What is it about Charismatics?

I have notice something about the evangelical/charismatic church, we blindly follow leaders. I followed the same guy for 17 years so I am as guilty as the next per fitter. When I attended the charismatic group for which I once belonged I heard many times that bad things happen to those people who left the group. Talk about fear motivation and this coming from the same guy who would tell me things the “Lord” said to him about me. I noticed that none of those things ever happened, whatever happened to the stoning of false prophets. That would shout up most Charismatics quickly. Anywho, I was just thinking about all those years I would jump from one Bible teacher to the next looking for the great leader. I caught myself doing it again when I would listen to these two guys who produce a weekly podcast about their version of Christianity. I was straightened out when one of the guys went after John Calvin, it was basically slander. Why can the guy at the pulpit say anything he wants? Whatever happened to the love Christ talked so much about.

Once again I realized that I had fallen for the same old trap of hero worship so prevalent in the evangelical/charismatic churches. Immediately Father began showing me a whole new (Old) world of Eastern Orthodox Faith and I made the decision to pursue gift to see where it would lead. My goal in all this is to determine if the Ancient Church was so controlled by the guy at the pulpit or was the center of the worship upon the Triune God. It should be an interesting test.

Chasing Phantoms Part II

In my last post I forgot the explanation of the title Chasing Phantoms. Over the past 25 years I have attempted to use teachers as a way for overcome my problems. It has not worked. As I said on my last post I sat under one teacher for 17 years. When I left that group after major Holy Spirit encouragement (I was attacked from the pulpit, nameless of course because he is a Minnesotan). As an aside beware of Minnesotans, they are passive-aggressive lot who will be nice to your face and will beat you behind your back. I digress.

Much of present day evangelicalism is chasing phantoms. The teaching is based on the latest whim of the pastor or the sermon outline used. The people go to church not to hear the lame sermon but to see their friends. Many churches have gotten so big that you have trouble finding your car after the service. I guess they call that success. Hahaha. I didn’t have this problem is the group for which I once belonged. The “teacher” made sure that anyone who thought a little different then he die no longer attended. I guess that’s what happened to me. I was growing rather bored with the same type of teaching every week. How many sermons can you hear on how do get things from God over 17 years. I don’t joke, that was his main teaching every week. I remember when he attempted to talk about relationships it was comical. The world revolved around him so the only relationship where those that benefited him.
Now why did I say all that, oh yeah. I started looking into the teachings of the Eastern Christianity and I find one thing to start interesting. In the first 1000 years of the Church there were seven ecumenical councils to resolve issues within the Church. The first was Nicea which dealt with the Arian heresy. After the last council in 787 AD the Eastern Church stopped adopting new doctrine because only the whole church can change dogma (if I am incorrect please let me know). That is another thing that I like about the Eastern Tradition if they don’t understand it they call it a mystery instead trying to have all the answers. I like that.

Chasing Phantoms

I have been reading a wonderful book by Peter Gillquist called: Becoming Orthodox: A Journey to the Ancient Christian Faith,” The story is about the group of people move from Evangelical Christianity to the Orthodox Christian Church. As this group studied church history they became convinced that the true Church was the Orthodox Church. I have been part of evangelicalism for many years and I understand the reasons for moving out of this movement. There is little meaning to anything the evangelicals do. A recent article on internetmonk.com talks about the coming Evangelical collapse. I see it coming.

My story is more in the Word of Faith movement. For 17 years I sat under a teacher whose basic learning technique was whatever the TV ministers were saying. It was the Church of the Whim. Whatever the latest fad on TV was that is what would be coming. When I left that group I tossed all my notes. Plus why are Evangelical/Charismatic minister so self centered. The whole world revolved around this guy. Anyway back to the Orthodox Church. I laid out a plan for myself to move back to the Ancient Christian Faith. How it will be revealed is unknown at this time but I do look forward to it. I am starting with two books I have ordered. The first is On The Incarnation by St. Athanasius. The book was a defense of the Christian faith against the Arianism. The second is a book on Orthodox spirituality.

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The Language Perfectionist: Mistakes in the News

By Don Hauptman

You might assume that respected publications employ battalions of skilled editors who work assiduously to ensure that no errors appear in their pages. Maybe so, but the mistakes don't always get caught. Here are four that I recently found in major newspapers:

* "When Mr. Biden indulges in his rhetorical overkill of repeating the same phrase three times - the proud men and women of Scranton, he said... 'wanted the government to understand their problem, to understand their problem, be cognizant of the problem'...."

Did you catch it? He didn't repeat the phrase three times. He repeated it twice.

* "We create elaborate Excel spreadsheets in our head sorting what we would buy...."

In our one collective head? Try the plural heads.

* "Indeed, the banjos owned by Mr. Scruggs were nearly priceless."

