[Jay]

Originally Posted by TLFisher

I would the combination of 1000 years outer darkness/being on overcomer is too much an emphasis in the local churches. I'd agree it is a driving force in the LC. Brothers and sisters lose sight of loving for today, taking care of relationships, etc.
I get what you're saying about Bellevue. I've been there. In the many prophesying meetings I attended, I can only recall one brother who had no shame exposing his soul life. Everyone else there was a lot of pretention.
Pretending we didn't have a soul life. Was it coincidental, that on Superbowl Sunday the lead elder would boo hoo churches that advertise watch the super bowl the afternoon following service? In the local churches, we were more private about that sort of thing. Superbowl Sunday 1996, I only remember that because it was the last time the Cowboys won a super bowl. One of the brothers in Bellevue was hosting a Superbowl party. For myself, living in the brother's house we didn't have a tv. If I wanted to watch a sporting event, I'd go to my uncle's home or another brother's home. However when we came to the meeting, there was no such talk what we enjoyed to do. So worldly. So soulish. Be in your spirit brother/sister.

I loved baseball, football, basketball. Didn't need a tv. A radio worked just fine. That goes back to my childhood. For the first few years living in Anaheim, my parents didn't have a tv and my dad enjoys sports. Our bonding time came from listening to Dodger games on the radio.

I really think serving ones do a disservice to the young children they're serving. They put fear into them with the focus on 1000 outer darkness, the gnashing of teeth versus being an overcomer. You don't want to miss out on the wedding feast.
When it comes down to it, everyone has a soul life and trying to live in denial is damaging. That's how I see churchkids being nurtured from an early age. They get programmed trying to be something they're not. If you cannot be a young brother/young sister who can buy into "Overcoming" 100%, there is going to be personal suffering.

Yeah solid points. For sure we all have a soul life and we all partake of things to find happiness and contentment for our souls, to whatever degree. Even Paul alludes to this in one particular verse that I just can't remember right now. But it's something along the lines of 'even you care for your own souls' or something like that. It's also interesting to note that many times the Bible uses the word soul in different lights. sometimes it's in a good light such as a verse that says something like 'you preserve your souls to live for God' or something like that which kind of is talking about the soul as in the entire person. And then other verses the soul is used in a negative light, where Jesus says something like 'he who loses his soul life will find it.' Which if you understand the context of that verse he's basically saying the soul is fallen and corrupted and we need to deny it for this reason

At any rate I believe there's a fine line between denying the soul life and asceticism. And many times that line is very very blurry, and easily can be crossed over into legalism/asceticism as opposed to self denial. I suppose that's why they often say in the recovery that 'the cross is in the spirit.' which is a fantastic maxim that helped me a great deal when I was young and trying to forsake the world by throwing out all of my belongings. But I think that we can't deny our soul life by our own efforts. That's like using the soul to deny the soul, which is kind of where Paul was in Romans 7. But then in Romans 8 he tells us to use the soul to turn to the spirit. Particularly the will and mind. He's basically just saying "exercise your spirit, and do it by using the soul to get into the spirit." Then there's other concepts such as the spirit saturating the soul which is how we become transformed. And verses such as 'you have the mind of Christ' and 'be transformed by the renewing of the mind' and 'that Christ may make his home in your hearts through faith.' These verses are all strong indications that transformation takes place in our soul (mind, emotion, will)



But I think the better message as opposed to "you'll go to the darkroom if you do such and such thing," is "turn to your spirit and enjoy the Lord as much as possible and don't worry about the stuff that you can't change right now." Which I have heard many in the recovery also say in not so many words. But it's difficult because satan comes in to attack using our fallen conscience and we start feeling bad over things that God doesn't even care about. I feel like God cares more about us turning to our spirit than giving up certain things and going cold turkey for consecration. I also think a lot of young people fall into the mistake of being too extreme and it causes pain and suffering when they backslide. Which is why a solid healthy message is another recovery maxim- "you're where you're at until you're somewhere different." Which basically just alludes to the fact that transformation takes time and it won't happen by throwing out all of your belongings that may or may not be worldly, and to be comfortable and content in your station in life and not try to be overcomers without Christ. Only Christ can be the overcomer within us. And only by his life can we overcome. Otherwise we're just trying to fulfill the law through self effort, which is another huge mistake that many Christians make, even Paul

But with that said there for sure are things that do need to be tossed into the bin. And just frankly speaking when I was in Spokane they really had a lot of enjoyment of the Lord and a living out of the spirit, and in my estimation it was largely due to their corporately making strong efforts to forsake the world and give it up. And I've also often wondered if one of the major problems of Bellevue was because the leader there was kind of hypocritical in that he was often in his soul, and when I heard him talking about football like that after a meeting was over when everyone was still at the hall, and I think he even invited everyone over for a super bowl party like you said, that just never sat right with me

I think what we do behind closed doors is between us and God but to take that stuff into the church could stumble others. But I think in Spokane they really lived it, they didn't just talk the talk, they had really left the world in a real practical way in their personal lives, and I always respected that and feel it was a large reason they had so much life and love. There were times when they would just exude God and didn't even know it. I remember when I first started meeting with them when I was around twenty-one I felt like they just were permeated with the spirit of God, to such an extent that I felt like I could SEE GOD in them and their expressions. That was one of the biggest things in my life that confirmed the reality of God and confirmed that some in the recovery are really really close to God and God is with them