Church of God News

COGwriter

When we were in Greece in June 2007, my wife Joyce took a photograph of the following which is actually named “Sunday Church”.

Sunday Church, Naxos Greece

This morning when checking from the COGlinks page, I noticed that the link to Church of God Sabbath Day of Herb Morrow is now a link to some referral site that seems to promote Catholicism.

A Sabbath-keeping church promoting a Sunday-keeping church?  No, I do not think so.  While I do not recall what Herb Morrow’s group taught, promoting the late Pope John Paul II  was certainly not what was there the last time I checked.

In my years of attempting to have links to various ones that claim to be in the Church of God, it frequently seems to happen that some very small groups drop off.  So, I intend to remove the link to Church of God Sabbath Day of Herb Morrow from the COGlinks page.

In the case of Herb Morrow’s group, I presume that for some reason he did not renew his URL and some one else ended up with it.

An article of possibly related interest The Laodicean Church Era was predominant circa 1986 A.D. and still is.

The June-July 2007 edition of The Journal has a lengthy article on the June 2007 “One-God Seminar” put out by Ken Westby and his Association for Christian Development (A.C.D.).

I believe that what A.C.D. does and stands for is dangerous and at least two of its teachings need to be denounced as heresy–the first being the denial of Jesus being God and the second being the denial of portions of the New Testament being scripture. 

For some background, let’s begin with the following introduction to this conference from Dixon Cartwright of The Journal:

Ken Westby continues to stir things up five years after his first annual conference to promote the concept of “one God.” This year a congregation in the Albany, N.Y., area whose affiliations include the Church of God Abrahamic Faith served as the local host of the sixth yearly conference.

The Living Hope Community Church, pastored by Vince Finnegan and copastored by Mr. Finnegan’s son Sean, was the site of the three days of meetings June 8-10, 2007, to argue (in a collegial way, as Mr. Westby always optimistically puts it) that God is one rather than two, three or some other number.

The obvious consequence of a belief that God is one—unitarianism, or unitary monotheism—is that Jesus is not God, at least not God in the sense that the Father is the Supreme Being: eter-nal and all-powerful. Trinitarians (most of Christianity) and binitarians (most churches derived from the Worldwide Church of God) believe that Jesus is God.

Mr. Westby and friends, on the other hand, say that Jesus is the Son of God, the Son of Man, the Savior and the elder brother of Christians but is not God.

A.C.D. is promoting heresy by teaching that Jesus is not God. Yet Jesus is God and that is what the Bible clearly teaches.   

So how do unitarians get around the Bible?

They either tend to ignore, question the validity of, or retranslate portions of the Gospel According to John!

Notice:

F. Paul Haney began by referring to his “lingering doubts” about the authenticity of the Gospel of John “and its substance.” He has concluded that John, unlike the synoptics—Matthew, Mark and Luke—is an “evolved book.” …

Mr. Haney ratcheted the discussion up a few notches for the fundamentalist Christians to whom he was speaking when he mentioned that he had decided that perhaps the entire book of John is not what he once thought it was…

If that method means Mr. Haney “must excise some parts of the Gospel of John, in particular, as being hostile to Yahweh’s teaching,” then “so be it.” Mr. Haney’s presentation, he said, was meant to “examine, interrogate and analyze John’s Gospel,” not to discard it.

“I do not worship the Bible,” he said, “but over the years I have discovered that some professing Christians do.” Mr. Haney spoke of John’s prologue, the first 18 verses, as “a hymn that was a later addition.” Therefore, anything in the prologue that seems to support Jesus as God as God the Father is God is automatically suspect…

The synoptics—Matthew, Mark and Luke—in large part “agree with one another,” Mr. Haney said. “But John’s Gospel is a special case. It came on the scene relatively late and has the distinction of sharply disagreeing in many respects with the synoptics as well as with some of Paul’s writings.”

