Okay Josh Duggar....

Post Reply New Topic

You mention idol worshiping cults but some of what is in the Bible is just as bad, like stoning people, and where I live a rabidly Christian running for office said he agreed with it and he got votes, not enough to win, but people voted for that ideology.

As for God dictating the Ten Commandments to Moses, it's still not the same as God writing them. The one who wrote them, if you believe in the accuracy, is Moses.


Okay what if I told you God is speaking through me now and I am typing it down? You would believe God is typing this to you? Or, must I simply rewrite what's already in the Bible to make that claim? When Moses wrote the Ten Commands it wasn't in the Bible yet people want to believe God wrote it so who's to say God isn't writing this, too? I think He is.




WHY the sigh?


To me it's a matter of forgetting what God is if you focus solely on words in a book or images. You are simply connecting to the form, not to God and this is why I believe people warned about worshiping idols instead of the one without form that you have to contemplate a bit and search within yourself. You get a more profound connection with the possibility of insight and wisdom if you let go of the words and the images.



This is pretty much what WBC, whom I learned about Lukewarm Christians from, say. They say you claim to be a church, for instance, you must be like WBC or you are spit from the mouth of Jesus. He doesn't want any kind of church but WBC and ones who pretty much say the same things as them, in the same ways they do. This is why they have such a disgust with other churches which I didn't understand at first. I thought, why do they hate other Christian churches so much? Mystified me because I thought Christianity was about brotherly love, agape and all. They explained it through the Bible verses about lukewarm Christians. So then I thought, that's just kinda strange, to want people to be fanatics all the time or it's bye-bye because it seems counter intuitive nowadays but wait...in the days of Jesus, when you had like, 10,000 competing bands of religious folk with various beliefs and creeds all vying for members, why, it makes absolute perfect sense when I think in terms of that! The only ones who drew new members were the ones who were hot. The lukewarm ones might have even drawn ridicule and trouble from others who would verbally attack the lukewarm ones, then snatch up the hesitant members. Back then you had to be virile or you simply weren't respected, it was part of the culture so Jesus says NO to lukewarm people and yes to the ones with the loud voices who talked of Jesus all day long, relentlessly, with great vigor. People who said nothing weren't a problem because they were not ridiculed or humiliated for simply being "cold" so the attitude toward them was no harm no foul. It was claimed by Jesus's followers after his death this is what he required but it sounds more like what the followers required for larger membership in their churches.
Nowadays, in the US, one of the most Christian nations on earth, there's no worry of that since Christians are going to go to hot or lukewarm churches regardless. They are still going to go to Christian churches so it's not like anyone will be alienated from the Good News. With Christians dominating several locations on earth, the hot/cold/lukewarm parable isn't really necessary any more since Christians going to church are, for the most part, Christians already. No one is being converted. At one time, yes, it was difficult. Christians had to convert large groups of people to survive and had to convince them why they should pay attention to the Gospel and join the groups of believers. That might have not always been an easy thing to do. When a local church seeks new members being on fire for Jesus might help. Churches sometimes actively seek new people and they respond best to enthusiasm, warmth and passion. This is what is meant by hot. It's not about telling all the churches to be hot, if they have members already. Lukewarm can work, too. Lukewarm is up to interpretation like the rest of it. It's not an excuse for church to persecute church, in other words.

Be careful here… Keep in mind who you're talking to. My worldview presupposes that Biblical application of justice is superior to that of secular justice. I'm not going to have a problem with stoning people.

And, also, if you read it a little more carefully, it's not about stoning. It's what stoning represents. It's what you're ALLOWED to do, not what you're required to do. Stoning represents capital punishment. Replace "stoning" with "lethal injection" and, I believe, you won't change the intended meaning or spirit of the law. If you think stoning is an unmerciful method to put someone to death, you aren't prohibited from finding a better way to put someone to death. Always remember that in the Holy of Holies, the Mercy Seat was placed ABOVE the Law.


