But then, I left in '89, maybe a bit before they really got heavy with all the dire consequences that would befall anyone who dared use their brain.
I had plenty of other stuff to occupy my mind though. Like, what would I do for work? (I left a staff position) What would I do for "twig" now? (yeah, I really wondered about that!), and where are we going to live? (we made an abortive move to Kalispell and were greeted with all the warmth of a case of the clap by the Wayfers that were there) and various and sundry other everyday crap.
But, here it is almost 20 years later and looky how swell things worked out!
If we believe and confess the positive, what we believe and confess will surely come to pass. Likewise on the negative side. If we fear and confess the negative, what we fear and confess will surely come to pass. It's a law, and it works every time, for saint and sinner alike.
How I would respond to this now is, "BULL SH#T!!!"
But while in TWI, I accepted this teaching as truth just like everything else VPW said. And of course after hearing that what I fear will be brought to pass in my life, I became terribly afraid.
I can remember fighting a particular category of sin in my life that I knew I was weak in and found myself falling into all the time, I would be terrified that something bad was going to happen to me, that I didn't have God's protection and that I would be afflicted by the adversary in some way whether it be a disease, financial disaster, car accident, etc. This was all due to the Grease Spot teaching: Don't leave the Way or else you won't have God's protection. If you have sin in your life, the Adversary's gonna get you.
Then because I was afraid of these things, believing that what I fear will come to pass, I found myself even more afraid. And it wasn't a fear that made my hands shake or anything, it was just a quiet terror on the inside. A quiet thought in the back of my head always there with that fear, knowing "I wasn't where I should be spiritually and somehow I would pay for it". After all, the Adversary always takes his pound of flesh, right?
I spent so much time worrying about how disaster would befall me because of my weaknesses and fears, I didn't have any real time for a peaceful relationship with God. The thief was stealing that from me because of my fears via false doctrine.
I feel almost embarrassed and foolish about it looking back. You'd think after years and years of a fear that never materializes would make you wake up. Yet you trust in and believe the teachings of your MOG even though reality around you is saying otherwise. Don't tell me people's words aren't powerful and that brainwashing isn't a reality.
I don't leave TWI with many scars, but the teaching that what you fear will come upon you scared me to death. I'm recovering now, but still struggle with it at times.
Did anyone else struggle with fear issues or am I just the Lone Loser?
Lone Wolf McQuade
I did believe in all that crap while still in and still taking all their ....s and mind games until I had enough when they started to give me a lot of grief, like their BS confrontation crap, which is nothing more than psychological, spiritual abuse. To me, that was enough, I do not need that ..... So, I plotted my own escape without them knowing. I left on my own accord and not giving them the satisfaction to apply their BS on me. Even with the belief of becoming a Greasespot, I didn't give a flying F**K: I'd rather be a greasespot and live free rather than live under their law.
Well, yes, sometimes I struggled with the question 'Am I believing in this situation or do I have fear?' In those situations I tried to draw close to God and His love for me (perfect love casts out fear), and sometimes in my prayers I would use the cry of the man with the possessed son (Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief!). I still sometimes use that prayer today because I continue to believe that 'believing equals receiving'.
For a long time when things would go wrong as they do, I would think "Ok is this punishment for something I did or thought?" It took years to bring that thought under control. I don't know why it bugged me for so long. Every once in a while even today I will catch myself having that stray thought "What did I do..."
Don't feel alone Lone McQuade; I experienced that stuff too. I remember going out to my car one day to find a boot on my wheel. I had just left twi the month before and had thoughts of punishment for leaving God's household filling my mind, and it was DRIVING ME CRAZY! It didn't take long to get over it because I knew I rationalized in my mind that it was BS. My mind does occasionally go there when I am being judgmental of others. I'm still working on that one. It seems to be a hard one to shake. But I am much more liberal in my thoughts than I was before. I really try not to be so black and white.
I think that was one of the most devilishly ingrained beliefs TWI shoved down our throats. It was as foundational a TWI doctrine as one could find.
TWI turned our expectations away from God, and focused them on men and our own works. I had to DO something to GET something. God wasn't going to give me crap unless I performed the rituals in the correct manner!! And if I didn't get what I decided I needed, it was my own fault...I did something wrong...I didn't believe enough...and the leadership, of course, were quick to point that out to me!!
How many times did God offer me what I needed, and I blew it off as a wrong result because I wasn't "believing" for THAT!! Talk about frustrating the grace of God!!!
