Watered Garden

Osama bin Laden's last Facebook post:

"BRB, there's someone at the door!"

You're right BA, I remember - didn't all the unmarried students have to live in dorms for the first year or two?

Perhaps Ohio State would indeed have been a better choice or Capital (Bexley, not Berkely) but they had plenty of money.

Athens was an interesting place. There was a population of 10% exchange students, many from the middle east. One time (perhaps BA remembers)some of them organized a protest march is support of Ayatollah Khomeini, who had captured the US Embassy and was holding hostages. Unfortunately for them, their route passed by a row of fraternity houses, and a melee ensued. Then there was "The Wall" a site where individuals could unofficially paint graffiti messages for all to see.

And that strange smell of leaves burning wafting through the air on Friday and Saturday nights...Halloween downtown...

It was a long time ago, but an interesting experience to live there.

No analysis here, just a thought:

"The devil can quote Scripture for his purpose. An evil soul producing holy witness is like a villain with a smiling cheek, a goodly apple rotten at the heart."

Shakespeare, "The Merchant of Venice."

My condolences for the loss of your sister-in-law.

I took PFAL because I knew what the Methodists said about God and I knew what the Catholics said about God. I wanted to know what God had to say about Himself.

The irony was - He was without sin and could have cast the first stone, but chose not to.

Yes, I did indeed paraphrase the Apostles' Creed. It was fairly succinct and I added some thoughts of my own.

Socks, all I see at the top is the poll results. That's okay, though.

And then there are "Christian" churches who exclude women from fully sharing, who exclude anyone who is not in complete agreement with their teachings from the faith or exclude most Christians from heaven on some man's formula or other (TULIP comes to mind here).

If Christians could see that the Body of Christ is bigger and more important then their church, their creed, their race, their politics, their nationality, that the Body of Christ is in all who confess His Name and believe God raised Him from the dead, that would be Christianity in action. I attend a church but I will never belong to another religious organization.

Okay, this is probably off topic. Sorry.

I think perhaps the vote mechanism is closed as I am not able to utilize it so I will answer the poll here:

I am a Christian. I am a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was conceived of the Holy Spirit, borne of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried. I believe that on the third day He arose from the dead, appeared to the disciples and others, and ascended into heaven where He is seated at the right hand of God the Father. I believe He is coming to earth again in due time and will judge the quick and the dead.

I do not believe churches or philosophies matter. I believe that if individuals who call themselves by His Name will seek Him diligently and have a personal relationship with Him their lives will change in ways they never dreamed of.

The 1979 Advanced Class Special was in Athens, Ohio at Ohio University. It was two weeks long. The Saturday in the middle was called "Specially Mine in '79" and was open.

Athens is a relatively small town except for the college and this was in the summer. Merchants who usually closed their stores and restaurants for the summer stayed open and made a fortune.

The next spring, I had an acquaintance who was friends with some of the businessmen call me to ask if another special was planned for the summer of 1980. They wanted to know in advance whether to plan a summer vacation.

We actually had to move the summer of 1979 to accommodate folks. One of our "housemates" was the BL and she filled the house where we lived with her kin and friends. We subleased a smaller house and she sent people to stay with us there.

It was a really big stress for those of us who lived/attended college there. Not all of the "townies" were pleased. I do remember there was a nice restaurant on the corner of Union Street and Richland (?) called Town House and they were not expecting the "Specially Mine" influx of even more people so they were swamped. Mr. Garden and I ate there frequently, so we got up and helped bus tables until they could call in reinforcements.

There are many more facilities and cities that were better suited to handle a huge crowd like that. I'm not sure what TWI was thinking when they picked OU.

Bland, boring and promoting indigestion - sound familiar?

Ham, that is just awesomely wonderful! Good for you! I'm a type I-A, so to speak and have an insulin pump. Joined a wellness center, working out 4-5 times a week and loving it, feeling much better.

JohnIAm, when was your last hemoglobin A1C? The symptoms of lightheadedness may have been hypoglycemia or low blood sugar. That would simply mean your metformin needed to be cut in half.

Diabetes is called a silent killer because the side effects sneak up on you. All the symptoms you describe, thirst, weight loss, blurred vision are those of uncontrolled diabetes. The lightheadedness after being on Metformin was a symptom of low blood sugar.

These "specials" are usually scheduled over what is traditionally a family holiday. Word in Business and Professional conferences used to be scheduled over Thanksgiving holiday.

The given reason was that hotel rates are cheaper then, but the underlying reason is to keep the attendees from going home to a family gathering, realizing how much more satisfying it is and how real the love of family is, and never coming back.

