Mike

def59, You wrote: "Oh I agree that God's does the judging, but we can learn from "dr's" mistakes, can we not?" We can not. Dr's mistakes are poorly known, and therefore require most of us to place great trust in those who claim first hand experience. No one on this board, nor in any of the splinter groups have earned MY trust anywhere near like Dr did in his class, tapes, and writings. Dr gave me GREAT benefits, so he did earn my trust. Dr's mistakes, even those reported here, are common among human beings, and I see no learning in them at all, even if all the GSC reports are true and accurate, which I'm willing to bet my life they are not. I'm much more interested in learning from Dr's successes, which occured in the team effort the produced the writings. That area is still rich in learning potential because we all drifted from the written portion of his ministry, or never really got any significant exposure to them to begin with.

Mark will be sorely missed. He was a Groovy Rye Christian when I met him in 1971 and had the opportunity to work with him at times in setting up Pressed Down concerts. He was a strict taskmaster and a perfectionist, just like VPW, so I learned much from him. He told me recently that he copied Dr's life as best he could. He loved Dr and was a total servant for him and us. He taught me much by his example and heart. I also had the opportunity to work with him at HQ doing audio, and with Barbara in the Boookstore. They were a perfect couple in the way they balanced their personalities. We've kept in touch over the years and missing him greatly I do look forward to seeing him again soon.

Hay, That's cool, but you might want to check out what alfakat and I are discussing right now on the Masters thread in the Docrinal Forum. Discussing something with an individual in private certainly shouod be guided as you post, but in public, there are others listening. Jesus did have one recorded discours with the Pharasees, but it was more for his diciples benefit. Jesus once prayed out loud (John 11) so that the listeners could hear him talk to his Father and benefit. The whole world is watching.

So you paste and I record?! :D-->

igotout, It's nice to see that you made it through the hurricanes. You wrote: "There is no question that this concept that we called "believeing" indeed was used as an open door for abuse, condemnation and control in TWI." Maybe the concept YOU call believing was used that way, but the concept Dr called believing (in the sum total PFAL series of BOOKS [not film]) was not used for any abuse at all. It wasn't used for anything at all, and sits in print waiting for us to read it aqain after years of neglect, master it and apply it properly. I agree that the abuses were terrible, especially after Dr left. *** You wrote: "To quote VPW: 'You are where you are because of your believing.' Tell that to the widows and children of these two fine young men and to the dad and mom of the daughter." If they have a full and complete knowledge of the written PFAL exposition of the law of believing, those widows and kids will know that's there's no shame in Peter's, Paul's, Abraham's, and all our Bible heros' believing finally running out. We don't look at their lives as shameful failures. If I were one of them I'd find more comfort in knowing that it wasn't God's capricious or mysterious will that did them in. If I were one of them kids I'd be proud I had a dad who DID believe, and the termination of that believing happens to everyone, so why feel shame or hurt? It was the way these things were presented, with no love, that was the hurtful factor.

oenophile, Has anyone ever told you that you look a lot like Research Geek? ;)--> So you say I'm making it too simple, and shaz thinks I make it too complex! --> Have you two thought of duking it tou together? :D--> If you want to think that life is a hodge-podge of complexities go ahead. You won't, though, find any agreement from the world of science, one of the most successful enterprises 5-senses man has acomplished. Scientists see a complex situation and look for simple laws. In many cases they have found that great complity arises from just a small number of simple laws interacting together in many, many different permutations. My guess is that you are an arts and humanities type person who has avoided the simplicity of science all your life, and enjoy the complexities in the world in an artistic way. That's fine. I like to do that too at times. But be aware that behind many complex situiations there have already been found an astoundingly small number of simple laws interacting. "Nature keeps her books on a thumbnail" is the way scientists put it. Besides, Neither Dr nor I have ever claimed that all of reality is reduced to what we learned in the class. We were told in Session 1 that we would be getting the BASIC keys, so that we could live an abundant life. You may have thought I was saying that all of reality was going to be explained away by us getting ALL the keys in PFAL. I don't say that. PFAL doesn't give us all the keys for understanding all reality. PFAL doesn't give us even enough keys to understand our own lives. PFAL most certainly DOES give us enough keys to LIVE our lives much better, and even understand a few things too. *** If you REALLY thought it through about the letter killing, why do you type letters and words here? Do you think just MAYBE you took that verse out of context here? If not aren't you killig GSC readers with your words? :D--> *** You wrote: "Far too many people who struggled 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." Amen! I agree. This is a valid complaint. Those who are responsible for this were poor students of PFAL, failing to obey Dr's frequent urging to master the books. Instead they winged it (like most posters are doing here) and drifted into horrible abuses. *** You wrote: "...the summation of Jesus' message love, mercy, justice and hope which are concepts that don't lend themselves easily to trite slogans, maxims and formulas." I agree again. Slogans, or simple abreviations like "believing = receiving" are only good for quickly stimulating memories of previous book study where the necessary details are to be found. Without those details it all falls apart. Maybe it's these details that I just mentioned that are what you protest are missing in my posting and in PFAL. If that's the case I'd agree with you even more. The law of believing in it's full form is fairly simple to state and understand, and even more simple to apply, even though finding all the details of the simple law may not be so simple, and retaining them in the face of pressures and pleasures that distract may be a challenge, and rooting out all doubt may be even harder and more complex. But, again I agree, slogans like "believing = receiving" or "Where's your believing?", withoiut the supporting details PFAL masters can find, are WAY to simple to get us into anything but trouble.