Beginnings of books are normally NOT later additions.   The Bible itself says that we are to get doctrine from it (2 Timothy 3:16), yet many unitarians teach heresy when they teach that John 1:1-18 is a “later addition”.  It should be noted that F.P. Haney also questioned several other portions of that Gospel–hence apparently feels that it is not inspired scripture.  I believe he is teaching heresy.

Here are some other comments about the conference:

Noel Rude presented “Did Christ Create the Cosmos?”

Several New Testament passages, Mr. Rude said, “seem to say that Jesus Christ created the universe.” The most widely cited, he said, is John 1:3, which states that “all things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.”

In reality, rather than Jesus the Messiah literally existing before His birth as a human, “the Messiah takes on and personifies the preexistent Word, wisdom, way, truth of God . . . Yet Jesus acknowledges that this is not His own wisdom” in John 12:49: “For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak.”

Mr. Rude noted that some verses in Paul’s writings are not as easy to explain and “actually do seem to say that Christ created the cosmos.” The verses include 1 Corinthians 8:6 (“by whom are all things”), Ephesians 3:9 (“who created all things by Jesus Christ”), Colossians 1:16 (“for by him were all things created”) and Hebrews 1:2 (“by whom also he made the worlds”).

So the above presenter seems to be saying that you cannot rely on the statement in John 1:3, even though they agree with Paul’s writings that also show that all things were made by Jesus Christ.  Teaching against relying on scripture is heresy.

Here is information relating to another presenter:

Citing 1 John 4:1-3 and 2 John 7, Mr. Gluckin noted that “the very root of the spirit of Antichrist is founded in not acknowledging Jesus was a man.”

The above explanation was probably given in more detail at the conference, so I would simply refer readers interested in the Antichrist to the article Some Doctrines of Antichrist.

Another presenter took exception to John as well:

Gary Fakhoury presented “The Nature of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels.”

The synoptics—Matthew, Mark and Luke—“demonstrate an obliviousness to Jesus’ deity,” Mr. Fakhoury said…
“Mr. Fakhoury continued: “If everything we knew about Jesus were contained in the synoptic Gospels, we would not have the slightest reason to suspect that Jesus was God in the flesh. “We would, however, have every reason to believe what our group [the One God Seminar people] has always believed and taught: that Jesus was God’s unique son: begotten by the Holy Spirit, righteous in word and deed, faithful to the end, a just and mighty Lord Messiah who reigns as God’s glorified vice regent in heaven and before whom all knees shall bow.”

Regarding the literalness of the events of the synoptics as opposed to the literalness of the events mentioned in the Gospel of John, Mr. Fakhoury said he thinks of John as a “meditation” about Jesus Christ whereas the synoptics present “just the facts, ma’am.” Therefore, John has a different purpose, Mr. Fakhoury seemed to be saying, and is not required to be as literal a report as are the synoptics. 

I bolded the above portion to comment about it.  First of all, the New Testament is more than Matthew, Mark, and Luke (the “synoptic” Gospels).  So, notice two comments from Paul about Jesus:

Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God (Philippians 2:5b-6).

But to the Son He says: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your Kingdom (Hebrews 1:8).

And second of all, perhaps he forgot about a particular passage in Matthew:

“Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,” which is translated, “God with us” ” (Matthew 1:23).

The Journal also reported the following comments from Ken Westby at the conference:

“God is a personal being,” Mr. Westby said. “He is not a mystery, a phantom, a godhead or anything of the like. He has plans, emotions of anger, wrath, grieving, love, laughter, compassion, disappointment, pleasure and surprise…” 

The Apostle Paul, unlike Ken Westby, did support the idea of a Godhead as he wrote:

For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily (Colossians 2:9).  

Earlier, Ken Westby wrote:

But no Gospels, no epistles, and no Apocalypse were penned until decades after Jesus was taken up into the clouds. This fact is not debated. This point can be important when confronting the very few scriptures in the NT that seem to reference the preexistence of a glorified Christ (Westby, Kenneth. Two Thrones, Two Lords, Two Saviors, One God. Association for Christian Development’s The One God Seminar. Tyler, Texas July 25–27, 2003).  