Well, my bible says he will supply ALL my needs according to His riches in glory. If that's true, I don't need to DO anything to recieve anything...except have faith that HE will provide for me no matter what situation I'm in, and LOOK for the solution He provides....which may not be what I want or expect, but will be what I need.
Now, that makes for some exciting living! At least, I think so.
Oh that was awfull...the waiting for the other shoe to drop. I thought the kids would die....I waited for my spouse to die...When he quit tithing I hated him for not protecting our family...
When my horse and foal died in a horrible way.....for though I attended fellowship faithfully.....I blamed husband for not writing the loyalty oath so that we could remain in good standing with twi/God.
It took years and much time at greasespot to start understanding the falicy of these doctrines.
I still think believing equals receiving, but whatever the situation there's a point at which you've done your best thought and action and no sense worrying about it. Whatever happens happens. Believing what God says equals receiving, but believing something my stupid mind came up with might just fail.
The closest I came to fearing that bad things might happen to me was when we left TWI. We were forced out and treated with shame. To give an idea of the atmosphere of the last twig we attended, the leader said that not absing was like holding up a sign to the adversary that said "HIT ME!". But we didn't stop praying and God came through for us and still does.
The thing that gets to me is...who is the idiot who came up with this religious standard that says that if you don't believe God 100% perfect you are a bad believer? I don't think it was VP. I remember as far back as 1980 Vince F was teaching a SNS tape and he was saddened that people were being treated like some kind of criminal if they skipped twig for 2 weeks or something harmless like that. Back then it was a few people who did this. By 1994 when we left it was everybody...or else!
Somehow I must have just blocked that statement from entering my brain, cause I honestly don't ever recall that statement being made in a "serious" way.. Hmm, Maybe that was it, I always took their threats as jokes! lol...
Well, I'm from the olden days of TWI so the "grease spot analogy" was not used at that time.
We were told, though, that once you knew "The Truth", you could never go back to what your life was before TWI.
To do so was to venture outside the fortress walls of God's protection. Once outside, the Devil would be waiting for you to keep you from telling anyone else about "The Truth". He would stop at nothing to keep you silent. I guess it was kind of like having your "spiritual cherry" broken. Forgive me if that sounds crude but that kind of illustrates it for me. It reminds me a little of that old Janis Ian song where she sings" You can never go home anymore".
Tithing was the big thing for me. We were conditioned to believe that tithing was a life- line to God's protection.
Without it we were wide open to "attack".
After I stopped going to twig, it really took some mental adjustment on my part to understand God was not going to sell me down the river because I no longer had a place to send my ABS(Abundant Sharing).
So, the terminology changed over time, but the basic concept that was taught was virtually the same.
We have always continued to tithe, but over the years since we left TWI, we were forced to be pretty creative with it. Some-times we gave it to a church; sometimes we just set it aside and gave it to people in need; sometimes we gave it in other ways. I'm not so sure that God cares WHERE you give as much as He cares THAT you give.
I think that was one of the most devilishly ingrained beliefs TWI shoved down our throats. It was as foundational a TWI doctrine as one could find.
TWI turned our expectations away from God, and focused them on men and our own works. I had to DO something to GET something. God wasn't going to give me crap unless I performed the rituals in the correct manner!! And if I didn't get what I decided I needed, it was my own fault...I did something wrong...I didn't believe enough...and the leadership, of course, were quick to point that out to me!!
How many times did God offer me what I needed, and I blew it off as a wrong result because I wasn't "believing" for THAT!! Talk about frustrating the grace of God!!!
Well, my bible says he will supply ALL my needs according to His riches in glory. If that's true, I don't need to DO anything to recieve anything...except have faith that HE will provide for me no matter what situation I'm in, and LOOK for the solution He provides....which may not be what I want or expect, but will be what I need.
Now, that makes for some exciting living! At least, I think so.
Good post. Many times God is more than willing to meet the REAL need but we are the ones to frustrate Him because we weren't 'believing' for what God was sending us. I remember once that I needed a pair of winter boots and I thought that I needed to 'believe' for the money to buy them, but God had a complete stranger walk up to me on the street and give me a brand new pair. Also, it sometimes seems to me that we are limiting God by restricting Him to financial prosperity. I once had a situation in which I gave a believer a picking of beans out of my garden, which resulted in my not having enough for my family for the winter. I left the plants in the ground and waited, and in about two weeks the plants began to produce again, and the second bearing was not only enough for my needs; I gave them away to my mother, my sister, some of my aunts, and ended up putting them out by the street in bushel baskets with a sign saying 'free beans'. Talk about a literal fulfillment of the promise in Malachi. Yes, very exciting living!
