The Way was clearly and evilly devised organization. No matter what VPW's intent was establishing a secular ministry was NOT Gods will. So if it was not God's will then the EVIL one himself devised it and VPW was an unwitting pawn. Just like he tried to make of you.
Unless like I said you believe VPW's claim that God told him to do it. Of course VPW told me that God said He ( God ) would teach him ( VPW ) His ( God's ) word like it hadn't been know since the first century if he ( VPW ) would teach His ( God's ) people. There is no request made by God to establish a secular ministry in what VPW claimed God told him.
Really either God wanted a Way ministry or He didn't. If the Way did anything it was get in the way of God answering your prayers not help. Who knows maybe your prayers would have been answered sooner if the person God was working in to go tell you hadn't wasted all that time in Ohio at the rock paying homage to the great one.
If you think my attitude towards religion or the nature of man is hostile you need to rethink that. Do you presume man is capable of doing good own his own? Not that it matters if you do. 5000 years of recorded history speaks for itself.
?I know it?s of God, because I was desperate, prayed, and [fill in the blank]? tales are common to all sorts of religions and religious groups. Plenty of ?Moonies? are convinced that the Unification Church is of God because of events similar to Johnny?s story. Heck, there were probably members of Jim Jones? group who prayed to God for help just before meeting one of Jones? followers. Maybe that kool-aid was God?s way of rescuing them from the desperation in their lives?
Many people reach a point of desperation and cry out to God, or others, for help. Some get real help, but plenty of them get taken in, by religious groups, swindlers, abusers, and even murderers. Desperate, hungry people are the most likely to be attracted to any food offered, the least likely to see a hook in it, if one is present, and seemingly among the most likely to swear that any bait they went after was really good food, benevolently offered.
I don?t know what Wierwille?s original intent was, but if fraud is evil, then The Way was evilly devised. It was founded on fraud, and set up without any of the checks and balances that humans have learned to incorporate into their institutions. I suspect that Wierwille intentionally set it up without them because he perceived such things as ruling him with a heavy hand. He defied normal morality, including that of the Bible, from at least the time he incorporated TWI in 1955. Both he and his organization seem to have gotten worse over time, but he founded TWI on corruption, and it bore fruit accordingly.
Your arrogance astounds me. And evidently, you know way more about me than I do, so who am I to continue this discussion?
And this is why it is never worth posting any positive experiences about The Way.
If a person comes here and does not toe the "party line" of total negativity, then that one person is branded as a mindless automaton who only worshipped Wierwille, and as a person whose opinion is worthless. I think that this is getting back to the original intent of this thread.
So like I said, I guess my opinion here is worthless...
Nice thread Linda Z, I think I like you, and could have a nice converstation with you
You know people are scared to admit their nature. It is difficult to say you are worthless. But that is what we all are in the flesh unworthy of even our own life let-alone the lives of others. This is why we all die because death is what we have all earned. It does no good to argue about it.
Every government we form whether secular or religious is just a cheap nock off. An attempt to do what only God can do. This is why they are all evil because they are the inventions of man and man is an evil creature by nature. Goodness and virtue are not born in man but in God for man to adopt.
And the title to this thread is what???? Oh yeah why some people don?t get it!
Which I would like to add to LindZ?s list knowing a person on security that often had to drag young females away from the Wierwille home during the ROA and other big events.
Why? Simple they were going to get them some VP in the middle of the night by going through the bedroom window!
But more than that, Yes Jonny; it is improper to have any decent and good thoughts conveyed concerning TWI! But this is why many won?t get it and never will get the abuse stories straight. They are driven off before they can come around. I was just to damn stubborn to let them chase me off. I know what I saw, I know what I lived and I know what I believe. When that is attacked by total strangers, their credibility goes to hell in a hand basket. Their accounts then become questionable when I compare my whats whens and wheres and whoms.........
I don?t know if it was started for evil and nobody does! That will be shown when we all stand before the judgement seat of Christ. But what I do know is that there were many, many good upstanding spiritual people that helped me and I hope I was able to help some others.
