Inalienable Right
You shall not steal. Exodus 20:15 ESV
Steal – Tim Hegg provides the following insight into the assumption of this commandment. “ . . . that which is owned is to be used for the glory of God, and the owner is responsible to make this a reality. Indeed, all civilized societies are based upon this foundational principle, that individuals within the society have the right to exclusive ownership of private property. Any individual or collective, including a government, which seeks to uproot this basic right, is in violation of the eighth word [this commandment].”[1] In other words, the commandment makes no sense at all unless God intends that individuals have private property rights. I cannot steal what doesn’t belong to anyone. Stealing assumes that what I take rightfully belongs to another.
Hegg’s comment helps us realize that the commandments (the ten words) have much wider implications than simple personal morality. God’s view of Man’s responsibility is based in a communal context where I exist in relation to my neighbor. I am responsible for him and his actions. I cannot opt out of this responsibility because it defines who I am. I can act in violation of my responsibility but that does not negate it. What belongs to another man belongs to him because the Sovereign granted ownership of that property to my neighbor for the King’s purposes. Theft is therefore a violation of a basic principle of kingdom management—and an insult to the distribution of the King.
Today we live in cultures where this basic idea in under attack. It is not under attack because the governments desire to remove “unfair” distribution. It is under attack because the governments desire to play God. Governments of any kind, political or spiritual, that attempt to redistribute ownership or remove the right to individual property do so under the assumption that they know how to distribute property better than God does. Perhaps this is the essential reason why God hates taxation. There is only one Sovereign in the universe and He distributes according to His desire. That does not relieve any man of the obligation to use His distribution for Kingdom purposes, but it does obliterate the claim that the government or the Church has any right to redistribution. God grants us ownership in order to serve Him. No one and no organization may usurp that right without becoming idolatrous.
By the way, this principle applies to all the assets God puts under your command. Your material possessions, your time, your talents, your influence, your relationships—all of these and more are to serve the Lord. This is the full scope of serving Him with all your “strength” (Greek) or “whatness” (Hebrew). Anyone who steals any of these assets is a thief. If I take time from my employer, if I rob someone of my beneficial influence, if I withhold talent or deny needed material goods when I am capable of offering them, I steal. In fact, I can steal from myself because in the end it all belongs to God and misuse of His “loaned” possessions is also theft.
Topical Index: steal, right, private property, Exodus 20:15, Hegg
[1] Tim Hegg, Exodus: Studies in the Torah, p. 121.
I have plenty to meditate (chew on) today!
r.e. about that moral rights of government: when I realized that there was such a thing as immoral government, I set out to find a picture of what a moral one would look like. I think the closest thing I have been able to find, other than the Tanakh, of course, is a slim volume (called “The Law”) written by a contemporary of Karl Marx, at least partly in response to his Communist Manifesto. Frederic Bastiat was a Frenchman who wrote a defense against communism, but the way I read it, he actually wrote against all improper uses of governing power. The crowning phrase in his book, the one I go back to and use so much, defines this topic so well: “legal plunder”, which is surely an act of “framing wickedness with a law”. These are enormous sins, and so often the ones who are affected the most are the widows and children. (All done in the name of widows and children, of course!)
I wonder how many people know that the actual budget in this country for welfare (allegedly for those widows and orphans) is less than 1%? Even more pernicious are the way the tax laws are structured. Try being the working poor in this country. Now try being the working poor AND paying all your taxes. It almost cannot be done without some sort of divine assistance. Even if a body cuts out all insurance, medical help, buying of clothing, etc., all the way down to tithe, food, bills, debt service and gas, it cannot be done. And I even ‘own’ my house! (LOL) So many around me make less than I do. I am afraid the only way the ones who still want to support themselves do it is to under report their taxes. They clearly feel the theft that it is, and their response is to steal back to survive. So what to do if you are honest? This is a design of demons.
We hear of the unfairness of tax brackets ‘taking’ too much from the upper levels, but I wonder if ANYBODY would like to trade the percentage -out of the actual food in the mouth and roof over the head, mind you – with any working poor in this country? What about tax breaks? They still either don’t apply, or add up to pittance. This is clearly a way to pressure everybody to cheat and steal. I mean, everybody. Typical devil. Give with one hand, take with the other. So who set out to do business with him in the first place, I’d like to know!