If God uses someone as His hands to do His work, then yes, it IS God who wrote it. If Moses is sitting in the presence of God Himself, there'd be a pretty intense pressure to make sure it's all accurate! Besides, the ancients often employed scribes to take dictation, yet it is the original source that always gets the credit for "writing" the text. So I reject the premise that God did not write the Bible. And even if I were to accept that premise, the fact that those men responsible for putting pen to paper at God's direction believed God and could demonstrate that the message they came to deliver came from God carries a pretty heavy impact. Either way, I'd take it pretty seriously…and I DO take it seriously.


Depends on what you have to say. I have no problem believing God is convicting you to ask me a question like that.


I'm under the assumption that you are a human being. If true, that means you are a fellow image-bearer of God and in one sense, you are subject to God's will and it is God's will that you type it. If not, you couldn't possibly do it.

That, of course, doesn't mean you can't be a liar. So depending on what you have to say, I may or may not believe you are delivering a message to me from God. I would want to know whether what you have to say is compatible with existing scripture. Second, if you really were some kind of prophet, you would have to be tested in order to verify that you really are a prophet. And I already know you'd fail.


God let you do it. Do I believe God told you to do it? No. I know for a fact God hasn't sent you here to deliver some message to me. I know that for a fact because if that were the case, I'd have believed it.

Go back and give your Old Testament a good thorough read, and maybe pick up a few commentaries from both Christian and Rabbinic sources like the Babylonian Talmud. While you're at it, spend some time in both the Leningrad Codex and the Septuagint and look at a literal word-for-word translation. If God Himself were dictating to you exactly what to type to deliver a message to me, I'd have no choice but to believe you.

Why? We have evidence of those who chose not to believe even after it was apparent God had spoken through a prophet, so why would I have no choice but believe you? For one, I'm open to the possibility. For another, I don't have an agenda that would put me in denial (such as Yahweh acting through Moses to challenge the deity of Pharaoh). But more importantly, I believe in testing God. That is how it was done with the old prophets, how it was done with Jesus and the disciples, and I believe that's one thing that never changed. If you are sent from God, there's no way I can deny it.

The Israelites were aware of God's presence among them. They knew the consequences of disobedience. Everything Moses said would happen DID happen. It was made very clear that Moses was God's appointed liaison, that his words were God's words, and what God handed down to the Israelites through Moses was LAW. Legit prophets always had practices that would similarly establish their credibility. All that was codified in Torah.

Seriously, go back and read your Bible without the anti-scriptural bias. Look at it as something that could plausibly be true. It's all right there.


Because, if I understand you correctly, this is an example of cherry picking. You either accept all the Bible as truth or you don't. If you're picking and choosing what you want to believe or practice as is simply convenient for you, then you don't really believe the Bible. You're using it as a tool. Which is it? Is it all true or not? Why cherry pick?

I've already explained why there are some things that are applicable to Christians while other things are not, and it directly relates to the identity of the Israelite people and ceremonial purity customs practiced in the temple.

On a brief tangent, some of those things are private and nobody would ever know. If you have sex during the day, you have to take a bath and remain ritually unclean until sunset. If you have family members with a contagious skin disease or other ailment, no law says you can't give them food and medicine or clean clothes. It just means you have to quarantine yourself for a few days, after which you'll take a ritual bath before a priest declares you clean. It's NOT A BIG DEAL.

The problem is you have to look at WHO would make this stuff a big deal, and by NT times what started out as a priesthood who were supposed to be servants to God's chosen people ended up being an intellectual elite who actively worked to separate God from man. If you went to a leper colony to give your father or mother food and medicine, you were just as much an outcast as they were. Money was a sign of God's blessing. So if you have no money, that means God hates you.

What has happened that you're observing is that there are groups of Christians who are doing the same thing. Cherry-picked legalism. If you believe that, then you pretty much have to convert to Judaism before you're allowed to become a Christian--after all, Jesus was a Jew, right? Except that's inconsistent with Paul's teachings among the Greeks and Romans. Either it's all true or it isn't. If you're cherry-picking, then you're admitting it's not all true. And if it's not all true, then why are you claiming to live by it and demanding others live by YOUR interpretation? You're a jerk who's separating men from God just as bad as the Pharisees.

