It's a pleasure to discuss things with you here. I hope you didn't mind the flippant humor I used to initially respond. That was all the time I had, and I thought if I tried to get into any serious responding then, it would be too abbreviated.
You wrote: "I have been doing a bit of research and biblical study lately on the power of words - i.e. life and death being in the power of the tongue for one. What at one time appeared to me to be merely "good biblical advice" for living the Christian life - living by Christian principles to get along with others now goes a lot deeper in my understanding than just "maintaining a positive relationship" with other people."
In recent months I've turned to study this too, only in the BTMS. I was very sloppy with my spoken words for decades, and am only now realizing how powerful they've been, usually in defeating me. I'm learning to change that.
The Chapter that focuses on this subject in BTMS is "The Synchronized Life" and much can be gleaned there. I've also noticed a pertinent passage in GMWD, in the "Job" chapter. On pages 59 and 60 we read:
"If a sinner turns to God, he will get peace. When he puts God’s words in his heart, the man will be edified. I challenge you to start thinking about and believing this statement: Job 22:28: 'Thou shalt also decree a thing, and it shall be established unto thee....' In other words, if you declare a promise of God, it must come to pass. What a great promise this is when we use it in our everyday living!
Not only does this hit on declaring a positive confession, it also targets the Word, God's promises, as what we must target if the law of believing is to work for us. This latter point you bring up well, later in your post with these words:
"The only reason the law of believing would not work for anyone is because they tried to believe for something over which they have no authority."
And in another place in your post you write of the same topic:
"But the law of believing won't work outside that God given authority. The only reason the law of believing doesn't work (and why some want to put forth an argument there isn't even such a law) is because they tried to operate a spiritual law outside the authority God placed it - or out of their ignorance of what God has given us believers authority over. As VPW put it - find out what is available. To that I could only add, discover the authority God has made available to you as a born again son or daughter, and then walk in and use the authority God Almighty has given unto you. If you doubt, you will do without. If you believe, you will receive."
Yes! Believing must be focused on what God has placed on the "available list," i.e., His promises.
I've found many, many places where Dr taught exactly this, yet many have totally forgotten this important detail, both those who think believing is not a law, end even those who still know it is a law.
Thank you for your contribution here, WTH. I look foward to discussing more with y in the future as you have available time.
A few days ago you brought up a few points that I finally have some time to get to.
You wrote: "Some of Paul's letters are his opinions. His comments about marriage in 1 Corinthians 7 are his opinion."
Yes, but don't forget Paul's opinion counts more than most since he was hand picked by Jesus Christ. When he sat down to inspired writing and ministering to the Church Paul's opinions were not really his own, but God's. God had Paul use a figure of speech in that section to let people know that there were no hard fast rules that applied to everyone, in every situation. They were God-breathed verses that you refer to, but they were not absolute commandments from God, but more like general guidelines for most situations. To go against them, it would be wise to be sure it was an exceptional situation, and that no other sections of God's Word were being violated.
***
You wrote: "If PFAL is God's revelation as you say, why did vpw need editors to "clean" it up. Could it be the master teacher was a lousy speller?"
It was definitely the case that ALL of the men God selected to put revelation into written form were flawed individuals in many categories. NONE of them were the Son, and actually, all of them ministered to the Son, in spite of their flaws. Since Jesus Christ was not God, he had to be taught and learn just like any man. All of his "live" teachers were flawed human beings, which is all that God ever has to work with, outside of His Son. You should be thankful for this because YOU TOO are flawed, yet God is able to work a mighty work in you!
Because the PFAL revelation (like all written revelation) did not come in the form of divine dictation, where each word was there in linear sequence. We were taught this in several places, and I've posted on it often. It took time for ALL of the revelation to get into written form.
Plus, we were taught right up-front that proof readers and printers could interfere with the process some.
Plus, some of the changes from edition to edition were not "clean up" situations but changes in the revelation, also a topic we were taught right up-front and relatively often. The spiritual situation was changing as more and more of the revelation was getting to circulation, and various people were accepting it and growing with it.
***
You wrote: "You want to put to PFAL on a level above the Bible, go right ahead, God gave you a will."
If you ever have put a correction in your KJV or NIV or any version, then you are placing yourself above that VERSION of the Bible. That is not bad if the correction is accurate with the original revelation. Same with PFAL: In my mind I place it above any man-made version of the ancient scriptures, because I'm convinced God placed it there in reality.
***
You wrote: "But what if we dig deeper and find PFAL lacking. Many have and you still reject them. In fact, you won't even face their challenges. You dodge, distract and attack, but you don't face up to the problems they have brought up."
Yes I do, but they reject my solutions. I insist on using a different set of tools in working those challenges. I find their tools lacking,a nd that's the reason they come up with their disappointing conclusions when examining PFAL. I don't always find the answers using my tools according t their timetable demands, but why should I have to? I once used their tools and found them lacking in comparison to the ones I use now. I shopped and compared, but they did not.
The tools I insist on using are the same tools Dr taught us in the class we should use when working on the somewhat flawed KJV and critical Greek texts. The flaws in PFAL are much less, and using the same tools is easier. It's getting the mind to go against tradition that's hard.
***
You wrote: "The problems begin with vpw's biography and his extemporary statements made in times and places where you weren't. __ The 1942 revelation is doubted because there is no record of any snowfall in that area on that date."
We have had a witness here on GreaseSpot who saw in his lifetime TWO highly localized snow "storms" that were very dense, yet very small in the area they covered, like football field size. It is easy to see how such a "rogue wave" in land based weather might not make into the county weather recordings because it was small enough to escape the attention of whoever records the official weather events.