Hi Laurita. If you enjoyed Bastiat, I think you’d like the book “The Economics of Freedom: What Your Professors Won’t Tell You”. It includes several of Bastiat’s best known essays. I thought it was a good read.
All theories of economics turn on the question of property rights. The biblical approach is that property resides with families to the extent that Naboth could refuse to sell his vineyards to the king on the grounds that he could not dispossess his family. They were not ‘his’ to sell – he was merely the current trustee for the family.
Not since 1215 and Magna Carta has there been a concerted effort to maintain property rights against the claim of the king (state). Since then, it has been gradually downhill until the last clauses of Magna Carta were legislated away. A clause in the Magna Carta allowed the barons to appoint a 25-man recovery team should the king take that (i.e. tax) which did not belong to him. You can thus understand why the monarchs of England were not happy with the original Magna Carta. It made their taxing (i.e. stealing) unprofitable.
But most noticeably, with the established use of promissory notes (i.e. paper currency), property rights in money disappeared along with what was real money – gold and silver. It doesn’t appear that any time soon property rights in money might be restored. That would ruin the system of eminent domain whereby the political state reserves the right to dictate to families at any time it chooses how they should use the assets God has given them. Which makes the state the ‘owner’ of everything – and the people of YHVH are once again under bondage to the Egytians.
Well said Ian! Thanks
Community is what traditionally has sustained the poor. I have seen the studies where the complexity of community was compared between the poor and the rich. No true comparison. I am talking about functioning community, of course. The concept of all the above descriptions that Skip listed as assets is invariably included in the concept of community, and further, in the concept of ‘paying it forward’. If I am plugged into my community, and am dependent upon it to carry me in all the places I cannot carry myself, it behooves me to put into that community UP FRONT, everything I can possibly find a way to, in an effort to hedge against that ever-looming disaster. The ‘richer’ I am in community points, the better when it comes to my turn. ‘My turn’, by the way, is determined by need, not merit, but, because the community has no obligation to help me, it being entirely voluntary, the more weight I have managed to put out up front, the better. This skill set calls for an incredibly complicated accounting system to keep up with, but it can be amazing how able folks are at doing it when they are going on their perceptions of how much relative merit someone has. Just walk into any working community and everybody can sort out who is at the top of the ‘pay-forward’ line, and who is at the bottom. Nice adjustments are made along the way to account for handicaps of all descriptions, of course.
We can stand outside of poverty and either hold our noses or point our fingers, but I would like to ask how many of us can point to anything approximately close to the comparative richness of community in their own lives? It is a sure thing that if you have enough resources, you can coddle and foster almost any amount of relationship fracture and isolation you have a mind to, but without a doubt, you do not last long at all in poverty without having to forgo a large amount of those self-indulgent habits. Yes, substance abuse and mental and emotional illness is rampant among the dis-enfranchised, and, yes, they can destroy relationships, but I have decided that even they cannot hold a candle to the sins of isolating self-indulgence that wealth can support. Bob Dylan sings that some can rob you with a gun, and some can rob you with a fountain pen. Some are in a position to rob others just by drawing breath. But I can assure you, those would not be the poor, much as we would like it to be so. With much that is given, much will be required. And I will get off my soapbox. Thank you for your indulgence.
P.S. A further iniquity has appeared here in my state of Georgia. It is called taxation of barter. We are now required to pay taxes on all barter. Somehow, a ‘value’ is supposed to be assigned to all ‘exchanges’ of any sort, and this value is supposed to have taxes paid upon it. First, the new car dealerships lobbied for taxation of private sales of used cars, with the obvious baleful results, but then someone just got on a roll, and here we are. Barter, by the way, is the lifeblood of the poor. The gold standard. But how to work in the pay-it-forward aspect is beyond ludicrous. I don’t even know how to work up a comment…..
Hi Laurita, I have read your posts and after 22 years of ministry I’m finally getting a sabbatical. I read a book by a pastor who lives in Georgia and has a ministry to help people get to the spiritual roots of their illness. He was studying to be a doctor and the Lord called him out to become a pastor and focus on healing. Their website is Be in Health, Dr. Henry Wright and his ministry is in Thomaston Georgia and I wondered if you know of him or the ministry. I am trying to decide if I should go their for a week of retreat. Could you let me know if you are familiar with them? Thank you in advance, Dana Carpenter
Dana,
In addition to whatever Laurita will say to you, i know the ministry that you are talking about very well and if you go understand that they do NOT agree w/Skips understandings, will refuse to acknowledge the equality of women and will tell you that there are certain diseases that are directly tired to your not being a submissive woman in marriage that is run by ‘Godly Order’. (if you are a woman)
By that i mean that a married woman is to be lead by her husband who is lead by Messiah who is lead by God (it’s that 1 Corinthians Scripture, backwards). If you do not stay under your husbands covering you will be in rebellion your children at risk for gender confusion and your marriage will self destruct. It will be your fault.
