Posted on 12/09/2007 12:49:26 PM PST by aomagrat
Edited on 12/09/2007 12:59:09 PM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
Wellll, with a good fire, hot chocolate, FR and a good book or 3 . . . you could do quite well.
Warmth, good eats and blessings to you and yours.
3 books? I don’t think so...no time for that right now.
But, I’ll take a cup of hot cocoa any day.
Thanks for the warm wishes, Quix; may you also be blessed.
nic
Some Mormon wrote a book that’s probably full of stuff from the pit . . . but one thought could be true. Nothing I know of in Scripture clearly against it . . .
The assertion was that God the father meets with each of us with a cluster of our better friends in Heaven before we are incarnated, born on earth. In that meeting, we decide ourcelves what traumas we will endure for the edification of our personhood, soul, spirit, being . . . I assume toward the goal of bearing a greater weight of glory ruling and reigning with Christ in eternity.
I certainly don’t teach it as truth. But it wouldn’t surprise me if it turned out to be true. God is MORE than fair, in the end. It is His nature. There’s plenty of mystery about a lot of things. Paul mentioned things unlawful to say, disclose in this realm.
I’ve had lots of fiery furnaces & long dark nights of the soul—probably more by far than most I’ve known directly—except a few . . . such as for one poor single mother in San Diego . . . though I’ve heard of folks who’ve had more. Probably the majority, I’ve brought on myself to a large degree. But not all. Some have clearly been mostly other folks’ cow pies.
When the dust has settled . . . usually years later . . . the spiritual benefit has always been worth it. And you have no idea how costly a statement that is.
Yeah, plenty of truth in your perspective, imho.
And, it’s easy to do with Matthew.
But, clearly the church was flawed at the top and likely in the ranks. Thankfully, they sound like they’ve delt with things decisively.
Here’s another perspective from another Believer . . .
NOTE: The following is from a lurker that I received privately. They asked me to change a few things. I ran it by them before sharing it.
RE: Colorado Gunman
12/15/2007 morning
You get too intense. Back off. Quit yelling. Please?
They don’t get it and aren’t going to get it; you will blast their eardrums out. I do. You do.
[QX: I don’t have anything to add on that score. Will likely continue to do as I feel compelled to do—as mystifying as it may be]
As much as can be gleaned now. They are digging in their heels, their boat is being rocked, and it’s like arguing with various odd sects. Pointless.
[Qx: Plenty of truth to that. Though off and on, I get emails and FREEPMAILS affirming the benefit of some such]
If they are decent otherwise, I reach out a hand of friendship to them and don’t attack their beliefs any more, not that I ever did too much.
He was on a frenzied journey to find the Truth. It doesn’t work that way, but he couldn’t possibly have known that given where he was in it, drowning, looking for a life preserver in the same environment that made him sick. It’s very sad he turned to what he did but, at his age, not too surprising.
[Qx: The kid reminds me so much of myself the first 18 years of my life and a good bit in the 20’s. Thankfully, the context was not so intense for me in the church and home life. But the existential conflicts and double binds were almost as emotionally intense and excruciating for me. Only God kept me alive more than once. Thankfully I had a hard time killing a chicken to eat. I was the opposite of violent.
QX: I had plenty of self-defeating habits but I loathed violence.
QX: And the search for answers was relentless and also excruciating when the BEST Christians around persistently had no answers—and often, though, said so. The best they could often suggest was SEEK GOD—which I did to the best of my ability—more or less—but still inadequately. I’m convinced now that more fasting and prayer on my part would have made a difference though at times I prayed hours a day.]
I have never felt sorry for a mass murderer before. Ever. This one I do, but I don’t condone it in any way shape or form. May he find mercy for his diminished capacity to be held fully accountable. It sounded like he was going to end just his own life, then when people still were cruel to him in his last-ditch effort to resolve it, in the wrong venue, the internet, it pushed him over the edge.
[Qx: I don’t think that the exPentecostal folks pushed him over the edge. I believe he was over the edge before he got on that website. I believe demonic forces had been mostly in the driver’s seat for some time by then. He had been looking eagerly, hungrily for vengeance for some time, imho.
Qx: I think he knew that he would not be granted sleep accommodations. I think it was a faint yearning for maybe an odd chance of acceptance by a group he somewhat respected and valued. But mostly it was a set-up for vengeance.