If we believe and confess the positive, what we believe and confess will surely come to pass. Likewise on the negative side. If we fear and confess the negative, what we fear and confess will surely come to pass. It's a law, and it works every time, for saint and sinner alike.
How I would respond to this now is, "BULL SH#T!!!"
But while in TWI, I accepted this teaching as truth just like everything else VPW said. And of course after hearing that what I fear will be brought to pass in my life, I became terribly afraid.
I can remember fighting a particular category of sin in my life that I knew I was weak in and found myself falling into all the time, I would be terrified that something bad was going to happen to me, that I didn't have God's protection and that I would be afflicted by the adversary in some way whether it be a disease, financial disaster, car accident, etc. This was all due to the Grease Spot teaching: Don't leave the Way or else you won't have God's protection. If you have sin in your life, the Adversary's gonna get you.
Then because I was afraid of these things, believing that what I fear will come to pass, I found myself even more afraid. And it wasn't a fear that made my hands shake or anything, it was just a quiet terror on the inside. A quiet thought in the back of my head always there with that fear, knowing "I wasn't where I should be spiritually and somehow I would pay for it". After all, the Adversary always takes his pound of flesh, right?
I spent so much time worrying about how disaster would befall me because of my weaknesses and fears, I didn't have any real time for a peaceful relationship with God. The thief was stealing that from me because of my fears via false doctrine.
I feel almost embarrassed and foolish about it looking back. You'd think after years and years of a fear that never materializes would make you wake up. Yet you trust in and believe the teachings of your MOG even though reality around you is saying otherwise. Don't tell me people's words aren't powerful and that brainwashing isn't a reality.
I don't leave TWI with many scars, but the teaching that what you fear will come upon you scared me to death. I'm recovering now, but still struggle with it at times.
Did anyone else struggle with fear issues or am I just the Lone Loser?
Lone Wolf McQuade
Lone Wolf-You're not the only one, I also struggled with this false doctrine teaching as well. I found out that these teachings were meant as scare tactics to try keep us brainwashed and in the so called "household". I also got very scared as well, and also found out that I had a hard time finding a peaceful relationship as well.
I invented a saying though that has really helped me recover from this false doctrine teaching:
"Greater is he(Jesus Christ) that is in me, than the Way ministry which is in this world"
I think believing is just trusting in God to be a faithful God Who keeps His promises. I think the "All Believing Equals Receiving" law is just another "name-it claim-it" falsity. Kinda like that Janis Joplin song about "Oh Lord won't you buy me a Mercedes-Benz".
That's what I think now. At the time we left TWI, in an "I quit you're fired" situation, I told my son "Now I'm going to die and it's all your fault" because he had been one of the major problems with TWI. We refused to "get rid of him" and that was disobedience to leadership and that was that.
I had been taught that my diagnosis with insulin dependent diabetes was a result of some sin I had committed, some negative in my life, i.e. I didn't believe that LCM was The Man Of God For This Day And Time And Hour Unto The Entire World, or something like that.
I was fearful and depressed for years, and still get that way sometimes (it's been over 10 years). The big problem for me was that I had let TWI doctrine replace the truth of the Scriptures in my mind. Craig said it, that settles it, I believe it. That's basic idolatry in my book. Just read the Psalms. Read the Gospels. Do something radical - pray to Jesus! Don't be afraid you will reap the results of negative believing or get possessed if you don't follow TWI-think to the letter.
Which brings up a sudden thought. The fear of believing negatively and bringing negative resulst on my head kept me for a long time from actually thinking about what was happening in TWI at the time (early to mid-1990s), and kept us around a lot longer than would have been necessary. Maybe that's a reason we were so diligently warned to not think negative thoughts (like "LCM's a real jerk", for example, or "I don't see that in the Bible at all" for a better example.)
When the first lawsuit hit, and I went online and found WayDale for the first time, my hands were shaking so bad I could hardly click the mouse. I was terrified of getting caught. Terrified of what I would find. Terrified I wasn't in my own right mind for believing what I was reading. Terrified that I was on the verge of walking away from twi, my marriage, and maybe even God.
But as I read more and more, and the realization hit me that I had been doing and saying things that I really didn't believe in or want to be a part of for YEARS simply for the sake of trying to keep it all together... because that's what wives were supposed to do... the less I believed that I would be a greasespot by midnight.