Simultaneously they teach (very well, i might add) on occultism, a topic many people are not familiar with. They teach that occultism is when the lesser (anything created) is looked to instead of the greater (the creator). When a woman is unmarried, she is ‘covered’ by Messiah/Holy Spirit (creator) and expect to hear/receive answers to her prayers directly. When she marries, however, her ‘covering’ becomes her husband (creation) and she needs to hear from Messiah/Holy Spirit via her husband.
They fail to see any kind of schizophrenia in that kind of teaching. They also fail to interpret Scriptures concerning women and leadership according to the standard Skip has established here, that being culture, content and context.
They will teach you that in the Spirit you and your husband are equal but in the mechanics of marriage someone has to be the leader and YOU were created to follow, your husband created to lead. They do have a forum where questions can be asked and in every instance where this is questioned, and examples are asked for in the way of a man ‘covering’ his wife, what is presented are what Skip would consider/teach as basic acts of love expressed in marriage. The difference being that in Skip’s paradigm those acts would be exchanged equally between the two and in Henry’s paradigm the acts are magnaminous acts of male covering.
They teach that to benefit from their teachings you must let go of your ‘sacred cow’, i.e., things that you USED to believe but they are about to challenge. Same as Skip. But they will not move on their blind spots and if you push back against them they WILL silence you. Unlike Skip they do not invite dialogue, take personal affront to you if you ask questions you may be compared to a goat, goats, and undesirable animal in Scripture, sound like this “YEAHH BUTTTT”. I was goat.
But check this out, in Scripture, Messiah used the phrase “BUT i say unto you” or something similar no less then 15 times. Good company.
It’s their ministry. Their sandbox (as Laurita is fond of saying) and their rules. You will not broach the rules or question their authority or leadership in any way. ever. Especially the older women who were the first to recover using Henry’s understanding of Dake’s teachings. (Henry is a walking expert on Dake, google him).
They have NOT done much in the way of historical, cultural study. They certainly have not Skips level of understanding in the way of Biblical Worldview or Biblical Leadership (2 teachings of skip that i have flat worn out). Henry detests Frank Viola’s work (not the man, the books) on the error church leadership, he does, in fact call Viola’s understanding “heresy”.
You will be treated as guest and feted as long as you have the money and/or the right heart. By that i mean you don’t ask to many questions, allow the ‘leaders’ free reign to dictate/interpret your words and actions and abide by their decisions. If you do not, if you ask questions or stand up for yourself you will be told that a person in right spiritual standing doesn’t have to stand up for themselves, the Holy Spirit will do that for them, only someone with an accusing spirit would stand up for themselves and in doing so you demonstrate a divisive spirit of conflict that is present in people who have spirits of rebellion.
I want you to know that i love this ministry. I it saved my life. I love the people that run it and are part of it. But i hate the short sighted, shallow researched and marked manipulative fashion in which they deal with people. Go. Do not discuss Skip’s understandings. Do not draw attention to yourself in any way.
Gather the gold that they have, that is proven. Be prepared to be shocked at what you haven’t understood in the way of spiritual insights and understand that a good 30% of what they teach, now is derived from the research of people that they no longer allow any interaction with because THOSE people question them in some fashion.
In general it is the people with the stones (male or female) to question things are the ones that dig up the gold. PVC tends to attract those kind of people, leach off their work for a certain amount of time and then discard them.
Buyer beware.
Disclaimer: i was intimately involved w/BIH for over 5 years. Henry invested time with me and then discarded me over our differences of opinion on the research/woman issue. In other words, i am banned from emailing anyone in the ministry or participating on their forum. He and his church now actively pray ‘against’ me, specifically, so that i may be brought to humble repentance.
