News of The Churches of God

Click Here for the COGwriter Home Page which has articles on various sabbatarian Churches of God (COGs) and articles supporting beliefs of the Philadelphia portion of the Church of God.

09/06/06 a.m. In the current edition of the Bible Advocate, CG7's president Whaid Rose writes:

PCG is correct that the European Union is getting its economic house in order, though other bumps are expected. The Bible shows that a European Confederation is destined to play a major role in future events.

09/05/06 a.m. This morning. LCG announced its latest commentary, this one by Martin Fanin titled Who won in Lebanon – what lies ahead? In it, he stated:

Notice that even Roman Catholic scholars know that the early church was against idols and images and that the reason given to accept them appears to contradict the Bible (bolding mine):

In other words, long after the apostles died, once non-biblical "Christianity" attained power, it allowed the veneration of images to develop. Shouldn't everyone associated with the Roman and Orthodox Catholic churches understand that there veneration of images is NOT consistent with the Bible or the practices of the "faith once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 3)?

While David Hulme claims to provide an important resource for scholars on the Arab-Israeli conflict, COGaic does not want the COGs to fully access its own information nor let its own membership know the doctrines of their own church. An article of related interest may be Church of God, an International Community.

Zenit.org, a Vatican-supporting news source, reported the following given by a Roman priest named Michael Hull:

While we in the COGs would have used the term God's law instead of natural law, in general we agree that rule by the majority can lead to tyranny as well as to many social and moral evils. We also agree that Christ will reign, and that form of governance is much better than democracy. An article of possible interest may be Should a Christian Vote?.

Is this Labor Day weekend (for those in the USA) going to be like all of your other ones?

Would you to like to learn many of the doctrines of the true early Christian church?

Although its actual subject had to do with Guatemala, Christianity Today had an article interestingly titled The Truth Is Somewhere. Those who are wondering where they may find the truth about early Christianity and what were the actual teachings of the true Church in the first few centuries of Christianity, should go to the Early Christianity page. There are many biblically and historically documented articles at that page to show what the truth is, where it was in those earlier times, as well as were it can be found now.

Would some of your time this Labor Day weekend be more memorable and significant if you read and study some of the articles at Early Christianity page?

Speaking of one who is warning about radical Islam (but who also believes in much of God's law), in his latest newsletter, SDA S. Bacchiocchi reported:

In his first speech on national security, British Home Secretary, Mr. Reid warned that "Muslim terrorists are the greatest threat to the civilized world since Adoph Hitler." Addressing the think tank Demos, "Reid said that judges, British politicians and commentators had all failed to realize that liberties enshrined in the 20th century and bolstered after the Second World War, could not all remain intact if today's high-tech, global terrorists were not thwarted." (London Telegraph, August 10, 2006)...

Are Islam and the Papacy Two Manifestations of the Antichrist?

The preceding observations on the threat that Islam is posing, not only to the Middle East, but also to Europe, should cause Adventists to take a fresh look at a possible prophetic connection between Islam and the Papacy. About two years ago I attempted to explore this connection in a study that generated considerable controversy on the part of a few "ultra-conservative Adventists"...

As we witness today the expansion of Islam through warfare and demographic explosion, perhaps the time has come to reconsider the claim of two Great Reformers, Luther and Calvin, that the Papacy and Islam are the two legs or the two horns of the Antichrist. The interest of the Reformers for Islam and the Papacy stemmed from the fact that they lived at a time when Papacy had corrupted the Western Church, while Islam was swallowing up much of what was left of the Eastern Church. In many ways the Muslims threat was as real in Luther and Calvin's days, as the threat of Muslims expansion is today through terroristic acts and demographic explosion.

In the light of the historic role Islam has played during the past fifteenth centuries in persecuting God's people and promoting false worship, should we as Adventists today include also Islam among the key players of the final showdown over worship?

The identity of the antichrist is one of the differences between the COGs and the SDAs. The COGs also tend to consider that those in the Middle East will become part of the King of the South, while the papacy will support the European king of the north.

It should be noted that Dr. B's comments about the two horns are different from the traditional SDA position (as well as the COG position). An article of related interest may also be SDA/COG Differences: Two Horned Beast of Revelation and 666.

In his latest newsletter, SDA S. Bacchiocchi also reported:

This preparatory review of existing powerpoint lectures, has convinced me that what is missing in the studies that I have seen, is an understanding of the REAL CONSPIRACY hidden in The Da Vinci Code. Most authors spend their time exposing the fallacies of the alledged Catholic conspiracy to conduct, through secret societies, a massive cover up to conceal from the public the truth that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, had a daughter name Sarah, and his bloodline extends to this very day. Such a conspiracy is laughable for its absurdity and hardly deserves a lengthy refutation. The same is true of the claim that Constantine arbitrarily chose the four Gospels, rejecting the 80 Gnostic gospels. Any one familiar with the history of the early church and of the formation of the NT canon, find such claims totally absurd.

In my mind what deserves serious consideration is the REAL CONSPIRACY hidden in the The Da Vinci Code. This is not the CATHOLIC CONSPIRACY, which is totally devoid of historical support. Instead, it is DAN BROWN CONSPIRACY. In subtle, deceptive ways, Dan Brown conspires to destroy the credibility of Christianity, in order to promote his neo-pagan worship style with ritual sex.

