The Nov/Dec Sower has an "enlightening" article on the royal priesthood and how "modern" Christianity produces "weak Christians" who "are rarely equipped to walk out on what the Bible says Christians are to do."
Where have I read that sort of thing before? Oh, perhaps every year in a TWI and then STF rag. Written by people who haven't stepped into a church in years, and couldn't plan and execute a large group get-together (church) on a weekly basis and do it well if their lives depended on it.
Large group (corporate) worship is not a bunch of people spectator-ing. It is people being led in worship by other people, preferably by people who do those things very well.
STF, IMO, does corporate worship poorly in pretty much every aspect, so it tells its followers that corporate worship is not needed for "true believers".
Suggestion: Find yourself a good church (they are out there) and participate in corporate worship. I think you will find out there is a place for it.
Yes the corporate church. The blind leading the blind into a ditch. One person standing up in front of 500, most without a bible shaking their heads in agreement to every thing the tradition taught teacher is teaching. Home style fellowships were what moved the word over asia minor. Well since you don't believe in home fellowships, you probably believe miracles prophecy and other manifestations of the spirit aren't real too. Just keep saying your hail marys and let the corporate elders pat you on head. Well done, now your approved by man.
Yes the corporate church. The blind leading the blind into a ditch. One person standing up in front of 500, most without a bible shaking their heads in agreement to every thing the tradition taught teacher is teaching. Home style fellowships were what moved the word over asia minor. Well since you don't believe in home fellowships, you probably believe miracles prophecy and other manifestations of the spirit aren't real too. Just keep saying your hail marys and let the corporate elders pat you on head. Well done, now your approved by man.
My, but your magnanimity overwhelms me.
Personally, I think you're maybe just a teensy bit too proud of a superstition (or your particular brand thereof) with so little to substantiate itself to begin with.
I'm terribly afraid of the monsters under my bed, but did you know there's people who think that if they step on a crack in the sidewalk they'll break their mother's back? Boy, are THEY stupid!
Yes the corporate church. The blind leading the blind into a ditch. One person standing up in front of 500, most without a bible shaking their heads in agreement to every thing the tradition taught teacher is teaching. Home style fellowships were what moved the word over asia minor. Well since you don't believe in home fellowships, you probably believe miracles prophecy and other manifestations of the spirit aren't real too. Just keep saying your hail marys and let the corporate elders pat you on head. Well done, now your approved by man.
So are you saying that the blind leading the few into a ditch is preferred? I guess from a numbers standpoint that it's true. Do you know what happens to a person who disagrees with someone at STF? Try it sometime.
Home fellowships may have moved the word over asia minor, but for whatever reason, it wasn't sustainable. I hate to confuse you with facts, but the entire area is about 99% Islamic. That tells me that home fellowships failed. Maybe the goal should be to understand why the concept failed, rather than try to recreate a moment.
The very nature of miracles is that they are not reproducible, so creating a causal link between miracles and how one fellowships is really not possible, regardless of what they insist is truth. Obviously you haven't heard the level of damage that prophecy (in the manner that it is practiced at STF) has done to people. It's appalling, and apparently it hasn't been renounced. But why would they? It's used to make decisions, justify decisions, and overall run roughshod over other people's lives - all in the name of God. Don't let them tell you that abuse was an isolated incident perpetrated by people who are no longer involved. Every last one of them who are left had a hand in the abuse. I say if you can't refrain from using prophecy as a control mechanism, that you should restrain yourself from using it.
Actually, there's nothing in the bible that says home fellowships are superior, but it is a belief that has been traditionally held and passed down to the current leadership of STF. Ironically, not a one of them has ever tested the validity of that belief. They simply accept it as being true and teach it as truth. Is there harm in that? Well only from the standpoint that it gets people believing that they are doing something extra-special when the reality is that home fellowships (or small groups) can create boundary issues in people who have problems in that area, either in respecting other's boundaries, or being able to set appropriate boundaries. The idea that small groups keeps people accountable is suspect. Invariably, someone gets the notion that accountability does not apply to them, and then the balance goes out of whack. I personally choose not to have to deal with it. Teaching people that home fellowshipping is best (in my mind) is the beginning of testing someone's boundaries. If they can get you to readily accept that on the basis of asia minor's home fellowship model, which I already pointed out was a failure, then getting you to accept other lines of BS is relatively simple.