Henry teaches a great number of insights that are directly pulled from our correspondence. In many instances he doesn’t even change the verbiage, he just allows others to assume it is his research or his words, in fact he couches things in such a fashion as to let you KNOW that it is his godly research/connection (w/the Holy Spirit, that while YOU may have, HIS is more direct and accurate) that illicit this wisdom and understanding.
Henry has a PhD now but he is unable or unwilling to footnote his work or extend credit to the myriad of people and sources that his current work is not derived from. Understand that if you post on their forum anything you post becomes theirs and if it is of any value they WILL use it and they will NOT give credit where credit is due. And they WILL do it because it is their right. (and you have to click ‘agree’ when you sign on, so unless you have a good lawyer you ARE giving them the fruits or your labor).
Would i go if i were you? Yes. But i would certainly appreciate having the above understanding before i behaved in the freedom i had grown to expect in interacting w/Skip and those that he draws to his work. You will NOT have that at PVC. Keep your mouth shut, your heart guarded and you mind awake. It will be worth it. (I’m not good at keeping my mouth shut. But i spent ten years in the streets and ten years in the Marines and i can research the molecules of a crap sandwich. Tends to piss people off.)
My apologies for the length of this response and the MANY grammatical and punctuation errors. Very distracting, but i can’t go in and correct.
Second to last paragraph should read: Henry has a PhD now but he is unable or unwilling to footnote his work or extend credit to the myriad of people and sources that his current work is NOW derived from.
This is my second post where I attempted to correct the gross mistakes of my first one. My apologies.
In addition to whatever Laurita will say to you, i know the ministry that you are talking about very well and if you go understand that they do NOT agree w/Skips understandings, will refuse to acknowledge the equality of women and will tell you that there are certain diseases that are directly tired to your not being a submissive woman in marriage that is run by ‘Godly Order’. (if you are a woman)
By that i mean that a married woman is to be lead by her husband who is lead by Messiah who is lead by God (it’s that 1 Corinthians Scripture, backwards). If you do not stay under your husbands covering you will be in rebellion, your children at risk for gender confusion and your marriage will self destruct. It will be your fault. This is called “Matriarchal Witchcraft” and in faltering marriages it has been found (according to their research) that most of the time it is directly traced back to women participating in Matriarchal Witchraft.
Simultaneously they teach (very well, i might add) on occultism, a topic many people are not familiar with. They teach that occultism is when the lesser (anything created) is looked to instead of the greater (the creator). When a woman is unmarried, she is ‘covered’ by Messiah/Holy Spirit (creator) and can expect to hear/receive answers to her prayers directly. When she marries, however, her ‘covering’ becomes her husband (creation) and she needs to hear from Messiah/Holy Spirit via her husband.
They fail to see any kind of schizophrenia in that kind of teaching. They also fail to interpret Scriptures concerning women and leadership according to the standard Skip has established here, that being culture, content and context. Possibly because they have never found any of those topics to be of interest or necessity.
They will teach you that in the Spirit you and your husband are equal but in the mechanics of marriage someone has to be the leader and YOU were created to follow, your husband created to lead.
They do have a forum where questions can be asked and in every instance where this is (marital godly order) questioned, and examples are asked for in the way of a man ‘covering’ his wife, what is presented is what Skip would consider/teach as basic acts of love expressed in marriage. The difference being that in Skip’s paradigm those acts would be exchanged equally between the two and in Henry’s paradigm the acts are magnanimous acts of male covering.
They teach that to benefit from their teachings you must let go of your ‘sacred cow’, i.e., things that you USED to believe, that they are about to challenge. Same as Skip. But they will not move on their blind spots and if you push back against them they WILL silence you. Unlike Skip. Also unlike Skip, they do not invite dialogue, take personal affront to you if you ask questions; you may be compared to a goat. Goats, and undesirable animal in Scripture, sound like this “YEAHH BUTTTT”. This is a direct quote for Dr. Henry. I was goat.
But check this out, in Scripture, Messiah used the phrase “BUT i say unto you” or something similar no less then 15 times. Good company.
It’s their ministry. Their sandbox (as Laurita is fond of saying) and their rules. You will not broach the rules or question their authority or leadership in any way. ever. Especially you will not offend or question the older women who were the first to recover using Henry’s understanding of Dake’s teachings. (Henry is a walking expert on Dake, google him). These women are experts in the topic of matriarchal witchcraft, both in theory and practical application.