Why is it that no one here recalls that GreaseSpot witness' report but me? Shall I find it and paste it here for all to see again? Is anyone able or willing to bring back that evidence? Or is it only evidence that fits with the popular theory on the 1942 weather that Dr was lying that gets recalled?
Would you like me to bring up that discussion here? I don't want to bother. I have better things to do with my time.
***
You wrote: "The Tulsa story is questioned, because again there's no evidence to support the blizzard story either."
Here, for this subject, I have EVEN LESS time. Dr could have made a mistake on the time and date and that would settle it very easily. I don't see that this situation is critical for him to have been accurate. Then again, the weather report cold have a error. That happens to, you know. Then there are man other possibilities. Why bother? Unless you're hell bent on finding excuses to not taking him seriously. I see this story as relatively insignificant.
***
You wrote: "Some of his "sources" doctrinal beliefs are questioned because of their gnostic or non-Christian bases."
Questioned by whom? Not me. The Gnostics could have been right about some things! same with non-christians. Gads! The Gnostics could have been Christian too! Dr made no secret that he searched all over for the truth. It was the separation of truth from error that is important, not the source of the truth. God promised to help him with this separation process.
"Some of Paul's letters are his opinions. His comments about marriage in 1 Corinthians 7 are his opinion."
”Yes, but don't forget Paul's opinion counts more than most since he was hand picked by Jesus Christ. When he sat down to inspired writing and ministering to the Church Paul's opinions were not really his own, but God's. God had Paul use a figure of speech in that section to let people know that there were no hard fast rules that applied to everyone, in every situation. They were God-breathed verses that you refer to, but they were not absolute commandments from God, but more like general guidelines for most situations. To go against them, it would be wise to be sure it was an exceptional situation, and that no other sections of God's Word were being violated.”
A few days ago, on a different website, I was asked what I thought about marriage and divorce. I answered with Paul’s guidance.
Man did I get stomped on. Nobody wants to be confined to just a few marriages; they all just completely justified various rational for racking up as many marriages as you possibly can.
It does amaze me that our changing society does more to modify and dictate ‘Right and wrong’, more so than the Bible does.
“The problems begin with vpw's biography and his extemporary statements made in times and places where you weren't. __ The 1942 revelation is doubted because there is no record of any snowfall in that area on that date."
“We have had a witness here on GreaseSpot who saw in his lifetime TWO highly localized snow "storms" that were very dense, yet very small in the area they covered, like football field size.”
I have seen them. Perhaps it is just one of those things that G-d does for you as a ‘special treat’.
Once while driving Bonnie in a U-Haul coast-to-coast, we were on the freeway between Needles and Barstow, going through that horrible washboard section of 100 miles. When she asked me why they kept those washboards in the freeway when they built it, wouldn’t they have leveled the road and made it smooth? It was sunny and without a cloud.
I knew the answer and as we were talking about flash-floods, it began hailing. It hailed so heavy we could not see the road. I creeped to the top on the hill and parked. It shifted from hail to rain and then just as suddenly it all stopped. We looked and the road behind us as well as the road in front of us were both underwater. We waited a few minutes while the water sub-sided, and then continued on our trip.
Now was that just coincidence? Was G-d doing us a ‘special treat’? It happened just as we were talking about the possibility of such a thing happening. Did it happen? Were Bonnie and I ‘transported’ in our minds so that G-d could show us the event and we could be witnesses of it?
Nobody else was there, nobody else saw it. Does that mean it did not happen? I am witness, as is Bonnie.
quote:...it began hailing. It hailed so heavy we could not see the road. I creeped to the top on the hill and parked. It shifted from hail to rain and then just as suddenly it all stopped. We looked and the road behind us as well as the road in front of us were both underwater. We waited a few minutes while the water sub-sided, and then continued on our trip.
Very nice. I've had a few of those situations myself. Coming back from an Advanced Class Special one year we were driving west on I-80 and saw what looked like a mirage in the distance, kind of a fuzziness in the air. It looked like it was moving toward us. Turned out it was rain, moving like a wall toward us. We watched as it moved toward us, rained on us, and in about five minutes passed on.
So what. Neither Galen nor I are trying to use these weather phenomena to justify becoming the final arbiter of biblical truth.
The Tulsa story is even more suspect IMHO than the 1942 gas pumps story. In that one, airplanes were grounded, busses were cancelled, the city shut down. And nobody noticed it? What did he say tyo the Heart Magazine woman? Maybe he talked to angels? Right. And he couldn't have looked out the window?
You wrote: "So what. Neither Galen nor I are trying to use these weather phenomena to justify becoming the final arbiter of biblical truth."
Nor do I use these 3 reports to verify anything Dr said.
Actually, Lifted Up (if I have the right person) reported seeing it TWICE, once in Ohio and once in PA. So that's 4 citings of a small rogue hail or snow storm.
However, those who lean on the old weather records that claim it did NOT snow on certain occasions are leaning on flimsy data.
An old weather report cannot be used as evidence that Dr lied, because weather records only report the large scale or very local events. A rogue storm could easily miss mentioning in such a report, ESPECIALLY one in 1942 when long distance phone commnication was expensive and rare.
The Tulsa incident catches little of my attention. Little rides on it as far as I can see. Dr could have even remembered it wrong, and that wouldn't affect anything I regard as important. I could spend all kinds of time thinking up LOTS of ways that could have actually come down. The person Dr talked to could have had a vision, could have been talking about the wrong city, could have been an angel, ...etc. etc. etc.
I'll repeat: The four citings posted here PROVE that weather report archives can prove nothing negative about Dr's 1942 account.
There's no evidence he remembered it wrong. There was even an article that had a corps grad I believe research that weekend and found the hotel vpw stayed at. At no time did vpw ever say he has his facts wrong.