No, let me restate that: I actually got the point where I just didn't care... I was so miserable in my current circumstances that I figured if God abandoned me, I would take those consequences. If He couldn't understand what was terribly wrong with twi and with my marriage, and would hold my leaving all that against me, then he was not a god I could worship anyway.
And, interestingly, once I made my decision to leave and started taking action on it, I got all kinds of confirmations and reassurances that I was doing exactly the right thing. I saw leadership and my ex do and say things that were absolutely appalling, and clearly not godly just to try to talk me out of it. And the people around my son and I were commenting that he and I seemed so much more light-hearted and fun-loving recently... so much less stressed and negative. Hmmm....
I actually got the point where I just didn't care... I was so miserable in my current circumstances that I figured if God abandoned me, I would take those consequences. If He couldn't understand what was terribly wrong with twi and with my marriage, and would hold my leaving all that against me, then he was not a god I could worship anyway.
I think that's what some of us call "being sick and tired of being sick and tired."
And, interestingly, once I made my decision to leave and started taking action on it, I got all kinds of confirmations and reassurances that I was doing exactly the right thing. I saw leadership and my ex do and say things that were absolutely appalling, and clearly not godly just to try to talk me out of it. And the people around my son and I were commenting that he and I seemed so much more light-hearted and fun-loving recently... so much less stressed and negative. Hmmm....
"Confirmations and reassurances".
And some people still don't have any idea why twi always said never to rely on
experience, and to dismiss your own feelings if they contradict "the Word" (twi's word, anyway.)
Oh, and I meant they said not to rely on YOUR experience-
it was perfectly fine to rely on vpw's experience or lcm's experience on something.
twi's never had a problem keeping double-standards their Standard Operating Procedure.
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George Aar
Nah, that stuff never bothered me.
But then, I left in '89, maybe a bit before they really got heavy with all the dire consequences that would befall anyone who dared use their brain.
I had plenty of other stuff to occupy my mind though. Like, what would I do for work? (I left a staff position) What would I do for "twig" now? (yeah, I really wondered about that!), and where are we going to live? (we made an abortive move to Kalispell and were greeted with all the warmth of a case of the clap by the Wayfers that were there) and various and sundry other everyday crap.
But, here it is almost 20 years later and looky how swell things worked out!
Just another day in paradise!
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TheInvisibleDan
If the fear didn't kill me, the boredom would've.
It was time for something different.
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dmiller
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FreeFromCults
I did believe in all that crap while still in and still taking all their ....s and mind games until I had enough when they started to give me a lot of grief, like their BS confrontation crap, which is nothing more than psychological, spiritual abuse. To me, that was enough, I do not need that ..... So, I plotted my own escape without them knowing. I left on my own accord and not giving them the satisfaction to apply their BS on me. Even with the belief of becoming a Greasespot, I didn't give a flying F**K: I'd rather be a greasespot and live free rather than live under their law.
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Lone Wolf McQuade
I feel like quite an idiot. Maybe it had the impact it did on me because I was in the Way so young (teens).
Lone Wolf
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Jeaniam
Well, yes, sometimes I struggled with the question 'Am I believing in this situation or do I have fear?' In those situations I tried to draw close to God and His love for me (perfect love casts out fear), and sometimes in my prayers I would use the cry of the man with the possessed son (Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief!). I still sometimes use that prayer today because I continue to believe that 'believing equals receiving'.
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Ham
I dunno. I think it was a real fear for a while, but with my last meeting with mr. bread and vegetables, all of a sudden, I realized I was really had.
He sat there asking me basically what debil spurt I was supposed to be possessed, or influenced by..
I think at that point I saw how powerless and immature they had become.
When I left, I didn't have even a thought that I'd get worked over on the devil's highway on account of these half baked "ministers".
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Eyesopen
For a long time when things would go wrong as they do, I would think "Ok is this punishment for something I did or thought?" It took years to bring that thought under control. I don't know why it bugged me for so long. Every once in a while even today I will catch myself having that stray thought "What did I do..."
It just makes me so friggin' sick.
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Nottawayfer
Don't feel alone Lone McQuade; I experienced that stuff too. I remember going out to my car one day to find a boot on my wheel. I had just left twi the month before and had thoughts of punishment for leaving God's household filling my mind, and it was DRIVING ME CRAZY! It didn't take long to get over it because I knew I rationalized in my mind that it was BS. My mind does occasionally go there when I am being judgmental of others. I'm still working on that one. It seems to be a hard one to shake. But I am much more liberal in my thoughts than I was before. I really try not to be so black and white.
