Pray-Reading

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by ToGodAlone

I suppose another relevant question to the topic would be, how do we show them that certain "truths" they believe in are not in fact truth? How do we back up claims about topics like the local ground, pray reading, and all that?

Ray Graver wrote a short booklet on pray reading. In that booklet he quoted many spiritual men from church history talking about praying over the word, praying with the word, and speaking the word back to God in prayer. If you could find that booklet (and I am sure both RG and BP would have copies, probably EM and KR as well) that would be a great place where you could start. I don't think anyone would have an issue with reading that book (either in the LRC or out of it) and once you do it will change your whole perception of what the term "pray reading" really means. You will see that the current practice is merely a superficial imitation. You don't have to say this, the LRC member will come to their own conclusion and probably take this message back to their meeting as well.

As far as the truth on the ground of the church I would start by reading from TNCL from WN where he discusses this truth. What you see is that the basis for the search for "this truth" was a way to overcome the divisiveness in Christianity, rather than lay the foundation for the most divisive group. To me, what makes this teaching harmful is the spirit of exclusivity. When you see that the spirit behind the teaching was to have a spirit that embraces all christians it is much easier to lay that teaching aside when it contradicts the objective.

[OBW]

Was Ray Graver's booklet on pray reading the same one that sort of introduced it back in the early 70s or late 60s? If so, I recall that there was much discussion a couple of years ago around it and it was far from certain that the thing in the booklet we were discussing was really the same thing as all those great men and women of the faith had done before.

I would agree that praying with the word is a significant thing. But the kind of thing that was taughti this booklet taught to divorce the words from each other in such a manner that they no longer constituted sentences and thought within context. Unlike the declaration in that booklet, it was not "the way" to take in the scripture/word of God.

Maybe this thing written by Ray is not the one we were talking about then.

[kisstheson]

Originally Posted by OBW

Was Ray Graver's booklet on pray reading the same one that sort of introduced it back in the early 70s or late 60s? If so, I recall that there was much discussion a couple of years ago around it and it was far from certain that the thing in the booklet we were discussing was really the same thing as all those great men and women of the faith had done before.

I would agree that praying with the word is a significant thing. But the kind of thing that was taughti this booklet taught to divorce the words from each other in such a manner that they no longer constituted sentences and thought within context. Unlike the declaration in that booklet, it was not "the way" to take in the scripture/word of God.

Maybe this thing written by Ray is not the one we were talking about then.

Hello again, dear brother OBW,

Are you referring to the book entitled "Lord . . . Thou Saidst" compiled by Ray Graver and published by Living Stream Ministry in 1981? That book was reprinted by LSM at some point in the 2000's. That book contains quotations from Scripture and from various Christian authors throughout Church History regarding "reading the Scriptures in an attitude or prayer" and "praying based upon the Scriptures".

The testimonies recorded in that book are all are a far cry from the "Shout Reading" which focuses on repeating single words or short phrases from Scripture, inserting some sporadic prayers, that the LRC calls "Pray Reading".

There is a little booklet published by LSM entitled "Pray Reading the Word" which explains the LRC practice of "Pray Reading". If I remember correctly from a long ago post by dear brother Hope, it was Benson Phillips who actually wrote that booklet back in the late 1960s/early 1970s, even though Witness Lee's name appears on the booklet.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by kisstheson

Hello again, dear brother OBW,

Are you referring to the book entitled "Lord . . . Thou Saidst" compiled by Ray Graver and published by Living Stream Ministry in 1981? That book was reprinted by LSM at some point in the 2000's. That book contains quotations from Scripture and from various Christian authors throughout Church History regarding "reading the Scriptures in an attitude or prayer" and "praying based upon the Scriptures".

The testimonies recorded in that book are all are a far cry from the "Shout Reading" which focuses on repeating single words or short phrases from Scripture, inserting some sporadic prayers, that the LRC calls "Pray Reading".

There is a little booklet published by LSM entitled "Pray Reading the Word" which explains the LRC practice of "Pray Reading". If I remember correctly from a long ago post by dear brother Hope, it was Benson Phillips who actually wrote that booklet back in the late 1960s/early 1970s, even though Witness Lee's name appears on the booklet.

I was wondering if there were two different booklets. I believe that the booklet I am referring to was written at the end of the 60s or the early 70s and was sort of a "how to" on turning off your mind and deconstructing verses into words and phrases punctuated with "Oh Lord," "Lord you are our. . .," "Amen," and other things that emphasized the notion of "eating" the words without any concept of what the words actually said or meant. Nothing that changes your life. In my opinion, it just gets you out of your mind to accept Lee's take on the verses without their actual content getting in the way.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by OBW

I was wondering if there were two different booklets. I believe that the booklet I am referring to was written at the end of the 60s or the early 70s and was sort of a "how to" on turning off your mind and deconstructing verses into words and phrases punctuated with "Oh Lord," "Lord you are our. . .," "Amen," and other things that emphasized the notion of "eating" the words without any concept of what the words actually said or meant. Nothing that changes your life. In my opinion, it just gets you out of your mind to accept Lee's take on the verses without their actual content getting in the way.

The booklet I was referring to was not a how to, but rather an attempt to show that the concept of pray reading was both scriptural and something that men of faith had practiced throughout the past centuries.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

The booklet I was referring to was not a how to, but rather an attempt to show that the concept of pray reading was both scriptural and something that men of faith had practiced throughout the past centuries.

And apparently, whether or not what they practice as "pray reading" is the same thing as practiced in past centuries...is another matter.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

The booklet I was referring to was not a how to, but rather an attempt to show that the concept of pray reading was both scriptural and something that men of faith had practiced throughout the past centuries.

That would be Graver's compilation, "Lord ... Thou Saidst." March 1981

Quite a good work actually. I could recommend this to any Christian. Graver included a short bio introducing each brother, along with pertinent quotes from his writings.

Apparently after completing this work in 1981, Graver did an about face, and began to promote WL with an almost blind passion. Ray Graver is one of those great anomalies in the LRC. Apparently he viewed WL as a culmination of the "best of the best" throughout man's entire history.

[rayliotta]

Based on ZNP's sharing, I would have thought much earlier than 1981. Maybe we should be open to the idea that there was no "about face", that someone actually could write such a pamphlet while fully committed to the "blind promotion" of the minister of the age.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

Based on ZNP's sharing, I would have thought much earlier than 1981. Maybe we should be open to the idea that there was no "about face", that someone actually could write such a pamphlet while fully committed to the "blind promotion" of the minister of the age.

I based my post on two factors. Firstly, the book came out during the time of litigation for the Mindbenders and God-men books. Graver's book was an attempt by LSM to make them appear in the "mainstream" like the rest of evangelical Christianity, and it was really anti-cult groups like the Spiritual Counterfeits Project which were the real fringe group. The practice of pray-reading made the LC's look suspicious, and the book helped to relieve those concerns of the Christian public.

Secondly, following the Philippians Life-Study training, RG and BP began to travel about and teach concerning "having an account with the Apostle." The teaching was coupled with the ministry of condemnation that somehow all the churches had been negligent in their care for WL and his burden for the gospel. This teaching, coming out of Texas in the wake of the so-called Max rebellion, laid the groundwork for the radical "oneness" zeal which accompanied the "new way."

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by Ohio

I based my post on two factors. Firstly, the book came out during the time of litigation for the Mindbenders and God-men books. Graver's book was an attempt by LSM to make them appear in the "mainstream" like the rest of evangelical Christianity, and it was really anti-cult groups like the Spiritual Counterfeits Project which were the real fringe group. The practice of pray-reading made the LC's look suspicious, and the book helped to relieve those concerns of the Christian public.

If I understand you you're saying the booklet was really just political, a little game of CYA? Not sure that'd be something I'd recommend to others...

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

Based on ZNP's sharing, I would have thought much earlier than 1981. Maybe we should be open to the idea that there was no "about face", that someone actually could write such a pamphlet while fully committed to the "blind promotion" of the minister of the age.

I saw the booklet prior to 1981, but it may be that the LSM published it in 1981. What I saw was clearly something that RG had put together prior to being published. I may be mistaken but I think KR helped him with his research.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I may be mistaken but I think KR helped him with his research.

Now that helps to explain a lot of things ...

[awareness]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I saw the booklet prior to 1981, but it may be that the LSM published it in 1981. What I saw was clearly something that RG had put together prior to being published. I may be mistaken but I think KR helped him with his research.

Before leaving the LC, around 80/81, I heard rumblings of this booklet, even read some of it at one point, tho it may have been after the LC.

The booklet is nothing but an attempt to justify and legitimize the practice of pray-reading that, anyone on the outside of the LC thought to look like crazy mindless parroting of words in the Bible. It's purpose to validate that mindless insanity, that : pray reading the Bible would result in magic transformation ... when all that the transformation resulted in was attending meetings, conferences, and such, and acting like a bunch of crazies at large from the insane asylum.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by awareness

Before leaving the LC, around 80/81, I heard rumblings of this booklet, even read some of it at one point, tho it may have been after the LC.

The booklet is nothing but an attempt to justify and legitimize the practice of pray-reading that, anyone on the outside of the LC thought to look like crazy mindless parroting of words in the Bible. It's purpose to validate that mindless insanity, that : pray reading the Bible would result in magic transformation ... when all that the transformation resulted in was attending meetings, conferences, and such, and acting like a bunch of crazies at large from the insane asylum.

I didn't see it that way. It seemed to me that what the booklet showed was that the word of God is designed to be prayed and has been prayed over throughout the centuries. There was nothing in the booklet that suggested to me that pray reading as a practice should be done in a mindless way.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I didn't see it that way. It seemed to me that what the booklet showed was that the word of God is designed to be prayed and has been prayed over throughout the centuries. There was nothing in the booklet that suggested to me that pray reading as a practice should be done in a mindless way.

I'm not sure that I would assert that the word of God was "designed to be prayed." It was designed to reveal God through its various forms. Among the various ways that you may be able to use and understand portions of it would include through prayer.

But the last time I read anything by the LSM that was trying to show others "pray reading" I was unable to conclude that any of them (or at least few of them) actually engaged in what the LRC had called pray-reading. I've heard scripture used in prayers in many ways, but outside of the LRC, I have not heard, or heard of such a practice that looks like their version of it.

What I recall from what I read was some descriptions of some notable people through history that made reference of some kind of prayer as they read the scripture. Virtually all of these were part of their personal study time. And I somehow recall only finding one or two that were even possibly found to have mixed the scripture in with their prayer, although the description I recall was still nothing like the deconstruction that was practiced in virtually every LRC endeavor that I had any knowledge of or participation in.

So they found "pray" or "prayer" within a reasonable proximity of the word "read" within a sentence that was talking about scripture and determined that their practice was thereby blessed.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I didn't see it that way. It seemed to me that what the booklet showed was that the word of God is designed to be prayed

So the Bible is designed to be prayed....

Really! Is that so? Are there Bible verses that advise us to pray it? References please. Educate me.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by awareness

So the Bible is designed to be prayed....

Really! Is that so? Are there Bible verses that advise us to pray it? References please. Educate me.

Yes, that was the thesis of RG's book as I recall it. I don't have a copy, but if the LSM published it you might get a copy from them.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Yes, that was the thesis of RG's book as I recall it. I don't have a copy, but if the LSM published it you might get a copy from them.

Chicago Bible and Books carries it ...

http://biblesandbooks.com/mm5/mercha...egory_Code=BSA

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by OBW

I'm not sure that I would assert that the word of God was "designed to be prayed." It was designed to reveal God through its various forms. Among the various ways that you may be able to use and understand portions of it would include through prayer.

But the last time I read anything by the LSM that was trying to show others "pray reading" I was unable to conclude that any of them (or at least few of them) actually engaged in what the LRC had called pray-reading. I've heard scripture used in prayers in many ways, but outside of the LRC, I have not heard, or heard of such a practice that looks like their version of it.

What I recall from what I read was some descriptions of some notable people through history that made reference of some kind of prayer as they read the scripture. Virtually all of these were part of their personal study time. And I somehow recall only finding one or two that were even possibly found to have mixed the scripture in with their prayer, although the description I recall was still nothing like the deconstruction that was practiced in virtually every LRC endeavor that I had any knowledge of or participation in.

So they found "pray" or "prayer" within a reasonable proximity of the word "read" within a sentence that was talking about scripture and determined that their practice was thereby blessed.

I would agree that the word was designed to reveal God but I would add that it reveals God's will as well. Jesus taught us to pray like this "Thy will be done". I wouldn't know God's will if it wasn't for his word.

Now you might not be so sure, but Hannah, Solomon, Moses, Joshua, and Daniel all prayed God's word to Him. And, Mary's praise in Luke could be considered a thanksgiving for answered prayer, in which case she clearly viewed the Bible verses as prayers designed to be prayed.

Hannah prayed in 1Samuel 2:1-10 and that, to my mind, is a Biblical example of praying the word of God back to God.

Solomon’s prayer, recorded in 2 Chronicles 6 is also, to my mind, a Biblical example of praying the word of God back to God.

Moses prayed to God in Numbers 14:17-19 saying “let the power of my Lord be great, according as thou has spoken, saying…” to which God responded in verse 20 “I have pardoned according to thy word”. Moses prayed God’s word to Him and God pardoned according to Moses’ word which was in fact God’s word spoken by Moses.

In Joshua 19:50 it says that Joshua prayed for a city to be given him “according to the word of the Lord” and “according to the word of the Lord they gave him the city which he asked”.

Daniel prayed the word in Jeremiah concerning the return of Israel back to God.

Mary’s praise beginning in Luke 1:46 could be a praise for answered prayer. The verses she quotes can easily be viewed as promises of God. We are instructed to remind God of His promises.

1Thess 3:1 tells us exactly what to pray for. Clearly, if you receive that word and pray according to Paul’s request it is fair to say that word was designed to be prayed.

Psalm 119:25 “quicken thou me according to they word” – yes this word of God is a prayer and I would say was designed to be prayed.

Psalm 119:28 “strengthen me according to thy word” – ditto

Psalm 119:49 “remember the word unto thy servant, upon which thou hast caused me to hope”. Praying the promises of God back to God is a way of reminding God of these promises. Not only does the word teach us the promises of God but we are also instructed to remind God of these promises. Repeatedly the men of God prayed that God would “remember His word”.

119:58 I intreated thy favour with my whole heart: be merciful unto me according to thy word. Again, another word in the Bible that I would say was designed to be prayed.

119:89 LAMED. For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven. The Lord taught us to pray that God’s will would be done on Earth as it is in heaven. This verse says that God’s word is settled in heaven. God’s word reveals His will.

119:133 Order my steps in thy word: The Lord taught us to pray that God would forgive us as we also forgive others. Our actions and our living are intertwined with our prayer. But this verse tells us that our steps are ordered in the word. James says that the prayer of a Godly man is very effective. How can you be a Godly man apart from God’s word?

Isaiah 55:10 For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:
55:11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.

Clearly God spoke a word to accomplish something, that by definition, is His will. The Lord said that we are to pray “thy will be done”. Surely the Lord’s instruction is referring to this very thing. This is a promise, from God, that we should remind Him of. Yes, this word was designed to be prayed.

Jeremiah 1:12 Then said the LORD unto me, Thou hast well seen: for I will hasten my word to perform it. This is another example that the Lord’s will is revealed in His word.

29:10 For thus saith the LORD, That after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return to this place. This word was prayed back to God by Daniel.

2:17 The LORD hath done that which he had devised; he hath fulfilled his word that he had commanded in the days of old: This is a principle that is repeated over and over in the Bible. God will fulfill His word. Therefore it is a very powerful thing to remind God of His word and pray that He would fulfill it, even as Jesus taught us.

12:1 The burden of the word of the LORD for Israel, saith the LORD, The word of God has a burden. I believe that we join with the Lord’s burden in prayer, that is where we agree with God. That to me, is what the Lord instructed us to do when He taught us to pray.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I didn't see it that way. It seemed to me that what the booklet showed was that the word of God is designed to be prayed and has been prayed over throughout the centuries. There was nothing in the booklet that suggested to me that pray reading as a practice should be done in a mindless way.

Expect for the pesky little fact of how pray reading is actually practiced in "the Recovery", so much of the time.

In other words, that little devil called context.

[OBW]

ZNP,

For all of your examples, I see exactly what I said. There are numerous places where as part of a prayer, passages were, in effect, recited back to God. This is the kind of praying of the word that I have seen with significant impact. Even simply repeating the "Lord's Prayer" is profound as part of a larger prayer. It fills in our poor prayers with at least generalities concerning the broad categories we were taught to pray. To pray for more than just kingdom stuff. To also pray for those "poor, pathetic" things about ourselves and our lives that Lee so despised.

But that is not the practice that was being defended by anything written by the LRC and published by the LSM. The practice being defended by Graver's little book was the one described in the earlier book in which neither true reading of the word, nor prayer that looks anything like what Jesus taught when he said, among other things "Thy will be done." Nor any of the other passages you quote in which clear, coherent sentences of profound meaning were turned into something like:

"Our Father. Oh, Lord, Amen, Our Father! Yes, Lord, our Father! Hallelujah, our Father! . . . Thy kingdom! Oh, Lord, Your kingdom! It's all about your kingdom! Save us prom prayers about anything but your kingdom! Come. Oh, Lord, Come! Come! Come! . . . "

And so on. And it can be argued that simply because the actual words from scripture are in there, it is a "sound" praying of the word. But while I did manage to leave the content vaguely recognizable, the process of dealing with scripture are more than sanctified syllables that contain power in their utterance — sort of like the effects of speaking the words from the Book of the Dead in the Mummy series of semi-modern swashbuckling adventure movies. The words contained in The Word have far less meaning as dictionary entries as they do in sentences, paragraphs, and whole passages.

And while there is power in the Word of God, it is not from merely saying the words contained in it. It is from reading for wisdom and understanding — something that the deconstruction of sentences into snippets divorced from their companions cannot do. There is no mystical power in mashing a bunch of words together in a meaningless way. That is not "letting the Word wash over you." It is no better than sitting in a circle and chanting "om." You feel better. You have been engaged in an exercise of emotional exhilaration but with no spiritual significance.

And the problem is not that there is no such thing through history as what might be called "pray reading," but that there is no record of the kind of thing that the LRC pushed as "pray reading." As you point out, there are numerous examples of praying by using passages of scripture as major portions of your own prayer. Or mixing parts of passages into your coherent sentences that, joined together, pray currently in a manner consistent with the passage mixed into your prayer.

So, a little book like Lord Thou Saidst correctly points to prayer in conjunction with what we know to be written in scripture. But that book is not being used to defend the practices mentioned in it, but something different. Something that only shares the words "pray" and "reading" with the examples brought out in the book.

In effect, the whole premise of that book is a kind of equivocation. They make note of practices that they call pray reading (and even others have called pray reading), then assert that their practice is also called pray reading and is therefore covered. But it ain't necessarily so.

So save your dissertation on examples of praying words from prior scripture contained within the scripture. I already agreed with that kind of practice.

And for anyone who still practices that stew-of-a-prayer the LRC calls pray reading, are you empowered to go out and care for the needy after pray reading those passages? Or is pray reading them not on the agenda?

Oh, and finding places where scripture contains the recording of a prayer that we can also pray does not support the general statement that scripture in general "was designed to be prayed." A prayer was designed to be prayed. That is not a general statement about the rest of scripture. So you can correctly assert that "there is scripture that was designed to be prayed" and that would be because it was a prayer when it was recorded.

And just because the word accomplishes God's will, and the words "Thy will be done" are found in a prayer does not support a general statement that the words of scripture are "designed to be prayed." That is just nonsense.

Yes. Pray the Word. Use it all in prayer. We can pray anything (although there clearly is no purpose in praying the American Heritage Dictionary). But that does not make any of it broadly "designed to be prayed." The purpose of scripture in general was not to be prayer. It was to be God's speaking. We can pray it. It is possible to do so. In some cases it is profitable to do so. But I do not see any evidence that, as a whole, it was "designed" as such.

[aron]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

ZNP: "Nothing in that booklet showed me that pray-reading was to be done in a mindless way"

Except for the pesky little fact of how pray reading is actually practiced in "the Recovery", so much of the time.

Right. Chopping up sentences into words and phrases and chanting them with an extremely limited repertoire of accompanying words ("Oh Lord", "Amen", "Hallelujah") is probably not most people's definition of prayer. It's probably not the definition of prayer of the authors quoted in RG's "Lord, Thou Saidst".

Which doesn't definitively disqualify LC practice as "prayer". But to use those authors to prop up your practice of "pray-reading" is probably too much of a stretch.

1. George Washington wore a blue coat.
2. I have a blue coat, which I also occasionally wear.
3. Thus, I am also qualified to be president.

Um, no, sorry. Fallen human logic at work here.

Also, regarding the "mindless" part: I was definitely told by several people not to use my mind. Just to say "Oh Lord", "Amen", and "Hallelujah". If I really wanted to stretch the envelope, I could say "Lord Jesus" or "Praise the Lord". But to actually compose sentences containing original thoughts was not encouraged.

