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It's too early for me to share the personal and painful details of my life. I can tell you that with the support of God , my family, a psychiatrist, and a psychologist, I've been able to move forward. Although I don't resent TWI, I wouldn't recommend anyone attend TWI unless it's ONLY to receive information about Romans 10:9 and then leave in peace. Where do I start? Lies about the ministry's origin, lies about the content they teach, plagiarism, abuse. Leaders believe they are chosen by God because of VPW's misuse of Romans 13, and those leaders believe that since they are called by God, they can do whatever they please. If you are with the ministry, they will be with you; if you walk away from the ministry, all those friends.. will stop talking to you. They use people, they don't love them. They "research" the WORD OF God only to the extent that it doesn't contradict VPW. (CULT-RED FLAG) They have abused thousands of people around the world, and now that Martindale and Rivenbark are gone... they go around telling people to "forgive" and move forward with the "Love of God in the renewed mind in manifestation." It's not an honest organization that publicly and openly acknowledges mistakes; they only do so privately (at some point the will do) TIME TO COME HOME uhh? They don't teach people not to harm; They don't teach people not to harm; they demand that victims forgive abusers, and they keep the abusers in power. If you want details, send me a PM. God Bless U, PD: Vern seems like a good man, with good intentions. But he doesn't have the strength to weed out TWI's sectarian practices. (I met him 3 times)

“The Word, the Word, and nothing but the Word.” -vpw Nothing. But. The Word. NOTHING. So, what is the Word? It’s whatever victor paul wierwille says it is. I was “taught” victor did all the “research” so I wouldn’t have to - oh, how he toiled 18hrs/day for years. Such selfless sacrifice on his part, I was “taught.” I should be so grateful. Oldies is right. It’s like any other religion. (TWI is indeed religion, no matter what they claim.) They are dogmatic, yet call themselves a “research ministry.” This is one of many contradictions illustrating their mathematic inexactness and scientific imprecision. No doubt they are nice. Super nice, I bet. Friendly, I’m sure. Be friends. Go to their church (yes, it’s a church), fellowship with them. Whatever. If anyone in TWI came on this board wanting to talk, I suspect they would be welcome. Wierwille apologists have always been welcome and free to post inexhaustible platitudes. Some here might have questions for them. I know I do.

Oops! This is the first thing that will get you in hot water. Make that boiling water. The Word takes precedence over everything... not God, not Christ, not family, not your friends. "You have no friends when it comes to The Word." (VPW). They don't come right out and say it, but, in essence, they worship The Word. "You have to put The Word above everything else." "Having done all, you just stand on The Word and don't let anyone budge you." (VPW). Oh, I could go on and on about how they exalt The Word (at, least, their interpretation of it) above all else, but I probably shouldn't, I have to go shopping for dental floss today..

lol. I almost forgot how privately interpreted this was.

And as the sun set slowly in the west and the cows mosied toward the safety of the barn... EDIT: Oops. I forgot the part about the smiling driver, waving gleefully as he sped past and continued down the road.

To shine LIGHT on the darkness we've seen. Why would that be a bad thing?

Raf can answer for himself, obviously, but I read his post as just showing you around - what's available, how to get it, and what to do with it once you've got it. Different forums for different topics. Discuss whatever you want. Only politics is out of bounds. Avoid politics and you're good.

For those of you asking. The Way is no longer supporting "tithing", in their STS they talk about "GIVE" and in the last fellowship I participated I was encourage to give freely. So they are not longer asking for 15% even for graduates of the advanced class ( I was) The Way has changed in the recent years? For sure, ¿ real changes? Not at all. TWI is bringing back the "good old years", uploading VPW teachings on their Youtube Channel, offering basically the same content. And hiding some of their core teachings in order to look more appealing to a younger crowd. Good people in TWI? For sure, you can find good people everywhere. You'll receive a lot of love in the beginning (Love-bombing uhh) ; as long as you don't commit to the ministry, they won't ask much of you. When you become deeply involved with TWI, the hell and abuse begin. And even though LCM's abusive tactics are no longer as prevalent, the emotional and psychological manipulation persists. I left TWI a little over two years ago. If you have any question about current TWI, just ask. Have a good day!

I was never personally involved with IHOPKC. I learned of Bickle when a couple of his books were part of a Vineyard church library I was overseeing. If you type "bickle" in the search box above, you will see my posts about them. If you want to follow up on any of them, you can do it through those threads.

Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to (softly) challenge them on belief(s) you hold that challenges their narrative. LOL...

