This quote is from Mike...not Wayside. Mike God gave nobody a free pass. Jesus Christ paid the price...a rather hideous price...and based on that sacrifice we are declared righteous by our identification with Christ. Vpw got a lot of splaining to do on that day.
If and when student loans are forgiven, that is a free pass for them.
If and when we confess (admit, agree) our sins we are forgiven FAITHFULLY by God, no matter what the sin. People can't do this, but God can, and He promises it in 1 John 1:9
When we are forgiven by God we are cleansed from all unrighteousness.
That means we get a free pass from God and He is not at all inclined to punish, but very inclined to resume work moving His Word with us. People are not so inclined to forgive, and when they do they usually remember the hurt and there is no free pass from them or others who see the hurt.
These are very difficult issues. Studying Uriah's family and how they handled the hurt from David is enlightening. Some did not give a free pass to David, some did. The ones who did forgive and forget (somewhat) had the great benefit of hearing God's Word from David again.
I also wonded how well people were able to forgive Paul, who had murdered some of their family and friends. Have you ever placed yourself in their shoes, and felt what they felt. Similar to the Uriah situation.
David did not get a free pass from the devil and from some of Israel.
From what I hear VPW did not get a free pass from people. He had to have bodyguards, and I hear he was sometimes in fear.
But God is good. God does give us all a free pass to start all over, cleansed. God is good.
I think the way I understood the 'absent Christ' quip was: Christ is not here physically. I didn't see him physically nor ever saw him physically, has anyone seen physically? I vaguely recall in one of those old threads of Greasespot, that someone posted that twi used to refer to "absent" as "unseen". He hasn't been seen physically, with the eyes, since the first century. Another usage: I believe twi was conveying that you and me (when we are preaching the Word) takes the place of the "unseen" Christ. We are ambassadors for Christ. He cannot be here physically. If he were here physically he wouldn't need an ambassador. At least that's they way I understood it in twi so I didn't have a problem with the statement.
I hate to say this (and end up agreeing with Mike), but I totally agree.
I think the concept of the "absent Christ" is much ado about nothing. If he's not absent, why y'all looking forward to his return?
The problem I see with the "absent Christ" is that it's not a Biblical term. The Word never claims to take the place of the absent Christ. Rather, the Word IS Christ, and it is how he maintains his presence while we await his bodily return.
One thing I remain proud of is my effort, those many years ago, to distinguish between what I thought Wierwille got right and what he got wrong, using the Bible as a measuring stick. Sometimes I was right and sometimes I was wrong, but I never rejected something just because VPW said it.
I'm not trying to give people whiplash here, and I apologize if that's the result. Take my comment with all the salt you need. My point is that the absent Christ, in context, wasn't the outrage ex-Way critics made it out to be. At worst it was a poorly worded attempt to magnify the Word of God.
Mike's response: You are close here. I spent the years 1998 to 2018 reviewing all the collaterals and Magazine articles of VPW. I am now spending more time applying what I learned in that 20 year review: applying to my life's dicipline, applying to loving others better, applying to working the KJV, NIV, NASB, etc. PFAL only directly covers a fraction of the scriptures.
~ ~ ~ ~
T-Bone: I appreciate the clarification. You might feel your hard work goes unrecognized, but I for one think if wierwille were still alive he might be impressed with what you’ve done. I thought I remembered PFAL pretty good, but you’ve shown me how malleable PFAL and the Bible can be.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: I cherish any and all friendly exchange here. I am in close contact to TWI leadership on the field and slowly getting to know some at HQ.
T-Bone: I figured you have been doing some networking with TWI-folks – well, good for you…who knows…TWI becoming a less harmful and controlling cult may already be underway.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: The legacy I feel worth preserving of VPW's is what he taught in writing. That is what I focused on to get an understand of God, His Son, and the written Word. It got purified by the time it reached the printing stages. He had a lot of help doing that, people with holy spirit and love.
Mike's response: You are close here. I spent the years 1998 to 2018 reviewing all the collaterals and Magazine articles of VPW. I am now spending more time applying what I learned in that 20 year review: applying to my life's dicipline, applying to loving others better, applying to working the KJV, NIV, NASB, etc. PFAL only directly covers a fraction of the scriptures.
~ ~ ~ ~
T-Bone: I appreciate the clarification. You might feel your hard work goes unrecognized, but I for one think if wierwille were still alive he might be impressed with what you’ve done. I thought I remembered PFAL pretty good, but you’ve shown me how malleable PFAL and the Bible can be.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: I cherish any and all friendly exchange here. I am in close contact to TWI leadership on the field and slowly getting to know some at HQ.
T-Bone: I figured you have been doing some networking with TWI-folks – well, good for you…who knows…TWI becoming a less harmful and controlling cult may already be underway.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: The legacy I feel worth preserving of VPW's is what he taught in writing. That is what I focused on to get an understand of God, His Son, and the written Word. It got purified by the time it reached the printing stages. He had a lot of help doing that, people with holy spirit and love.