Aw, geeze, Johnny Lingo. I don't remember you as a person who was easliy offended. Please don't tell me you would be threatened by someone who disagrees with you? People have alot of varying experiences and opinions here. Conflict and disagreement are inevitable, but that's part of what makes this place so wonderful. I mean, heck, we were never allowed to say what we REALLY thought while in TWI, without being reprimanded and/or blackballed. With the freedom to speak, comes some messiness and unpleasantness, but don't you think it's worth it?
Maybe I have the advantage here, because I know you to be one of the good guys, who would never do anything willingly to hurt anyone else. You always called it as you saw it. So keep on doing it. If someone disagrees, so what? At least that's my philosophy.
johnny --early2it has a history of somewhat trollish behavior and he loves the sound of his own voice a tad too much. But ex10's point is well taken---who gives a rat's rear end what he thinks or what I think, for that matter...you sort it out the best you know how, hang on to the knowledge of JC the Lord and be open and flexible to learn on all the rest...I have changed my opinion on ole vic and twi radically in the past 5-6 years, and yes, I went through the process most did 86-89 and thought cg's poop paper said it all--for a while. Now I know what it did NOT say and I know that God gets the credit for the good but God wasn't scopin babes and scoopin cash, as fer as I know....YMMV
I figure it has had to do with some subjectivism and a tendency to manufacture doubts about that which is upsetting to a somewhat rosy opinion about Wierwille than it has had to do with skepticism provoked by deficiencies of Wierwille's accusers and critics.
Okay, I speak for myself as well, but taking PFAL was the greatest thing for me at that time in my life. And to me the ministry was sweet and wonderful. We have all met someone who just got born-again; all they see are great things. Everything is exciting.
Heck, they had a joke in a movie once to show what a bad plane ride the character had by saying, ?and I got to sit next to someone who just got born-again.? The entire world is wonderful and you kind of want to tell everyone.
I LOVED PFAL. I loved twig and the people in twig. I loved them. So, from 1972 to about 1977 I had some of the best, most simple, lovely times with God, I ever had. But because I was enjoying my new birth in Christ does that mean the ministry itself was ?good? at that time?
In other words, because I was having GOOD times with God does it mean the ministry of TWI was good?
Well, let me see and my years may be off a bit but you will get the idea?
While I was praising God and seeing the Lord help teens exit from a drug culture, as I was singing sweetly out of the blue book, and lining up to be ministered to, while I was seeing God, and getting answers to prayer, my view of the TWI was nothing but GREAT!
The reality was Hqs. around circa 72-76, without hunting for ?the way living in Love? I will try to do my best. VPW had already gone out to see Jim Doop and find out about the ?free sex? he had in his ministry so VPW to validate his lifestyle, VPW had already had an affair and left the church, VPW took Leonard?s class and reworked it a little and was selling it as his own work. He was sleeping with the teens and young girls in the 3rd and 4th corps.
So, while I was having the greatest time finding the Lord does NOT mean the ministry was innocent and good. It means, like any new person to the greatness of finding Jesus, I was enamored with seeing God!
Somehow, in the middle of all of this God still worked. God still loved us. God still answered prayer.
Funny cause when I saw the dark side of TWI it was around 1981. So, my concept of the ?good old days? are before that date. Yet folks that saw the evil around 1990 refer to the time before 1990 as the ?good old days?. Someone once posted about their good old days right up until the evil started in 1987.
I think the ?good old days? maybe the days when we held onto to being born-again, we saw love in our fellowships and the beginning of the bad is when we found out what was going on. I wonder if Peter J Wade would refer to the days prior to 1972 as the ?good old days?
The point is maybe our good old days were because we were enjoying God for the first times in our lives and it had very little to do with the state of HQS.
Johnny Lingo BTW, I believe that little girl was sent to you by God. Johnny, that little gal God brought in your life was a true lover of God and excited about him! She brought the genuine enthusiasm of the Lord. Despite the darkness that was brewing at HQS. I think God brought her into your life.
I do not know how to reconcile everything else except by your own example. To my understanding of your post this is what it speaks to me... You SAW bad stuff in the TWI in Alaska. (paraphrased) You say the conspiracy of silence enable a perpetrator to hurt kids. Yet, somehow you were a good and decent lover of God who still tried to do the right thing and stop the bad stuff.
That little gal that witnessed to you was a gift from God as you were to those people in Alaska. She was the real deal as were you. The stuff around you was not healthy or anything God would endorse. God would not want woman abused in TWI or people to be conned out of money or any of it. God surely was not behind kids being hurt in Alaska even though you were the real deal.