"Builds more harmony in the home"? Not hardly.

I yearned for garlic and onions, and REAL salsa, all three months.

One of the big, huge, eyeopeners for me occurred before the formal start of FWC XX. Because we had a child in school, we had to be there early and were granted the privilege of being "volunteers" or unpaid staff. Because we garden and can, we got to process tomatoes that were being harvested. First they were rinsed in ice cold water, then cooked. They were NOT to be picked over and the rotten spots removed but stems and rotten ends and all went into those big cookers. I just knew they were wrong but got yelled at twice.

Then, we got to make salsa with NO onion and NO garlic. "This isn't salsa." I stated. "Well, we can't put onion and garlic in the salsa because Rev. Martindale hates onions and despises garlic." was the reply.

I was so stunned. One man decides what we get to eat? Why can't he have his own little batch made just for him? Call it "president's reserve" or something fancy sounding?

I was immediately dragged through the brier patch, so to speak. Who was I to question the man of God? If Rev. Martindale hates onions and garlic, I better line up my thinking with that of the MOGFODAT!

What BS! What micromanagement!

I'm so glad I'm going to church on Easter Sunday instead of some lousy, stressful "advanced" class!

I'm pretty sure there was some kind of government investigation regarding TWI helping him and I have a friend who was involved and I will try to find out more. It seems this individual was told to lie to the FBI or whoever if asked certain questions, perhaps "Did this TWI organization tell you to campaign for him?"

I will see if the person remembers anything.

When we were briefly in the FWC in 1993, I began to suspect his rantings and ravings were a symptom of insanity, but pushed that thought away and tried to replace it with "he is soooooo spiritual." One 19th WC woman made it to Gunnison to do the LEAD thing, had a couple of bad asthma attacks and refused to go out into the wilderness, thinking, no doubt, she might have a fatal attack while out there. (My son has asthma and acute attacks are scary as heck).

You would have thought she had committed high treason from his .... fit. He had someone in charge put her up in a motel room until it was time to hitch hike home, since he didn't want the likes of her contaminating the holy grounds of Gunnison. At the Corps Night hookup while that group was off campus learning to rappel, etc, he had a mother-loving raging rant about them and their spiritual weakness and how prideful and so on and so forth, naming this unfortunate woman and detailing her many loathsome sins and shortcomings in microscopically and obscenely exquisite detail.

When they returned the whole group of them had to listen to that Corps Night rage, and I looked in the dining room and she had her head down crying as she listened to what he said about her. Her husband sat next to her, shame-faced at being married to such a loathsome, weak, unspiritual and worthy creature.

Oddly enough, they stuck it out and as far as I know are loyal Wayfers to this very day.

I am so dumb, my unspiritual mind kept saying "why didn't they take her to the nearest ER like anyone else would do with an acute asthma attack?" I mean, I certainly have no in-depth spiritual perception and awareness, but I do know how to treat someone who is having trouble breathing - "scoop and run" it's called. You can pray on the way to the emergency department.

And I guess the big thing about confrontation - I would NEVER let anyone speak about my husband in such a fashion, and I think this woman's husband should have stood up after the tape ended and announced that he was outraged that LCM would speak about his woman, the mother of his children, in such horrible terms. He could have then driven to NK and punched the SOB in his fat ugly nose. But nooooo, if LCM says your spouse is a piece of poo you better agree with it.

If he'd talked that way about Mr. Garden, I would have certainly urged Mr. Garden and the Sprout to get the he11 away from there.

LCM's behavior was inexcusable. Period.

I didn't much want to go in the first place, but like a truly Christian, submissive little wife I kept my mouth shut and did as I was told. My reasons, except for one, were purely selfish. We lived in a small town in the South, owned a little home with sidewalks and shade trees, I worked part time and we were okay financially. I loved my life there, but convinced myself that Mr. Garden was hearing a higher calling, and didn't VPW teach that "God speaks to the husband; the husband speaks to the wife. The wife speaks to the husband, and the husband goes to God FOR BOTH OF THEM?"

The one good reason was that our son, 11 at the time, had raging ADHD and would not obey me and did exactly as he pleased, lied and stole. I didn't think being in the FWC would make this any better. I was right.

