Vic's Latest "Testimony" 2019 ... Part 2
Posted: Wed Jul 31, 2019 7:02 pm
My Apology for breaking the post but I reached the Streetcar word limit .....BR
Part 2 of Vic's Latest Testimony ... 2019 ----- extracted from: ---
Vic Hall’s latest book “The Steps of Salvation --- Christ the Great Shepherd .... Part 6”.... Chapter 7 “A testimony of Restoration” including Vic’s most recent Testimony
Resuming Vic's Testimony.......
On my return from Asia, my health issues became more serious. (Definitely prostate Cancer) At the same time, I was held up for public humiliation in our national media. The church was accused of being a cult, and I was vilified as a cult leader. (Poor Vic, always the victim, ever the narcissist! “God of the Broken Heart” did not vilify Vic as a Cult Leader.... It exposed him as a Cult leader, and BCF/RFI as a cult destructive of family relationships,) As a consequence of these accusations, the church and I were investigated by numerous government authorities, including the police. (I am aware of three complaints to the Australian Tax Office (ATO) about the dubious financial Mismanagement of BCF/RFI in relation to tax-exempt benefits, and overseas bank accounts, and at least three similar complaints made to the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profit Commission regarding abuses of BCF/RFI abuse of their Religious, Charitable, Not-for profit status. The statement about the Police involvement is news which until now has never leaked out. Has anyone heard of this?)
Furthermore, for two full years I was the target of legal action in the Supreme Court, under spurious accusations. (Again Vic does his narcissistic spin on what actually happened. These were not spurious accusations. This was about Graeme Harry taking Vic, Murray Wylie, and RFI to the Supreme Court for $324,306 including $285,000 in damages for unconscionable or misleading conduct, in relation to reneging on restoring his wife to the marriage for $ 250, 000 and other monies related to property (amounting to $20,000,000 in property assets). This was made public in the Queensland Press (Sunday Mail) on March 21st 2010, and communicated to ALL CF members around Australia on email accounts in the week leading up to the Australia-wide Bible convocation at the beginning of October 2010, at which Vic proclaimed his Lampstand Church heresy. The case was settled out of Court for much more than Graeme had claimed (between $750,000 and $1,000,000). When you add on the costs of Vic’s Senior Counsel battery of lawyers over 2 years, and the costs awarded against Vic for Graeme Harry’s battery of Senior Counsel lawyers for the same 2 years, Vic had cost BCF/RFI costs towards $2,000,000, but what a surprise!!!! .... no such costs ever showed up in the financial Statements of BCF/RFI for the period 2010 to 2012. The fact that the case was settled out of Court indicates that Vic did not want this to go to open court which would have exposed the dubious financial empire Vic has created very willingly, including the Wattle Loans Scandal) All these sufferings were my participation in the mourning, lamentation and woe of Christ, and were the 'few stripes' with which the Lord was chastening me.(Clearly Vic really didn’t listen to his Heavenly visitor (Jesus????) and here he is doing a massively fake “Mea Culpa! And I really need to share the stripes of Christ to show how I follow Him”. Overweening pride, deceit and false humility are symptomatic of Vic’s deep-seated hypocrisy coupled with his narcissistic personality. If you believe this piece of religious hypocrisy then you’ll believe anything!!!!)
Although we were being falsely accused in the media and in the courts, we were also exonerated by the relevant authorities. (I cannot believe this statement. It sounds too much like the spin Donald Trump has put on the Mueller Report because he wasn’t prosecuted for Obstruction of Justice. My Guess is that whatever was fed back to Vic was more like ... “We have not yet found sufficient evidence to prosecute you for breaches of the ATO Act/ACNC Act.” This is not exoneration but a warning “We have you on our Radar!”. In relation to the media, and specifically in relation to 4 Corners and “God of Broken Hearts”, Vic put out two LIES to the gullible of BCF/RFI, and the CFs around Australia. They were: ---
Lie #1: --- “There was an investigation, and we were shown not to be a cult”. If so Who did it? Why was it never publicised, except by Vic from the BCF/RFI elder network? What did it say?
Lie #2: --- “Chris Masters who made “God of the Broken Heart” for the ABC had been sacked by the ABC because of it.”
This is a monstrous and deliberate lie taking advantage of Chris Masters leaving the ABC not long after “God of Broken Hearts” aired on June 23rd 2008.
