that theory fit with you folks? Did you folks ever find yourself thinking he was Pure Good or even anything close?

Yes. It is missing, because I don't want to apply it to my life. I'm lucky that I didn't personally witness much of it, so I can do the separation, and look only at the good. I don't want to spend too much time inventorying all the bad from others, especially 2nd and 3rd person distant, and especially if it's emotionally charged and even possibly exaggerated. I'm not blaming you folks who do want to look at these things, but I'm just not joining in on that part of our common experience. But I am telling you that if you want to relate to grads who, like me, were given a significant dose of the good, then altering the Pure Evil model might help. It's just a suggestion.

Once again, back to the Pure Evil model. I don't deny the bad; it's guaranteed in I John 1:18. What is missing in your model is the complexity that there was some extreme good done for a lot of people.

I hear you on this. Thank you. just read it a second time.

Thanks for the tip (reaching for my Thesaurus).

I have already done that, a little here, and a lot in my own mind. There are things I don't know about it, like it's exact boundaries. I mentioned this here. Examples: the Foreward to ADAN is written by Karen Martin, a very large quote from Kenyon in OMSW, the added Appendix of JCNG. Another limitation (and posters were constantly missing this, so I repeated it about 6 times) was I was not able to prove that PFAL was God-breathed. I was only proving that vpw had CLAIMED it was. Now, that proof was pretty significant, even though it didn’t at all prove PFAL to actually BE Good-breathed. What my proof did show was the vpw had said over and over, right under our noses on tape and in print, that PFAL was God-breathed AND WE MISSED IT! It begs the question: what else did we miss that is in the record?

Twinky, I agree that very small groups (twig size?) are essential to effectively get to individuals. Sometimes approaching individuals over what blesses their lives and what they are really into is better than approaching them with a view to hurts. Connecting on positives may lead, for some, to deeper hurt ministering later. I have a suggestion for your dealings with those leaving TWI, or had left long ago, or are still in. The reason they stayed in and got hurt is because there was genuine good there that kept them (us) in, holding noses to tolerate the stink. If you acknowledge that good with them, then they can let go of the bad easier. I’m talking about a sub-set of those leaving. I think there are some leaving TWI who agree (somewhat) with me that PFAL was of God. They see it a tangled mess with the ministry machinery and would like to give it all up, but the goodness they see in there (like I see) prevents them from trusting you and the GS landscape. I think you folks can do better if you advance from the Pure Evil model to a more realistic model. The man did a lot of good when he walked in fellowship, and that is lost in your model of him. Those younger grads who never saw the real spiritual work (unsupervised by TWI) in the field like many of us did, and who only know of LCM’s monstrosity and afterwards are probably in a different boat. But those older grads who can’t give up TWI because they know there was something worthwhile in PFAL, are IMO, not able to get much help here. I suggest if a realistic model, and not the Pure Evil one, were entertained then the GS community could help much better those older grads stuck in TWI’s influence. The only reason TWI has this influence is because members are committed to that SOMETHING that is good. Get to know that something and you all can relate together better.

I was taking the bulk of the blame.

Please don't read that much blame in there. I see is as normal human mechanics. Just a little momentum.

For people with difficulty seeing, color/bold/sized fonts can make for easier reading. Also, I find when a lot of detail is happening, with lots of back and forth quoting, colors help in sorting out who said what.