I think a lot of people who went in the WC gave up a lifestyle they loved to pursue a lifestyle they ultimately hated. Little did they know how they were being used. We were told how wonderful it would be for our son, and later he told us "it was like 'they' were the Nazis and we were the Jews." Poor kid. He said any kid who touched a wall got a beating. I was never told about it. He finally acted out so much (beating up kids, stealing Pop-Tarts, throwing eggs across Adam's Alley, etc. that we were tossed out with nowhere to go. So off to WA we went to learn from a great man and woman of God how to successfully raise our son in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, only to find them twice the child of hell the FWC staff was.

However, God took care of us all through that whole 3 years plus. We came out better and stronger in the long run, not because of the FWC but in spite of it.

We have a three year old cocker spaniel, Buckeye, that we've had since she was eight weeks ago. A little over a year ago, we got a 9 year old retired mama dog, no relation, but from the same breeder.

We introduced them in the front yard on leashes. Bucks was curious and very alert but not overtly hostile. Nellie slept in a crate for the first six months she was here. She got sick, got well, and got a whole lot more interested. Because she had spent less time being snuggled up with humans than Buckeye, she was not interested in getting up on the sofa or the bed for a little bit, until it got very cold in the house. Then, necessity required her to get under the snuggi with one of us.

Now, she still likes to have her quiet time - probably rambunctious little Buckeye reminds her of all those years with puppies. But she is an absolute sweetheart and has made herself part of the pack.

Aren't people who believe their own lies called sociopaths?

So did VPW kill him or just make him wish he was dead?

Martindale's "teachings" were like the ravening rantings of someone whose brain has been truly fried. He was heartless and mean-spirited.

I remember very little about my three months of he11 in FWC. I do remember Corps Nights, and the only difference between the Corps Night excoriations and the FLO bitching and complaining was the voice.

Him yelling and screaming and the FWC coordinator's high pitched castrato echoing it with particulars concerning us lowly FWC.

It was a bad dream wrapped in a nightmare draped in madness.

So if Mr. Garden was in FLO then, that LC would have been **rl B****n. The one who caught the drinkers, that is.

I remember the fellow to whom I think Waysider refers having been somewhere out of state, then coming back on a weekend when we hapless souls were all harvesting from the garden. I met him coming up the stone steps as I was going down them, on my way to report for squash collection, and he had a paper cup in his hand, holding not coffee or beer. I must have given him an inquiring look, as it was about 10 am or so, and he muttered something about jet lag. I think he had been on the West Coast. Problem is, jet lag mostly kicks in flying east to west, not west to east, or at least that's been my experience.

Incidentally, I don't remember a single word of the socalled classes in FLO. I do remember a couple that were tape classes of the advanced series; one was about manners and customs of the Bible, and one was about manners, period. In the first, I amused myself by watching the future Mr. Garden (which I of course did whenever possible anyway). He would start to bend forward, slowly at first, then steadily until he jerked awake just before he fell entirely asleep. The second I watched a fellow fellowlaborer, neither Mr. Garden nor Waysider, do the same thing, accompanied by a thick string of drool that eventually landed on his Bible. It was fairly entertaining.

I did like the garden, though, as Mr. Garden was there my first year and very impressed that I knew a radish from a weed. :D

Was the horse poop for the garden? I remember mulching with piles of straw that had been out all winter and having mice run down my arm when I picked up a bunch of it. That was a real thrill.

Not really.

I do know how you feel, BA. A few years back, we went through a situation with a church plant where the pastor, who seemed to be a stand-up guy, raped a 15 year old girl on the floor of his office. After a couple of days, she managed to gather herself together and go to the cops, he was arrested and plea bargained his way out of rape charges. It was all over the local papers. He got eight years; I though Galatians 5:12 would be more appropriate.

Apparently, the association of churches to which this pastor belonged sent a letter to the other pastors in the association stating that "we must do everything we can to help and support our brother during this difficult time."

Support him? What about the 15-year-old girl? She was a kid, he was 45 with a wife and two children, and a pastor for Pete's sake. I don't care if she pranced into his office naked as a jay-bird, threw herself down on his desk and said "please!" He just should have run like the very devil was on his heels.

This letter was mentioned on-line in a series of comments on the article in the local newspaper. I was outraged! I will never support a church of that particular denomination again. I don't know who got a hold of that letter and published parts of it, but they sure did me a favor.

There's nothing new under the sun, and man continues to devise evil. It's hard not to take the evil personally, but I think it's more the human nature to try to have one up on the other fella.

Your post made me feel sad.

Perhaps that A.C. stuff about the "Jesus" spirit, one that impersonates The Lord Jesus Christ, whispering false revelation in your ear, kept you from listening and obeying the very real revelation/inspiration/whatever you want to call it that Holy Spirit really was telling you, and listen to the "teacher" instead?