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Listener
I think that was one of the most devilishly ingrained beliefs TWI shoved down our throats. It was as foundational a TWI doctrine as one could find.
TWI turned our expectations away from God, and focused them on men and our own works. I had to DO something to GET something. God wasn't going to give me crap unless I performed the rituals in the correct manner!! And if I didn't get what I decided I needed, it was my own fault...I did something wrong...I didn't believe enough...and the leadership, of course, were quick to point that out to me!!
How many times did God offer me what I needed, and I blew it off as a wrong result because I wasn't "believing" for THAT!! Talk about frustrating the grace of God!!!
Well, my bible says he will supply ALL my needs according to His riches in glory. If that's true, I don't need to DO anything to recieve anything...except have faith that HE will provide for me no matter what situation I'm in, and LOOK for the solution He provides....which may not be what I want or expect, but will be what I need.
Now, that makes for some exciting living! At least, I think so.
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rascal
Oh that was awfull...the waiting for the other shoe to drop. I thought the kids would die....I waited for my spouse to die...When he quit tithing I hated him for not protecting our family...
When my horse and foal died in a horrible way.....for though I attended fellowship faithfully.....I blamed husband for not writing the loyalty oath so that we could remain in good standing with twi/God.
It took years and much time at greasespot to start understanding the falicy of these doctrines.
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johniam
I still think believing equals receiving, but whatever the situation there's a point at which you've done your best thought and action and no sense worrying about it. Whatever happens happens. Believing what God says equals receiving, but believing something my stupid mind came up with might just fail.
The closest I came to fearing that bad things might happen to me was when we left TWI. We were forced out and treated with shame. To give an idea of the atmosphere of the last twig we attended, the leader said that not absing was like holding up a sign to the adversary that said "HIT ME!". But we didn't stop praying and God came through for us and still does.
The thing that gets to me is...who is the idiot who came up with this religious standard that says that if you don't believe God 100% perfect you are a bad believer? I don't think it was VP. I remember as far back as 1980 Vince F was teaching a SNS tape and he was saddened that people were being treated like some kind of criminal if they skipped twig for 2 weeks or something harmless like that. Back then it was a few people who did this. By 1994 when we left it was everybody...or else!
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outandabout
As far as fear of becoming a grease spot goes-
I recall driving to an Ex-Wayfer fellowship while still in TWI but on the way out.
I was afraid I would get into an accident on the way there because I was leaving the walls of protection of TWI.
I guess I wasn't totally afraid though, because I did drive to the meeting.
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TrustAndObey
Somehow I must have just blocked that statement from entering my brain, cause I honestly don't ever recall that statement being made in a "serious" way.. Hmm, Maybe that was it, I always took their threats as jokes! lol...
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Lone Wolf McQuade
Thank you all for your posts. I thought I was the only one for a minute there. I am very glad to be out of TWI.
I think for the first time I see the benefit of this forum in helping people to deal with the repercussions of being in a cult.
I used to think people were here only to bitch about their problems. I was mistaken.
Lone Wolf
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Listener
That's very cool, Lone Wolf. It's great to hear about the GS community helping people.
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waysider
Well, I'm from the olden days of TWI so the "grease spot analogy" was not used at that time.
We were told, though, that once you knew "The Truth", you could never go back to what your life was before TWI.
To do so was to venture outside the fortress walls of God's protection. Once outside, the Devil would be waiting for you to keep you from telling anyone else about "The Truth". He would stop at nothing to keep you silent. I guess it was kind of like having your "spiritual cherry" broken. Forgive me if that sounds crude but that kind of illustrates it for me. It reminds me a little of that old Janis Ian song where she sings" You can never go home anymore".
Tithing was the big thing for me. We were conditioned to believe that tithing was a life- line to God's protection.
Without it we were wide open to "attack".
After I stopped going to twig, it really took some mental adjustment on my part to understand God was not going to sell me down the river because I no longer had a place to send my ABS(Abundant Sharing).
So, the terminology changed over time, but the basic concept that was taught was virtually the same.
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Jeaniam
We have always continued to tithe, but over the years since we left TWI, we were forced to be pretty creative with it. Some-times we gave it to a church; sometimes we just set it aside and gave it to people in need; sometimes we gave it in other ways. I'm not so sure that God cares WHERE you give as much as He cares THAT you give.
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WordWolf
We are a versatile community!
We can accomplish BOTH, and more besides!
For example, some of us are also playing games,
and we have a lot of information compiled as well...