These are the facts: ---
1. Chris Masters was not sacked ---- he resigned, but not over “God of Broken Hearts”..
2. He resigned because the ABC reneged on a book they had commissioned Chris Masters to write.
This was an immaculately researched exposure of Alan Jones called “Jonestown: the power and the myth of Alan Jones” Jones had got wind of it and was threatening the ABC with a massive lawsuit, and the ABC chickened out, so Chris Masters resigned as an act of integrity.
Alan Jones is reputed to have tried to buy up every copy of the first edition which had already gone on sale, but I have a copy which he missed. Had the book been turned into a 4 Corners exposé Jones would have been in tatters, exposed as a massive fraud with suspect sexual proclivities. .... A risk he could not take!) A number of community leaders provided helpful advice, and even withstood the media, publically, for what had been done to us. (This is very hard to believe as Vic has been constant in avoiding public comment or exposure, or anything vaguely like associating with Community Leaders ---- whoever they are and how they actually “withstood the media”? Names would be interesting, if they actually exist! This is reinforced by the fact that since the publication of “Unto Perfection “ in the late 90s Vic has totally avoided any contact with the Ministers Fraternal and any other Christian Churches so that they don’t contaminate “the Word we have”. Pity the spellchecker wasn’t working when this book was typeset or “publicly” wouldn’t have been spelt wrongly. Whoever wrote it will get a rap over the knuckles, as Vic relies on his two Ghost Writers Peter Hay and David Baker.)
Through this time, the Holy Spirit made it plain to me that I was to hold my peace and to remain quiet under the pressure, interrogation and abuse that I was suffering.
Cultivating the divine nature
After returning from Asia, and in the midst of this season of chastening, I began to address the culture within the presbytery that had made the church vulnerable to thieves.
I asked a number of elders around Australia to stand aside so that room could be made for a deaconing administration to be raised up among us that would be directly connected to the presbytery. Most of the brethren agreed to do this, and an administration based on the teaching of Paul began to take shape in the church.(Vic clearly underplays what “stepping aside” actually entailed, but my guess it was a scene from the Godfather.... if what happened to Murray Wylie, and then David Falk is anything to go by. This also makes sense of the shift towards a generation change to the 30—50 next generation wannabees which became evident around 2012, and who are now quite evident on the Management Committees of every CF around Australia. This is exemplified by Vic’s co-authors David Baker and Peter Hay, and others like Luke Pomery, Lachlan Perrin and Nathan Smith (the latter two Falk sons-in-law survivors of the Falk purge at Toowoomba, commissioned by Vic and carried out by David Baker.) Loyalty to Vic would be an absolute prerequisite to join the new “deaconing presbytery”, despite the piety Vic spins in accounting for the change, which is of course definitely in keeping with What Jesus’ second visitation laid on him, if Vic is ever to be believed. With Vic in control since 1988 the rise of this new “deaconing administration” by the younger men subjected to 30+ years of Vic’s indoctrination conjures up a frightening flashback to the rise of Hitler Youth to carry out Hitler’s war, without dissent or question. That doesn’t seem to be consistent with what Jesus was commissioning Vic to do after His second rebuke. My gut feeling is that Vic is on his way to Rebuke #3, which might well be “3 Strikes....y’er OUT!” and no amount of naiveté will be any excuse at all!)
From here on I leave Vic to speak for himself about his latest heresies/teaching, and you to judge, gentle reader, for yourself. His three most current heretical teachings are in bold and underlined at the end... see if you picked them up.
At the same time, I began to teach on the divine nature being resident within a family as part of the covenant that had been given to Abraham, and which was now available to believers in the church. I understood this to be a foundational pillar for our structure as a Lampstand church.
The structure of a Lampstand church followed the pattern that Paul had established in the region of Ephesus. It had a public face through the ministry of the presbytery, and its fellowship was also house to house. The Ephesian Pattern was a two-level administration.
After Paul left Ephesus, he committed the apostolic administration to the oversight of the presbytery. The presbytery was to take heed to itself as a governing body, and also to care for the church with its many communion venues within the region of the Ephesian state.
•
The church could function in fellowship from house to house because the covenant of the divine nature was in the homes. Because the covenant of the divine nature was in Christian homes, parents were able to raise their children in the admonition of the Lord. The divine order of headship was in operation in a home when a husband and a wife, by faith, lived together in divine order. lCo 11:3. Fatherhood and motherhood became capacities that delivered the grace of life to their children. lPe 3:7.
From headship, eldership was to be developed as part of the structure of administration in the church. If a man did not know how to guide his home and to minister the life of Christ to his children, he would be unable to take care of the church. 1Ti 3:5. The culture of a true godly father was to be a cornerstone of the authority and oversight of the presbytery.