T-Bone: And again, I say you and I are worlds apart concerning the validity and value of what wierwille taught and wrote.
Ok, it looks to me that my two moderately difficult questions have been seen by most regular posters, and that none can or none wants to answer them.
Here is the short answer to the absent Paradise. I wish I remember WHERE we were taught this, but had God allowed Adam and Eve to stay and eat of the tree of life, then they would live forever under the devil’s rule and ownership. Prior to Pentecost, the only way to totally escape from the devil was to die. But after Pentecost, it became possible to be born again, from above, and have a new nature that is created by God and cannot sin. Now, all we have to do to escape the devil is count the old man dead, and live in the new man.
So, the absent Paradise makes it possible for us to live in the new Paradise of the future, and be more than conquerors until then.
*/*/*/*/*
Answer to moderately difficult question #2 :
The devil tried his best to make Christ absent by killing him. But God had a secret plan, to make Christ MORE present by raising him from the dead, and then 50 days later, to ascend to become physically absent.
Had the devil known that all of us would get Christ in us and the potential to beat the devil just like Jesus did, then he would NOT have killed Christ. This is written.
This is the answer to why the PHYSICALLY absent Christ is beneficial to us. Instead of having Christ WITH us like the apostles had in the Gospels, in only one geographical location at a time, we all have Christ in us and with us wherever we go.
Had the devil known this secret plan for a widely distributed Christ he’d have backed off his crucifixion plan. Instead of only one Christ in one location to beat the devil, now there are millions that can beat him. That is the reason Christ is physically absent. It is so we can have Christ live within every one of us, and make Christ everywhere present wherever we go.
We were taught this abundantly.
Limb leaders taught this to branch leaders, who taught it to twig leaders, who taught it to new people. This “Christ present in all of us” doctrine was probably the most often repeated teaching in the ministry. I heard it hundreds of times, if I include casual conversations with formal teachings.
The physical Christ is absent so we ALL can have Christ within, permanently, and incorruptible.
Mike's response: You are close here. I spent the years 1998 to 2018 reviewing all the collaterals and Magazine articles of VPW. I am now spending more time applying what I learned in that 20 year review: applying to my life's dicipline, applying to loving others better, applying to working the KJV, NIV, NASB, etc. PFAL only directly covers a fraction of the scriptures.
~ ~ ~ ~
T-Bone: I appreciate the clarification. You might feel your hard work goes unrecognized, but I for one think if wierwille were still alive he might be impressed with what you’ve done. I thought I remembered PFAL pretty good, but you’ve shown me how malleable PFAL and the Bible can be.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: I cherish any and all friendly exchange here. I am in close contact to TWI leadership on the field and slowly getting to know some at HQ.
T-Bone: I figured you have been doing some networking with TWI-folks – well, good for you…who knows…TWI becoming a less harmful and controlling cult may already be underway.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: The legacy I feel worth preserving of VPW's is what he taught in writing. That is what I focused on to get an understand of God, His Son, and the written Word. It got purified by the time it reached the printing stages. He had a lot of help doing that, people with holy spirit and love.
T-Bone: And again, I say you and I are worlds apart concerning the validity and value of what wierwille taught and wrote.
Good luck, Mike
Thank you again, T-Bone
I actually get some of my ideas for suggestions to TWI leaders from GSC.
I am discussing this behind the scenes with some GSC posters and lurkers already.
TWI being an evil corporation has ended, IMO.
They admit to me in private that there is still work to do in cleaning up past errors.
It is largely a whole new crew in charge and doing the work.
They are MUCH more approachable than they had been for about 40 years.
I hate to say this (and end up agreeing with Mike), but I totally agree.
I think the concept of the "absent Christ" is much ado about nothing. If he's not absent, why y'all looking forward to his return?
The problem I see with the "absent Christ" is that it's not a Biblical term. The Word never claims to take the place of the absent Christ. Rather, the Word IS Christ, and it is how he maintains his presence while we await his bodily return.
One thing I remain proud of is my effort, those many years ago, to distinguish between what I thought Wierwille got right and what he got wrong, using the Bible as a measuring stick. Sometimes I was right and sometimes I was wrong, but I never rejected something just because VPW said it.
I'm not trying to give people whiplash here, and I apologize if that's the result. Take my comment with all the salt you need. My point is that the absent Christ, in context, wasn't the outrage ex-Way critics made it out to be. At worst it was a poorly worded attempt to magnify the Word of God.
Here is the short answer to the absent Paradise. I wish I remember WHERE we were taught this, but had God allowed Adam and Eve to stay and eat of the tree of life, then they would live forever under the devil’s rule and ownership
I'm pretty sure it was in session 5 or 7.
Here's a quick question:
Is there supposed to be a comma between "forever" and "rule"?
Without the comma, it would simply imply that their days on Earth would be under the devil's rule. That doesn't exactly sound like earth shattering news.
With the comma, It implies they would never physically die, contradicting the Hayflick Limit, which would be scientifically impossible.
