Twinky

It really makes me wonder why people who disagree with TWI's current policies continue to stay involved. She loves God very much, that's obvious to me.

Perhaps for the same reason people hang around in churches even though they are not trinitarians. They get some of their needs met, prayers answered, are in a nice group, and don't know what else is out there (for TWIers, daren't look).

After PoP, TWI demanded the return of all their books and materials. This was everything to which TWI held copyright or published through American Christian Press. Eventually and only after the threat of legal proceedings, a huge crate of publications - VPW books, class materials, and the like - were all returned to HQ.

The legal proceedings that were threatened included threats to complain to the Charities Commission and have them investigate WayGB or WayUK or whatever it was called at that point (others were later appointed loyal to TWI but not as a legally incorporated organisation, and it became the other, Way UK or WayGB).

But no doubt by then CG had copied (or simply retained) at least one copy of every publication so that he could plagiarise the plagiariser.

The High Way: Too right the loss.

But Job 42: the restitution. And it's not from within TWI

What’s so scary is that all this stuff is true…

My first thought was that this girl was M&A’d (marked and avoided, Maryon; perhaps you might know this as excommunicated) and wanting to get back into fellowship because she feels guilty or … whatever negative they put on her.

To show that she is worthy of consideration for the M&A to be lifted, she needs to show that she can still bring people in.

Actually, they are likely to accept the people brought in and still reject the person M&A’d.

When they got round to me and I was all alone, I happened across a really nice man who just showed me how much he enjoyed my company, very patient, quietly looked after me as much as I would allow (which wasn’t very much) and was never confrontational. After all the years of hardness, it was almost frightening not to be confronted if I said something that might be controversial and I found myself almost provoking fights (which he wouldn’t be drawn into). It worried me enormously that he was behaving in the matter set out in the latter half of Eph 4; that I was seeing this in an outright unbeliever and not at all in the people of the Way. Actually I thought it was a devil spirit trick, that he was nice to me. (Screwed in the head, or what?)

Being with him didn’t heal me but it gave me a breathing space to start to collect myself together. It was only confronting the lies and deception, the bad things that TWI did and the way that “love” had failed to be tender but had become hard as rock, that healed me. I didn’t know about GSC in those days.

If you stick with her, Maryon, be kind, gentle, patient, and expect some emotional ups and downs. She has to learn to think again, and really let the love of God start flowing in her life. It was there and probably still is. But it has a whole heap of junk piled on top. If you can help her get rid of the junk you will be a friend indeed.

Doesn't have to be bacon dripping, just a little (very little, enough and no more that the puddings don't stick) of the dripping from the roast beef.

If you leave the batter to stand (you can leave as long as overnight) the puddings rise more.

The oven needs to be very hot (smoking slightly blue) then tip in the batter. You can make one big one but lots of little ones are better. And as Chas says, don't open the oven door.

You can experiment with different thicknesses of batter, but generally you don't want it too thick.

Brit delicacy (not for those with cholesterol problems): Leave the dripping that you need to make gravy, to stand and separate. Spread the fat when solid on thick chunks of bread. Can't say I like it but I know many who love it.

Ex10: Enjoy the sticky toffee pudding (licking my lips in anticipation!)

Chas: What is a dover beater? Sounds like an implement for chastising fish!

2 Corinthians 10:5 "Casting down every imagination and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ."

or is it

2 TWI CP1 "Casting down every imagination and every high thing that exalts the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of TWI."

I remember hearing LCM go on about, “If you can’t believe for healing, you can believe that God works in the doctor or surgeon” to fix what is necessary. Think that was on a Corps night.

But generally, I saw lots of physical needs - long-standing believers with various disabilities which made, say, mobility very difficult.

Praying for and expecting more or less instant healing wasn’t what happened, as the norm. DrtyDzn sums it up just about right.

The insurance thing I do recall: but back out on the field, my WC leaders very quickly disabused me of the idea that certain insurances were not necessary and made sure that where it ought to be obtained, it was.

