Talk:The Living Word Fellowship

message: Looking again at the sourcing for this article, I have pretty strong doubts about the usability of the article from People magazine. Firstly, the Wikipedia guidelines state that reliable sources must be "third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." WP:SOURCE I think we'd be hard pressed to say that People magazine has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Secondly, even if we trust People magazine for information on pop culture or celebrities, I don't think they have a reputation for being an authority on religious institutions. Thirdly, this particular article essentially reads like an interview and could hardly be called a tertiary source. Certainly, it is barely one step away from being a primary source directly from Cox himself. Any thoughts? Jeremiah (talk) 23:00, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: People Magazine a Reliable Source?

message: I recently found a quality source on The Living Word Fellowship from 2011, titled Historical Dictionary of New Religious Movements, by George D. Chryssides. I am planning on making changes to this article using the following material from page 93 this book: 
:*"Although the organization claims to be nondenominational, it is a form of Protestant Chrestianity, stemming from the Pentecostalist tradition. It believes in the inerrancy of the Scripture, in the Trinity, in Christ's saving work, and in the various gifts and ministries of the Spirit as taught by the apostle Paul."
:*"The church celebrates all the ancient Jewish festivals, including Purim, Pentecost, and "Feast of Trumptes," Ten Days of Repentance and the Day of Atonement, and the Feast of Tabernacles."
:*"The Church of the Living Word does not claim to possess the exclusive means of salvation but regards itself as part of the wider church. The alternative name "The Walk" was used in the organization's early years to reflect the belief that each member should personally walk with Jesus Christ (I John 1:6-7)."
:*"The Church of the Living Word has been criticized by the Christian countercult movement and received negative publicity through Antony Cox's documentary film Vain Glory in 1985."
Please let me know if anyone has thoughts on this material. Thanks. Jeremiah (talk) 23:19, 26 January 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I just completed some changes based on the above. Please let me know if anyone has questions/concerns. Thanks. Jeremiah (talk) 01:52, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggesting Changes - January 2015

message: Erased the Magical Christmas Caroling Truck link because the event is not run by or overseen by The Living Word Fellowship, nor by any church in the fellowship. Some of the people who volunteer and contribute to this annual Christmas event attend Living Word Fellowship churches, but there are also many participants who do not. Lsrbarton 00:50, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Changes made on 11/9/07

message: User Bebobopityblue deleted a few sections of info which were somewhat critical of TLWF but did not contain misinformation. Please debate rather than deleting, it looks like you're trying to hide something. I undid these deletes, as well as adding a "Kingdom Facilities" section to talk about Shiloh, since Jeremiah thought it superfluous to include in the headline.Captain Planet's Green Mullet 18:42, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Info Being Deleted

message: What does the Church of the Living Word believe happens to its members who experience physical death?
:I'm not sure they think about it much. The focus is always on creating the new spiritual kingdom where the leaders will be transformed into their immortal bodies as quickly as possible. Its possible that when that happens, the leaders will have the power to selectively raise the dead and then help them finish their transformation. Its an important question historically with them because they never really recovered from Stevens (their leader) himself dying (it was not supposed to happen).
As noted in other comments and verifiable by reference to the Living Word website, the doctrinal positions of the Living Word fellowship are virtually identical to other fundamental non cessationist christian churches including the view of physical death etc. In fact, the Living Word teaching promotes a higher view of Scripture than many (but not all) fundamentalist Churches it includes the strong conviction that not only is the Bible the inspired, inerrant word of God, the basis for all teaching and doctrine, but the Scriptures are the only true foundation of the Church with regard to structure and practice (as opposed to the many human traditions seen throughout the church world which have no basis in scripture). Thus the LW fellowship believes that the power,the purity, the ministries and the quality of relationships found in the primitive apostolic church as portrayed in the New Testament is the true template and the goal to which the universal Body of Christ and every local church should aspire. It is believed that the Holy Spirit painstakingly defined the structure of the Church in the pages of the New Testament for a reason -  that all future generations would diligently build according to that pattern (Eph. 4:11-13). Whether or not a church holds to the New Testament pattern can never be the basis for questioning the salvation experience of the members and the legitimacy of the church expression etc. since we are all members of one Body by our acceptance of Jesus as Lord and Savior. The basis of unity is infinitely more powerful and important than the apparent differences in church organization etc.. However, it is believed that the power and efficacy of the Church is directly related to adherance to the scriputral pattern.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by Nahte2974 (talk • contribs) 19:39, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: View of death