Is there supposed to be a comma between "forever" and "rule"?
Without the comma, it would simply imply that their days on Earth would be under the devil's rule. That doesn't exactly sound like earth shattering news.
With the comma, It implies they would never physically die, contradicting the Hayflick Limit, which would be scientifically impossible.
I could understand your question better with a more precise location of the comma you suggest.
Did you mean session 5 or 7 of the film class?
I'm surprised to hear that it is in the foundation class.
I will start looking there. I knew my memory was weak on this, and I wanted to find it to get things more accurate.
There could easily be an error in my statement needing a comma.
*/*/*/*
As far as the Hayflick Limit goes, I always figured that is what the Tree of Live was all about, to keep the physical atoms tuned up.
I think the concept of the "absent Christ" is much ado about nothing. If he's not absent, why y'all looking forward to his return?
The problem I see with the "absent Christ" is that it's not a Biblical term. The Word never claims to take the place of the absent Christ. Rather, the Word IS Christ, and it is how he maintains his presence while we await his bodily return.
1 hour ago, Mike said:
Answer to moderately difficult question #2 :
The devil tried his best to make Christ absent by killing him. But God had a secret plan, to make Christ MORE present by raising him from the dead, and then 50 days later, to ascend to become physically absent.
Had the devil known that all of us would get Christ in us and the potential to beat the devil just like Jesus did, then he would NOT have killed Christ. This is written.
This is the answer to why the PHYSICALLY absent Christ is beneficial to us. Instead of having Christ WITH us like the apostles had in the Gospels, in only one geographical location at a time, we all have Christ in us and with us wherever we go.
Had the devil known this secret plan for a widely distributed Christ he’d have backed off his crucifixion plan. Instead of only one Christ in one location to beat the devil, now there are millions that can beat him. That is the reason Christ is physically absent. It is so we can have Christ live within every one of us, and make Christ everywhere present wherever we go.
We were taught this abundantly.
Limb leaders taught this to branch leaders, who taught it to twig leaders, who taught it to new people. This “Christ present in all of us” doctrine was probably the most often repeated teaching in the ministry. I heard it hundreds of times, if I include casual conversations with formal teachings.
The physical Christ is absent so we ALL can have Christ within, permanently, and incorruptible.
"The Word takes the place of the absent Christ."
So, Christ isn't absent at all. Christ is within. I brought this up very early in this thread.
HOWEVER, Jesus, the Nazarene, the anointed, the perfect human being, God's only begotten is obviously absent in the sense that no one could expect to run into him at Starbucks. Sure. I don't think this is the issue.
What seems to be missing from this parsing is the subtle nuance of the implications of the proposition: The Word take the place of the absent Christ. (Maybe this should have been phrased more accurately according to mathematical usage: The Word takes the place of Jesus, the Nazarene.)
MOREOVER, what is this Word that replaces God's only begotten? Is it the Bible? God's perfect only begotten is replaced with... the Bible? A book put together hundreds of years later by hundreds of editors, redactors, interpolators, scribes? And not rightly divided for another 1000 years when Darby, Bullinger, and victor showed up? victor said the word is the ministry and the ministry is the word. What is this ministry? Obviously, it is The Way International, Inc. Or, is this not obvious?
The Word never claims to take the place of the absent Christ.
And that is the crux of it - nowhere in the Bible does it say anything takes Christ's place and no place ever is he referred to as absent - which carries the connotation of missing, lacking, not at an expected place, etc.
If and when we confess (admit, agree) our sins we are forgiven FAITHFULLY by God, no matter what the sin. People can't do this, but God can, and He promises it in 1 John 1:9
When we are forgiven by God we are cleansed from all unrighteousness.
That means we get a free pass from God and He is not at all inclined to punish, but very inclined to resume work moving His Word with us. People are not so inclined to forgive, and when they do they usually remember the hurt and there is no free pass from them or others who see the hurt.
These are very difficult issues. Studying Uriah's family and how they handled the hurt from David is enlightening. Some did not give a free pass to David, some did. The ones who did forgive and forget (somewhat) had the great benefit of hearing God's Word from David again.
I also wonded how well people were able to forgive Paul, who had murdered some of their family and friends. Have you ever placed yourself in their shoes, and felt what they felt. Similar to the Uriah situation.
David did not get a free pass from the devil and from some of Israel.
From what I hear VPW did not get a free pass from people. He had to have bodyguards, and I hear he was sometimes in fear.
But God is good. God does give us all a free pass to start all over, cleansed. God is good.
The difference is, Mike, all of the people you mentioned actually CONFESSED their sins and God was faithful to forgive. Wierwille hid his sins, justified them with scripture, and used the congregation as his sexual playground. But you are ok with that, which basically equates to a tacit agreement that wierwille was ok to have sex with young women from the congregation.