"Get out of your mind", "Exercise your spirit", etc is what I remember in my "pray-reading" instructions. Ray Graver probably didn't write to pray in a mindless way: surely he knew it would look bad (this book was at least partly to put a "public face" on LC doctrines and practices). So it was behind closed doors that we were clearly instructed not to use our fallen human minds as we pray-read the Bible.

But it was ok for RG to use his fallen human mind to compile a book of quotes on praying God's word. Because, you know, he was under "the deputy authority", so even when he was wrong he was right.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

Expect for the pesky little fact of how pray reading is actually practiced in "the Recovery", so much of the time.

In other words, that little devil called context.

Why would the fact that there are superficial Christians out there have any influence on my reading of the Bible and learning from the spiritual men before me? I am not looking at the LRC practice.

[aron]

Originally Posted by OBW

the problem is not that there is no such thing through history as what might be called "pray reading," but that there is no record of the kind of thing that the LRC pushed as "pray reading."

I remember Mr. Lee saying that it was like cutting up a steak. Cut it up into tiny peices and chew on it. Nice analogy; but where is the basis of this, beyond Mr. Lee's inspiration? Suddenly the "historical basis" evaporates.

Originally Posted by OBW

In effect, the whole premise of that book is a kind of equivocation. They make note of practices that they call pray reading (and even others have called pray reading), then assert that their practice is also called pray reading and is therefore covered. But it ain't necessarily so.

Right. Cite others where it is convenient; ignore details which are not convenient. I think this is a trend which goes beyond the subject of pray-reading. You know, make a big deal about being rooted in the history of the christian faith, then when you want to deviate from that history, tell people how God wants a "new move". Then you can have it both ways.

That was easy, wasn't it?

Originally Posted by OBW

finding places where scripture contains the recording of a prayer that we can also pray does not support the general statement that scripture in general "was designed to be prayed." A prayer was designed to be prayed. That is not a general statement about the rest of scripture.

I remember being told (I don't doubt it goes back to Mr. Lee) that Paul told us "Unceasingly pray", therefore we were supposed to pray-read ALL the Bible, not just read it.

And when you got to the nasty parts, like Job's wife telling him to curse God and die, or Peter denying the Lord Jesus, you couldn't say "Amen" or "Hallelujah"... your repertoire of "prayers" shrank to "Oh Lord" and "Lord Jesus".

Reminds me of Lee's famous line that "Christianity (i.e. the clergy-laity system) has nullified the function of the members of the body." My prayers got shrunk to only 3 words!!

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by OBW

ZNP, For all of your examples, I see exactly what I said. There are numerous places where as part of a prayer, passages were, in effect, recited back to God. This is the kind of praying of the word that I have seen with significant impact. Even simply repeating the "Lord's Prayer" is profound as part of a larger prayer. It fills in our poor prayers with at least generalities concerning the broad categories we were taught to pray. To pray for more than just kingdom stuff. To also pray for those "poor, pathetic" things about ourselves and our lives that Lee so despised.
But that is not the practice that was being defended by anything written by the LRC and published by the LSM.

I do not understand the fixation and hangup with the fact that there are superficial Christians whether in the LRC or anywhere else? I find this mockery particularly distasteful since I do not meet with the LRC and in my experience, there are plenty of superficial Christians outside of the LRC. I have heard many prayers that are as fleshly as you can get. But I don't mock them because I realize the real error in the LRC is their pride and arrogance.

As I recall I thought RG's book "Lord...Thou saidst" (thank you Ohio) was beneficial in improving my prayer life. I felt as a result of that book and the Biblical evidence he provided that if I could punctuate my prayer with "Lord...thou saidst" not as a formula, but by Finding God's will in His word, that would have impact. Please do not misunderstand what I am saying, I don't ever use the phrase "Lord thous saidst" in my prayer, but I often do seek to pray God's word back to him.

No doubt your mockery of pray reading is a shoe that fits many in the LRC, but certainly not everybody. I stayed at Dunton House in 1996. There were two older sisters there (in their 70s and 80s) and an elder (also in his 70s I think) in addition there was another brother. These 4 had all been in the LRC far longer than I, and I first met with the LC in '78. Their practice of praying the word for morning watch did not resemble your mockery in any way. We read the word, fellowshipped over it (perhaps, perhaps not), raised some prayer requests / burdens (again maybe yes, maybe no) and then finished by each praying. They refused to use that LSM booklet. The church in NY had a schedule on a weekly basis of verses for morning watch that were based on the messages during the Lord's day morning. No other church that I had met with had that practice, but so what, we used those verses in our morning watch.

For those of us who understood the genealogy of the practice, the point was that the word of God keeps us aligned with God's will and we knew that prayer is, at least in part, praying that God's will would be done.

As for your mockery, I wish many more Christians would have a time in the word every morning along the lines that we did.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by OBW

Oh, and finding places where scripture contains the recording of a prayer that we can also pray does not support the general statement that scripture in general "was designed to be prayed." A prayer was designed to be prayed. That is not a general statement about the rest of scripture. So you can correctly assert that "there is scripture that was designed to be prayed" and that would be because it was a prayer when it was recorded.

And just because the word accomplishes God's will, and the words "Thy will be done" are found in a prayer does not support a general statement that the words of scripture are "designed to be prayed." That is just nonsense.

Yes. Pray the Word. Use it all in prayer. We can pray anything (although there clearly is no purpose in praying the American Heritage Dictionary). But that does not make any of it broadly "designed to be prayed." The purpose of scripture in general was not to be prayer. It was to be God's speaking. We can pray it. It is possible to do so. In some cases it is profitable to do so. But I do not see any evidence that, as a whole, it was "designed" as such.

Once again you take a very general statement "the word of God is designed to be prayed" and put your very strict definition on it. If I said Cheerios were designed to be eaten would you assume I was talking about the box?

No it is not nonsense. If I can show you a verse in the Bible that was clearly designed to be prayed that is proof of the statement. I never said that every word was designed to be prayed. I understand that there is a range of acceptance on this point, personally I feel that a very high percentage of the Bible is designed to be prayed, but if others feel only 5% is designed to be prayed, so what, that does prove my statement. Not your absurd assumptions about what the statement meant. This is typical of you. Take a reasonable statement, put absurd inferences on the statement that then make the statement almost impossible to prove and say the statement is false. If you agree, which you have stated that you do, that one word in the Bible is designed to be prayed, then you have agreed to the statement that "the word of God is designed to be prayed". All you are doing is qualifying it to say you don't agree that every word is designed to be prayed. So what?

Likewise, if you agree that the word of God reveals God's will. Then without a doubt praying that God's will be done can certainly involve praying this word back to God as many examples in the Bible attest. Yes, this definitely proves that "God's word is designed to be prayed". Once again you color this statement with an absurd inference that I used the qualifier "every". Also you cut the verse references out of the context. It is as though I had a two step proof and you argue that step one by itself is not a proof?! The proof is this: 1. the Lord taught us to pray "thy will be done" (we all agree this is what is taught), 2. We learn of God's will from the word of God (again, no dispute that the word of God reveals God's will). 3. There are many examples of prayers recorded in the Bible in which God's will from His word is prayed back to God (once again no dispute). Therefore, to pray God's will as revealed in the word is a Biblical practice of the Bible. Try respecting the ways of God and his servants.

Instead, I would say that as you find the easiest words to pray back to God you will find others as well. So although you initially may feel that only 5% of the Bible was designed to be prayed, that percent will grow as you pray.

[aron]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I stayed at Dunton House in 1996. There were two older sisters there ... and an elder ... [whose] practice of praying the word for morning watch did not resemble your mockery in any way. We read the word, fellowshipped over it ... raised some prayer requests / burdens ... and then finished by each praying. They refused to use that LSM booklet. ... No other church that I had met with had that practice, but so what...

You seem to be citing the exception (Dunton House, 1996), and then wondering why OBW is mocking the rule promoted by LSM and practiced nearly universally in the LCs?

[aron]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Instead, I would say that as you find the easiest words to pray back to God you will find others as well. So although you initially may feel that only 5% of the Bible was designed to be prayed, that percent will grow as you pray.

And sung. And declared. And spoken in the congregation. And mulled over. And copied in notebooks.

Etc etc ad infinitum. Yes, also "eaten". Thy words were found and I did eat them.

How that prayer and declaration and singing is to be conducted is perhaps left up to the participant, and not headquarters. Other than that, you and I and OBW and Ray Graver are all pretty much in agreement. We are believers who think it's important to engage God in His word. You know, conduct a transaction with God, which ostensibly equips us to conduct divine transactions to needy vessels in a fallen world.

"I will not let you go unless you bless me" -- Genesis 32

"I held Him and would not let go" Song of Solomon chapter 3

Our manner of holding the Lord in His word should be free to the inspiration of the participant. Lee was free to cut up his steak into little pieces and chew on it; I likewise am free to engage God's word as I see fit.

OBW's objection was that Graver was using the writings and experiences of others as a cover for LC practices, which were quite narrowly dictated to the rank-and-file.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by aron

You seem to be citing the exception (Dunton House, 1996), and then wondering why OBW is mocking the rule promoted by LSM and practiced nearly universally in the LCs?

I thought I was clear. To my mind the error in the LRC was pride and arrogance, hence their fall. To mock superficial Christians is to me an example of pride and arrogance. So you wish to point out the error of the LRC by continuing to walk in pride and arrogance, that is what I don't understand.

Second, if you are honest you will admit that reading and praying the Bible in a superficial way is hardly the worst thing that superficial Christians do. I choose not to mock others because I feel my error was pride and arrogance. If I choose not to mock what are clearly fleshly prayers, why would I mock the LRC's superficial pray reading?

My point in using the example of Dunton House is that the mockery does not apply to all in the LRC. Ask OBW if his family practices pray reading the way he is mocking others? If his father doesn't, isn't that relevant?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by aron

OBW's objection was that Graver was using the writings and experiences of others as a cover for LC practices, which were quite narrowly dictated to the rank-and-file.

My objection was that he has not substantiated that allegation. I read the booklet back around 1980 or at the latest in the winter of 1981 before the Irving Hall was started. I do not recall it being a "cover". The most I would characterize it as being a polemic in defense of the Biblical and spiritual legitimacy of the practice of "praying the word back to God".

I do not recall that booklet really getting into a prescribed method in which to do this. Now if OBW wants to put his money where his mouth is, cough up the $7, buy the book, and quote the offensive parts to us. If he can prove his case, and I'll let you be the judge of that, then I'll buy the book off of him.

[aron]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I do not recall that booklet ["Lord, Thou Saidst"] really getting into a prescribed method in which to do this.

True. But as RayLiotta pointed out, that is not the way it is on the street. The publication puts a public face on it. Then, within the actual LRC fellowship, what they call "the church life", you are clearly given the method in which to "pray-read". And if you go into the meetings and deviate from collective practice, you will be marked. You are no longer "one".

[UntoHim]

ZNP I don't see where Mike is mocking.

His example:
"Our Father. Oh, Lord, Amen, Our Father! Yes, Lord, our Father! Hallelujah, our Father! . . . Thy kingdom! Oh, Lord, Your kingdom! It's all about your kingdom! Save us prom prayers about anything but your kingdom! Come. Oh, Lord, Come! Come! Come! . . . "

This is an accurate example. Plus Mike went on further to give a very detailed and helpful (in my view) rebuttal and provided to us what "pray-reading" should really look like.

I am reminded of the apostle Paul's word to the Corinthians: "I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also". In my opinion what is practiced in the LC ignores the mind part. Of course when you tell people to "get out of their mind" what else could you expect?

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by aron

Right. Chopping up sentences into words and phrases and chanting them with an extremely limited repertoire of accompanying words ("Oh Lord", "Amen", "Hallelujah") is probably not most people's definition of prayer. It's probably not the definition of prayer of the authors quoted in RG's "Lord, Thou Saidst".

Probably the single greatest difference between the edifying praying of scripture by numerous men of God, as recorded in Graver's book, and what was often promoted in the LC's by LSM, could be characterized by the Lord's instruction in the "Sermon on the Mount." Here He admonishes the disciples not to pray as the "hypocrites" but to pray to your heavenly Father in secret "in your closet." He also warns them not to "repeat empty words." (Matt 6.5-8)

Once LSM began to promote these public "prayers," giving them a structured format, with a 6.7.6.7 cadence accompanied by somewhat robotic "Amens," it was not very long until the LC's fell into the danger of "praying like the Gentiles." Firstly, the danger of praying before man, and not praying from the heart, is a very real danger indeed. It doesn't matter if the words of the Bible are used. The nature of prayer has been changed. This is why the Lord warned the disciples.

Secondly, repetitive "amens" of a public nature, can force prayer into a man-pleasing performance. Bad habits become self-reinforcing, since they are loudly promoted by the entire congregation. Genuine prayer gives way to robotic repetitions, as the "Amen-volume" is cranked up. I strongly promote the praying of scripture, and I equally discourage the repetitive shouting of verse-slogans. The two practices have nothing in common. Unfortunately LSM has messed up the whole thing, to the damage of many a LC'er prayer life.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

My objection was that he has not substantiated that allegation. I read the booklet back around 1980 or at the latest in the winter of 1981 before the Irving Hall was started. I do not recall it being a "cover". The most I would characterize it as being a polemic in defense of the Biblical and spiritual legitimacy of the practice of "praying the word back to God".

I do not recall that booklet really getting into a prescribed method in which to do this. Now if OBW wants to put his money where his mouth is, cough up the $7, buy the book, and quote the offensive parts to us. If he can prove his case, and I'll let you be the judge of that, then I'll buy the book off of him.

Brother ZNP, my suggestion is to post what is on your heart, and not try to win arguments. Some folks just love to challenge everything. It is just a trap. The way out, at least for me, is to write unto the Lord for the unseen reader. Let the other poster disagree, and then let the reader decide.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by aron

True. But as RayLiotta pointed out, that is not the way it is on the street. The publication puts a public face on it. Then, within the actual LRC fellowship, what they call "the church life", you are clearly given the method in which to "pray-read". And if you go into the meetings and deviate from collective practice, you will be marked. You are no longer "one".

How do you ascribe so much to this book? It is a booklet, RG is not called the author or editor but the "compiler" because it is a compilation. To my recollection the vast majority of the quotes were either from the Bible or Christian leaders outside of the LRC. I don't know if he quoted WL at all.

Second, I have travelled to many localities. I have visited every locality in Texas, a few in the Far East, as well as many in California, Florida, Atlanta, NY, Boston, etc. In my experience (which is very limited since 1995) pray reading was practiced differently in different locales. Some emphasized it, some didn't emphasize it as much.

In Taipei it seemed to be quite different from the US.

Things may have changed, perhaps the influence of the LSM and BBs has truly permeated the entire LRC (is the proper term mingled, don't know) But if that is the case why are you ascribing that to RG's booklet published 15 years prior to 96?

I was there when he was researching it, when he wrote it, I read a rough draft of it before publication. His burden was to prove that praying the word was not some kind of far eastern chanting practice brought over from China but was scripturally sound. As I said it was designed as a Polemic to defend the scriptural basis for praying the word back to God. RG is not a theologian, so he didn't add his own 2 cents, instead he compiled a lot of quotes, put them into a good order, and left it at that. To my knowledge he didn't get into the LRC practice other than to put it into the same sphere as praying the word back to God.

Why is he being attacked and vilified for this?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Probably the single greatest difference between the edifying praying of scripture by numerous men of God, as recorded in Graver's book, and what was often promoted in the LC's by LSM, could be characterized by the Lord's instruction in the "Sermon on the Mount." Here He admonishes the disciples not to pray as the "hypocrites" but to pray to your heavenly Father in secret "in your closet." He also warns them not to "repeat empty words." (Matt 6.5-8)

Once LSM began to promote these public "prayers," giving them a structured format, with a 6.7.6.7 cadence accompanied by somewhat robotic "Amens," it was not very long until the LC's fell into the danger of "praying like the Gentiles." Firstly, the danger of praying before man, and not praying from the heart, is a very real danger indeed. It doesn't matter if the words of the Bible are used. The nature of prayer has been changed. This is why the Lord warned the disciples.

Secondly, repetitive "amens" of a public nature, can force prayer into a man-pleasing performance. Bad habits become self-reinforcing, since they are loudly promoted by the entire congregation. Genuine prayer gives way to robotic repetitions, as the "Amen-volume" is cranked up. I strongly promote the praying of scripture, and I equally discourage the repetitive shouting of verse-slogans. The two practices have nothing in common. Unfortunately LSM has messed up the whole thing, to the damage of many a LC'er prayer life.

I have a theory on this. I believe that if you are living in sin and then forced to stand up in front of the entire assembly of the church and pray you will feel like all of your sins are open for all to see. Therefore you need a fig leaf. Once the LRC closed their eyes to the sins around them they needed a fig leaf and that is when the practice of pray reading and other practices really became nothing but a front to pretend they were spiritual, just like the hypocrites Jesus warned of.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

ZNP I don't see where Mike is mocking.

His example:
"Our Father. Oh, Lord, Amen, Our Father! Yes, Lord, our Father! Hallelujah, our Father! . . . Thy kingdom! Oh, Lord, Your kingdom! It's all about your kingdom! Save us prom prayers about anything but your kingdom! Come. Oh, Lord, Come! Come! Come! . . . "

This is an accurate example. Plus Mike went on further to give a very detailed and helpful (in my view) rebuttal and provided to us what "pray-reading" should really look like.

I am reminded of the apostle Paul's word to the Corinthians: "I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also". In my opinion what is practiced in the LC ignores the mind part. Of course when you tell people to "get out of their mind" what else could you expect?

Do you pray with your mind also? Would you be offended if I said you didn't? How about OBW? How about OBW's family that still meets with the LRC?

The question is you don't see where Mike is mocking. My response is "do unto others as you would have them do unto you". I consider it very much over the line if someone criticizes and complains about my prayer and my time with the Lord. I personally do not practice "pray reading" as described by OBW, not even when I was in the FTTT. No one ever pressured me, I just prayed quietly while others did all of that. But on the other hand I never criticized. I have heard one argument that in the LRC you have to adopt this practice or else you are not "one". Yet, this approach of attacking this practice is to me no different, just the other side of the pendulum.

In my experience the most vocal and energetic of this style of "pray reading" were those who were recent converts. Surely you remember the joy of your salvation. Maybe they are just expressing that and it takes a year or two to work its way out.

Ultimately, I have seen a lot that I would be critical of in Christians, particularly sin and the flesh. I think criticizing pray reading is not on my list. I have known many, many saints in the LRC that had been there for over 10 years and I can't think of any that stands out as being "mindless".

This thread is "combating LC arguments". Someone brought up pray reading and my response was to use RG's book as a place where you could meet and fellowship with this person. I feel that they would be open to the fellowship and it might help them to see that their practice, if it is the case, is mindless and not what was practiced by the saints of old. I stand by that advice.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

How do you ascribe so much to this book? It is a booklet, RG is not called the author or editor but the "compiler" because it is a compilation. To my recollection the vast majority of the quotes were either from the Bible or Christian leaders outside of the LRC. I don't know if he quoted WL at all.

In the section of end "Notes," titled "The Word as Nourishment," there is one quote by WL.

[kisstheson]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Do you pray with your mind also? Would you be offended if I said you didn't? How about OBW? How about OBW's family that still meets with the LRC?

The question is you don't see where Mike is mocking. My response is "do unto others as you would have them do unto you". I consider it very much over the line if someone criticizes and complains about my prayer and my time with the Lord. I personally do not practice "pray reading" as described by OBW, not even when I was in the FTTT. No one ever pressured me, I just prayed quietly while others did all of that. But on the other hand I never criticized. I have heard one argument that in the LRC you have to adopt this practice or else you are not "one". Yet, this approach of attacking this practice is to me no different, just the other side of the pendulum.

In my experience the most vocal and energetic of this style of "pray reading" were those who were recent converts. Surely you remember the joy of your salvation. Maybe they are just expressing that and it takes a year or two to work its way out.

Ultimately, I have seen a lot that I would be critical of in Christians, particularly sin and the flesh. I think criticizing pray reading is not on my list. I have known many, many saints in the LRC that had been there for over 10 years and I can't think of any that stands out as being "mindless".

This thread is "combating LC arguments". Someone brought up pray reading and my response was to use RG's book as a place where you could meet and fellowship with this person. I feel that they would be open to the fellowship and it might help them to see that their practice, if it is the case, is mindless and not what was practiced by the saints of old. I stand by that advice.

Hello dear brother ZNPaaneah,

Just some random comments on your post:

1) I like Ray Graver's book "Lord . . . Thou Saidst". It may well be the best thing that LSM has ever published. As dear brother Ohio has pointed out, none of the examples from Scripture or from Church History support Witness Lee's style of "pray-reading". In Ray Graver's book, we see some very touching examples of dear brothers and sisters who incorporated the Scriptures into their prayers and who incorporated prayer into their reading of the Scriptures. NOWHERE is this book do we find anything like the "Shout-Reading" promoted by WL and LSM in their booklet entitled "Pray Reading the Word". WL's method is NOT supported by Scripture or by Church History.