Resistance to godly fatherhood and motherhood
There was some resistance to the teaching of the divine nature in Christian homes. Some leaders rejected the scriptural principle that the children of covenant households are recipients of the blessing of Abraham - which means being born of the Spirit - from conception. I Co 7:14. By implication, these leaders were resisting the view of Christian homes as contexts of fellowship from which the gospel could be proclaimed in the world. This was particularly the case for leaders who maintained their belief in the historical notion that salvation is in the church and at the disposal of the ministers of the church.
There was also a teaching and culture among us that facilitated the practice of giving absolution for sin in the counselling process or at an altar call: This, too, was based in historical theologies that positioned the clergy as mediators between Christ and His church.
However, the influence of these traditional understandings and practices within the church have been disempowered, as households have accepted and walked in the accountability of cultivating the divine nature. This has also delivered these families from the perceived control that some in the clergy group have had over their families.
Concluding comments
The Lord first came to me with a revelation of His Lampstand church and a call to return to first love.(How strange that Jesus made no mention of anything like the Lampstand Church when he first appeared to you in 1975, Vic! How careless of Him!) Through this time, the Holy Spirit made it plain to me that I was to hold my peace and to remain quiet under the pressure, interrogation and abuse that I was suffering.
Christ was not addressing only me at that time. This was His word to every man whom He had called to shepherd His Lampstand churches. Significantly, it was also His word to the heads of every family within His church.
Since that time, it has been apparent to me that unless we are delivered from our own fleshly perspectives and religious practices, we will inevitably misappropriate the things of the Spirit. The actions that we take, believing that we are walking in obedience to the word, will unavoidably be at odds with the initiative of the Spirit. The collegiality that emerged within the presbytery of Brisbane Christian Fellowship after the leaders had received the word on Ephesian Pattern exemplifies this point.
Although the word was calling for a two-level structure, the outcome of responding to the word of the Ephesian Pattern from the basis of our own history, experience and fleshly perspective, was the emergence of a counterproductive three-level structure. This had a detrimental effect on the lives of a number of people within the church, as the deeds of the flesh, such as immorality, contentions, selfish ambitions, dissensions, etc, flourished among some leaders. The three-level structure, and its collateral damage within the congregation, was the fruit of the flesh, even though the word had come by the Spirit.
Christ first comes to us in judgement, confronting our self-made projections, and calling us to repentance. As we respond in faith, He commutes our judgement to chastisement by joining us to the fellowship of His offering. In particular, He chastens overseers and heads of houses with a few stripes when their disobedience to the word and culture of Christ is the consequence of ignorance. He does this to deliver them from the spiritual lameness that is caused by the other law. By this means, they are able to make their paths straight so that they are not turned out of the way of holiness. Heb 12:13.
Unfortunately, there have been some people among us who have not received the word of the Lord, nor repented from their self-righteous practices. These ones have received many stripes, and some have been cut in pieces and assigned a place with the unbelievers. Luk 12:45-47. They did not make straight paths for their feet. Because they continued in their spiritual lameness, they were turned out of the way. Heb 12:13.
Thankfully, the Lord does not wish for any person to perish in this way. He desires for us all to come to repentance and to obtain our sonship in Christ. 2Pe 3:9. If we are to bear good fruit as sons of God and members of the body of Christ, repentance and faith must be foundational to the way in which we receive God's word. Heb 6:1,7.
When Christ comes to meet us, He is not coming to affirm our self-righteous endeavours, however noble and fruitful they may appear to be. He comes to meet us eye to eye, and to illuminate our heart concerning the inadequacy of our own way. Most often, our first response to the word of Christ that searches our heart and brings illumination is to respond in the flesh and to justify ourselves. However, if we will humble ourselves and receive His priestly initiative and word to us, He grants us faith to believe what He is saying, and to repent from our own way. Significantly, Christ equips us for our participation in His offering. The fellowship of His offering is the context of first love. This has implications for how we are to meet and to relate with one another in the presbytery and in the church.
The Lord is restoring to His church the message of the cross, which is the gospel of sonship. As we receive His word, and join the fellowship of His body, we are made adequate to minister this word of life to others. It is in our mouths to proclaim, and in our hearts as the cultural reality of our lives, individually, as families, as presbyteries and as Christ's church.
After reading this I came away with the distinct impression that Vic has set himself up to be remembered this way, and this is not just a Testimony, but part of a Last Will and Testament, as he perceives his time is short. The Prostate cancer, which miraculously went into remission about the time of Jesus’ second rebuke, is reported to be malignant and active again.