As the MasterCard ads suggest, the word priceless has some validity when it's applied to a sunset or time with one's family. But a rare collectible surely has a price. What's more, "nearly priceless" is nonsensical.

* "I have known him for nearly two years, and have seen him in a variety of situations... over a glass of wine in his boyish loft in Manhattan's Tribeca...."

The word boyish means "like a boy" or "youthful and innocent." The word may legitimately be used to characterize an adult male, but can it describe his apartment? Nope. In place of this clunky phrasing, the writer should have told us something about the resident's furnishings or toys. That would have conveyed a vivid and concrete image.

These examples demonstrate once again that it's a good idea to express oneself carefully. Sloppy writing and unprofessional editing tend to stop readers in their tracks and distract from the message.

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Slash Your Travel Expenses With 7 Strategies From an Expert Scrooge

By Steenie Harvey

Despite their concerns about the economy, Americans are still traveling, according to a Fast Park survey. Says a report on CheapFlights.com, "Fast Park found that 66 percent of its customers planned to book the same number of vacations and purchase airline tickets in 2009 as they did last year."

While this news may be surprising, it's no shocker that the people who plan to travel are searching for bargains.

My advice? Head East.

I just returned from Southeast Asia, and it was full of budget-friendly deals.

The best buy? An airline ticket with AirAsia. Flying from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's capital, to Penang Island cost me the equivalent of $9.45, taxes included. And it wasn't a travel writer's discount. If booked at the right time, that budget fare was available to everyone.

Although freebies and discounts are part of a professional travel writer's life, you usually need to have a few stories published before you're treated to "hospitality." When starting out, most have to make their dollars stretch as far as possible.

And even if travel writing doesn't figure in your plans, it doesn't require wads of cash to explore exotic places. Not if you start thinking like a cheapskate writer.

Okay. I lucked out and got a generous media discount (and an upgrade to club status) at the Manila Hyatt. But although lounging in luxury is fun, I'm really a Scrooge at heart.

So if you dream of exploring Asia this year, here are seven tips to help you slash your budget:

1. Scratch Japan, Singapore, and South Korea from your schedule.

They're not inexpensive countries - and their high-profile beach destinations are for well-heeled tourists only. Nice if you can afford it, but Thailand has far more to offer than the beaches of Phuket and Koh Samui. (Besides, White Beach on Boracay Island in the Philippines outdoes them both - and it's a better value.)

2. Asian Web travel agencies often supply better discounts than you can get from major U.S. booking sites or by contacting the hotels themselves.

Here are a couple of deals I got: Through asiawebdirect.com, a double with breakfast at Kuala Lumpur's Swiss Garden Hotel was $61. In the Philippines, at the Carmela de Boracay Hotel facing Boracay Island's famous White Beach, a double with breakfast was $71 through agoda.com.

3. "Budget accommodations" doesn't have to mean grungy backpacker hostels.

On Borneo, I met a retired British couple staying in a Kota Kinabalu guesthouse for $18 nightly. Private room, air conditioning, power shower, Internet, free airport pickup - they had no complaints. For them, "flashpacking" throughout Asia for five months worked out cheaper than staying at home.

4. Eat with locals.

Just because a meal costs only a dollar or two doesn't mean it's unsafe - or that a plastic-table joint is unhygienic. My only caveat is to avoid empty restaurants. They're usually empty for good reason.

5. Vietnam is an exception, but organized excursions can be outrageously expensive.

Before signing up, check to see if you can make the same trip yourself using public transport. For example, I went snorkeling on Sapi Island, off Northern Borneo. Return ticket on a public ferry: $4.75. Hire of snorkeling equipment: $4.20. A seafood noodle lunch with fresh lime juice: $2.80. Total cost for me: $11.75. The same trip with a local tour outfit costs $36.40.

6. On the same subject... if you're traveling with someone else, hiring a taxi for the day is often cheaper than a tour.

My husband and I have done all-day taxi trips in both Thailand and India for under $60.

7. Be creative, and you'll unlock lots of adventures for very little.

Ride a jeepney in Manila - less than 10 cents for one of the most unforgettable rides of your life. Delve into a night market. (You don't have to buy anything.) Try a fish pedicure. (In Malaysia, it costs only $6 to $8.) And why visit a fancy spa for a traditional massage? You'll find many beaches where you can have for one for $2 or $3.

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Hotel Insider Reveals How to Snag the Best Deals

By Bonnie Caton

Over the past 14 years, Wendy G. has worked her way up from hotel front desks to operations and beyond. She's trained hotel reservationists to negotiate prices... and she knows better than anyone how to work the system.

Here are her five tips for getting a great deal on hotels with three or more stars:

1. Book directly with the hotel.

Call the front desk and ask to speak with the "on-site reservationist." Avoid the reservations 800 number, which will usually connect you to an outside company that isn't open to negotiation and can't access the best deals.