2) If you think dear brother OBW was mocking in the example that he gave, please check out this word-for-word quotation from LSM's booklet entitled "Pray Reading the Word" (emphasis mine):

"We would not argue in a doctrinal way, but we must realize that there is no need for us to close our eyes when we pray. It is better for us to close our mind! For example, in pray-reading Galatians 2:20 simply look at the printed page, which says, “I am crucified with Christ.” Then with your eyes upon the Word and praying from deep within, say: “Praise the Lord, ‘I am crucified with Christ.’ Hallelujah! ‘Crucified with Christ.’ Amen! ‘I am.’ O Lord, ‘I am crucified.’ Praise the Lord! ‘Crucified with Christ.’ Amen! ‘I am crucified with ’ Hallelujah! Amen! ‘And it is no longer.’ Amen. ‘No longer.’ Amen. ‘I who live.’ O Lord. ‘I who live.’ Hallelujah! Amen! ‘But it is Christ who lives in me,’ etc.” Then perhaps you will turn to John 10:10 and read, “I have come that they may have life.” Then with your eyes still on the Bible you can pray: “‘I have come.’ Amen! ‘I have come.’ Hallelujah! ‘I have come that they may have life.’ Praise the Lord! ‘May have life.’ Hallelujah! ‘Life.’ Amen! ‘Life.’ O Lord, ‘Life.’” "

From this quote, we can see that OBW was not far from the mark. If OBW was mocking, then LSM is mocking themselves in their own booklet on pray-reading.

3) I have practiced "Shout-Reading" (WL's and LSM's version of "pray-reading") with brothers and sisters all over North and South America in dozens of localities. I have encountered a few localities where LSM-style pray-reading is not promoted that much, but in the vast majority of localities the leading brothers want to be in lock-step with Anaheim and LSM-style pray-reading is very much promoted.

4) In my experience, it is the leading brothers and the old-timers who are most zealous for LSM-style pray-reading. Some new converts seem to like it, but most do not like it. If it was mostly new converts it would have died away by now. From what I have experienced in multiple localities, it is definitely the leading brothers and the old-timers from Eldon Hall who most zealously promote this practice.

5) I do not know about the FTTT, but LSM-style pray-reading was heavily promoted right from the start in the FTTA. About ten years ago I listened to all the audio tapes in the series "The Exercise and Practice of the God-Ordained Way" given by WL in the late 1980's to one of the original set of FTTA trainees in the United States. Before many of the messages, WL had the trainees pray-read the verses for that message. Interestingly, the trainees never seem to have gotten it right, and WL was constantly scolding their attempts at pray-reading. Even today, FTTA trainees practicee LSM-style pray-reading A LOT, multiple times a day. From what I have seen in localities that have received a "Full-Timer Team" to work on the local campus(es), the "Full-Timers" (former FTT trainees) do several things: they gradually dominate the "prophecying" meetings and, regardless of current practices in that locality, they strongly promote the practices of LSM-style pray-reading and calling on the Lord.

Just some random thoughts.

[UntoHim]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Do you pray with your mind also? Would you be offended if I said you didn't? How about OBW? How about OBW's family that still meets with the LRC?

ZNP, first of all you’re taking this too personal. Critiquing and challenging teachings and practices does not have to be taken as a personal insult. Again, I see nowhere where Mike or anyone else (except maybe awareness, and he’s kind of grandfathered in as the board antagonist) has crossed the line into personal insults. And if you are offended by my citing a perfectly applicable portion of scripture, well then I just don’t know what to tell you about that.

The question is you don't see where Mike is mocking. My response is "do unto others as you would have them do unto you". I consider it very much over the line if someone criticizes and complains about my prayer and my time with the Lord. I personally do not practice "pray reading" as described by OBW, not even when I was in the FTTT. No one ever pressured me, I just prayed quietly while others did all of that. But on the other hand I never criticized. I have heard one argument that in the LRC you have to adopt this practice or else you are not "one". Yet, this approach of attacking this practice is to me no different, just the other side of the pendulum.

You contradict yourself here. You say that you “personally do not practice ‘pray reading’ as described by OBW” and yet you say that it’s “very much over the line of someone criticizes and complains about my prayer and my time with the Lord”. If you do not practice pray-reading as described by OBW and others here, then why are you so offended by the criticisms? You say “on the other hand I never criticized”. Great. Nobody here is forcing you to criticize anything (though you are free to do so), but I am going to ask you to give the freedom and grace to others who feel that the way pray-reading is practiced in the Local Church is neither scriptural nor especially profitable.

Ultimately, I have seen a lot that I would be critical of in Christians, particularly sin and the flesh. I think criticizing pray reading is not on my list.

Great, pray reading is not on your list. So be it. You have your list and I have mine. So long as a poster’s “list” does not include flaming and insulting other members, extra strong or foul language or other forum no-nos, then they can post here.

I have known many, many saints in the LRC that had been there for over 10 years and I can't think of any that stands out as being "mindless".

Who called anybody “mindless”? Please point that post out to me. I hope you have a lot of time on your hands cause you’re not going to find it. I think you may find some of us criticizing the mindless way that pray-reading is practiced in the Local Church. Sorry ZNP, but your saying that “I didn’t pray-read that way” is not a good defense of the practice of pray-reading as it has been practiced in the LC since the early days.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by kisstheson

Hello dear brother ZNPaaneah,

Just some random comments on your post:

1) I like Ray Graver's book "Lord . . . Thou Saidst". It may well be the best thing that LSM has ever published. As dear brother Ohio has pointed out, none of the examples from Scripture or from Church History support Witness Lee's style of "pray-reading". In Ray Graver's book, we see some very touching examples of dear brothers and sisters who incorporated the Scriptures into their prayers and who incorporated prayer into their reading of the Scriptures. NOWHERE is this book do we find anything like the "Shout-Reading" promoted by WL and LSM in their booklet entitled "Pray Reading the Word". WL's method is NOT supported by Scripture or by Church History.

2) If you think dear brother OBW was mocking in the example that he gave, please check out this word-for-word quotation from LSM's booklet entitled "Pray Reading the Word" (emphasis mine):



From this quote, we can see that OBW was not far from the mark. If OBW was mocking, then LSM is mocking themselves in their own booklet on pray-reading.

3) I have practiced "Shout-Reading" (WL's and LSM's version of "pray-reading") with brothers and sisters all over North and South America in dozens of localities. I have encountered a few localities where LSM-style pray-reading is not promoted that much, but in the vast majority of localities the leading brothers want to be in lock-step with Anaheim and LSM-style pray-reading is very much promoted.

4) In my experience, it is the leading brothers and the old-timers who are most zealous for LSM-style pray-reading. Some new converts seem to like it, but most do not like it. If it was mostly new converts it would have died away by now. From what I have experienced in multiple localities, it is definitely the leading brothers and the old-timers from Eldon Hall who most zealously promote this practice.

5) I do not know about the FTTT, but LSM-style pray-reading was heavily promoted right from the start in the FTTA. About ten years ago I listened to all the audio tapes in the series "The Exercise and Practice of the God-Ordained Way" given by WL in the late 1980's to one of the original set of FTTA trainees in the United States. Before many of the messages, WL had the trainees pray-read the verses for that message. Interestingly, the trainees never seem to have gotten it right, and WL was constantly scolding their attempts at pray-reading. Even today, FTTA trainees practicee LSM-style pray-reading A LOT, multiple times a day. From what I have seen in localities that have received a "Full-Timer Team" to work on the local campus(es), the "Full-Timers" (former FTT trainees) do several things: they gradually dominate the "prophecying" meetings and, regardless of current practices in that locality, they strongly promote the practices of LSM-style pray-reading and calling on the Lord.

Just some random thoughts.

Thank you, it seems that there may be a significant change from 1987 to the present in the practice. I find that interesting, but have no way to verify since it is almost 15 years since I was last there.

[kisstheson]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Thank you, it seems that there may be a significant change from 1987 to the present in the practice. I find that interesting, but have no way to verify since it is almost 15 years since I was last there.

Hello again dear brother ZNPaaneah.

As a fairly recent "escapee" who left the LSM-loyal LC in early 2007, and who still stays in touch with brothers in the LC, I agree that a significant change has taken place between 1987 and the present, especially after WL's death. WL at least was still experimenting a good bit, so the situation under WL was somewhat fluid. But once WL passed away, things really got set in stone, more and more so as the years progressed.

Amongst the BB's, Ed Marks in particular has been a huge cheerleader for LSM-style pray-reading (Dick Taylor would be a close second). I can not even count the number of conference and training messages where Ed Marks would be speaking about calling on the Lord or pray-reading and he would turn to the Elden-Hall-era brothers and ask "What in the world did you brothers do in the meetings before calling on the Lord and pray-reading?" The Elden-Hall-era brothers would always shrug their shoulders and sigh. That always speaks volumes the first time you see it. Of course, when you see Ed play out that scenario multiple times, it loses it's effect.

The assimilation of the many thousands of FTTA graduates into the various LC's has definitely changed the LC landscape a good bit.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

ZNP, first of all you’re taking this too personal. Critiquing and challenging teachings and practices does not have to be taken as a personal insult. Again, I see nowhere where Mike or anyone else (except maybe awareness, and he’s kind of grandfathered in as the board antagonist) has crossed the line into personal insults. And if you are offended by my citing a perfectly applicable portion of scripture, well then I just don’t know what to tell you about that.

Well I'll respond to this first.

1. I am not taking this personal at all. My discussion here has been almost exclusively about RG's book which I was the first to mention and therefore feel obligated to respond to. I am not a fan of pray reading as practiced in the LRC. I think people are free to practice as they please and see nothing inherently dangerous about mixing the Bible with what I would characterize charitably as an attempt to pray. What I have attempted to do is distinguish between what was taught concerning Pray reading back in 1980/81 in Houston by RG.

2. If OBW or you do not feel that those remarks, directed at yourself, would be insulting, then I would agree with you.

3. Why would I be offended by citing Bible verses? My point is simple, what you are doing is what the LRC practices. They cite Bible verses to prove everyone else is wrong. The idea that one verse in the NT is a basis to reject their practice is no different than the reasoning WL came up with to reject Christian drama. Why not cite David dancing before the Lord who was then mocked by his wife? That seems like a much more appropriate verse reference to me. OBW has stated repeatedly that he feels the teachings and practices of the LRC need to be completely reexamined. Why can't you see the similarity with WL talking about poor Christianity and what you are doing?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

You contradict yourself here. You say that you “personally do not practice ‘pray reading’ as described by OBW” and yet you say that it’s “very much over the line of someone criticizes and complains about my prayer and my time with the Lord”. If you do not practice pray-reading as described by OBW and others here, then why are you so offended by the criticisms? You say “on the other hand I never criticized”. Great. Nobody here is forcing you to criticize anything (though you are free to do so), but I am going to ask you to give the freedom and grace to others who feel that the way pray-reading is practiced in the Local Church is neither scriptural nor especially profitable.

No, I don't contradict myself. Treat others the way you want to be treated. I don't want others critiquing my prayer and personal time with the Lord, therefore I will afford them the same treatment. What makes me especially vocal in this is that I am keenly aware that when I appear before the Lord I will be judged with what judgement I judge. Criticizing the way others worship the Lord seems to me to be a way to make that time before the judgement seat particularly onerous.

I have already provided numerous verses to support my assertion that praying the word back to God is scriptural. This has been challenged by OBW and I have responded in detail. I don't think it is necessary to add anything here.

I have not taken away anyone's freedom on this forum.

I agree that the way pray-reading is described by OBW (and based on your quote, by the LSM as well) is not something I feel led to do, but I am not the Lord, it is not for me to judge what is and is not profitable for someone else. I do feel that the way Pray reading was taught to me by RG and described in his book "Lord Thou saidst" is something that is profitable.

Personally I find this book extremely interesting as it gives a window into RG right before JI was ousted and the Texas brothers took control of the LSM.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by kisstheson

3) I have practiced "Shout-Reading" (WL's and LSM's version of "pray-reading") with brothers and sisters all over North and South America in dozens of localities. I have encountered a few localities where LSM-style pray-reading is not promoted that much ...

Lots of practices passed through the LC's. PSRP was another one. I'm surprised they are still doing that shout-reading thing. Don't they ever get bored with the same old stuff?

Back in the 80's, my LC obtained an interesting reputation for a practice called "rap-reading." It was started partly in response to contemporary "rap," which was in its infancy, and as a way to get the young teenagers reading the word in a fun way. It kind of took on a life of its own as one small group would rap-read during their meetings. Each would take turns leading the others, who repeated what was said exactly, including tones a rhymes.

They had great fun with it. Some were quite good. You needed to be quick witted with a fast tongue. I was not that good at it, and only did it a few times, but sometimes it was a barrel of laughs. A good number of saints had fun with it for a while. It was basically harmless, though some felt it was a little disrespectful and childish.

The sister who started the thing in motion eventually left the faith. My wife felt the elders were childish for letting it go on as it did. The brothers actually had a few successful performances regionally, with all the saints laughing, until TC frowned on the practice.

A few years after that, the region picked up on Polynesian dancing from Malaysia, but that's another story ...

Anybody feel that earthquake?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

Who called anybody “mindless”? Please point that post out to me. I hope you have a lot of time on your hands cause you’re not going to find it. I think you may find some of us criticizing the mindless way that pray-reading is practiced in the Local Church. Sorry ZNP, but your saying that “I didn’t pray-read that way” is not a good defense of the practice of pray-reading as it has been practiced in the LC since the early days.

No one called anyone mindless. My point, though I clearly did not explain it, was that one observation that would support pray reading being a mindless form of prayer is that after years of practicing it those that practice it would themselves seem to be mindless. So I pointed out that I have not observed this even though with all of the saints I met you would have thought I would.

Since most of our prayer life is done in secret, in our closet, I cannot assume to know who is praying in a mindless way (ie your quote about praying with the mind).

You clearly misunderstand my posts on this thread, I am not defending the way pray reading is practiced in the LRC. As KTS has so clearly illuminated, things have changed since WL died. I have not met with the LRC since WL died. 15 years is a long time, I have no idea how it is practiced.

I did point out that when I was in the LRC it was not true to say that everyone practiced it the same way. I gave an illustration with 4 people that most saints would have met had they visited NY, especially if they took hospitality in NY.

Obviously I have been in many meetings that the practice occurred just like OBW described. What I noticed and has not been brought out here, is that in a meeting of 200 saints it was rarely more than 15 saints who would dominate the meeting with that practice. That means over 90% were not active in all of that. So I am not defending the practice, what I am defending is what Paul said "Who are you, O man, to judge another man's servant, to his own Lord he stands or falls".

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Lots of practices passed through the LC's. PSRP was another one. I'm surprised they are still doing that shout-reading thing. Don't they ever get bored with the same old stuff?

Back in the 80's, my LC obtained an interesting reputation for a practice called "rap-reading." It was started partly in response to contemporary "rap," which was in its infancy, and as a way to get the young teenagers reading the word in a fun way. It kind of took on a life of its own as one small group would rap-read during their meetings. Each would take turns leading the others, who repeated what was said exactly, including tones a rhymes.

They had great fun with it. Some were quite good. You needed to be quick witted with a fast tongue. I was not that good at it, and only did it a few times, but sometimes it was a barrel of laughs. A good number of saints had fun with it for a while. It was basically harmless, though some felt it was a little disrespectful and childish.

The sister who started the thing in motion eventually left the faith. My wife felt the elders were childish for letting it go on as it did. The brothers actually had a few successful performances regionally, with all the saints laughing, until TC frowned on the practice.

A few years after that, the region picked up on Polynesian dancing from Malaysia, but that's another story ...

One practice I really enjoyed back in 1981 through 1983 was writing songs. It was a labor that took the whole week. You would fellowship over a message, the verses, your experience. You would try and write a song, maybe you would only contribute a line or two, then you would work on the meter, and if possible polish up the rhyme. Hopefully by the Lord's table you would have a song to sing. Saints were mailing songs between churches. It was a very profitable practice, don't know why it was stopped.

[UntoHim]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

My point is simple, what you are doing is what the LRC practices. They cite Bible verses to prove everyone else is wrong. The idea that one verse in the NT is a basis to reject their practice is no different than the reasoning WL came up with to reject Christian drama. Why not cite David dancing before the Lord who was then mocked by his wife? That seems like a much more appropriate verse reference to me. OBW has stated repeatedly that he feels the teachings and practices of the LRC need to be completely reexamined. Why can't you see the similarity with WL talking about poor Christianity and what you are doing?

I am not trying to prove everyone else is wrong. I am discussing pray-reading, a long established staple practice in the Local Church movement. I quoted one verse as PART of my argument and was not presenting the idea that one verse in the NT is a basis to reject the practice. (I do agree that Witness Lee did this very thing though) So the desire to "reexamine" the teachings and practices of one little sect is to be considered the same thing as Witness Lee's blanket condemnation of the whole of "Christianity"? Really? You may want to rethink that one.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

One practice I really enjoyed back in 1981 through 1983 was writing songs. It was a labor that took the whole week. You would fellowship over a message, the verses, your experience. You would try and write a song, maybe you would only contribute a line or two, then you would work on the meter, and if possible polish up the rhyme. Hopefully by the Lord's table you would have a song to sing. Saints were mailing songs between churches. It was a very profitable practice, don't know why it was stopped.

In the GLA, many have been active song writers. For a while, after LSM "canonized" the supplement, the practice was discouraged, but after WL passed away, TC no longer felt he needed to succumb to every whim of WL. The GLA even has a new hymnal, less every WL song, along with numerous young people song books. If I wasn't so tone-deaf, I might have got involved.

Since the mid-70's, I was constantly condemned by my apologetic cousin and others for the LC practices of pray-reading, calling on the Lord, etc. I found all of these practices far less objectionable than the Catholic confessionals, which, btw, also had minimal Biblical support. The Jonestown tragedy spooked a lot of people into thinking anything slightly different is supposedly dangerous. How dangerous can "shout-reading" be? Did you ever hear the sing-song preaching of Pentecostal ministers? That, to me, is far worse.

Somebody hit them with that 4 letter c-word!

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

I am not trying to prove everyone else is wrong. I am discussing pray-reading, a long established staple practice in the Local Church movement. I quoted one verse as PART of my argument and was not presenting the idea that one verse in the NT is a basis to reject the practice. (I do agree that Witness Lee did this very thing though) So the desire to "reexamine" the teachings and practices of one little sect is to be considered the same thing as Witness Lee's blanket condemnation of the whole of "Christianity"? Really? You may want to rethink that one.

You asked me to "rethink" this. I went back to OBW's post, here, per your request, is my "rethinking".

This is OBW’s post #51 in black.

ZNP,

For all of your examples, I see exactly what I said. There are numerous places where as part of a prayer, passages were, in effect, recited back to God. This is the kind of praying of the word that I have seen with significant impact. Even simply repeating the "Lord's Prayer" is profound as part of a larger prayer. It fills in our poor prayers with at least generalities concerning the broad categories we were taught to pray. To pray for more than just kingdom stuff. To also pray for those "poor, pathetic" things about ourselves and our lives that Lee so despised.

But that is not the practice that was being defended by anything written by the LRC and published by the LSM. The practice being defended by Graver's little book was the one described in the earlier book in which neither true reading of the word, nor prayer that looks anything like what Jesus taught when he said, among other things "Thy will be done." Nor any of the other passages you quote in which clear, coherent sentences of profound meaning were turned into something like:

"Our Father. Oh, Lord, Amen, Our Father! Yes, Lord, our Father! Hallelujah, our Father! . . . Thy kingdom! Oh, Lord, Your kingdom! It's all about your kingdom! Save us prom prayers about anything but your kingdom! Come. Oh, Lord, Come! Come! Come! . . . "

This is not right. RG’s book did not quote this or refer to this. The context of the book was that the Mind Benders book was out accusing the LC of “chanting”. RG was proving that “praying the word back to God” is scriptural and didn’t come from the Far East. No doubt he was defending the practice in the LC by compiling these quotes. But it is a huge stretch and very unfair to him at the time to say he was defending a mindless practice of pray reading. On the contrary, there is nothing in his book that would have supported that. The most you can say is that he was saying that since these saints prayed the word back to God, so can we without being a cult. He didn’t discuss the practice of it. The practice of pray reading in 2011 can hardly be considered the practice in 1979 when he first probably started this book.


And so on. And it can be argued that simply because the actual words from scripture are in there, it is a "sound" praying of the word. But while I did manage to leave the content vaguely recognizable, the process of dealing with scripture are more than sanctified syllables that contain power in their utterance — sort of like the effects of speaking the words from the Book of the Dead in the Mummy series of semi-modern swashbuckling adventure movies. The words contained in The Word have far less meaning as dictionary entries as they do in sentences, paragraphs, and whole passages.

Correct me if I am wrong, but this sounds like mockery to me. Was this quoted from an LSM publication?

And while there is power in the Word of God, it is not from merely saying the words contained in it. It is from reading for wisdom and understanding — something that the deconstruction of sentences into snippets divorced from their companions cannot do. There is no mystical power in mashing a bunch of words together in a meaningless way. That is not "letting the Word wash over you." It is no better than sitting in a circle and chanting "om." You feel better. You have been engaged in an exercise of emotional exhilaration but with no spiritual significance.

This to me is a prime example of “who are you to judge another man’s servant, to his own master he stands or falls”. I believe Paul has drawn a very clear line with this verse and that this post has crossed that line.