I believe that it is ALL true. But because it is ALL TRUE, I have to accept that the OT was inspired by God, penned by Hebrews FOR Hebrews. And that DOES mean that certain laws have certain purposes that CANNOT be applied to ALL PEOPLE at ALL TIMES. Temple worship is OVER. Christians are not Jews. So now we have to decide what DOES apply to all people at all times in all places and go from there. Once you say you have to keep ALL of the OT for the same reasons as the ancient Israelites, then you're saying that righteousness is gained through the Law and not through the blood of Christ. It means now you have to go to the Dome of the Rock and get a Levitical High Priest to go in and burn a lamb on an altar in front of a bunch of Muslims…oh…wait…

See my point?

Or you can simply believe that Jesus is the Son of God who died to atone for all our sins, for all time, once and for all.

These people you're talking about don't really have faith that they are forgiven, nor do they follow OT teachings they way they claim to. If they did, they'd get every Christian and Jew together, completely eradicate all Islamic relics from the former Temple Mount, rebuild the Temple, and reestablish the sacrifices. I'm not saying they are all bad people, nor am I saying they are all destined for hell. But they are in danger of following false teachings and misleading their children. THAT is what frustrates me about the whole thing.


Are you going to hell if you never read the Bible? If so, a lot of people who are unable to read are in big trouble!

No, I don't buy that. You are correct up to a point. It is the blood of Jesus that saves, not a book.

All the book does is inform people of how God related to His chosen ones leading up to the redemption of all of humanity. That is ALL the Bible is.

But at the same time, it's important to understand all these things so you aren't misled into believing something that is false. You NEED to read the Bible if you can, meditate, and pray about it. By all means study with someone who knows a lot about it…hopefully a lot more than I do. Put it into actual practice in your daily life. Just don't lose sight of why the Bible is important and what it all means. You run a risk "letting go of the words" of the whole thing becoming meaningless. If God didn't mean anything by giving us the Bible, He wouldn't have given it to us in the first place.



Eh…reading this just makes my head hurt. No, that's not what is meant by hot/cold/lukewarm.

Let me ask a different way: Has WBC ACTUALLY made much of a difference in a number of peoples' lives? They draw a lot of attention to themselves. But I fail to see how inspiring hate is consistent with the spirit of Christ's teachings.


OK…I get it…but like I said, this isn't what is meant by the hot/cold/lukewarm. I think you have to keep the ancient audience in mind to really get what this means. Hot water brings health and healing. Cold water quenches thirst and refreshes. Lukewarm tastes like urine and makes you sick. (OK, I embellished that last one a little, so sue me). Does a church allow God to work through them to bring spiritual healing like a hot spring? Does a church bring the gospel like a cold drink of water to those who are spiritually thirsty? Yes to either? Great! If they do neither, they are lukewarm, useless, and distasteful to God. LOT'S of churches fit the lukewarm mold. I don't perceive WBC to be the kind of church who really serves the spiritual needs of anyone. They only serve people's need to be angry all the time. Being angry all the time never helped me much, so no thanks.

Ana, just to clarify… I DO understand that's what WBC means regarding the whole lukewarm thing. I'm just saying I think this interpretation is badly misinformed and downright false. I never have given WBC much credence if any.

This is where you and the Gnostic, me. are at odds. For one thing, I do not support capital punishment and the reason I do not is because the Christos came to earth and took the form of someone who went through a brutal, torturous form of it and to honor the beauty of what the Divine Christos did for all of us, to help us understand divinity, I reject ALL capital punishment and I encourage all who follow Christos to do the same.
So I would definitely NOT support stoning because Christos stood with someone and pretty much said, just by standing with the person, if you stone this person you will also stone me as well. I know in my heart Christos is totally against capital punishment. Christos disapproves of the state killing people as punishment.
I do not support lethal injection, gas chamber, nitrous oxide, hanging, firing squad, burning at the stake, or drowning as forms of punishment, either, nothing that involves death or torture.


