Anyone lucky and unscathed? Croyants francais?

[mdsnpp]

I guess I was darn lucky, because I would never have accepted Christ in another format or a traditional church setting. I enjoyed my involvement 1978-1982 and was in France part of that time. I somehow knew to get out on time. I don't regret what I learned and think that TWI was a positive experience for me, but I could see things were starting to get weird. Part of the reason I left was the "name -it -claim- it -prosperity-no trials" gospel that was preached with rarely a mention of sin. It was an unbalanced message that did not prepare me to live in this world. We all smoked and drank in my circle and most of us were sexually active outside of marriage. We were not taught otherwise. Still I am so grateful for the introduction to His precious Word, which to this day I stand on as the rock solid foundation of my life. I remember an advance in Switzerland in the spring of 1981 at a chalet. We had beleivers from at least 4 countries, the main language being French. I will never forget that weekend and wish the saints from Rye NY as well as France the very best.

[Belle]

Welcome, md!

May I offer you some danish and coffee?

Sounds like you had a wonderful experience and got just what you needed. :) I'm glad. Yes, there are quite a few folks with the same kind of wonderful experiences and answers. I also think that being so far from New Knoxville prevented a lot of people from being exposed to the ugliness in TWI.

I love hearing about all the groovy Christians, listening to their beautiful music and when they reminisce about the wonderful, fun and also crazy things they did "back in the day". I look forward to hearing about more of yours.

I didn't get involved till the early 90's and most all of my experiences are not so nice. I was raised in a typical Southern Baptist Church and, as far as the core beliefs, TWI didn't teach me anything new. The "new" stuff they DID teach me, I have since determined to be extremely inaccurate.

Edited January 31, 2007 by Belle

[mdsnpp]

Welcome, md!

May I offer you some danish and coffee?

Sounds like you had a wonderful experience and got just what you needed. :) I'm glad. Yes, there are quite a few folks with the same kind of wonderful experiences and answers. I also think that being so far from New Knoxville prevented a lot of people from being exposed to the ugliness in TWI.

I love hearing about all the groovy Christians, listening to their beautiful music and when they reminisce about the wonderful, fun and also crazy things they did "back in the day". I look forward to hearing about more of yours.

I didn't get involved till the early 90's and most all of my experiences are not so nice. I was raised in a typical Southern Baptist Church and, as far as the core beliefs, TWI didn't teach me anything new. The "new" stuff they DID teach me, I have since determined to be extremely inaccurate.

[mdsnpp]

I could see that alot of the beleiving- folks were the walking wounded, victim-prone and that some of the leaders were not sincere. That was evident. So i never made too much of the organization itself and just concentrated on the Word. Never was tempted to do the WOW thing, what a disaster that can turn out to be. Never thought the writings of vpw were holy writ, just tried to benefit from what i heard and threw out that nutty stuff. i remember there was a girl in our twig that was a little overweight, i remember the you-would-recognize-the-name leader talking to her about it. i just thought that was out of line, period. "they went to meddlin'" and apparently it got worse. sorry to hear about it.

[coolchef]

for these people to delve into ones private life uninvited was the bottom of the barrel

they were and are snakes

i got away ok