And the problem is not that there is no such thing through history as what might be called "pray reading," but that there is no record of the kind of thing that the LRC pushed as "pray reading." As you point out, there are numerous examples of praying by using passages of scripture as major portions of your own prayer. Or mixing parts of passages into your coherent sentences that, joined together, pray currently in a manner consistent with the passage mixed into your prayer.

Well this misses the point. A brother asked how to respond to saints concerning the issue of pray reading. I suggested that they get this booklet and use it to fellowship. I see no reason why anyone in the LRC would have a problem with reading this booklet, and if their practice was mindless I think this booklet might help them see that. With that as the context this paragraph seems woefully out of context.

So, a little book like Lord Thou Saidst correctly points to prayer in conjunction with what we know to be written in scripture. But that book is not being used to defend the practices mentioned in it, but something different. Something that only shares the words "pray" and "reading" with the examples brought out in the book.

This is unsubstantiated. Give me a quote from the book that does this. I have already stipulated that the book was a polemic to defend the LC practice. But you haven’t provided anything that demonstrates that the practice in 1979 in Houston was drastically different from what RG wrote.

In effect, the whole premise of that book is a kind of equivocation. They make note of practices that they call pray reading (and even others have called pray reading), then assert that their practice is also called pray reading and is therefore covered. But it ain't necessarily so.

I knew RG from 1978 to 1981. I have learned things that have shocked and disappointed me concerning him on this forum. I feel he may have hid his eyes during the JI expulsion. But it is a very serious matter in the NT to accuse an elder of lying or equivocation. I find this to be very insulting, I feel you have crossed the line with this comment, and I feel you need to back it up with solid witnesses and evidence. Because based on Paul’s word in the NT I am not to receive a charge against an elder unless it is from several reputable witnesses, and this is not.

So save your dissertation on examples of praying words from prior scripture contained within the scripture. I already agreed with that kind of practice.

And for anyone who still practices that stew-of-a-prayer the LRC calls pray reading, are you empowered to go out and care for the needy after pray reading those passages? Or is pray reading them not on the agenda?

Once again, the use of the term “dissertation” is mocking, especially since both you and Awareness asked directly for references to support the statement that “the word of God is designed to be prayed”. References are asked for, I provide them, you mock. As to empowering saints to live the Christian life, let the Lord judge.

Oh, and finding places where scripture contains the recording of a prayer that we can also pray does not support the general statement that scripture in general "was designed to be prayed." A prayer was designed to be prayed. That is not a general statement about the rest of scripture. So you can correctly assert that "there is scripture that was designed to be prayed" and that would be because it was a prayer when it was recorded.

Which also misses the point, or interprets it extremely narrowly. The fact that Solomon quoted scripture when he prayed to God is an example of the practice. Of course you can pray his prayer, but you can also learn from and imitate him.

And just because the word accomplishes God's will, and the words "Thy will be done" are found in a prayer does not support a general statement that the words of scripture are "designed to be prayed." That is just nonsense.

Yes. Pray the Word. Use it all in prayer. We can pray anything (although there clearly is no purpose in praying the American Heritage Dictionary). But that does not make any of it broadly "designed to be prayed." The purpose of scripture in general was not to be prayer. It was to be God's speaking. We can pray it. It is possible to do so. In some cases it is profitable to do so. But I do not see any evidence that, as a whole, it was "designed" as such.

I responded to this already. But, I will add that this was the point of the book “Lord thou saidst”, once God says something He is obligated by his word. This is why I quoted the verse “my word shall not return void”. Since the Bible is “God’s speaking” as you point out, we can latch onto his words and pray them back to him. This aligns us with His will. This reminds Him of his word, something we are told to do, which is why I quoted that word as well in my “dissertation”. This was something that RG shared a lot in Houston, for example on Romans 10:13 he argued that if you call on the Lord, and proclaim that Jesus is Lord, you have to be saved. You could show up at the judgement seat, hold up the Bible and tell the Lord He is obligated, by His word, to save you.

[Cal]

When I was in the LRC, pray-reading was not about prayer and it was not about reading for understanding. It was for using the word as a vehicle to get more in the Spirit. It wasn't praying so much as it was declaring or speaking. It's not bad in itself, it just (like everything else in the LRC) got taken to an extreme. And it got touted as the greatest thing since sliced manna.

That's what is really annoying about the whole thing. The LRC couldn't just have a practice. They had to believe and try to convince everyone else that their practice was the greatest thing ever and that everyone else is a complete idiot for not realizing as much.

I agree with OBW to this extent. Books like "Lord.. Thou Saidst" were not written to encourage a broad audience to pray the Word. They were written to defend an LRC practice which LRCers called praying the word, but which just as easily could be called "chopping verses into pieces and repeating the pieces over and over in the hopes of achieving a spiritual experience."

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Igzy

When I was in the LRC, pray-reading was not about prayer and it was not about reading for understanding. It was for using the word as a vehicle to get more in the Spirit. It wasn't praying so much as it was declaring or speaking. It's not bad in itself, it just (like everything else in the LRC) got taken to an extreme. And it got touted as the greatest thing since sliced manna.

That's what is really annoying about the whole thing. The LRC couldn't just have a practice. They had to believe and try to convince everyone else that their practice was the greatest thing ever and that everyone else is a complete idiot for not realizing as much.

I agree with OBW to this extent. Books like "Lord.. Thou Saidst" were not written to encourage a broad audience to pray the Word. They were written to defend an LRC practice which LRCers called praying the word, but which just as easily could be called "chopping verses into pieces and repeating the pieces over and over in the hopes of achieving a spiritual experience."

My experience was that I never "got" pray reading. I heard glowing testimonies of the practice, but I just filed those away under something I didn't understand. However, when RG shared his booklet with us, I understood that. Since then I have had many wonderful experiences of praying the word of God. For example, I shared before how I rebuked BP in a meeting, and how I stood up to the threats of JD and the elders in Houston, and how I wrote a letter to the elders in Texas rebuking them, etc. How do you do that, it is rebellion, and not get excommunicated? The answer is simple, you pray the word and speak that. When you speak the Lord's word in prayer your head is covered.

Now because of this I never felt "pressured" to pray read in that way.

So it may be that my understanding of that book was not its intended meaning, how could I know what RG intended? I am not omniscient. But I will say this, there were four things that RG shared as elder that left an indelible mark on me. All four of them had to do with standing on the Lord's word and having faith that God would honor His word. Second, my impression of RG was that he never asked more of anyone than he asked of himself. I do not believe that he was a hypocrite. What I do find easier to believe is that in his zeal to be absolute he was deceived. That is the most credible interpretation I have at the present. The biggest surprise for me in coming to these forums was to learn of the errors of BP and RG. WL was not a surprise, and I had already pegged PL by meeting him once without having to know any details.

[kisstheson]

Originally Posted by Igzy

When I was in the LRC, pray-reading was not about prayer and it was not about reading for understanding. It was for using the word as a vehicle to get more in the Spirit. It wasn't praying so much as it was declaring or speaking. It's not bad in itself, it just (like everything else in the LRC) got taken to an extreme. And it got touted as the greatest thing since sliced manna.

That's what is really annoying about the whole thing. The LRC couldn't just have a practice. They had to believe and try to convince everyone else that their practice was the greatest thing ever and that everyone else is a complete idiot for not realizing as much.

I agree with OBW to this extent. Books like "Lord.. Thou Saidst" were not written to encourage a broad audience to pray the Word. They were written to defend an LRC practice which LRCers called praying the word, but which just as easily could be called "chopping verses into pieces and repeating the pieces over and over in the hopes of achieving a spiritual experience."

Brother Igzy! "And it got touted as the greatest thing since sliced manna."

It really was touted as something truly, truly,great. Here is the closing paragraph to LSM's little booklet entitled "Pray Reading the Word":

"Thousands have proven that this is the right way to come to the Word of God. It has revolutionized their lives. It may seem awkward at first, but with practice and a sincere heart, you will touch the living Spirit. If you will try this both privately and corporately, you will be able to testify of the riches of Christ that have been imparted to you by pray-reading the Word of God. You will see blessing and growth in your spiritual life. There will be a great change. By contacting the Word in this way to enjoy Christ and be nourished by Him, you will be a person growing to maturity, full of life and saturated with this living One."

"Thousands have proven . . ."
". . . revolutionized their lives."
"You will see blessing and growth . . ."
"There will be a great change."
"You will be a person growing to maturity . . ."

Just a tad over-sold, don't you think?

[OBW]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I do not understand the fixation and hangup with the fact that there are superficial Christians whether in the LRC or anywhere else? I find this mockery particularly distasteful since I do not meet with the LRC and in my experience, there are plenty of superficial Christians outside of the LRC. I have heard many prayers that are as fleshly as you can get. But I don't mock them because I realize the real error in the LRC is their pride and arrogance.

As I recall I thought RG's book "Lord...Thou saidst" (thank you Ohio) was beneficial in improving my prayer life. I felt as a result of that book and the Biblical evidence he provided that if I could punctuate my prayer with "Lord...thou saidst" not as a formula, but by Finding God's will in His word, that would have impact. Please do not misunderstand what I am saying, I don't ever use the phrase "Lord thous saidst" in my prayer, but I often do seek to pray God's word back to him.

No doubt your mockery of pray reading is a shoe that fits many in the LRC, but certainly not everybody. I stayed at Dunton House in 1996. There were two older sisters there (in their 70s and 80s) and an elder (also in his 70s I think) in addition there was another brother. These 4 had all been in the LRC far longer than I, and I first met with the LC in '78. Their practice of praying the word for morning watch did not resemble your mockery in any way. We read the word, fellowshipped over it (perhaps, perhaps not), raised some prayer requests / burdens (again maybe yes, maybe no) and then finished by each praying. They refused to use that LSM booklet. The church in NY had a schedule on a weekly basis of verses for morning watch that were based on the messages during the Lord's day morning. No other church that I had met with had that practice, but so what, we used those verses in our morning watch.

For those of us who understood the genealogy of the practice, the point was that the word of God keeps us aligned with God's will and we knew that prayer is, at least in part, praying that God's will would be done.

As for your mockery, I wish many more Christians would have a time in the word every morning along the lines that we did.

You like to refer to it as mockery. But I am making direct reference to the practice that I saw and was taught over a 14+ year period in which "pray reading" was never anything but exactly as I referenced. And that little booklet from back in the late 60s or early 70s was all about that kind of pray reading.

And I'm pretty sure that was the practice that RG felt a need to defend since that kind of pray reading was what the first booklet (also written by a Texas brother, although I don't remember who now) covered and was what the Mindbenders and/or others were referring to.

I did not accuse you of defending the LRC. I just noted that they things your brought up were consistent with what I think most non-LRC people would think of if faced with the term "pray reading."

But I'm not sure that the "morning watch" version of pray reading that I ever saw would be something I would suggest to any Christians. It might give a good feeling, like many mindless activities can be when engaged in as a "tune-out" kind of venture. I can't comment on your experience because I wasn't there to compare to what I saw. I know that there was something about what I saw that always bothered me. But until long after I left, I was convinced enough of its "rightness" that I would have defended it despite my personal misgivings.

That is the kind of thing that really makes me wary of so many things LRC. It gets into your nostrils and hair and clothes and you think you can smell roses and its still LRC garlic. They taught us some things that they said were so spiritual that I still don't think about whether they really are. We just assume it is true.

And I have to assume that it is happening elsewhere. And you are getting the results of my willful questioning of everything LRC. It all needs to be proved by reference to something wholly unrelated to the LRC. I even distrust the sense of experience unless there is something more to it than that.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by kisstheson

Brother Igzy! "And it got touted as the greatest thing since sliced manna."

It really was touted as something truly, truly,great. Here is the closing paragraph to LSM's little booklet entitled "Pray Reading the Word":



"Thousands have proven . . ."
". . . revolutionized their lives."
"You will see blessing and growth . . ."
"There will be a great change."
"You will be a person growing to maturity . . ."

Just a tad over-sold, don't you think?

The whirling of the dervishes is said to accomplish the same release into the realm of the Spirit. Maybe we should whirl while praying the word.

[OBW]

To respond to your post on the points I think needing response, I will simply copy and paste the whole thing in here and then edit it down to what I want to respond to.

My new comments are in GREEN.

-----

You asked me to "rethink" this. I went back to OBW's post, here, per your request, is my "rethinking".

This is OBW’s post #51 in black.

ZNP,

. . . . The practice being defended by Graver's little book was the one described in the earlier book in which neither true reading of the word, nor prayer that looks anything like what Jesus taught when he said, among other things "Thy will be done." Nor any of the other passages you quote in which clear, coherent sentences of profound meaning were turned into something like:

"Our Father. Oh, Lord, Amen, Our Father! Yes, Lord, our Father! Hallelujah, our Father! . . . Thy kingdom! Oh, Lord, Your kingdom! It's all about your kingdom! Save us prom prayers about anything but your kingdom! Come. Oh, Lord, Come! Come! Come! . . . "

This is not right. RG’s book did not quote this or refer to this. The context of the book was that the Mind Benders book was out accusing the LC of “chanting”. RG was proving that “praying the word back to God” is scriptural and didn’t come from the Far East. No doubt he was defending the practice in the LC by compiling these quotes. But it is a huge stretch and very unfair to him at the time to say he was defending a mindless practice of pray reading. On the contrary, there is nothing in his book that would have supported that. The most you can say is that he was saying that since these saints prayed the word back to God, so can we without being a cult. He didn’t discuss the practice of it. The practice of pray reading in 2011 can hardly be considered the practice in 1979 when he first probably started this book.

If you start with the fist sentence I included after the ellipsis, I am giving the practice that RG is defending, not the practice he is describing in his book. I'm not sure who wrote the other book, but it really does sort of describe something like I laid out. It is not a mockery. And it is the whole of what I ever saw in the LRC from Jan 1973 through August 1987.

I really don't care what the practice in certain places in 2011 is because RG did not write about that. He wrote about what was at the time. Well, he wrote with the intent of making what he wrote about seem to be covering what was common practice at the time.

And so on. And it can be argued that simply because the actual words from scripture are in there, it is a "sound" praying of the word. But while I did manage to leave the content vaguely recognizable, the process of dealing with scripture are more than sanctified syllables that contain power in their utterance — sort of like the effects of speaking the words from the Book of the Dead in the Mummy series of semi-modern swashbuckling adventure movies. The words contained in The Word have far less meaning as dictionary entries as they do in sentences, paragraphs, and whole passages.

Correct me if I am wrong, but this sounds like mockery to me. Was this quoted from an LSM publication?

No. It is a fairly faithful representation of the kind of thing that I heard and participated in over a 14+ year period. This is no quote from a publication.

And while there is power in the Word of God, it is not from merely saying the words contained in it. It is from reading for wisdom and understanding — something that the deconstruction of sentences into snippets divorced from their companions cannot do. There is no mystical power in mashing a bunch of words together in a meaningless way. That is not "letting the Word wash over you." It is no better than sitting in a circle and chanting "om." You feel better. You have been engaged in an exercise of emotional exhilaration but with no spiritual significance.

This to me is a prime example of “who are you to judge another man’s servant, to his own master he stands or falls”. I believe Paul has drawn a very clear line with this verse and that this post has crossed that line.

I tire of your "who are you to judge another man's servant." That just makes us all into servants of Lee and therefore free from any questioning of what might be wrong there. Besides, what is the "this verse" that Paul has drawn any kind of line about? I am not referring to any verse of Paul's that I am aware of. Did you dream this part? If you don't want to "judge" anything, what the heck are you doing here??

. . . .

So, a little book like Lord Thou Saidst correctly points to prayer in conjunction with what we know to be written in scripture. But that book is not being used to defend the practices mentioned in it, but something different. Something that only shares the words "pray" and "reading" with the examples brought out in the book.

This is unsubstantiated. Give me a quote from the book that does this. I have already stipulated that the book was a polemic to defend the LC practice. But you haven’t provided anything that demonstrates that the practice in 1979 in Houston was drastically different from what RG wrote.

You are joking. Right? It has already been stated that the book came out during the time of the lawsuits as a historical view of praying with the word so that the LRC practice of pray reading could be defended. Are you disagreeing with this? Are you suggesting that the method of pray reading that you see in 2011 is what was seen by observers prior to 1981? Back to the origins of pray reading. Back when Duddy and others visited LRCs to see for themselves? They may have made more out of it in a negative way than I did, but it was what it was.

But the book isn't going to quote anything that mentions what I did. That is what it is trying to hide. Trying to make go away.

In effect, the whole premise of that book is a kind of equivocation. They make note of practices that they call pray reading (and even others have called pray reading), then assert that their practice is also called pray reading and is therefore covered. But it ain't necessarily so.

I knew RG from 1978 to 1981. I have learned things that have shocked and disappointed me concerning him on this forum. I feel he may have hid his eyes during the JI expulsion. But it is a very serious matter in the NT to accuse an elder of lying or equivocation. I find this to be very insulting, I feel you have crossed the line with this comment, and I feel you need to back it up with solid witnesses and evidence. Because based on Paul’s word in the NT I am not to receive a charge against an elder unless it is from several reputable witnesses, and this is not.

Equivocation can be both intentional and unintentional. But after all the stuff that Benson and Ray did in the whitewashing of JI and others, I do not have any compunction to fear saying that lies have proceeded from his mouth. I would suggest that the deception was intentional.

I would also suggest that he probably was loose in his thinking and simply thought that any kind of prayer with the Word was sufficient since prayer with the Word is prayer with the Word. And if that was as far as he thought, then maybe he wasn't willfully deceptive about it. Maybe more like he was himself deceived.

But if the purpose of the book was to defend the LRC practices at the time of those early lawsuits, and you have even pointed out within this post (a part I have not kept) that the book can be used to show how the LRC is not really engaged in the practices mentioned in that book, then how do you say that there is no equivocation of any kind if the purpose was to defend one thing by showing something else with a similar name. Isn't that the raw definition of equivocation?

So save your dissertation on examples of praying words from prior scripture contained within the scripture. I already agreed with that kind of practice.

And for anyone who still practices that stew-of-a-prayer the LRC calls pray reading, are you empowered to go out and care for the needy after pray reading those passages? Or is pray reading them not on the agenda?

Once again, the use of the term “dissertation” is mocking, especially since both you and Awareness asked directly for references to support the statement that “the word of God is designed to be prayed”. References are asked for, I provide them, you mock. As to empowering saints to live the Christian life, let the Lord judge.

And, despite all of your sources and references, you actually have not established that "the word of God is designed to be prayed." It can be prayed. Some of it is already prayer. But you have failed to actually deal with the question. The question is not whether you can pray the word. It is whether it was designed to be prayed. Is there any evidence that, as a general statement, you can show that the word is designed — written with the structure and intent that it would be prayed.

You can make generalizations about where there are prayers contained in scripture. You can find that some portions of scripture were actually prayed by someone else in other scripture. But you haven't established that anything says that it was designed to be prayed.

-----

I could explain that finding prayers, and verses prayed, is like finding verses that say "to the church in [city]" and declaring that churches must be by city. It could be true in some cases. But there are other cases that are not that way. Just as there are a vast array of verses in scripture that are not demonstrated as being prayed, nor are they said that they should be prayed.

No one has said you should not pray scripture. But you cannot find anything that establishes that it is expressly designed to be prayed. That is the point.

[kisstheson]

Hello dear ones. I have to admit that my respect for Ray Graver's book entitled Lord . . . Thou Saidst has plummeted since this discussion began. I still like the contents of the book, but the reason it was written was very disingenuous, to say the least. Based upon LSM's own words in the booklet entitled Pray Reading the Word, other Christians had PLENTY to be concerned about regarding LSM's version of pray-reading.

There is absolutely nothing in Ray Graver's book which defends LSM's version of pray-reading. Nothing! The clearest NT example of an assembly incorporating Scripture into their prayer is given in Acts 4:24-26. This account is TOTALLY DIFFERENT from the high volume, pep-rally, 6.7 6.7 cadence, chop-the-scriptures-up-into-tiny-pieces, "close your mind", "no time to use your mind" approach to pray-reading promoted by LSM. Dear brother Ray Graver - if you are reading this post, you desperately need to repent! Writing a book to document how other dear ones have used the Scriptures in their prayers and have prayed as the read the Scriptures actually condemns LSM's approach since LSM's approach to pray-reading is NOTHING LIKE what we see in the Scriptures or what we see in the testimony of church history.

There is a HUGE chasm between George Whitefield on his knees tearfully reading his Bible and praying over what he read to obtain strength to carry out his campaigns of soul-winning vs. LRC meetings where the pep-rally, rapid-paced, shout-reading takes place.

I don't know Ray Graver's heart at the time of writing, but the purpose of his book was extremely disingenuous. Between this book and Witness Lee's lies while under oath in court, I am INCREDIBLY SICKENED by the whole WL/LSM charade in their so-called "defense". What a bunch of phonies! There is such a blatant disparity between the image LSM tries so hard to publicly display and the true inner workings of their sectarian, aberrant, sick little group. I am no fan of The God Men or The Mind Benders, but I am finding out all the time that other Christians had plenty to be concerned about with LSM and the LRC.

Sorry for the strong language, but finding out the real history behind this book that I have always admired really makes me want to vomit!