Do you think those kids needed that Children?s Fellowship to learn about Jesus or do you think God could have reached them another way, even though you were the real deal? Did that guy want to teach children to abuse them or lead them to God? And when those kids grow and they try to sort it all out, they may remember a great guy they heard about who tried to stop it ? Johnny Lingo. But will they think despite the molestation, I am so thankful I heard of the Lord? Or geez, why didn?t people listen to Johnny? We could have heard of Jesus down the street and not have been molested.
It is all very convoluted. Praise God for your good times. Did I see God while in TWI ? yes I did. But did I see TWI as a God based organization once I could LOOK at it ? No.
Johnny L., I sure do value your opinion, as I do everyone else's on this thread.
Alfakat is exactly right. I'm not so sure early2it expresses his/her opinions. It seems more to me like he's always preaching at everyone and contending that his way is the only way. I generally do my best to ignore people who behave in that way.
I didn't start this thread for anyone to use as a platform to show how spiritually superior he thinks he is or to denigrate others' opinions and thoughts. I started it in hopes it would be a way for those of us who wanted to participate in it to gain a better understanding of each other's experiences and what's brought us to the point where we are now. There have been some real gems here, and I thank everyone for contributing them!!
Sometimes when new people come the GSCAFE and still have the mindset of VPW was the MOG, I wish there was a milder way to share with them some of the horrible acts commited in TWI and the erronious doctrines we were taught without upseting them to the point of no return.
But I also feel that people should hear the truth. Because if they were like I used to be, which was idolizing VPW as the MOG etc. it may help them get out from that sin.
Linda Z wrote;
"Nothing against Billy Graham, but he never reached me, and I had watched him preach on TV and had gone to one of his large meetings. None of the other ministers I'd grown up around or looked to for a clue about God had reached me. VPW did."
I hear ya Linda, I believe that many of us were reached by some of the teachings of VPW.
I believe it may have been because some of us were of that rebelious anti establishment era and established religious figures were a turnoff.
But TWI with all it's young, cool people was an attraction for some of us, and God was able to work in reaching some of us with some truth of His word.
Johnny Lingo, I believe your story about God sending someone. I've heard other people tell similar stories & I don't doubt theirs either.
Even though I now believe VPW conned and hurt people, and I believe he taught some erroneous doctrines, he also taught some truth, and people got saved.
Oh, and Dot, your posts are amazing. Keep up the good work!
[This message was edited by Outin88! on January 04, 2004 at 23:43.]
quote:Do you think those kids needed that Children?s Fellowship to learn about Jesus or do you think God could have reached them another way...
I have often thought along those lines concerning my own Christian experience. Would I have been "called" by another group? church?
When I got witnessed to in High School - I immediately witnessed to all my friends. One of them, Janet, was Jewish, as most of my home town was and still is. She was very angry at me for defecting from my religion. She was older than I was, graduated, and went away to college and was gone by the time I went in the Corps.
Last year, I received a classmates email from Janet after having not heard from her in over 30 years. She was all filled with "praise God's" and "hallelujahs!" She told me she was born-again 15 years ago and she was so sorry she didn't listen to me when we were in High School. She is very involved with her church and is a very enthusiastic Christian.
I'm very, very glad she didn't listen to me 30 years ago.
Anyway - I think if being a Christian is a matter of predestination, then yes, somewhere, somehow, God would have made sure we heard the call - with or without TWI, PFAL or VPW!
Hope R. color>size>face>
What a long, strange trip it's been!size>face>color>
Aww geez guys, I'm kinda heartbroken right now. OU (university of Oklahoma) just lost to LSU in the Sugar Bowl, and I don't have the heart to get back into this right now. But Ex 10, thank you fthank you for your kind words, and you too Linda Z, Alfakat and Dot. i had a few beers tonight as the Sooners lost this years Championship, so it would be hard to get back into this.
But Dot, I will come back and tell you how I was seduced by a TWI clergy woman. I mean she didn't quite get all that she wanted, but it really was salacious as hell!
