Mike

I was luckier, somewhat. I got some subtle results, but I also had lots of obvious failures in the first 15 years. Then I got a 10 year break from all TWI officialdom. After that period, my PFAL experience has been written only for 20 years now. The results I enjoyed got better. About 5 years ago I started seeing some spectacular results. From my varied results, and from my lucky clean separation of written PFAL out from all the TWI trappings, I would say that what failed you was a complicated mix of PFAL with a lot of TWI junk. I think it is possible to sort it all out, but it would take time and be a lot of work. I’ll do my best to motivate you should you want to try.

Continuing from before… I realize my posting tests peoples' emotions, and I can't blame anyone. If someone had accurately and politely presented the God-breathed PFAL idea to me a few years earlier and without the special preps I got, then I'd have been strongly against it. I try to keep this in mind. The reason I press on with presenting it is it testifies of the goodness of God in an intensity that serves as proof for me. I can see all the negatives that abounded with the ministry and that are reported here, but the goodness of God I also see in PFAL completely overshadows all of the TWI woes. That one paragraph can serve as my mini-manifesto on a thumbnail. I see this overshadowing as similar to Paul’s argument in Romans that the reason God tolerated the disobedience of Adam and death that resulted was He saw the obedience of Jesus Christ as FAR OVERSHADOWING all the woes in death. Paul argues that it’s worth it, what’s coming. The goodness of God I see in PFAL is like what I see in the stars. Atheists look at the stars and see a testimony of man’s total insignificance. I see them as being there for us, the greatly significant ones, the ones who dare to believe in a God so good that He would create the entire universe just for us.

If it helps anyone, I feel no grudges from it. I realize my posting tests peoples' emotions, and I can't blame anyone.

Did I say this? I thought I said I am not prepared to present. In my own life I can point to things, but many would take a long time to present. Some are so personal I'd rather do it in private, and only to some people. Some are still being researched and pondered. I know that to present anything here I have to plan like George Washington crossing the Delaware River. I know that as soon as I post anything it's going to draw crossfire from half a dozen adversaries. Have you ever presented anything to a jeering audience? I doubt it. I use jeering and catcalls as practice for doing stand-up comedy. When I'm on mic I have no time to think and edit, like I do here. Here's a tid-bit I'll toss out on a relatively rare impulse post: "Christ formed in you." Anyone know anything about this topic, either in theory or in practice? I'm still working on this great benefit, but I'm greatly interested if anyone here knows anything about it. It's from Gal. 4:19 and a few SNS tapes.

Thank you for the move towards decorum.

Here for your re-reading is the core of my answer: "...the practical application side, the side I admitted to having less discipline for than the man I know to be, the side that I left GreaseSpot 10 years ago to explore more thoroughly. Living it, I've been doing, and on an exploratory basis. I have NOT, however, been thinking about it from a logical or expository basis. The kind of explanation you ask for here, I am not well prepared to deliver on. I will now think on it much. *** I saw your deja vu thread. Did you realize that this thread we are on now was started the same way? Is that a standard ploy? Instead of dealing with the points of discussion you want to single me out for derision? When posters start resorting to distractions from what I post I think maybe I'm hitting a nerve or something. I admitted to you that this is something I want to think about. Are you AT ALL interested in the topic of discussion or are you trying to hustle me around?

I'm quoting this post mostly so it can't so easily get lost to me. This post brings up good points. Please notice that it points to the practical application side, the side I admitted to having less discipline for than the man I know to be, the side that I left GreaseSpot 10 years ago to explore more thoroughly. Living it, I've been doing, and on an exploratory basis. I have NOT, however, been thinking about it from a logical or expository basis. The kind of explanation you ask for here, I am not well prepared to deliver on. I will now think on it much. In my personal life I have not done much witnessing outside of the “living epistle” type for some years now. I’ve been exploring the freedom in Christ I have from institutional supervision. Your post got me thinking along relatively new lines. Hopefully I’ll be able to answer it better later.

Thank you. I looked there, briefly, bookmarked it, and will read it carefully after I get back from work. Yikes! That thread looks pretty intense!