MOREOVER, what is this Word that replaces God's only begotten? Is it the Bible? God's perfect only begotten is replaced with... the Bible? A book put together hundreds of years later by hundreds of editors, redactors, interpolators, scribes? And not rightly divided for another 1000 years when Darby, Bullinger, and victor showed up? victor said the word is the ministry and the ministry is the word. What is this ministry? Obviously, it is The Way International, Inc. Or, is this not obvious?
I am sorry you did not see the good old days when many were turning to God and Christ within, loving it. From the date I saw you got in the ministry, during Craig's torture, I can't blame you for getting it wrong, what I am saying.
Mike - the concepts you are talking about from PFLAP are really easy to understand and I spent years working all of those books even during my time in-residence where I was studying around 30 hours a week or more. Im not getting it wrong, I disagree with you and PFAL especially. I wasn't exposed to Craig's shenanigans because the year I first went to HQ was the year he was fired. I am of the opinion that there was a significant movement of God underway when vpw stepped and co-opted other's ministries as his own, took them over, started keeping the money, etc.
Soooo...He used ONE verse from the Amplified Bible, HALF a chapter from the New English Bible and required PFAL '77 students to get some version from the 1800's that has a name so unremarkable you can't remember what it's called or where you store it.
Yep, the guy was a bona fide Bible scholar, a genuine research technician if ever I've met one.
On top of that,
he plagiarized the Amplified Bible when he posted "his" "literal translations according to usage." He claimed he'd "worked the Word" and came up with renderings that were word-for-word identical to the Amplified Bible. The most egregious example, IMO, was Philippians 4:13. vpw: "I am ready for anything and equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me." Word-for-word, that's in the 4:13 rendering in the Amplified Bible.
Now, vpw would have you think it was a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE that the phrasing was identical. However, nearly all of us see that as just ripping off their work and taking credit for it, aka "plagiarizing." Any of you who heard Acts 29's song with this as their chorus should remember it: "I am ready for anything and equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me. Yes, I am more than a conqueror, a real super-conqueror, and nothing will separate God's Love from me."
If you go to Divinity School, specialize in preaching, and spend NO time on studying the Bible, you might be this much of a lightweight, also.
Ok, it looks to me that my two moderately difficult questions have been seen by most regular posters, and that none can or none wants to answer them.
Here is the short answer to the absent Paradise. I wish I remember WHERE we were taught this, but had God allowed Adam and Eve to stay and eat of the tree of life, then they would live forever under the devil’s rule and ownership. Prior to Pentecost, the only way to totally escape from the devil was to die. But after Pentecost, it became possible to be born again, from above, and have a new nature that is created by God and cannot sin. Now, all we have to do to escape the devil is count the old man dead, and live in the new man.
So, the absent Paradise makes it possible for us to live in the new Paradise of the future, and be more than conquerors until then.
*/*/*/*/*
Answer to moderately difficult question #2 :
The devil tried his best to make Christ absent by killing him. But God had a secret plan, to make Christ MORE present by raising him from the dead, and then 50 days later, to ascend to become physically absent.
Had the devil known that all of us would get Christ in us and the potential to beat the devil just like Jesus did, then he would NOT have killed Christ. This is written.
This is the answer to why the PHYSICALLY absent Christ is beneficial to us. Instead of having Christ WITH us like the apostles had in the Gospels, in only one geographical location at a time, we all have Christ in us and with us wherever we go.
Had the devil known this secret plan for a widely distributed Christ he’d have backed off his crucifixion plan. Instead of only one Christ in one location to beat the devil, now there are millions that can beat him. That is the reason Christ is physically absent. It is so we can have Christ live within every one of us, and make Christ everywhere present wherever we go.
We were taught this abundantly.
Limb leaders taught this to branch leaders, who taught it to twig leaders, who taught it to new people. This “Christ present in all of us” doctrine was probably the most often repeated teaching in the ministry. I heard it hundreds of times, if I include casual conversations with formal teachings.
The physical Christ is absent so we ALL can have Christ within, permanently, and incorruptible.
You were being cagey, and you really had nothing beyond THAT and were hiding THAT for a day and a half? We all knew this, whether some of us currently agree with it or not. That was all basic in twi, and some of it was basic Bible, which is why you don't have to go to ex-twi or twi to get any or all of that.
it's a little embarrassing that we've gone over David, Bath-shebah and Uriah as much as we have, and you STILL maintain the same errors over the accounts.
he plagiarized the Amplified Bible when he posted "his" "literal translations according to usage." He claimed he'd "worked the Word" and came up with renderings that were word-for-word identical to the Amplified Bible. The most egregious example, IMO, was Philippians 4:13. vpw: "I am ready for anything and equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me." Word-for-word, that's in the 4:13 rendering in the Amplified Bible.
Now, vpw would have you think it was a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE that the phrasing was identical. However, nearly all of us see that as just ripping off their work and taking credit for it, aka "plagiarizing." Any of you who heard Acts 29's song with this as their chorus should remember it: "I am ready for anything and equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me. Yes, I am more than a conqueror, a real super-conqueror, and nothing will separate God's Love from me."