What the Hay was speaking of the power of words. This is a Jewish principal as well - "God spoke it into being". I certainly agree that the words we speak can have a great deal of power and influence, so we should do our best to choose them with care. However, I will not condemn myself for occasionally choosing poorly - which is what this principal was turned into by TWI.
"Not only does this hit on declaring a positive confession, it also targets the Word, God's promises, as what we must target if the law of believing is to work for us. This latter point you bring up well, later in your post with these words: "
Ah the law of believing. I think of it as the principal of believing. There is certainly great truth to this principal and it doesn't take a biblical scholar to figure out that if you take action to bring something to pass you greatly increase the likelihood it will happen. Similarly, if you think about it all day long and never get off your behind - it ain't likely to happen.
But again - it was taken to an extreme and used to condemn people. I can "believe" for my son to someday grow up and not need the medications he currently takes. It is certainly a promise from God - prosper and be in health. I can take a number of different actions to bring this to pass as well. But if it doesn't go down that way, I'm not condemning myself and I'm not condemning God. Sometimes things just don't turn out the way we want them to and I just have to accept that I may not understand why that is.
quote:The Tulsa incident catches little of my attention. Little rides on it as far as I can see.
Only his integrity. Wierwille didn't "get his facts wrong." He LIED about that snowstorm. That snowstorm was pivotal to his story about why he stayed in Tulsa.
There is more evidence that both snowstorms were lies than there is that either snowstorm took place. You can believe the gas pump story if you want, but considering the certainty of the Tulsa lie, I'm confident that the gas pump story was a lie too. I have no reason to believe it. The only evidence of the existence of a snowfall in the gas pump story is the testimony of a man proven to have lied about the Tulsa snowstorm.
Abigail, great post. What the Hay made some good points.
Dr never taught that sincerity should be subtracted from the equation.
I disagree Mike. I think he taught precisely this. How did he teach it? by minimizing the effect of it he reduced it to worthlessness. Sincerity is, seeking the Lord, in a nutshell that is. To this David, Jesus & Paul testified. And by the way, u make it sound like the way corps gave VPW a bad name, but he was the one who started them and was the chief conductor of there activities. doubltless, Mike , he had to be aware of his teachings and how they impacted his followers.
As far as rightly dividing the word of truth, heck , Peter said to desire "the sincere milk of the word" or something like that. Rightly dividing the word of God , is therefore conditional upon a persons heart. The word of God, Mike , divides our intents and motives. by letting it do so this is how we rightly divide the word of God. Moreover, it is not just studying the word of God that we rightly divide it, we must also study God and the movement of the holy spirit, and this is something VPW never taught, indeed he disdained it.
you know Mike I aint saying there arent some nuggets u cant take along the way of Christianity.
But to think that PFAL was an abundant one stop shopping for all ur knowledge of God needs is just perposterous. In addition, this is precisely the collective attitude fostered by many of vpw's teachings, as thou he had it and no one else did. This is simply not the truth.
I dont know what else to say to u Mike, except move on with the Lord. There's so much more to God than this PFAL stuff. It is not the work of some guy who preached the word since it hasnt been since the first century church. are all of us blessed by reading the Bible?, well of course and more so if we do it.
After I read this I realized how all too often we've fallen prey to other peoples emotional appeals, fallacies, manipulations, disinformation, misdirection and "political correctness" regardless if the person was involved in TWI or not.
When one becomes familiar with these "20 or so" misleading and deceptive arguments, and recognizes them for what they are, one can usually seperate the emotional response from the subject at hand.
As the article states, "Unknowingly making choices based on emotional appeals and logical tricks, one allows others to control their thinking, and their behavior, setting themselves up to be used for someone else's interests." I believe this article may be worth the read to many here.
I responded to a post of yours yesterday about your perceived contortions that I go through in maintaining my chosen belief system.
There's very little time this morning for me to even read, let alone respond to, any of your posts since then, nor anyone else's. (maybe later today) However, I've spent a lot of time thinking about what you said since then.
It is easy for me to see why you say that, about me going through great contortions, but I want to tell you FROM MY PERSPECTIVE, these things I do are very easy and even fun.
Things that I said about the marketplace and the expectations of rewards from other marketplace participants must really gall you! When I adopt (temporarily) YOUR PERSPECTIVE I can readily see that this is no way to think or behave. In fact, most of my work day is spent in my thinking from your perspective regarding physical goods, services involving labor and time, and intellectual property. I expect my customers to pay me in 99% of all the squeegee swinging I do, and not God. I only switch over to the Family of God method of reward in a few instances, mainly because it's so small right now, and even where it exists in numbere, most are not doing much real "family style" believing.
I see my participation in "normal" business as temporary.
It's obvious to me that in your belief system there is no God to reward men's efforts to bless others, and there is no God to give revelation, and thus be the ultimate owner of all intellectual property, as well as physical. You probably think that Abraham's family were pirates of sorts in the way they claimed the land promised to them by God, and unfortunately occupied by unbelievers. In your system, Abraham's family appropriation of that land (ultimately in Joshua) was just as as unrighteous as Dr's appropriation of the revelations God gave to people like Kenyon and Styles, and Leonard, and others.
My question to you is this: If you can temporarily adopt the frame of mind that there IS a all owning God, and one who gives accurate revelations to men, and that Dr was such a man, THEN can you see that from that frame of mind my contortions are graceful and beautiful gymnastics?
I'm not blowing my own horn here; the beauty of the arguments I present are not of my own doing. I haven't tried to copyright for my own use any of my writings here, because I see that they come from a source other than myself. I do very much delight in them, though. I consider this a sharing in God's Family.