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by OBW

And, despite all of your sources and references, you actually have not established that "the word of God is designed to be prayed." It can be prayed. Some of it is already prayer. But you have failed to actually deal with the question. The question is not whether you can pray the word. It is whether it was designed to be prayed. Is there any evidence that, as a general statement, you can show that the word is designed — written with the structure and intent that it would be prayed.

You can make generalizations about where there are prayers contained in scripture. You can find that some portions of scripture were actually prayed by someone else in other scripture. But you haven't established that anything says that it was designed to be prayed.

-----

I could explain that finding prayers, and verses prayed, is like finding verses that say "to the church in [city]" and declaring that churches must be by city. It could be true in some cases. But there are other cases that are not that way. Just as there are a vast array of verses in scripture that are not demonstrated as being prayed, nor are they said that they should be prayed.

No one has said you should not pray scripture. But you cannot find anything that establishes that it is expressly designed to be prayed. That is the point.

This is true, which is why I still like you. You don’t stop until I can get to the punch line. Everything I have shared is relevant to the comment, but doesn’t establish that the word was designed for this purpose.

1 Peter 3:12 For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers and James 5:16 – The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. God’s ears are open to the prayers of the righteous, their prayers are effectual, and their prayers avail much. Therefore, if you want God to hear and answer your prayers you need to be a righteous man.

Rom 3:28 – we are justified by faith. Rom 4:21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. 4:22 And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Paul explains that Abraham was fully persuaded that what God had promised He was able to perform, and therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. This is what he is referring to when he says Abraham was justified by faith. So in Galatians Paul says: 3:5 He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? 3:6 Even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. 3:7 Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham.

It is by faith that we are justified, it is by faith that righteousness is imputed to us, it is by the hearing of faith that God ministers the Spirit to us and works miracles among us.

Then Romans 10:17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

The word is designed for us to hear it, and when we hear it faith comes. This is how faith comes. Without that faith it is impossible to please God, it is impossible to be justified, it is impossible to be a righteous man that God hears, a man whose prayers are effectual and that avail much. God has designed his word to transmit this faith to us. Prayer is based on faith. This is what James refers to when he says “the prayer of faith” in 5:15. A prayer of faith is your telling God that you have received his promise and are fully persuaded that He is able to perform it.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I would agree that the word was designed to reveal God but I would add that it reveals God's will as well. Jesus taught us to pray like this "Thy will be done". I wouldn't know God's will if it wasn't for his word.

These verses all have to be stretched beyond recognition to support the type of pray-reading practiced in the LC. They are not even close. They do not indicate the Bible was designed to be prayed. You are reading into them something not intended, for why I don't know.

What I'm wondering is why you feel so strong as to over reach in your support for pray-reading.

I haven't pray-read for 30 yrs, and don't miss it at all. In fact, if I did try to pray-read the Bible I'd feel silly and stupid, like I would be in need to have my head examined.

What a silly unnecessary practice. May as well say some Buddhist mantra over and over again, or whirl like the dervishes. And that's okay if that's what you want to do. Sometimes being silly can be fun. So have at it. Pray read all the day long. Just don't let family and friends catch ya doing it, or they may check you into Bellevue for a 3 day mental examination.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

So it may be that my understanding of that book was not its intended meaning, how could I know what RG intended? I am not omniscient.

I'm not omniscient either, but I know from being in the LRC and particularly from watching the actions of RG that their focus is defending their own beliefs and practices, not defending the things of the Lord in general.

The reason I said the book was published to defend LRC practices was because that's why they did everything. They thought they were they "move of God" so they felt that everything they did was better and more crucial than everything everyone else was doing. They made a practice of putting down everyone else and building themselves up.

The LRC walked and walks around with a chip on its shoulder. It provokes opposition then acts all shocked when it gets it. It behaves anti-socially then blames others for not being sociable. They can't even get excited about people getting saved outside the LRC. They have to talk about them being "Moabites."

RG decided a long time ago that his best service to God is to treat WL and his ministry like they are second to God alone. As far as I'm concerned, that's a warped motive. That's probably the best way to describe the LRC. Warped.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by awareness

These verses all have to be stretched beyond recognition to support the type of pray-reading practiced in the LC. They are not even close. They do not indicate the Bible was designed to be prayed. You are reading into them something not intended, for why I don't know.

What I'm wondering is why you feel so strong as to over reach in your support for pray-reading.

I haven't pray-read for 30 yrs, and don't miss it at all. In fact, if I did try to pray-read the Bible I'd feel silly and stupid, like I would be in need to have my head examined.

What a silly unnecessary practice. May as well say some Buddhist mantra over and over again, or whirl like the dervishes. And that's okay if that's what you want to do. Sometimes being silly can be fun. So have at it. Pray read all the day long. Just don't let family and friends catch ya doing it, or they may check you into Bellevue for a 3 day mental examination.

I think the issue here is "the practice in the LRC". I am not defending the practice in the LRC. What I have said consistently from my first post on this thread to this one is that "pray reading" as defined by RG's book is scriptural.

OBW has argued that this book was written to defend the practice of the LRC and that by using the term "pray reading" it is a form of equivocation. I feel that it is too strong to accuse RG of this without more evidence. However, I think applying his use of equivocation to this thread is very accurate. Everyone that disagrees with my posts has done so based on "the practice in the LRC" whereas no one has actually disagreed with what I have actually said, which is "pray reading as defined in RG's book is scriptural".

The second thing that I have argued is that there was not a uniform practice of pray reading. When I was in Houston it was clearly a practice that was being hyped and sold, but not necessarily embraced or employed. When I was in Irving working on the hall it was almost non existent. When I was in Odessa, I did not bring this practice, nor did GW (thankfully) so it was not an issue at all. When I was in the FTTT it was there and I ignored it. When I was in NY the practice in the meetings was quite different from the practice in Dunton house and it was a minor irritant (as a High School teacher I have a high tolerance for minor irritants).

The third thing I have argued is that with sin and the flesh we should be absolute and uncompromising. But since this was neither we should be general, strict on ourselves, general with others. I have stated that judging the way a man serves his Lord is to cross a line and you will regret that at the Lord's judgement seat. But having said that I have fulfilled my responsibility.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

My experience was that I never "got" pray reading. I heard glowing testimonies of the practice, but I just filed those away under something I didn't understand. However, when RG shared his booklet with us, I understood that.

And this is what raises warning flags for so many of us. The glaring difference between "pray reading" as practiced in the LRC, and "pray reading" as defended so eloquently, apparently, in Ray Graver's book.

You say, What's the issue, Graver never talked about the LRC practice in his booklet? To which we reply, Exactly!

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Igzy

I'm not omniscient either, but I know from being in the LRC and particularly from watching the actions of RG that their focus is defending their own beliefs and practices, not defending the things of the Lord in general.

The reason I said the book was published to defend LRC practices was because that's why they did everything. They thought they were they "move of God" so they felt that everything they did was better and more crucial than everything everyone else was doing. They made a practice of putting down everyone else and building themselves up.

The LRC walked and walks around with a chip on its shoulder. It provokes opposition then acts all shocked when it gets it. It behaves anti-socially then blames others for not being sociable. They can't even get excited about people getting saved outside the LRC. They have to talk about them being "Moabites."

RG decided a long time ago that his best service to God is to treat WL and his ministry like they are second to God alone. As far as I'm concerned, that's a warped motive. That's probably the best way to describe the LRC. Warped.

It may be the reason "it was published" but I certainly don't believe it was the reason it was written. RG felt that God always had a people and through this research he felt it was proof that we were touching the same divine truths that others had discovered. This was something he consistently shared in the meetings. He didn't have any interest (as far as I could tell) in the way it was practiced, but rather in the truth. I say this because there was no push in Houston concerning this practice during my 4 years there. His push was on Life Study messages and service. If anything, this book would serve to steer the practice into more alignment with the practice of the church fathers. To my observation in Houston the biggest error of RG was in promoting the use of footnotes. This was prior to the RcV being published in its entirety. EM was the point man on this little charade. But by the time we went to Irving it was clearly a push. But he may have embraced it because "it is safe to imitate the apostle" (one of his teachings). Others have talked about how messy fellowship meetings can be, as an elder he may have felt this would be an improvement.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

And this is what raises warning flags for so many of us. The glaring difference between "pray reading" as practiced in the LRC, and "pray reading" as defended so eloquently, apparently, in Ray Graver's book.

You say, What's the issue, Graver never talked about the LRC practice in his booklet? To which we reply, Exactly!

Exactly!

Just so we are all clear. RG was not commissioned by the LSM to write this book. The very idea is preposterous (at this time in his life RG was a construction worker). RG became interested in this, probably because of the Mind Benders, and with KR in Houston he had access to the Rice Library. Do not misunderstand, I don't think the legal team would have ever asked RG to do research for them, rather I think as an elder of a church with a lot of college age converts he was trying to inoculate us from the accusations in that book. I saw him in the library on several occasions doing his research. This research shaped his understanding, it influenced the direction the church in Houston took, and it probably kept the elders in Houston from aggressively promoting the forms of pray reading floating around at the time. And this is not my opinion, at this time a professor from Rice who was writing for the Texas Monthly came and observed a meeting. His take on the meeting was that we had "more octane than a typical Christian gathering" but nothing that would appear cultic. So although it might be useful in a law court to defend "pray reading" it is hard to imagine that anyone reading this book would understand it to defend a superficial practice as so eloquently described by OBW complete with metaphors and figurative language.

I have another experience concerning pray reading that I have been reminded of during this thread. Perhaps it is time to share it. I took a road trip to visit 7 churches in the NE during the Summer of 80. I visited Cambridge, Boston and Amherst. When we visited Amherst the elder kind of took us aside and explained that their meetings were "unusual" because they basically just pray read for the entire meeting. He explained that with the Max expulsion the church was ripped with recriminations and accusations. Eventually the only way they could conduct a meeting was if everyone left all of that at the door and just focused their attention on the word. No one would trust anyone else to "share a message". So they had developed a 7 step approach to reading the word. So, the brother and I that came from Houston sat in on the meeting and enjoyed it. I don't remember what the seven steps were, only that after 45 minutes we had had a very thorough reading of a Bible passage. This approach was unlike anything that I had seen anywhere else. According to the elder "it had saved their church". Yet I didn't have the slightest inclination to go back to Houston and talk about "this great practice" nor did the other brother with me. We understood this was something they did because of their situation. The one thing they could all agree on was the Bible, so that was the sole focus.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

It may be the reason "it was published" but I certainly don't believe it was the reason it was written. RG felt that God always had a people and through this research he felt it was proof that we were touching the same divine truths that others had discovered. This was something he consistently shared in the meetings. He didn't have any interest (as far as I could tell) in the way it was practiced, but rather in the truth. I say this because there was no push in Houston concerning this practice during my 4 years there. His push was on Life Study messages and service. If anything, this book would serve to steer the practice into more alignment with the practice of the church fathers. To my observation in Houston the biggest error of RG was in promoting the use of footnotes. This was prior to the RcV being published in its entirety. EM was the point man on this little charade. But by the time we went to Irving it was clearly a push. But he may have embraced it because "it is safe to imitate the apostle" (one of his teachings). Others have talked about how messy fellowship meetings can be, as an elder he may have felt this would be an improvement.

The idea that Ray Graver wrote a book defending "pray reading" as a scriptural practice, yet was not actually trying to defend the prevailing practice of "pray reading", as practiced in the Recovery, is absolute nonsense.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I think the issue here is "the practice in the LRC". I am not defending the practice in the LRC. What I have said consistently from my first post on this thread to this one is that "pray reading" as defined by RG's book is scriptural.

OBW has argued that this book was written to defend the practice of the LRC and that by using the term "pray reading" it is a form of equivocation. I feel that it is too strong to accuse RG of this without more evidence. However, I think applying his use of equivocation to this thread is very accurate. Everyone that disagrees with my posts has done so based on "the practice in the LRC" whereas no one has actually disagreed with what I have actually said, which is "pray reading as defined in RG's book is scriptural".

The second thing that I have argued is that there was not a uniform practice of pray reading. When I was in Houston it was clearly a practice that was being hyped and sold, but not necessarily embraced or employed. When I was in Irving working on the hall it was almost non existent. When I was in Odessa, I did not bring this practice, nor did GW (thankfully) so it was not an issue at all. When I was in the FTTT it was there and I ignored it. When I was in NY the practice in the meetings was quite different from the practice in Dunton house and it was a minor irritant (as a High School teacher I have a high tolerance for minor irritants).

The third thing I have argued is that with sin and the flesh we should be absolute and uncompromising. But since this was neither we should be general, strict on ourselves, general with others. I have stated that judging the way a man serves his Lord is to cross a line and you will regret that at the Lord's judgment seat. But having said that I have fulfilled my responsibility.

Actually, I started by trying to find out when the book was actually written and whether it was the one that described the very disjointed, deconstructive practice of pray reading. I believe that Igzy and/or someone else had suggested that Lord Thou Saidst was written during the turmoil of the Nelson/Mindbenders lawsuits and would appear to be defending the LRC's pray reading.

I do not recall where I read it, but through some online resources, either in the LSM online books, or through another repackaged web site, I read several of the comments actually made by some of the people that were cited earlier. It has been a long time, so finding it again in the format that is drifting foggily through my brain could be difficult. But I recall that virtually none of them described anything like what I had ever seen as the practice of pray reading in the LRC. I admit that I only saw Dallas, Arlington, and Irving, plus whatever happened at conferences (mostly Dallas, Houston, Austin or Irving) and trainings (Anaheim or Irving).

Relative to my experience and observation, RG's book does not represent anything descriptive of the LRC practice of pray reading. So there is a disconnect from the very beginning outside of the use of the term "pray reading."

You need to forget this "judging a man's servant" malarkey. That is just a way to hide error. RG is the only one "judged" at any level and according to the rules of this forum, he is fair game. If you don't like it, argue why the judgment is incorrect. Just saying it should not happen is sooo like saying that we will be struck down for leaving the LRC. You sound quite foolish for it.

Besides, in the capacity as writer of the book we are discussing, whose servant is RG? If you argue that he is God's, then we might as well shut this forum down because we are all God's servants. And to take that position is to presume that he is actually doing what he did at the behest of his master. I don't think that God directed RG to write a book about a practice that the LRC did not employ so that through a common terminology it would be viewed as covering a practice that they did employ. That is deception. That is actually called equivocation. RG may have been blind enough to actually think that finding practices that mixed prayer with reading scripture was sufficient. But if he did, then he is not qualified to be writing such a book, or having anything to do with leading an organization of more than a handful of people.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

The idea that Ray Graver wrote a book defending "pray reading" as a scriptural practice, yet was not actually trying to defend the prevailing practice of "pray reading", as practiced in the Recovery, is absolute nonsense.

Have you read it? RG did not write it. He compiled it. Second, I read it and was completely unaware until this thread that the LSM ever published it. He never mentioned in Houston that it was going to be published by the LSM. Yet I saw him several times working on it and he shared it with the church in a meeting. Based on that I conclude that the decision to publish this as a booklet was made after he wrote it, not before.

Second, do you know RG? The guy was a construction worker (among other jobs). He was terrified of theological discussions and avoided them, hence his teaching "it is safe to imitate the apostle". This is the last guy anyone would have assigned the task of defending WL's ministry.

Third, do you know the LSM? They didn't go around commissioning other writers to write. As far as I can tell they publish WN because they have the rights to his stuff and they publish WL. Maybe now that WL is dead things have changed, but in 1980 who ever heard of them publishing someone else's work?

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

So although it might be useful in a law court to defend "pray reading" it is hard to imagine that anyone reading this book would understand it to defend a superficial practice as so eloquently described by OBW complete with metaphors and figurative language.

I disagree, it's really not hard to imagine. It's harder to imagine that their booklet written in defense of "pray reading" actually had nothing to do with their own practice of "pray reading" at all!!

Couldn't you say the same thing about any number of books on "the ground" or "the oneness" which were actually used to defend the standing of a very sectarian group?

Z, didn't RG himself tell you the story about Mr. Wood-eye?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by OBW

RG may have been blind enough to actually think that finding practices that mixed prayer with reading scripture was sufficient. But if he did, then he is not qualified to be writing such a book, or having anything to do with leading an organization of more than a handful of people.

Hence my surprise a year ago to learn that he is. RG has his strengths, no doubt about it, manna man would probably be better than me at describing them, but he is no theologian. You can be sure that thorny issues of doctrine are handled by RK or KR, not RG.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

I disagree, it's really not hard to imagine. It's harder to imagine that their booklet written in defense of "pray reading" actually had nothing to do with their own practice of "pray reading" at all!!

Couldn't you say the same thing about any number of books on "the ground" or "the oneness" which were actually used to defend the standing of a very sectarian group?

Z, didn't RG himself tell you the story about Mr. Wood-eye?

That is funny. I did hear that story in Houston but not from RG. He did not speak jokes like that while ministering. RG was quite puritanical.

Are you talking about books from WL? WL did not go around asking others to write books to be published by the LSM. If he or the legal team was going to ask someone, there were quite a few scholars and Bible scholars in the LRC, why of all people would they ask RG? I think you guys have him confused with RK or someone. This guy is comfortable as a foreman on a job site, not as a scholar in a debate.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Have you read it? RG did not write it. He compiled it. Second, I read it and was completely unaware until this thread that the LSM ever published it. He never mentioned in Houston that it was going to be published by the LSM. Yet I saw him several times working on it and he shared it with the church in a meeting. Based on that I conclude that the decision to publish this as a booklet was made after he wrote it, not before.

Second, do you know RG? The guy was a construction worker (among other jobs). He was terrified of theological discussions and avoided them, hence his teaching "it is safe to imitate the apostle". This is the last guy anyone would have assigned the task of defending WL's ministry.

Third, do you know the LSM? They didn't go around commissioning other writers to write. As far as I can tell they publish WN because they have the rights to his stuff and they publish WL. Maybe now that WL is dead things have changed, but in 1980 who ever heard of them publishing someone else's work?

I'm not sure what difference it makes whether LSM "commissioned" him to write it or not. It seems entirely plausible that he wrote it on his own, and LSM recognized it for what it was -- a great defense of their own preferred variation on "pray reading", calling two very different things by the same name and pretending they must actually be the same.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by kisstheson

I don't know Ray Graver's heart at the time of writing, but the purpose of his book was extremely disingenuous. Between this book and Witness Lee's lies while under oath in court, I am INCREDIBLY SICKENED by the whole WL/LSM charade in their so-called "defense". What a bunch of phonies! There is such a blatant disparity between the image LSM tries so hard to publicly display and the true inner workings of their sectarian, aberrant, sick little group. I am no fan of The God Men or The Mind Benders, but I am finding out all the time that other Christians had plenty to be concerned about with LSM and the LRC.

Sorry for the strong language, but finding out the real history behind this book that I have always admired really makes me want to vomit!

KisstheSon, you really "vented" in this post.

I have heard about WL's lies under oath, but not really studied it. Do you have more info?

I give Graver's book a pass, however, due to context. In those days, LC members were being kidnapped and deprogrammed due to the hyper hysteria post-Jonestown. Graver did not have the benefit of knowing what we know now. He was attempting to legitimatize a practice based on church history. Too bad others never read his book. I can testify that his book helped the brothers I was with from mindless repetitions of segments of scripture. We still shouted occasionally, but it was not mindless robotic public exhibition.

Brothers in the 70's were much more "in tune" with the "idealism of the initial vision," for lack of a better expression. The concepts of "recovery" and "standing on the shoulders" of past men of God were more real to the saints. Many bro/sis read biographies in those days. LSM had very few books, rather loose ministry messages were common. Other brothers were writing things too, not just RG. Things in the church were much different then, and society was also different.

I actually believe that the Lord had a role in that early "shout-reading." Church history is filled with "strange" practices, appropriate in context, but strange to the reader. If the Lord is shouting, then by all means, let's all shout! The real danger is not shouting, but the vain repetition, doing it mindlessly, long after the Lord has quit.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by OBW

You need to forget this "judging a man's servant" malarkey.

And how many other verses have also been removed from your "bible?"

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Ohio

And how many other verses have also been removed from your "bible?"

It is not the removing of the verses. I believe it is the inappropriate use of them to stop a righteous inquiry. Just because someone does something at someone else's behest is no excuse. To take that verse to mean that we are unable to judge RG is to suggest that the lackeys of mafia bosses are excused because they are "dealing with" his rivals at his behest and not merely on their own.

I believe that this verse is being used in an incorrect way. In the context, the only master in question is God. This is about the meat v no meat controversy in Romans 14. It is not about someone doing something at the behest of some human master. There is a context. It is not so general as to forgive everything.

Besides, it is clear from other words by Paul that we are not to judge the world, but we are to judge the believers. This is why there is church discipline. This is why we do care about teachings. It is how we decide to "refuse" certain teachers. It is a judgment.

Just because one verse says "Who are you to judge someone else’s servant?" does not make that an overarching command. It is specific concerning things with no command. It is about what meat you can eat. No command. Each man acts according to his conscience before God. There is no parallel to RG writing Lord Thou Saidst.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by OBW

I believe that this verse is being used in an incorrect way. In the context, the only master in question is God. This is about the meat v no meat controversy in Romans 14. It is not about someone doing something at the behest of some human master. There is a context. It is not so general as to forgive everything.