If you go to Divinity School, specialize in preaching, and spend NO time on studying the Bible, you might be this much of a lightweight, also.
He did the same thing when Dr. Higgins called him out for preaching like Bullinger wrote. So embarrassed and afraid of being found out as a plagiarizing fraud, he played dumb and presented it all as a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE, one that independently validated his teaching. (Error verified by error?)
This is a textbook narcissistic cop out ruse.
If anyone believes any of these REMARKABLE COINCIDENCES, please reach out. I've got some property to sell you.
He did the same thing when Dr. Higgins called him out for preaching like Bullinger wrote. So embarrassed and afraid of being found out as a plagiarizing fraud, he played dumb and presented it all as a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE, one that independently validated his teaching. (Error verified by error?)
This is a textbook narcissistic cop out ruse.
If anyone believes any of these REMARKABLE COINCIDENCES, please reach out. I've got some property to sell you.
Oh...but...but....he didn't plagaraize he just collated all the material into one class to rule them all, claimed ownership, and copyrighted them. Dont ya know God sent him out to stea...I mean collect all these works together so we wouldn't have to?
It's revealing that when he was called out he didn't say that God told him by revelation to use Bullinger's material as his own. Instead he acted like it was all a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE. Why didn't he speak up and explain the nature of his ministry was to glean what he could that hadn't been known for 2000 years...material he gleaned from existing sources...Im kind of being a jerk here to show how ridicoulous Mike's argument is that plagarisim is ok for VPW to do because it all belonged to God anyway.
Oh...but...but....he didn't plagaraize he just collated all the material into one class to rule them all, claimed ownership, and copyrighted them. Dont ya know God sent him out to stea...I mean collect all these works together so we wouldn't have to?
It's revealing that when he was called out he didn't say that God told him by revelation to use Bullinger's material as his own. Instead he acted like it was all a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE. Why didn't he speak up and explain the nature of his ministry was to glean what he could that hadn't been known for 2000 years...material he gleaned from existing sources...Im kind of being a jerk here to show how ridicoulous Mike's argument is that plagarisim is ok for VPW to do because it all belonged to God anyway.
Allegedly, according to his tombstone, his last narcissistic "poor me" plea, he couldn't be honest, even if he knew to be honest. He could only wish to be honest.
I wonder why God didn't reveal to the Christ within victor to reveal to his mind to motivate his walk to be honest?
Yes, but not "The Word" in writing. THAT TOO is absent, probably burned by evil people in the first century. All we have from the first several centuries are fragments of varying sizes. Most of the Word we got in written form came gradually through scholarly efforts to reconstruct what may have been the originals. Some passages can be accurate i such reconstructions, some not.
What DOES take the place of the missing Christ (Jesus, the man) is whatever accurate Word is in the mind of a believer who lives it in love, as an ambassador for the missing man Jesus, the missing Christ.
So, Christ isn't absent at all. Christ is within. I brought this up very early in this thread. Christ, the man, is absent.
Christ, the anointing, also called the gift of holy spirit is NOT absent.
HOWEVER, Jesus, the Nazarene, the anointed, the perfect human being, God's only begotten is obviously absent in the sense that no one could expect to run into him at Starbucks. Sure. I don't think this is the issue. .Great !
What seems to be missing from this parsing is the subtle nuance of the implications of the proposition: The Word take the place of the absent Christ. (Maybe this should have been phrased more accurately according to mathematical usage: The Word takes the place of Jesus, the Nazarene.)
.There were some things in the class that got an abbreviated explanation, that were followed up on later in other classes or publications.
MOREOVER, what is this Word that replaces God's only begotten? Is it the Bible? God's perfect only begotten is replaced with... the Bible? A book put together hundreds of years later by hundreds of editors, redactors, interpolators, scribes? And not rightly divided for another 1000 years when Darby, Bullinger, and victor showed up? .All this paragraph I agreed with above, and in detail. The Word is alive when it is in a believing mind. This is how Jesus grew up strong. He had the Word in his mind, and he lived it, but he still needed spirit to have it work fully, so he waited until he was baptized by John.
victor said the word is the ministry and the ministry is the word.
What is this ministry? Obviously, it is The Way International, Inc. Or, is this not obvious? .Best understand it, when VPW referred to The Way or The Way Ministry, he meant the spiritual mission of ministering or serving in the Body of Christ. Anyone with the Word in mind, holy spirit within, and walks in love can be on this "mission for God." (greatest line in The Blues Brothers).
Jesus Christ is THE WAY, and those who have Christ within and know what they are doing are "in The Way." Long before the filming of PFAL, not that many really had that much of the Word. They would have some great bundles of it, and then mix it with serious and debilitating error. We were spared this kind of error. Therefore, in the early days 1950s to late 1960s, most of the people who could effectively be in the spiritual Way Ministry were also fellowshipping in New Knoxville.
Then when VPW referred to The Way International he was talking about the legal corporation in Ohio. I think the TWI title was invented around 1971, I think.