A.C.D.  denies the deity of Christ and questions at least portions of the Gospel that the Holy Spirit inspired John to write and apparently other passages of scripture.  A.C.D. is thus promoting dangerous heresies and should be denounced by those who believe that they are in the true Church of God. 

Several articles on the Godhead include:

Binitarian View: One God, Two Beings Before the Beginning Is binitarianism the correct position? What about unitarianism or trinitarianism?
Is The Father God? What is the view of the Bible? What was the view of the early church?
Jesus is God, But Was Made Man Was Jesus fully human and fully God or what?
Did Early Christians Think the Holy Spirit Was A Separate Person in a Trinity? Or did they have a different view?
Did the True Church Ever Teach a Trinity? Most act like this is so, but is it?
Was Unitarianism the Teaching of the Bible or Early Church? Many, including Jehovah’s Witnesses and other groups, claim it was, but was it?
Binitarianism: One God, Two Beings Before the Beginning This is a shorter article than the Binitarian View article, but has a little more information on binitarianism.

Another article of possibly related interest may be Why Be Concerned About False and Heretical Leaders?

The photo above is of an ancient carving of Euro who is supposed to be the southeast wind.  I (COGwriter) took this picture in Athens (Greece).  (A picture of the tower is available at https://www.cogwriter.com/299.htm) 

Forex – Dollar flounders after spell of weak US data
08.03.07, 1:19 PM ET

LONDON (Thomson Financial) – The dollar floundered after a spell of weak US data underlined the bleak outlook for the world’s biggest economy.

Coming on the back of a rise in the number of Americans out of work, the crucial US services sector was pronounced to be cooling, fuelling fears that the economy may be slowing more rapidly than expected.

The Institute for Supply Management said its service sector business index fell to 55.8 in July from 60.7 in June. It was also well below predictions of a more modest drop to 59.0.

‘The weaker than expected ISM report fed into dollar selling following the non-farm payrolls disappointment earlier,’ said Michael Woolfolk at Bank of New York...

‘Dollar strength earlier this week was largely attributable to safe-haven flight to safety and repatriation of foreign holdings by US investors. The market’s growing sensitivity to economic information suggests safe haven flows into the US may be subsiding,’ said Woolfolk.

He believes the euro will test highs around 1.3850 usd next week.

Elsewhere, the euro stayed well bid after the final services sector purchasing managers’ index for the region remained unchanged from June at 58.3 in July, an upward revision from the provisional estimate of 58.1 and above market expectations for no change from that estimate.

This is likely to boost already-firm expectations that euro zone interest rates will rise to 4.25 pct in September.

The euro had rallied overnight, rising above 1.37 usd following hawkish talk from the European Central Bank (ECB) yesterday and as risk appetite returned to financial markets, but it fell back on profit-taking.  http://www.forbes.com/afxnewslimited/feeds/afx/2007/08/03/afx3985807.html

While the Euro and Dollar will go up and down, in a recent LCG sermon, RC Meredith correctly stated that the overall trend for the US dollar is down.

There are several prophecies that this general assessment are based up.  Here are some from Deuteronomy Chapter 28 which we believe applies to the USA and its English-speaking allies:

13 And the LORD will make you the head and not the tail; you shall be above only, and not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you today, and are careful to observe them…

43…The alien who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower. 44 He shall lend to you, but you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you shall be the tail (NKJV).

And we believe that Bible prophecy reveals that Europe will arise.  An article of possibly related interest may be Europa, the Beast, and the Book of Revelation. 

The latest (June-July 2007) edition of The Journal: News of the Churches of God is now out.

Here are some of the highlights.

An article by CGI’s Ian Boyne states:

KINGSTON, Jamaica—The Church of God,

International (CGI) in Jamaica continues to shatter its own attendance records, recording on Pentecost, May 27, 2007, its highest-ever holy-day observance in Kingston of 300, moving up from the Unleavened Bread figure of 277…

CGI apparently has the strongest presence of any COG in Jamaica (LCG and UCG are probably second and third).  But other than Jamaica, CGI has little presence in other nations.  More on them can be found in the article Teachings of the Church of God, International.

