Ham

FIFTEEN regions, heh heh heh. If the numbers of folk involved would justify having fifteen regions, I think it would be more miraculous than the miracle of the loaves and fishes.. Maybe that's just a new name for who knows what.. Or maybe its just wishful thinking. "well, if we just pretend that we are really a highly attended, loving, professional group, people will come". But three V.P.'s- makes a little sense IF you are a rather large, diverse, PROFESSIONAL organization. One organization I am involved with has three vice presidents, one for educational type services, one that does a LOT of legal work, and one that oversees international operations. This is a rather large organization, with many hundreds of thousands of VOTING members. All three of these VP's each have at least a PHD in something, and at least in something RELEVANT to the position they are in. Wonder what kind of qualifications these new VP's in podunk ohio have? "Well, I could balance a checkbook the last time I tried..." "Well, I can yell and scream when I don't get my way..." But here they are, taking a big, bold new step into the twenty first century, ptooie. Nothing but window dressing. Gotta keep up with the Joneses- if THEIR corporation has to have 3 VP's, well then OURS oughta.. gotta keep up appearances, you know.." Good grief. What kind of work will they have to do? Only thing I can think of- it's gonna take at least three VP's to make sure Rosie and Donna's rears are kissed properly.

Overseeing OHIO? Good grief. Not even a region.. Sounds like "dear" old harv is on the fast track out of there. I wonder how he'll adapt to the real world, where he can see what the stupid, insane mandates did to the flock.

Same here. I guess I still believe in believing, just in the right context.

Oh yes.. "you say it, you believe it, and God will bring it to pass". What in the dadburned world is "it"? "Well, its Da Word".. If its that simple, I think people would have NO PROBLEM clearing out hospitals and sanitariums by saying it and believing it.. Life would be so stinkin boring. Anything you want is yours, at your beck and call.. After about fifty years or so of wine, schnapps, music and naughty women folk, I would be kind of worn out, heh heh. I think that kind of thinking is fairly intoxicating. Seems people get jazzed up just THINKING they can perform the magic ritual, and get whatever they want.. whether it actually works or not. I think its addictive. I have seen the most angry side of people when I challenged them to just verify if what they "believe" really works, or not. Give me some details! Anybody can talk.. "You say it, you believe it, and God will bring it to pass" is only valid in a few instances, at least in my opinion. Maybe that's why old Loy and others got so mean. Finally realized that they were not able to jump over debils with a single bound, that they were not anywhere near the men they convinced themselves they were supposed to be.

Three V.P.'s. Hummmmm. lets see.. Could it be ole Rosie is egotistical enough to think she has to raise up several people to be able to take over her "job"? Hmmm. One to handle planning, one to coordinate legal matters, and one to "coordinate" Donna.

Wonder if Moneyhands is the best that she could come up with to represent Da Vey to the Brittish- God have mercy on them..

Too bad, we won't have good ole harve to kick around anymore, heh heh. Makes me wonder though- if the vice prezzes have a vote to oust "poor" Rosie..

If he was up to bat, you would be accurate in saying "good eye".

Well, one-eyed jacks are wild. In some games, anyway.

I find it interesting that God does not really outline what the good works in Ephesians are, at least the good works that we are called to do- just that they are prepared for us. Before I greatly offend, or offend further- let me say that if your full-time calling is to herald the gospel- run classes, do this, do that- so be it. Personally, I can't object with that. But I heard a local preacher several sundays back- he said something almost "revolutionary"- that maybe God calls the vast majority of his children to a SECULAR calling. Chemists, engineers, etc. etc. and that if they have the impression that they are somehow a second rate christian for doing it, the church has failed to get the true message to them. We love to tell the story, but maybe God wants us busy doing something else along the way..