Early2it ~ you are entitled to your opinions, although I find them gritty and depressing (at times, just like some religions)...but with everything else I've listened to/from everyone else on this board, in some fashion, there might be a grain of truth in your thoughts, as well...I'll keep listening and see if something doesn't spark some formadable thought. Not saying you haven't in the past, they just get lost in the doom and gloom, but that's alright, look at some religion, you know?
You have nothing to be ashamed/afraid of anyway...spiritually...no one has all the answers so it's like a catwalk.
(where are they really going?)
Depends on if your view of the human race is negative or positive, or somewhere in-between. I think.
Spiritually, you'll build on that or look into what needs better imput, on your own, or with ones you trust, or not...it's your own right, no one can tell you what to believe.
The main thing is, on an ex-cult site, no one has to agree...even if it's your intention deliberately to be controversial.
You have had some good points here and there and I detect a sense of humor ~
outin88, when i initially posted something negative about wierwille at the start of waydale, i got blasted to smitherines. and when i talked about sexual abuse....ohmygod. some people said very cruel things, i shut my computer off for almost a year.
please anyone don't get me wrong when i say this -- because i DEFINITELY believe in putting yourself in another person's shoes and treating them as you would like to be treated --
but i do not feel obligated to witness or undershepherd here at greasespot
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early2it
The Way was clearly and evilly devised organization. No matter what VPW's intent was establishing a secular ministry was NOT Gods will. So if it was not God's will then the EVIL one himself devised it and VPW was an unwitting pawn. Just like he tried to make of you.
Unless like I said you believe VPW's claim that God told him to do it. Of course VPW told me that God said He ( God ) would teach him ( VPW ) His ( God's ) word like it hadn't been know since the first century if he ( VPW ) would teach His ( God's ) people. There is no request made by God to establish a secular ministry in what VPW claimed God told him.
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J0nny Ling0
Wow Early2it. Your virulence derails your opinion as far as I am concerned...
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wyteduv58
I knew I shoulda stayed in the Lutheran Church.
Now I'm paying dearly for it.
Dovey....proud owner of two low riders...Dovey's Doxies...... Dovey
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early2it
Johnny,
My words are liberating yours are the poisonous one's. Why not just answer the question?
Do you believe the Way Ministry was established because God wanted it or do you believe VPW acted in his own interest?
Continued on next post.....
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early2it
Really either God wanted a Way ministry or He didn't. If the Way did anything it was get in the way of God answering your prayers not help. Who knows maybe your prayers would have been answered sooner if the person God was working in to go tell you hadn't wasted all that time in Ohio at the rock paying homage to the great one.
If you think my attitude towards religion or the nature of man is hostile you need to rethink that. Do you presume man is capable of doing good own his own? Not that it matters if you do. 5000 years of recorded history speaks for itself.
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LG
?I know it?s of God, because I was desperate, prayed, and [fill in the blank]? tales are common to all sorts of religions and religious groups. Plenty of ?Moonies? are convinced that the Unification Church is of God because of events similar to Johnny?s story. Heck, there were probably members of Jim Jones? group who prayed to God for help just before meeting one of Jones? followers. Maybe that kool-aid was God?s way of rescuing them from the desperation in their lives?
Many people reach a point of desperation and cry out to God, or others, for help. Some get real help, but plenty of them get taken in, by religious groups, swindlers, abusers, and even murderers. Desperate, hungry people are the most likely to be attracted to any food offered, the least likely to see a hook in it, if one is present, and seemingly among the most likely to swear that any bait they went after was really good food, benevolently offered.
I don?t know what Wierwille?s original intent was, but if fraud is evil, then The Way was evilly devised. It was founded on fraud, and set up without any of the checks and balances that humans have learned to incorporate into their institutions. I suspect that Wierwille intentionally set it up without them because he perceived such things as ruling him with a heavy hand. He defied normal morality, including that of the Bible, from at least the time he incorporated TWI in 1955. Both he and his organization seem to have gotten worse over time, but he founded TWI on corruption, and it bore fruit accordingly.
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J0nny Ling0
Your arrogance astounds me. And evidently, you know way more about me than I do, so who am I to continue this discussion?
And this is why it is never worth posting any positive experiences about The Way.
If a person comes here and does not toe the "party line" of total negativity, then that one person is branded as a mindless automaton who only worshipped Wierwille, and as a person whose opinion is worthless. I think that this is getting back to the original intent of this thread.
