This LCG ministurd thinks Jesus is standing next to him as he preaches. This was a slick way of keeping the dumb sheeple in submission. If you dared question this minister you were going against God. Rebellion!
This was a teaching that I heard over and over growing up in the Cincinnati and Dayton churches. We even had our fair share of crackpots in Pasadena who said this same thing.
I knew Gilchrist from college and believe me, Jesus is NOT standing by him when he preaches! Jesus is nowhere to be found in the proximity of the guy!
It was a regional ministerial and leadership conference in the UK. I believeThe above quote was made in response to the latest gathering of LCG henchmen where they were lectured by Winnail about ministerial authority and church government.
Dr. Winnail was conducting the conference. There were many subjects that were
covered but the one that caught my attention was the section on "church
government and ministerial authority". Now whether Winnail was telling them to
exercise more or less ministerial authority the announcement didn't say but we
can probably guess. If Glen Gilchrist is any indication, it probably had a
flavor of the 3rd reich. Gilchrist has made the following statement twice now
at our church area" When you hear me[telling you something] you should see Jesus
Christ standing right next to me [backing me up].
This person does not think too highly of Winnail. You would think after all these years away from the mother church these little harlot daughters would have learned not to be abusive and controlling, but no. Power, control and submission are the only things these splinter cults know. They have no other means of keeping their members in check. It certainly does not involve the love of Jesus and unconditional grace. Imagine that!
Did anyone catch announcements the other week about the ministerial
conference? Dr. Winnail said that they focused on "church government and
ministerial authority" this year at the conference. I'm sure they were telling
the ministers to use less of both and use more "servant leadership", because HQ
would never want a minister to ABUSE his power or over emphasize church
government in order to try to CONTROL his congregation.
LCG seems to be losing members left and right. On the LCG Yahoo group (now deleted) many of the members have stopped attending LCG because of the heavy handedness and outright lies. More and more of Lord MerryDeath's henchmen are flexing their limp wrists in trying to control members and they have been found to be weaklings.
11 comments:
I was at the feast in Myrtle Beach in 2007 when Dr. Winnail said "In ancient Israel, there was no king. That is why there was so much chaos." I half expected him to slam his fist down and say "Ve must have ORDER!!" Apparently Dr. Winnail forgot that the reason there was no king in Israel was that was the way God wanted it.
Towards the end WCG mostly left me speaking beside myself......
M.T.Pulpit
Well, I recall Pack saying something to the effect that God backs him no matter what, even if he (Pack) is wrong. Talk about printing your own "get out of jail free cards"
Thiel has always crowed about how many baptisms LCOG has had, and how their work has be growing. It would be nice to shut him up for a while. Of course that is assuming he would admit such a decline.
The long slow decline
I just had the editor of The Journal tell me what fine and honest people who sincerely believe what they are teaching are amongst the ministers of the Armstrongist Churches of God. He objected to me call the ACoGs cults and certainly took umbrage at my calling most of the ministers and leaders narcissists, sociopaths, psychopaths and nut jobs. I think I'll get my money back for the ad first before I challenge him to show me just which ACoG has such a fine reputation.
This all started with an heretic blathering about prophecy in The Bible Advocate -- a man with barely an 8th grade education, full of himself and having encountered the CoG7 just after his psychotic break, going on and becoming a well known and thoroughly proved false prophet. If you this is hyperbole, just go look at the 1956 version of "1975 in Prophecy". It's really embarassing!
It's especially embarassing to me as the webmaster of TheHeraldOfTruth.org for Paul Woods, the Editor of The Herald of Truth and pastor of the Seventh Day Church of God in Caldwell, Idaho. There are associated 7th Day CoG congregations all around the world, and no, they are not of the CoG7 at all. They keep the Feasts. As I was in the living room of Paul Woods after the potluck across the way in the church, he and I discussed the Armstrongist CoGs. You know that the ACoGs are well-known and pretty much ignored by the other CoGs, but both the 7DCoG and CoG7D quietly hold the ACoGs in less than honorable prestige in their thinking. Paul Woods told me that British Israelism is idolatry. I guess that is an assessment I can live with.
None of the ACoGs seem to understand just how unimportant they are: They are steadily disappearing like the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland. They don't have any substance any longer, not that they had much to begin with. Their shrinkage is as obvious as it is inevitable and they are shriveling up.
The CoG7D minister told me that the CoG7D is growing and they are now getting inquiries from all over the world, as the ACoGs implode. The ACoG loss is the CoG7D gain, even though the ACoGs are almost totally invisible to the world at large.
So Christ standing behind someone in the ACoG as they speak? Nonsense. Although, you know, every once in awhile when I drop in to services for UCG, I hear the minister say things which undermine the United position (all of the ACoGs, really) without his remembering or even realizing he said it, for example, the hypocrisy of having the Night to Be Much Remembered out in restaurants. Oh, my. But then, perhaps it just demons, lying spirits, inspiring the speaking.
Oh, you know, who knows?
I'm pretty sure though, that Jesus Christ isn't behind false prophets nor would he be actively supporting narcissists, sociopaths, psychopaths and nut jobs. I would suppose that he might send people to give a wake up call to the ACoGs, although at this point, it would be more appropriate to give them Shock Treatment.
