published by:
The Truth Foundation
11 Laurel Court
Freehold Township, New Jersey 07728
1981
This chapter contains more Armstrongite apologetic's and blatant mythology. He jumps onthe Waldenses band wagon as proof they were Sabbath keepers. History is quit plain this group of people were NOT Sabbath keepers. A current member of the Waldenses has this to say about their history: What About The Waldenses?
The Waldensian Churches are Reformed Presbyterian Churches: they were called in Latin: Mater Reformationis (=Mother of the Reformation) as they were before an old Middle Ages movement, but NOT a Church . They adopted the Huguenot Confession of faith, so called "De la Rochelle" of 1559 (but really of the Paris Synod, their first Huguenot General Assembly), but in 1655 the Waldensian Churches had its own Confession of Faith, hurriedly drafted in Italian immediately after the massacre of the Waldenses called "Piedmonts Easters". This was simply a shortened version in Italian of the Huguenot Confession of faith of 1559: it confirmed that in theology the Waldenses were in the mainstream of Presbyterian Calvinism . It is still the basis to this day of Waldensian beliefs, which the Candidates have to undersign in front of the General Assembly before becoming Ministers in our churches.
More detailed information on this quote is here: Did The Waldenses Keep The 7th Day Sabbath?
Chapter 21 The Origin of the WCG(pg. 275) IN THE EARLY YEARS OF THE CHURCH, ARMSTRONG WAS LEARNING and growing in the knowledge of God's truth. As long as he did this, God continued to bless the Worldwide Church of God. The problems seemed to start in 1968, after Mrs. Armstrong died. At that time, Stanley Rader who had been around Armstrong for the past ten years, was finally able to make his big move. Garner Ted says that his mother had a great influence over his father, and she was really the guiding influence over the Church. Garner Ted said of his mother, "One of the most important things she was able to do in dealing with my father and some of his ideas was to say, 'No, Herbert'."
It is so easy to understand that this Church organization, which was teaching so much of God's truth in such a powerful way, would be a main point of Satan's attack. And it was Armstrong's ego and vanity, and his later belief that he was a specially appointed apostle of God, that gave Satan that opening. Armstrong's claims that this was the only Church teaching God's truth were false, as were his claims that he had been given this knowledge in a special way from God. By making such claims, he drew special attention to himself as someone very unique and specially chosen, which placed him between the people and Jesus Christ.
The facts are that the Church of God Seventh Day of Stanbury, Missouri, back in the 1930s, had the same basic truths that Armstrong (pg. 276) had been teaching. And it was from this group that Armstrong broke away in the 1930s. The Church of God Seventh Day can trace its history back to the Middle Ages when Sabbath-keeping Christians were being persecuted and killed along with the Jews. This history, although rather spotty and difficult to piece together, was written in a book called "The History of the True Church" by A.N.Dugger and C.O.Dodd. Both these men were Elders in the Stanbury, Missouri Church. Although there were many inaccuracies in the book, it does form the foundation for the fact that the Church never died out and can actually be traced all the way back, even though there are gaps, to the first century Church.
In the 1600s, Seventh Day Baptists began to flourish in England, and they too were a part of the remnant Church. Many of our early settlers were of various Sabbath keeping groups, including the Seventh Day Baptists and the Church of God. The founders of the Rhode Island colony, including Roger Williams, were members of the Church. While the Seventh Day Baptists and other Seventh Day worshippers had many differences in their doctrines, there was a small remnant group among them that constituted the Church of God. They were the ones who believed the doctrines being taught by the Worldwide Church of God today. While some did not believe in keeping the Holy Days, there were others among them who did keep the Holy Days. Also, in their very early days, many of the Waldensians and Moravians were Sabbath keepers, although they later drifted totally into Sunday keeping.
Sabbath keepers, while scattered and of no strength as far as organization was concerned, finally began to come together in the early 1800s. That was during the time that the Adventist movement, which believed that Christ would return in 1844, was commonly accepted among both Sunday keepers and Sabbath keepers. Of course, He did not. They had been reading too much into prophetic events, and setting dates, which the Bible tells us not to do.
Ellen G. White was one of the leaders of the Adventist movement and was originally a Sunday keeper. She later came into the knowledge of the Sabbath. It was in 1844, when the Adventists realized that they had made an error in attempting to pick a date for Christ's return, that a split came in the Sabbath-keeping Adventist church. A large group followed Ellen G. White, and that was the beginning of what is now known as the Seventh Day Adventist Church, probably the largest Sabbath-keeping Church in the (pg. 277) world. While at one time they taught many of the doctrines now taught by the Worldwide Church, they have, over the years, fallen away and drifted into many pagan beliefs, including the keeping of Christmas.
It was during that split in 1844 that the Church of God Seventh Day was formed. There were probably also many other splinter groups that are hard to identify that sprung up in various places. The Bible Sabbath Association in Fairview, Oklahoma publishes a directory of Sabbath-keeping groups. This directory lists Sabbathkeeping groups of various doctrinal beliefs. Included in the listing is a large number of groups having the same beliefs as the Worldwide Church of God. And interestingly, many of these groups, although very small, in many cases are scattered throughout the world in India, South America, Asia and Africa. In most cases, these far-flung small Churches of God had no contact at all with the Church in the United States. The members of many of these foreign Churches of God say that they have existed for many generations in their little villages. For hundreds of years they have been carrying the same name and believing the same beliefs as the Worldwide Church of God and other similar groups in the United States.
