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Did you receive training in the whole Word?


Kevlar2000
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While reading Imagine's thread about the Corps Principles (thank you, Imagine!), I had this random question:

How much training or teaching did you receive concerning the book of Revelation? Some? Any? None?

Was it sloughed off with the excuse, "It's for our learning"? If so, did you learn anything about it?

While my question is primarily addressed to Way Corps survivo... uh, grads, I would like to hear from anyone that received more than a cursory thought or two from Way teachers while in the Way. Thanks.

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While reading Imagine's thread about the Corps Principles (thank you, Imagine!), I had this random question:

How much training or teaching did you receive concerning the book of Revelation? Some? Any? None?

Was it sloughed off with the excuse, "It's for our learning"? If so, did you learn anything about it?

While my question is primarily addressed to Way Corps survivo... uh, grads, I would like to hear from anyone that received more than a cursory thought or two from Way teachers while in the Way. Thanks.

Ditto on ACTS, which was supposed to be the main thrust of study in Fellow Laborers.

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I wasnt in the corps. I was a WOW, twig coordinator, adv class grad and all that. I received very little 'training' at all...I took all the classes but other than to misguidedly think that I knew a lot more than I actually did I didnt learn many practical things other than a few mental gymnastic exercises while remaining unchristian in a lot of my behaviour

.... Over a decade I memorized a whole ton of verses, learned my way around the bible, and also how to hop and skip around to make a point while almost always negating the context......but as far as training --- no --nada--

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Lets' see...

The Gospels were out. The Book of Revelation was out. Any epistle after Titus was suspect (though there were a few verses that got cherry-picked out of James and I, II, and III John and cleaned up so they were good enough for use.)

The OT was useful for controlling the masses... but if a NT verse would do it had to be used or emphasized.

I'd say the phrase, "training in the whole word" was more like a class in "Swiss Cheese 101."

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i don't know man

i went to corps night teachings for my first year, second year, interim year, and last year

i have to say i'm not much better for it

sorry

i remember weeks and weeks and weeks of teaching on a word like "and" or "but" or "or"

i didn't get the significance

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Lets' see...

The Gospels were out. The Book of Revelation was out. Any epistle after Titus was suspect (though there were a few verses that got cherry-picked out of James and I, II, and III John and cleaned up so they were good enough for use.)

The OT was useful for controlling the masses... but if a NT verse would do it had to be used or emphasized.

I'd say the phrase, "training in the whole word" was more like a class in "Swiss Cheese 101."

Dooj - this IS sooooo true!!!!

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do you love your brother and yourself ? your family ? do you try to help others ?

gees excie there was no time for that...we had to move the word! :doh:

I didnt even see my family but a few time the whole time I was in TWI,--- "helping people" meant making sure you signed them up for PFAL no matter what their circumstances :blink:

Im with Groucho--I didnt receive any training in "The Word" at all --ever-- in the way ministry.

I didnt get to really do any of those things excie mentioned above until I was far far away

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I heard very few teachings on the book of Revelation in the Corps, but many on the book of Acts.

I'd tend to agree with Linda I think Acts were covered for the years 71 & 72 Corps nights, then again in 75,76, and half of 77. The Corps notes from those years are about 500 pages alone. They for the most part cover verse by verse.

Here is a listing of books covered and the time frame for Corps nights.

Corps Notes

1973 Timothy (Sept.1973 -through Aug. 1974)

1974 Timothy (through Aug. 1974)

Ephesians (Sept.1974-June 1975)

1975 Acts (Sept. through Jan 1977)

1976 Acts (Sept. through Jan 1977)

1977 Acts (Sept. through Jan 1977)

I & II Thessalonians (Feb.1977 - Feb 1978)

1978 I & II Thessalonians (Feb.1977 - Feb 1978)

Romans (Sept. 1978 - July 1980

1979 Romans (Sept. 1978 - July 1980

1980 Romans (Sept. 1978 - July 1980

1981 Ephesians (Sept.1981- through May.1982)

1982 Ephesians (Sept.1981- through May.1982)

I Corinthians (Sept. 1982)

1983 I I Corinthians (June 1983)

Galations (Sept.1983 through Nov. 1983)

1984 Philippians ( Jan.1984 through March 1984)

Colossians ( May1984 through June 1984)

Timothy ( Sept. 1984 through June. 1985 )

1985 Timothy & Titus ( Sept. 1984 through June. 1985 )

1986 Galations- ( Sept. 1986 through April 1987)

1987 Galations- (through April 1987)

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Actually the closest thing to ANY systematic handling of the scriptures was Corps teachings which focused on whole books of the Bible. Many of those were later released as "University of Life". All I am aware of were either church epistles, "leadership" epistles (Timothy/Titus) or Acts.