2. Appeal to the "human factor" for negotiating power.

Once you get an on-site reservationist on the phone, let her know why you're excited about going to that particular hotel. Going on your honeymoon? Let your excitement show.

3. Be nice.

"If you're nice," Wendy told me, "you're much more likely to get what you want. If you're unkind, you'll pay full price for the room by the elevator."

4. Try someone else.

If you still don't get the deal you're looking for, call back a few hours later to see if you can catch someone on the next shift.

5. Ask for a nicer room.

If you're already getting a discount, you'll be less likely to get upgraded to a nicer room for free. But if you're paying full rate, make sure you ask if a room upgrade is available.

This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.

What to Do If You Get Laid Off

By Jason Holland

Companies are cutting expenses due to the economy's downward slide. Not even workers with a perfect track record are immune to layoffs. And with an unemployment rate that reached 8.1 percent in February, it can be tougher than ever to find a new job.

If you're handed a pink slip, here are some ideas to help you get the best possible severance package and/or "exit" plan:

* Don't blindly sign your severance agreement. The terms can be negotiated. (This is best done by talking to your boss instead of HR.) You can, for example, ask for more money, extended health benefits, or job search assistance.

* If you're in the middle of a project, ask to stay on until it is completed. Explain the consequences if it is not done on time.

* Offer to keep working as a freelancer or consultant. Your pay will be lower, but at least you'll have some money coming in while you look for another job.

* Ask for a prorated bonus, especially if your scheduled performance review is only a couple of months away.

But don't spend too much time and effort begging your soon-to-be-ex boss to "extend" your old job. Remember, it would be just a stopgap until you find a new job - so direct most of your attention to that task without delay. You're not going to be able to live off your severance for long. That already limited source of money will dry up very quickly.

(Source: Smart Money)

This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.

The Language Perfectionist: Silver Spoonerisms

By Don Hauptman

In honor of April Fool's Day, let's look once again at the lighter side of language.

You've surely heard, or perhaps even committed, a spoonerism - the exchange, often accidental, of the initial letters or sounds of two words, which results in a surprising and funny new meaning. For instance, one might intend to say "It's time to leave the house" but inadvertently say "It's time to heave the louse."

Since childhood, I've been fascinated by spoonerisms. In 1991, Dell published Cruel and Unusual Puns, my book on the subject. I still occasionally write articles about the genre for fellow logophiles.

The word spoonerism derives from William Archibald Spooner (1844-1930), a clergyman and a scholar and official at Oxford University. He supposedly uttered these blunders constantly. Scolding a student: "You have hissed all my mystery lectures. You have tasted two worms."

Only a handful of genuine spoonerisms are attributed to Dr. Spooner, and even those have been disputed. Mischievous students invented most of his alleged bloopers, yet the myth that Spooner said them persists to this day.

Spoonerisms continue to be crafted deliberately for humorous purposes. Consider the following specimens. If any stump you, remember the principle of reversing the initial letters of two of the words.

* Unadoptable section of the animal shelter: Nixed mutts.

* First lesson for Starbucks' baristas: Heed the foamless!

* Why celebrities usually tolerate autograph seekers: A good fan is hard to mind.

* Alert for Australian soldiers: But mate - there's war!

* What it's called nowadays when teenage girls know so much that their beleaguered dads can't keep up: The well-aware daughter gap.

* That bittersweet feeling on returning from summer vacation: One sighs; it's fall.

* Homer Simpson's reaction when he belatedly heard about Chamberlain's 1938 appeasement of Hitler: Better the Neville you... d'oh!

Is all this just silly fun, without practical value? No! The study of spoonerisms and other speech errors gives us a "window into the mind," say neurologists, psychologists, and linguists who do research in human behavior. It yields important clues about how the mind works; how language is acquired, structured, and retrieved; and how language disabilities such as dyslexia might be treated or cured.

My hunch is that you'll now be on the alert whenever you encounter tips of the slung. Er, I mean, "slips of the tongue"!

[Ed Note: For more than three decades, Don Hauptman was an award-winning independent direct-response copywriter and creative consultant. He is author of The Versatile Freelancer, an e-book recently published by AWAI that shows writers and other creative professionals how to diversify their careers into speaking, consulting, training, and critiquing.]

This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.

The Language Perfectionist: Words' Worth

By Don Hauptman

Are you a writer? A speaker? Whatever you do professionally, you need to communicate effectively. That means your success is determined in part by how well you use language. A new book by Roy Blount Jr. can help you improve your knowledge and mastery of English. And as lagniappe, it's fun to read.