I do not see that this says, Love a book (not even a bible) - not love PFAL. Hi Twinky, Love certainly is what it’s all about. That, or a similar verse comes up in the first 10 minutes of the film class. Since I took the class to heart, I naturally took that idea of loving God first and then neighbor as self to heart. I still do. One of the things that I did early in my experiences with that verse was track it down. I wanted to know where Jesus got that from. It wasn’t hard. From memory I think it was Deut 6. but I’m avoiding a lot of quotations right now. Right after Moses told Israel (and Jesus) to love God first, he told HOW to do it. The OT verses that follow the "love God first" verse are interesting. They basically say that to love God we should immerse ourselves in His words, almost like a fanatic. Some people err on the side of moderation here; sorry, I may have erred on the side of fanaticism. I am moderating. Long ago, when we carried green cards in our Bibles, I would tell people that we love God the same basic way we love people: we listen to hear their will, and we act on that will. Not so coincidentally, this is also the heart of entrepreneurship. *** I do see that it requires some practical application, otherwise, how else will you love your neighbour? By reading the house number on the letter box? .Yes, I agree. The “acting on another’s will” I mentioned means first determining what their need or yearning is, and then finding actions that assist in that. How do you love yourself? Is it by reading your diary? Or is it by being kind to yourself, and trying to understand your own strengths, weaknesses, vulnerabilities, and physical needs. Do you seek warm clothes and a roof over your head, in bad weather? .Yes, again I agree. I look to what is needed in my life for me to be able to love others. *** Help someone less fortunate. Do you enjoy sufficient food every week? Help someone who has less. Do you get help or companionship at your "low times"? Come alongside someone who needs that help or companionship. .More agreement. However, this kind of behavior has not been a primary focus of my public posting here. In my private communications with posters here things are a lot different. In my personal life things are a lot different. I have hundreds of customers that I try to regard as friends of varying closeness. My application of love there is not trivial. Same with neighbors in my apartment complex. I belong to a dance club that involves hundreds of people and all kinds of social giving and receiving. I’ve found I can give companionship where it is needed most. It may be the case that, for me, a public GreaseSpot application of the principle of love may not be as possible as it is in other areas of my life. I mentioned before that I do actually come here in love, post words of love as I see it, and have to hold my nose for a lot of my applications of it. If I succeed in transmitting one of God’s ideas here, then that is love. I regret the messiness, and am doing my best to clean it up. *** Put the book down, Mike, and leave the internet alone. Take a couple of months off and spend that time engaging in a meaningful way with the people around you. .Good advice. I’m glad to say I have followed it a lot already, and often. I put GreaseSPot down for 10 years. My posting is not even one tenth the volume it was, and I am slowly driving it down as we speak. I am having a great time with the people around me, honest. For the past 5 years I have been enjoying many open doors in my work and in my play. *** There is a certain momentum involved in my posting style. I honed it 15 years ago. It’s like trying to stop a freight train from my perspective. There’s also a kind of momentum within posters here, to keep me in my hard hitting style, and I understand that. Whenever we go back to our home town, our old townie friends expect us to be the same person who left town 40 years ago. They tend to drag us back to our former selves. I think both of these momenta are diminishing. Thank you for your patience.

I've never thought to apply "confession of belief yields receiving of confession" to these kinds of matters, like math or science or philosophy. When I am looking at the promises of God, then I start thinking that way. I found that a lot of abuse of the law of believing occurred both in my life and I suspect in the lives of others in the ministry. That law is intimately bound up with God and His Word and His promises. There are corresponding principles in life that look like the law of believing, but are weak by comparison and have plenty of exceptions. Things like "Positive thinking get positive results" seem to work somewhat, but are more tendencies than laws. I think we all (and I know I) tended to merge these two ideas into a tangled mess. I'm still straightening it out for myself.

I think we all have that tendency. Peeking outside of our comfortable opinions is not the norm, but a skill that can be learned. I admit that HERE, in the past I did not do that, because I was on a mission that I did not want to be distracted. I've aborted that mission, and have contented myself in what partial accomplishments did come from it. As far as the tight arguments go, I was only asking for examples because I seek learning in that area. It was not to win an argument. It's been my experience that the tightest proofs are all directed away from human life and spirituality. It there are tight proofs elsewhere I want to know about them. So far I know of none. ....maybe Plato and Aristotle, but all my learning there was over 50 years ago and has faded. I hope you're joking about negative believing and finding proofs. IF you were serious, we should start a thread in Doctrinal on it. I do not know all there is about believing, but what little I do know assures me that that law of believing is not about that kind of believing. I am still working on the details of how believing works, both in print and in my life.