I am not sure if he always talked this way, but I strongly suspect (from limited research, so far) when he committed a teaching to print, this was his code for TWI and The Way.
Is there supposed to be a comma between "forever" and "rule"?
Without the comma, it would simply imply that their days on Earth would be under the devil's rule. That doesn't exactly sound like earth shattering news.
With the comma, It implies they would never physically die, contradicting the Hayflick Limit, which would be scientifically impossible.
Waysider, I've learned that if you are pretty sure, I can be pretty sure.
HOWEVER, doesn't the Hayflick limit contradict victor's claim that no one dies until one stops believing, and the cessation of believing only comes when one gets too tired to believe anymore?
You were being cagey, and you really had nothing beyond THAT and were hiding THAT for a day and a half? We all knew this, whether some of us currently agree with it or not. That was all basic in twi, and some of it was basic Bible, which is why you don't have to go to ex-twi or twi to get any or all of that.
Yeah, the answers were right under you nose, weren't they.
I had this notion of how walking in hate towards a brother blinds the mind.
What I see happening here often is a religion of hate, and sin focus.
I think that if people were able to even temporarily disengage from their "mission" of blowing the whistle on VPW, which is really a sin focus perspective, then lots of things would become clear that were not.
I think if some were NOT so focused on anti-VPW stuff, they'd have been able to come up with the answers to those two questions. Either people ARE blinded by the negatives here, OR their understanding of PFAL was shallow and missed a lot of detail.
To severely and persistently criticize what one does not know well is unwise. I was being cagey in describing those two questions as moderately difficult. I meant for posters here, focused on negatives, they'd be moderately difficult. I will try these questions on some local grads who are just enjoying the Word and avoid the negatives like I try to do most of the time.
it's a little embarrassing that we've gone over David, Bath-shebah and Uriah as much as we have, and you STILL maintain the same errors over the accounts.
Read closer. I was talking about the relatives of Uriah and their feelings.
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OldSkool
First off, Biblically speaking, Christ has never been absent...that doctrine does not come close to occuring anywhere in the Bible. Yet the way international teaches the word of God takes the place of
Bolshevik
Mike's apparent anger toward Christ and emphasis on obedience . . . that's Wayworld . . . that's the annihilation of the individual
waysider
Soooo...He used ONE verse from the Amplified Bible, HALF a chapter from the New English Bible and required PFAL '77 students to get some version from the 1800's that has a name so unremarkable you can
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Mike
If and when student loans are forgiven, that is a free pass for them.
If and when we confess (admit, agree) our sins we are forgiven FAITHFULLY by God, no matter what the sin. People can't do this, but God can, and He promises it in 1 John 1:9
When we are forgiven by God we are cleansed from all unrighteousness.
That means we get a free pass from God and He is not at all inclined to punish, but very inclined to resume work moving His Word with us. People are not so inclined to forgive, and when they do they usually remember the hurt and there is no free pass from them or others who see the hurt.
These are very difficult issues. Studying Uriah's family and how they handled the hurt from David is enlightening. Some did not give a free pass to David, some did. The ones who did forgive and forget (somewhat) had the great benefit of hearing God's Word from David again.
I also wonded how well people were able to forgive Paul, who had murdered some of their family and friends. Have you ever placed yourself in their shoes, and felt what they felt. Similar to the Uriah situation.
David did not get a free pass from the devil and from some of Israel.
From what I hear VPW did not get a free pass from people. He had to have bodyguards, and I hear he was sometimes in fear.
But God is good. God does give us all a free pass to start all over, cleansed. God is good.
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Raf
I hate to say this (and end up agreeing with Mike), but I totally agree.
I think the concept of the "absent Christ" is much ado about nothing. If he's not absent, why y'all looking forward to his return?
The problem I see with the "absent Christ" is that it's not a Biblical term. The Word never claims to take the place of the absent Christ. Rather, the Word IS Christ, and it is how he maintains his presence while we await his bodily return.
One thing I remain proud of is my effort, those many years ago, to distinguish between what I thought Wierwille got right and what he got wrong, using the Bible as a measuring stick. Sometimes I was right and sometimes I was wrong, but I never rejected something just because VPW said it.
I'm not trying to give people whiplash here, and I apologize if that's the result. Take my comment with all the salt you need. My point is that the absent Christ, in context, wasn't the outrage ex-Way critics made it out to be. At worst it was a poorly worded attempt to magnify the Word of God.
In my humble opinion.
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T-Bone
Mike's response: You are close here. I spent the years 1998 to 2018 reviewing all the collaterals and Magazine articles of VPW. I am now spending more time applying what I learned in that 20 year review: applying to my life's dicipline, applying to loving others better, applying to working the KJV, NIV, NASB, etc. PFAL only directly covers a fraction of the scriptures.