 Legacy Institutes’ Leon Sexton wrote:

CHIANG MAI, Thailand—I have been asked quite often about the political situation in Thailand because of the military takeover in September 2006 and how this affects the country in general and our Legacy Institute project in particular.

I thought I should write THE JOURNAL a report to clarify the situation from my personal perspective to inform its readers, since I have lived and worked in Thailand for more than 10 years now…

Armed pro-Taksin cohorts were heading to Bangkok to stop the anti-Taksin protesters. Thailand was on a collision course for civil war. The army stepped in to stop the impending bloodshed.

It should be noted that, to the army’s credit, not one person was shot during the coup. In fact, families and children came out of their homes to welcome the soldiers with flowers and food. The situation took on what was almost a carnival atmosphere…

As far as our Legacy project is concerned, we were in no danger and are not in any danger today.

It is good that people were not shot in the coup.  Legacy Institute, the Living Church of God, and other COG groups have people in Thailand.

An article titled SDA author claims Gregorian University officials are libeling him, wants an apology by Dixon Cartwright stated:

Aprominent Sabbatarian Christian says he

has suffered verbal attacks on his integrity in the form of false accusations from officials at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, Italy.

Samuele Bacchiocchi, a retired professor at Andrews University, a school in Berrien Springs, Mich., sponsored by the Seventh-day Adventist Church, is known to many Church of God members as a scholarly defender of the Sabbath and its observance, especially in his 1977 book From Sabbath to Sunday.

The attacks on his character have been devastating, Dr. Bacchiocchi reports, especially statements from Barbara Bergami, general secretary of the university where Dr. Bacchiocchi completed work on his doctorate in 1975.

Dr. Bacchiocchi emailed me from Italy last week, perhaps he will be able to meet with some at the Vatican about these matters.  I have already read some of his explanations of what has happened to him.

On the back page of The Journal was the following:

UCG move hits a snag

MILFORD, Ohio—In other building news from the United Church of God, the planned transfer of church headquarters from a Cincinnati suburb to the North Texas town of Denton has apparently hit a snag.

Word had gotten around on Internet forums that the proposed building site was close to a Safety Kleen, Inc., plant, which disposes of and recycles sometimes hazardous industrial wastes, and near the residences of convicted pedophiles.

The church says there is no truth to the pedophile rumor and the plant is not a theat to the church’s potential property. Still, because some in the church are squeamish about the location, the search is on for property elsewhere in North Texas and the Dallas–Fort Worth area.

The reason I have not covered the above before is that I agree with UCG on this and see no reason for this to be a news item, unless UCG leadership was disingenuous on this, and I have no reason at this time to feel that they were.

For more from The Journal, here is a link to the PDF Front and Back Page of The Journal.

Other news items covered in The Journal included the fact that COG Big Sandy elected its board, my article advising the Orthodox to reject Roman Catholic unity, an article by the returning “guest” Brian Knowles essentially against me, and a lot of information on Ken Westby’s “One God-Seminar” (Ken Westby’s views are to some degree dealt with in the articles Binitarian View: One God, Two Beings Before the Beginning and Was Unitarianism the Teaching of the Bible or Early Church?).

I will probably post my article on why the Orthodox should reject Roman Catholic unity later at this news page.   

The fact that I pointed out how Brian Knowles’ closeness to ACD appeared to me set off his article.  To me, what Brian Knowles has been publicly doing promotes ACD and hence some version of unitarianism–he does not wish to see it that way.   His rebuttal article has also not changed my public view that I was shocked that CG7 Denver recently ran one of his articles, but that is up to CG7.  

Although it was nice that, in The Journal article, Brian Knowles made a statement suggesting that he is probably not unitarian (and I updated my five sentence article Brian Knowles in CG7’s Bible Advocate to include his statement), I remain firm in my belief that if he is in the COG that he should not associate the way he does with Ken Westby’s ACD.  