I can relate to that being annoying. I’m not sure where this comes from, but I’d like to address it. I think this could be a mis-perception on your part, or a mis-projection on my part, or maybe a little of both. There are only SOME things that I know better than anybody else, BECAUSE I’ve had my face in the collaterals for the past 20 years (after a break for 10 years) with zero TWI interference. So some things I definitely have a one-up on. I do NOT know it all; not even close. AND THEN there’s the issue of how well do I apply it in my life. I confess: I fall short! The times that I constantly correct posters on as to what is accurately in the record ARE DUE TO my constantly refreshing my memory for the past 20 years, while most here are having actual PFAL text (not audio) fade fast in their memories. It’s no big deal that I should know more, when this is taken into account. For just about everything in life, and in ministry history, I’m just average to less than average. I’ve admitted when and where I’m not sure of things. Please help me fix this misconception you seem to have. It will make our communication go much easier. *** So_crates, in many of your posts I get confused as to how to respond to multiple quotes you post in a row. I only responded to this one, but I saw the others. When I hit the “quote” button I seem to have no control over what gets echoed in the response box. I wanted you to know this, and that I’m not avoiding your other points. My time is short this morning and I’ll have to get back to it. Things get lost in the shuffle, so I plan to go back to the beginning of this thread to re-read and pick up things that got lost.

I'm working on it.

I see you haven't lost your TWI confrontation skills. Too bad for you, those techniques stopped working on me decades ago. I heard the suggestions of other posters (as you documented above), and I apply them in the mix I feel is right. I do not look much to your indignation when I decide what to do…. to wait on posting or posting. I take breaks and think about my manifesto according to the schedule that suits me… not you. If you really like scolding like that, though, feel free to let her rip. I’m currently weighing formats and audiences for such a manifesto or “proof.” I’m also currently weighing lengths, density, and how thorough I want to do it. I have memories of long ago putting out a few brief sketches of proof formulas, so I’m slowly reading the archives here as well as my own archives, searching for templates of mini-manifestos. I’m getting a lot of new ideas in the process. I get ideas interacting here, answering SOME questions, and clearing up some misconceptions. I find that the focus or the root theme of my manifesto is just as important as the contents. From the small talk here so far I can see that many (to most) of you have OODLES of misconceptions as to exactly WHAT it is I am trying to prove. How am I going to prove some detailed thesis, if many readers already are saddled with a very distorted notion of where the proof is going? I’m happy to fix such misconceptions, one-by-one, but feel repetion may be necessary for some people. Sometimes I clarify a point with one poster, but that clarification is not absorbed with understanding by another poster who has the SAME misconception. Some of the needed clarifications seem to need frequent repetition. So, anytime you want to ASSIST me in my manifesto organization (instead of scolding me like a Craighead about my progress) please feel free to do so.

To “know your audience” is something I can turn back to you. I know this posting audience well. I also know of segments of the non-posting audience; maybe better than you. There are people wanting to leave TWI right now, but who can’t because they are convinced (like many of us were) that there is SOMETHING worth staying for and slogging through the junk for. I say that something is the pure written forms of PFAL and NOT the TVTs and the newer teachings. What do you say to THAT audience? They are not going to buy your “Pure Evil” model of PFAL. There are many, many such grads who did successfully leave. They know something went right and something went wrong. Then they glance here and see the Pure Evil model and know there’s not going to be any genuine help here for them. Last summer two grads independent of each other ( I contacted them) posted the entire PFAL class set of videos on the Internet; one on FaceBook and one on YouTube. Those videos were up for many months before being finally removed. For one, 700 grads signed up in less than a week. Word got out. You should have seen the comments! Most had not seen the class in 30 years! They were overjoyed. There are many, many such grads out there. They are confused as to how or if they should separate PFAL out from the TVTs. This portion of your audience you lose, daily.

I know there are other points you just made, but this one I wanted to quickly get to, since it is in that audience-addressal issue I mentioned earlier. I can only properly address my ideas to people who believe that (1) God exists, and (2) He rewards people who diligently seek Him. That includes the MANY different ways God can "speak" to us humans, not all of which are textual. I can only talk at length to people who believe that or who want to.