Oakspear, your approach to most of what I write (like others here) is one of always looking for me to prove that which I have chosen to assume as already proved.
I cannot prove to anyone in writing that there is a God Who created everything and therefore owns it all, that He does give revelations, and that Dr received, put together by divine guidance, and put into written form the mother load of those revelations.
I don't try to do that. I assume it now, after 27 years of God proving it to me.
If you have it in mind that I am trying to prove my postulates, then my moves SHOULD look contorted to you.
If you think it through from my perspective, then this whole plagiarism thing totally evaporates, and it is YOU FOLKS HERE arguing against Dr that are contorted and twisted all out of shape in your protestations.
I was just wondering it you have yet taken the time to see this, if even only temporarily.
Wordwolf is referring to a thread started by Research Geek where RG said much the same thing that you just did (and rightly so for both of you) that many here need to step away from illogic and emotion based persuasion for a breather.
Your tip is helpful and a much needed reminder.
RG's thread is titled "Jeepers Sherlock. How'd you arrive at that?" and is at:
You may notice that on my thread many quotation marks and apostrophe marks are distorted. This occured a software glitch during a moving of the thread to a new forum.
Both threads were started and finished a little before you registered here.
Thank you for this third refresher course worth repeating again.
I've been busy with work and other responses, and also I've been collecting points scattered all through my e-mails and posting to bring to the table for the topics you brought up.
Are there any Bible believers here who can tell me why Joshua was right in taking the land from those who had occupied it for hundreds of years?
I brought up this issue in my post to Oakspear this morning a little above, but it really is a challenge to all the plagiarism vigilantees here, especially the Bible believers.
I think you got your Bible wrong. God gave it to Abraham, who took a small part of it for three generations, then lost it, and his family didn't fully claim it until many generations later with Joshua.
While they were gone from the land, those who lived there would have been given all the squatter's rights in the universe by those same courts that recognize intellectual rights today.
Before I saw the difference between God's ownerhip and man's ownership ...(which is like the difference between God's family and man's court/marketplace/academic circles)... I was very disturbed by Joshua's taking that land from those people who had lived there generation after generation for centuries.
Think about it. How would you have felt if you were one of those real estate "owners" who lost everything to Joshua's armies?
Sorry, I just don't have the attention span for those long posts like I used to, must have been all those times sitting through three-hour PFAL classes. :D-->
By the way Mike, I have looked at things from your perspective, and I often put myself in the shoes of those I disagree with to attempt to understand their point of view.
I do understand that all of your opinions spring from the premise that Wierwille's writings were god-breathed.
Good strategy, by the way, introducing the Israelites taking of the "promised land" to confuse the issue of plagiarism. While I'm not a bible-believer, I do not see them as the same.
I Peter 2:13-15> Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme or unto governers, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well. For so is the will of God, taht with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men
Do you want to argue that those verses are not applicible? I can see where it may be necessary to disobey the law when it conflicts with what God has to say, but I see no reason why God wpould have Wierwille plagiarize, when there were many legal ways to get the message across.
While I do view the records in the Torah and Joshua-Judges as the attempt by the Israelites to justify their invasion of a land that was occupied by other tribes, and the subsequent genocide of some peoples, conquering other nations by force was the way of the world, especially in those days.
The biblical record, while I don't personally believe that it's true, is at least plausible in it's attribution to God the command to conquer. Even assuming that Wierwille received revelation, it is not plausible to me that he would choose such roundabout mmethods to get his point across.
Another point: I don't look for you to prove anything. I know you won't. Just continuing to wait for a reason why you believe as you do that makes sense to me.
God promised the land to Abraham, Jacob left it, but God promised Moses a land flowing with milk and honey.
Many of the nations Joshua fought were cousins of Israel, who should have helped, but instead fought with them and were defeated. The land was poisoned by sin and Israel was the tool of judgment God used to cleanse it.
Some, like Rahab, saw the handwriting on the wall and came to faith. She and her family was saved and she became part of the earthly Christ line.
The signs and wonders given by God to confirm the promise were done in public before thousands.
Those who didn't believe were destroyed.
But not all, as Israel grew weary of the battle and allowed some of the others to live. They returned later as tools of judgment on Israel.
Or perhaps Israel simply believed this was what God's will was and the real lesson here is Genocide has been going on since time began and it is wrong.
The lesson for today's Christian is that God wants us to root all sin from our lives. The battle is not flesh and blood and we are never told to kill indiscriminately to "cleanse" an area.
Joshua was told to do this deed and he was faithful to a point to do it. We may find it distasteful, but from what some archaeologists have found, the people of Canaan were no angels and death may have been the merciful thing to do.
Again the lesson here is that for the Christian, God wants us to clean all the sin out of our lives.
I don't understand the hows and whys God commanded all these people to be slaughtered. Faith is a messy proposition and involves much thought, study and prayer.
I do know that Christians are not called to do to unbelievers, what Israel was called to do.
But look at the practical side. If God had promised Abraham's descendants this land and other people were living there, what else could they do but forcibly move them?
And we can see from Rahab's story, that is was possible for these people to come to terms with God and avoid destruction — A good argument against universalism.
And the survivors of these people groups were later used by God to destroy Israel. Funny, how no one decries that action.
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Mike
Hello What The Hay,
It's a pleasure to discuss things with you here. I hope you didn't mind the flippant humor I used to initially respond. That was all the time I had, and I thought if I tried to get into any serious responding then, it would be too abbreviated.
You wrote: "I have been doing a bit of research and biblical study lately on the power of words - i.e. life and death being in the power of the tongue for one. What at one time appeared to me to be merely "good biblical advice" for living the Christian life - living by Christian principles to get along with others now goes a lot deeper in my understanding than just "maintaining a positive relationship" with other people."