So like I said, I guess my opinion here is worthless...
Nice thread Linda Z, I think I like you, and could have a nice converstation with you
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early2it
Long Gone
Amen brother.
You know people are scared to admit their nature. It is difficult to say you are worthless. But that is what we all are in the flesh unworthy of even our own life let-alone the lives of others. This is why we all die because death is what we have all earned. It does no good to argue about it.
Every government we form whether secular or religious is just a cheap nock off. An attempt to do what only God can do. This is why they are all evil because they are the inventions of man and man is an evil creature by nature. Goodness and virtue are not born in man but in God for man to adopt.
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Grizzy
And the title to this thread is what???? Oh yeah why some people don?t get it!
Which I would like to add to LindZ?s list knowing a person on security that often had to drag young females away from the Wierwille home during the ROA and other big events.
Why? Simple they were going to get them some VP in the middle of the night by going through the bedroom window!
But more than that, Yes Jonny; it is improper to have any decent and good thoughts conveyed concerning TWI! But this is why many won?t get it and never will get the abuse stories straight. They are driven off before they can come around. I was just to damn stubborn to let them chase me off. I know what I saw, I know what I lived and I know what I believe. When that is attacked by total strangers, their credibility goes to hell in a hand basket. Their accounts then become questionable when I compare my whats whens and wheres and whoms.........
I don?t know if it was started for evil and nobody does! That will be shown when we all stand before the judgement seat of Christ. But what I do know is that there were many, many good upstanding spiritual people that helped me and I hope I was able to help some others.
God Bless America; SIZE>
Grizz SIZE>
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LG
early2it,
I don't agree with your assessment of religion, your beliefs about God, or your opinions of humanity and human institutions.
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ex10
Aw, geeze, Johnny Lingo. I don't remember you as a person who was easliy offended. Please don't tell me you would be threatened by someone who disagrees with you? People have alot of varying experiences and opinions here. Conflict and disagreement are inevitable, but that's part of what makes this place so wonderful. I mean, heck, we were never allowed to say what we REALLY thought while in TWI, without being reprimanded and/or blackballed. With the freedom to speak, comes some messiness and unpleasantness, but don't you think it's worth it?
Maybe I have the advantage here, because I know you to be one of the good guys, who would never do anything willingly to hurt anyone else. You always called it as you saw it. So keep on doing it. If someone disagrees, so what? At least that's my philosophy.
Love to you and yours, and happy new year back!
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alfakat
johnny --early2it has a history of somewhat trollish behavior and he loves the sound of his own voice a tad too much. But ex10's point is well taken---who gives a rat's rear end what he thinks or what I think, for that matter...you sort it out the best you know how, hang on to the knowledge of JC the Lord and be open and flexible to learn on all the rest...I have changed my opinion on ole vic and twi radically in the past 5-6 years, and yes, I went through the process most did 86-89 and thought cg's poop paper said it all--for a while. Now I know what it did NOT say and I know that God gets the credit for the good but God wasn't scopin babes and scoopin cash, as fer as I know....YMMV
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Oakspear
Opinions that you are entitled to (not a complete list
:D-->)
- The opinion that The Way was (or even still is) a godly organization
- The opinion that Wierwille was a good man who made some mistakes, but still taught us "The Word"
- The opinion that what you experienced in TWI was good, great, godly or "neat"
- The opinion that someone else's memories of the "good ol' days" is a delusion
- The opinion that someone else's opinion about the worth of Wierwille, PFAL, or TWI in general is WRONG
remember, it's not a complete listIn theory, there is no difference between theory and practice...but in practice there is
Oakspear
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Cynic
I figure it has had to do with some subjectivism and a tendency to manufacture doubts about that which is upsetting to a somewhat rosy opinion about Wierwille than it has had to do with skepticism provoked by deficiencies of Wierwille's accusers and critics.
But, of course, I'm an a$$hole.
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excathedra
oh i like a$$holes
?
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Dot Matrix
IMHO
Okay, I speak for myself as well, but taking PFAL was the greatest thing for me at that time in my life. And to me the ministry was sweet and wonderful. We have all met someone who just got born-again; all they see are great things. Everything is exciting.