If God can write through Moses, why can't God write through you and me, too? How do you know God isn't writing through me right this moment and wants you all to know this? What if God actually wants people to question more and to not replace an image with words which is what Protestants do. It's not worshiping a graven image, instead it's worshiping a graven word. Still, it's something you see with your eyes. When you pay enough attention to something and make it your soul purpose, you are worshiping it so if you are worshiping words, you aren't really worshiping God because he is not a word. I try to explain this to Christians so they are more connected with the spiritual side but they are so attached to words, the spiritual side worries them.



So what do you mean by convicting me? Are you saying I am angering God by asking you questions? I live a pretty saintly life and I feel good about my spirituality. I want to help others, not harm. This is the essence of benign spirituality as opposed to the destructive kind. I just don't subscribe to the rigid, overbearing, commanding structure of the Bible which I feel can be destructive.



All of us regardless of our faith, our beliefs, our behavior, our actions are subjected to forces beyond our control. It's a condition of life on earth. You can be the most God fearing, Bible thumping person on earth and bad stuff can still happen. It doesn't mean you aren't a good person or God has abandoned you. It's just a condition of living on this planet and has nothing to do with what you believe but it might have something to do with decisions you make, as in, avoiding bad situations if possible and try to develop the foresight to know they might happen. In other words, turn around, don't drown.


The only message I want to send is please do not worship the Bible like it is God because I see the negative effects of doing this. The Bible is a book that requires much pondering and thought.



As a Gnostic, I find God within myself. I will read books when I feel like it but I do not feel I need to be devoted to reading them to find my spirituality because I find spirit and books to be at odds. Spirit, to me, is living. Books are not. If you find God within yourself, you find a profound moral backbone, a center, that can help you survive life. You do not need a book. People can read the Bible until their eyeballs fall out of their sockets and still find trouble. The Bible cannot save you. Only God can give you what you need and you have to find God within. Like, for instance, through knowing God I reject capital punishment and a lot of other things people do to harm each other. I find psychological healing, too. Peace and calm. Insight. Wisdom. All these are gifts of being connected to God. If you possess them, you are connected. If you are stumbling around, you might need to work on your connection. I even find it hard to put how I think and feel about spirit into words. It never comes out how I want it to. These words never ever do my experience justice or convey what the connection is really like. It just ends up sounding hokey and new agey but that's not how I experience it or want it to sound. It's a very personal thing, not to be subjected to mockery or ridicule because it just doesn't translate into words well.



I would need to know the prophet's attitude toward me to determine if I will accept them as a prophet. I do not accept a prophet on another's word alone. I need to feel their energy first. I understand there are prophets in the Bible and self proclaimed ones today but it doesn't mean a lot to me. I can look at how they lived and see why they were the way they were. I can see why Daniel was so trippy. He's my favorite because he was a man taken into captivity and you can bet what we know of him was shaped by this experience. I like reading about Daniel because of the fantastic visions.



You don't know if that's true because we only have the knowledge in hindsight. Fifty years later, someone proclaims, Moses is always right! What he said would happen did and then he doesn't even know what Moses said would actually happen, just what did happen so he makes the claim Moses was right even if he doesn't know. Moses was a human trying to help his people. That's the most important thing, the truth in this. It's not to be like Moses or proclaim him to be God's appointed and all knowing prophet, but to know Moses was willing to go through hell and high water to help his people and he did it! One mortal man helping the multitudes.
I do believe the Israelites felt the presence of God and were connected to God and I will leave that experience to them.



As a kid, I went to Children's Church all the time and I enjoyed the Bible stories, especially Noah and I loved Joseph, too. I loved Jacob's ladder and the story about the lion's den and I look back on hearing them in fondness but nowadays, I do not feel compelled to study the Bible as often because I want to study other things and there are only so many hours in the day. The Bible happened a long time ago. It's about how people lived thousands of years ago. Some of it I cannot relate to in the slightest because I am living in a different time and I have no desire to live in that culture or environment. So, I connect to whom I call the living God of understanding, knowledge, wisdom, divinity and read more modern text.