Since getting out in a very short time I’ve seen more genuine miracles of healing than ever seen in the long years in TWI.

Hey Eagle, I had one of those under my bed too! I didn't know it couldn't pass through bed covers, just thought it couldn't see me if I hid under the bedclothes!

Hey, Beautiful, have an absolutely tremendous birthday. You sure are fun to know!

Got taken to a Salvation Army presentation last night, a sort of nativity story with music and the nativity cast members played by the Junior Band and a choir, sorry, songsters, at the front. All very well until the MC for the evening turned round and indicating the songsters (all in the SA uniform) and said, let's thank the Corps for their hard work this evening...

Brainfreeze and chills up the spine for quite some little time after that...

I like to keep a journal at specific times. I note “activities” in a diary (one liners, about, perhaps, places I visit). But my thinking is done with a journal. It helps to crystallize what’s going on and see direction.

As has been said, we were required to maintain a journal in rez. Sometimes it was very hard – too much to do, too little time to do it. Sometimes it just records the myriad activities of that day (or some of them). But I always tried to look at what I had learned, or been challenged in, that day.

Some of the entries (I looked at some of my journals recently) are about things that are laughable – oh, the things that they got us wound up about in rez! How hard we all tried to “be our best” and to “do God’s will” (ie, whatever activity, however bizarre, in rez) . I wonder why I didn’t just take it a bit more laid back (oops, not a good choice of expression, but I don’t mean in that way!) or just tell ‘em they were being daft .

Some of the posts record the good times (and there were good times) and fun activities, that I had forgotten about.

We were told, things will happen in rez and you won’t know or understand why at the time. It might be ten years down the road that you realise why something happened.

Well, that ten years is up and passed. And yeah, I am coming to some interesting realisations. Those journals might be worth reviewing, if I can get past the annoyance at the pettiness of some things that happened. If nothing else – how things should not be done.

In the last few months, I have gone through an immense period of head- and heart-healing and great blessing, and the current journal records that. I don’t want to forget this truly awesome time. Sometimes, my journal entry might just be a copy of an email to or from somebody, or a post I made on GSC (which has been very healing) or something I saw on GSC with my own comments in the margin. When time allows, it’s nice to sit down with a pen and a blank sheet of paper and say, okay, what did I learn today? Sometimes nothing is in my mind until the pen hits the paper and then I might write quite a lot, thoughts, emotions, motives, excitement, discouraging bits, good bits, bad bits, reflections, how someone helped me, or I helped someone - but really it’s (in my mind) quietly talking things over with God. And he often gives me a bigger picture on something. Very calming and settling. It’s quiet time with me and God. Perhaps that’s how Paul felt when he wrote his epistles (not that my scrawlings are on that level).

It’s not the “you must” from in rez but the delight in seeing how my life has improved so very much lately. I want to capture that great joy. It is soooo different from the bottom of the deep dark cold well where I lived (call that living??) before I got healed. I demanded the restitution from Job 42 and – oh Lordy – have the windows of heaven opened!

Also in my journal are specific things I want or need: like my new job (start on Monday, yippee ). I wrote out my “wish list” in the back of the journal a few months ago, and just happened across it a couple of weeks ago when I knew my employer was going to offer me the job. No prizes for guessing that every single thing on the “wish list” was encompassed in the new job. And some extras.

Share what’s happened? You bet. Share the actual handwritten words on the page? Never!

oops!

I never believed JC=G before TWI and I don’t now.

I have had many good friends over the years who think I am completely deluded and they pray for me to believe JC=G (!). This has been from several friends who do not know each other. They do, however, deeply love God and do their best to abide by what he says (as they understand it).

It is fair to say that God has worked bigtime in their lives. You can see it in the blessings in their lives, and how things they pray for do happen (apart from my “conversion”!). They have meekness and tenderness for God in their hearts and are willing to change their minds as they grow in grace. As far as I know, these people pray to God (the Father) and not to God the Son, or God the HS – or they have never actually turned their minds to who or what they are praying to. Or maybe it’s the lot of them??