My experience is that every religious organization has its problems and struggles. STF's struggles and problems are pretty significant for an organization of its size and age, and that forced me to take a long hard look at what they were doing, and if its mission fit with what I wanted to align myself. Ultimately, the answer was no. I think people should be free to worship with whomever and however they want, but I also think that it should be an informed decision.
Mrt - I don't want to further confuse you, but I can't help but point out that the current president of STF had to do research to determine that adultery and fornication is wrong in the eyes of God. Prior to his delving into the subject, apparently he didn't have any idea that either of those things were wrong - in this administration. I don't think that he was a practicing adulterer or fornicator, but that was probably more of a result of his lack of social skills and his idea of what an ideal woman looks like to him - than because he necessarily thought it was wrong. <== snarky personal observation. I was sitting in front of him at the Chicago conference back in '88 and had a conversation with him about it. How he managed to wrap his mind around what was going on all over TWI left me dumbfounded. To be able to do what he did comes from concentrating on the esoteric at the expense of the simple. Unfortunately, JWS has not outgrown that tendency.
Furthermore, if you remove him from the confines of the premises that are the basis of his arguments, he can't converse. I've tried.
Home fellowships - there's nothing magical about them. Reading from a bible - nothing inherently better, other than one has fewer opportunities to misquote. There is nothing that says reading from the bible makes a teaching any more coherent or godly. That's nothing more than a premise. It is not a fact.
I really liked the way that TWI drew from seeming parallels in the OT to support its theology, yet ignored any parallels that didn't. STF does the same thing. One only has to listen to DG's latest teaching on tattoos to see that. (I chuckled through the whole thing)
The point I'm trying to make is that STF is no less ala carte in picking and choosing what it wants to believe than any other organization. The only reason why it doesn't look like that is the ground rules of engagement are carefully laid out and all beliefs are checked against those ground rules. One of the main "ground rules" is the belief in dispensations. The other belief is in who Jesus is (or is not). Every belief is checked against at least one of the 2. The catch (and the thing that took me the longest to get) is that those ground rules aren't any more valid than anyone else's. Once I questioned the validity of those ground rules (i.e. how to study the bible, dispensations, and who Jesus is) then the whole thing fell apart as THE answer to gaining eternal life. It's just one of many ways of looking at it.
My job brings me to churches all over the country and I am amazed every trip at the things that 'normal people' in the church do. Many, many people flourish in a church setting.
Although I have to admit that Ive yet to hear anyone in the churches that I go to whine as loud or as long as John Lynn can and does,(thats gotta be a superspecial gift of whining to go on that long) or hear anyone talk or base many of
many churches you have seen flourish? In signs miracles and wonders? Who are you kidding? as far as john lynn goes, why all the religious persecution against him? are you getting comfortable in the world of benny hinn, jimmy swaggart? Where your treasure is there will your heart be also,consider this saying when you go to confession.
as far as john lynn goes, why all the religious persecution against him?
Persecution against John Lynn? ... based upon some negative posts about him on one out of about a million online message boards throughout the country?
((snort)) People like you wouldn't know what persecution was if it smacked you upside the head with a 2x4. ... Twice. <_<
many churches you have seen flourish? In signs miracles and wonders? Who are you kidding? as far as john lynn goes, why all the religious persecution against him? are you getting comfortable in the world of benny hinn, jimmy swaggart? Where your treasure is there will your heart be also,consider this saying when you go to confession.
Do tell. What are these signs, miracles and wonders you've been seeing?
Yes the corporate church. The blind leading the blind into a ditch. One person standing up in front of 500, most without a bible shaking their heads in agreement to every thing the tradition taught teacher is teaching. Home style fellowships were what moved the word over asia minor. Well since you don't believe in home fellowships, you probably believe miracles prophecy and other manifestations of the spirit aren't real too. Just keep saying your hail marys and let the corporate elders pat you on head. Well done, now your approved by man.
many churches you have seen flourish? In signs miracles and wonders? Who are you kidding? as far as john lynn goes, why all the religious persecution against him? are you getting comfortable in the world of benny hinn, jimmy swaggart? Where your treasure is there will your heart be also,consider this saying when you go to confession.
Hi Mrt,
I don't know anything about you, but that's ok. the anonymity available here at GSC serves many people well.
If you think some of us are persecuting John Lynn do you also think you are persecuting all the rest of Christendom too? Because from my perspective it is your vitriol that is lacking credibility.
