From - Fri Aug 21 02:44:41 1998
Dear Mike:
I would have to take time out to make a good testimonial for the Web,
and
it may take me at least a week. Also, because I am female, which
of
course renders me totally contentious and idiotic to begin with according
to COBU, my opinion would count for squat, so it maybe would be better
if
Jim and I consult and it is presented from his point of view, and I
could
ghost write since he is not really into sitting at the computer when
he
could be playing his banjo or making a dulcimer or something.
It doesn't surprise me that everyone there is from the same cookie
cutter. Your message is ambiguous enough for them to question
if they
are nice to you that maybe you would still like to visit them, the
Only
True Church, but of course you are still going to hell for having a
wife
and kids and not being able to give in all your money, unless
you are
willing to sell all that you have and move back in and let everything
you
have go to Haiti, because of course it is just your greed and worldliness
and love of money that is keeping you from wanting to live in a pure
enviroment, like say 515. Didn't you realise that you had no
recourse
but to turn into an Older Bro.? I mean its simply biological.
Did you
really think you had a choice to avoid it? Did you know only
one
physically older bro. (besides ST) that ever was considered a pure
example in the system? ST's "second in command" as you put it
(Jimmy
Greiner) tried with all his might to be the ultimate "striver" and
look
what happened to him... used up, and spit out. I honestly don't
think of
COBU as a cult. It is a "church that abuses" and I wonder
if it isn't
some kind of a serious principality religious spirit that causes these
tragedies all over the world. If you were the devil, it would
seem like
a great plan, wouldn't it - ala Screwtape Letters, CSLewis...
Those poor bros. that are still so willing to fight for something they
know that they themselves aren't "enjoying" (terrible thing to love
your
life, which you will lose anyway, so make sure you are always miserable
while you are here... no "dollar a day" for you brother, lest you should
actually have it too easy...) It got to where Jim and I didn't
want to
witness because there was nothing honest to bring the "lambs" home
to, no
love about the place that would make them want to remain Christians.
When I first got saved we greatly respected the older brothers.
They
could teach on the most obscure parts of Scripture, and they could
publicly refute "dead" church pastors, and JWs and Mormons, and honey,
they could quote all kinds of amazing verses and know the addresses!!!
And we would go out on the streets and to the Malls, and people would
get
down on their knees on the sidewalks and on the benches of parks and
get
saved. I vividly remember praying in our "squatted" position,
about 15
of us, in Moorestown Mall, NJ while security guards didn't know what
to
do with us! And about 3 people getting saved. And I remember
my
half-sister Cathy had asked us to pray at a Center mtg. re: a large
tumor
on her kidney and we prayed and the next day it wasn't on the X-ray
and
they cancelled surgery, (this was probably around 1977 or so).
I mean,
stuff happened, and we would have been fools NOT to have been there
in
the beginning. God delivered a lot of people through the beginning
of
COBU. I say it got the most messed up when the Lofts started
and everyone got blasted
instead of encouraged. It may have been a good idea to want to
give
everyone some more of a central ideal, and make the houses a bit more
uniform in ways, for efficiency, but that's when old ST saw he could
take
over this motley crew. And I will give him credit that his colored
bible
thing is genius-y. But meglamaniac... I mean ST was just a vacuum
cleaner nerd with a bunch of kid living in a school bus, and his first
wife must have gotten real sick of his weird involvement with teenagers,
and why didn't he get a real job to feed the kids? and she did at one
time give him an ultimatium like "its me or the church" and since she
was
so evil they seperated, and then someone else seems to have come along
with a shoulder for her to cry on, and hey, she's an adulteress so
ST has
a right to leave her now and married Gayle not that long afterwards,
although I don't think they were technically having a relationship
when
the wife left. I mean, I feel sorry for the first wife, because
it was a
rotten set-up. So why does ST think women are evil?...hmmm, no
brainer
there. Women might actually be thinking "hey, wouldn't it be
nice if my
husband was to provide for me and the kids and we had a decent place
and
maybe health insurance?" How evil to be "hoping in house and
home..."
like that! Imagine, young marriagable age people actually wanting
to get
married, how shocking! How evil of them to want to devote themselves
to
loving another Christian and encouraging one another for a lifetime
and
bringing forth more children for God's Kingdom.... why they must just
be
turning into older brethren with those terrible thoughts... totally
of
the flesh. Only "a silver" or "a gold" could handle such things,
and of
course, those are very rare and elite. Certainly not commoners
like you
and me, bro. We could never handle it, so surely our conscience
must be
saturated in guilt for the worldliness of our lives and we better run
for
the good of our souls back to some delapidated building that is ready
for
the health dept. shut down to purify ourselves before God, right?
I mean
it is the only way to avoid hell is to live like we're in hell now,
right? Or something like that... Is anyone really having
life changing
experiences (I mean for the good... not changing your life from the
frying pan into the fire...) in COBU now? I remember ST vividly
saying
he was going to "outlast you all." Whatever that meant. Does
that mean
"he who endures to the end"... like the kids' game of "king of
the
hill"... the biggest bully wins?
I, like you, miss the singing. I miss the corporate prayer.
I miss the
idiot idea that I once held that said: if I led someone to Jesus from
Utica, NY that was visiting our fellowship in NJ that the Utica people
would be consistantly spiritual enough to entrust with this person
that I
loved. You know, that we were a network, we had all things in
common.
That if I wanted to talk about the Bible, that I would always know
someone who shared that deeper desire, that if I wanted to pray that
didn't mean some whimpy little one liners as we went around the circle
holding hands about how pretty the day was today... that I could discuss
miracles and brethren were right there with me at heart. That
we
suffered together the same deeper commitment and even poverty daily.
That we chose to be there, because we believed things would get better
eventually. That surely, since we were so happy, and people were
getting
saved and we had studies and stuff, when Stewart arrived he would be
pleased, right? He would surely be glad that we were keeping
the million
rules and all our contacts, conversation and conversion charts looked
great... and only one of the brothers out of 10 was into his head...
surely we would have pleased him, and therefore, God, right?
Never. How
could I have been so naive? I was young, I had good intentions,
I
believed...was I just a fool? No, because how does the real God
see my
heart back then? And I look back...did I hurt anyone? Probably
the
answer to that is yes. There were times I bought into the party
line. I
was never an older sister there, we left before I got to that.
But I
would sometimes be vocal about ones "should be" more zealous, or try
harder to get estimates, whatever. Jim says your spiritual condition
was
directly proportional to how successful you were with getting
estimates... that's how everyone treated you. And Jim never being
a good
salesman was always a trip it seemed, but at least his few estimates
always closed! (Quality not quantity...) I do have a few regrets
about
not being kinder and not being more vocal against unrighteousness when
I
did see it. (But remember the Book of Bob "Say what you see,
and see
what you get...") We left end of 1979 - I don't know how you
could have
taken it after then until '84. It amazes me that a whole new
crop of
people are still getting hurt by it. Are we to blame by shutting
up and
licking our own wounds for so long? Should we band together to
speak out
against it, and if so, would it do any good at all? I do fundamentally,
as a Christian American, agree that they have a right to exist or
religious liberty is compromised. But I also think they stretched
the
law a lot in the money practices and that ST should not have profited
at
so many people's personal expense, and through deception. I don't
want
to "go there" in resentment or bitterness, because the Real God takes
care of me. But it is wrong as a principle. Hey, you're
right about the
Romance, but the "moon and NYC" did have an effect on me and Jim.
We
still have a joke about the COBU personal escort system. Gotta
go bro.
Love ya in Christ - Nancy
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