COGwriter 

Is there any evidence that Chinese people ever knew about the early accounts in the Book of Genesis, such as a devil in the Garden of Eden, the great flood, or the Tower of Babel?

Yes, as some evidence seems to exist in early Chinese writings. 

Notice for example that an ancient Chinese character for Devil indicates a knowledge of the account in Genesis:

Devil	= Secret	+ Person	+ Garden

Sadly, Eve seemed to believe the devil as she desired to benefit from the fruit of the tree that was prohibited:

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate (Genesis 3:6).

God decided later to prohibit the second tree lest Eve and others desired it so much that they would go for it as well (see Genesis 3:22-24).

Notice the symbol for the Chinese word lán for desire or greed is a combination of the symbols for woman and two trees:

Desire, Greed	= Woman	+ Trees

After succumbing to temptation, humans noticed that they were naked:

Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings. (Genesis 3:7).

Notice that the Chinese symbol for being naked has to do with clothing, one tree (the one that Adam and Eve were originally told not to eat from perhaps), and a garden with four irrigation canals:

Naked	= Clothing	+ Tree	+ Garden

After Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden they had children. On of their sons was Abel, who raised and sacrificed sheep:

Now Abel was a keeper of sheep…Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the LORD respected Abel and his offering (Genesis 4:2,4).

Notice what a Chinese character meaning righteous is made of:

Righteous(ness)	= Sheep	+ Hand	+ Lance

Interestingly, the New Testament account of Abel refers to:

…the blood of righteous Abel (Matthew 23:35).

Notice how the Chinese symbol agrees with the New Testament account that essentially the sacrifice of sheep (by Abel, for example) was righteous.

Since Christ was our Passover lamb sacrificed us, and that through Him we attain righteousness at least one has speculated that perhaps that is why the following symbol for righteousness was somehow chosen (since the combination of the symbol for hand and lance can mean us):

Righteous(ness)	= Sheep	+ I, Us

And while it is NOT likely that this was determined by the Chinese after Jesus’ crucifixion, it is a fact that Abel and Noah, who the Bible calls righteous, sacrificed clean animals such as sheep.

Many know that Chinese history contains an account of some type of worldwide flood. And there may be a couple of aspects of it preserved in its characters.

Notice a couple of statements in the Bible concerning the flood:

Then the LORD said to Noah, “Come into the ark, you and all your household, because I have seen that you are righteous before Me in this generation. (Genesis 7:1).

…in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water (1 Peter 3:20).

A Chinese word chuán for a type of boat is:

Boat	= 8	+ Mouth	+ Little Boat, Vessel

It may be of interest to note that one of the Chinese symbols for flood (chong) is a combination of an inverted symbol meaning “first Earthly branch” and eight (the term for eight may instead mean “person remaining””–that of itself is interesting as that the symbol for eight and “person remaining” look about the same–recall that on the ark there were only eight persons remaining alive).

After the flood, humans stayed together and built a tower:

Now the whole earth had one language and one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there. Then they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.” (Genesis 11:1-4).

But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. And the LORD said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” (Genesis 11:5-7).

It is highly likely that when people saw others speaking foreign languages, that they thought that somehow something at this tower affected their mouths. Notice the following Chinese symbol of a tower.

Tower	= Grass	+ Clay	+ Mankind	+ 1	+ Mouth

The tower of Babel was built with bricks (grass and clay) and humans originally had one language (or mouth). It is possible that this symbol is showing that the ancient Chinese recognized a connection to the biblical tower of Babel.

The Bible shows that after God confused the languages in Babel that He scattered humans all over:

So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city. Therefore its name is called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth (Genesis 11:8-9).

To Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided; and his brother’s name was Joktan (Genesis 10:25).

…the ancient Chinese people were quite familiar with the same record which the Hebrew Moses is popularly given credit for writing some 700 to 1,000 years later. Imagine this information being stored in special characters that were in use hundreds of years before the first page of the Bible was written! (Kang C.H., Nelson E.R. The Discovery of Genesis: How the Truths of Genesis Were Found Hidden in the Chinese Language. Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, 1979, p. 5)

Notice that the development of Chinese characters predates the writing of the Book of Genesis. Thus, the Chinese characters seem to provide an ‘independent’ account that verifies portions of the accounts in Genesis.