Oakspear, Thanks for the passing grade in English. You wrote: "Apparently the only way to really know if you are believing is if you are receiving, because if you're not receiving, your not really believing." I disagree. A person can be NOT believing and receive anyway, by God's grace or by the devil's seduction. Also, a person can be believing, and not IMMEDIATELY receive. One scenario to consider is this. A person has a need and believes God's proimise to cover it. __ God goes to work and sets various processes at work to meet that need. The processes take time, the believer hasn't received, but finally when everything is in place, the receiving finaly happens. There's a record, I think in Daniel, where he prays every day for an answer for something, but no answer. Finally an angel appears to him and explains that he had been trying to get through with the answer, but it took time. We tend to forget that we're in a huge battle zone where a powerful false god is hindering the True God. This won't last forever, but right now God must respect all the laws He has set up, including respecting what power Adam handed over to the adversary. Let's avoid the circularity you exposed and say that the only way we can believe is by taking in The Word, as Romans 10 explains, and the best way to do that is by mastering God's Word that He has given us in PFAL. As far as KNOWING that we are believing, I haven't seen much on that. We can KNOW that we KNOW Him, though

Bravo Tumbleweed Kid !!! You wrote: "I do understand believers believing for two different teams to win the super bowl, or two different players claiming to be believing God to score touchdowns, hit home runs, etc. not making sense, but we do have to know what's available, right? __ Sorry, but there's so much other content to consider, I don't see this as a complete argument." TK, you hit the nail right on the head on the lack of completeness here. Plus, I also appreciate your reminder that the list of available items (promises of God) is crucial in the law of believing. I've seen it often the case that non-mastering grads forget to include that it only works for what is available. And how many times does Dr say the word "available" the PFAL class? I just counted 47 times in the first segment of the class. That's SEGMENT 1, not Session 1. The segments were 28 minutes long. In Session 1 the count is 89 times. In the PFAL book it was 47 times. Yet people are so forgetful of this and prone to think that the law applies to any old thing we want to "believe for." Is there anyone here who thinks that this Zacharius analysis is complete and wise? Has anyone done any kind of deeper research other than a quick KJV reading? Has anyone even systematically looked for ALL of the KJV references to this exact topic or any related ones? Is it ever referred to again in a tucked away in a remotely located fragment of a verse that no one remembers? Can anyone here reasonably say that we can expect of God that He always puts into written form all the facts about this issue to illustrate the law of believing? Yeah sure! Who's going to tell me that every incident reported in the Bible has complete documentation included that reveals all the details of each participant's believing at each point in time in the sequencing of the story? What a bunch of baloney. Tumbleweed's nailed it.

Shaz, I'm convinced that NONE of us ever really believed, except in certain isolated areas of our lives where we had already (by accident) developed a true steady unshakable set of attitudes that simply needed some fine tuning from the Word. Most of what we thought was believing was mental assent. Believing is simple, but we get so easily talked out of it. There is a not so simple, and voluminous set of techniques the adversary has in place to cause us to stumble before our mental assent develops into real believing. Thinking that you believed for something is no proof that you really did believe. You may have done well with some of the details in learning, but the depth of your believing report is something that I would not take as anything but subjective testimony. If you were really believing, then the circumstances of it not coming to pass would not stall the process. Believing the promises of God means rejecting a belief in the 5-senses circumstances that say otherwise. When our body hurts, believing the Word more than our own body's reports is simple still, but still very difficult. Look how long it took Abraham to get his circumstances to change. He could have thrown in the towel if he had listened to you after several years of waiting for a kid. He nearly did do that with the incident involving Ishmael, but he hung in there. Believing is a battle at times because we have an adversary. Jesus said we needed to have NO DOUBT for it to work. That's no flinching at all. Dr taught that we cannon have ONE IOTA of doubt. Just a little bit can throw it off. The law is simple, applying it in a battle can be very challenging. That's why all believers (so far) have died. They pooped out on believing, every one. Every apostle, every prophet, even John the Baptist. Mary too. Joseph was in prison for two full more years, even though he had successfuly believed for the revelation interpretation of two inmates' dreams.