If I were you I'd pay attention to who is it that has led you into your virtually blanket condemnation of Christianity and consider also how that this attitude effectively isolates you from almost everybody.
Is your theological isolation the product of being deliberately isolated by your teachers or is is that your brand of Christianity is soooo vastly superior to all others that you can afford to cop an attitude that even Jesus Christ himself didn't take part in? Or does He show grace and mercy only to your group?
Signs and miracles are nice, but for me they don't automatically bring credibility. But whether genuine or fake, I do dramatically increase the intensity with which I analyse any group.
The problem with mega-churches (one of which I attend occassionally) is that there are too many people involved. The problem with home fellowships (one of which I run occassionally) is that there are too many people involved. The problem ain't the number, the problem is THEY'RE PEOPLE!
One time, the seventh-graders were asking me why they had to read the Iliad. They had gotten to the point where they were beginning to suspect that it wasn't a story of good guys versus bad guys (there are no perfect heroes in the Iliad, and no perfect villians either) and that the story was not going to end "and they all lived happily ever after."
I pointed out to them that we learn how to deal with situations in life through the stories we hold in our minds. The Iliad is a whole bunch of stories about deeply flawed characters trying to do the best they knew how in very difficult circumstances that they couldn't control. Then I asked them, "Who are WE, if we aren't deeply flawed characters trying to do the best we know how in very difficult circumstances that we can't control?"
We were a Christian school, and we related the subject matter to the Bible as we taught, but we never taught the Bible the way we taught the Iliad for two reasons. First, we were an interdenominational school. We had what we called "primary" and "secondary" doctrines. We would teach the primary doctrines, but we left instruction in the secondary doctrines to the children's parents and religious leaders. If I remember rightly, the primary doctrines were pretty close to the apostles' creed. Second, the students thought they already knew all the right answers about the Bible from their Sunday school lessons. At that age, they couldn't very well grasp that the characters in the Bible were also deeply flawed people, trying to do the best they knew how (in spite of God telling them from time-to-time that they DIDN'T know best) in very difficult circumstances they couldn't control.
We taught the heck out of the Iliad, and hoped that the students would at some time take the things they learned reading about Achilles and apply them to reading about David.
The earliest churches were organized as home fellowships because that's how nearly everything was organized in those days. The secular elders who governed a city were the heads of the households of the city. The elders of the church in a city were the heads of household who ran "twigs" in their homes. When the church elders began squabbling among themselves, as we have seen happen in TWI and its offshoots, either they would elect an overseer for the city's officially recognized twigs (the "metropolitan bishop"), or someone from outside the city, that the elders respected, would appoint one of them as bishop. Organization really couldn't spread too much farther than a city and its environs in those days because of the inadequacies of communication.
I think there was a power struggle between the counsels of church elders and the metropolitan bishops in the cities toward the end of the first century, and I think the bishops won. Before that, baptisms and communions were conducted at the twig level by the elder of the twig. After that, baptisms and communions were not sanctioned if they weren't performed by the bishop. I think the motivating factor for the struggle was "who get's to control distribution of the abundant sharing?"
As for miracles, I think God uses miracles like a writer uses figures of speech. A figure of speech is an apparent violation of the laws of grammar that an author uses to draw the reader's attention to something the writer wants to emphasize. I think signs, miracles and wonders are apparent violations of the laws of nature that God uses to draw our attention to the things He wants us to pay attention to. I've experienced miracles before I got involved with TWI, during the time I was involved, and after I left. I think there were a lot of signs, miracles and wonders around PFAL in the early days, because Wierwille was preaching a lot of truth, even though his teaching and practice contradicted what he preached. In my experience, as a person rose through the ranks of TWI to the level of Corps training, and as Headquarter took more and more remote control of what was being said and done in the twigs, the signs, miracles and wonders dried up.
To reply to waysiders have you seen any miracles. I was hired on to a company when there was a supposed hiring freeze. But of course since you scoff at what god can do you probably would'nt believe it was of god anyway. As to corporate woman. I think history teaches that constantine, ordered the building of temples or so called churches with the so called clergy to mediate between us and god back in the day. Since he was into paganism the big church temples were basically a modified pagan temple. Anyway do I need to go into the council of nicea. Isn't this where your watered down denomonations spring from? Oh and waysider, do you like sugar and creme with your cup of reality(hail mary)?
I haven't seen anybody pull a cat of nine tails out of a purse or anything..
he is entitled to his "nuttiness". Its just pathetic when he tries to sell the same inept products, over and over and over..