Coming back then to the Church in the States, we find that there was a man named G.G.Rupert who in the very early 1900s produced a publication called "Remnant of Israel." His teachings were again, basically the same believed by the Worldwide Church.
Coming, then, into the 1930s, when Herbert Armstrong came on the scene, we find that there were many splits at that time. They occurred over various minor doctrinal differences, and perhaps one major one, as some did not want to keep the Holy Days and others did. Today, we have the Worldwide Church of God which is by far the largest. Then there is the Church of God Seventh Day, headquartered in Denver, Colorado, which is a result of a split, and the Stanbury group which by that time had relocated to Salem, West Virginia. The Salem, West Virginia church is still in existence in Salem. Neither of these groups any longer keep the annual Holy Days, other than Passover, but otherwise there is essentially no difference in teaching. They have various congregations throughout the world. The Denver Church has a total worldwide membership of perhaps 35,000 with most of the members outside the United States and the Salem church is considerably smaller. Out of the (pg. 278) Salem group emerged the Seventh Day Church of God of Caldwell, Idaho in 1952. This resulted because the Caldwell group wanted to keep the Holy Days. They, too, have several churches throughout the world, having about twenty-five ministers in the United States and 175 in foreign countries. There are many other small groups, some of which emerged from the original Stanbury, Missouri group, and some of which carried through independently from the darkest, most distant annals of Church history.
Parallel to all these groups, and many times mingling among them, were others known as Sacred Name Believers. All of the Sacred Name Believers keep the annual Holy Days. Where they have been able to organize, they are known as the Assemblies of Yahweh. The largest such group is headquartered in Bethel, Pennsylvania, and was formed in 1966 by Jacob Meyer by gathering together various Sacred Name Believers who had been worshipping in and among the other groups known as the Churches of God. The only difference in doctrine between the Holy Day-keeping Churches of God and the Assemblies of Yahweh is the fact that the Assemblies of Yahweh believe that the only names to be used for God and Jesus Christ are original Hebrew names. "Yahweh" comes from the Hebrew word which was spelled YHWH, and is the word from which we get the word Lord. Rather than use the Greek words "Jesus Christ," they adhere to the original Hebrew word, "Yashua Messiah."
And again, just as there are Churches of God throughout the world, there are groups in these same obscure places in foreign countries known as the Assemblies of Yahweh. And again, many of them have been there for hundreds of years with no knowledge or contact with other like groups until the last few years.
All of this proves, then, that while the Worldwide Church of God is not the one and only Church as Herbert Armstrong claims, it is in fact one of the groups in the one and only true Church. The way these doctrines have been preserved over the centuries, even through much turmoil in the Church due to Satan's constant attacks, is more than ample proof that these beliefs, these teachings and doctrines, are true, and whoever believes in them and follows them is in fact a member of the one true Church, the true Church of God, the Body of Christ, no matter what its actual name.
Christ said that He would not forsake His Church, and by keeping it dispersed, Satan could never destroy it. But certainly Satan (pg. 279) would go after Herbert Armstrong with a vengeance, as Armstrong was making an impact with his message. Once he allowed his ego and hisself-proclaimed importance to become dominant in his thinking to the point to where he proclaimed himself an apostle, he was vulnerable to Satan's attack, and this attack came through Stanley Rader, who can only be described as a tool, an instrument of Satan. Once Rader was able to prey on Armstrong's human weaknesses, he had him. And as long as Garner Ted was having his problems, Rader thought that he could control him also. However, Garner Ted apparently has overcome his problems and repented. After years of battling these serious problems, he apparently overcame them and was able to stand against Rader. No longer would Rader be able to hold anything over his head. In 1978 Garner Ted was able to meet Rader head on and, for whatever purpose, God allowed Rader to prevail over Garner Ted. It could only have been that God allowed this in order to purge and purify the Worldwide Church. As Garner Ted said, "Rader has something on just about everybody he wants to control, but he has nothing on me. My past is my past." And referring to the problems and the excesses of the Worldwide Church he said, "I praise God, and thank Jesus Christ my Savior that I am no longer a part of any of that - that any part I remotely had in it I have vomited it up in deep heartfelt repentance before my God". Referring to the problems of the past, Garner Ted said, during the time of his greatest troubles, that "it was just becoming more than I could cope with. I was nearly having my own private mental breakdown." His wife Shirley had said that it was the most horrible time of their lives and that it was only through the grace of God that they pulled through it. Garner Ted has recently said, "I can only go forward now. Anything bad that could be said about anyone has already been said about me, there's nothing more they can say. And that's all behind now. I can now go forward and do the work of Jesus Christ as He leads me."
So while Garner Ted ultimately ended up out of the Worldwide Church, what had Rader really been up to with Herbert Armstrong?
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