Published a few months ago, Alphabet Juice revels in the joys of the written and spoken word. The title is, I gather, a play on "alphabet soup." But it's also a tribute to the excitement that words can generate. Explains the Introduction: "Juice as in au jus, juju, power, liquor, electricity."

As you might expect, the text is in alphabetical order. Readers will discover short (mostly) entries on ain't, beg the question, cliche, double negative, Goldwynisms, headlinese, kvetch, limerick, portmanteau word, semicolon, subjunctive, unbeknownst... and scores of other topics.

Blount delves into the ancient roots of words, points out unexpected connections among seemingly dissimilar words, and explains the origins of slang expressions such as phooey and pizzazz. He debunks popular "folk etymologies" that are, in fact, fabrications or urban legends.

Best known as a humorist, Blount is the author of 20 previous books. His serious interest in language is confirmed by his membership on the American Heritage Dictionary's Usage Panel, which adjudicates thorny language disputes. But Alphabet Juice is witty and conversational, and festooned with puns, wordplay, light verse, and clever coinages (e.g., antepenultimatum: two warnings from the final one!).

Here are some excerpts that illustrate the book's range of subjects and the author's distinctive style:

* babble/babel: "It's hard to believe that these two words, whose meanings are so close, have no etymological connection. But they don't, say the scholars: Babble is from baby talk and babel from the Bible."

* English: "English is an outrageous tangle of those [Greco-Latin] derivations and other multifarious linguistic influences, from Yiddish to Shoshone, which has grown up around a gnarly core of chewy, clangorous yawps derived from ancestors who painted themselves blue to frighten their enemies."

* intelligible: "We say something is unintelligible or barely intelligible, but we never say, 'That argument of yours sure is intelligible.'"

* mic: "I hate to see mike, short for microphone, rendered as mic, which is how it tends to be spelled these days... . Mic, dammit, should be pronounced mick... . The colloquial abbreviation of a word is not limited to letters taken from that word. If it were, we wouldn't be able to shorten refrigerator to fridge."

* wrought: "... not the past tense of wreak, as is often assumed, but of work, in the sense of making something, forming something, bringing something about... . Archaic though the word wrought is, it has stayed alive... ."

One of Blount's favorite themes is that certain words are imitative, reflective of their meanings, or that they "sensuously evoke the essence of the word": blob, crackle, grunt, queasy, scrawl, throb, wince, zest, and many others. He calls such words "sonicky."

I applaud the author's prescriptivism. He firmly defends the traditional definitions of many words and doesn't capitulate to their popular misuses - e.g., disinterested, hopefully, and literally. He also advocates, as I do, retaining the hyphen in e-mail.

Any quibbles? A few. Because the book is formatted like a dictionary or encyclopedia, some readers may be misled into assuming that it's a comprehensive reference work. It's not. The author chose to include items that struck his fancy, and excluded others. Thus, you'll find helpful discussions on flack vs. flak and the misuse of incredible, but you're out of luck if you're seeking clarifications for other troublesome words, such as comprise, enormity, or fortuitous.

My hunch is that Blount, over several years or decades, habitually tossed notes and clippings into a shoebox. Then, when the collection became large enough, he cobbled everything into a book. There's nothing wrong with that. After all, it's pretty much the technique I use to write these columns for ETR! But for a complete guide to the English language or English usage, you'll have to consult a volume other than Alphabet Juice.

It's perhaps not surprising, then, that the book is something of a grab bag. The content sometimes tends toward the random, desultory, and idiosyncratic. Blount isn't reluctant to free-associate or to digress into sports, movies, or an irrelevant anecdote from his childhood or adolescence. The entry on consonants somehow sparks a recollection of his father's tool chest, and a discussion of spelling bees leads to... Madame de Pompadour? He's also prone to shameless name-dropping. These excursions are interesting, but their connection to language is often minimal or nonexistent.

A final gripe: Alphabet Juice lacks an index and a table of contents. Apparently, when a book is formatted alphabetically, the publisher considers both to be dispensable. But without an index, the reader can't easily find proper names or terms that aren't major entries. A listing of topics up front isn't redundant. It's a valuable tool that gives the reader an overview of the book at a glance.

These reservations aside, Alphabet Juice is informative, entertaining, and amusing. And a big advantage in these times of information overload is that you need not read it cover to cover. Browsing and grazing in its pages will reward you well.

[Ed Note: For more than three decades, Don Hauptman was an award-winning independent direct-response copywriter and creative consultant. He is author of The Versatile Freelancer, an e-book recently published by AWAI that shows writers and other creative professionals how to diversify their careers into speaking, consulting, training, and critiquing.
Knowing just the right word to say can not only help you become a more persuasive writer and speaker - it can elevate others' impressions of you. Spend 10 minutes a day with ETR's Words to the Wise CD Library and learn how to command a powerful vocabulary quickly, confidently, and easily.]