They (BIH) have NOT done much in the way of historical, cultural study. They certainly have not Skips level of understanding in the way of Biblical Worldview or Biblical Leadership (2 teachings of skip that i have flat worn out). Henry detests Frank Viola’s work (not the man, the books) on the error church leadership, he does, in fact call Viola’s understanding “heresy”.
You will be treated as guest and feted as long as you have the money and/or the right heart. By that i mean you don’t ask to many questions, allow the ‘leaders’ free reign to dictate/interpret your words and actions and abide by their decisions. If you do not, if you ask questions or stand up for yourself you will be told that a person in right spiritual standing doesn’t have to stand up for themselves, the Holy Spirit will do that for them, only someone with an accusing spirit would stand up for themselves and in doing so you demonstrate a divisive spirit of conflict that is present in people who have spirits of rebellion.
I want you to know that i love this ministry. I it saved my life. I love the people that run it and are part of it. But i hate the short sighted, shallow researched and marked manipulative fashion in which they deal with people. Go. Do not discuss Skip’s understandings. Do not draw attention to yourself in any way.
Gather the gold that they have, that is proven. Be prepared to be shocked at what you haven’t understood in the way of spiritual insights and understand that a good 30% of what they teach, now is derived from the research of people that they no longer allow any interaction with because THOSE people question them in some fashion.
In general it is the people with the stones (male or female) to question things are the ones that dig up the gold. PVC tends to attract those kind of people, leach off their work for a certain amount of time and then discard them.
Buyer beware.
Disclaimer: i was intimately involved w/BIH for over 5 years. Henry invested time with me and then discarded me over our differences of opinion on the research/woman issue. In other words, i am banned from emailing anyone in the ministry or participating on their forum. He and his church now actively pray ‘against’ me, specifically, so that i may be brought to humble repentance.
Henry teaches a great number of insights that are directly pulled from our correspondence. In many instances he doesn’t even change the verbiage, he just allows others to assume it is his research or his words, in fact he couches things in such a fashion as to let you KNOW that it is his godly research/connection (w/the Holy Spirit, that while YOU may have, HIS is more direct and accurate) that illicit this wisdom and understanding.
Henry has a PhD now but he is unable or unwilling to footnote his work or extend credit to the myriad of people and sources that his current work is now derived from. Understand that if you post on their forum anything you post becomes theirs and if it is of any value they WILL use it and they will NOT give credit where credit is due. And they WILL do it because it is their right. (and you have to click ‘agree’ when you sign on, so unless you have a good lawyer you ARE giving them the fruits or your labor).
Would i go if i were you? Yes. But i would certainly appreciate having the above understanding before i behaved in the freedom i had grown to expect in interacting w/Skip and those that he draws to his work. You will NOT have that at PVC. Keep your mouth shut, your heart guarded and you mind awake. It will be worth it. (I’m not good at keeping my mouth shut. But i spent ten years in the streets and ten years in the Marines and i can research the molecules of a crap sandwich. Tends to piss people off.)
Hi, Dana.
First, my good friend, Barbara, is still trying to work through her family issues. It hurts. It all needs prayers from all sides.
My perspective is that Be In Health was an answer given to Henry Wright in response to a heartfelt request to understand how to deal with sick people. He was given a gem. There is no doubt. Among his stable of folks with restored health, there is certainly a long list, from Anita Hill, the original ‘girl in a bubble’ with no immune function because of early childhood trauma, to people who dropped dead of heart attacks, to countless Environmental Illness casualties. Very sick people. Very messed up people. Now very happy people. The research they have on the spiritual roots of disease is truly eye-opening, and if nothing else convinces you that there is no difference between spirit, mind and body, this would. The emphasis that they understand is that obedience is what restores spirit, mind and body in equal dimensions. (It does.) They have broken down the major areas of disfunction into major strongholds, or areas of unrighteousness that many people never recognize as sin. First, a fractured relationship with the Father. Then, how to separate from sin, then accusation, bitterness, occultic thinking (very good, for the most part), envy and jealousy, addictions, unloving and fear. Then they teach how to recognize sin, how to deal with sin, and how to renew your mind using the Word. All very good. Then…… there are the areas that I think they went out (there is an entire church community there now) and found things on their own, in a goodhearted effort to understand, mind you, but, to me, they range from irrelevant to some of it down-right wrong. BUT, none of it need interfere with the solid core of what they do have to give. It all depends on how solid you are with your own understanding of the Word, and where you are at with it. I think many of the pluses of the deal are still there. The week leaves you feeling great after you get rid of so much stuff. Repentance can be fun! And there will probably be some (unholy) stuff missing, too. Renewing the mind can take as little as 4 days, done right. I would still recommend the program. I still do love the people. Just folks. But you will never look at sin the same again, guaranteed. Oh, healing on all levels is a great bonus! Righteousness is good stuff. Take what you like (of their deal, that is), and leave the rest. I did.
