Since GCG Takeover 2,600 LCG Baptisms
In November 1998, the old board of directors of the Global Church of God removed evangelist Carl McNair from the board on the trumped up charge of “failing to protect corporate assets” and replaced him with a lawyer.
What did Carl McNair actually do to be removed from the board? He allowed RC Meredith the presiding and founding evangelist of the then Global Church of God to have access to the mailing list of the church.
Although it never did have a majority of support from the old GCG Council of Elders, the new board after removing Carl McNair had enough members to then takeover GCG and fire RC Meredith.
Anyway, during Thanksgiving week of 1998, on or near the day he was removed from the board, RC Meredith, after consulting to insure he still had legal authority to do so, signed a few checks to repay on-demand loans from a few individuals who asked to be repaid. The new board, even though it had plenty of cash, later stopped payment on those checks, spent the money on those supporting the takeover, and essentially went bankrupt about ten months later.
The reason for the takeover according to supporter Larry Salyer (now with UCG) was the fact that the new board disagreed with hierarchical governance. At that time he wrote, “the real issue IS government” (Salyer, L. Information Update, 11/25/98 from larry.salyer@gcg.org).
Furthermore, the new board appointed GCG president, Raymond McNair, who had written:
Jesus Christ never intended His Church to be run autocratically, and He never set one person over His Church…Christ fully realized that power corrupts and that absolutely power corrupts absolutely (McNair Raymond. Letter to Council of Elders. Church Government in the New Testament).
For a general article on government, please read the article Should a Christian Vote?
Those who were once part of the old WCG know Herbert W. Armstrong was opposed to the type of governance that Larry Salyer and Raymond McNair advocated. Herbert W. Armstrong taught that proper church governance was one of the 18 Truths Restored to the Churches of God during the Philadelphia Church era.
I felt, then and now, that without having proper governance, that any COG would simply not have the fruits that the remnant of the Philadelphia Church era should have.
Jesus Himself taught:
You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them (Matthew 7:16-20).
So what were the fruits?
Well, the old GCG went bankrupt, its replacement organization (CGCF) was shut down, and most who supported the takeover scattered to various groups. In total, the organized groups that came out of those who supported the takeover seem to have less than 1,200 people who attend with them. None seem to have had any significant ability to proclaim the gospel through television or radio. Nor have they had many baptisms.
However, one group is different, as it was made up of those opposed to the takeover.
The Living Church of God began to form in December 1998 and became a truly functioning entity in January 1999. It had about 5,000-5,300 attendees (including unbaptized children) then.
LCG is, as of 11/20/07, on 206 television and 14 radio stations around the world. It sends out over 330,000 copies of its Tomorrow’s World Magazine.
It has reached millions through television, plus millions through the internet. 3,800 television listeners contact it each week requesting more information.
As of 11/09/07, LCG has had over 2,600 baptisms–which is about twice as many people than all the other groups that came out of GCG have attendees in total.
LCG is the only group to have the type of fruits that Jesus told His followers to look for.
More information about many of the groups that had some type of GCG affiliation, but are not now part of the Living Church of God can be found at the News of Those Once Affiliated with the Global Church of God.
An article of possibly related interest may be There are Many COGs: Why Support the Living Church of God?
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