~ ~ ~ ~
T-Bone: I appreciate the clarification. You might feel your hard work goes unrecognized, but I for one think if wierwille were still alive he might be impressed with what you’ve done. I thought I remembered PFAL pretty good, but you’ve shown me how malleable PFAL and the Bible can be.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: I cherish any and all friendly exchange here. I am in close contact to TWI leadership on the field and slowly getting to know some at HQ.
T-Bone: I figured you have been doing some networking with TWI-folks – well, good for you…who knows…TWI becoming a less harmful and controlling cult may already be underway.
~ ~ ~ ~
Mike's response: The legacy I feel worth preserving of VPW's is what he taught in writing. That is what I focused on to get an understand of God, His Son, and the written Word. It got purified by the time it reached the printing stages. He had a lot of help doing that, people with holy spirit and love.
T-Bone: And again, I say you and I are worlds apart concerning the validity and value of what wierwille taught and wrote.
Edited by T-BoneGood luck, Mike
typos again I say
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Mike
Ok, it looks to me that my two moderately difficult questions have been seen by most regular posters, and that none can or none wants to answer them.
Here is the short answer to the absent Paradise. I wish I remember WHERE we were taught this, but had God allowed Adam and Eve to stay and eat of the tree of life, then they would live forever under the devil’s rule and ownership. Prior to Pentecost, the only way to totally escape from the devil was to die. But after Pentecost, it became possible to be born again, from above, and have a new nature that is created by God and cannot sin. Now, all we have to do to escape the devil is count the old man dead, and live in the new man.
So, the absent Paradise makes it possible for us to live in the new Paradise of the future, and be more than conquerors until then.
*/*/*/*/*
Answer to moderately difficult question #2 :
The devil tried his best to make Christ absent by killing him. But God had a secret plan, to make Christ MORE present by raising him from the dead, and then 50 days later, to ascend to become physically absent.
Had the devil known that all of us would get Christ in us and the potential to beat the devil just like Jesus did, then he would NOT have killed Christ. This is written.
This is the answer to why the PHYSICALLY absent Christ is beneficial to us. Instead of having Christ WITH us like the apostles had in the Gospels, in only one geographical location at a time, we all have Christ in us and with us wherever we go.
Had the devil known this secret plan for a widely distributed Christ he’d have backed off his crucifixion plan. Instead of only one Christ in one location to beat the devil, now there are millions that can beat him. That is the reason Christ is physically absent. It is so we can have Christ live within every one of us, and make Christ everywhere present wherever we go.
We were taught this abundantly.
Limb leaders taught this to branch leaders, who taught it to twig leaders, who taught it to new people. This “Christ present in all of us” doctrine was probably the most often repeated teaching in the ministry. I heard it hundreds of times, if I include casual conversations with formal teachings.
The physical Christ is absent so we ALL can have Christ within, permanently, and incorruptible.
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Mike
Thank you again, T-Bone
I actually get some of my ideas for suggestions to TWI leaders from GSC.
I am discussing this behind the scenes with some GSC posters and lurkers already.
TWI being an evil corporation has ended, IMO.
They admit to me in private that there is still work to do in cleaning up past errors.
It is largely a whole new crew in charge and doing the work.
They are MUCH more approachable than they had been for about 40 years.
Thanks again, T-Bone for meeting me half way.
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Mike
Thank you Raf.
You and Pawtucket are Paragons of Free Speech !
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waysider
I'm pretty sure it was in session 5 or 7.
Here's a quick question:
Is there supposed to be a comma between "forever" and "rule"?
Without the comma, it would simply imply that their days on Earth would be under the devil's rule. That doesn't exactly sound like earth shattering news.
With the comma, It implies they would never physically die, contradicting the Hayflick Limit, which would be scientifically impossible.
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Mike
I could understand your question better with a more precise location of the comma you suggest.
Did you mean session 5 or 7 of the film class?
I'm surprised to hear that it is in the foundation class.
I will start looking there. I knew my memory was weak on this, and I wanted to find it to get things more accurate.
There could easily be an error in my statement needing a comma.
*/*/*/*
As far as the Hayflick Limit goes, I always figured that is what the Tree of Live was all about, to keep the physical atoms tuned up.
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Nathan_Jr
"The Word takes the place of the absent Christ."
So, Christ isn't absent at all. Christ is within. I brought this up very early in this thread.
HOWEVER, Jesus, the Nazarene, the anointed, the perfect human being, God's only begotten is obviously absent in the sense that no one could expect to run into him at Starbucks. Sure. I don't think this is the issue.
What seems to be missing from this parsing is the subtle nuance of the implications of the proposition: The Word take the place of the absent Christ. (Maybe this should have been phrased more accurately according to mathematical usage: The Word takes the place of Jesus, the Nazarene.)
MOREOVER, what is this Word that replaces God's only begotten? Is it the Bible? God's perfect only begotten is replaced with... the Bible? A book put together hundreds of years later by hundreds of editors, redactors, interpolators, scribes? And not rightly divided for another 1000 years when Darby, Bullinger, and victor showed up? victor said the word is the ministry and the ministry is the word. What is this ministry? Obviously, it is The Way International, Inc. Or, is this not obvious?
