lily rose Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> I think in part what made Grace Chapel "something"
> in my mind was the congregation was made up of
> "real people" who had to sacrifice to pay off
> their church. I remember that in the 70's the
> church organist/head of transcribing and who also
> worked was know to be contributing most of her
> salary to keep the church out of the red.

The last seven years of my time in TLWF was spent as a congregant of the South Gate church...and I can confirm the "realness" and humility that existed in the people there. I worked side by side with a number of them working on maintaining/fixing up the facility...and the sacrifice came from a genuine place. About a year after I left the church was sold, and so far the only info about what transpired has come from discussions in this forum. There obviously is not a freedom to question the few in TLWF that make these kind of significant decisions...the role of the average person is to submit and expect 'God' to work out everything for good. To this day I am not certain about:
Where the proceeds of the sale of the church went...
Was any of it used to directly benefit the congregation--many who spent the better part of their lives there?
Why was it sold in the first place?
Why was selling it to a congregant not an option (if, indeed, a congregant offered to buy it)?

Little questions like that....

Faith Chapel in Salt Lake City was bought and paid for essentially by three families over a period of about twelve years. The Maxwell’s, the Bailey’s and the Kitchin’s. They were very dedicated, giving much more than ten percent in order to have a church building.

In the early eighties, after John Miller installed Ron Court as the chief shepherd, things became intolerable. The Maxwell’s had gone to California, the Bailey’s moved (escaped) to Tucson, Arizona and the Kitchin’s were blackballed.

The Kitchin’s oldest daughter, who grew up in the church was getting married. The blowout happened a couple of weeks before the wedding which was scheduled to be held at the Faith Chapel Church. No surprise, the Kitchin’s were told, “No Way ----- we cannot allow the building to be contaminated.”

To this day, the Kitchin’s will have nothing to do with either the ones who stayed or the ones who dropped out of the Walk.

Of course the church was sold, the proceeds benefitting who knows who.

This is a bad memory.

FCSLC Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Faith Chapel in Salt Lake City was bought and paid
> for essentially by three families over a period of
> about twelve years. The Maxwell’s, the
> Bailey’s and the Kitchin’s. They were very
> dedicated, giving much more than ten percent in
> order to have a church building.
>
> In the early eighties, after John Miller installed
> Ron Court as the chief shepherd, things became
> intolerable. The Maxwell’s had gone to
> California, the Bailey’s moved (escaped) to
> Tucson, Arizona and the Kitchin’s were
> blackballed.
>
> The Kitchin’s oldest daughter, who grew up in
> the church was getting married. The blowout
> happened a couple of weeks before the wedding
> which was scheduled to be held at the Faith Chapel
> Church. No surprise, the Kitchin’s were told,
> “No Way ----- we cannot allow the building to be
> contaminated.”
>
> To this day, the Kitchin’s will have nothing to
> do with either the ones who stayed or the ones who
> dropped out of the Walk.
>
> Of course the church was sold, the proceeds
> benefitting who knows who.
>
> This is a bad memory.


Wow

Today's scripture:
""Come to Me, all who are reasonably happy, and I will make you miserable."
--somewhere in New Testament

changedagain Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Today's scripture:
> ""Come to Me, all who are reasonably happy, and I
> will make you miserable."
> --somewhere in New Testament


Thank you Debby Downer.

Mat 11:25: Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take My Yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in.

Unfortunately within the LW cult many of us rather than ask Jesus to receive us thought that a human Man or our human leaders were going to fix our lives not realizing the darkness that was really in their hearts.

Here's a quote from JRS: "People are not going to make it unless they have a Man like Moses to intercede for them." And that was part of the thought reform process we experienced in the LW that the human leaders had the authority of God and that we should blindly trust in human authority even thought this is never called for in the Scriptures.

I get it now: We were told to think like John, get John's thinking i.e. thought reform.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2015 02:23AM by lily rose.

...and then we were told that if we wanted the "mind of Christ" we had to get Marilyn's thinking.

A while back I decided to re-read the This Week pamphlet "Continuing in the Apostle's Teaching." I was surprised by how poorly JRS made the case for the Apostolic Ministry. The basic contrast between the hierarchy of the Catholic Church and the anarchy of Protestantism is fine, but the alternative of the Apostolic Ministry as the "right balance" between hierarchy and anarchy is ludicrous. To borrow Jeremy Bentham's words, it was nonsense on stilts.

It would be beneficial to group-together some of these substantial accounts against the LW. The same anonymity that empowers us to speak up on a forum is a shortfall in effective change. It's easy for shepherds to dismiss personal testimonies on these forums as attempts to plant lies and muddy names with baseless accusations. The posts with sourced ovbservations like those documenting property value are noteworthy. They almost deserve a thread of their own--as opposed to being hidden in this 160 page active conversation. Any ideas?

factoverfiction,

You're right the testimonies while helpful to those who post them and those trying to sort it out are probably easily discounted by the leadership. But they do point out the dysfunction in the church as 160 pages of complaints can't all be wrong. But I think I see what you are getting at.

paleface Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well another gala 4th of July show was presented
> at Shiloh. It is part of Shiloh's campaign to
> reach out to the community and say "Hey everybody,
> come see our fireworks show and behold how normal
> we are.


Paleface's reference to "normal" reminded me of TLWF webpage section entitled Our Beliefs which states TLWF teaches the same biblical principals and tenants that other conventional Christian Churches hold sacred. I think the attempt to liken TLWF to other conventional Christian Churches is misleading.

Perhaps it would be more accurate for the webpage to say "TLWF teaches the same biblical principals as other conventional Charismatic Christian Churches who hold sacred the Latter Rain doctrines. But what really separates TLWF from other conventional churches is our strong emphasis on church hierarchy and the authority of church leaders to control both the spiritual and private mundane affairs of the lives of the congregation."

So my idea would be to convey the core values of TLWF aren't really conventional. (What other church has a Mama and a Papa who are worshiped?) But I am not sure how one does that.

Norman Bates is a nice, well-mannered boy. He couldn't hurt a flea!



Paleface wrote:
> Well, another gala 4th of July show was
> presented at Shiloh. It is part of Shiloh's campaign to
> reach out to the community and say "Hey everybody,
> come see our fireworks show and behold how
> normal e are.