"and yes, we will need ... (drumroll....).. MONEY.."
if the product is so great.. why didn't it work for him? Failed marriages.. divorce.. remarriage.. how many "romantic(?)" liasons..
adultery.. *maybe* even worse..
and after forty some years.. he's just BARELY coming around to the concept, that he needs to be accountable to someone else than his old, arrogant pudgy self..
but even with that, he's back to selling perhaps one of the greatest failure since the first century..
and js is no better. He's got an "Ephesians" ministry, dontcha know..
same damned arrogance that was in the old "ministry".. they haven't managed to grow up..
in my opinion, anyway..
so who is the spectator here? Those actually doing something in the world, or those who stay in their little comfortable "way homes"?
To reply to waysiders have you seen any miracles. I was hired on to a company when there was a supposed hiring freeze. But of course since you scoff at what god can do you probably would'nt believe it was of god anyway. As to corporate woman. I think history teaches that constantine, ordered the building of temples or so called churches with the so called clergy to mediate between us and god back in the day. Since he was into paganism the big church temples were basically a modified pagan temple. Anyway do I need to go into the council of nicea. Isn't this where your watered down denomonations spring from? Oh and waysider, do you like sugar and creme with your cup of reality(hail mary)?
well, welcome to the cafe Mrt.
actually, I think "all that" started long before Nicea.
Usually, all the other church leaders didn't have anything like the power constantine had to force compliance. Like today, they just threatened, shamed and the like..
like.. "what about the KIDS? Without *us*, they will go to hell in a handbasket.."
The point about miracles.. I've seen two honest to god undeniable miracles happen. In both instances, I was forbidden to put the name of da way on them..
Which explains why all they seem to have is a loose ex-way affiliation.
I would ask though.. what do they consider a "christian spectator" to be?
I think its obvious.. one is either mog, stands with, and support da mogs, or they belong to the spectator crowd, the off scouring of christianity, so to speak..
Which explains why all they seem to have is a loose ex-way affiliation.
I would ask though.. what do they consider a "christian spectator" to be?
I think its obvious.. one is either mog, stands with, and support da mogs, or they belong to the spectator crowd, the off scouring of christianity, so to speak..
It's funny how this cup of reality works.I did a little research of my own on Dr. John Juedes of this site, a devoted lutheran. Pray tell, what did I find. Here's what histiry tells us of Dr. John Juedes mentor Martin Luther: He could imagine mary as intercessor for christ! Whoaw! Martin Luther believed Jesus couldn't come back to earth without Mary's consent! Yikes! And of course if your not baptized with water, your not saved. Hmmmm Oh, and history tells us Martin luther wrote a dirty little book about the jews and their lies. He called them miserable, stupid, and accursed. Martin Luther purposed to set fire to jewish shools, synagogues,forbid them to pray, and said we would not be at fault for slaying them. Maybe you should investigate John Juedes and call it your afternoon cup of reality. What does the bible say waysider, something about we all fall short, remember?
Constantine wasn't the first to damage the "church," and he certainly wasn't the last. Did Wierwille do as much damage as Constantine? I don't think so, but that's just because Wierwille had such a paltry following compared to Constantine. I think, on a one-to-one basis, Wierwille was much more destructive than Constantine.
Martin Luther had his faults including bigotry to Jews when they wouldn't convert to his brand of Christianity. Yes Luther believed of Mary as co-redemptrix, intercessor, immaculate conception, assumption, queenship of heaven, etc. But he never claimed to be a prophet or MOG like Wierwille.
It's funny how this cup of reality works.I did a little research of my own on Dr. John Juedes of this site, a devoted lutheran. Pray tell, what did I find. Here's what histiry tells us of Dr. John Juedes mentor Martin Luther: He could imagine mary as intercessor for christ! Whoaw! Martin Luther believed Jesus couldn't come back to earth without Mary's consent! Yikes! And of course if your not baptized with water, your not saved. Hmmmm Oh, and history tells us Martin luther wrote a dirty little book about the jews and their lies. He called them miserable, stupid, and accursed. Martin Luther purposed to set fire to jewish shools, synagogues,forbid them to pray, and said we would not be at fault for slaying them. Maybe you should investigate John Juedes and call it your afternoon cup of reality. What does the bible say waysider, something about we all fall short, remember?