Blessings to you and yours.
Love, Laurita
Yeah, ‘discarded’ is probably over the top there and i probably should have toned that down a bit. or a lot.
My sincerest apologies.
Their core teachings and results are amazing.
Barbara
Thank you both for your insight. I am a woman and have been going through the healing process for years. I’ve come across abusers during this journey and have been praying for discernment on what to do. You are helping me to clarify. I’m glad I reached out when I saw where you are from. Thank you and I pray continued healing in your lives. I’m not sure what I will do; some of what I’ve had to deal with would go against what they believe a woman is allowed to do, so I’m guessing I couldn’t really be open which would defeat the purpose?
Dana, I would want to say, don’t misunderstand. Nothing that BIH does is personal. It is a teaching forum and personal privacy is maintained. It is basically work that you do with yourself and God. I don’t agree with lots of things, but that did not prevent me from recognizing the truth that was there,and responding to it. Truth comes through the Holy Spirit. BIH is not a therapy, much less a ‘guided imagery’ or anything like that. They teach against that. One of their better teachings. It is truth that sets us free, not others. There is enough truth there to get the job done. The rest you are free to leave. BIH tells you to consider them as a bowl of chicken soup; eat what goes down, and kindly spit out the bones. That worked for me. The Jordan River was muddy, too. As are we all. Especially me! I cut others the same room I see I need for myself. That keeps me free. Truth is truth. I pray the discernment of the Holy Spirit for all of us to keep us free from error and to speak to us always.
P.S I am walking out of abuse, too. I have considered it part of my growth to learn how to not let others do things to me, or teach me that I have to let them. We can be in the world, but not have to be of it. Freedom. Nice stuff. It works wherever we are (perhaps even in lion’s dens?!). Halleluah!
Dana,
In some areas Laurita is light years ahead of me. Her ability to remain Zen in the face of personal slights and out right rudeness surpasses mine. I tend to confront, which BIH will teach you is a possible spirit of something, rejection, at the very least, and my passionate verbal response as accusation, most likely.
I woke up with this topic on my brain. It is about community.
Skip teaches that no community will exceed 150 people, it’s simply not possible, at that point, for individuals to establish relationship and trust w/more then 150 people. At 150 people there is a break and another community is established. It’s not a ‘sub’ community, it is a brother or sister community, an equal community, comprised of people who naturally gravitated around someone who established themselves as a trustworthy individual that others to learn from and go to in conversation for guidance and godly feedback.
In Skip’s community(yes) individual rights and opinions are respected. Skip teaches that every community needs at least one heretic. Keeps things interesting and people on their toes. Why do they believe what they believe and how they respond to that other person, in love and compassion is more important then converting the heretic or getting rid of them because they are not in line w/the rest of the community. Skip teaches that the reason Judaism has only 4 different ‘sects’ is because Jews accept and expect that they are not ever going to agree on everything and the heated debate does NOT diminish either the community or the persons involved. It just adds character to the community.
Henry teaches that debate is from an evil spirit and not agreeing with the leadership is a sin unto death (exaggerated for effect here). If you have ever read the book The Purpose Driven Church, where unity and oneness of mind and focus are goals, with steps laid out on how to get people to either get in line or get out the door are laid out, you will understand how BIH is, ultimately, run. I’m using henry’s name here to represent the entity of BIH.
Skips community looks like this: An S chain necklace, each link of the necklace is in the letter S w/some individuals facing in and some individuals facing out. The in out sequence is not static, it’s peppered with people talking to each other, not in exclusive ‘cliques’ but in topics of interest, some momentary, some long term. Each link of the S is firmly encased, on both sides, w/another S link of like creation. You may move freely from conversation to conversation, link to link, in the circle. You can participate or not participate, listen or speak.