VPW suggested that. VPW said of PFAL "try it.. if it works for you, you have an answer, if not, kick it." But like ALL other religions, TWI has and have inviolate positions and interpretations that make it difficult if not impossible to believe something contrary. Stray from the narrative and you will be out quicker than a fly on s.... They aren't open to change, LIKE ANY OTHER RELIGION. I personally experienced this in TWI through the tithing teaching when I questioned them up and down on it, they were unmovable, and ready to defend the VPW narrative to the end. I really and truly wish I can say they wanted us to read, study and interpret the bible for ourselves but my experience differs. And don't think for a minute that the Catholic Church doesn't do likewise. How long do you think I'd last there if I preach PFAL there? LOL x 2 ...

This has been my experience as well, the last few years attending mass. No legalism. No compulsion. Haven't heard a peep about "tithing", "abundant sharing".... although it's always "available" when folks come around. Nobody watches you to see if you're giving. Nobody cares.

Nice words Joyful Sound :)...Me and my family prospered after LEAVING TWI...I put it down to seed sown years previously. We still hold onto much of the 'Word' and occasionally listen to some of LCM's latest teachings (have learnt even more, newer stuff from that) but do not fellowship with any particular church as almost always within the first 5 minutes they're preaching trinity, or the dead are alive or some such diatribe...Psalm 119:104 all day...!!

Way Productions...God Awful Hillsong music...inspirational, transformational...

My fellowship commander, an eternally committed Corps grad, did not "teach" me to follow Jesus Christ. Instead, he "taught" me to stand on the shoulders of victor. Jesus Christ was merely a name to be uttered - the name of a bastard Jew far away in absentia. The one who claims to speak for God is surely the one who does not. No one can jump over a barn.

It's possible to conflate the two- mainly because vpw himself worked hard to conflate the two, and convinced a lot of us, ONCE, that it was so. vpw plagiarized his way through BG Leonard's class, JE Stiles' book, and everything Bullinger ever printed, and made a comfortable living off of it, claiming he was learning all this from God Almighty. When some of these people came up, vpw claimed he "got the error out" of their works- which was a bogus claim. That gave him materials from people who understood God Almighty more than he did- although if they made a mistake, he just copied it over because he lacked the depth of understanding to "get the error out" for real. But he could sure claim he did- and people bought it. The real results came when vpw hijacked the hippies. He read about the legit Christians at the House of Acts- prayer, healing, REAL movements of God- and all by naive young folk whom he could hoodwink. So, he did. He went there, and performed his full act. Trying to serve God, and sure nobody would lie or deceive them, they became convinced- based on all the plagiarized stuff they thought he'd learned on his own- that this man was the great power of God. In this manner, he bewitched them. He managed to convince some of them to join twi. This was how he managed to strangle a new movement of God Almighty among the people, a move that the Devil no doubt applauded. He took people who were already serving God, seeing miracles, etc, and turned them into twi's sales force, quenching the spirit, and making them into income sources. Those people recruited people to twi, and those people they recruited did the same. Any real movement of God's people in twi was entirely due to those people. So, there are people who had godly experiences in twi- due to those people- and were told it was due to vpw, which was all a smokescreen. They still tried to serve God, but inadvertently advertised a movement of a man. Once those people started arriving, vpw was able to put into practice some things he'd always wanted to but never had the chance- namely, rape and molestation. He was able to put together really elaborate social structures to find him victims, groom the victims, isolate the victims, and cover up anything, and silence the victims if they seemed ready to come forward. Confusing twi for a " reformation of the church" is possible if one has no idea what happened, why, or who did what. The House of Acts was real, vpw was a fraud. In twi, both interacted. It's that simple.

You mean, like when Jesus overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and chased away the folk that made the temple big business? Jesus walked with God (and, technically, with Jesus) and he was vocal about some of the crimes done on his watch.

If you're so motivated, please send $20 via the donate button. If you're not, no one is going to bust any part of you over it. But, yes, it costs money, and donations are cheerfully accepted and rarely solicited. BTW, I've been to groups where I was never pushed for donations. Of all things, I was involved for a time with a Catholic church group that never hit me up for donations....although we once did a project to feed homeless, and we did it out-of-pocket. Nobody asked me to, but I opened my pocket.... and in that instance, it actually made a big difference.