Sooooo, is it just me or are the odds of any conversation with Mrt ending up worthwhile zero already or just heading there very quickly?
So Mrt, do you have an answer for any questions that I asked you earlier in post #35? It's kind of eerie for me to hear you believing some of the same lies I used to.
_________________________________
POST#35
Hi Mrt,
I don't know anything about you, but that's ok. the anonymity available here at GSC serves many people well.
If you think some of us are persecuting John Lynn do you also think you are persecuting all the rest of Christendom too? Because from my perspective it is your vitriol that is lacking credibility.
If I were you I'd pay attention to who is it that has led you into your virtually blanket condemnation of Christianity and consider also how that this attitude effectively isolates you from almost everybody.
Is your theological isolation the product of being deliberately isolated by your teachers or is is that your brand of Christianity is soooo vastly superior to all others that you can afford to cop an attitude that even Jesus Christ himself didn't take part in? Or does He show grace and mercy only to your group?
Signs and miracles are nice, but for me they don't automatically bring credibility. But whether genuine or fake, I do dramatically increase the intensity with which I analyze any group.
(I added a bit for the sake of clarification.)
_______________________________
(ADDED IN EDITING)
In case it helps here is a definition of "vitriol" from an online dictionary:
2. Bitterly abusive feeling or expression.
and for whatever it's worth to you, when formerly abused wayfers or STFIers have trouble coming to terms with the vitriol at the heart of their former leaders THEY ARE CREDIBLE FEELINGS IMO.
But what has denominational Christianity ever done too you? FYI...you are free to ignore this last question too. :B)
"I really liked the way that TWI drew from seeming parallels in the OT to support its theology, yet ignored any parallels that didn't. STF does the same thing. One only has to listen to DG's latest teaching on tattoos to see that. (I chuckled through the whole thing)
The point I'm trying to make is that STF is no less ala carte in picking and choosing what it wants to believe than any other organization. The only reason why it doesn't look like that is the ground rules of engagement are carefully laid out and all beliefs are checked against those ground rules."
My gosh, there are so many critical and spiritual issues going on all around us and in the world, and the most in depth study worthy of their time is about TATOOS?????
Is this more self-serving "apologetic" in defense of this man's distracting markings on himself?
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George Aar
My, but your magnanimity overwhelms me.
Personally, I think you're maybe just a teensy bit too proud of a superstition (or your particular brand thereof) with so little to substantiate itself to begin with.
I'm terribly afraid of the monsters under my bed, but did you know there's people who think that if they step on a crack in the sidewalk they'll break their mother's back? Boy, are THEY stupid!
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waysider
Hey there, Mrt.
Welcome to GSC.
Do they still have THESE at twig meetings?
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Tzaia
So are you saying that the blind leading the few into a ditch is preferred? I guess from a numbers standpoint that it's true. Do you know what happens to a person who disagrees with someone at STF? Try it sometime.
Home fellowships may have moved the word over asia minor, but for whatever reason, it wasn't sustainable. I hate to confuse you with facts, but the entire area is about 99% Islamic. That tells me that home fellowships failed. Maybe the goal should be to understand why the concept failed, rather than try to recreate a moment.
The very nature of miracles is that they are not reproducible, so creating a causal link between miracles and how one fellowships is really not possible, regardless of what they insist is truth. Obviously you haven't heard the level of damage that prophecy (in the manner that it is practiced at STF) has done to people. It's appalling, and apparently it hasn't been renounced. But why would they? It's used to make decisions, justify decisions, and overall run roughshod over other people's lives - all in the name of God. Don't let them tell you that abuse was an isolated incident perpetrated by people who are no longer involved. Every last one of them who are left had a hand in the abuse. I say if you can't refrain from using prophecy as a control mechanism, that you should restrain yourself from using it.
Actually, there's nothing in the bible that says home fellowships are superior, but it is a belief that has been traditionally held and passed down to the current leadership of STF. Ironically, not a one of them has ever tested the validity of that belief. They simply accept it as being true and teach it as truth. Is there harm in that? Well only from the standpoint that it gets people believing that they are doing something extra-special when the reality is that home fellowships (or small groups) can create boundary issues in people who have problems in that area, either in respecting other's boundaries, or being able to set appropriate boundaries. The idea that small groups keeps people accountable is suspect. Invariably, someone gets the notion that accountability does not apply to them, and then the balance goes out of whack. I personally choose not to have to deal with it. Teaching people that home fellowshipping is best (in my mind) is the beginning of testing someone's boundaries. If they can get you to readily accept that on the basis of asia minor's home fellowship model, which I already pointed out was a failure, then getting you to accept other lines of BS is relatively simple.