message: On 22 April 2007 Andycjp removed reference to the theology of The Living Word Fellowship being fundamentalist, indicating that the reference did not conform to Wikipedia:Neutral point of view policy. My question is: what is POV about calling a fundamentalist theology fundamentalist? It is not a pejorative word is it? Wouldn't that make the entire Fundamentalist Christianity article a POV nightmare? Don Hender, a leader in the Living Word Fellowship, calls it fundamentalist. Living Word Open Study. What exactly is not NPOV about referring to its theology as fundamentalist? Is this an internal squabble among Christians where various sects want to claim the fundamentalist heart-ground as their own? --Bejnar 03:15, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think that site is affiliated with The Living Word Fellowship we are talking about here, which is based in the US and doesn't have any churches in the UK to my knowledge. I would not say TLWF is fundamentalist since they do not believe the creation was literally 7 days, and they believe the earth is more than 5000 years old.Captain Planet's Green Mullet 18:51, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Fundamentalist

message: I wanted to explain the changes I made to this article on this date. I felt it was important to summarize the general beliefs of The Living Word Fellowship in the introductory paragraph, so I made that the focus of the paragraph. 
“This organization is also known as The Church of the Living Word…” – I removed this because it is not true. There is a church in The Living Word Fellowship called Church of the Living Word, but the name refers only to that particular church (located in North Hills, California) and not to the fellowship as a whole (see http://www.thelivingword.org/tlwf/churches.shtml). 
“and is sometimes referred to as ‘The Walk.’” – although the fellowship was called “the Walk” at various times, that title is not used very much today, if at all. I think this would be a valid topic to discuss later in the article, but it is an historical point and should not appear in the opening paragraph. Just as an aside, my understanding is that John Robert Stevens called it “The Walk” at a time when there was no official title for the group of churches. Once the name “The Living Word Fellowship” had been established, the name “the Walk” went out of circulation.
“The organization runs a large facility in Iowa called Shiloh.” – this is a true statement, but since the introductory paragraph should be a summary of the most salient general points, I feel that this should be discussed later in the article. Jeremiah 01:05, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Changes - June 16, 2007

message: I deleted the reference to “the Walk” because it was never the title of The Living Word Fellowship. Although it's true that for a short time the Fellowship was unofficially known as "the Walk" in certain circles, the term hasn't been in use since the 1970s. John Robert Stevens had this to say about the subject, from his message "Do You Know the Lord?" (4/8/82):
 
::We come to be called "the Walk." That’s sacrilege. We’re not the Walk. It was taken from the fact that people wanted a walk with God. It was trying to characterize a movement. This is not a movement. This is a search to know the Lord.
I believe that he used the term “sacrilege” because to specifically call one group of churches “the Walk” would be to exclude others from also having a relationship with God. The term comes from the phrase “a walk with God,” a Scriptural term (from Genesis 5:24, 6:9, as well as many references in Galatians, Ephesians and other books of the Bible) that John Robert Stevens sometimes used to describe a daily relationship with the Lord. It was always a foundational belief of John Robert Stevens that God was available to everyone, not just to a few. He was adamant that, as it says in the Scriptures, all would know the Lord, from the least to the greatest (Jeremiah 31:34, Hebrews 8:11). Stevens knew that there could never be one “Walk,” and that the Lord leads all who seek Him. Jeremiah 21:34, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Changes - August 9, 2007