Then you must take into account the context of Romans 14. By attacking RG's supposed motives in writing a book, you have "elevated" his motive to those of eating veggies and celebrating Christmas. You have become as narrow and as judgmental as the ones you judge.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by OBW

Just because one verse says "Who are you to judge someone else’s servant?" does not make that an overarching command. It is specific concerning things with no command. It is about what meat you can eat. No command. Each man acts according to his conscience before God. There is no parallel to RG writing Lord Thou Saidst.

If there is no command to not write books then writing a book falls under Romans 14. What is written is another matter. That's the teaching which we can judge. But we cannot judge someone simply for writing a book.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by Igzy

If there is no command to not write books then writing a book falls under Romans 14. What is written is another matter. That's the teaching which we can judge. But we cannot judge someone simply for writing a book.

And that's my point.

No one is protesting what was actually written in the book by Graver entitled "Lord... Thou Saidst." They are objecting to what the book does not say, and then are assigning guilt to Graver based on some presumed, ulterior motive.

[kisstheson]

Originally Posted by Ohio

KisstheSon, you really "vented" in this post.

I have heard about WL's lies under oath, but not really studied it. Do you have more info?

I give Graver's book a pass, however, due to context. In those days, LC members were being kidnapped and deprogrammed due to the hyper hysteria post-Jonestown. Graver did not have the benefit of knowing what we know now. He was attempting to legitimatize a practice based on church history. Too bad others never read his book. I can testify that his book helped the brothers I was with from mindless repetitions of segments of scripture. We still shouted occasionally, but it was not mindless robotic public exhibition.

Brothers in the 70's were much more "in tune" with the "idealism of the initial vision," for lack of a better expression. The concepts of "recovery" and "standing on the shoulders" of past men of God were more real to the saints. Many bro/sis read biographies in those days. LSM had very few books, rather loose ministry messages were common. Other brothers were writing things too, not just RG. Things in the church were much different then, and society was also different.

I actually believe that the Lord had a role in that early "shout-reading." Church history is filled with "strange" practices, appropriate in context, but strange to the reader. If the Lord is shouting, then by all means, let's all shout! The real danger is not shouting, but the vain repetition, doing it mindlessly, long after the Lord has quit.

Amen, dear brother Ohio. More good points. Very good points especially about the context of the times in which Lord . . . Thou Saidst was written.

If shout reading had served it's time and been allowed to pass from the scene when it's time was over, that would be one thing. In fact, that would have been glorious. But in the LRC regions which are most "absolute" for the ministry of WL and the BB's, shout reading IS pray-reading to this very day. "Witness Lee recovered it and you WILL practice it in our meetings" is the attitude I have encountered. I certainly understand that your region had a very large "umbrella" protecting you from having to be in lock-step with Anaheim. That was not the case for my region.

Just about a year ago at a conference (maybe last year's Thanksgiving Conference?) Ray Graver and Benson Phillips gave an announcement which had to do with a major call for "saints" to migrate to Europe. Ray's portion of the announcement was to rehash the whole history of the LRC in this country. To say the least, he was very, very, positive about WL's form of pray-reading, which he included as a major item of "Recovery". If the BB's really believed in the validity of the testimonies in Ray Graver's book, then this should be reflected in their speaking. Instead, what we get from the BB's is that WL's form or pray-reading is the way pray-reading will be practiced in the LC's.

One thing I don't understand is that if the brothers and sisters were reading biographies in those days, why in the world were sisters like Thankful Jane and Max R's wife condemned for reading Christian biographies? Also, if Ray was so broad-hearted, why did he and Benson begin traveling around the U.S. greatly emphasizing WL and telling churches that they had not done enough for "the apostle" [i.e. WL] and that they needed to "have an account with the apostle"? This was a huge step in turning the LC's into sectarian, narrow, LSM-ministry churches, which seems to be the polar opposite of the spirit of Lord . . . Thou Saidst.

[kisstheson]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

And this is what raises warning flags for so many of us. The glaring difference between "pray reading" as practiced in the LRC, and "pray reading" as defended so eloquently, apparently, in Ray Graver's book.

You say, What's the issue, Graver never talked about the LRC practice in his booklet? To which we reply, Exactly!

Well said, dear brother rayliotta. "Exactly!" indeed.

I really like the content in Ray Graver's book. I wish that it had influenced the LRC one-thousand times more than it did! Sadly, the Blended Brothers for decades have consistently promoted Witness Lee's form of pray-reading over all other forms. As I mentioned in my previous post, even Ray Graver is up to his old tricks and is back to promoting WL's form of pray-reading as a major item of "Recovery".

The fact that this book can be seen by anyone as a kind of "defense" of WL's form of pray-reading is what is so distasteful to me. All one has to do is read the little booklet published by LSM entitled Pray Reading the Word and then read RG's book Lord . . . Thou Saidst and one can readily see that the two are light-years apart. It just strikes me as one more example of how differently LSM presents themselves to outsiders to gain credibility with "Christianity" vs. how they actually believe and practice internally.

[Cal]

Originally Posted by Ohio

And that's my point.

No one is protesting what was actually written in the book by Graver entitled "Lord... Thou Saidst." They are objecting to what the book does not say, and then are assigning guilt to Graver based on some presumed, ulterior motive.

Well, I understand your point. But the fact is, RG has made it clear his priority is "the Recovery," meaning Lee and Lee's ministry. He's shown that he will go to the wall defending it, so it's not too much to assume that's at least part of the reason that book exists.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by kisstheson

Good Lord! This has to be one of the WORST examples of "proof-texting" run amok that I have ever seen. This is ludicrous. Utter rubbish.

I know that all sounds harsh and I apologize for the tone, but someone had to say it, dear brother. The Bible is not our plaything! When we have mastered the PLAIN speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ and His apostles - and there is a great deal of that in the New Testament - then maybe we can start trying to get clever and fancy with allegorizing and proof-texting. May we turn and become as little children and simply obey our Lord and Master.

Our Lord and Master began by telling us to pray "thy will be done". That is where I began with quoting the plain word.

That said, Romans 10:17 "Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God" is also a clear word that the word of God is designed to bring us faith.

These verses in the post you are quoting clearly show that faith is an essential component of prayer, you cannot pray without it.

Your car can be perfect in every way, but without gas in the tank it will not be effective at transporting you. So it is perfectly reasonable to say that gasoline is designed for automobiles.

Likewise it is perfectly reasonable to say that the word of God is designed for prayer.

I provided numerous examples of recorded prayers in the OT that clearly involved this principle. OBW is correct in saying that those examples do not prove that the word was designed for prayer, only that others used it for prayer. However, the absence of these examples would cast serious doubt on the assertion that the Bible was designed for prayer. This was related to RG's book whose thesis is that the word of God is designed to be read and prayed.

This forum does not lend itself to 2,000 word responses as OBW pointed out in referring to the verses in another post as a "dissertation". He was also correct to point out that I had not come to the conclusion. Therefore I had to remind other readers that this was a conclusion to numerous other posts.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Then you must take into account the context of Romans 14. By attacking RG's supposed motives in writing a book, you have "elevated" his motive to those of eating veggies and celebrating Christmas. You have become as narrow and as judgmental as the ones you judge.

I'm not the only person providing a motive for Ray. But simply because there is a motive does not make it on par with Paul's discussion in Romans 14. If that were the case, then how could he ever make a comment about anyone because they teach certain ways to be enriched (fill their bellies is the way I think he said it). And you could never "refuse" anyone due to anything other than the actual errors in teaching. Paul said to look at the person of a teacher. And the writer of a book is effectively a teacher. If there were no context concerning the lawsuits, we could rightly say that the book was good without any qualifier. But even though the book itself remains good, with a context of lawsuits and a practice of so-called "pray reading" that was not like what was described in the book, there is almost surely a motive. Since there was no effort to change the way we did our pray reading as a result of the book, then it is difficult to describe it as for the purpose of defending the LRC's practices.

Actually, it looks more like it was written for the purpose of defending the term "pray reading" with little or no regard for what might be lumped into that term. It certainly did not defend the practice that I saw.

And no matter how I read it, you can't put this discussion of RG, the effects of the book, or the writing of it within the meaning of the passage in Romans 14. In that place, Paul is saying that one person is living before God according to his conscience. Another is doing the same yet is taking a different personal stance on the same issue. The master is the one who will judge them both and that is God. He will judge them according to their faithfulness to what they understand to be true.

How do you determine that writing a book about something not practiced, and not taught after the writing of the book but put on display as if a primer on the workings of what is practiced is done as a matter of conscience before God concerning an irrelevant thing? Further, when the actual practice that is already in place, and given the same name as the one in the book, is not consistent with what is described in the book, is continued without change, and is not pushed to be changed, how do you say that it is simply a matter of conscience and something that is relevant to Romans 14?

It would be a little like saying that your conscience does not allow you to partake of alcoholic beverages. But you drink beer and just say it is not alcoholic. Not differentiate between levels of alcoholic content in your conscience, but say one thing and do another.

Besides, how does RG writing a book in any way fall under the context of Romans 14? I just don't see it. Are you saying that it is a matter of conscience that Ray wrote a book about one kind of pray reading and that is all there is to it? That this kind is essentially irrelevant to the LRC is irrelevant to the discussion? That there was a lawsuit going on in which it was asserted that the LRC practice of pray reading was a kind of mind-altering experience that helped to control the members? And while there is little in common between the LRC practice and the ones in this book, it appears in print (and not written by Lee) in the middle of those lawsuits?

The "another man's servant" line refuses to allow anyone to connect the dots? Why doesn't someone ask Don R if he knows anything about this book. He was involved in the lawsuit defense for at least a while. I remember his discussing how they would come in with their lawyers and others to the depositions and come up with just the right document over and over, and ask question after question to keep the other guys busy. I know that he has much on his mind and heart these days and we probably should not bother him. But that might be a place to discover something.

[UntoHim]

Please let me know if there are other posts that should be transferred over to this new thread on Pray-Reading.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

Please let me know if there are other posts that should be transferred over to this new thread on Pray-Reading.

Wow, nice job, that must have been a lot of work.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

I think this is the same reaction many of us had to RG's pray-reading booklet. It's hard to take it seriously, because if it really meant anything to the leadership, the practice would have changed.

Overnight, no. But in a year, or two, or 30?

But the pray reading book was a different time. In 78 and 79 everyone was eagerly trying to prove that these things were so with a view towards refuting Mind Benders. I don't think that was cynical. By 1981 the Irving construction project and the significance to Texas brothers like RG and BP was the key focus. The RcV was not yet finished, but almost. EM and RG were beginning to formulate the whole use of footnotes in testimonies which would mean everyone had to have a RcV, and hence they would become "gold bars" to LSM and LSM would embrace the Texas brothers. 1981 was a major turning point in RG's life in the LRC, but this was at least a year or two years after he began work on that booklet.

According to the Mind Benders book Pray Reading was introduced to us here in the US from the Far East, it was based on chanting and practices that have no root in the Bible and it was a form of mind control or brain washing. It was a practice that define the LRC as a cult. If you know the history of Pray Reading you know that it is not right to blame WL for bringing this practice from the Far East. The practice originated with a church that was going through great turmoil and it was so bad they couldn't have anyone speaking a message. The only thing they could meet around was the Bible. The meetings were based on reading some verses, then praying, and ultimately there might be some short testimonies. The church experienced a revival, they described the practice as "pray reading" and then it was promoted as another practice recovered that had been lost.

Clearly the original practice and what is now called "pray reading" are very distant relatives. Not unlike the difference between a TV dinner and a real home cooked meal. I think it is fair to say in hindsight that LSM wanted to package and sell "pray reading". But in 78 and 79 it is very likely that RG was running with the original story, not the repackaged version.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

But the pray reading book was a different time. In 78 and 79 everyone was eagerly trying to prove that these things were so with a view towards refuting Mind Benders. I don't think that was cynical. By 1981 the Irving construction project and the significance to Texas brothers like RG and BP was the key focus. The RcV was not yet finished, but almost. EM and RG were beginning to formulate the whole use of footnotes in testimonies which would mean everyone had to have a RcV, and hence they would become "gold bars" to LSM and LSM would embrace the Texas brothers. 1981 was a major turning point in RG's life in the LRC, but this was at least a year or two years after he began work on that booklet.

I thought it was the same time, wasn't Mel Porter's ultimatum to awareness in the late 70's?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

I thought it was the same time, wasn't Mel Porter's ultimatum to awareness in the late 70's?

Ask Awareness. I would find that shocking. During the Summer of 78 we spent months discussing the Max R expulsion. WL gave very clear messages concerning the truth. In those messages he strongly rebuked anyone who said he was the MOTA and said that if anyone said that you should stand up and rebuke them to their face. He even charged saints to stand up and rebuke him to his face if he said that. I would find it very hard to imagine that anyone could get away with what Mel Porter did to Awareness within a year of those messages.

Also, we had a lengthy discussion before on the origin of the teaching of the MOTA and everyone agreed that it came from RG after the Philippians training. First, for a few months after the training he was developing the teaching, little glimmers here and there in the meeting. Then about 8 months later he was bolder, laying out the entire teaching to the church in Houston. Then in Irving he began pushing it on other elders.

[rayliotta]

Quote from Paul Cox, in the book of Job thread --

Originally Posted by Paul Cox

Haven't had the time or heart to figure out what ya'll are fighting about. But I did go to the Life-study of Job, chapter 12. This caught my eye:

"Suppose there is a problem between you and your spouse, You should not do anything, for whatever you do will be in the realm of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You should simply pray-read Galatians 2:20."

I don't know, but in reading Paul he seems to talk about loving and submitting. Is that doing nothing but pray-reading? Address all your problems by just pray-reading scripture? I can't believe we fell for that sewer water for so many years.

Now if a couple will address all their problems only by pray-reading the bible, that will make their marriage only good within the context of the Local Church. It still doesn't teach them what it means to submit to and love one another.

See Witness Lee's idea about pray-reading here in the Life-Study of Job.

The practice of praying the Bible, spoken of by the men (and women) throughout church history, as compiled in Ray Graver's book on Pray-Reading -- do we honestly think they are talking about the same thing?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Paul Cox

Haven't had the time or heart to figure out what ya'll are fighting about. But I did go to the Life-study of Job, chapter 12. This caught my eye:

"Suppose there is a problem between you and your spouse, You should not do anything, for whatever you do will be in the realm of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You should simply pray-read Galatians 2:20."

I don't know, but in reading Paul he seems to talk about loving and submitting. Is that doing nothing but pray-reading? Address all your problems by just pray-reading scripture? I can't believe we fell for that sewer water for so many years.

Now if a couple will address all their problems only by pray-reading the bible, that will make their marriage only good within the context of the Local Church. It still doesn't teach them what it means to submit to and love one another.

Good catch bro Paul. "In as much as ye do unto the least of these ye do unto me." And what does it say about pray-reading? Isn't pray-reading in this way espoused then just an escape? Maybe all pray-reading is an escape. Maybe it's just a way to deny reality.

Maybe pray-reading, in the end, was a way to make the mind numb so that we/they would be good followers, robots, of Witness Lee.

I too "can't believe we fell for that sewer water for so many years."

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by awareness

Good catch bro Paul. "In as much as ye do unto the least of these ye do unto me." And what does it say about pray-reading? Isn't pray-reading in this way espoused then just an escape? Maybe all pray-reading is an escape. Maybe it's just a way to deny reality.

Maybe pray-reading, in the end, was a way to make the mind numb so that we/they would be good followers, robots, of Witness Lee.

I too "can't believe we fell for that sewer water for so many years."

It wouldn't be so bad if WL had practiced what he preached and "pray-read" away his difficulties with John Ingalls, instead of running a smear campaign against him and others. If pray-reading was such a "family cure all," why did the practice fail so miserably for WL's own family?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Ohio

It wouldn't be so bad if WL had practiced what he preached and "pray-read" away his difficulties with John Ingalls, instead of running a smear campaign against him and others. If pray-reading was such a "family cure all," why did the practice fail so miserably for WL's own family?

Do you think Philip Lee and Timothy Lee ever pray-red? What about Witness Lee? Anyone ever catch him pray-reading?

[awareness]

Brother Paul you really got me stirred up with this awful pray-reading catch from chap. 12 of the Life-Study of Job.

It's not just the pray-reading but is also the attitude. What an attitude to display to your spouse!

If every time there is a disagreement or trouble a spouse runs off to pray-read, soon the other spouse will get the hint that you really don't care about him or her, that you really don't love him or her.

It will feel like your spouse's heart has run off to another. And will rot a marriage out at the bottom.

Pray-reading the way Witness Lee espoused it in this Life-Study is destructive.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by rayliotta

The practice of praying the Bible, spoken of by the men (and women) throughout church history, as compiled in Ray Graver's book on Pray-Reading -- do we honestly think they are talking about the same thing?

One would think that any reasonable man would agree with you. Therefore, RG's book is probably a good place to go if you want to fellowship with an LCer about Pray Reading, which is why RG's book was first referenced in this thread. The book would be a good way to help someone in the LRC see that what they practice as pray reading is a far cry from what is mentioned in that book.

My own testimony was that as a result of the study that RG did in Houston (he shared messages in the meetings which comprise what is now that book) I had the peace to ignore the way others practiced pray reading. So it is clear, at least to one observer that was present when RG was doing this study, that the study does not justify the LRC practice.

I think Hope shared something on this that was spot on.

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by Ohio

It wouldn't be so bad if WL had practiced what he preached and "pray-read" away his difficulties with John Ingalls, instead of running a smear campaign against him and others. If pray-reading was such a "family cure all," why did the practice fail so miserably for WL's own family?

Great point. He was like "Daddy" talking down to all the silly little children. Kind of like telling a little kid to concentrate real hard, and count to 10 slowly, whenever he gets mad. And for the child, it may actually work a few times.

But ya think Daddy's ever gonna try that himself? I mean, come on -- silly wabbit, Trix are for kids!

[rayliotta]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

One would think that any reasonable man would agree with you. Therefore, RG's book is probably a good place to go if you want to fellowship with an LCer about Pray Reading, which is why RG's book was first referenced in this thread. The book would be a good way to help someone in the LRC see that what they practice as pray reading is a far cry from what is mentioned in that book.

My own testimony was that as a result of the study that RG did in Houston (he shared messages in the meetings which comprise what is now that book) I had the peace to ignore the way others practiced pray reading. So it is clear, at least to one observer that was present when RG was doing this study, that the study does not justify the LRC practice.

I think Hope shared something on this that was spot on.

Absolutely, Z. There are probably those who could be helped by this.

I just remember the resignation in so many people, it's not really a matter of "whether this is the biblical way of pray-reading, or not" -- after 30 years, it's all so far gone...

But I have been called a glass half-empty kinda guy before, which you surely are not...

[John]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

But the pray reading book was a different time. In 78 and 79 everyone was eagerly trying to prove that these things were so with a view towards refuting Mind Benders. I don't think that was cynical. By 1981 the Irving construction project and the significance to Texas brothers like RG and BP was the key focus. The RcV was not yet finished, but almost. EM and RG were beginning to formulate the whole use of footnotes in testimonies which would mean everyone had to have a RcV, and hence they would become "gold bars" to LSM and LSM would embrace the Texas brothers. 1981 was a major turning point in RG's life in the LRC, but this was at least a year or two years after he began work on that booklet.

According to the Mind Benders book Pray Reading was introduced to us here in the US from the Far East, it was based on chanting and practices that have no root in the Bible and it was a form of mind control or brain washing. It was a practice that define the LRC as a cult. If you know the history of Pray Reading you know that it is not right to blame WL for bringing this practice from the Far East. The practice originated with a church that was going through great turmoil and it was so bad they couldn't have anyone speaking a message. The only thing they could meet around was the Bible. The meetings were based on reading some verses, then praying, and ultimately there might be some short testimonies. The church experienced a revival, they described the practice as "pray reading" and then it was promoted as another practice recovered that had been lost.

Clearly the original practice and what is now called "pray reading" are very distant relatives. Not unlike the difference between a TV dinner and a real home cooked meal. I think it is fair to say in hindsight that LSM wanted to package and sell "pray reading". But in 78 and 79 it is very likely that RG was running with the original story, not the repackaged version.

ZNPaaneah,

I know that this discussion took place awhile back; but I thought that I should respond to your post, since it contains several inaccuracies as well as misleading information:

• The Mindbenders does not claim that pray-reading came to the U.S. from the Far East. The book also does not claim that pray-reading was based on chanting.

• I don’t know if the church where you claim that pray-reading started, the one “going through great turmoil,” was in the U.S. or the Far East. If you are maintaining that pray-reading started in the U.S., what you wrote is inaccurate based on what I’ve read and been told, in addition to what I experienced in The Church in Houston (having been there from its inception). If you meant that pray-reading started in the Far East, your description sounds like it might have come from Living Stream Ministry propaganda.