In any event you are regarded, as you move around, not with suspicion but with curiosity. “Oh…you are?” “Hello, welcome, have something to say”? “Hmmm, I have to think about that”, or “really? Are you sure….i’m not so sure, but ok” And that is on a good day when all is well and we have all had our coffee and the sun is shining. On a bad day? Maybe not. You may get into a heated disagreement or even a debate. But the link will not be broken and the chain does not disintegrate over this. Neither do the people disrespect or break fellowship over it. It is seen as ‘relationship w/in the body’.
BIH is a series of circles. Everyone is facing in. Their goal is to keep others out as well as to keep the circle well weeded of those who have made it into the circle but do not measure up, to prune those people away at any cost. The tightest, hardest pruning comes the closer you get to the cash cow, Henry.
They teach ‘touch not God’s anointed’ and know this they will seriously cut you if you get to close to the cash cow or if you broach any of their teachings with the remotest dissension. Henry rules and the men around him are hand picked to ensure it stays that way. The women are only to happy to support the leaderships decisions that ensure hierarchy is maintained. Very catholic in its approach, actually.
Outside of that, It’s a communistic dictatorship and the community is established for the support of the inner-inner circle. There is an amazing emphasis put on the fact that in the next age all true believers will be Kings and rulers, judging others (I’m assuming only the men will be in positions of authority, but I could be wrong). The job of the inner, inner circle of BIH is to practice judging. To practice judging you have to, you know…judge. So they are excused from the Scripture that tells people not to judge the hearts of others, they are expected to judge the hearts of others and because of their preeminent position of spiritual awareness they are MORE then qualified to do so.
And since any teaching that counters their sacred cow of ‘godly order’ has been deemed heresy, there is no venue by which you may state your opposition. Oh…wait, there is a series steps and tacts you may take to state your opposition but your view will be weighed and judged by their checks and balances and responded to accordingly.
At this juncture it seems fitting to note that Skip teaches that while there are only 4 Jewish sects (5 if you count Karaites, I think) there over four THOUSAND Christian sects. Why? Because the Christian church refuses to give a brother (used inclusively for women as well) the basic right to disagree. Skip teaches that the heretic is necessary for iron to sharpen iron. BIH teaches that their iron is sharp unto perfection and the heretic is a blight in their midst. Note: BIH defines heretic to their taste and they do NOT answer to you.
My apologies, again for the length of this post. I woke up this morning with a picture of two circles. One was a silver colored S chain necklace and the other a fence topped with barbed wire. I understood immediately I was looking at community. It took me all this to explain it.
You have community. You have us. You can go, observe, learn. They have a LOT that is amazingly spot on and you will only be the better for having participated. Even their godly order teaching would be interesting for you, if not for any other reason then to take notes on how amazing it is that people without any concept of the original intent of the Scripture they are teaching on can go so far to use it to support their viewpoint. Go with the understanding, when they get to ungodly order = ADD/ADHD that the very person who ‘discovered’ ADD/ADHD did a death bed recantation, stating that it was a bogus diagnosis and the condition was created to sell drugs.
So the aspect of their teaching that supports their theory of how to ‘cure’ ADD/ADHD is using Scripture to heal a disease that technically doesn’t exist. These things didn’t happen back in the early 2000’s, when i first attended.
Oh. And the teaching Laurita refers to on guided imagery? That’s mine. Henry basically taught it by reciting my side of an extended email exchange, recorded it and is now selling it. I don’t mind that he does, the word needs to be spread. What I mind is the underhanded way in which people like myself are treated by BIH. It’s wrong and no amount of christianese speak will make wrong wright.
BIH is either unwilling, unable or ignorant of how to allow people the freedom of expression. What Skip has been able to teach as well as implement on this blog is what BIH talks about, but is constantly fighting against. I believe Henry is hugely anointed but he has surrounded himself with so many yes men that he is no longer growing. What was once a hugely successful, thriving entity that had no need for fundraising drives or veiled donation requests has now been reduced to common monetary pleas.
It’s sad. But I promise you, if you go and get ousted you will still get letters requesting donations. 😉
Skip, the form of giving that was in the early Church, I heard it was a form of communitarianism, is that correct? Sharing to those in need?
Tithe and tithe-barns were the primary form of giving in the early church, together with free-will offerings. By the early 7thC, one church had accumulated 8,000 lbs of gold in its storehouse, and had 7,500 people on its welfare rolls.