Heck, they had a joke in a movie once to show what a bad plane ride the character had by saying, ?and I got to sit next to someone who just got born-again.? The entire world is wonderful and you kind of want to tell everyone.
I LOVED PFAL. I loved twig and the people in twig. I loved them. So, from 1972 to about 1977 I had some of the best, most simple, lovely times with God, I ever had. But because I was enjoying my new birth in Christ does that mean the ministry itself was ?good? at that time?
In other words, because I was having GOOD times with God does it mean the ministry of TWI was good?
Well, let me see and my years may be off a bit but you will get the idea?
While I was praising God and seeing the Lord help teens exit from a drug culture, as I was singing sweetly out of the blue book, and lining up to be ministered to, while I was seeing God, and getting answers to prayer, my view of the TWI was nothing but GREAT!
The reality was Hqs. around circa 72-76, without hunting for ?the way living in Love? I will try to do my best. VPW had already gone out to see Jim Doop and find out about the ?free sex? he had in his ministry so VPW to validate his lifestyle, VPW had already had an affair and left the church, VPW took Leonard?s class and reworked it a little and was selling it as his own work. He was sleeping with the teens and young girls in the 3rd and 4th corps.
So, while I was having the greatest time finding the Lord does NOT mean the ministry was innocent and good. It means, like any new person to the greatness of finding Jesus, I was enamored with seeing God!
Somehow, in the middle of all of this God still worked. God still loved us. God still answered prayer.
Funny cause when I saw the dark side of TWI it was around 1981. So, my concept of the ?good old days? are before that date. Yet folks that saw the evil around 1990 refer to the time before 1990 as the ?good old days?. Someone once posted about their good old days right up until the evil started in 1987.
I think the ?good old days? maybe the days when we held onto to being born-again, we saw love in our fellowships and the beginning of the bad is when we found out what was going on. I wonder if Peter J Wade would refer to the days prior to 1972 as the ?good old days?
The point is maybe our good old days were because we were enjoying God for the first times in our lives and it had very little to do with the state of HQS.
Johnny Lingo BTW, I believe that little girl was sent to you by God. Johnny, that little gal God brought in your life was a true lover of God and excited about him! She brought the genuine enthusiasm of the Lord. Despite the darkness that was brewing at HQS. I think God brought her into your life.
I do not know how to reconcile everything else except by your own example. To my understanding of your post this is what it speaks to me... You SAW bad stuff in the TWI in Alaska. (paraphrased) You say the conspiracy of silence enable a perpetrator to hurt kids. Yet, somehow you were a good and decent lover of God who still tried to do the right thing and stop the bad stuff.
That little gal that witnessed to you was a gift from God as you were to those people in Alaska. She was the real deal as were you. The stuff around you was not healthy or anything God would endorse. God would not want woman abused in TWI or people to be conned out of money or any of it. God surely was not behind kids being hurt in Alaska even though you were the real deal.
Do you think those kids needed that Children?s Fellowship to learn about Jesus or do you think God could have reached them another way, even though you were the real deal? Did that guy want to teach children to abuse them or lead them to God? And when those kids grow and they try to sort it all out, they may remember a great guy they heard about who tried to stop it ? Johnny Lingo. But will they think despite the molestation, I am so thankful I heard of the Lord? Or geez, why didn?t people listen to Johnny? We could have heard of Jesus down the street and not have been molested.
It is all very convoluted. Praise God for your good times. Did I see God while in TWI ? yes I did. But did I see TWI as a God based organization once I could LOOK at it ? No.
(((everyone))))
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Dot Matrix
Yes, johnny tell your story...
I am sure it is a good one!
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Linda Z
Johnny L., I sure do value your opinion, as I do everyone else's on this thread.
Alfakat is exactly right. I'm not so sure early2it expresses his/her opinions. It seems more to me like he's always preaching at everyone and contending that his way is the only way. I generally do my best to ignore people who behave in that way.
I didn't start this thread for anyone to use as a platform to show how spiritually superior he thinks he is or to denigrate others' opinions and thoughts. I started it in hopes it would be a way for those of us who wanted to participate in it to gain a better understanding of each other's experiences and what's brought us to the point where we are now. There have been some real gems here, and I thank everyone for contributing them!!
Linda Z
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WordWolf
I recommend everyone turn the computer off for 30 minutes and take a brisk
walk around the block.