I don't accept it as truth. I do not believe in finding truth in books. I am a Gnostic Christian. I feel life on earth is flawed, books can be deceptive and riddled with errors and mistakes. People who blindly follow what's in a book can be deceived, lose their center and thus do evil things. Books are just another flawed part of life and I firmly believe in cherry picking ANY book. I believe in using reasoning in everything. I have never been the type who believes something just because it's in a book. When I went to church as a kid, I did have to conceal my thoughts on the Bible but I didn't feel alienated from spirit. To me, they are energy states.



Practiced thousands and thousands of years ago by people living in a completely different culture than I. Even in modern Israel, the culture is different than it was back then.



That's why we have things like Tide, hot water heaters, rubbing alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, Palmolive, Neosporin. These weren't available back then. So they did what they thought they had to do to stay healthy and survive. They hoped all the germs would just die out if they stayed away from people for a while after being around the sick except they didn't know what germs were. They just knew from experience, those that stayed away didn't chance giving the sicknesses to others so they thought it meant God wanted them to stay away for a while.



The people from the provinces (which were the Nazarites among others) didn't feel a kinship to the elite in Jerusalem, the big city. It's kinda like how everyman doesn't feel comfortable about politicians in Washington D.C. It's normal for people further away to feel alienated by the elites in a far off city they must travel to. The Nazarites were cut from an entirely different cloth than the elitists in Jerusalem, who were chummy with the Roman rulers like Pilate and also the puppet kingship of the Herods. It was different as night and day. John the Baptist pretty much lived in the wilderness with honey and locusts which was normal for Nazarites. It is no surprise they didn't like the priesthood in the big city and they didn't trust them. One famous Nazarite was beheaded by Herod.



I don't believe anything is all truth and to me that's healthy. I do not separate men from God. In fact, I find the ones, like WBC, who alienate people from spirituality and try to get them to see it from a realistic standpoint and they are not helping anyone find God even though they think their warnings will. So yes, I do help them find their own way. I do not alienate anyone from God and encourage everyone to experience a deep connection. I tell people to look beyond books and into spirit because I feel they are disconnected, so much so, the spiritual side scares them when they should feel confident and comfortable about it. I do.



And the Gospels and Acts spoke to the persecuted converts living in the time of the Roman Empire. For instance, when it is stated women should be quiet in church. That has nothing to do with our culture today. Women are often outspoken wherever we go. It's accepted. So, we can be outspoken in church, just like men can but modern fundies will take that one verse and hit people over the head with it like Jesus Himself uttered it when it is clear Christos had a lot of kindness toward and appreciation for women.


Proceed.


I believe Christos came to tell us something very important about the divinity within each of us, how we can access it and what it means when we experience it. How it changes us. It's about grace.



It's because we live in a state of demiurge. We can expect this sort of thing in this world. It is an imperfect place. There will never be peace here.



At one time, it was common for Catholics to never read the Bible. They had their sacraments and that was enough.

YES it is about Jews, various ethnic groups in the region, and what these poor folks did when they were occupied by outside forces, namely, the Romans and what the Romans did to them which was often wretched. It's a lesson in how to treat others in my opinion.



I am naturally skeptical of everything.




Considering the context, it could be the most obvious reason why the parable was used. It was used to help them establish churches which was very difficult to do in that environment with all the competition. It's just not a very exciting explanation. It's a pragmatic one. Early Christians had to convince others to join them or they wouldn't have gotten anywhere. They wouldn't have lasted. So, they tell their members, go out and be on fire. That way, people will listen and be drawn to you like a moth to flame. Either do this or just shut up. If you go out there without any enthusiasm then you might as well get lost. We don't want you. It's almost like a director telling his actors and actress, do a good job acting or just go home. Don't just go through the motions. Become the part! A good director wants the actors to be convincing. It could be rooted in what you typed about water but the meaning ties into what I just typed. Keep in mind, if the water is too hot, no one would be able to drink it without the membrane in their mouth cracking and peeling.



They inspire a lot of hatred and alienation. They hurt themselves more than others though. I was trying to help them see how they hurt themselves but they feel, when they are hurting, they are serving Jesus, so they want to continue.



I get what you mean by the water but also, the meaning would apply to them going out and seeking converts for their churches and how they must persuade them. It basically means, either be enthusiastic or shut up but do not just go through the motions thinking it will get people to join.