Qx: I think his hostility at mom was way off the scale, imho, understandably. But that he was in enough of a symbiotic love/hate relationship with her that he couldn’t act out violence against her. But he sure could at her icons and in that way stab her to the heart doubly—tarnishing her sacred son with blood on his hands against her icons. What a double blow. It would appear that he relished at the thought of such in demonized exaltation and release of all the pent-up resentment, bitterness, exasperation, rage, hostility.]
No way am I going to engage in discourse with those self-righteous, all-knowing idiots you are dealing with, may God forgive me for judging.
[Qx: Well, I can understand that. Thankfully I don’t construe them quite so harshly though I see how one could see them that way, easily. They are just convinced of their perspective. I don’t think they have significant mental health training and they have certainly not been far down the roads Matthew traveled virtually exclusively on. Nor have they counseled dozens and dozens of mothers and fathers like Matthew’s parents. I have.
QX: It is logical that my PATTERN RECOGNITION skills in such realms would be markedly better. And, I doubt their ego dynamics would ever allow them to admit that—certainly not easily and not publically.
Qx: Then there’s the philosophical existential stuff. I think part of them would be terrified to admit that I’m significantly right, at all. Too much of their world view; their construction of Christianity would have to be too significantly adjusted. That has to be anxiety producing, if not frightening at some level—understandably.]
It all could have possibly been avoided with a great deal of work, compassion and a different environment. In the end, he did fulfill the (to me) false prophecy and lying wonder in a very bizarre way. So few people get it. I just hope it doesn’t rebound on all Christians. HE WAS MESSED OVER, BRAINWASHED, MANIPULATED, SPIRITUALLY ABUSED FROM HIS EARLIEST DAYS. He had NO OTHER FRAME OF REFERENCE to fall back on. It is SICK SICK SICK what he was forced to endure in the name of a loving God.
[Qx: I don’t know if the prophecies were wholesale false to begin with, or not. A lot of such prophetic stuff comes WITH CONDITIONS.
Qx: It appears that instead of seeking God in solidly Biblical ways and letting God be God in the situation, a straigh-jacket regimine was implemented that was going to—BY FLESHLY MEANS—produce this great new spiritual leader.
Qx: No way is God going to honor that—quite apart from PROVOKE NOT YOUR KIDS TO WRATH; train up a child in the way that child should go, developing his giftings, skills and anointings etc. stuff.
Qx: But as you say . . . the MOM was undoubtedly significantly messed up before she ever had the kid—as was mine. Though tracing it all back to Adam doesn’t fix anything.
Qx: My mother had a heart of gold and the best of intentions. Yet she terrified every pastor but two. I can still hear her stomp down the church asile and that locked jaw look. Some pretty big men would run and hide.
Qx: It’s conceivable that his mom did, too. But we don’t help any situation by touching the ark. We don’t help anything by trying to do God’s exclusive Holy Spirit inner work in someone else’s life by our fleshly coercians, manipulations, seductions and control freak habits. She evidently never learned that.
Qx: Lots of emphases were put on externals. If the heart and spirit are askew . . . NO AMOUNT of EXTERNALS will do ought but make things worse. Oh, there’s merit in ACTING AS THOUGH—earnestly—but pretend white-washed tomb stuff will NOT work. It’s ALWAYS an abomination.
Qx: If the child, friend, co-worker, spouse won’t yield to God . . . making them bow at the point of a gun, whip, ball bat or other humiliation will only engender greater resistence and rebellion. Better to fast and pray or Love them sacrificially into a greater insight or understanding.
Qx: Though, in some situations, when one has limited contact or opportunity—such as seeing a family at a restaurant . . . I’ve written a few thought provoking lines on a card in an intense hit-and-run sort of way. But even with that, I’ve taken pains to make clear that love was behind the thought provoking questions or statements.
Qx: On FR . . . a good percentage of folk wouldn’t recognize the love if it whacked them upside the head in quadruplicate in only the ways the thought they preferred. Some things we only see with hindsight after some fiery furnaces. Many folk get it and let me know privately. But mostly I write for the lurkers. The narrowly, rigidly, pontifically self-righteously strident hereon remind me more often than I prefer of the strident 2,000 years ago . . . the experts in the law etc. I don’t know if such are on this thread, or not. But I can understand your perception on that score.]
This is a wake-up call for predator, fame-seeking, money-loving, control freak, hypocritical Christians (there was no doubt some goodness in some of them, you’ll find that). Most will not see it even the families of his victims including his own. They may leave their churches, but I think most will stay.
[Qx: As Peter said—Lord, to whom could we go. He alone is Worthy. He alone is God.]