Continuing, the authors of the previous citation go so far as to state:

Moreover we believe that the Chinese actually employed this historical knowledge as one small facet in the process of building their written language. The significance of this claim is broad. But most important, it appears to us to give support and added acceptance of the much slandered account of Biblical Genesis (Ibid).

Thus, the existence of these Chinese characters should be a comfort to the Chinese that their ancestors did have some type of biblical witness.  These characters should also help modern believers understand that even in a land as removed as it is from the Middle East, the Chinese did know about various portions of the Genesis account. And since their characters were developed prior to Moses writing Genesis, their very existence provides additional verification that the events were known for many thousands of years.

The above information and more is included in the article China, Its Biblical Past and Future, Part 1: Genesis and Chinese Characters . 

Other articles of possibly related interest may include:

China, Its Biblical Past and Future, Part 2: The Sabbath and Some of God’s Witness in China When did Christianity first come to China? And is there early evidence that they observed the seventh day sabbath?
China, Its Biblical Past and Future, Part 3: China in Prophecy What is Ahead for China? What will happen to nearly all the Chinese?

Roderick Meredith of the Living Church of God called for a Church-wide fast for today.

Here is some of what he wrote:

Many “little groups”—here and there—have part of the Truth and are doing a “little” part of the Work. But where is Christ primarily working and where are His eyes focused today on the Church He is using to prepare for the coming Kingdom of God? Most of you understand. But some of our people are confused and weak, and some are also discouraged that several of our brethren are becoming seriously ill with various forms of cancer, heart disease, etc. 

So our Headquarters team unanimously agreed that we should call a Church-wide fast for the Sabbath of August the 4th! Please inform the brethren of this important fast, “clear the decks” of any Church activity which might interfere and encourage the brethren to do the same with their personal schedules. 

Fellow servants of Christ, let us all look forward to unitedly humbling ourselves and to fasting before our God. Let us beseech Him for increased spiritual discernment and strength, for His special blessing on the vital Work He is using us to perform, and for His divine intervention to heal those who are seriously ill among us. 

As we prepare ourselves and our brethren for this fast, let us meditate on God’s promise as given in 2 Chronicles 7:14, “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

Brethren let us truly go “all out” to prepare ourselves and our brethren to draw very close to God in the months and years ahead. As events speed up, those who have real spiritual discernment realize that time truly is short! So let us use every opportunity to walk ever more closely with Christ and with God as the end of this age approaches.

On the internet, I noticed that he was criticized for this at one of the anti-COG sites. In the past, even some who claim to be in one of the COGs have criticized LCG for having church-wide fasts for miracles such as healing and getting closer to God.

The criticism from those who claim to be in the COG has somewhat amazed me as the Bible itself teaches:

6 “Is this not the fast that I have chosen:
To loose the bonds of wickedness,
To undo the heavy burdens,
To let the oppressed go free,
And that you break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
And that you bring to your house the poor who are cast out;
When you see the naked, that you cover him,
And not hide yourself from your own flesh?
8 Then your light shall break forth like the morning,
Your healing shall spring forth speedily,
And your righteousness shall go before you;
The glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.
9 Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer;
You shall cry, and He will say, ‘Here I am.’ (Isaiah 58:6-9, NKJV).

But there are factions, Paul taught (1 Corinthians 11:19) 

An article of possible interest may be There are Many COGs: Why Support the Living Church of God?