AngelRho, just so you know I read some of your reply. I skimmed it because I got the basic gist of what you are saying. It sounds like you are a loving parent from what you say so I don't want to press it too much further. I didn't understand "hammer on the leg" phrase or whatever it was. I'm hoping this is a metaphor. I honestly hope that a hammer wasn't actually swung at the child. If so, well, our philosophies are very different and my input isn't going to change anything.

Just so you're wondering, I know it might seem like diversion, but you saying that makes it sound like you are being defensive. I take this stand out of genuine empathy for children, not as a means to distract the conversation out of malice. If you want to defend yourself further, feel free to do so, but notice that you are worrying about your public image. It's difficult to be perfect all the time. Nobody is.

I find a lot of what I read here very upsetting.

Oooo is a gnostic Christian, which I find confusing. The thing is these crazy churches like WBC are absolutely right that their religion is in danger. What they are wrong about is that they need to defend it to the death. I honestly believe in my heart that raising children with Christian beliefs is harmful to them. I honestly think Christianity is eventually going to deny out as people become more and more "lukewarm" (as if that is an insult).

"Dropping the hammer" is an expression. It means to end something, crack down, or go all out. Refers to pulling the trigger on a pistol.


Not defending anything. You brought it up and I was just explaining my position on the matter. I think this thread is really about religious beliefs and how there has been a conflict between questionable practices of the Duggars' religious leader and actual beliefs promoted by the organization he founded. My main contention is people just like to see good successful people fail. I don't think we should make this about my disciplinary repertory.


Gnosticism doesn't make any sense, but I'm not going to get into that pointless argument.

Yes, WBC is a crazy church. But let's look at reality: their religion is NOT in danger at all. We've always had people like that as long as there has been a Christian church, and we always will. Sure, they'll change their names, their theology will undergo slight variations, but they'll never go away.

How are Christian beliefs harmful to children? And don't say because we believe in spanking children, because that's not, strictly speaking, a Christian thing. It's an option. "Spare the rod" doesn't mean you have to beat children. "Spare the rod" just refers to refusing to correct children at all, whatever form that "rod" takes (I don't "switch," whip, or paddle my children--never have, and I'm not about to start) be it firm words, timeouts, gentle reminders, or whatever.

And "lukewarm" water in the Bible was something that made God feel sick. To distill the meaning of the water analogy, let's just say it means that if the church isn't reaching out and helping people, it's a useless, pointless institution. There are a lot of those. What ana is talking about are churches who twist the intended meaning of that analogy to be an insult. Maybe I need to work on "getting the beam out of my own eye" and understand them better, but as best I can tell THEY are the lukewarm ones. They aren't helping anyone. They just insult people and spread hate. How is that living out the words of Christ?

I DO think that churches should stand on the words of the Bible and stand on principle. And I do think that means standing in opposition to the secular status quo. But there's a Christlike way to do that which I don't see these people doing. Maybe I just don't get it. Churches like WBC and people who support them need to repent and ask Jesus to be their savior and Lord.

This thread is about what the Duggars could be doing now to merit such judgment from God through others, which is something they believe. Something else going on?

I'm not 100% certain that's what the Duggars believe in this situation. This is book of Job stuff. I think when bad things happen, one SHOULD examine whether this is judgment from God for something. But if you look through the Bible, you're going to see case studies of bad things happening to good people. Job is the classic, #1 go-to example. The prophets brought messages of doom and gloom if their leaders refused to repent, and for that the prophets were insulted, imprisoned, tortured, and killed. Good people just doing their jobs, and God allowed them to die at the hands of evil people. Why? It's just the nature of the fallen world we're born into. Fallen human nature. What the Duggars, and all Christians, have to do is examine themselves and pray that God make them aware of the wrongs they have done--because we've all done SOMETHING for which we deserve judgment--and if what has happened is NOT a result of judgment, then pray that God be glorified in these circumstances.
.
My family was homeless for 2 1/2 months. Did we make some foolish or naive mistakes? Sure. We shouldn't have tried to buy a house in the middle of a real estate credit bubble. I should not have placed so much faith in job security or worked for compassionless people who'd throw me under a bus at the first opportunity. But at the same time I had no control over the housing/banking market, didn't think I'd need "go-to-hell"/"get-out-of-Dodge" money so soon, figured a little debt was ok since I'd always been able to pay bills and still had some margin, didn't MAKE all those people who mistreated my family and I do what they did… I could have done a better job at making friends, but I woke up one day and had NOTHING. People are evil, and that's not my fault.