My experience is that every religious organization has its problems and struggles. STF's struggles and problems are pretty significant for an organization of its size and age, and that forced me to take a long hard look at what they were doing, and if its mission fit with what I wanted to align myself. Ultimately, the answer was no. I think people should be free to worship with whomever and however they want, but I also think that it should be an informed decision.
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Tzaia
Mrt - I don't want to further confuse you, but I can't help but point out that the current president of STF had to do research to determine that adultery and fornication is wrong in the eyes of God. Prior to his delving into the subject, apparently he didn't have any idea that either of those things were wrong - in this administration. I don't think that he was a practicing adulterer or fornicator, but that was probably more of a result of his lack of social skills and his idea of what an ideal woman looks like to him - than because he necessarily thought it was wrong. <== snarky personal observation. I was sitting in front of him at the Chicago conference back in '88 and had a conversation with him about it. How he managed to wrap his mind around what was going on all over TWI left me dumbfounded. To be able to do what he did comes from concentrating on the esoteric at the expense of the simple. Unfortunately, JWS has not outgrown that tendency.
Furthermore, if you remove him from the confines of the premises that are the basis of his arguments, he can't converse. I've tried.
Home fellowships - there's nothing magical about them. Reading from a bible - nothing inherently better, other than one has fewer opportunities to misquote. There is nothing that says reading from the bible makes a teaching any more coherent or godly. That's nothing more than a premise. It is not a fact.
I really liked the way that TWI drew from seeming parallels in the OT to support its theology, yet ignored any parallels that didn't. STF does the same thing. One only has to listen to DG's latest teaching on tattoos to see that. (I chuckled through the whole thing)
The point I'm trying to make is that STF is no less ala carte in picking and choosing what it wants to believe than any other organization. The only reason why it doesn't look like that is the ground rules of engagement are carefully laid out and all beliefs are checked against those ground rules. One of the main "ground rules" is the belief in dispensations. The other belief is in who Jesus is (or is not). Every belief is checked against at least one of the 2. The catch (and the thing that took me the longest to get) is that those ground rules aren't any more valid than anyone else's. Once I questioned the validity of those ground rules (i.e. how to study the bible, dispensations, and who Jesus is) then the whole thing fell apart as THE answer to gaining eternal life. It's just one of many ways of looking at it.
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Mrt
many churches you have seen flourish? In signs miracles and wonders? Who are you kidding? as far as john lynn goes, why all the religious persecution against him? are you getting comfortable in the world of benny hinn, jimmy swaggart? Where your treasure is there will your heart be also,consider this saying when you go to confession.
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GarthP2000
Persecution against John Lynn? ... based upon some negative posts about him on one out of about a million online message boards throughout the country?
((snort)) People like you wouldn't know what persecution was if it smacked you upside the head with a 2x4. ... Twice. <_<
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waysider
Do tell. What are these signs, miracles and wonders you've been seeing?
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JeffSjo
Hi Mrt,
I don't know anything about you, but that's ok. the anonymity available here at GSC serves many people well.
If you think some of us are persecuting John Lynn do you also think you are persecuting all the rest of Christendom too? Because from my perspective it is your vitriol that is lacking credibility.
If I were you I'd pay attention to who is it that has led you into your virtually blanket condemnation of Christianity and consider also how that this attitude effectively isolates you from almost everybody.
Is your theological isolation the product of being deliberately isolated by your teachers or is is that your brand of Christianity is soooo vastly superior to all others that you can afford to cop an attitude that even Jesus Christ himself didn't take part in? Or does He show grace and mercy only to your group?
Signs and miracles are nice, but for me they don't automatically bring credibility. But whether genuine or fake, I do dramatically increase the intensity with which I analyse any group.
(I added a bit for the sake of clarification.)
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Tzaia
JAL persecuted? Obviously he's been mocked here. But persecuted? What's the whole deal against the Catholics?
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Steve Lortz
The problem with mega-churches (one of which I attend occassionally) is that there are too many people involved. The problem with home fellowships (one of which I run occassionally) is that there are too many people involved. The problem ain't the number, the problem is THEY'RE PEOPLE!