Part 2 of Vic's Latest Testimony ... 2019 ----- extracted from: ---
Vic Hall’s latest book “The Steps of Salvation --- Christ the Great Shepherd .... Part 6”.... Chapter 7 “A testimony of Restoration” including Vic’s most recent Testimony
Resuming Vic's Testimony.......
On my return from Asia, my health issues became more serious. (Definitely prostate Cancer) At the same time, I was held up for public humiliation in our national media. The church was accused of being a cult, and I was vilified as a cult leader. (Poor Vic, always the victim, ever the narcissist! “God of the Broken Heart” did not vilify Vic as a Cult Leader.... It exposed him as a Cult leader, and BCF/RFI as a cult destructive of family relationships,) As a consequence of these accusations, the church and I were investigated by numerous government authorities, including the police. (I am aware of three complaints to the Australian Tax Office (ATO) about the dubious financial Mismanagement of BCF/RFI in relation to tax-exempt benefits, and overseas bank accounts, and at least three similar complaints made to the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profit Commission regarding abuses of BCF/RFI abuse of their Religious, Charitable, Not-for profit status. The statement about the Police involvement is news which until now has never leaked out. Has anyone heard of this?)
Furthermore, for two full years I was the target of legal action in the Supreme Court, under spurious accusations. (Again Vic does his narcissistic spin on what actually happened. These were not spurious accusations. This was about Graeme Harry taking Vic, Murray Wylie, and RFI to the Supreme Court for $324,306 including $285,000 in damages for unconscionable or misleading conduct, in relation to reneging on restoring his wife to the marriage for $ 250, 000 and other monies related to property (amounting to $20,000,000 in property assets). This was made public in the Queensland Press (Sunday Mail) on March 21st 2010, and communicated to ALL CF members around Australia on email accounts in the week leading up to the Australia-wide Bible convocation at the beginning of October 2010, at which Vic proclaimed his Lampstand Church heresy. The case was settled out of Court for much more than Graeme had claimed (between $750,000 and $1,000,000). When you add on the costs of Vic’s Senior Counsel battery of lawyers over 2 years, and the costs awarded against Vic for Graeme Harry’s battery of Senior Counsel lawyers for the same 2 years, Vic had cost BCF/RFI costs towards $2,000,000, but what a surprise!!!! .... no such costs ever showed up in the financial Statements of BCF/RFI for the period 2010 to 2012. The fact that the case was settled out of Court indicates that Vic did not want this to go to open court which would have exposed the dubious financial empire Vic has created very willingly, including the Wattle Loans Scandal) All these sufferings were my participation in the mourning, lamentation and woe of Christ, and were the 'few stripes' with which the Lord was chastening me.(Clearly Vic really didn’t listen to his Heavenly visitor (Jesus????) and here he is doing a massively fake “Mea Culpa! And I really need to share the stripes of Christ to show how I follow Him”. Overweening pride, deceit and false humility are symptomatic of Vic’s deep-seated hypocrisy coupled with his narcissistic personality. If you believe this piece of religious hypocrisy then you’ll believe anything!!!!)
Although we were being falsely accused in the media and in the courts, we were also exonerated by the relevant authorities. (I cannot believe this statement. It sounds too much like the spin Donald Trump has put on the Mueller Report because he wasn’t prosecuted for Obstruction of Justice. My Guess is that whatever was fed back to Vic was more like ... “We have not yet found sufficient evidence to prosecute you for breaches of the ATO Act/ACNC Act.” This is not exoneration but a warning “We have you on our Radar!”. In relation to the media, and specifically in relation to 4 Corners and “God of Broken Hearts”, Vic put out two LIES to the gullible of BCF/RFI, and the CFs around Australia. They were: ---
Lie #1: --- “There was an investigation, and we were shown not to be a cult”. If so Who did it? Why was it never publicised, except by Vic from the BCF/RFI elder network? What did it say?
Lie #2: --- “Chris Masters who made “God of the Broken Heart” for the ABC had been sacked by the ABC because of it.”
This is a monstrous and deliberate lie taking advantage of Chris Masters leaving the ABC not long after “God of Broken Hearts” aired on June 23rd 2008.
These are the facts: ---
1. Chris Masters was not sacked ---- he resigned, but not over “God of Broken Hearts”..
2. He resigned because the ABC reneged on a book they had commissioned Chris Masters to write.
This was an immaculately researched exposure of Alan Jones called “Jonestown: the power and the myth of Alan Jones” Jones had got wind of it and was threatening the ABC with a massive lawsuit, and the ABC chickened out, so Chris Masters resigned as an act of integrity.