But we've relied on God, straightened ourselves up, got out from under our mortgage before there was even talk of foreclosure, took what limited resources we had left and BOUGHT a smaller house on the edge of town IN CASH, paid off the car note (oh, and when we traded that in for a van a few years later, we paid IN CASH), paid off all our credit cards IN FULL. Sure, we've got student loan debt we can't completely resolve right now and maybe one or two other black spots on our credit report and a couple of medical bills. But we've been richly blessed and are able to get rid of things like medical bills fairly quickly. And we can't take credit for that… Without God helping us through all this, we couldn't say we did anything at all. It's evidence that in spite of the worst of circumstances, whether it's people acting against us or our own mistakes, everything works out for the best when we allow God to be in control of our lives.

The Duggars have obviously done much better than my family and I don't begrudge them that. They have gone farther than we ever could, they've enjoyed greater success than we have, and they're just plain smarter. They are all too aware of how blessed they are by God. They've responded so far the way any Christian should respond: by surrendering the situation to God and His guidance, letting the haters hate, and encouraging each other. And when/if this eventually blows over, and I'm confident that it will, they'll give glory to God for seeing them through it and life will pretty much go back to normal.

I do agree on the inward path to God (what some refer to as prayer while I refer to as knowing) being the way I choose and wish others would explore more. I believe in the Job story because bad things do happen to good people. It's not always karma punishing the wicked. Some people are awesome yet they experience such hardship through no fault of their own and others are thoroughly rotten and get rewarded. It seems like fate enjoys toying with living beings from time to time.

However, I don't know if this is what is happening to the Duggars. Couldn't hurt to deepen their connection to the spiritual because it can make them stronger and give them backbone. You are not going to develop that by just reading a book. It takes a lot more than just that. I believe it can be a gift from what or who I cannot explain. Maybe it triggers a process within our bodies that heals and strengthens us, or it just causes us to become more aware. The more aware you are, the less likely you will get into trouble through something like committing illegal acts yet you need the wisdom to tell what is immoral despite what the law says. An immoral act is always immoral despite being caught and punished. Even if you do not face consequences, it is still fundamentally immoral. Sometimes, you have to fight the law if it tells you to violate someone which from time to time, it does. It's spirituality that can help you with all this. I believe something is immoral if it violates others in some way. So, if you get in people's face only to cause them distress, to me, that's immoral even though it's not illegal. In fact, it's protected by the constitution. If you choose to converse with someone, as in, rebuking, that's different. People will cross the line between rebuking to help or doing it to just inflict emotional pain and it's obvious when they are just doing it to harm.
.


YES the ways of the world can seem extraordinarily wicked! This is why i reiterate the world is far from being a perfect place and is quite often treacherous to its inhabitants. You do everything you can to survive, you work hard everyday, yet nothing seems to go your way. You can't grasp the manageable and eventually get swept away even though you do everything in your power to be your best and make it through. It happens to people.
We need a sense of the divine to navigate such a brutal place. The divine can truly help us by allowing us a more peaceful life here on earth. We cannot make it perfect. We can make it better. We need peace of mind and strength within ourselves to make it through tough times and this comes from something outside yet inside, too, through the divine spark within, the fiery heart, we can connect with. Outside, it is beyond our comprehension but yet we can be aware. We cannot fully comprehend, not at this time. During times such as this the connection is invaluable.