It is also fair to say that God has worked bigtime in my life and in the lives of others who I know do not believe JC=G. You can see it in the blessings in our lives, and how things we pray for do happen. These people also have meekness and tenderness for God in their hearts and are willing to change their minds as they grow in grace.

From this, the conclusion seems inevitable that to honor God and do one’s best to observe what he says to the best of one’s ability is all that is required. And God is not particularly bothered if we don’t believe correctly about JC – maybe a little miffed, but not enough to refuse to bless his kids. It’s not that big a deal to God or to JC. Perhaps that’s where “grace” covers.

I am pondering this and reading other materials outside of TWI publications. There are some good discussions in Doctrinal.

Don’t have any answers – just know that God looks on the heart and seeks to bless his kids and, heck, we all believe something wrong, none of us has a completely complete knowledge of God.

T-Bone - this kinda ties in with what you said. You were posting while I was writing it:

Ex10, you appal me. Thought you had better taste. How can ANYONE enjoy those dreadful mushy peas? (ducking for cover!)

Tom, recipe is In the Kitchen/Leftovers

Shepherd’s pie (added by request)

This is the archetypal “left-overs” meal. The only essentials are the meat and the mashed potato topping. Traditionally the meat is left-over lamb (hence the “shepherd” part of the name, but it works equally well with other meats, eg, beef.

The recipe is very flexible and quantities and cooking times can be to suit. If the meat is thoroughly heated, the potato can just be piled on top and you can finish it under the grill/broiler.

Shepherd’s pie

8-12 oz cooked meat

1 oz dripping or fat

1 onion

2 tomatoes

Good pinch mixed herbs

Seasoning

¼ to ½ pint stock/brown sauce/gravy (dep on personal preference)

1 lb mashed potatoes

1 oz butter/margarine

Method:

Cut meat into neat pieces or mince up.

Heat dripping or fat.

Fry the finely-chopped onion in the fat for 3 mins

Add the skinned tomatoes and the meat. Heat together for 3 mins

Add stock/sauce – the amount depends on how firm or soft you like the mixture.

Put into a pie dish and cover with the mashed potato. Fork the mashed potato over or pipe it – you don’t want a smooth layer, but it should be slightly rough-looking with little peaks.

Dot with the butter or margarine, to help it to brown.

Bake for 35-40 mins @ 375-400 F / Gas mark 5-6 until top is crisp and brown.

Variations:

• Sprinkle top with a little grated cheese (not too much) instead of butter.

• Add a carrot to the meat mixture (NB this is not a “meat and veg” pie so don’t overdo the vegs

• For lamb, add mint, tarragon and/or basil.

• For beef, try a little mustard or a small pinch of curry powder instead of herbs.

If you substitute pieces of fish for the meat, you get Fisherman’s pie

Hi Tom, welcome to Europe! Take three shepherds, marinate for two days in brown ale, mince up with onions, peas and overcooked carrots, and ...

Just joking. No harm intended to any human being. It's a left-over lamb dish (hence the shepherds). Will post something tomorrow on the main thread In the Kitchen.

Okay you Brits.

There's a topic in Open / In the Kitchen about regional dishes. When you're brought up with a particular kind of food, it's hard to think what's unique about what you're used to. And of course in the UK there are also regional differences. So let's have our own sub-topic on this one.

Specialties:

Roast beef and Yorkshire pud

Fish and chips

Processed peas

Toad in the hole

Welsh:

Laver bread

Bara Brith

Scottish:

Haggis

Please, nobody mention black pudding (yeuk).

Chas: All good stuff, yum especially the Yorkshire (batter) puds!

So did you also eat laver bread (seaweed bread, for Americans) and bara brith?

Christmas dinner for us was also usually roast beef. With Yorkshire pud. And English mustard (very hot) or Dijon mustard (for those who like it more mellow). And horseradish sauce, if you want to blow the top of your head off and steam clean the sinuses (Linda Z: nothing too bland about that!!).