"Grace based works"- now there's a novel concept, heh heh. But that really is a pretty good observation, Temple Lady.. Sometimes I ask that question: what are you DOING with your redemption? I see a LOT of action going on that does not involve going door to door witnessing, running classes and generally being an over-zealous religious bigot in Christ's name. "And the result of this is we put our trust and lives in God's hands knowing that if the answer to our requests is no or not exactly what we expected it is becuase the answer is part of a larger and greater plan GOd in His wisdom has for us." Usually this is gold instead of the brass we were trained to yammer about claiming all the time..

One poor guy here was screamed at for hours for- guess.. Singing too loud. Showed he must've been egotistical or something, they said. And NO ONE was allowed to sing any harmony. Everybody had to sing the same dreadful melody.. What were they thinking? I didn't put up with that long, it was only a matter of weeks before I left for good.

For me its been about eighteen years- but boy, does that bring back a few memories, and smells- whoo. For such moments I threatened (lovingly of course) to take the rascal down to the river and dunk said stinky end in the river, all while singing "lets all go down to the river"

I read several accounts where the guy involved did not know what to do with it after he received it until after he received it. "Go, and sin no more", "Tell no man", "go make the offering Moses commanded.." All well AFTER the big event took place. So maybe having all this stuff lined up to pry a miracle out of God's hands isn't quite so right. Even believing. Sure, believing "works". "Whosoever shall say to this mountain..." but what if the Almighty likes the mountain right where he put it? Nothing's gonna happen. I think believing, or even more properly faith- has more of a spiritual nature. Not so much an action of the human mind, but that is obviously a necessary part. As corny as it may sound- and opposite to what I learned in PFAL- I think there is a little bit of truth in the statement the God gives faith to be healed, or to work miracles- if God does not energize it, all the mental gymnastics in the world is not going to produce the results you think God "owes" you.

Sure that was the auditorium? Sounds more like a guy in a sanitarium.. Maybe that would explain it. The guys in the little white suits explained it all to Loy..

Or when hook shots finally reigned supreme..

Maybe it was when he realized that he finally got an upside down W on every major street corner..

Maybe he got tired of waiting for them to carve his face in granite at Mount Rushmore, called it good enough..

Probably because both names of him and his organization were in every cult book labelled from A to Z..

Who knows- maybe reality will come like a flash- "You mean to tell me that they actually will PAY us to put up with the abuse???" Heh heh.

Ah yes. And the pay scale is so much higher..

Got thinking about this on another thread. The five sacred keys we were taught, know what's available, how to receive, what to do, need and want parallel, and God's ability equals Gods willingness- I now have more of an opinion that these are not actual keys to receive ANYTHING. At best, they are five OBSERVATIONS. One or more can be observed in biblical accounts, but where does it say if you mimic these OBSERVATIONS that you can acquire the moon, or anything else for that matter? No, I'm not trashing them entirely. I still think there is something to be learned in all this- just not quite what it was hyped up to be. Maybe it's kind of like a traffic accident. You may observe that the driver ran a red light, or was driving on a slippery road. Another driver may have been preoccupied with hellions in the back seat or a cell phone conversation- or maybe another incident, the tires had no tread left. OK. Suppose you are out on a slippery wet night, screaming at the kids in the back seat, all while trying to listen to your buddy on the cell phone, and you inadvertantly blow through a red light, squealing on bald tires. Does this GUARANTEE that you will have an accident? NO, not in my opinion. I would venture to say that in MOST of the miracles recorded in the bible, the folks involved did not have the luxury of five or ten seconds to figure all this stuff out. I put forward that perhaps these are not the "keys" that they were touted to be. Perhaps good observations, but observations nonetheless.

I have DREAMED of the day the former limb guy here walks up to "witness" to me in a public setting, heh heh. But I never received any of these famed letters of threat. Probably was far enough outside of the inner circle that they thought it might get them in trouble.

That's the scary part of it- they are about all that's left in any kind of leadership positions. "No $**t, it was THE M*rk W*ll*ce of Way International fame, who held a managerial position with Orkin here in the Cleveland area just prior to taking on the Region job." Small world, Catcup- heh heh.

Galen, at least that explains half of life, heh heh. Interesting that He "sends" it. My understanding was that sun and rain are GOOD things.