In recent months I've turned to study this too, only in the BTMS. I was very sloppy with my spoken words for decades, and am only now realizing how powerful they've been, usually in defeating me. I'm learning to change that.
The Chapter that focuses on this subject in BTMS is "The Synchronized Life" and much can be gleaned there. I've also noticed a pertinent passage in GMWD, in the "Job" chapter. On pages 59 and 60 we read:
"If a sinner turns to God, he will get peace. When he puts God’s words in his heart, the man will be edified. I challenge you to start thinking about and believing this statement: Job 22:28: 'Thou shalt also decree a thing, and it shall be established unto thee....' In other words, if you declare a promise of God, it must come to pass. What a great promise this is when we use it in our everyday living!
Not only does this hit on declaring a positive confession, it also targets the Word, God's promises, as what we must target if the law of believing is to work for us. This latter point you bring up well, later in your post with these words:
"The only reason the law of believing would not work for anyone is because they tried to believe for something over which they have no authority."
And in another place in your post you write of the same topic:
"But the law of believing won't work outside that God given authority. The only reason the law of believing doesn't work (and why some want to put forth an argument there isn't even such a law) is because they tried to operate a spiritual law outside the authority God placed it - or out of their ignorance of what God has given us believers authority over. As VPW put it - find out what is available. To that I could only add, discover the authority God has made available to you as a born again son or daughter, and then walk in and use the authority God Almighty has given unto you. If you doubt, you will do without. If you believe, you will receive."
Yes! Believing must be focused on what God has placed on the "available list," i.e., His promises.
I've found many, many places where Dr taught exactly this, yet many have totally forgotten this important detail, both those who think believing is not a law, end even those who still know it is a law.
Thank you for your contribution here, WTH. I look foward to discussing more with y in the future as you have available time.
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Mike
def59,
A few days ago you brought up a few points that I finally have some time to get to.
You wrote: "Some of Paul's letters are his opinions. His comments about marriage in 1 Corinthians 7 are his opinion."
Yes, but don't forget Paul's opinion counts more than most since he was hand picked by Jesus Christ. When he sat down to inspired writing and ministering to the Church Paul's opinions were not really his own, but God's. God had Paul use a figure of speech in that section to let people know that there were no hard fast rules that applied to everyone, in every situation. They were God-breathed verses that you refer to, but they were not absolute commandments from God, but more like general guidelines for most situations. To go against them, it would be wise to be sure it was an exceptional situation, and that no other sections of God's Word were being violated.
***
You wrote: "If PFAL is God's revelation as you say, why did vpw need editors to "clean" it up. Could it be the master teacher was a lousy speller?"
It was definitely the case that ALL of the men God selected to put revelation into written form were flawed individuals in many categories. NONE of them were the Son, and actually, all of them ministered to the Son, in spite of their flaws. Since Jesus Christ was not God, he had to be taught and learn just like any man. All of his "live" teachers were flawed human beings, which is all that God ever has to work with, outside of His Son. You should be thankful for this because YOU TOO are flawed, yet God is able to work a mighty work in you!
Because the PFAL revelation (like all written revelation) did not come in the form of divine dictation, where each word was there in linear sequence. We were taught this in several places, and I've posted on it often. It took time for ALL of the revelation to get into written form.
Plus, we were taught right up-front that proof readers and printers could interfere with the process some.
Plus, some of the changes from edition to edition were not "clean up" situations but changes in the revelation, also a topic we were taught right up-front and relatively often. The spiritual situation was changing as more and more of the revelation was getting to circulation, and various people were accepting it and growing with it.
***
You wrote: "You want to put to PFAL on a level above the Bible, go right ahead, God gave you a will."
If you ever have put a correction in your KJV or NIV or any version, then you are placing yourself above that VERSION of the Bible. That is not bad if the correction is accurate with the original revelation. Same with PFAL: In my mind I place it above any man-made version of the ancient scriptures, because I'm convinced God placed it there in reality.
***
You wrote: "But what if we dig deeper and find PFAL lacking. Many have and you still reject them. In fact, you won't even face their challenges. You dodge, distract and attack, but you don't face up to the problems they have brought up."
Yes I do, but they reject my solutions. I insist on using a different set of tools in working those challenges. I find their tools lacking,a nd that's the reason they come up with their disappointing conclusions when examining PFAL. I don't always find the answers using my tools according t their timetable demands, but why should I have to? I once used their tools and found them lacking in comparison to the ones I use now. I shopped and compared, but they did not.
The tools I insist on using are the same tools Dr taught us in the class we should use when working on the somewhat flawed KJV and critical Greek texts. The flaws in PFAL are much less, and using the same tools is easier. It's getting the mind to go against tradition that's hard.
***
You wrote: "The problems begin with vpw's biography and his extemporary statements made in times and places where you weren't. __ The 1942 revelation is doubted because there is no record of any snowfall in that area on that date."
We have had a witness here on GreaseSpot who saw in his lifetime TWO highly localized snow "storms" that were very dense, yet very small in the area they covered, like football field size. It is easy to see how such a "rogue wave" in land based weather might not make into the county weather recordings because it was small enough to escape the attention of whoever records the official weather events.
Why is it that no one here recalls that GreaseSpot witness' report but me? Shall I find it and paste it here for all to see again? Is anyone able or willing to bring back that evidence? Or is it only evidence that fits with the popular theory on the 1942 weather that Dr was lying that gets recalled?
Would you like me to bring up that discussion here? I don't want to bother. I have better things to do with my time.
***
You wrote: "The Tulsa story is questioned, because again there's no evidence to support the blizzard story either."