It is not necessarily God’s will, but He allowed it. I still don’t blame the parents too much because she was messed up, too, and her husband went along with it because he was a typical professional immersed in his first love, his career.
[Qx: Plenty of truth, imho, in that statement. And some of the posters with the most knowledge and experience have affirmed their convictions noting that, to me, privately—which is soooooo brave of them! LOL.]
She dragged the kid along on her spiritual journey, and it gave her life meaning and made her feel special that she would have a wonder kid who would be another famous evangelist in that generation.
[Qx: I think that’s likely true. But, she could have TO A LARGE DEGREE been acting out of the best altruistic servant-hearted motivations and methods she knew. She likely was never taught better or she’d have done better. She likely didn’t have better insight and understanding or she’d have known better. I suspect she did the best at doing things as right as far as she knew and could imagine—even as she could get good Christian counsel to do. She seemed to leave no stone unturned in trying to help this kid become his destiny as she saw it.
Qx: Sure, we can say with hind-sight—she had this psychodynamic problem of her own. She was fatally flawed in this motivation, that perspective, this effort, that effort. But she evidently didn’t have good working mirrors on those scores. So she soldiered on with this impossible kid toward this IMPOSSIBLE DREAM.
QX: Some of us could have told her had we come along side and observed an hour or a week. But evidently no one with such insight and such stature in her Christian social network had such a view or the courage to say such things . . . or else she didn’t listen—thinking them wrong and maybe even a danger to the IMPOSSIBLE DREAM.
Qx: On th other hand . . . with different fingers . . . she DID HAVE SCRIPTURE. PROVOKE NOT TO WRATH SHOULD HAVE RANG SOME WARNINGS. But in my experience, that verse and others that might have given her pause get lost in the hurricane of the sterner, harsher, more authoritarian construed Scriptures—too sadly, sometimes, all the more so in such groups as they were immersed in.
Qx: She was likely doing all she and her reference group knew and could counsel her to do.
Qx: Sadly, Jim Dobson, in the same city, could have set her right though she probably only took his authoritative assertions in his writings, as justification to be more authoritarian. And, he can come across overly stern. I’ve had him look at me rather sternly. But his heart is not that way. And he knows that sternness is very often very counterproductive.]
Please, please, please pardon my language. There are just no other words. I don’t presume I have the total picture here, not at all. But I see through this glass darkly, and don’t necessarily expect you to agree with me 100%. It doesn’t matter to what degree we agree on it. I guess you have to have been through a taste of it and are honest and look into your own psyche, soul, to be able to see it for what it is.
[Qx: it does appear too often that only experience brings some sorts of understanding. The research is clear that the best counselors come from two groups: (A) Just the cream of the crop of normal people (B) those who’ve been through the mill and worked it through.
Qx: I think a lot of lay folks and a huge percentage of counselors are mostly clueless. They do not have a very sufficient vision of the whole. They do not understand root causes very well. Some fairly well trained and very bright even Spirit-filled folks can be incredibly clueless.
Qx: However, where there’s a heart to truly SEEK GOD and TRULY FOLLOW HIM and His ways, in His Love, then change can really occur. But that has to include a lot of BROKENNESS and no small amount of humility.
Qx: I don’t see much brokenness in the situation except in terms of the kid’s spirit.
Qx: I think Jim Dobson made an excellent point in DARE TO DISCIPLINE decades ago: BREAK THE WILL, NOT THE SPIRIT. Matthew’s spirit was broken repeatedly, . . . frayed repeatedly, trashed and thrashed repeatedly.
Qx: It was as though he had no right to his own spirit, his own personhood, his own perspective and understanding. HE HAD to take on that of his mother and her icons. There was NO CHOICE from their perspective and certainly that was repeatedly, RELENTLESSLY communicated in how he was treated at least 1-17 years.
Qx: In other words, he had to be someone unreal. He could not even be true to himself at all and have any hope of survival, respect, caring, love. What a turmoil!
It’s not easy going against the mob, is it? Maybe you enjoy it. It drains and is destructive for me so I avoid them if possible. If I’m backed into a corner, then I will take my stand. Please hang in there, get some rest, and may some ultimate good come out of it for somebody.
[Qx: Oh, it’s a severe trial a lot of the time. Most of me is a soft-hearted wuss that prefers to please folks and make everyone feel good. But God doesn’t always let me get away with doing that only. Often He doesn’t. Though that’s one thing I miss about Sunday breakfast . . . bussing tables for folks.]