CKnapp3, I too liked what you wrote for the most part. If we busy ourselves with the negatives of Dr's life, we'll miss the positives God has for us. Let's let God do the judging.

My3Cents (and WordWolf), You wrote: "However obscure the "true" teachings of vpw are, he and the leadership who followed him did nothing to discourage people from accepting the idea that 'believing = receiving'..." NOT SO! I can agree that his top leadership did nothing, or next to nothing, in this category, but that may be because they too did not have the understanding to do it. Dr certainly understood it and he did do plenty to discourage oversimplistic embraces of the law. He didn't do this every time the topic came up, but he OFTEN did put in the record what we needed to do to prevent such ignorance in us. I have shown here in this thread (and others) what Dr did do to steer us to the proper understanding. I pointed out that he put in writing that we (especially top leadership) needed to master the PFAL writings. That includes p.29 of BTMS where we were warned that simple phrases are just that: simple, and should not be confused with the entire ballgame. Dr often pointed out (and in the class) that we cannot take one sentence in scripture and lean on it alone doctrinally, but that we must see what is said in it's entirety on any one topic, and that may mean searching and combing through a lot of material. This principle of getting the whole story and not a mere abbreviation holds for secular writing as well as God's Word, so there's no excuse, even for those who disbelieved Dr's authority. In the good old days, though, no one (openly) did that. Dr often urged his top leadership to master the writings, but in the long run, all disobeyed. After Dr stepped down in 1982, most top leadership got farther and farther from the wisdom needed to see that the simplistic slogans without comprehensive mastery was leading to distorted and bizarre doctrines. If we had done these things we were told, then we would have been much more comfortable with first operating the law, and understanding more of it to. *** You wrote: "The result of accepting this idea is that when things go well (according to your expectation) you feel like you caused it to happen. When they don't, you feel at fault. __ Since the "law" is never questioned, and the results are out there for all to see, the only variable must be YOU and YOUR believing. This leads to a very warped view of the world, and an easy way for leaders to control those who take comfort from this view." I can agree that this did happen. The idea of the ONLY variable being our believing, though, is NOT what he taught. In the AC we learned of community believing being another variable. I've posted before on other variables or causes. Here is what is on page 19 of GMWD (with my bold fonts) on these other causes: "Verse 3 of Psalms 103 very plainly says, “Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all [without exception] thy diseases.” Does God forgive your sins? Well then, does God heal you? He must or He is a liar; but God is no liar. People may then question, “Well, why doesn't God heal everybody?” Healing for all is God’s will. But when we fail to rise up to our rightful and legal privileges, due to a variety of causes—the greatest cause being a negative society where people talk about, expect, and cope with negative things—we fail to be healed. To claim and manifest God’s healing we must believe on the positives of His Word, not the negatives of the world. If we would become immersed in the Word and start living, we would find that God is still able to quiet down the nerves; God is still able to bring health and peace without antibiotics, sedatives, or alcohol."

What The Hay, You wrote: "I also touched on this subject on the Masters of the Word thread (I think it was that tread) but I quit discussing the subject with a number of individuals. I came to the conclusion I could not argue anyone into believing - "believing is a law" because the law of believing does not work outside the greater law, which is the law of love." Gosh, I hope I wasn't one of those individual you had to give up on. I kinda like what you said here. It fits right in with what I said above (and adds more) about NOT leaning on simple mnemonic sloganary abbreviations (believing=receiving) and seeking out the entire exposition of the law as laid out in PFAL. Your approach here is to add-in the idea of looking at love and the context the law of believing works in. Actually, adding a little refinement here, I'd say that when you believe in someone, when you adhere to, trust on, and rely on someone, that's the same as loving them. When you love them, you believe in them (respecting whatever limitations they have). When you believe in them (again respecting their limitations), then you love them. Since God has no limitations except those He imposes on Himself, we can love and believe Him to the max. *** You wrote: "Just about everybody I was discussing the subject with only wanted some "logical argument" to support it. There is no logical argument to support the law of believing anymore than there is a logical argument to support the law of love. Both laws, the law of believing and the law of love, there is only the command from God's Word; and that is - do." I agree; we can't derive any of this stuff, just see it in the written revelations God has given us and obey it. Some of the logic may come later, some may not. God promises to meet our need, not our greed to understand everything.

dmiller, Including Dr's demerits ?????????? YES!!! Including Dr's demerits.