Here goes. Maybe later this can be boiled down closer to 25 words. Recognizing God speaking is similar to recognizing people in everyday life. When I meet a human being, the words that they speak and the actions than take tell me about them. To begin with, I notice that they EXIST and are a conscious human most deeply by how their words line up with mine in conversation. They also tell me who they are, and I line that up with their words and actions. As time goes by I see how well they stick to their words; I get a feel for the quality of their personality by how they deal with stress and things not going their way. At some point I may vouch for them as to who they claim they are. Similarly with the God I met informally and intermittently from 1971 to 1987, and then much more rigorously in 1998. This God has lived in ideas of the PFAL writings long before VPW was born, and has come gradually and faintly into textual manifestation in writings like Kenyon, Styles. Then finally He came into full manifestation in the final PFAL writings. Like getting to know and trust (with proof) a human takes time and interacting, the same holds with this Word of God in written form. When you do it, He eventually proves to you Who He is. The only way to know for sure what is God-breathed, to the point of betting your life, is to have God tell you.

I agree. This business of producing a proof on demand is not well understood by me... yet. Plus, discussing and "proving" the God-breathed nature of PFAL is something I put down 10 years ago so that I could focus more on LIVING what I had sufficiently proved for myself. My memory of those discussions is being constantly revived, though. Plus I’m finding more and more in my post archive. More and more ideas are occurring to me. So, hang in there Professor Einstein. I may get this explained simply, eventually.

My priorities are not the same as your priorities. I’ll go at the speed that suits me, and in the format that suits me. That may change from day to day. FOR SURE any product I do finally put out will NOT suit you, right? I mean, isn’t that a documented given already? You all are bound and determined to reject, pick apart, deride, mock, and DISOBEY any directive or plan of action my proof points to. So why should I fret about suiting you now, before I deliver the finished product? IF it takes me twenty years, think of all the frustration that would cause you. Why don’t you focus on the logic of my posts instead of the timing and format? *** There’s still, also, the unfinished business of to whom I address it. Actually, I could “address” the logic to be compelling to the man-on-the-street, while I literally address it to you folks here. There’s lots of decisions to make there. *** Just today I, as I was brainstorming through the posts of the last few days, I happened on an new tack. Another proof I’ve discussed much here is this: How will the genuine Christ Jesus PROVE to you who he says he is at the gathering together? I mean a proof that he is NOT the anti-Christ, who could be a convincing counterfeit of the genuine. How do you know you got the genuine Christ in the end. What would be the ULTIMATE proof of this? Sounds trivial, until you actually think about it a little. Even a tiny discussion of this side-topic would give me lots of hints as to how to eventually put something together that would stimulate the LEAST amount of rejection, pickings apart, derisions, mockings, and disobedience. *** And those of you who are (or were) believers in the God-breathed ancient scriptures, might you still have in your possession an old proof that got you started on that track? I think some you might be pretty hard pressed to come up with such a proof. Even current believers in perfect God-breathed documents in the days of old, usually back off real fast if given a challenge to prove such a fundamental belief. How fast would you folks back off? Do any of you still witness? *** In mathematical proofs, a common strategy it to take a well known problem and its well known proof and try to get it to fit with another completely different problem. A simple case of this is differential equations. Equation A has a known solution. Equation B has no known solution. Both equations are manipulated in ways appropriate with the established laws. Eventually, a happy similarity between the two equations is noticed. The two equations can be then manipulated in such a way that they look like each other. FINALLY, the solution to A can be modified to fit B, and the proof is done. I did this wit the mirror riddle. I got it’s proof down tight, first. Then I manipulated it constantly, for 20 years, to make it easier for others to understand. Then suddenly, eureka!, I notice that the form of the mirror riddle makes it look like another, much more difficult riddle. In no time the mirror solution was modified and working for the new tougher riddle. *** I’m VERY interested in proofs of all sorts. Has anyone ever seen one? I mean a significant proof. A proof of a significant thing as opposed to a proof of a trivial thing. I’ve hardly ever seen a proof of a significant thing. If any of you know any proofs well, I want to see how high a bar you’re holding up for me. Show me your proofs!