It was because you were able to experience a humble state of mind and scale down. A lot of people have trouble with that. They become accustomed to the best and they only want to go upward and would do anything to stay on that path, despite going into tremendous debt and losing everything but then they hit rock bottom which is actually far worse than merely scaling down a bit. It's best to realize it's better to have less, not lose it all. It's their pride. This is very wise of you to gracefully settle for less to be in a better situation overall. Americans dislike this concept and some consider it insulting, to be expected to do this but I understand life can be a state of flux and we are here to experience it. Just be grateful for the opportunity to be alive because it truly is a rare one. That is the divine spark talking!



It's actually pure luck. There are numerous families in the same boat as the Duggars and they are equally as religious and devout. They work hard and yet they never experience the success and it's because the Duggars landed the lucrative contract with Discovery Inc and the odds are, most people are not going to land such a deal. It's like winning the lottery. The competition is intense. The odds are incredibly low. You can spend hundreds a month and never win a dime yet someone else can win a jackpot on their first ticket. Well, you need to win that jackpot before having 15 kids. What is needed before the birth of so many kids is a plan. How will I provide for them all and opportunities like Discovery should be in the line up first, not after. In other words, my family planning is contingent upon how much money I can make in x amount of years, not the other way around, because I might not get that lucky and I have to be realistic. I can't just have twenty kids without a solid plan to take care of their needs, food, clothing, shelter. All that costs money. And then I have to figure out if I am mature and self sacrificing enough to forgo my own needs because that many kids take oodles of time, energy and money. The Duggars look good because they got lucky but there are so many who do not get lucky and who pays the price? All the kids because they have needs. There's no denying it. They have these basic needs and if you are not aware of this, it will be difficult to be a parent.

Who says just reading a book is going to solve all problems?


I just prefer to acknowledge my own powerlessness and helplessness and allow God to empower me and decide my fate. Makes things a lot less stressful.


Couldn't have done it without God at work in my life.


Very true. I may way off-base here, and that's ok…but I suspect most Americans have a lot of trouble placing total faith in and total dependence on God for everything. For a long time I thought this was what I was doing. Those experiences taught me a lot about real, walk-on-water faith. BTW, Peter's walk-on-water experience is not notable in that he failed but rather that he had just enough little "mustard seed sized" faith to call out to Jesus to rescue him. The lesson of walking on water is a progression to total reliance on God, whereas the mustard seed faith is all about one's personal growth extending to bringing more and more people to faith in Christ and salvation.


They couldn't have done any of it without God.


None of which would have been possible without God.

Angelrho -

What about all those devout family who have more than ten kids, rely on God yet are poor and struggle to parent them all? Many Quiverfull families fit this mold, this coming from someone who was raised in one and socialized with other Quiverfulls growing up. She reported as many as ten kids and two parents in a two bedroom trailer. So you see, it's not that simple. God does not take care of every Quiverfull like the Duggars. This is where wisdom comes into play. Money first, then as many kids as you can afford.

God chose to bless them with a lot of children. And God is taking care of them. They're still alive, aren't they?


God takes care of everyone. Large families, small families, rich and poor alike.


Wisdom comes from God.


God first.


God said "be fruitful and multiply." God didn't ask what we could afford. Obedience to God comes first. Jesus said, "Consider the lilies. They don't work, but they are clothed finer than King Solomon ever was." God takes care of the lilies, and He takes care of us, too.

Obviously God doesn't take care of everyone equally or all the Quiverfull families would be like the Duggars and they aren't. I read a Quiverfull mother was diagnosed with cancer and she rejoiced at the idea of escaping her abusive husband and large number of children by dying of a terminal illness. When you think of a parent in that situation, it is clear they are not feeling God within. It always helps to have a plan FIRST.

All I have to say on this is 20^5 = 3,200,000! Lol. Compare this with 2^5=32.

I was reading somewhere that their goal is out-populate the enemy. Is this true?

Christian Identity groups do have a fear of population decline among their numbers so this could be true and it's not a matter of denying them, more one of saying this is a tall order and a lot to deal with. Can you manage it?
No one has the authority to deny reproductive rights and you are free to have as many kids as you possibly can but if you have them, you have to take care of them.

It goes beyond that though.

They refer to their children as arrows (yes, it's a metaphor, but a telling one). Ethically questionable at best to produce offspring for the purpose of fighting a political war. Children are not weapons.