First of all, as I have pointed out here a number of times but it has conveniently slipped from some minds already: "Believing Equals Receiving" is not, Not, NOT, N.O.T. what the law of believing is!!! Page 29 of the too-simple-to-bother-with Blue Book says that 'what we believe for or expect, we get" is the law SIMPLY STATED!!! If some simpleton latches on the simply stated version of the law and tries to get detailed precision predictions from it, he will stupidly proclaim that the law is wrong. We must go to the WHOLE law to get precision understanding of it. To do this, get to the whole law, we must master PFAL, not just a few sentences here and there. "Believing equals receiving" rhymes and is a convenient mnemonic for remembering the simply stated version of the law. Even in this simply stated version, it still works like a rule of thumb... approximately. Next, on that same ignored page 29 of BTMS we see that the law applies in "every realm: physical, mental, material, spiritual." To understand this in our enlightened quest (as opposed to the armchair stupidity I frequently see) we must know everything that this list of four entails. That would include mastering the natural/factual versus the spiritually/true dichotomy. I started two large threads on this whole natural/factual vs. the spiritually/true dichotomy that delve into many of these same aspects. The first is "The Ubiquitously Hidden Teaching of VPW" and can be found at http://gscafe.com/groupee/forums?q=Y&a=tpc...=3656073772&p=1 The second is "The Spiritually Divine over the Naturally Factual" and can be found at http://gscafe.com/groupee/forums?q=Y&a=tpc...=3216084083&p=1 I have posted these two links three times in the past day on three different threads. There are many, many more threads and erroneous notions that will be cleared up for those who obey God and master PFAL. These two links are a start. People can wallow in ignorance and complain till they die, but only by coming back to PFAL and mastering it as we all were instructed will we have any answers to life. Come back to God or die are the only two choices.

dmiller, You wrote: "So -- Mike. You lost me, bro. I guess it's my fault this thread got de-railed into where the righteous will live in the end, but I didn't understand what you just said, especially that thing about: 'The heavenly realm cannot be seen or even comprehended without spiritual eyes that are trained (mastering PFAL) to see it.'" heaven (literal-physical) = the sky, above the earth, the solar system, space, etc. heaven (figurative-spiritual) = where God lives, where Jesus Christ is seated, not a physical location in space, invisible to the 5-senses. I had heard the ministry's teaching that we would live in heaven and Israel on earth, but I don't believe that was to be taken in the literal sense. Those born again of God's spirit really live in the spiritual realm (the figurative heavenly) and minister to the earthly. *** You wrote: "Stephen certainly never took pfal, but as he was being stoned to death in Acts, I daresay he saw something you or I will never see, in our earthly days." Certainly? How do you know he didn't take PFAL? Oh sure, the orange book and the film class weren't back in his time. But had you ever heard how Dr stated that he could teach the class 17 different ways? Jesus taught his apostles and disciples (as is covered in the class) exactly how to manifest when Pentecost was to come not many days hence. He taught them the same principles, truths, and necessary facts for them to receive power from God. Why? ...for abundant living ...so that they could enjoy the abundance of the 9 manifestations in living. Jesus taught them PFAL in the form it existed them. Jesus learned what to teach them by revelation from the same God that taught Dr what to teach. When Dr taught the early classes in the 1950's there was no orange book or film class, yet he taught them PFAL none-the-less. The orange book and the film are part of the 5-senses aspect of the class you and I took, but that's just the factual side. The truths and principles we were taught in our form of the PFAL class are the exact same as the 1950's grads were taught, as the first century believers were taught. It's just some of those necessary facts that may have differed. We had anecdotes about bent handlebar bicycles, while the first century students might have had anecdotes about crooked horse saddles, or something like that. Jesus taught PFAL to his apostles, who taught it to Stephen, one of a small number of ace students who went all the way that was available to go with it at that time. I dare to TOTALLY disagree with your daresay that "he saw something you or I will never see..." We are supposed to see that and even greater, when we get our "spiritual eyes" functioning. *** I didn't complete your daresay quote, however in my above paragraph. If it is the case that by those closing words "...in our earthly days" you meant "in our senses-limited, natural/factual oriented earthly days" then I withdraw my total disagreement. In that case it's accurate what you said, and we WILL see what Stephen saw in our more enlightened days into PFAL mastery. But my guess is that your closing words meant "in the days we have before we die and are buried" then my total disagreement stands. It is available NOW to see what Stephen saw. However, it is also unfortunate fact that we failed to master PFAL, and our days now are limited to only seeing the earthly, the 5-senses. *** I started two large threads on this whole natural/factual vs. the spiritually/true dichotomy that delve into many of these same aspects. The first is "The Ubiquitously Hidden Teaching of VPW" and can be found at http://gscafe.com/groupee/forums?q=Y&a=tpc...=3656073772&p=1 The second is "The Spiritually Divine over the Naturally Factual" and can be found at http://gscafe.com/groupee/forums?q=Y&a=tpc...=3216084083&p=1

