Dennis On: "Getting Back On Track"

"...among other things, and some have again committed to “get back on track.”

 

Not Again!

 

 

"Maybe we should reconsider this route?"

 

If we have heard it once, we have heard it a thousand times.  "God has put his work back on track!"   It used to be "we are in the gun lap," but evidently there were so many gun laps, they all ran out of bullets. 

 

What did that mean?

 

Back in the day it always meant that HWA had been spending so much time flying around the world preaching the Non-Gospel of the Soon But Not Real Soon Kingdom of God to world leaders , that when he got back for a few days, he found out the mice had been playing. 

 

Mouse play could have been anything to a drop in income while he was gone to publishing an article or a PT cover that was less than pleasing and for sure was done without his permission.  Often times he probably had given permission but simply forgot.  And so after the appropriate sermon blasting everyone for "not getting it,"  the Church was put back on track and the appropriate member was sent out declaring it to be so. 

 

The Church got put back on track in 1968, 69, 70 ,71, 72,73,74,75,76,77,78----all way up to 1986 when it derailed again because the Engineer had died while the train, now on another right track was speeding ahead throttle up knowing that his end was near and unwilling to admit it or ask someone to take his place.  One of the conductors had spent a lifetime telling all the passengers that the Engineer could not die and would live until the train pulled into the station, but that was just rail road talk. 

 

Pretty quickly though, a new Engineer put himself as far as we can tell into the cab as all the conductors once again put the train back on the tracks.  Or at least back on tracks because these were different tracks than previous tracks.  Very often in the past, the impression was given that the train was always put back on the same right tracks as God and Jesus, I mean Christ, would have done if they were actually here helping with the heavy lifting.  But often, while close, it was at best a parallel track yet a little more right of center than the last.  Derailments were generally blamed on falling off the tracks on the left side. 

 

At any rate, it did not take long to see that the new Engineer, a Mr. Weaver, was unlike any Engineer WCG had ever had.  These can't be the same tracks as all the others we suspected.  He really had little training as an Engineer as far as one could tell and was prone, as was the original WCG Engineer towards nepotism putting close relatives and friends in charge of the train, the station , the conductors and all the passengers who wanted to be on the train on the right track.  I think they even took over concessions as far as I can tell. 

 

However, it was not long before it was obvious this Engineer was on Jesus Drugs and the train plowed into a miracle caused by Jesus, who was quite different from the Christ of WCG.  Well they said it was a miracle, but I say it was one of those abutments that announce this track is going no where and one has reached the end of the line.  I think you are supposed to stop when you see that coming up, or even be smart enough to know the route being taken actually ends up ahead and slowing down would be in order. Not being there in the first place would be even better.  But alas, no one on the train seemed to understand this or at least assumed the Engineer would know this and stop in time.  Wishful thinking evidently. 

 

When the train, Engineered by Mr. Weaver hit the end of the line, ugh...bodies everywhere.  The momentum took the wreckage clear into the little town of Evangelical where it burst into the flames of the Holy Spirit.  Conductors and passengers alike, who survived crawled out and off to join new railroads and work on safer and more predictable trains.  Some even started their own railroads and put those trains back on the right tracks all over again. 

 

It wasn't long before we could see dozens and then hundreds of separate trains each with their own unique passengers, crews and Engineers lined up, one behind the other, yet all on the same "right track."  What a site.  Have you ever seen a train behind another one on the same track try to pass the one ahead of it?  Not pretty and certainly not easy!   I guess when you are in a line anyone of them can claim to be at the head of the line and the one ahead is really at the end of the line, it's just that you caught up with it.

 

Pretty soon there were hundreds of right tracks all part of the one true railroad and lead by the one true Engineer barreling down the right track.  New stations sprang up all over the country and then the world, all claiming to be the true and right railroad and back on the true and right tracks.  Problem is, they all forbid their passengers from ever riding or even reading the brochures of the other trains on the right tracks and surely never even thinking of riding on their same but different true but false railroads not driven by God's chosen Engineer.  

 

Soon we had competing one true railroads all on track.  There were the PCG, RCG, LCG, UCG , GCI, and dozens more railroads, all back on the same right track yet denying that each other really were.  We had "That Engineer," "And yes brethren, I am an Engineer," and even "We are the Two Engineers," of all things.  I was concerned that two engineers on the same train would cause conflicts, but was relieved to see that the one engineer never spoke and really didn't know how to run a train on the right track anyway.  Anyway, we also have, "Presiding Engineers," and "Engineers for life. " He runs the GCI line but doesn't seem to have much of a route. 

 

I tell you, all these trains back on the same right track makes me nervous.  Sometimes conductors from one true train on track jumps track and lands on the same right track again but different.  I can't figure that one out.  They say the last true right track train was true but is now less true and on a track but maybe not THE track.  I don't know.  Some say that some railroads pay conductors better than others and, of course, that is the real reason for jumping trains. 

 

Anyway, sometimes it crosses my mind that all these Engineers blowing their own whistles and stoking their own fires really aren't back on the right track after all.  I think they are on a track, but the right one?....not sure.  Well, pretty sure they aren't actually.  No, positive!  I think you can put a train back on the same WRONG track and just think you are on the right one....until you see that bumper thing at the end of a dead end staring you in the face and you going way too fast to slow down, much less stop and avoid yet another train wreck with casualties.

 

Personally,  I don't ride trains anymore because I am leery of the tracks.  None of these companies seem to do much maintenance or educate their conductors on how to take care of the passengers.  You know, "Jones pays the freight, give Jones what he wants,' as the old original Engineer used to say.  Shoot, their engineers haven't even gone to a real engineer school it turns out nor have they learned the many nuances of engineering.  They know nothing of the origins of real railroads or what constitutes right tracks much less how to get back on them when you drive recklessly and plow into reality.  Sometimes I think they even have the wrong book or at least read the directions half drunk.  Maybe they just filter out the stuff that they don't understand and make what they think they do mean more than it does. 

 

Anyway, once again, a conductor on one of the older new true railroads has jumped on to and even newer and truer one, even before the other once crashes.  He's sending passengers on all sorts of sorta true railroads and trains new schedules and wants to meet them at the station, the true station anytime they have time.  We'll see.

 

But, while the claim is made that once again, the true train has now been put back on the true tracks and the most true conductor and Engineer will meet you at track 29,  I have my doubts.  I have never understood how the passengers that survive can crawl from one wreck after the other and still sit on the latest train as if there never was a wreck or OK there was, but God put me on this track and damn it, I'm riding this train into glory!  Passengers are the biggest enigma to me.  They buy a ticket.  Step over the bodies, find a new train and let any glib talking, railroad reading , Engineer come lately take them along for the ride on tracks that have already proved less than safe and reliable.  Go figure.

 

Oh well.  Pardon me boys, is that the cat who ate your new shoes?  Ok, sorry, couldn't resist.  Personally I think you can be put back on the wrong tracks and never even suspect it the whole time you are on the train going nowhere.

 

 

 

Dennis C. Diehl
DenniscDiehl@aol.com