Here, for this subject, I have EVEN LESS time. Dr could have made a mistake on the time and date and that would settle it very easily. I don't see that this situation is critical for him to have been accurate. Then again, the weather report cold have a error. That happens to, you know. Then there are man other possibilities. Why bother? Unless you're hell bent on finding excuses to not taking him seriously. I see this story as relatively insignificant.
***
You wrote: "Some of his "sources" doctrinal beliefs are questioned because of their gnostic or non-Christian bases."
Questioned by whom? Not me. The Gnostics could have been right about some things! same with non-christians. Gads! The Gnostics could have been Christian too! Dr made no secret that he searched all over for the truth. It was the separation of truth from error that is important, not the source of the truth. God promised to help him with this separation process.
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Galen
"Some of Paul's letters are his opinions. His comments about marriage in 1 Corinthians 7 are his opinion."
”Yes, but don't forget Paul's opinion counts more than most since he was hand picked by Jesus Christ. When he sat down to inspired writing and ministering to the Church Paul's opinions were not really his own, but God's. God had Paul use a figure of speech in that section to let people know that there were no hard fast rules that applied to everyone, in every situation. They were God-breathed verses that you refer to, but they were not absolute commandments from God, but more like general guidelines for most situations. To go against them, it would be wise to be sure it was an exceptional situation, and that no other sections of God's Word were being violated.”
A few days ago, on a different website, I was asked what I thought about marriage and divorce. I answered with Paul’s guidance.
Man did I get stomped on. Nobody wants to be confined to just a few marriages; they all just completely justified various rational for racking up as many marriages as you possibly can.
It does amaze me that our changing society does more to modify and dictate ‘Right and wrong’, more so than the Bible does.
“The problems begin with vpw's biography and his extemporary statements made in times and places where you weren't. __ The 1942 revelation is doubted because there is no record of any snowfall in that area on that date."
“We have had a witness here on GreaseSpot who saw in his lifetime TWO highly localized snow "storms" that were very dense, yet very small in the area they covered, like football field size.”
I have seen them. Perhaps it is just one of those things that G-d does for you as a ‘special treat’.
Once while driving Bonnie in a U-Haul coast-to-coast, we were on the freeway between Needles and Barstow, going through that horrible washboard section of 100 miles. When she asked me why they kept those washboards in the freeway when they built it, wouldn’t they have leveled the road and made it smooth? It was sunny and without a cloud.
I knew the answer and as we were talking about flash-floods, it began hailing. It hailed so heavy we could not see the road. I creeped to the top on the hill and parked. It shifted from hail to rain and then just as suddenly it all stopped. We looked and the road behind us as well as the road in front of us were both underwater. We waited a few minutes while the water sub-sided, and then continued on our trip.
Now was that just coincidence? Was G-d doing us a ‘special treat’? It happened just as we were talking about the possibility of such a thing happening. Did it happen? Were Bonnie and I ‘transported’ in our minds so that G-d could show us the event and we could be witnesses of it?
Nobody else was there, nobody else saw it. Does that mean it did not happen? I am witness, as is Bonnie.
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Mike
THANKS Galen!
That makes TWO witnesses the nay-sayers have to ignore now.
I think the first one was Lifted Up.
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Oakspear
So what. Neither Galen nor I are trying to use these weather phenomena to justify becoming the final arbiter of biblical truth.
The Tulsa story is even more suspect IMHO than the 1942 gas pumps story. In that one, airplanes were grounded, busses were cancelled, the city shut down. And nobody noticed it? What did he say tyo the Heart Magazine woman? Maybe he talked to angels? Right. And he couldn't have looked out the window?
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Mike
Oakspear,
You wrote: "So what. Neither Galen nor I are trying to use these weather phenomena to justify becoming the final arbiter of biblical truth."
Nor do I use these 3 reports to verify anything Dr said.
Actually, Lifted Up (if I have the right person) reported seeing it TWICE, once in Ohio and once in PA. So that's 4 citings of a small rogue hail or snow storm.
However, those who lean on the old weather records that claim it did NOT snow on certain occasions are leaning on flimsy data.
An old weather report cannot be used as evidence that Dr lied, because weather records only report the large scale or very local events. A rogue storm could easily miss mentioning in such a report, ESPECIALLY one in 1942 when long distance phone commnication was expensive and rare.
The Tulsa incident catches little of my attention. Little rides on it as far as I can see. Dr could have even remembered it wrong, and that wouldn't affect anything I regard as important. I could spend all kinds of time thinking up LOTS of ways that could have actually come down. The person Dr talked to could have had a vision, could have been talking about the wrong city, could have been an angel, ...etc. etc. etc.
I'll repeat: The four citings posted here PROVE that weather report archives can prove nothing negative about Dr's 1942 account.
.
.
.
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def59
But Mike,
There's no evidence he remembered it wrong. There was even an article that had a corps grad I believe research that weekend and found the hotel vpw stayed at. At no time did vpw ever say he has his facts wrong.
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Abigail
Thought I'd toss in a couple of comments. . .
What the Hay was speaking of the power of words. This is a Jewish principal as well - "God spoke it into being". I certainly agree that the words we speak can have a great deal of power and influence, so we should do our best to choose them with care. However, I will not condemn myself for occasionally choosing poorly - which is what this principal was turned into by TWI.
"Not only does this hit on declaring a positive confession, it also targets the Word, God's promises, as what we must target if the law of believing is to work for us. This latter point you bring up well, later in your post with these words: "
Ah the law of believing. I think of it as the principal of believing. There is certainly great truth to this principal and it doesn't take a biblical scholar to figure out that if you take action to bring something to pass you greatly increase the likelihood it will happen. Similarly, if you think about it all day long and never get off your behind - it ain't likely to happen.