That's just a suggestion, though. Feel free to ignore it.
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Outin88!
Excellent Thread Linda, you speak with wisdom.
Sometimes when new people come the GSCAFE and still have the mindset of VPW was the MOG, I wish there was a milder way to share with them some of the horrible acts commited in TWI and the erronious doctrines we were taught without upseting them to the point of no return.
But I also feel that people should hear the truth. Because if they were like I used to be, which was idolizing VPW as the MOG etc. it may help them get out from that sin.
Linda Z wrote;
"Nothing against Billy Graham, but he never reached me, and I had watched him preach on TV and had gone to one of his large meetings. None of the other ministers I'd grown up around or looked to for a clue about God had reached me. VPW did."
I hear ya Linda, I believe that many of us were reached by some of the teachings of VPW.
I believe it may have been because some of us were of that rebelious anti establishment era and established religious figures were a turnoff.
But TWI with all it's young, cool people was an attraction for some of us, and God was able to work in reaching some of us with some truth of His word.
Johnny Lingo, I believe your story about God sending someone. I've heard other people tell similar stories & I don't doubt theirs either.
Even though I now believe VPW conned and hurt people, and I believe he taught some erroneous doctrines, he also taught some truth, and people got saved.
Oh, and Dot, your posts are amazing. Keep up the good work!
[This message was edited by Outin88! on January 04, 2004 at 23:43.]
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Hope R.
Dot wrote:
I have often thought along those lines concerning my own Christian experience. Would I have been "called" by another group? church?
When I got witnessed to in High School - I immediately witnessed to all my friends. One of them, Janet, was Jewish, as most of my home town was and still is. She was very angry at me for defecting from my religion. She was older than I was, graduated, and went away to college and was gone by the time I went in the Corps.
Last year, I received a classmates email from Janet after having not heard from her in over 30 years. She was all filled with "praise God's" and "hallelujahs!" She told me she was born-again 15 years ago and she was so sorry she didn't listen to me when we were in High School. She is very involved with her church and is a very enthusiastic Christian.
I'm very, very glad she didn't listen to me 30 years ago.
Anyway - I think if being a Christian is a matter of predestination, then yes, somewhere, somehow, God would have made sure we heard the call - with or without TWI, PFAL or VPW!
Hope R. color>size>face>
What a long, strange trip it's been!size>face>color>
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J0nny Ling0
Aww geez guys, I'm kinda heartbroken right now. OU (university of Oklahoma) just lost to LSU in the Sugar Bowl, and I don't have the heart to get back into this right now. But Ex 10, thank you fthank you for your kind words, and you too Linda Z, Alfakat and Dot. i had a few beers tonight as the Sooners lost this years Championship, so it would be hard to get back into this.
But Dot, I will come back and tell you how I was seduced by a TWI clergy woman. I mean she didn't quite get all that she wanted, but it really was salacious as hell!
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Ginger Tea
Early2it ~ you are entitled to your opinions, although I find them gritty and depressing (at times, just like some religions)...but with everything else I've listened to/from everyone else on this board, in some fashion, there might be a grain of truth in your thoughts, as well...I'll keep listening and see if something doesn't spark some formadable thought. Not saying you haven't in the past, they just get lost in the doom and gloom, but that's alright, look at some religion, you know?
You have nothing to be ashamed/afraid of anyway...spiritually...no one has all the answers so it's like a catwalk.
(where are they really going?)
Depends on if your view of the human race is negative or positive, or somewhere in-between. I think.
Spiritually, you'll build on that or look into what needs better imput, on your own, or with ones you trust, or not...it's your own right, no one can tell you what to believe.
The main thing is, on an ex-cult site, no one has to agree...even if it's your intention deliberately to be controversial.
You have had some good points here and there and I detect a sense of humor ~
Ginger Tea
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excathedra
outin88, when i initially posted something negative about wierwille at the start of waydale, i got blasted to smitherines. and when i talked about sexual abuse....ohmygod. some people said very cruel things, i shut my computer off for almost a year.
please anyone don't get me wrong when i say this -- because i DEFINITELY believe in putting yourself in another person's shoes and treating them as you would like to be treated --
but i do not feel obligated to witness or undershepherd here at greasespot
i hope that makes sense
?
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