We have a couple here in Southern California who are being threatened by legal action by their city because they are holding Bible Studies in their home that garner 50+ people in attendance. It is impacting the neighborhood and people are complaining about it. They are not upset with the Bible Study part, but at the number of people showing up each week.
This has led to a comment from a conservative COGger who's mind is so small she cannot grasp that people outside the COG study their Bibles. Obviously in her view anyone outside a COG is a pagan Christian who does not care about Bible Study. She is shocked that over 50 people would show up at this pagan's Christian's home. God knows only REAL Christians in the COG attend Bible Study! Can Armstrongites minds really be this shallow?
My mom used to have a Wednesday Bible study group at her house (it rotated among the members homes)--There were about 5-8 people. I can't imagine 50 people showing up for Bible Study who are not in a CoG!
Another person responds:
The bible in most people's hands is a dangerous thing. Especially Prostestants who are a bit more whacky than most with their once saved always saved nonsense etc.
Some of this is true when it comes literalists. However, in this woman's mind no one outside of the COG can understand the Bible. There are close to 700 splinter groups now with almost 700 different ways of interpreting the Bible, so I would think these Armstrongites would stop throwing stones because their own glass houses have been shattered beyond repair!
8 comments:
"The bible in most people's hands is a dangerous thing" which is why HWA should have left it to the professionals;)
What is most shocking is that these sorts of Bible Studies spend little or no time on speculative prophecy and concentrate on spiritual things.
Shocking. Absolutely shocking.
"My mom used to have a Wednesday Bible study group at her house (it rotated among the members homes)--There were about 5-8 people. I can't imagine 50 people showing up for Bible Study who are not in a CoG!"
MY COMMENT: I can't imagine 50 people showing up for bible study who ARE in a COG! Most of them don't even get that many for their church service.
Steve wrote:
I can't imagine 50 people showing up for bible study who ARE in a COG! Most of them don't even get that many for their church service.
So true! The splinter cult one of my relatives goes to has only about 30 members. They have turned into a bunch of self-righteous bigoted fools.
Amen to most of the comments here.
Clearly that stunned woman doesn't turn on TV much. She might see 50, 100 -- perhaps THOUSANDS -- assembled together to worship God. And not at a Feast site, either.
Well, that's all part of the basic programming, isn't it? Nobody else studies God's word, no other groups are sincere, prayer for those outside of the ACOGs consists of "Now I lay me down to sleep....."
I was one of the shocked ones back in the late 1970s and '80s. I had no idea the depth that people we'd called "Christians falsely so-called" actually do study their Bibles! I think we were programmed to overlook these people simply because they come up with different conclusions from what is taught in Armstrongism, and the fact is they can support these conclusions in many cases better than Armstrongite ministers can support theirs!
There are many, many, many Bible based churches across the USA, and around the world. And, there are deep Bible study type internet sites which are helpful in doing a full topical study, complete with the original Greek and Hebrew words, and their most common usages in other passages. The Calvary organization in particular is known and respected for teaching their members to study their Bibles, and showing them how.
The ACOGs have been built on a lying witness, on systematic debasing of other sincere Christian groups, and even on the forbidding of their members to seek out second opinions from outside Armstrongism.
There is an entire level of spirituality which will never be reached by Armstrongites, because they insist on filtering the teachings of Jesus and the writings of Paul through Old Covenant legalism, and they end up blinding themselves in much the same manner as did the majority of the Jews in Jesus' time.
BB
The causes of my doubts are manifold, but one of the most telling is the proliferation of sects that disagree over the meaning of scripture.
If there really is a god whose power is infinite, and who set out to write a set of instructions for living a moral, happy, prosperous life, he should have been able to construct a text with no inconsistencies or ambiguities to puzzle its readers. And he should have been able to create beings who could read that text with such reliable accuracy that they would never disagree about what it meant.
If we use the reasoning power we've been given, we must agree.
If God had any intention of leaving a written, everlasting Word for us, then He could have done so.
Even lesser beings have left everlasting marks such as the Pyramids, so I can only conclude that God did not intend to give us a written message.
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