message: Jeremiah mountain why have you changed my recent edits? everything is factual and verifiable. What you have done is known as vandalism. If you try it again i will report you.Jesus Sandoval (talk) 21:29, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  recent edits 

message: @Bejnar: Although Tipton does talk about a Living Word Fellowship, it is different that the subject of this article, which is on The Living Word Fellowship. They had two different founders. The Tipton source does not accurately inform the writing of this article. Jeremiah (talk) 23:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I have not actually read the Tipton book, but information about the Living Word Fellowship given in reviews of the book that I have seen is generally consistent with other information about LWF. That is, they describe LWF as a Pentecostal movement that attracted a counterculture element and had some drug use. --Orlady (talk) 18:54, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tipton source 

message: i put this up for afd which was closed as no consensus. however, the original problem still exists. the book by tucker is the only appropraite source. i will have to delete the other sources as two of them are primary sources (the church's own website) and the other is another website that hardly counts as a reliable source. however, if i removed the information from these sources the article will only have two sentences. new sources need to be found and the article written based on them. Jessi1989 (talk) 20:31, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: * these sources need to be added to the article. the primary sources are not currently providing "supplementary" information, they are providing all the information except for two sentences. the article should be re-written, based on the secondary sources, and then any supplementary info that is not covered in the secondary sources can be added from the primary ones. Jessi1989 (talk) 21:13, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: *Please don't disrupt Wikpedia to make a point. It is not necessary to supply a reference citation after every individual phrase or sentence. For example, two sentences "At its peak in the 1970s, the fellowship had about 100 member congregations" and "Membership declined after founder Stevens' death in 1983" are both supported by the source at the end of the second sentence. By treating the first sentence as unsourced and deleting it, you created a nonsensical passage. There are plenty of articles in Wikipedia, particularly about organizations and institutions, that would be eviscerated if primary sources were not used to provide key details. In this article, the article is supported by several independent sources that tell different facets of the church's story, but the LWF's own publications are the single best source for some basic facts about the LWF. --Orlady (talk) 21:40, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: * hi, as far as i'm aware i'm not disrupting anything and i'm certainly not trying to make a point. i see that a second reliable source has been added and it's starting to look a lot better now. sorry for any disruption you think i have caused, i was just trying to help. Jessi1989 (talk) 23:02, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: sources

message: how abt a section on the group's most famous congregant, and the 10? 15? 20? year SEARCH for her?! she is far more notable than the FATHER.  209.172.25.135 (talk) 04:07, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Kyoko Chan Cox 

message: Their latest inspiration is Christian marketer Phil Cooke who tries to help churches become more marketable in the Internet age. Their current web site offers a sanitized history of the Living Word Fellowship, leaving out the divorce that led to the marriage of Gary & Marilyn Hargrave and other divorces and remarriages among the leadership (sometimes multiple, as in the case with Marilyn's son and others)that led to their current status.  In general, it attempts to portray the fellowship as believing most of what other Christian fellowships believe, but going deeper into Kingdom truths.  They do not reference some of their fellowship's other beliefs, such as how the Kingdom of God was ushered in on December 12, 1979, seven years after John Stevens allegedly was transported into the future.  Or their belief that John Stevens' death brought about the final judgment of Satan. They have also taught that their present-day apostles are exempt from Paul's requirement of having seen Jesus Christ, if they can claim to have seen the Lord Jesus Christ in the person of Marilyn Hargrave. Anthony.pettit (talk) 18:08, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: An anonymous user attempted to remove some content from this comment - reverted the edit. Captain Planet's Green Mullet (talk) 01:23, 20 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Living Word Fellowship is now trying to re-brand itself 

message: How does this page not mention the whole Yoko Ono debacle? See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Cox_(producer)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.243.16.154 (talk) 14:59, 20 August 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Yoko Ono