My great grandfather was apparently a big fan of beetroot - cooked and eaten like any other root vegetable, with a meal and not just part of a salad. This did not pass into family food history. Actually it's quite nice like that, but beetroot takes so long to cook that it's scarcely viable.

My dad's mother was English, so at her house we ate very plain meat and potatoes meals. In fact, neither my grandmothers nor my mother (Brits on both sides of the family) used much in the way of spices. I don't think I had fresh garlic until I left home!

Did you know that the most popular dish in Britain now (according to lots of "surveys") is said to be - curry!

And Britain has spawned a number of curry-type dishes that are unique to Britain, not known in their original cultures.

And anyway, it's what you do with the meat and spuds that matters. Brits aren't known by their French friends as "les rosbifs" (the roast beefs) for nothing!

Now... freshly picked runner beans, steamed, straight off the plant... with or without butter and with or without black pepper... mmm-mmm.

Cod (in crispy batter) and chips (french fries). Not the mushy peas, though (yeuk).

Toad in the hole, anyone? With bubble'n'squeak?

We all missed the elephant in the room, folks. What about these words: "the way" ?

Might be used perfectly casually - "Can you tell me the way to [K-Mart/the pool/the next town...]"

or

"What's the best way to [do this job/handle this problem/pay for this item...]"

Still sometimes makes me do a double take and look carefully at whoever says it.

And then it's, "Mind, come back here!!" (to quote somebody dear -not- to our hearts) so that I can actually pay attention to what's being asked and not freeze for a few seconds with eyes large and defensive, while Waybrain takes over temporarily - firstly, wondering if the person asking had used the "proper" terminology.

Happy birthday, and thanks for all you do in the GSC.

Invite him home with you for a cup of coffee. You will just carelessly have left your computer up and running with Grease Spot Cafe on screen with some relevant article (say, about some marriage ruined by TWI involvement). You will casually invite him to pick up something from near the screen...

... and he'll probably run screaming from your house pursued (in his opinion) by every devil spirit in the area.

Well. Maybe something like that will be worth a try. :unsure:

Hope they can sort things out between them and escape with their marriage intact.

Well, there's always Sue, Grabbit & Runn

and a real firm I came across - Crook & Co

(you'd think a lawyer would change his name by deed poll or something!)

Sticky Toffee Pudding

(This is a totally weird looking recipe, especially the bit about making the sauce. But "stick" with it!)

The recipe is pretty good natured and flexible in the amounts.

For Americans, please note 1 oz is about 25g and 500ml is about 22 oz liquid, rather more than a US pint.

For the sponge:

100g dark muscovado sugar

175g Self Raising flour

125ml full fat milk

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla extract (I never bother)

50g unsalted butter

For the sauce:

200g dark muscavado sugar

25g unsalted butter in blobs

500ml boiling water

Preheat oven to Gas Mark 5/190deg C and butter a 1 1/2 litre (3 pint?) capacity pudding dish.

Combine 100g sugar with flour in large bowl.

Pour the milk into a measuring jug, beat in the egg, vanilla and melted butter and then pour over sugar and flour, stirring with a wooden spoon to combine. Put into dish.

Sprinkle over the 200g sugar and dot with butter. Pour over the boiling water and transfer carefully to the oven. Set timer for 45 minutes, though pudding may need 5 or 10 minutes more.

Top of pudding should be springy and spongy when it's cooked, underneath is a rich sticky sauce.

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Comment:

You will need a fairly large dish as the water on top stands proud before it's cooked; and the mixture rises quite a lot after cooking.

We made this with chopped up dates mixed into the sponge mixture, which added a really delicious flavour. No doubt other fruits (sultanas?) or perhaps nuts could be added to give extra interest to the flavour.

The vanilla essence could be substituted for coffee or other essence to complement other fruits and the taste of the sticky toffee sauce.

Okay, in rez sometimes for breakfast we had "5 grain" or "7 grain", a sort of porridge. I loathe "ordinary" oatmeal porridge, but I LOVED the seven grain.

Anybody got a recipe that I can play with?