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OldSkool
And that is the crux of it - nowhere in the Bible does it say anything takes Christ's place and no place ever is he referred to as absent - which carries the connotation of missing, lacking, not at an expected place, etc.
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OldSkool
The difference is, Mike, all of the people you mentioned actually CONFESSED their sins and God was faithful to forgive. Wierwille hid his sins, justified them with scripture, and used the congregation as his sexual playground. But you are ok with that, which basically equates to a tacit agreement that wierwille was ok to have sex with young women from the congregation.
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OldSkool
This ^^^^ right here!!!
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OldSkool
Mike - the concepts you are talking about from PFLAP are really easy to understand and I spent years working all of those books even during my time in-residence where I was studying around 30 hours a week or more. Im not getting it wrong, I disagree with you and PFAL especially. I wasn't exposed to Craig's shenanigans because the year I first went to HQ was the year he was fired. I am of the opinion that there was a significant movement of God underway when vpw stepped and co-opted other's ministries as his own, took them over, started keeping the money, etc.
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WordWolf
On top of that,
he plagiarized the Amplified Bible when he posted "his" "literal translations according to usage." He claimed he'd "worked the Word" and came up with renderings that were word-for-word identical to the Amplified Bible. The most egregious example, IMO, was Philippians 4:13. vpw: "I am ready for anything and equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me." Word-for-word, that's in the 4:13 rendering in the Amplified Bible.
Now, vpw would have you think it was a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE that the phrasing was identical. However, nearly all of us see that as just ripping off their work and taking credit for it, aka "plagiarizing." Any of you who heard Acts 29's song with this as their chorus should remember it: "I am ready for anything and equal to anything through him who infuses inner strength into me. Yes, I am more than a conqueror, a real super-conqueror, and nothing will separate God's Love from me."
If you go to Divinity School, specialize in preaching, and spend NO time on studying the Bible, you might be this much of a lightweight, also.
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WordWolf
You were being cagey, and you really had nothing beyond THAT and were hiding THAT for a day and a half? We all knew this, whether some of us currently agree with it or not. That was all basic in twi, and some of it was basic Bible, which is why you don't have to go to ex-twi or twi to get any or all of that.
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WordWolf
BTW,
it's a little embarrassing that we've gone over David, Bath-shebah and Uriah as much as we have, and you STILL maintain the same errors over the accounts.
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Nathan_Jr
He did the same thing when Dr. Higgins called him out for preaching like Bullinger wrote. So embarrassed and afraid of being found out as a plagiarizing fraud, he played dumb and presented it all as a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE, one that independently validated his teaching. (Error verified by error?)
This is a textbook narcissistic cop out ruse.
If anyone believes any of these REMARKABLE COINCIDENCES, please reach out. I've got some property to sell you.
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OldSkool
Oh...but...but....he didn't plagaraize he just collated all the material into one class to rule them all, claimed ownership, and copyrighted them. Dont ya know God sent him out to stea...I mean collect all these works together so we wouldn't have to?
It's revealing that when he was called out he didn't say that God told him by revelation to use Bullinger's material as his own. Instead he acted like it was all a REMARKABLE COINCIDENCE. Why didn't he speak up and explain the nature of his ministry was to glean what he could that hadn't been known for 2000 years...material he gleaned from existing sources...Im kind of being a jerk here to show how ridicoulous Mike's argument is that plagarisim is ok for VPW to do because it all belonged to God anyway.
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Nathan_Jr
Allegedly, according to his tombstone, his last narcissistic "poor me" plea, he couldn't be honest, even if he knew to be honest. He could only wish to be honest.
I wonder why God didn't reveal to the Christ within victor to reveal to his mind to motivate his walk to be honest?
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Mike
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Mike
Off topic.
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Nathan_Jr
Waysider, I've learned that if you are pretty sure, I can be pretty sure.
HOWEVER, doesn't the Hayflick limit contradict victor's claim that no one dies until one stops believing, and the cessation of believing only comes when one gets too tired to believe anymore?
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Mike
Yeah, the answers were right under you nose, weren't they.
I had this notion of how walking in hate towards a brother blinds the mind.
What I see happening here often is a religion of hate, and sin focus.
I think that if people were able to even temporarily disengage from their "mission" of blowing the whistle on VPW, which is really a sin focus perspective, then lots of things would become clear that were not.
I think if some were NOT so focused on anti-VPW stuff, they'd have been able to come up with the answers to those two questions. Either people ARE blinded by the negatives here, OR their understanding of PFAL was shallow and missed a lot of detail.
To severely and persistently criticize what one does not know well is unwise. I was being cagey in describing those two questions as moderately difficult. I meant for posters here, focused on negatives, they'd be moderately difficult. I will try these questions on some local grads who are just enjoying the Word and avoid the negatives like I try to do most of the time.
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Mike
Read closer. I was talking about the relatives of Uriah and their feelings.
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