:)
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Jeaniam
Good post. Many times God is more than willing to meet the REAL need but we are the ones to frustrate Him because we weren't 'believing' for what God was sending us. I remember once that I needed a pair of winter boots and I thought that I needed to 'believe' for the money to buy them, but God had a complete stranger walk up to me on the street and give me a brand new pair. Also, it sometimes seems to me that we are limiting God by restricting Him to financial prosperity. I once had a situation in which I gave a believer a picking of beans out of my garden, which resulted in my not having enough for my family for the winter. I left the plants in the ground and waited, and in about two weeks the plants began to produce again, and the second bearing was not only enough for my needs; I gave them away to my mother, my sister, some of my aunts, and ended up putting them out by the street in bushel baskets with a sign saying 'free beans'. Talk about a literal fulfillment of the promise in Malachi. Yes, very exciting living!
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cdonkers
Lone Wolf-You're not the only one, I also struggled with this false doctrine teaching as well. I found out that these teachings were meant as scare tactics to try keep us brainwashed and in the so called "household". I also got very scared as well, and also found out that I had a hard time finding a peaceful relationship as well.
I invented a saying though that has really helped me recover from this false doctrine teaching:
"Greater is he(Jesus Christ) that is in me, than the Way ministry which is in this world"
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Watered Garden
I think believing is just trusting in God to be a faithful God Who keeps His promises. I think the "All Believing Equals Receiving" law is just another "name-it claim-it" falsity. Kinda like that Janis Joplin song about "Oh Lord won't you buy me a Mercedes-Benz".
That's what I think now. At the time we left TWI, in an "I quit you're fired" situation, I told my son "Now I'm going to die and it's all your fault" because he had been one of the major problems with TWI. We refused to "get rid of him" and that was disobedience to leadership and that was that.
I had been taught that my diagnosis with insulin dependent diabetes was a result of some sin I had committed, some negative in my life, i.e. I didn't believe that LCM was The Man Of God For This Day And Time And Hour Unto The Entire World, or something like that.
I was fearful and depressed for years, and still get that way sometimes (it's been over 10 years). The big problem for me was that I had let TWI doctrine replace the truth of the Scriptures in my mind. Craig said it, that settles it, I believe it. That's basic idolatry in my book. Just read the Psalms. Read the Gospels. Do something radical - pray to Jesus! Don't be afraid you will reap the results of negative believing or get possessed if you don't follow TWI-think to the letter.
Which brings up a sudden thought. The fear of believing negatively and bringing negative resulst on my head kept me for a long time from actually thinking about what was happening in TWI at the time (early to mid-1990s), and kept us around a lot longer than would have been necessary. Maybe that's a reason we were so diligently warned to not think negative thoughts (like "LCM's a real jerk", for example, or "I don't see that in the Bible at all" for a better example.)
WG
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TheHighWay
When the first lawsuit hit, and I went online and found WayDale for the first time, my hands were shaking so bad I could hardly click the mouse. I was terrified of getting caught. Terrified of what I would find. Terrified I wasn't in my own right mind for believing what I was reading. Terrified that I was on the verge of walking away from twi, my marriage, and maybe even God.
But as I read more and more, and the realization hit me that I had been doing and saying things that I really didn't believe in or want to be a part of for YEARS simply for the sake of trying to keep it all together... because that's what wives were supposed to do... the less I believed that I would be a greasespot by midnight.
No, let me restate that: I actually got the point where I just didn't care... I was so miserable in my current circumstances that I figured if God abandoned me, I would take those consequences. If He couldn't understand what was terribly wrong with twi and with my marriage, and would hold my leaving all that against me, then he was not a god I could worship anyway.
And, interestingly, once I made my decision to leave and started taking action on it, I got all kinds of confirmations and reassurances that I was doing exactly the right thing. I saw leadership and my ex do and say things that were absolutely appalling, and clearly not godly just to try to talk me out of it. And the people around my son and I were commenting that he and I seemed so much more light-hearted and fun-loving recently... so much less stressed and negative. Hmmm....
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WordWolf
I think that's what some of us call "being sick and tired of being sick and tired."
"Confirmations and reassurances".
And some people still don't have any idea why twi always said never to rely on
experience, and to dismiss your own feelings if they contradict "the Word" (twi's word, anyway.)
Oh, and I meant they said not to rely on YOUR experience-
it was perfectly fine to rely on vpw's experience or lcm's experience on something.
twi's never had a problem keeping double-standards their Standard Operating Procedure.
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