But again - it was taken to an extreme and used to condemn people. I can "believe" for my son to someday grow up and not need the medications he currently takes. It is certainly a promise from God - prosper and be in health. I can take a number of different actions to bring this to pass as well. But if it doesn't go down that way, I'm not condemning myself and I'm not condemning God. Sometimes things just don't turn out the way we want them to and I just have to accept that I may not understand why that is.
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Raf
Only his integrity. Wierwille didn't "get his facts wrong." He LIED about that snowstorm. That snowstorm was pivotal to his story about why he stayed in Tulsa.
There is more evidence that both snowstorms were lies than there is that either snowstorm took place. You can believe the gas pump story if you want, but considering the certainty of the Tulsa lie, I'm confident that the gas pump story was a lie too. I have no reason to believe it. The only evidence of the existence of a snowfall in the gas pump story is the testimony of a man proven to have lied about the Tulsa snowstorm.
Abigail, great post. What the Hay made some good points.
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sky4it
Mike:
Your comment:
Dr never taught that sincerity should be subtracted from the equation.
I disagree Mike. I think he taught precisely this. How did he teach it? by minimizing the effect of it he reduced it to worthlessness. Sincerity is, seeking the Lord, in a nutshell that is. To this David, Jesus & Paul testified. And by the way, u make it sound like the way corps gave VPW a bad name, but he was the one who started them and was the chief conductor of there activities. doubltless, Mike , he had to be aware of his teachings and how they impacted his followers.
As far as rightly dividing the word of truth, heck , Peter said to desire "the sincere milk of the word" or something like that. Rightly dividing the word of God , is therefore conditional upon a persons heart. The word of God, Mike , divides our intents and motives. by letting it do so this is how we rightly divide the word of God. Moreover, it is not just studying the word of God that we rightly divide it, we must also study God and the movement of the holy spirit, and this is something VPW never taught, indeed he disdained it.
you know Mike I aint saying there arent some nuggets u cant take along the way of Christianity.
But to think that PFAL was an abundant one stop shopping for all ur knowledge of God needs is just perposterous. In addition, this is precisely the collective attitude fostered by many of vpw's teachings, as thou he had it and no one else did. This is simply not the truth.
I dont know what else to say to u Mike, except move on with the Lord. There's so much more to God than this PFAL stuff. It is not the work of some guy who preached the word since it hasnt been since the first century church. are all of us blessed by reading the Bible?, well of course and more so if we do it.
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What The Hay
Here is an interesting article that was published by: JHWhite Publishers regarding the Power of Words.
The Power of Words
After I read this I realized how all too often we've fallen prey to other peoples emotional appeals, fallacies, manipulations, disinformation, misdirection and "political correctness" regardless if the person was involved in TWI or not.
When one becomes familiar with these "20 or so" misleading and deceptive arguments, and recognizes them for what they are, one can usually seperate the emotional response from the subject at hand.
As the article states, "Unknowingly making choices based on emotional appeals and logical tricks, one allows others to control their thinking, and their behavior, setting themselves up to be used for someone else's interests." I believe this article may be worth the read to many here.
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WordWolf
We discussed some of these in 2003/2004. Where were you?
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Mike
Oakspear,
I responded to a post of yours yesterday about your perceived contortions that I go through in maintaining my chosen belief system.
There's very little time this morning for me to even read, let alone respond to, any of your posts since then, nor anyone else's. (maybe later today) However, I've spent a lot of time thinking about what you said since then.
It is easy for me to see why you say that, about me going through great contortions, but I want to tell you FROM MY PERSPECTIVE, these things I do are very easy and even fun.
Things that I said about the marketplace and the expectations of rewards from other marketplace participants must really gall you! When I adopt (temporarily) YOUR PERSPECTIVE I can readily see that this is no way to think or behave. In fact, most of my work day is spent in my thinking from your perspective regarding physical goods, services involving labor and time, and intellectual property. I expect my customers to pay me in 99% of all the squeegee swinging I do, and not God. I only switch over to the Family of God method of reward in a few instances, mainly because it's so small right now, and even where it exists in numbere, most are not doing much real "family style" believing.
I see my participation in "normal" business as temporary.
It's obvious to me that in your belief system there is no God to reward men's efforts to bless others, and there is no God to give revelation, and thus be the ultimate owner of all intellectual property, as well as physical. You probably think that Abraham's family were pirates of sorts in the way they claimed the land promised to them by God, and unfortunately occupied by unbelievers. In your system, Abraham's family appropriation of that land (ultimately in Joshua) was just as as unrighteous as Dr's appropriation of the revelations God gave to people like Kenyon and Styles, and Leonard, and others.
My question to you is this: If you can temporarily adopt the frame of mind that there IS a all owning God, and one who gives accurate revelations to men, and that Dr was such a man, THEN can you see that from that frame of mind my contortions are graceful and beautiful gymnastics?
I'm not blowing my own horn here; the beauty of the arguments I present are not of my own doing. I haven't tried to copyright for my own use any of my writings here, because I see that they come from a source other than myself. I do very much delight in them, though. I consider this a sharing in God's Family.
Oakspear, your approach to most of what I write (like others here) is one of always looking for me to prove that which I have chosen to assume as already proved.
I cannot prove to anyone in writing that there is a God Who created everything and therefore owns it all, that He does give revelations, and that Dr received, put together by divine guidance, and put into written form the mother load of those revelations.
I don't try to do that. I assume it now, after 27 years of God proving it to me.
If you have it in mind that I am trying to prove my postulates, then my moves SHOULD look contorted to you.