‘Eminent domain’ seems to me to be a case of local or State governmental stealing from individuals or businesses. Lots of it goes on in my locality.
You are right, John. Eminent domain, as well as most taxation of the low income earner is primarily done on a State and local level. The list of State and local taxes is ridiculous: property tax, sales tax, gas tax, State income tax, local income tax, water tax — the list is endless. But Federal income tax rates, for the lowest 50% of wage earners, after tax credits, are at or near zero for those who have dependent children at home. Low earning families get a significant rebate, usually well above their tax liability, from earned income credits. The biggest burden to the working poor in federal taxes is the burden of self-employment tax, for those who earn their living with small businesses, such as gardening or housekeeping. These folks have to pay the full social security tax. (Employees typically split that tax burden with their employers.) For 5 years, as a single mom, I owned a small retail shop; my biggest tax expense (next to paying the accountant) was for self-employment tax and to the State of California. Had it not been for the federal earned income credit on my personal income, I would not have been able to pay my SE tax or my State tax. In California, most of our State and local tax is imposed by ballot propositions, which are passed by voters who mistakenly think they are voting bounty for themselves, rather than understanding that they have just enabled the State to steal their futures.
Thank you again Skip. We are sailing the same ocean in the same ship right now.
A few weeks ago in a bible study a question was asked that caused this broken ones heart to stop. That is my high sign from the Father to interrogate Him about the text.
The study was addressing the instructions concerning restitution and the question was
“What class of personal rights is the subject of the laws in Ex. 21:33-22:15?”
Isn’t YHVH the only one in this story that has personal rights? Don’t we see Him laying those rights down so that redemption can happen? What do any of us have that was not first given by Him? And why did He give it?
If we are one day to be judged by our deeds then, doesn’t it stand to reason that we need some resources to do something with? Aren’t we called servants and stewards by our Lord? Did He give us personal property and personal rights?
Here’s a stunning thought. Le 25:23 The land shall not be sold for ever, for the land is Mine; for you are strangers and sojourners, gar toshav, with Me. Israel is gar toshav with Him?
A servant that lends a resource that has been placed in his stewardship is temporarily at a disadvantage to perform the work that he himself has been given to do. To loan out a resource in your stewardship is to carry a burden for the sake of a brother in need who has also been given work to perform by God. When something happens to that resource the loan agent still has a task to perform but now has no resource for the task.
All of this stuff is on loan from God. It belongs to Him. If the borrower fails to make restitution to the steward he makes the steward’s job more of a burden, but the person he is actually robbing is the owner. Not only do God’s tasks not get done and His resource is squandered, the intended reflection of the reflected character of God in the transaction is aborted. However there is still redemption available.
This image is resurrected in forgiveness and restoration of the relationship so that a renewal of purpose can take place and the glory of the image becomes even brighter in it’s recovery. When the parties refuse to seek restitution His image that was supposed to be reflected in the righteousness of restitution, becomes twice profaned in pride and arrogance.
When we deceive ourselves into believing that we are something more than we really are, presuming to be the owners rather than stewards of God’s resources put in our care for the nourishment of others, we become blind to God’s purpose in creating us in His image to display His manifold wisdom to the powers and principalities and all the nations.
Last weeks parasha was also about a shepherd leading people in an exodus out of slavery with great wealth at God’s command. Laban tried to claim his personal rights to his daughters and their children according to the law (Ex.21:4) But God spoke to Laban and he listened however begrudgingly (unlike Pharaoh) and his life was spared.
Thank u skip for opening my eyes when it comes to stealing, there is so much more to it than meets the eye as the saying goes,now I have a better understanding ,time to pull up the boot straps and march in the word with more focus on his gifts and what we are to do with them.
This message is very well needed for the young millennials in the church today. I see too many embracing government confiscation and redistribution to replace what many see as a remedy for so called deficiencies in the church.
Good TW today.
My skin crawls anytime the topic of taxes comes up. I’m still not good at dealing with this issue. It just overthrows my system thinking of out of control governments ruling from “on high” far away and above their subjects and far and above any of the very rules they make and enforce.
Ugh. My blood pressure is going up.
I’m stopping.
When the monarchs of England confiscated the church tithe-barns and got control of money, they effectively killed God’s ordained system of social welfare. But since social welfare is a necessity, the political state took on that particular role, relegating the church members to mere navel-gazing on a Sunday as they listen to dull sermons about fire insurance.