I would like to add that I read a Catholic book against the Da Vinci Code last week. And while it was over 100 pages long and did address the sex and marriage issues, it did not properly address the canon nor did it once mention what the Da Vinci Code got right or wrong about the Sabbath, Christmas, and various other points. A relatively short article by me did address them and is titled The Da Vinci Code: Some Good and Lots Bad.

09/01/06 a.m. The following were the top ten read non-news pages of the COGwriter site for August 2006:

This is the second month in a row that the RCG article topped the list. I substantially revised and added to the top two articles this month, so if you have not read them recently, you may find the additional information of value.

Sadly, it will get much, much worse before we see much in the way of real repentance.

Is the most dangerous heretic the one who directly denies Jesus and makes himself God, like Simon Magus did? Is the most dangerous heretic the one who first did away with the Old Testament and the Sabbath, like Marcion did? Is most dangerous heretic the first one who taught the Trinity like Montanus or Valentinus did? Is the most dangerous heretic one who wrote clearly inaccurate and false statements, like Justin Martyr?

Or is the most dangerous heretic, the one while writing against heretics, was a more subtle heretic himself?

The Bible clearly shows that the Apostle Peter condemned Simon Magus. And while some consider that Simon Magus was "the father of all heresies" and in that sense highly dangerous, the fact is that all should know that the Bible condemned Simon Magus. Thus any interested in the following the Bible should be careful about following in some of Simon's practices (though a very large church seems too).

Furthermore, since even Catholic preserved history shows that Polycarp of Smyrna, the disciple of the Apostle John, condemned Marcion as the "son of Satan" and turned people away from the heretics Marcion and Valentinus, it should be clear to any who consider that Polycarp was a true Christian, that Marcion and Valentinus were heretics.

Pretty much all who study early Christianity realize that Simon Magus, Marcion, Montanus, and Valentinus were all condemned as apostate heretics.

Thus, all who have looked into early Christianity should realize that they should not follow the practices of those heretics (though to some degree, depending upon the heretical teaching, all the "mainstream" churches do).

08/31/06 a.m. The lead article in CG7's September 2006 edition of the Bible Advocate, by Richard A. Wiedenheft, states:

The Sabbath is one of the doctrines that CG7 teaches in a similar manner to the other COGs. Here is an article on the teachings of the Church of God, Seventh Day.

The above contains a mix of truth and change. It is true that there is another time in the future when all the house of Israel will return and dwell safely. However this will be well AFTER the time of "Jacob's trouble". If CGOM is teaching that the European superpower will be highly Arabic or Moslem, this is an inaccurate change. Those who rely on changes in prophetic understanding by CGOM may do so to their own peril (the GTA related splits have done away with teachings such as Church Eras and a Place of Safety). An article of related interest may be Teachings and Practices of the Church of God Outreach Ministries.

LCG's Sept-October 2006 edition of Tomorrow's World arrived last night. It now lists that LCG is on 195 television and 18 radio stations originating in 21 countries. LCG has recently increased its literature in Spanish and the same edition is available in Spanish at http://www.mundomanana.org/paginas/revistas.htm

Of course, I do not send WCG any money and have not done so for over a decade, but at least J. Tkach is being truthful about why he writes his monthly letter.

On other matters, notice some of what the Eastern Orthodox teach about being "born-again":

Speaking of the Orthodox, even though they are trinitarian, their scholars, like certain Roman Catholic and Protestant scholars, understand that the idea of the Holy Spirit as the third member of a trinity really is cannot be proven from the Bible. Look at the following admission:

The Orthodox Church claims Polycarp as a faithful saint and the successor to the Apostles,

Because like the COGs, Polycarp kept the Passover on the 14th of Nisan and refused to accept the position of the then Bishop of Rome to change it to a Sunday to honor the resurrection. Yet, the Orthodox Church endorses Easter Sunday--a position that the early church in Asia refused to accept (as Polycrates recorded testimony shows). Now the other amazing thing is that even though the Orthodox still refer to Easter as Pascha, which is the Greek form of the Hebrew word for Passover, they do not observe Pascha as the memorial of Christ's crucifixion, but instead as to His resurrection.

When Francis II abdicated the throne of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation in August 1806, the longest-lasting political system in the German-speaking world ceased to exist. Founded by Otto I almost a millennium earlier, the empire had consisted of hundreds of estates, or state-like entities...

DW-WORLD.DE: Why should people still care about the Holy Roman Empire today?

Brigitte Mazohl-Wallnig: The Holy Roman Empire is the foundation of our common European history.

More on the common European history (and its future) can be found in the article Europa, the Beast, and Revelation.

While it is good to hear that those in China are interested in learning about God, sadly there are few, if any, true Christians in the PRC now. However, as history has shown, even when cut off from Westerners, some in China have apparently practiced true Christianity. Three articles of related interest may be:

The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation fell apart 200 years ago. While German museums mark the occasion, an Austrian expert says that Europeans would do well to look back and learn for the future.