                                             Pope Benedict XVI

TPM’s W. Dankenbring reported in an article linked as Second Beast of Revelation Now Arising!:

…Biblical prophecy marches forward – it is being fulfilled right before our very eyes! The second “Beast” of Revelation is beginning to flex its muscles, and stretch its claims and powers, and to once again ENFORCE ITS DOGMA… 

Most of what I quoted from the article above is correct, but as is typical of TPM, some additions are questionable such as the following in the same article: 

PCG made a press announcement:

Philadelphia Church of God Press Release – August 2, 2007…        

Fleecing the Flock: Church Leaders Cash in after Emptying the Pews, According to New Book

When Worldwide Church of God leaders rejected the teachings of church founder Herbert W. Armstrong, a mass exodus occurred. A decade later, church leaders have made millions selling off church property. Bewildered ex-members and former tithe payers are finding answers in a new tell-all exposé.

Edmond, OK (PRWEB) August 2, 2007 — Patricia Malone, 65, shakes her head as she watches disgraced Enron executives on the nightly news. Though she is not an investor, she identifies with the feelings of betrayal and loss.

Malone and her late husband, Wilbur, were some of the hundreds of thousands of members and former contributors to a church founded by 1980s televangelist Herbert W. Armstrong.

“We’re all asking the same questions,” she explains. “How could this happen to our church, and where did all that money go?”

Author Stephen Flurry claims to know the answers. “Had it happened in the corporate world, the CEOs and executives responsible for hijacking a corporation and robbing its investors would have been fired, if not prosecuted in a court of law,” he writes…

Flurry, a former member whose father was fired from the WCG ministry after Armstrong’s death, is on a mission to tell the millions who used to follow Armstrong’s ministry “the truth about what happened inside his Church after he died.” In his new book, Raising the Ruins – The fight to revive the legacy of Herbert W. Armstrong, Flurry draws upon thousands of pages of official reports, internal memos, and personal interviews to “expose the depth of corruption and deceit that was ‘Tkachism’ – the administration of Joseph Tkach, who succeeded Armstrong as pastor general of the Worldwide Church of God.”

According to G. Jeffrey MacDonald of the Religion News Service, “Flurry’s new book emphasizes how Armstrong’s hand-picked successor, Joseph Tkach Sr., and his allies ‘betrayed’ and dismantled all that the world valued about Armstrong. It’s a high-profile challenge to the WCG’s official line, which renders the church’s 180-degree shift from ‘Armstrongism’ as ‘a sign of God’s grace in action.'” In 1994 Tkach publicly disavowed Armstrong’s teachings and later the church officially labeled its founder a “heretic” and a “false prophet.” 

…For Patricia Malone, the revelations in the book are troubling. “We knew things were bad, but I was shocked by the premeditation of the conspiracy. I didn’t know it went all the way back to the 1970s before Mr. Armstrong died,” she says.

Source: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2007/8/prweb543867.htm

It is true that after Hebrert Armstrong’s death, the top leadership of WCG dismantled the church and changed its teachings.It is true that Stephen Flurry’s book selectively documents some of that.But his book is not quite new.   Also, others have attempted to explain much of what happened during that time.An article, for example, by my wife and I that was published over 4 years ago in The Journal dealt with many of the accusations against HWA and not just the changes in WCG (it is available on-line and titled 15 Accusations and Truthful Responses About Herbert Armstrong).

The following written by WCG’s John Halford is in the Aug-Sep 2007 edition of WCG’s Christian Odyssey:

These are stirring times to be a Christian. Critics are having a field day, questioning, undermining and ridiculing every aspect of our beliefs. Nothing, it seems, is sacred.   

That is because, if you are to believe some popular authors, nothing is sacred. The whole idea of God is a delusion, argues the enthusiastic atheist, Professor Richard Dawkins. Others suggest that religion has had a negative impact on human society, and should be banned, and that those who insist on teaching religious concepts to children be considered guilty of child abuse. Recent published books ask us to believe that nonbiblical “Gospels” may give us a more reliable source of understanding of Jesus than the New Testament… 

Many believing scientists assure us that the ever-increasing understanding of life’s processes has deepened, rather than shattered, their faith. Truth has nothing to fear from more truth, and you can be sure that “our side” is holding the line.  

So don’t let the anti-religious, anti-Christian propaganda destabilize you.

It has been a while since I posted something here from WCG that I agreed with, but the above is one of those times.

