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| Introductions and Testimonies Please tell everybody something about yourself. Tell us a little. Tell us a lot. Its up to you! |
Topic Review (Newest First)
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| 08-02-2010 11:22 AM | |||
| Unregistered |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn Now you are part of the "real" remnant... |
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| 07-28-2010 07:35 AM | |||
| aron |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn Quote:
My answer is to realize that simple fact. This warning applies to us all. What helped me enormously was a verse in an overlooked (in LC-land) book called Jude. Jude said that the angels who left their appointed places were given up, and put into chains to await judgment. Jude was speaking about some in the assemblies ("some in your love feasts") who were up to no good. For years I though Jude was a raving paranoiac, lacking vision and certainly lacking grace. But that story of the angels who fell (see Genesis 5 for more, also the Book of Enoch) illustrates a marvelous principle. Just as Lucifer turned away from God, just as Adam and Eve rejected the warning and left the garden, just as the Israelites died in the wilderness rather than attain the promise, just as the priests had the scrolls but rejected the promised One of whom the scrolls testified, so were the christians eager to turn to the weak and small things of the world, and to forsake their birthright as children of God. In this some of the angels also sinned, and turned from an allotted portion in God's house, to over-reach beyond the boundaries God has placed for us. We all do this. David did this, and took another man's wife. Murder soon followed. All of us who are blessed, at some point stumble and over-reach. There is only One who made it through, and became an offering for all. So I can look at your sins and you can examine mine and together we can agree on aspects of the LC, but it's all probably part of a bigger story. So it's actually a great thing to have passed through the cauldron of the Local Church of Witness Lee (I call them the Church of Witness Lee because if you look at their websites the top bar says "...affiliated with the ministry of Witness Lee" so they have named themselves surely as Wesleyans or Lutherans or anyone else). Quote:
Today I don't try to leave my old experiences so much as have new experiences which transform the old ones. I pray that you would have new experiences which bring all your old ones, LC and all, into what will be, for you, a seamless, coherent, marvelous, mysterious, joyful, peaceful, and useful reality which you can share with others. |
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| 07-28-2010 07:00 AM | |||
| awareness |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn 01000001011011010110010101101110 |
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| 07-28-2010 05:47 AM | |||
| 11of101 |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn To, yesterday's revelation is today's dogma.  I would like to add, ..is tomorrow's propaganda. I'm reading Mark Twain and, heaven forbid, Richard Dawkins. But I'll always be a die-hard born-again trekkie. (With a Texan drawl): Can I get an Amen??!! (Preferably in binary code.) 
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| 07-27-2010 10:03 AM | |||
| countmeworthy |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn Welcome Artaraxian, I think very few of us , upon leaving the LC, have a pure, secure relationship with God & His Word. While I never lost my faith in Christ, in the Father and the Holy Spirit, I did not understand their functions in the Godhead. (I have a much, MUCH better understanding of the 3 in ONE while sometimes speaking to the Holy Spirit, sometimes to the Father but mostly communicating with the SON...and yet all THREE are ONE. I can not possible communicate with God our Heavenly Father without going through JESUS and I cannot possibly communicate with Jesus without the LIGHT, the encouragment, the Voice, the illumination of the Holy Spirit. It may seem 'complex' but it isn't at all. They are not seperate 'gods'. They are ONE GOD. BUT in my journey to get where I am NOW in my relationship with JEHOVAH GOD, I veered off the 'straight & narrow'. I dabbled with new age 'thinking'. I found some TRUTH that gelled with my spirit. I listened to people like Deepak Chopra and Dwayne Dwyer...people like that...I always still kept my heart on JESUS nevertheless. But some of the things they said, helped me understand my struggles and gave me insight on how to pray to JESUS, the Son of the Most High God..our Redeemer, our Friend, our Saviour and our Deliverer. As time went on, the Precious Holy Spirit of Jesus, the Spirit of God, taught me the power of repentence, forgiveness, the Blood of the Lamb, the Word of God. He healed my broken soul, and healed my wounded soul. He turned my mourning into dancing and restored the Joy of the LORD in me. His JOY truly is my Strength. Not only because the Bible says it is. I KNOW it is. The fact you're here Atar, means you have a rich, unmoveable Golden Treasure deep inside of you. You're not going to let that go. You simply don't know YET how to spend it and invest it to make you RICHER. Our spiritual journey which affects our soul and even mortal bodies is a step by step process. But don't let go of JESUS' Hand. And in time, you'll be the person GOD created you to be !...a king and a priest unto HIM, shining, glowing, filled with JOY unspeakeable FILLED with God's Glory all around you, coming from within you.