In my opinion, The Way is not a reformation of the church, first century or otherwise. It's the remnants of a devious MLM scam, built on lies and plagiarism. I'm not bitter, just stating the factual reality. Not only is the vast majority of the material content plagiarized, it's filled with inaccurate assertions, such as "the four crucified", the so-called "law of believing", roosters that crowed differently 2,000 years ago, special bar mitzvas for illegitimate boys, inerrancy of scripture, bogus tithing requirements and on and on and on. The Way is and was a lot of things. A reformation of the church is not one of them.

Sorry to hear that... well, we know now there's abundant life outside of TWI. Thank you for posting and please continue!

Welcome. Lulu. You may find that there's different types of people here. Some are no longer Christian- partly because twi really made a bad case for Christianity. Some of us are still Christian, and even still believe the Bible's really important (Hi, that includes me!). Some people are Christians with varying beliefs- either far from what twi taught, or pretty close to what twi taught, all depending on our journeys. None of those positions is required to post here. You're welcome either way, and posting friendly is appreciated. Goodness, we've had so many discussions about how foolish, unbiblical and nonsensical the no-debt policy was. Even vpw's uncle Harry claimed you should never go into debt EXCEPT FOR A HOUSE OR A CAR.

Hi there, so glad you found Undertow helpful. Thanks for reading it and passing it along. Cheers! For more of my work, check out blogs on the cult topic and on fundamentalism that are stored on my website: Cults Archives | Page 11 of 11 | Charlene L. Edge (charleneedge.com) Fundamentalism Archives | Charlene L. Edge (charleneedge.com)

It only took four years for TWI to destroy my confidence and replace it with a catastrophic codependence. My family, my faith and my will to live were all sacrificed in servitude to this dastardly cult. I'm very happy to be here today. It took 30 years for me to regain my confidence and sense of self and purpose. I can never forgive what those monsters in sheep clothing did to so many of us. Sure, I chose to stick around for a while but one can only take so much BS and ego. Thank you for listening.

Don't really know where else to put this story... Move if needed. Well, taking a deep breath, and sharing here a brief history of the sexual abuse I experienced in what I had thought was FINALLY a place I could be cared about and where I could escape the "mental hospital" and recover from the breakdown I was experiencing in Jan '74. At the time was a Baptist folk-song-loving hippie, abusively married, VISTA-volunteering-in-very-racist-very-rural-southern-VA as a college graduate from New England. Starting in the Family Camp where I took PFAL as a brand new believer in NY that summer, a series of sexual encounters gradually began; I had been raped twice, as a 12 year old and on my honey moon night, but had kind of buried the memories, so was particularly vulnerable. At the CF&S Family Camp in OH three weeks later, my boundaries were further broken by the class, altho I was healed of some of the bondage and trauma surrounding sex. However, the pendulum was set to swing into the license-to-sin culture of the way that has been brought to light here and other places. Guess my path was pretty predictable- it involved being sexually abused by two young leaders and then engaging in sex with believer bros, then two guys I was "witnessing" to, etc. There were other incidents that were not (what's a cool way to say full-on intercourse?) Was invited on the motor coach corpse week '80; vpw dropped his pants, but I was again in mental distress after my interim year, and he ended up talking about my next year's assignment as we cuddled, thank You GOD! So from the Advanced Class '79 (July?) to the summer of my final WOW year in '83, I had 10 full sexual encounters/ relationships along with other activity that the culture sanctioned. (Was too "out of it" to protect with safe sex precautions, but my female system had shut down either due to the running, all the birth control pills in traveling hippie times, or the traumas, so there you had that...) When I finally kind of realized that I was becoming an abuser, I said Enough! These are my brothers and I am their sister, and this is wrong. I mentioned in another post how I learned that sexual abuse was A-OK with vpw et al; and of course along with it came the message that women were less than, that it was fine for men to help themselves to the young women, etc. 1 CORINTHIANS 7:1 WAS TAUGHT IN CF&S, YET. . . . . What's new?? A counselor labeled the way as misogynistic... Guess so?! Could of course, talk about how the way contributed to very good things in my life like meeting my future h, having my children with him, making wonderful friends, receiving some deliverance, etc. BUT! I am in full-time trauma recovery from many things, among them the cult aspects of the way and the sexual abuse. All for now I think... Blessings to all!

Former Jr. Corps member Steven Perez of Family Corps 9 shared a photo album of his recent visit to the Indiana Campus in Rome City. Good stuff both photos and captions. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?vanity=dtension&set=a.10161220720074418

One of the most liberating things when I left TWI was the realization the Sh1t Happens.