Probably the best part of the Adv. Class focused on textual teachings of OT people in the context of walking with God.

But absolutely not, "training in the whole Word". I seriously would question how many Way Corps grads have even read the whole Bible all the way through.

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The corps program was a mess when I went in, what I got out of it was access to study materials I wouln't have had at home, more time to do personal study, and a sense of fraternity with friends and those on work details.  Although in the end, there was no loyalty from those in charge of the corps, from twi, from friends or co-workers, twi existed to serve itself, not to help those in the corpse.

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I was in FWC for three months, and mostly what I learned was what a worthless piece of poo-poo I was, every thought, word and deed since the day I was born, and the senior WC and staff would need to rebuild me from the ground up if I were ever to amount to a hill of beans.

Before that, there were deep dark spiritual secrets that were known only to the WC, to which I was never to be privy, because I was simply "not spiritual enough to handle it." That included when I was in FLO, which had the exact same principles and did the same grungy work for free.

I remember, and this is silly but it stung deeply at the time, kind of like blundering into a hornets' nest you didn't know was there, one time when we lived in Charleston and there was some big whoop-de-do about naming something, some Charleston-type theme, and since there was a High Country Caravan in Colorado, I suggested "Low Country Caravan" or something siimilar, because Charleston calls itself the Low Country (due to sea level, not anything remotely spiritual). I was very haughtily informed that High Country referred to "The High Country of God's Word" which was something for only the Corps to know, because the rest of us were too dumb and dull-minded to possibly understand the in-depth spiritual secrets and meanings of the term, and to suggest anything playing on that sacred term was insulting to God, God's Ministry, God's Way Corps, and even the Man of God Himself, VPW. It may have been a banner they were making for use at a limb meeting or the ROA.

I was of course properly humiliated, embarrassed, and put in my lowly place. I never volunteered anything again as long as that couple were in charge. The husband had assisted VPW with research for one of his most famous and controversial "research" books, and I guess that made both of them very special.

The extra-special "training in the Whole Word" the WC received and the rest of us could never understand was used on me as a bludgeon more than once, but that's okay. I like to keep my walk with God as uncomplicated as possible.

WG

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Now you have made me pull out my old Bible with all those pencilled notes in it.

We did 1 John, where there are more pencil notes than printer's ink on the page; also 2 and 3 John but not in such depth.

We did a lot in 1 Timothy, and a lot in Ephesians and Colossians. But when?

You know, I really can't remember a lot of this stuff. Made an active decision that I wanted to use any other Bible and try to really learn and understand the heart behind what was written, without other people's interpretations of it.

We never looked at Revelation, not even in passing. Nor much in the OT.

BUT my research paper/thesis (basically a Greek word study), assigned to me by the great LCM himself, involved me reading practically every book in the Bible to follow through a particular theme. LCM had assigned me one thing, but God was clearly directing my steps in completely another direction and I ended up doing a lot of significant study on what it was to be a genuine and good leader, living the lifestyle, and how to guard and protect people. I learned about God's provision for his people by his people (his "social security"). It was awesome. (If you're still into "word studies" - try looking at the Hebrew word "Shaphat" sometime.) I also learned a lot about confrontation of hypocrisy (what a genuine leader is not) from the gospel of John.

My research paper was very well received and I was surprised at who came up to me afterwards to say they'd read it and thought it was wonderful. There were quite a lot of people - didn't know that these things got such a wide circulation! I never got the research paper back, and there was only ever the one copy.

It was when I started to apply this learning after graduation, when back on the field, that I really fell foul of The Powers That Be.

I have never forgotten my research paper stuff and if for nothing else that time in the Corps was worth it. I am still learning from it and endeavour to apply it as best I can.

But back to the point...

Receiving training in the whole word wasn't (I understood/had been told) supposed to mean "receive training in the whole Bible," but also "receive training in the practical application" of what we were studying. If we knew how to do that, we would understand how to apply parts of the Bible that we had not at that time studied but would in the future. Hence the work program. Because the Bible is very practical, y'know.

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Receiving training in the whole word wasn't (I understood/had been told) supposed to mean "receive training in the whole Bible," but also "receive training in the practical application" of what we were studying. If we knew how to do that, we would understand how to apply parts of the Bible that we had not at that time studied but would in the future. Hence the work program. Because the Bible is very practical, y'know.

