I once got a song called "The Real Thing." Actually, I got it in a dream. It's one of 4 songs I received in dreams so far, and it was pretty vivid, resembling something close to what is depicted in the old 70s Letter "The Drugstore," Dad's dream about a stark naked underground church...Well, the times have a-changed, and so has the Family, and even my personal interpretation of the meaning of that song, or who and what can be referred to as "the Real Thing" has changed.
It's clear that Jesus is and was and always will remain the Real Thing, as far as the way, the truth and the life in God are concerned.
But as far as there being one group capable of claiming exclusive rights to being "It," and, as I believed for a long time, the only true alternative to the System,(and I may have even defended that viewpoint to an extent where it became embarrassing to those who happened to know better), I've had to back off from that stance and conclude that it depends on each of us individually, to what extent we're going to be the real deal or not.
I'm afraid we all know folks from among our ranks who wouldn't fall into that category. And if at present I would even know one single person who would fulfill the criteria of a living disciple of Christ about whom I could say, "Yep, he (or she)'s doin' it," I wouldn't be writing this. I've heard some folks write about folks who are supposed to be the real deal, but I haven't met any. Not in the last 15 years or more.
I do have friends in the Family, and as far as I'm concerned, in many aspects the Family was probably the coolest outfit to be serving the Lord in during the 70s and early 80s.
One thing I got from the Lord recently about the Family and why He likes it so much is that it's a place full of mistakes. While He doesn't make mistakes Himself, when it comes to His representatives, the only ones who ever got anywhere were the kind of folks who made mistakes aplenty, because they're the best learning ground, the safest and most solid humility factor and the only thing that's going to keep us from becoming the worst kind of people in the world: the kind who think they never make any mistakes, like the Pharisees (who evidently have their modern day counterparts, and perhaps we've all had our Pharisaical periods).
Maybe the Family is the one outfit that came closest to a revival of the Early Church in the 20th century, and I certainly feel privileged to have been part of it for 3 decades, and the fact that we might not necessary be the "cream of the crop" or "Endtime Elite" we may have thought we were does not change anything about my desire to want to remain part of it. I still doubt that the chances are really substantial that I might find anything essentially better, since I've never been the churchy type.
I've visited a group of alternative Christians in our area who call themselves "Jesus Freaks" and enjoyed their informal type of "service," but it's not as if those guys wouldn't have their own problems.
I personally really appreciate the latest moves the Lord brought about in the Family and will give credit to Maria and Peter for granting us the liberty to mature into complete responsibility for our own actions and choices. To me that was the final proof that I did the right thing when I joined 30 years ago, although I seem to be a rather solitary figure in my area of the world with my appreciation of those changes, with some finding it hard to let go of the "elitist" think that seems to have replaced the humbler "Diamonds of Dust" approach from our early days somewhere along the line.
The thing is that I've met other folks - "other sheep" (?) - from other folds who also fall into the category of "the Real Thing," perhaps in some aspects even more so than the majority of my acquaintances from my own outfit, and I've found out that God goes a lot more by hearts than by outfit.
As far as the future of the Family is concerned, with no more expectations from my side for the group that refers to itself as TFI to be the sole fulfillment of criteria that would qualify any group as "the Real Thing," I simply hope that as many folks as possible might wind up fulfilling those criteria further down the road on individual levels.
I especially hope that I will be able to fulfill them myself, since that is the major of concerns I'm presently dealing with.
I'll let you know in another decade - Lord willing - how it went, & hope I'll see you there...