Alan Jones is reputed to have tried to buy up every copy of the first edition which had already gone on sale, but I have a copy which he missed. Had the book been turned into a 4 Corners exposé Jones would have been in tatters, exposed as a massive fraud with suspect sexual proclivities. .... A risk he could not take!) A number of community leaders provided helpful advice, and even withstood the media, publically, for what had been done to us. (This is very hard to believe as Vic has been constant in avoiding public comment or exposure, or anything vaguely like associating with Community Leaders ---- whoever they are and how they actually “withstood the media”? Names would be interesting, if they actually exist! This is reinforced by the fact that since the publication of “Unto Perfection “ in the late 90s Vic has totally avoided any contact with the Ministers Fraternal and any other Christian Churches so that they don’t contaminate “the Word we have”. Pity the spellchecker wasn’t working when this book was typeset or “publicly” wouldn’t have been spelt wrongly. Whoever wrote it will get a rap over the knuckles, as Vic relies on his two Ghost Writers Peter Hay and David Baker.)
Through this time, the Holy Spirit made it plain to me that I was to hold my peace and to remain quiet under the pressure, interrogation and abuse that I was suffering.
Cultivating the divine nature
After returning from Asia, and in the midst of this season of chastening, I began to address the culture within the presbytery that had made the church vulnerable to thieves.
I asked a number of elders around Australia to stand aside so that room could be made for a deaconing administration to be raised up among us that would be directly connected to the presbytery. Most of the brethren agreed to do this, and an administration based on the teaching of Paul began to take shape in the church.(Vic clearly underplays what “stepping aside” actually entailed, but my guess it was a scene from the Godfather.... if what happened to Murray Wylie, and then David Falk is anything to go by. This also makes sense of the shift towards a generation change to the 30—50 next generation wannabees which became evident around 2012, and who are now quite evident on the Management Committees of every CF around Australia. This is exemplified by Vic’s co-authors David Baker and Peter Hay, and others like Luke Pomery, Lachlan Perrin and Nathan Smith (the latter two Falk sons-in-law survivors of the Falk purge at Toowoomba, commissioned by Vic and carried out by David Baker.) Loyalty to Vic would be an absolute prerequisite to join the new “deaconing presbytery”, despite the piety Vic spins in accounting for the change, which is of course definitely in keeping with What Jesus’ second visitation laid on him, if Vic is ever to be believed. With Vic in control since 1988 the rise of this new “deaconing administration” by the younger men subjected to 30+ years of Vic’s indoctrination conjures up a frightening flashback to the rise of Hitler Youth to carry out Hitler’s war, without dissent or question. That doesn’t seem to be consistent with what Jesus was commissioning Vic to do after His second rebuke. My gut feeling is that Vic is on his way to Rebuke #3, which might well be “3 Strikes....y’er OUT!” and no amount of naiveté will be any excuse at all!)
From here on I leave Vic to speak for himself about his latest heresies/teaching, and you to judge, gentle reader, for yourself. His three most current heretical teachings are in bold and underlined at the end... see if you picked them up.
At the same time, I began to teach on the divine nature being resident within a family as part of the covenant that had been given to Abraham, and which was now available to believers in the church. I understood this to be a foundational pillar for our structure as a Lampstand church.
The structure of a Lampstand church followed the pattern that Paul had established in the region of Ephesus. It had a public face through the ministry of the presbytery, and its fellowship was also house to house. The Ephesian Pattern was a two-level administration.
After Paul left Ephesus, he committed the apostolic administration to the oversight of the presbytery. The presbytery was to take heed to itself as a governing body, and also to care for the church with its many communion venues within the region of the Ephesian state.
•
The church could function in fellowship from house to house because the covenant of the divine nature was in the homes. Because the covenant of the divine nature was in Christian homes, parents were able to raise their children in the admonition of the Lord. The divine order of headship was in operation in a home when a husband and a wife, by faith, lived together in divine order. lCo 11:3. Fatherhood and motherhood became capacities that delivered the grace of life to their children. lPe 3:7.
From headship, eldership was to be developed as part of the structure of administration in the church. If a man did not know how to guide his home and to minister the life of Christ to his children, he would be unable to take care of the church. 1Ti 3:5. The culture of a true godly father was to be a cornerstone of the authority and oversight of the presbytery.