• You state that “it is not right to blame WL for bringing this practice from the Far East.” What we can charge Witness Lee with is teaching it and promoting it to us in the U.S.; whether he brought it from the Far East or vice versa, or neither. In other words, where it came from (or even whom it came from initially), is not so important in this discussion. It’s what Mr. Lee did with it that’s most important, I think. And, the type of pray-reading that he did advocate and demonstrate was what I might call the Oh-Lord-Amen-Hallelujah (OLAH) kind, as described previously in this thread, not what is apparently referred to in Ray Graver’s booklet (which I haven’t read). One of the major thrusts in the Local Churches, including Houston where Ray was a leader, was to “get out of your mind and get into your spirit,” and pray-reading was one of the methods we were to use to accomplish that end. We were told that we shouldn’t use our minds when contacting the Word, because the mind was the wrong organ to use!

• Witness Lee was able to use pray-reading to maintain control of the Local Churches in the Far East after the 1966 split there. Since a number of church leaders had split from him because of his dictatorial control (among other things), pray-reading was one of the techniques that he was able to leverage to ensure that leaders would not be able to gain power and influence that would be outside of his control. Under Lee, pray-reading was taught in the Far East—the OLAH kind. It was one of the ways the saints there were given to escape the rational mind and become free in the Church. (This is my very high-level, partial summary of observations and conclusions by Fred in his 1975 anthropological doctoral dissertation, “Ritual as Ideology in an Indigenous Chinese Christian Church.”)

• You state that by 1981 that the “Recovery Version” was almost finished. One of our “Recovery Version” copies bears a copyright date of 1985. I don’t think many would consider a book to be “almost” finished when it didn’t come out for four more years. If you have one that bears an earlier copyright date, please let me know.

• You wrote as if Ray Graver was “running with” a version of pray-reading that was more biblical (my word) prior to 1981; yet, he was part of the leadership that was encouraging the original OLAH pray-reading in The Church in Houston.

This post of yours was disturbing to me; because, it appears that you have written as an authority yet misstated what The Mindbenders presented about pray-reading, glossed over Witness Lee’s push of mindless pray-reading into The Recovery, didn’t mention Fred’s observations on the subject, and incorrectly surmised that Ray Graver’s story in 1978 and ’79 was more like “original” pray-reading when the original in Houston was the OLAH kind.

Originally Posted by John

ZNPaaneah,

I know that this discussion took place awhile back; but I thought that I should respond to your post, since it contains several inaccuracies as well as misleading information:

• The Mindbenders does not claim that pray-reading came to the U.S. from the Far East. The book also does not claim that pray-reading was based on chanting.

• I don’t know if the church where you claim that pray-reading started, the one “going through great turmoil,” was in the U.S. or the Far East. If you are maintaining that pray-reading started in the U.S., what you wrote is inaccurate based on what I’ve read and been told, in addition to what I experienced in The Church in Houston (having been there from its inception). If you meant that pray-reading started in the Far East, your description sounds like it might have come from Living Stream Ministry propaganda.

• You state that “it is not right to blame WL for bringing this practice from the Far East.” What we can charge Witness Lee with is teaching it and promoting it to us in the U.S.; whether he brought it from the Far East or vice versa, or neither. In other words, where it came from (or even whom it came from initially), is not so important in this discussion. It’s what Mr. Lee did with it that’s most important, I think. And, the type of pray-reading that he did advocate and demonstrate was what I might call the Oh-Lord-Amen-Hallelujah (OLAH) kind, as described previously in this thread, not what is apparently referred to in Ray Graver’s booklet (which I haven’t read). One of the major thrusts in the Local Churches, including Houston where Ray was a leader, was to “get out of your mind and get into your spirit,” and pray-reading was one of the methods we were to use to accomplish that end. We were told that we shouldn’t use our minds when contacting the Word, because the mind was the wrong organ to use!

• Witness Lee was able to use pray-reading to maintain control of the Local Churches in the Far East after the 1966 split there. Since a number of church leaders had split from him because of his dictatorial control (among other things), pray-reading was one of the techniques that he was able to leverage to ensure that leaders would not be able to gain power and influence that would be outside of his control. Under Lee, pray-reading was taught in the Far East—the OLAH kind. It was one of the ways the saints there were given to escape the rational mind and become free in the Church. (This is my very high-level, partial summary of observations and conclusions by Fred in his 1975 anthropological doctoral dissertation, “Ritual as Ideology in an Indigenous Chinese Christian Church.”)

• You state that by 1981 that the “Recovery Version” was almost finished. One of our “Recovery Version” copies bears a copyright date of 1985. I don’t think many would consider a book to be “almost” finished when it didn’t come out for four more years. If you have one that bears an earlier copyright date, please let me know.

• You wrote as if Ray Graver was “running with” a version of pray-reading that was more biblical (my word) prior to 1981; yet, he was part of the leadership that was encouraging the original OLAH pray-reading in The Church in Houston.

This post of yours was disturbing to me; because, it appears that you have written as an authority yet misstated what The Mindbenders presented about pray-reading, glossed over Witness Lee’s push of mindless pray-reading into The Recovery, didn’t mention Fred’s observations on the subject, and incorrectly surmised that Ray Graver’s story in 1978 and ’79 was more like “original” pray-reading when the original in Houston was the OLAH kind.

Methinks ZNPaaneah has confused the MindBenders with the God-Men by Duddy. Since the lawsuit it is hard to get your hands on a copy the key is that the God-Men was pushed by Intervarsity, which now refers to points made in that book as being made "anonymously".

Calling on the Name of the Lord Compared to Buddhist-style Mantras: Critics claim that the practice of "calling on the name of the Lord" is similar to Buddhist mantras. Members find it hard to understand what is "Buddhist" about calling "O Lord Jesus!" They cite the innumerable passages in the Old and New Testaments that tell believers to "call on the name of the Lord". They further consider the critics' accusation akin to Paul's persecution of the early Christians, where he was authorized to arrest all who called on the name of the Lord (Jesus) (Acts 9:14). (http://www.indopedia.org/index.php?t...ch_controversy)

Pray-Reading: Critics claim that Local Church members worship the published words of Witness through their practice of Pray-Reading. Members "pray-read" non-inspired spiritual works, such as the words of hymns and the words of Witness Lee as well as other Christian writers. They strongly defend the pray-reading of the Bible based on verses such as Ephesians 6:17-18 that mentions taking the Word of God with all prayer, and verses such as Jeremiah 15:16, Matthew 4:4, and 1 Peter 2:2 that talk of eating, drinking, and breathing the words of God from the Bible. Pray-reading is sometimes described as "Buddhist" by critics because it involves repetition in which critics say the mind can be distracted from Christ by Satan. (http://www.indopedia.org/index.php?t...ch_controversy)

[Paul Cox]

Originally Posted by Callous

Methinks ZNPaaneah has confused the MindBenders with the God-Men by Duddy...

If LSM and its defenders think that chanting is okay as long as you use the Lord's name, instead an uninspired source of verbage, then they should have no problem at all with the Catholic Church and it's Gregorian chants. They should have no problem with the "holy rosary" wherein the Lord's prayer is repeated over and over again. If they can agree then they should drop all their talk of "The Great Harlot."

What's good for the goose is good for the gander, whatever that means.

P.C.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by John

ZNPaaneah,

I know that this discussion took place awhile back; but I thought that I should respond to your post, since it contains several inaccuracies as well as misleading information:

• The Mindbenders does not claim that pray-reading came to the U.S. from the Far East. The book also does not claim that pray-reading was based on chanting.

Thank you for catching this, my mistake. I have never read either the MindBenders or the God-Men. What I should have said is that at the time of the LRC lawsuit with both the MindBenders and the GodMen allegations made on the Rice campus where I was involved in preaching the gospel were that the LRC had practices based on chanting that came from the Far East. We were being painted as being “a Chinese church” with non Biblical influences from the Far East. We had to respond to this.

Originally Posted by John

• I don’t know if the church where you claim that pray-reading started, the one “going through great turmoil,” was in the U.S. or the Far East. If you are maintaining that pray-reading started in the U.S., what you wrote is inaccurate based on what I’ve read and been told, in addition to what I experienced in The Church in Houston (having been there from its inception). If you meant that pray-reading started in the Far East, your description sounds like it might have come from Living Stream Ministry propaganda.

I thought I gave a detailed and clear testimony on this somewhere, but if not I will repeat it. I went to the North East with DC and visited 7 churches, one of which was the church in Amherst. This was after the Max Rappaport incident and at the same time that BP was in Cambridge (one of the churches we visited). While on this trip we met with the elder of the church in Amherst, he in a very apologetic tone, explained that they did things differently than we might be used to. He said that after the Max incident things were so contentious that no one could speak anymore in the meetings without being shouted down, ultimately they moved to meetings that were focuses solely on their own (unique) style of “pray reading”. They had 7 ways in which to approach a passage, one way was reading, one was praying, a third was to share a testimony, I don’t recall all 7. He made it clear to DC and me that it was not their intent at all that any other churches imitate what they were doing, but that they did this as the only way they were able to meet and that it had caused a very small revival or renewal in the church. After this introduction, we had arrived to the meeting early and it had only been us three at this point, we then entered into the meeting as others came and I thoroughly enjoyed the time, even though we never had any inclination to bring or even share this practice in Houston. I do recall that we spent about 45 minutes going through a short passage of the Bible, perhaps half a chapter. Later I heard someone, (probably while I was in the FTTT or else it was in Houston when RG was sharing about his research and his book), relate how pray reading came to the US. Their story seemed very similar to the one I heard in Amherst but I have no idea of the truth to that story, though I believe the firsthand account I heard from the elder in Amherst to be very accurate.

Originally Posted by John

• You state that “it is not right to blame WL for bringing this practice from the Far East.” What we can charge Witness Lee with is teaching it and promoting it to us in the U.S.; whether he brought it from the Far East or vice versa, or neither. In other words, where it came from (or even whom it came from initially), is not so important in this discussion. It’s what Mr. Lee did with it that’s most important, I think. And, the type of pray-reading that he did advocate and demonstrate was what I might call the Oh-Lord-Amen-Hallelujah (OLAH) kind, as described previously in this thread, not what is apparently referred to in Ray Graver’s booklet (which I haven’t read). One of the major thrusts in the Local Churches, including Houston where Ray was a leader, was to “get out of your mind and get into your spirit,” and pray-reading was one of the methods we were to use to accomplish that end. We were told that we shouldn’t use our minds when contacting the Word, because the mind was the wrong organ to use!

Actually what is important to this discussion is what I laid out in the first post when I started the thread. This thread was started in response to a question on how to talk to LRC members about the practice of pray reading. And quite specifically, this thread is about my suggestion that using RG’s book would be a very good way to find common ground with someone in the LRC to discuss this. For example a key verse in RG’s book was Ephesians 6:17-18a). And receive…the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God, by means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit. Surely if you wanted to fellowship about “Pray Reading” all Christians could start with this verse. Even if you don’t agree with the practice as practiced by the LRC you can at least agree that “receiving the word of God by means of all prayer” is a biblical truth. Along these lines you could then raise up what Martin Luther said “It is very certain, that we cannot attain to the understanding of Scripture either by study or by the intellect. Your first duty is to begin by prayer (Martin Luther).” Perhaps you agree, perhaps not, but you have to admit that Martin Luther is a respected church father without any influence from the Far East. Personally I like the advice of William Law “When you meet with a passage that more than ordinarily affects your mind and seems as it were to give your heart a new motion towards God, you should try to turn it into the form of a petition, and then give it place in your prayers (William Law, 1686-1761).” George Whitefield also spoke something that struck me “My mind being now more open and enlarged, I began to read the Holy Scriptures upon my knees, laying aside all other books and praying over, if possible, every line and word. This proved meat indeed, and drink indeed, to my soul. I received fresh life, light, and power from above (George Whitefield, 1714-1770). And of course Andrew Murray “The word comes from God's heart, and brings His thoughts and His love into my heart. And then the word goes back from my heart into His great heart of love, and prayer is the means of fellowship between God's heart and mine (Andrew Murray, 1828-1917).” Now I feel, and this was the point of this thread, that if you used this book by RG it would be a great way to discuss Pray Reading. Now it may be that the practice in the LRC does not resemble this at all, it is not useful for me to say that, the person would only become defensive.

Now if you think that what is more important is what WL did with Pray Reading then I suggest you start a new thread on that topic. Since this thread is focused on using RG’s book to discuss pray reading with current LRC members the book and what it says is far more central to the discussion. As a result I will close this thread after posting this. I hope that my response is a thorough response to your post. If not you are free to start a new thread, but most of this post and most of the discussion in this thread was off topic as far as I was concerned.

Also I don’t understand how you could have been in Houston and not have read RG’s book? Don’t you remember that he would share on the book in the meetings and also provide us with rough drafts to read?

Originally Posted by John

• Witness Lee was able to use pray-reading to maintain control of the Local Churches in the Far East after the 1966 split there. Since a number of church leaders had split from him because of his dictatorial control (among other things), pray-reading was one of the techniques that he was able to leverage to ensure that leaders would not be able to gain power and influence that would be outside of his control. Under Lee, pray-reading was taught in the Far East—the OLAH kind. It was one of the ways the saints there were given to escape the rational mind and become free in the Church. (This is my very high-level, partial summary of observations and conclusions by Fred in his 1975 anthropological doctoral dissertation, “Ritual as Ideology in an Indigenous Chinese Christian Church.”)

I am not well versed on what WL did prior to ’78 nor do I think I have made any statements that suggest I did. Therefore I don’t see how this relates to any inaccuracies of my posts.

Originally Posted by John

• You state that by 1981 that the “Recovery Version” was almost finished. One of our “Recovery Version” copies bears a copyright date of 1985. I don’t think many would consider a book to be “almost” finished when it didn’t come out for four more years. If you have one that bears an earlier copyright date, please let me know.

Thank you for bringing this up, it is hard to remember that not all churches were the same. What I should have said and what would have been much clearer to those more removed from those days is this. In Houston many of the meetings were in the book of the Bible currently being taught by WL in the life studies. Friday night we would watch a video that came from Anaheim of the Genesis or Exodus messages. Sunday morning would often be based on the most recent NT training either the winter or summer. Now they always wanted us to read together from the RcV, so in your bag you might have a RcV of Matthew, and of Ephesians, and of Romans, Revelation, etc. Many, many times in Houston RG, EM, KR and others would fantasize about how great it would be to finally have a complete RcV of the entire NT so that we didn’t have to shuffle all of these different individual books. Now, for all of those in Houston, we were well aware that 1981 was a very big year for RG. This was the year the little printing operation in Houston that RG headed had been visited by WL and RG then announced he would be going to Irving to run the LSM printing. I was a classmate with KR who was going to work on the translation. So on a daily or even weekly basis I was hearing how great it would be to finally have one RcV, from many different people. So since the Life Studies of the NT were supposed to be finished in 1982 it seemed to me in 1981 that the RcV was almost finished in 1981.

Originally Posted by John

• You wrote as if Ray Graver was “running with” a version of pray-reading that was more biblical (my word) prior to 1981; yet, he was part of the leadership that was encouraging the original OLAH pray-reading in The Church in Houston.

Again, I don’t understand how this is an inaccuracy on my part. John Nelson Darby was quoted in RG’s book as saying “Study the Bible, dear brother, with prayer. Seek the Lord there, and not knowledge - that will come too; but the heart is well directed in seeking the Lord: the eye is single, and then the whole body is full of light (John Nelson Darby, 1800-1882).” The book RG published is running with this version of Pray Reading and it does seem more biblical than the LRC version. Or George Mueller is quoted as saying “I began therefore to meditate on the New Testament, from the beginning, early in the morning….When thus I have been for a while making confession or intercession or supplication, or have given thanks, I go on to the next words or verse, turning all, as I go on, into prayer for myself or others, as the word may lead to it, but still keeping before me that food for my own soul is the object of my meditation (George Müller, 1805-1898).”

Originally Posted by John

This post of yours was disturbing to me; because, it appears that you have written as an authority yet misstated what The Mindbenders presented about pray-reading, glossed over Witness Lee’s push of mindless pray-reading into The Recovery, didn’t mention Fred’s observations on the subject, and incorrectly surmised that Ray Graver’s story in 1978 and ’79 was more like “original” pray-reading when the original in Houston was the OLAH kind.

I am sorry for the confusion with the reference to the MindBenders, I hope you find my response an adequate explanation. As to the other things that disturbed you they are not relevant to the topic that I defined in the first post. They might be relevant to a comprehensive discussion of the practice of Pray Reading by the LRC but that was not the topic. If you think that is the best way to fellowship with someone currently in the LRC by all means propose that. From my own limited experience I have found it best to seek common ground and to not be judgmental or dismissive of others when trying to fellowship. While in the LRC I was taught that we were the vanguard of the Christian faith, since leaving I have been humbled. I no longer seek to be seated in the first seat, but merely to be able to sit with other Christians in fellowship. As a result I don’t assume that I know more or that their practices are “wrong”. I am sorry if that disturbs you.

[UntoHim]

ZNP and others,

Let's go ahead and keep this thread open. I think it has expanded and developed into something much broader then any issues surrounding this book. Actually this book was published as a kind of red herring - we all know that the "pray-reading" as practiced in the Local Church bears little to no resemblance to what is presented in the book. The simple truth is that most of the criticisms of the practice of pray-reading are valid. Whether or not it has it's origins from the Far East or not, the criticisms are valid and are fair game for discussions here on the Forum.

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

ZNP and others,

Let's go ahead and keep this thread open. I think it has expanded and developed into something much broader then any issues surrounding this book. Actually this book was published as a kind of red herring - we all know that the "pray-reading" as practiced in the Local Church bears little to no resemblance to what is presented in the book. The simple truth is that most of the criticisms of the practice of pray-reading are valid. Whether or not it has it's origins from the Far East or not, the criticisms are valid and are fair game for discussions here on the Forum.

Can you start a new thread on Pray reading? What you mention here is not at all what I intended to discuss, I was merely responding to a question about how to fellowship with someone. Because I had started this thread and the post was directed at me I feel I was dragged back into this forum. I would prefer it if that does not happen again.

[UntoHim]

Could somebody please dig through the forum and find any threads where we have discussed pray-reading. I will then probably combine them with this one.

In the meantime lets keep the thread open. ZNP you are free not to respond to any post. That's always your privilege.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

Can you start a new thread on Pray reading? What you mention here is not at all what I intended to discuss, I was merely responding to a question about how to fellowship with someone. Because I had started this thread and the post was directed at me I feel I was dragged back into this forum. I would prefer it if that does not happen again.

Brother ZNP, for the rest of us who have no clue why you suddenly stopped posting, would you mind sharing a word of explanation?

[ZNPaaneah]

Originally Posted by Ohio

Brother ZNP, for the rest of us who have no clue why you suddenly stopped posting, would you mind sharing a word of explanation?

I just started a thread that will determine if I continue to visit this forum or not. However, I first wanted to know that I could just walk away. But anyone that sent a PM or email and asked I responded to. According to the rules of the forum their is no need to give an explanation when they move or delete posts. Therefore I saw no need to give a reason for not posting.

[Ohio]

Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah

I just started a thread that will determine if I continue to visit this forum or not. However, I first wanted to know that I could just walk away. But anyone that sent a PM or email and asked I responded to. According to the rules of the forum their is no need to give an explanation when they move or delete posts. Therefore I saw no need to give a reason for not posting.

OK ... thanks.

And I was disappointed also when that whole thread vanished.

Pray reading in the denomination of the local churches, Lord's Rcovery, yes it is a denomination now, is now merely a charismatic exercise. Regardless of whether or not they want say they take a name, in actuality and practicality they refer to their group, as the local churches, and the Lords Recovery. Btw the way when they migrate, they do not do an exhaustive search to see if there are all ready believers meeting as the church, not taking a name, in that city. They just plop down and proclaim themselves the genuine local church and all other groups apostate.

Back to pray reading. They do not pray and muse over the word, at least corporately, privately no doubt many do. However, the corporate aspect of pray reading is merely a charismatic, if not Pentecostal exercise, to get the Spirit. Actuality it is just a stirring up of the soul to excitement. There is no communion with God in shouting to be heard by others. How can this be construed as prayer? It is merely a teaching, a practice promoted by Witness Lee, and even more by his disciples, who blindly follow whatever he says without examining the scriptures, as a noble believer should.

In church history what was considered heresy, but the Catholic Church, and what they burned people for, was holding different beliefs than that of the Catholic Church; not holding a different beliefs than what is in the Bible. The Catholic Church replaced the Bible with their teaching and tradition. Today, in my first hand experience, to express a feeling different from that stated by Lee in his ministry is considered by the majority of the local church group to be, basically heretical. They do not use this word, but this is the type of "how dare you" attitude they hold, and view you with. If you show in the word were Lee was not accurate, the members, merely consider you divisive. They do not care what the Bible says, it is secondary to Lee's ministry. Lee's ministry has replaced the Bible. This is another fulfillment of the Lord's word in Mt. 15:6- you deny the scripture of its authority by your tradition; and in Mk. 7:7- teaching as teachings the commandments of men. The Bible is a secondary source for this group, and all they understand is what they have been told, not what they have seen in the Scriptures. They pale in comparison to the British Brethren, and a no match for the scholarship and divine revelation, that was contained with Darby, Kelly, Mackintosh and company.