One time, the seventh-graders were asking me why they had to read the Iliad. They had gotten to the point where they were beginning to suspect that it wasn't a story of good guys versus bad guys (there are no perfect heroes in the Iliad, and no perfect villians either) and that the story was not going to end "and they all lived happily ever after."
I pointed out to them that we learn how to deal with situations in life through the stories we hold in our minds. The Iliad is a whole bunch of stories about deeply flawed characters trying to do the best they knew how in very difficult circumstances that they couldn't control. Then I asked them, "Who are WE, if we aren't deeply flawed characters trying to do the best we know how in very difficult circumstances that we can't control?"
We were a Christian school, and we related the subject matter to the Bible as we taught, but we never taught the Bible the way we taught the Iliad for two reasons. First, we were an interdenominational school. We had what we called "primary" and "secondary" doctrines. We would teach the primary doctrines, but we left instruction in the secondary doctrines to the children's parents and religious leaders. If I remember rightly, the primary doctrines were pretty close to the apostles' creed. Second, the students thought they already knew all the right answers about the Bible from their Sunday school lessons. At that age, they couldn't very well grasp that the characters in the Bible were also deeply flawed people, trying to do the best they knew how (in spite of God telling them from time-to-time that they DIDN'T know best) in very difficult circumstances they couldn't control.
We taught the heck out of the Iliad, and hoped that the students would at some time take the things they learned reading about Achilles and apply them to reading about David.
The earliest churches were organized as home fellowships because that's how nearly everything was organized in those days. The secular elders who governed a city were the heads of the households of the city. The elders of the church in a city were the heads of household who ran "twigs" in their homes. When the church elders began squabbling among themselves, as we have seen happen in TWI and its offshoots, either they would elect an overseer for the city's officially recognized twigs (the "metropolitan bishop"), or someone from outside the city, that the elders respected, would appoint one of them as bishop. Organization really couldn't spread too much farther than a city and its environs in those days because of the inadequacies of communication.
I think there was a power struggle between the counsels of church elders and the metropolitan bishops in the cities toward the end of the first century, and I think the bishops won. Before that, baptisms and communions were conducted at the twig level by the elder of the twig. After that, baptisms and communions were not sanctioned if they weren't performed by the bishop. I think the motivating factor for the struggle was "who get's to control distribution of the abundant sharing?"
As for miracles, I think God uses miracles like a writer uses figures of speech. A figure of speech is an apparent violation of the laws of grammar that an author uses to draw the reader's attention to something the writer wants to emphasize. I think signs, miracles and wonders are apparent violations of the laws of nature that God uses to draw our attention to the things He wants us to pay attention to. I've experienced miracles before I got involved with TWI, during the time I was involved, and after I left. I think there were a lot of signs, miracles and wonders around PFAL in the early days, because Wierwille was preaching a lot of truth, even though his teaching and practice contradicted what he preached. In my experience, as a person rose through the ranks of TWI to the level of Corps training, and as Headquarter took more and more remote control of what was being said and done in the twigs, the signs, miracles and wonders dried up.
Love,
Steve
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Mrt
To reply to waysiders have you seen any miracles. I was hired on to a company when there was a supposed hiring freeze. But of course since you scoff at what god can do you probably would'nt believe it was of god anyway. As to corporate woman. I think history teaches that constantine, ordered the building of temples or so called churches with the so called clergy to mediate between us and god back in the day. Since he was into paganism the big church temples were basically a modified pagan temple. Anyway do I need to go into the council of nicea. Isn't this where your watered down denomonations spring from? Oh and waysider, do you like sugar and creme with your cup of reality(hail mary)?
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Ham
John Lynn persecuted??
I haven't seen anybody pull a cat of nine tails out of a purse or anything..
he is entitled to his "nuttiness". Its just pathetic when he tries to sell the same inept products, over and over and over..
"and yes, we will need ... (drumroll....).. MONEY.."
if the product is so great.. why didn't it work for him? Failed marriages.. divorce.. remarriage.. how many "romantic(?)" liasons..
adultery.. *maybe* even worse..
and after forty some years.. he's just BARELY coming around to the concept, that he needs to be accountable to someone else than his old, arrogant pudgy self..
but even with that, he's back to selling perhaps one of the greatest failure since the first century..
and js is no better. He's got an "Ephesians" ministry, dontcha know..
same damned arrogance that was in the old "ministry".. they haven't managed to grow up..
in my opinion, anyway..
so who is the spectator here? Those actually doing something in the world, or those who stay in their little comfortable "way homes"?
