[Trapped]

The announcement about Ron is so strange to watch now that I haven't been in the direct LSM level meetings for a while. A few things I noticed:

1. I know Ed wasn't doing well a few years ago. His speech seems slurred here. Has he has a stroke or some other kind of neurological event?

2. What a strange thing to warn the saints not to do - don't pray for Ron directly. They believe in a God who doesn't care about Ron.....He just cares about His own interests and how Ron is a pawn in carrying His own interests out. They talk as if the church and the kingdom are separate things from the believers themselves. The strange flip side is they pray as if Ron himself is crucially necessary for God to carry out what He wants. Like God can't do it without Ron. Strange contradictory views happening at the same time there.

3. I noticed all the co-workers started their prayers with something like "Lord Jesus, we love you". They direct their prayers to Jesus.....who is the One in the Bible who told us to direct our prayers to the Father. Jesus died so we would have access to God, and yet the co-workers pray as if the veil is still in place and Jesus is the messenger, not the One who cleared the way to the Father.

4. Their prayers also clearly indicate that they think that Ron's cardiac issues are a part of Satan's attack. Ron has not been slim for quite some time now, although he has spoken about exercising on a treadmill. Unless there are genetic factors at play, Ron's clogged arteries are probably more a product of his diet, lifestyle, and age than Satan's attack. An 80+ year old man who angrily rails against anyone shining light on his secrets having health issues must, in their eyes, be the attack of the devil! This shows how they view literally any problems in their life.....how tiring.

It is my understanding that Ron ended up needing a quadruple bypass, i.e. open heart surgery. Unless they did something non-traditional like off-pump keyhole coronary bypass, his surgery would have been the whole shebang - chest cracked, heart stopped during surgery, veins/arteries harvested, the whole nine yards. If so, his recovery period will likely be extensive.

Trapped