Resistance to godly fatherhood and motherhood
There was some resistance to the teaching of the divine nature in Christian homes. Some leaders rejected the scriptural principle that the children of covenant households are recipients of the blessing of Abraham - which means being born of the Spirit - from conception. I Co 7:14. By implication, these leaders were resisting the view of Christian homes as contexts of fellowship from which the gospel could be proclaimed in the world. This was particularly the case for leaders who maintained their belief in the historical notion that salvation is in the church and at the disposal of the ministers of the church.
There was also a teaching and culture among us that facilitated the practice of giving absolution for sin in the counselling process or at an altar call: This, too, was based in historical theologies that positioned the clergy as mediators between Christ and His church.
However, the influence of these traditional understandings and practices within the church have been disempowered, as households have accepted and walked in the accountability of cultivating the divine nature. This has also delivered these families from the perceived control that some in the clergy group have had over their families.
Concluding comments
The Lord first came to me with a revelation of His Lampstand church and a call to return to first love.(How strange that Jesus made no mention of anything like the Lampstand Church when he first appeared to you in 1975, Vic! How careless of Him!) Through this time, the Holy Spirit made it plain to me that I was to hold my peace and to remain quiet under the pressure, interrogation and abuse that I was suffering.
Christ was not addressing only me at that time. This was His word to every man whom He had called to shepherd His Lampstand churches. Significantly, it was also His word to the heads of every family within His church.
Since that time, it has been apparent to me that unless we are delivered from our own fleshly perspectives and religious practices, we will inevitably misappropriate the things of the Spirit. The actions that we take, believing that we are walking in obedience to the word, will unavoidably be at odds with the initiative of the Spirit. The collegiality that emerged within the presbytery of Brisbane Christian Fellowship after the leaders had received the word on Ephesian Pattern exemplifies this point.
Although the word was calling for a two-level structure, the outcome of responding to the word of the Ephesian Pattern from the basis of our own history, experience and fleshly perspective, was the emergence of a counterproductive three-level structure. This had a detrimental effect on the lives of a number of people within the church, as the deeds of the flesh, such as immorality, contentions, selfish ambitions, dissensions, etc, flourished among some leaders. The three-level structure, and its collateral damage within the congregation, was the fruit of the flesh, even though the word had come by the Spirit.
Christ first comes to us in judgement, confronting our self-made projections, and calling us to repentance. As we respond in faith, He commutes our judgement to chastisement by joining us to the fellowship of His offering. In particular, He chastens overseers and heads of houses with a few stripes when their disobedience to the word and culture of Christ is the consequence of ignorance. He does this to deliver them from the spiritual lameness that is caused by the other law. By this means, they are able to make their paths straight so that they are not turned out of the way of holiness. Heb 12:13.
Unfortunately, there have been some people among us who have not received the word of the Lord, nor repented from their self-righteous practices. These ones have received many stripes, and some have been cut in pieces and assigned a place with the unbelievers. Luk 12:45-47. They did not make straight paths for their feet. Because they continued in their spiritual lameness, they were turned out of the way. Heb 12:13.
Thankfully, the Lord does not wish for any person to perish in this way. He desires for us all to come to repentance and to obtain our sonship in Christ. 2Pe 3:9. If we are to bear good fruit as sons of God and members of the body of Christ, repentance and faith must be foundational to the way in which we receive God's word. Heb 6:1,7.
When Christ comes to meet us, He is not coming to affirm our self-righteous endeavours, however noble and fruitful they may appear to be. He comes to meet us eye to eye, and to illuminate our heart concerning the inadequacy of our own way. Most often, our first response to the word of Christ that searches our heart and brings illumination is to respond in the flesh and to justify ourselves. However, if we will humble ourselves and receive His priestly initiative and word to us, He grants us faith to believe what He is saying, and to repent from our own way. Significantly, Christ equips us for our participation in His offering. The fellowship of His offering is the context of first love. This has implications for how we are to meet and to relate with one another in the presbytery and in the church.
The Lord is restoring to His church the message of the cross, which is the gospel of sonship. As we receive His word, and join the fellowship of His body, we are made adequate to minister this word of life to others. It is in our mouths to proclaim, and in our hearts as the cultural reality of our lives, individually, as families, as presbyteries and as Christ's church.
After reading this I came away with the distinct impression that Vic has set himself up to be remembered this way, and this is not just a Testimony, but part of a Last Will and Testament, as he perceives his time is short. The Prostate cancer, which miraculously went into remission about the time of Jesus’ second rebuke, is reported to be malignant and active again.