The ground of their group is that of locality as they preach, BUT ALSO in addition they take the teachings of witness lee in practicality as there ground. Therefore there only ground is not locality, and therefore they fail to meet there own pharisaical requirements of a genuine local church. To share what Darby, or Mackintosh wrote, in a local church meeting is not accepted, and is looked down upon. You are looked at as if something is wrong with you by the others, even though these men had the genuine New Testament ministry, darby even being called the minister of the age by Watchman Née, and even though they steal all their teachings and pass them off as their own.

I meet with them because the truth is high among them, however I receive their teachings with discernment, and examine the scriptures to see if there are so. Therefore, I personally reject several teaching promulgated by Witness Lee. I am not a respecter of persons, but of what is conveyed through the by God. The image worship in the Local Churches is beyond that of what Ron Kangus ascribes to our nation during the election of Obama. Lee is worshipped, and his disciples, along with some elders are worshipped, and how dare you hold a concept or thought different from them, they are never wrong, even when they are. This is an iceberg tip.

[UntoHim]

Hey "unregistered" (the one who just posted here).

First of all thank you for you participation. Could you please take a couple of minutes and register for the Forum. You can send your request, along with your desired UserName (Moniker) to LocalChurchDiscussions@Gmail.Com

[Paul Vusik]

I recently had a discussion with someone about this concept practiced by TLR of “pray-reading”. I find it amusing and funny that they can never point out where can it be found as a practice in “the New Testament church” as they claim to be. You always led astray to some kind of obnoxious theory of why it is so.

I kind of equate this baseless and unbiblical practice to going out to the store, and buying a bicycle that needs to be put together. Ones you bring it home, you open up a box and take out the instructions on how to assemble it. You sit down on the couch and just start to chant them out loud, without ever picking up the tools and parts, and just hoping that the bike will put itself together, by a miracle!

When it doesn’t go your way, and bike is still in the box and the parts are everywhere, because you refused to follow the “instructions”, you get on the phone and call a manufacturer and file a complaint that you not only read the instructions, but you even repeatedly chanted them back and forth out loud, and nothing happened, but you failed to mention that you never got off that couch, picked up the tools that required in the instructions, and even for a mere moment tried to follow them.

This person said they have prayed for 10 years, and not an answer. I hate to say it this way, but this nonsensical approach to the Word of God, will never produce any results or any answers! It might give you some emotional euphoria for a min, with your ability to read and chant, but besides that it will only lead to frustration.
I remember reading the Bible one time with them, it was James 1, and in the verse 5 it says “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” I prayed and said “Lord give me wisdom”, but they just sat there and kept say over and over “O lord, you be my wisdom”. I asked them and said, “that’s not what it says here to do at all, does it?” But I was told that “you are way to proud to think God will give you wisdom”. Well, no wonder that 10 years goes by, and not an answer. That bike is still in the box, and after hours of frustration it was tossed to the garage, since the instructions were “faulty”. And after sitting there collecting dust for 10 years and spending hundreds of dollars on the purchase was accidentally found, and sold on the neighborhood garage sale for mere $5, with a big fat label on the box “Buyer Beware, WRONG instructions”!

God doesn’t need you to sit there and chant the Bible back to Him, as if He needs a reminder of what He said! He doesn’t need you to point out to Him that He is wisdom! He doesn’t need you to blame Him for your failure to follow them! What He want you to do, is to stop chanting, get off the couch, place the tools and parts as described in the directions, and then step by step put that bike together. And maybe, just maybe, when you get to the last page, you will actually be able to get on it, and take it out to some nice off-road trail, and enjoy some great “answers”, for following the instructions, as it is written!

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Paul Vusik

God doesn’t need you to sit there and chant the Bible back to Him, as if He needs a reminder of what He said! He doesn’t need you to point out to Him that He is wisdom! He doesn’t need you to blame Him for your failure to follow them! What He want you to do, is to stop chanting, get off the couch, place the tools and parts as described in the directions, and then step by step put that bike together. And maybe, just maybe, when you get to the last page, you will actually be able to get on it, and take it out to some nice off-road trail, and enjoy some great “answers”, for following the instructions, as it is written!

Talking about these various LC practices is sort of a minefield because the purpose can hardly be faulted even if the methods may be. It is too much like so much of evangelical Christianity that argues that worship is simply about the heart. If the heart is right, then the manner of worship can't be faulted.

Yet the heart of man is stated as being incurably (my paraphrase) wicked. And if that is so, then what comes from any man's heart must be questioned.

Pray-reading, like calling on the Lord, seems to me to be near nonsense undertaken to do the Christian equivalent of Eastern mantras . . . to chant away the thoughts of the mind and be open to whatever. Like the popular "let go and let God" mantra. While at some level that is true, I do not believe that, in the context of wherever it is that such a phrase might have been dug up (like the golden calf that just came up out of the fire) it is really saying to just let go and let it happen.

Several years ago I was briefly involved in the early stages of setting up a Christian 12-step program for all sorts of issues, addictions, etc. When you read the 12 steps, very early it is emphasized that you must come to realize that you cannot do it. Yet in almost the very next sentence, you must. Many describe it as realizing that the wall in front of you is made of boulders so large that you can't even budge one of them. You realize your incapacity. But
ultimately, for any of them to move, you must put out your hands to move them. Not that you can do it alone, but that if you do nothing, no one else — no matter who you think your "higher power" is — is going to help you.

And turning verses into a word stew where nary a single word is recognizable nor connected to any other in a rational way will not magically infuse you with knowledge of what the actual phrases, sentences, and paragraphs say and mean.

And the LC practice of calling on the Lord seems harder to stand against because it just seems so good. But when you can ask a conference full of people to stand and call on the Lord 3 times before you go back to the business of spreading lies about another one from your number as you pass judgment to ostracise him from your little sect, the need to question the practice becomes all the more evident. Reminds me of the idea of going to my Dad's house, opening the door, and shouting "Hey Dad" a couple of times and then closing the door and going back to my business before he can even look up and see who it was who briefly darkened his door. Sort of a "drive-by calling." (A drive-by fruiting? — see who gets that one.)

If calling on the Lord along with years of pray-reading has convinced you that you cannot understand the Bible without first taking in Witness Lee's analysis of it, then it really hasn't done you much good. And reading and understanding the Bible then seeing if the "ministry" matches what you read and understood was one of Titus Chu's sins for which he was tossed out after a good round of calling on the Lord.

Go figure.

[Paul Vusik]

Originally Posted by OBW

Talking about these various LC practices is sort of a minefield because the purpose can hardly be faulted even if the methods may be. It is too much like so much of evangelical Christianity that argues that worship is simply about the heart. If the heart is right, then the manner of worship can't be faulted.

Yet the heart of man is stated as being incurably (my paraphrase) wicked. And if that is so, then what comes from any man's heart must be questioned.

Pray-reading, like calling on the Lord, seems to me to be near nonsense undertaken to do the Christian equivalent of Eastern mantras . . . to chant away the thoughts of the mind and be open to whatever. Like the popular "let go and let God" mantra. While at some level that is true, I do not believe that, in the context of wherever it is that such a phrase might have been dug up (like the golden calf that just came up out of the fire) it is really saying to just let go and let it happen.

Several years ago I was briefly involved in the early stages of setting up a Christian 12-step program for all sorts of issues, addictions, etc. When you read the 12 steps, very early it is emphasized that you must come to realize that you cannot do it. Yet in almost the very next sentence, you must. Many describe it as realizing that the wall in front of you is made of boulders so large that you can't even budge one of them. You realize your incapacity. But
ultimately, for any of them to move, you must put out your hands to move them. Not that you can do it alone, but that if you do nothing, no one else — no matter who you think your "higher power" is — is going to help you.

And turning verses into a word stew where nary a single word is recognizable nor connected to any other in a rational way will not magically infuse you with knowledge of what the actual phrases, sentences, and paragraphs say and mean.

And the LC practice of calling on the Lord seems harder to stand against because it just seems so good. But when you can ask a conference full of people to stand and call on the Lord 3 times before you go back to the business of spreading lies about another one from your number as you pass judgment to ostracise him from your little sect, the need to question the practice becomes all the more evident. Reminds me of the idea of going to my Dad's house, opening the door, and shouting "Hey Dad" a couple of times and then closing the door and going back to my business before he can even look up and see who it was who briefly darkened his door. Sort of a "drive-by calling." (A drive-by fruiting? — see who gets that one.)

If calling on the Lord along with years of pray-reading has convinced you that you cannot understand the Bible without first taking in Witness Lee's analysis of it, then it really hasn't done you much good. And reading and understanding the Bible then seeing if the "ministry" matches what you read and understood was one of Titus Chu's sins for which he was tossed out after a good round of calling on the Lord.

Go figure.

I don’t think that you can equate pray reading to some “Eastern mantras”, or some odd form of worship. Threre is a much deeper meaning and agendas behind that practice or process, that they try to achieve. So let compare apples to apples, and oranges to oranges. Saying “Christ has risen, yes indeed” doesn’t equal to mindless repetition and outright hypnosis of sorts, to achieve some kind of state of tranquillity, or presence of some being “as when it comes on calling on the lord a million times in the row”.

[gr8ful]

Originally Posted by Paul Vusik

I don’t think that you can equate pray reading to some “Eastern mantras”, or some odd form of worship. Threre is a much deeper meaning and agendas behind that practice or process, that they try to achieve. So let compare apples to apples, and oranges to oranges. Saying “Christ has risen, yes indeed” doesn’t equal to mindless repetition and outright hypnosis of sorts, to achieve some kind of state of tranquillity, or presence of some being “as when it comes on calling on the lord a million times in the row”.

It's important to be fair and precise when offering critique of anyone's practices or teachings, and as such I appreciate the balance in this reply.

While the forms of Calling and Pray-reading in the LC are uniquely stylized, they aren't completely unique within Christian practices. The Orthodox and Catholics have "The Jesus Prayer," for example, which is to repeat the name "Jesus" over and over throughout the day.

One benefit of the pray-reading every morning in my early years was gaining a deep familiarity with the Pauline Epistles, specifically, to the point that I nearly memorized them. The practice of memorizing a large script for a play is very similar to "pray-reading." Surely if someone can safely memorize "Death of a Salesman" or "Cats" they can use the same type practice with the Bible, safely.

The point I'm trying to make is that it's easy to criticize ancillary things like Calling and Pray-reading, but these are NOT the reason that Witness Lee can get away with claiming "My speaking of these main, new revelations in the past twenty-five years has been the oracle of God," and that claim making it through the editorial process into print.

There's other, bigger, problems such as hero worship, undue influence... things that match the BITE model. There are problems of "hiding history" (huge problems). Problems with delusions that the endlessly repeated outline points are "God's up-to-date speaking" that come with a heavy burden (which usually is to vindictively oppose someone for something seen as a threat to "The Ministry" and "God's Move" -- but I digress).

[Paul Vusik]

Originally Posted by gr8ful

It's important to be fair and precise when offering critique of anyone's practices or teachings, and as such I appreciate the balance in this reply.

While the forms of Calling and Pray-reading in the LC are uniquely stylized, they aren't completely unique within Christian practices. The Orthodox and Catholics have "The Jesus Prayer," for example, which is to repeat the name "Jesus" over and over throughout the day.

One benefit of the pray-reading every morning in my early years was gaining a deep familiarity with the Pauline Epistles, specifically, to the point that I nearly memorized them. The practice of memorizing a large script for a play is very similar to "pray-reading." Surely if someone can safely memorize "Death of a Salesman" or "Cats" they can use the same type practice with the Bible, safely.

The point I'm trying to make is that it's easy to criticize ancillary things like Calling and Pray-reading, but these are NOT the reason that Witness Lee can get away with claiming "My speaking of these main, new revelations in the past twenty-five years has been the oracle of God," and that claim making it through the editorial process into print.

There's other, bigger, problems such as hero worship, undue influence... things that match the BITE model. There are problems of "hiding history" (huge problems). Problems with delusions that the endlessly repeated outline points are "God's up-to-date speaking" that come with a heavy burden (which usually is to vindictively oppose someone for something seen as a threat to "The Ministry" and "God's Move" -- but I digress).

My biggest issue that I have with both practices is this: both are derived from Eastern Religions, such as Buddhism, Hinduism, and other practices that associated with the world of occult. There isn’t any Biblical instructions or mentions of these practices anywhere. Bringing in these ideas into Biblical Christianity, and equating them to “no big deals”, is a very dangerous game to play. I can’t and won’t get into these issues here on this thread, but I believe that majority of mental/emotional/cognitive issues that have also been noticed by a lot of people, are a direct results of people being exposed to the elements and practices that are strictly forbidden by the Word of God. There is plenty that has been stated in other threads regarding some of thes issues.

[Zezima]

Originally Posted by Paul Vusik

There isn’t any Biblical instructions or mentions of these practices anywhere.

And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Act 2:21

When your words came, I ate them; they were my joy and my heart’s delight, for I bear your name, LORD God Almighty

Jeremiah 15:16

[Paul Vusik]

Originally Posted by Zezima

Act 2:21



Jeremiah 15:16

Calling on the Lord to be saved, is as an event that happens in some people’s life at one point or another. On the other hand, sitting there and mindlessly chanting the name, as a vehicle in order to “get into” or “receive” a spirit, is a totally different thing, and not found anywhere in the Bible. Neither is countless repetions of the Word of God, as if it will have some special effect. I know that some people that left LC still hold these practices near and dear to them, so my opinion of it is just that, MY Opinion. I have done quite a bit of research into these things, and do have a very different perspective than the one I held before, so it is everyone’s personal choice and responsibility as to figure these things out for themselves. I don’t want to completely destroy this thread in regards to it’s topic, so I think that that if anyone want to talk about “calling on the Lord”, I think there is a thread for that somewhere here. My apologies that I mentioned both aspects in this thread.

Thanks

Matt 6:7
7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.

[gr8ful]

Paul, I am confused. When I mentioned my appreciation for careful critique, I was referring to this quote from your post:

I don’t think that you can equate pray reading to some “Eastern mantras”, or some odd form of worship. Threre is a much deeper meaning and agendas behind that practice or process, that they try to achieve. So let compare apples to apples, and oranges to oranges. Saying “Christ has risen, yes indeed” doesn’t equal to mindless repetition and outright hypnosis of sorts, to achieve some kind of state of tranquillity, or presence of some being “as when it comes on calling on the lord a million times in the row”.

But then calling it derived from Eastern religions contradicts this. Did you not write the above excerpt? I'm confused.

I'll just say this, "the Jesus Prayer" and repetitiously chanting texts (like pray-reading) both pre-date the introduction of "Eastern Religious practices" in the West. Calling them "Eastern" is just not true.

[Paul Vusik]

Originally Posted by gr8ful

Paul, I am confused. When I mentioned my appreciation for careful critique, I was referring to this quote from your post:



But then calling it derived from Eastern religions contradicts this. Did you not write the above excerpt? I'm confused.

I'll just say this, "the Jesus Prayer" and repetitiously chanting texts (like pray-reading) both pre-date the introduction of "Eastern Religious practices" in the West. Calling them "Eastern" is just not true.

Gr8ful,

The post that you referred to, is mine and I did write that. So the misunderstanding is not on your part but mine. I was responding to the previous post, which mentions “Eastern mantras”, and it was I that misread it as Easter mantras. So, it’s is my fault.

So to clear it up hopefully, I’ll just separate the two topics:
Regarding pray reading:
Besides Eastern Orthodox Church, which does do some repetition of Lord’s Prayer, and other Psams and things, they don’t do it as the LC. Also the Charismatic Movement has/had some sprinklings of it here and there. So I know you said that it pre dates this in the West, so maybe if you have a post or can point to whom else that you know that practice this type of Bible reading. I don’t really believe that this practice is anything more that another way they use it to take people away from actually understanding and focusing on what the Word of God says, rather to have an experience of some sorts, and go on to reading their interpretations of what they think it should mean for them.

And on Calling on the lord practice, as iit is done in LC, it comes directly from Eastern meditation teachings, such as Hinduism, Buddhism and some traces to the world of occult, and not from anywhere else. Just my opinion and conclusion.

[Zezima]

Originally Posted by Paul Vusik

On the other hand, sitting there and mindlessly chanting the name, as a vehicle in order to “get into” or “receive” a spirit, is a totally different thing, and not found anywhere in the Bible. Neither is countless repetions of the Word of God, as if it will have some special effect.

I see what you’re saying now. Very true, it isn’t found at all in the word. The idea of getting into the spirit is forsure not biblical either.

[OBW]

Originally Posted by Paul Vusik

I don’t think that you can equate pray reading to some “Eastern mantras”, or some odd form of worship. Threre is a much deeper meaning and agendas behind that practice or process, that they try to achieve. So let compare apples to apples, and oranges to oranges. Saying “Christ has risen, yes indeed” doesn’t equal to mindless repetition and outright hypnosis of sorts, to achieve some kind of state of tranquillity, or presence of some being “as when it comes on calling on the lord a million times in the row”.

I didn't mean to imply that either was simply an alternate form of Eastern mantra, but at the same time, even your descriptions of calling on the Lord imply that some of its variations appear more about a kind of clearing of the mind or the creation of an emotional state that is not consistent with the kind of clear-minded thinking that both Christ and Paul talked about.

My comments about pray-reading were more about the kind of practice of dicing a verse into single words, parts of phrases, etc., and interspersing them with other words and phrases (lots of "Oh Lord," "Amen," as well as other things) that seem unassailable because it seems impossible to use them incorrectly (but alas, I believe that we often did). The sum total is to derail the meaning of a verse or larger passage because it is almost never spoken as a unit, but as pieces divorced of context and even completeness of sentence (not to mention the loss of grammar). I do not believe that Christ intended man to learn of Him by repeating disjointed words in a manner that causes them to be almost meaningless. Much like when Paul took the Corinthians to task for using so much tongues in their meetings. He said he would rather speak 5 intelligible words to them than 10,000 in a tongue.

Having come from a background of Pentecostalism, I can attest that tongues are not really worth a lot unless they are made to be useful to a native hearer. Oddly, I believe that the way that pray-reading was so often practiced in the LC was not much different that trying to get something of lasting value out of hearing someone always talking to you in German. I am not saying anything against German. And I am not saying that it would be useful to a German because to them it would be the same as having someone speaking to them in Swedish. And so on.

I still will say that some aspects of "calling on the Lord" as the LC practices — especially in a corporate way — are more of an exercise in emotional release and mind centering than in making any kind of real call to the Creator and Savior.

[Paul Vusik]

Originally Posted by OBW

My comments about pray-reading were more about the kind of practice of dicing a verse into single words, parts of phrases, etc., and interspersing them with other words and phrases (lots of "Oh Lord," "Amen," as well as other things) that seem unassailable because it seems impossible to use them incorrectly (but alas, I believe that we often did). The sum total is to derail the meaning of a verse or larger passage because it is almost never spoken as a unit, but as pieces divorced of context and even completeness of sentence (not to mention the loss of grammar). I do not believe that Christ intended man to learn of Him by repeating disjointed words in a manner that causes them to be almost meaningless.

I agree with your conclusions, but I also think the issue of “calling” and “pray-reading” are so interconnected that they cannot exist separately. I have been to many of “Bible studies”, where it’s almost impossible to get anything out of the written word, because of insertion of constant repetitions and mantras. I always refused to read the nonsensical headings inserted there by the locals as I was told it’s somehow now should be read as a part of the text, since it “explains what the text is about to say”.

Originally Posted by OBW

Having come from a background of Pentecostalism, I can attest that tongues are not really worth a lot unless they are made to be useful to a native hearer. Oddly, I believe that the way that pray-reading was so often practiced in the LC was not much different that trying to get something of lasting value out of hearing someone always talking to you in German. I am not saying anything against German. And I am not saying that it would be useful to a German because to them it would be the same as having someone speaking to them in Swedish. And so on.

I still will say that some aspects of "calling on the Lord" as the LC practices — especially in a corporate way — are more of an exercise in emotional release and mind centering than in making any kind of real call to the Creator and Savior.

I was recently invited to attend a wedding, in which the bride comes from the Pentecostal Church. During the prayer, it was a total chaos. I actually had to step out for a bit, because it was like PTSD from my experience at the LC. Every time I hear it, makes me sick.

I spent a lot of time in research of this issue specifically. It never made sense. When I first came to the meeting, I was basically told I knew nothing about “correct prayer”, even though I was a Christian and been around it my whole life. Things didn’t add up, could never be found in the Word, tested against the Bible. It’s all make sense now, and I can totally see and understand why it’s an addicting exercise that has no true spiritual purpose or value, other that to make one feel as if they are oh so very spiritual for some fleeing moments, only to crave it again and again to camouflage the true reality that cannot be hidden. It brings damage and deception to all levels of the human being. Spiritual/emotional/phsycological and even physical.
All these practices are just retapped variations of the past, going back to like 3 century. (at least that’s as far as I can find them). They have destroyed millions of people, just as they are doing it now. Very hard to watch people close to you, be totally duped, and suffering. God have mercy.

[Paul Vusik]

Originally Posted by Zezima

I see what you’re saying now. Very true, it isn’t found at all in the word. The idea of getting into the spirit is forsure not biblical either.

All current variations and rebranded names that are now creeping in to almost every church, such as contemplative prayer, centering prayer, Christian yoga, Christian zen meditation techniques, all have the same origins, but just sprinkled with Christian vocabulary, and western terminology for the mass consumption and acceptance.