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| 07-26-2010 07:33 AM | |||
| aron |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn Quote:
I know that the "know-it-all" types will probably quote John 16:13, or some such, that the Spirit is leading us into ALL the truth, which is a good point. But that seems to be a slow, laborious (at least for me) process, and those who claim to have arrived at the end point (read 'high peak') seem to be doing so at some cozy place in the wilderness, rather than struggling forward. Theologians beware: yesterday's revelation is today's dogma. The Spirit is leading us on a journey. The only essentials I refuse to let go of are: #1 I love this Jesus guy, and #2 try to be nice to the person next to me. Beyond that, let go and go forward. |
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| 07-26-2010 07:08 AM | |||
| aron |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn Quote:
"Then one of the elders said to me, "Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals." Revelation 5:5 To me, this meant that the truth is known only to God, and to those to whom He chooses to reveal it. Jesus, of course, is the way for the believer to know truth. But each believer only gets a piece of the puzzle. We each have to come together and attempt to fit the puzzle together. So you have a piece, I have a piece, etc. Your experiences were of some great and mysterious purpose, and when you hold your light up for others to see it somehow blends with the rest to create a mosaic of reality which God only can compose. So if any one claims a corner on the truth, they may be a tad presumptuous. Quote:
On a related note, I also found in the book of Revelation that Jesus was called "the Faithful Witness". It impressed me with the idea that I, and you, and everyone else, regardless of claims to the contrary, is not a faithful witness. We are only "partly faithful". We are all compromised, at least somewhat. So we don't need to pretend to have all the reality at our disposal, neatly packaged in theological precepts. Just try to be nice to the person next to you, be willing to receive God if He/She/It/They show up, which may indeed be (at least partly) in that person next to you. Anyway, I ramble, which is my disposition, but my point is that we all have a piece of the puzzle. Those who claim to have it all don't have very much. Those who admit they don't have much have a little more. But nobody save God is allowed to be a "know-it-all". |
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| 07-24-2010 09:44 PM | |||
| awareness |
Re: Hello, I'm Ataraxian. I once believed I was part of God's special remn Great post Ataraxian. And WELCOME! And why not post that book you plan on writing out here, little by little. It can only help you gather your thoughts, and develop your style of articulation. And....I think the angels sing with joy every time someone walks out of the LC. |
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| 07-24-2010 05:02 PM | |||
| Ataraxian |
I once believed I was part of God's special remnant. Hello ya'll. Several years ago when I was only a teenager I became convinced that God had led me into his recovery of truth and practice. I was convinced that just as God has always worked with a select few people on earth in different times, that I was part of the select few that would ultimately yank him out of the sky. I saw many unhealthy and strange things while I was in the Local Church, but always ignored them with the intent to focus on the bronze serpent and "The Body." During a lengthy week-long dialogue/debate with a well educated man about a certain important matter of the faith, I became frustrated that he might be correct. At that time I articulated to myself that I would accept the truth no matter what it was, even if it meant that orthodox Christians would consider me a heretic. During week two, I became convinced that the Bible agreed with the "orthodox" viewpoint and not that of my friend. While that was a relief to me, the important part of the story is that I had articulated that I will accept the truth no matter the consequences. As it happens with a lot of people in the Local Church, I asked myself if the Local Church is what it claims to be. Do they really own the only table in any given city? Are they really all about "oneness" or is that a merely a bunch of talk? Is their belief and practice in harmony with each other? Are they REALLY the "Lord's Recovery?" To make a long story short here, I was forced to answer myself honestly because it was already articulated in my being to accept the truth. I had to determine the truth of the absurd statements the Local Church makes. After several weeks of desperate prayer, Bible Study, phone calls, and conversation I came to understand that the Local Church is a denomination. To those of us that left, it's quite obvious, but those still in the LC remain blind to such an obvious and simple truth because they don't want to believe it. Not only did I come to understand that the LC was a denomination, but I also came to understand that the LC was highly divisive and arrogant. I came to understand that the LC was downright... just... wrong. So, I accepted the truth and left the Local Church. My uncle, who had previously left the LC comforted me saying, "there is life after the Local Church." He was right! As I've told others recently, I intend to write a lengthy testimony of not only my experience going through the Local Church, but also the adventures of three generations of my family. My extended family has given me their blessing to make their stories public. They strongly believe that the ways of the Local Church need to be exposed. I've written a little of it already, but I find that I get in a bad mood when I write about the Local Church and put the document aside. With time though, I'll finish it and post it. It won't be anything too grand, I'm just saying that this post is my introduction to the forum, because too much time may pass before I finish the other document. In the spirit of full disclosure, please know that I am an agnostic. This means that I don't care too much about theological disagreements or whether or not LC followers are modalists. The Local Church has a well established history of hiding truth. Their practice is corrupt, and good-hearted teenagers and college kids across the world are duped daily into believing that the LC is "God's Move." That is what concerns me. Thanks to the internet and forums such as this, ex members that are willing to speak up can expose the Local Church for what it is. I intend to add to that voice, eventually. It will mark a point in my life where the emotional, mental, psychological, and physiological affect of the Local Church finally is of no consequence to me. For those thinking about leaving the Local Church, know that there is life after the Local Church. 
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