The fact is that science and history support the idea that God created life and that the true Church did know what the books of the Bible were from the earliest times. 

Several articles of possibly related interest may include:

Is God’s Existence Logical? Some say it is not logical to believe in God. Is that true?
Is Evolution Probable or Impossible or Is God’s Existence Logical? Part II This short article clearly answers what ‘pseudo-scientists’ refuse to acknowledge.
Where Did God Come From? Any ideas? And how has God been able to exist?
What is the Meaning of Life? Who does God say is happy? What is your ultimate destiny? Do you really know?
The Bible: Fact or Fiction? This is a booklet written by Douglas Winnail that answers if the Bible is just a collection of myths and legends or the inspired word of God.
The Old Testament Canon This article shows from Catholic accepted writings, that the Old Testament used by non-Roman Catholics and non-Orthodox churches is the correct version.
The New Testament Canon – From the Bible Itself This article, shows from the Bible and supporting sources, why the early Church knew which books were part of the Bible and which ones were not.

COGwriter

July 2007 was an interesting month. Although page views were not quite as high as they were in March 2007 (which had the most this calendar year), hits were the highest of any month this year. This is probably due to the recent change in format on this particular news page as it appears to result in more hits, though less page views the way the internet tabulates these particular statistics.

The top ten most popular articles in July were:

1. Concerns About Ronald Weinland’s Church of God-Preparing for the Kingdom of God Ronald Weinland claims to be one of the two witnesses. He has at least one other view that suggests that he is not part of the COG.
2. Why Not the Restored Church of God? This group, led by David Pack, claims to be the most faithful. The information in this article suggests otherwise.
3. Did Early Christians Celebrate Birthdays? If not, who did? Where did birthday celebrations come from?
4. History of Early Christianity Are you aware that what most people believe is not what truly happened to the true Christian church?
5. Church of God, Seventh Day: History and Teachings Nearly all COG’s I am aware of trace their history through this group. Whaid Rose is the president of the largest CG7 group (Denver). Do you know much about them?
6. 2007 Living Church of God Feast of Tabernacles’ Sites Updated information on many LCG FOT sites.
7. SDA/COG Differences: Two Horned Beast of Revelation and 666 The COG is NOT part of the Seventh-day Adventists. This article explains two prophetic differences, the trinity, and differences in approaching doctrine.
8. Sola Scriptura or Prima Luther? What Did Martin Luther Really Believe About the Bible? Though he is known for his public sola Scriptura teaching, Martin Luther’s writings about the Bible suggest he felt that prima Luther was his ultimate authority.
9. Differences between the Living Church of God and United Church of God This article provides quotes information from the two largest groups which had their origins in WCG as well as commentary.
10. 15 Accusations and Truthful Responses About Herbert Armstrong He, even after his death, keeps being improperly maligned–here is the truth on these matters.

FWIW, I am relatively sure that more people view my article each month on Ron Weinland than are actually part his Church of God-Preparing for the Kingdom of God .

Like always, I actually made updates to most (though not all) of the above articles in the past month. This is the first time that the “birthday” article has been popular.

If you have not read the Binitarian View article lately, some of its more recent additions may be of interest. Several of those additions are also in the article Did Early Christians Think the Holy Spirit Was A Separate Person in a Trinity?–I may have a post later explaining more precisely how the mainstream accepted the Holy Spirit as God in the future.

This site is becoming more popular with people from the Netherlands lately. As well as Japan and other Asian nations.

On particular viewer interest, to me at least, was the relative popularity of the COGwriter site in July for people from the relatively small nation of Antigua and Barbuda (it ranked between Hong Kong and Singapore in popularity last month). Currently LCG does not have a group there, but perhaps the interest there means that one may ultimately be able to form. Although I do not believe I have ever written about it before, I have long had interest in the island of Antigua as my grandparents were Peace Corp volunteers there in the 1970s.

Although it does not specifically mention Antigua and Barbuda, an article on islands of possible interest may include Islands and Bible Prophecy.