In the literal sense "heaven" is anything above the surface of the planet Earth, i.e. the sky. The literal is on the physical side of the Great Dichotomy: the natural/factual versus the spiritualy/true. The figurative use of a word brings in the spiritualy/true side of the Great Dichotomy. Figuratively (God's markings as to what is important), "heaven" represents the spiritual realm while "earth" is the natural realm. Many people confuse the literal "heaven" (or sky) with the heavenly realm. The sky (or the heavens) is physical and can be seen and measured with instruments. The heavenly realm cannot be seen or even comprehended without spiritual eyes that are trained (mastering PFAL) to see it.

And so do I offer condolences to you, Pawtucket. Being robbed of fellowship with a loved one is excruciating pain, no matter how peaceful the parting is. The great consolation is that it's only temporary. Someday all tears will be wiped away.

No hiss, no boo. Just understanding and patience.

Dear Research Geek, When I have more time I'm going to read every post here much more carefully. Until then I have just this one word to say to your originating post on this thread and to those who have harmonized with your heart....... BRAVO!!!

shaz, An addendum to the above list: the item that reads "WOW ambassador program begins; the PFAL book and Vols 1-3 are published" occured in 1971.

This is a premium subject! When my computer re-installation(s) are over there are many things I'd like to post here. Right now I'm hung up on asking Him for revelation(s) to help me get over the computer blues. It seems to be working. Here's a tid-bit to offer now: Does God have a budget?

Not only is the title of this this thread a deja vu on the title of the Way magazine article, it's deja vu all over again (thanks Yogi) with the criticisms leveled at Jeff. Where have I heard them before? -->

Jeff, Would I be a party pooper if I mentioned that the Sep/Oct 1978 issue of the Way Magazine had an article titled "What Is Jesus Christ Doing Up There?" by John Seiffer (5th Corps) in it? Would it be surprising if the contents of that article were rougly similar to the article you linked? Now what was I saying the other day about memory?

Hello GreaseSpotters, I'm still on a break; just taking a break from my break, so to speak. Since this thread is here the way it developed, I just thought I’d put something out there for discussion. The subject of sex is not the one I want to focus all my energies on, and it sure can be an energy waster. Because of that I sometimes feel a need to steer clear of too much discussion of it, especially when it’s being discussed in a heated fashion the way it usually is here. I’m not too keen of making too many comments on what I’m about to bring up, but I do have some thoughts I’d like to contribute after my break and after others have posted theirs. Here’s the sub-topic: WHY is extramarital sex bad? Put in another way, why did God forbid various forms of extramarital sex in the Old Testament Law? It’s very practical in life to obey God first and then ask any questions later, but I find most people never get around to asking “why?” to these kinds of questions. Thinking through why God finds murder wrong and forbids it is an excellent mental exercise. No one (hardly) will argue that murder is ok, but how many have thought through WHY it is wrong and WHY God forbids it? I’m not interested in the distraction of the difference between murder and killing, such as killing in a war or capital punishment, but plain old murder-murder: why is it wrong. Thinking this through (and, of course arriving at a conclusion that it IS wrong) is an excellent way to think about extramarital sex being wrong and why. While we’re at it, why are bestiality, pederasty, and homosexuality wrong? I am not advocating that anyone find these things ok, just that we think through the WHYs and the WHEREFOREs to what exactly makes them wrong. As to adultery, I think the John Scheonheit Paper’s appendixes hit on a few of the why’s without making a big deal out of them. Instead of filling ourselves with a lot of emotion and outrage over these issues, we who have been given so much of God’s Word ought to graduate to a higher level of understanding. God made known His acts and his written commandments to the 5-senses bound children of Israel, but His WAYs were made know to Moses who pretty much alone had the spirit. We ought to rise up with the Word we know to see the whys and wherefores of things like this if we are to be healed of some of the pains that bog us down and distract us from God’s light. So, have at it. Maybe someone would like to start a Doctrinal forum thread on this (not me), but I put it here because this topic came up a lot, and I thought Oakspear wouldn’t mind it if this thread popped back up higher on the charts.

Hey! Try verbalizing your trinity QUESTIONS in a triple-vision church and see how long you last!