If you think it through from my perspective, then this whole plagiarism thing totally evaporates, and it is YOU FOLKS HERE arguing against Dr that are contorted and twisted all out of shape in your protestations.
I was just wondering it you have yet taken the time to see this, if even only temporarily.
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Mike
What the Hay,
Wordwolf is referring to a thread started by Research Geek where RG said much the same thing that you just did (and rightly so for both of you) that many here need to step away from illogic and emotion based persuasion for a breather.
Your tip is helpful and a much needed reminder.
RG's thread is titled "Jeepers Sherlock. How'd you arrive at that?" and is at:
http://gscafe.com/groupee/forums?a=tpc&s=9...6921#8506056921
Then I resurrected it with "Part II: Jeepers Sherlock. How'd you arrive at that?" and is at:
http://www.gscafe.com/groupee/forums?a=tpc...42&m=5036027881
You may notice that on my thread many quotation marks and apostrophe marks are distorted. This occured a software glitch during a moving of the thread to a new forum.
Both threads were started and finished a little before you registered here.
Thank you for this third refresher course worth repeating again.
The Power of Words:
http://www.aniota.com/~jwhite/words.html#TRUTH
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Mike
HCW,
I haven't forgotten your post.
:)-->
I've been busy with work and other responses, and also I've been collecting points scattered all through my e-mails and posting to bring to the table for the topics you brought up.
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Mike
Are there any Bible believers here who can tell me why Joshua was right in taking the land from those who had occupied it for hundreds of years?
I brought up this issue in my post to Oakspear this morning a little above, but it really is a challenge to all the plagiarism vigilantees here, especially the Bible believers.
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def59
I don't think you can make a case over property rights on this one.
Joshua was reclaiming what was lost, while vpw was taking from someone else.
Joshua followed God's command to rid the land of unbelievers. Vpw followed Satan's command to rid his ministry of critically thinking people.
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Mike
def59,
I think you got your Bible wrong. God gave it to Abraham, who took a small part of it for three generations, then lost it, and his family didn't fully claim it until many generations later with Joshua.
While they were gone from the land, those who lived there would have been given all the squatter's rights in the universe by those same courts that recognize intellectual rights today.
Before I saw the difference between God's ownerhip and man's ownership ...(which is like the difference between God's family and man's court/marketplace/academic circles)... I was very disturbed by Joshua's taking that land from those people who had lived there generation after generation for centuries.
Think about it. How would you have felt if you were one of those real estate "owners" who lost everything to Joshua's armies?
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Oakspear
Mike:
Sorry, I just don't have the attention span for those long posts like I used to, must have been all those times sitting through three-hour PFAL classes.
:D-->
By the way Mike, I have looked at things from your perspective, and I often put myself in the shoes of those I disagree with to attempt to understand their point of view.
I do understand that all of your opinions spring from the premise that Wierwille's writings were god-breathed.
Good strategy, by the way, introducing the Israelites taking of the "promised land" to confuse the issue of plagiarism. While I'm not a bible-believer, I do not see them as the same.
I Peter 2:13-15> Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme or unto governers, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well. For so is the will of God, taht with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men
Do you want to argue that those verses are not applicible? I can see where it may be necessary to disobey the law when it conflicts with what God has to say, but I see no reason why God wpould have Wierwille plagiarize, when there were many legal ways to get the message across.
While I do view the records in the Torah and Joshua-Judges as the attempt by the Israelites to justify their invasion of a land that was occupied by other tribes, and the subsequent genocide of some peoples, conquering other nations by force was the way of the world, especially in those days.
The biblical record, while I don't personally believe that it's true, is at least plausible in it's attribution to God the command to conquer. Even assuming that Wierwille received revelation, it is not plausible to me that he would choose such roundabout mmethods to get his point across.
Another point: I don't look for you to prove anything. I know you won't. Just continuing to wait for a reason why you believe as you do that makes sense to me.
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def59
Maybe you don't know your Bible.
God promised the land to Abraham, Jacob left it, but God promised Moses a land flowing with milk and honey.
Many of the nations Joshua fought were cousins of Israel, who should have helped, but instead fought with them and were defeated. The land was poisoned by sin and Israel was the tool of judgment God used to cleanse it.
Some, like Rahab, saw the handwriting on the wall and came to faith. She and her family was saved and she became part of the earthly Christ line.
The signs and wonders given by God to confirm the promise were done in public before thousands.
Those who didn't believe were destroyed.
But not all, as Israel grew weary of the battle and allowed some of the others to live. They returned later as tools of judgment on Israel.
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Abigail
Or perhaps Israel simply believed this was what God's will was and the real lesson here is Genocide has been going on since time began and it is wrong.
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def59
The lesson for today's Christian is that God wants us to root all sin from our lives. The battle is not flesh and blood and we are never told to kill indiscriminately to "cleanse" an area.
Joshua was told to do this deed and he was faithful to a point to do it. We may find it distasteful, but from what some archaeologists have found, the people of Canaan were no angels and death may have been the merciful thing to do.
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Oakspear
Ah, I get it, genocide is good if God says it's okay. Hamas and Al Qaeda use similar arguments today.
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def59
Again the lesson here is that for the Christian, God wants us to clean all the sin out of our lives.
I don't understand the hows and whys God commanded all these people to be slaughtered. Faith is a messy proposition and involves much thought, study and prayer.
I do know that Christians are not called to do to unbelievers, what Israel was called to do.
But look at the practical side. If God had promised Abraham's descendants this land and other people were living there, what else could they do but forcibly move them?
And we can see from Rahab's story, that is was possible for these people to come to terms with God and avoid destruction — A good argument against universalism.
And the survivors of these people groups were later used by God to destroy Israel. Funny, how no one decries that action.
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