Or...
When I Speak The Most Amazing Thing Happens...
People fall asleep.
Douglas,
I was somewhat mystified by the removal of your ad, and in considering it all came to the following conclusion.
HWA's gospel was largely about himself. That's the way he made it, and the group that seems to recognize this the most, oddly enough, is Flurry's PCG, who makes prospective members acknowledge that HWA was the end time Elijah, God's Apostle, who restored truth in the endtimes, before they can be baptized. I believe that if you visit the headquarters office for any of the ACOGs, you are going to find a portrait of HWA prominently displayed. You and I recognize this as blatant idolatry, but that's the mindset of the ACOGs.
Now, as such, most members faith is in HWA, whom they consider to be a biblical level personality. They believe that what he was taught was directly revealed by God. This is why most members shut out the truth about British Israelism, won't read what the Antenicene Fathers had to say about Simon Magus, consider Alexander Hislop to be an authentic historian, and believe that the Waldensians kept the Jewish sabbath. Their apostle made these theories tenets of his basic teachings, and they have extreme faith that he will eventually somehow be vindicated and proven correct.
I've reached the point where I feel thankful for my own personal relationship with God, but no longer find it necessary to induce cult members to reassess and acknowledge the obvious errors which they've embraced. It's much better to determine where the Spirit of God is actually working, and to make oneself available to be used by God to assist in that. There are numerous examples in the Bible of God hardening and softening peoples' hearts, and unless God does soften someone's heart, they continue to cling to their own devices, or to the destructive errors taught by false teachers with their angry, growling, Pharisaical gospel rather than being open to truth.
BB
Byker Bob,
I am not really trying (that hard) to get people out of Armstrongism. What I am all about is liars getting away with lying.
The DNArefutesBI.com website wouldn't exist if it weren't for the fact that I had found the proof that DNA refutes British Israelism on Wikipedia. I told that to a UCG member on the Feast of Trumpets last year and by the Day of Atonement, someone (I know who you are you lying piece of...) the information about DNA had been removed. Casey Wollberg recently noted that he had been fighting Wikipedia Wars with Armstrongists in the past. It was really frustrating to find it just "disappear" like that -- wiping out the evidence that British Israelism is a load of scrap. It also says that the ACoGs are highly nervous about the truth being revealed, in spite of the fact that their members are so deluded that, for the most part, it won't matter if they see the truth.
So James, over at The Painful Truth, went through the archives and found the evidence. It was at that point I decided to put up the website so that when I told people about the evidence, it wasn't going to be wiped out from underneath me.
There were other motivations. For one thing, I used to to build expertise with .net .aspx and C# using Microsoft Studio 2010 Professional. (I finally abandoned that particular technology in favor of the much faster HTML / .php technologies). I have learned a wonderland of Internet, Server and PC technologies I would not have learned otherwise -- in this case, a win-win situation. We set up a project team similar to the one we used for coxcult.com.
It's actually taken about a year and it's not quite complete yet.
Beyond DNArefutesBI.com there are two other related websites waiting to be implemented. One is familiar and has been around before. The other centers on the premise that Armstrongism is a mental disorder and using the DSM IV to demonstrate it. That's the real fun one. The other two are a ton of work.
So, I hope it's evident that my efforts are primarily about exposing the liar and preserving what ever fringes of truth might be left in the crazy whacky world of Armstrongist Psychotic Delusion.
I have other projects waiting after that, and they are not related in any way to Armstrongism. The three websites will be static for 10 years, whether or not I'm still around. By that time, I'm hoping they just won't be necessary any more (if they even are today).
In the meantime, I am hoping to support (in my own eccentric way) the efforts of blogs such as this.
Oh, and, Byker Bob, isn't it just delicious that the ACoG ministers and leaders know they are wrong, but they dare not show their members that they know it?
Just imagine the brain damage that causes.
But back on topic: I've heard mainstream Pentecostal churches make a claim similar to this, in promoting revival speakers.
Except they say: "Angels are present at his services!"
Well, yes -- and if angels watch over you, they're at every church service you attend, too.
And by the way: do you think LCG emphasized government so much because of what UCG and COGWA went through last year?
do you think LCG emphasized government so much because of what UCG and COGWA went through last year?
No. LCG emphasizes government because that is how Rod Meredith can force his sheeple to accept his sons as his rightful heirs to the throne, passing over so many other more senior men.
Of course, this doesn't work for everyone. I have heard that LCG's income dropped sharply after Rod appointed his son Jim as his #2, and that it dropped even more after Rod baptized his son David and gave him a cushy HQ job. Lots of people in LCG are disgusted by Rod's blatant nepotism, and by his growing trail of lies, and there may even be a church split because of it.
Rod may end up with a cult smaller than Flurry's, but it will still be a nice inheritance to leave to his children, saving them from having to do another honest day of work as long as they live.
The other centers on the premise that Armstrongism is a mental disorder and using the DSM IV to demonstrate it.
That had my belly bounce with chuckling, even before I continued reading:
That's the real fun one.
You are obviously not trying to win any awards for pulling punches!
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