Please speak for yourself, Twinky. I'll write whatever I write, whomever I write it to, in the speed I feel is best. I don't regard questions and simple incorrect statements to be bait, especially to some trolling or bullying behavior. I regard them as CLARIFIERS. It's hard enough for me to organize how I am to write on a complex topic, but it's SO much harder to deal with an audience that is riddled with inaccurate expectations of my writing. There are just SO MANY instances of some poster coming up and saying my thesis is stupid for such and such a reason, only to find they had it wrong in their original assessment of what I am even proposing. Since people have much confusion regarding just my thesis alone, how are they going to follow any kind of proof I write up? Not only does the complication of "thesis confusion" gets cleared up a little from smalltalk, but pieces of my thesis can get a practice write-up.

As I posted, there are other passages that help to narrow down which are God-breathed and which are not. In a 1979 Way Mag he points to the "book and magazine form" God's Word was taking shape in. In his last teaching in 1985 he points to the "writings that came with the class." There are a few more. I'm not finished working them all.

So, you're saying it would be a WEAK "thus saith the Lord" statement? I'd go first with the literal grammar, unless the context suggested an Ohioism type of idiom like you suggest. The context doesn't do this, so I prefer the strong statement literal. I do agree to an element of uncertainty, but only to WHICH writings are God-breathed and which are not. That is not specified. That specification comes in other passages; not this one. The key word "necessarily" sets his writings in contrast with all the other writers in that section. Paraphrasing the passage: """Man’s writings are not trustworthy like God-breathed writings are. Not this great writer’s, not that great writer’s. Even some of MY own writings are in that untrustworthy category, and I was given the job of putting together the GENUINE God-breathed writings.""" He's saying the untrustworthiness of man's man's writings is extreme. It's so extreme it even infects his own writings (some). You'd think he'd be immune to that, since he had the job of putting together PFAL. But no. This untrustworthiness infects EVEN his writings.

Rocky, You’re the closest, but you still missed one important point. As you point out correctly, “Not all that Wierwille writes…” is equivalent to “Some of what Wierwille writes…” The point you omitted revolves around the word “necessarily.” BTW, this passage on p.83 of PFAL was debated hotly and endlessly 10 years ago. Most GS posters back then chose the side opposite of yours, Rocky. And no one ever saw “necessarily.” I ran this passage past two of VPW’s major editors. One was one an editor that worked with VPW on the PFAL book, one for the Way Mag for 10 years . They both agreed that p. 83 is a very strong “thus saith the Lord” statement by VPW, and they both saw that the word “necessarily” is crucial.

Either way it's a triviality and has nothing to do with my message. And I'm not that familiar with the lyrics to know what you mean.

But isn't it the READERS of the whole About the Way FORUM that considerations should be made for?

Raf, Ten years ago it was my impression that moving things to Doctrinal was largely motivated by the desire to protect recent refugees from TWI from confusion as they flock to the About the Way forum. This is the same reason (I think) why I have attempted to, and some posters have preferred that, I stay on one thread. I have a large amount of sympathy for this board’s mission to help TWI people that are attempting to totally break away, so I try to cooperate. I’ve been self examining my slightly hidden reasons for recently coming back here, but FOR SURE none of them include trying to make trouble. I would be totally happy confining myself in Doctrinal if that’s what the majority would prefer.

Thanks, Twinky. That was helpful. Probably no one registered it, but I started this subtopic by saying I wasn’t sure, and that I was still working on this. From your response here, it looks like you DID get it. You got what I was trying to communicate. The idea of the location of the “fruits to be examined” was being missed, over and over. Rocky got it too. Rocky refuted me on common sense. You refuted me with scripture. I actually heard both of you and respect what you contributed. I’m not settled totally, though. For the children, their lives are much more transparent to adults. The inability to see within someone else’s life that I brought up in my analysis does not show up as well for children. I’ve even heard that to know some of the secrets of the parents’ hearts, we look at the children’s behaviors. I imagine there are plenty of exceptions to that, though.