Qx: I can enjoy aspects of intense interaction. I love intense dialogue. Not per se intense argument. IRON SHARPENING IRON I LOVE INTENSELY. The rock throwing that I tend to attract is very distasteful, often hurtful and extremly mystifying and sad at so much of it’s chronic idiocy . . . but I understand that it goes with the territory . . . as so many on FR have told me over the years—I SAY TOO MANY THINGS PEOPLE DON’T WANT TO HEAR. But God has not given me another brief. So I run with the one He’s given me to the best of my flawed ability.
Qx: I know from a LOT of years of experience that many folks will not register benefit from what I’ve injected into their consciousness until many months and years down the road. But, I trust Holy Spirit to haunt them with what was truly from Him. The rest SHOULD be flushed.]
God bless you.
And to you. Thanks for the honor of your email.
I can’t afford the luxury of such meds.
Besides, my historically genetically weak immune system [praying for improvement on that score] doesn’t do well with such except in extremely necessary situations very controlled etc.
So, I do the oil of oregano for antibiotic and elderberry for antiviral plus lots of antioxidants etc. Works out OK. Usually quicker than this. Zi-Cam is great stuff. Hate the nose gel but it does help tons. Especially if one catches the first hint of such stuff.
But, God is shaping me even with such stuff. He has told me to avoid thinking of some things. And I disobeyed. Within 24 hours, I had this bout. That’s happened a lot the last year. Sometimes I can be a slow learner.
It seems at 61, His leash is shorter in some respects. LOL.
I’m not smart enough
= = =
HOGWASH.
PS: I’m going to read and think about your posts some more..and will try to reply when I can think straight. :)
= = =
Am humbled you’d bother.
PLEASE:
Ponder only those things Holy Spirit prompts you to. Flush the rest.
I thought it was very wise of the overseers who slapped him down hard when he fussed about not enough $$$ for some silly reason.
Sounds like he has some good overseers trying to get him back in shape.
Dennis Jernigan had his homosexuality delivered instantly in an Anne Herring concert when she had a word of prophecy for such.
Most don’t find it near so easy as that. Walking out persistent obedience and resisting the enemy is necessary over a considerable time period with lots of support from healthy, loving, healthily affectionate men not afraid to Love such a person into wholeness. Such men are rarely available to most such afflicted.
Thanks thanks.
Feeling signicantly better after another long nap.
LUB
Yeah, I'm weird about scapegoating the perpetrator of the crime rather than the victims. As for the "warped notions of human nature and the life of grace," if a kid sexually molested by a Catholic priest shot his way into a Catholic church would you take that same criticism to heart? Or would you rightly reject it as foolishness?
I’m a little curious . . .
to how much depth, breadth, degree and comprehensiveness
has God shown you the evil in your own heart?
There is none righteous, no, not one, Scripture declares.
I wouldn’t be shocked if that happened. It already did, in Baltimore, and I wasn’t shocked.
VERY well and briefly put.
Thx.
Please avoid saying I’m the shrink in response to the below . . . LOL . . .
What is this . . . dynamic, phenomenon . . . whereby
very complex intrapersonal, interpersonal and spiritual dynamics and interactions are reduced to sound-bite sized, black/white, knee-jerked explanations?
Is it too much work to contemplate a more robust vision of the whole?
Is it folks feeling safer by pigeon holing, shoe-horning massively complex massively sized stuff into tiny tidy little boxes?
Is it a compulsive need to project all the evil into that clueless idiot OVER !!!THERE!!! instead of inside the bloke in the mirror?
What?
Ah. Then I'm not scapegoating as you define scapegoating. There's obviously a process by which the guy got to where he was able rationalize his actions and that involved a web of complicated actions and myriad causes, not the least of which was the hypocrisy he observed around him.
But some of your assertions
SOUND LIKE
you are minimizing the process to down near absolute zero.
I don’t think that’s accurate to reality.
Gee, one whole week has passed and nary a word about this. Several people shot and killed in a hate crime and little national outrage.
Oh, I forgot. They were white Christians.
Gee, one whole week has passed and nary a word about this. Several people shot and killed in a hate crime and little national outrage.
Oh, I forgot. They were white Christians.
= = =
When the satanic globalist puppet masters’ script is to exterminate all authentic Christians . . .
their stoolies the MSM will do nothing else unless absolutely forced to by . . .
. . . uhhhh . . . by . . .
welll . . . hmmmm . . . by
a HIGHER power . . . e.g. God Almighty.
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