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Ham
well, welcome to the cafe Mrt.
actually, I think "all that" started long before Nicea.
Usually, all the other church leaders didn't have anything like the power constantine had to force compliance. Like today, they just threatened, shamed and the like..
like.. "what about the KIDS? Without *us*, they will go to hell in a handbasket.."
The point about miracles.. I've seen two honest to god undeniable miracles happen. In both instances, I was forbidden to put the name of da way on them..
I wonder why..
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Mrt
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Mrt
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Mrt
pppppppoiuytyrtree
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Mrt
I did a lit
It's funny how this cup of reality works.I did a little research of my own on Dr. John Juedes of this site, a devoted lutheran. Pray tell, what did I find. Here's what histiry tells us of Dr. John Juedes mentor Martin Luther: He could imagine mary as intercessor for christ! Whoaw! Martin Luther believed Jesus couldn't come back to earth without Mary's consent! Yikes! And of course if your not baptized with water, your not saved. Hmmmm Oh, and history tells us Martin luther wrote a dirty little book about the jews and their lies. He called them miserable, stupid, and accursed. Martin Luther purposed to set fire to jewish shools, synagogues,forbid them to pray, and said we would not be at fault for slaying them. Maybe you should investigate John Juedes and call it your afternoon cup of reality. What does the bible say waysider, something about we all fall short, remember?
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Steve Lortz
Constantine wasn't the first to damage the "church," and he certainly wasn't the last. Did Wierwille do as much damage as Constantine? I don't think so, but that's just because Wierwille had such a paltry following compared to Constantine. I think, on a one-to-one basis, Wierwille was much more destructive than Constantine.
Love,
Steve
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Thomas Loy Bumgarner
sorry, my reply got confused with MRT"s response.
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waysider
Maybe you should investigate Mr. Wierwille and call it your every day cup of reality.
(You do know he wasn't a "Dr.", right?)
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JeffSjo
Sooooo, is it just me or are the odds of any conversation with Mrt ending up worthwhile zero already or just heading there very quickly?
So Mrt, do you have an answer for any questions that I asked you earlier in post #35? It's kind of eerie for me to hear you believing some of the same lies I used to.
_________________________________
POST#35
Hi Mrt,
I don't know anything about you, but that's ok. the anonymity available here at GSC serves many people well.
If you think some of us are persecuting John Lynn do you also think you are persecuting all the rest of Christendom too? Because from my perspective it is your vitriol that is lacking credibility.
If I were you I'd pay attention to who is it that has led you into your virtually blanket condemnation of Christianity and consider also how that this attitude effectively isolates you from almost everybody.
Is your theological isolation the product of being deliberately isolated by your teachers or is is that your brand of Christianity is soooo vastly superior to all others that you can afford to cop an attitude that even Jesus Christ himself didn't take part in? Or does He show grace and mercy only to your group?
Signs and miracles are nice, but for me they don't automatically bring credibility. But whether genuine or fake, I do dramatically increase the intensity with which I analyze any group.
(I added a bit for the sake of clarification.)
_______________________________
(ADDED IN EDITING)
In case it helps here is a definition of "vitriol" from an online dictionary:
2. Bitterly abusive feeling or expression.
and for whatever it's worth to you, when formerly abused wayfers or STFIers have trouble coming to terms with the vitriol at the heart of their former leaders THEY ARE CREDIBLE FEELINGS IMO.
But what has denominational Christianity ever done too you? FYI...you are free to ignore this last question too. :B)
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chockfull
We are all spectators. The only man hanging on the cross was my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
If you aren't a spectator to the most powerful event in the history of mankind, then YOU are missing the point on the way to your superiority complex.
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Rejoice
Tzaia said;
"I really liked the way that TWI drew from seeming parallels in the OT to support its theology, yet ignored any parallels that didn't. STF does the same thing. One only has to listen to DG's latest teaching on tattoos to see that. (I chuckled through the whole thing)
The point I'm trying to make is that STF is no less ala carte in picking and choosing what it wants to believe than any other organization. The only reason why it doesn't look like that is the ground rules of engagement are carefully laid out and all beliefs are checked against those ground rules."
My gosh, there are so many critical and spiritual issues going on all around us and in the world, and the most in depth study worthy of their time is about TATOOS?????
Is this more self-serving "apologetic" in defense of this man's distracting markings on himself?
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