Sure. The problem is that words are assigned meanings or intents that they don't have, and those meanings or intents are accepted as truth despite what the words really mean. And a pattern of this is carried out for everything else, including very clear scriptures. So now, really words and the Bible only mean what some leader at the moment in some situation tells you that it means. Truth is relative, and the whole supposed motto of the Corps turns from "It Is Written" to "It Is Position". It no longer matters what words mean, what truth says, but only who said it.

If you walked up to an average Christian and asked them what does "Receive training in the whole Word" what would they think that entails? A systematic study of the complete Bible? Or something else?

If it's not supposed to mean that, then what is the more logical course of action? To change the principle to say what it means? Or to change the meaning and preserve the "history"?

Actually the modernized version of those principles that are currently in effect state "receive training in the whole Word, doctirinally and practically...".

They strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel. Become more anal about the little words that don't matter, and leave the glaring lie sitting, because they are so steeped in their own stupid traditions they no longer see it.

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They never got into the book of Revelation while I was in residence [Family Corps 11]. Reading this thread, I pretty much attributed its avoidance due to the "for our learning" TWI bias as you were saying – but have been thinking a little more about it and wonder if there's more to it than that. I find it odd though, vp had no qualms teaching from the Old Testament & Gospels [with that "written for our learning" qualification] to illustrate something about how to operate the manifestations of the spirit, "law of believing", or any of his other pet doctrines – but ignored Revelation.

I have about 36 commentaries on the book of Revelation – and by no means consider myself an expert on it - just saying it's one of my favorite books of the Bible and enjoy checking out what others have written about it. Even if a reader is in the same camp as TWI on much of the Revelation events happening after the Rapture of the church – there's a blessing associated with anyone who reads the book & takes it to heart [Revelation 1:3]. A number of the commentaries I've read were written by folks who believe as such.

I can't think of any reason why vp would shy away from the book – other than his vacuous mind. I dunno…maybe a man that plagiarized like it was going out of style, was weak in critical thinking skills, and fabricated self-promoting legends was afraid to jeopardize his God-revealed-His-Word-to-me-like-it-hadn't-been-known-for-centuries status by actually studying/teaching the book of Revelation "line by line and word by word" . :biglaugh:

But really I don't think he had anything to lose – his loyal masses would have eaten it up like candy anyway…The more I think about it though – Corps Night Teachings were just a reinforcement of PFAL hokum – it didn't matter what book was covered – somehow it always came back to the "greatness" of what's in PFAL…Ah ha! Maybe that's it! The events of the book of Revelation will happen after the rupture of the PFAL church. :evilshades:

…another thing - since we're discussing Corps Principle # 2 – I have such a vivid memory of lcm barking at us in his typical authoritative growl that we should base our Corps research paper on something from PFAL instead of trying to re-invent the wheel…Corps Principle # 2 is really receive reinforcement training in PFAL so as to be able to con others. :confused:

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I have about 36 commentaries on the book of Revelation – and by no means consider myself an expert on it - just saying it's one of my favorite books of the Bible and enjoy checking out what others have written about it. Even if a reader is in the same camp as TWI on much of the Revelation events happening after the Rapture of the church – there's a blessing associated with anyone who reads the book & takes it to heart [Revelation 1:3]. A number of the commentaries I've read were written by folks who believe as such.

I liked the "Left Behind" fictional series. Good entertaining reading. Of course I had to get past looking down my nose at them as inferior and inaccurate first (had to smack down the haughty twi thoughts). But the authors have done a whole lot more work in Revelation than I will ever get to.

Corps Principle # 2 is really receive reinforcement training in PFAL so as to be able to con others. :confused:

actually that's quite humorous. it really amounted to ignore sections of the Bible and any new work in them and to follow the example of plagiarism set by der fadder in der verd.

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Hey Chockfull - in that bit that you excerpted - you didn't take it all wholly seriously, did you? The last sentence should be accompanied by shaking of the head, cringing, or other "denial" activity!

T-Bone: I think we were told that Revelation was future, and could not be understood or properly interpreted going forwards, but after it all happened, we would be able to look back and see that it had all been predicted.

Possibly part of the knowing in part now (1 Cor 13), but we'll get the full knowledge later.

We didn't get a lot from books like Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Daniel, except the odd out of context verse or short extract here and there. And there's a lot still to come from those books. (Yes, they did have the Way of Holiness theme one year, and that was a quote from Isaiah - but it wasn't a study of that book.)

I really think that they only quoted stuff from those books and the so-called minor prophets simply to show off and to give the illusion of knowing and teaching the whole word. But most of it was out of context or flashed over too fast to really consider the full impact. Just showing off.

"The rupture of the PFAL church" - ha ha ha :biglaugh:

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