Some things never change even after splintering and splintering. Knowledge seems to be stagnate or decreasing.
A question was asked, If we are going to have Friday night Bible Study, what should be the proper clothing to wear? Sabbath dress, casual, or what? Clearly we are coming before the Eternal, we do need to give some regard to that. Being the Sabbath already, what do you do for Sabbath dinner on Friday night? Do you come home from work and just carry on in your work cloths, or do you tidy up and get ready for the Sabbath? I think putting it in the context, helps appreciate that maybe it would be wise to get out of the work clothes and get into something that would be acceptable before the Eternal. When all is said and done, we are asking the Eternal to be present to guide and direct our deliberations, so appropriate attire, Sabbath wear would be more than acceptable for it.Now, you’re at home, what do you wear at home on the Sabbath? When I get up in the morning, I don’t put a tie on straight away, I put a shirt on first, of course. Having put a shirt on, I don’t have to put a tie on do I? First thing at home. I think there is appropriate thought in terms of how do we dress ourselves on the Sabbath day. If we run around in sweats all Sabbath day and just get dressed up to go to services, is that appropriate for us? Maybe we need to give a little more thought on how we conduct ourselves on the Sabbath day, and dress ourselves in an appropriate manner.
15 comments:
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You are condemned to the LAKE OF FIRE if you dare to go "au natural" or "commando" on the Sabbath day.
Confession---once stayed home and was watching the live streaming in the bedroom from Cincy, when wife and I decided to play a little "Adam & Eve" and have some marital fun! It felt naughty and mischiveous doing such in the middle of the online services. Im not promoting this idea, but am coming clean that the Moellers are human like everyone else!
Peter Nathan needs to "major in the majors" and stop it with such nonsense. Lets be honest here...
if you can stay in fidelity in marriage, not get hooked on any substances, keep a job, stay out of jail, don't steal, and attempt to love others , you are already ahead of 99.9% of the rest of the class. This haranging on such minutia is embarrassing.
There are starving people in the world, people at war, multiple millions of abortions a year, terrorism, religious persecutions and imprisonments, global threats of all kinds... and this is what Peter Nathan puts his mind and effort on?? Nathan needs to get out more often and away from his tiny insular universe.
Joe Moeller
Cody, WY
I can see a new pet-doctrine splinter group forming already: the "In His Presence All Sabbath Long Church of God."
Let's be honest, if this omni-god exists, you're in his presence 24/7, so, no matter what you're doing (coal-mining, bathing, sleeping, hiking, skiing, gymnastics) shouldn't you be doing it in your best clothes?
In conservative, fundamentalist, pharisaical, legalistic, christianity (read: Armstrongism) it's all about the DOING. He who goes through the motions 1X shall be ruler over 1 city. He who goes through the motions 10X shall be ruler over 10 cities, right? And by golly, blessed are you if your greed and ambition know no bounds! Don't you wanna be ruler over a MILLION cities?!? But then the logic suddenly turns around on you...
Someone can always come along (and usually does) and point out how you could be DOING more, better, higher, more sanctimoniously, etc. And they're usually right. And therefore, so the logic goes, what you're doing NOW isn't enough! City-Nazi Jesus isn't happy yet! No cities for you!!!
You could always be putting on a better outward show for Jesus, couldn't you? Meh. Trouble is, this reasoning has no logical end. It can go on out to infinity. No matter how full and overflowing your plate is, someone can always offer you one more "wafer thin" morsel of "divinely ordained" obligation of personal worship you've been negligently non-observant about. But a human's capacity to go through various motions isn't infinite. The first thing that overflows off your plate is care and concern for others, especially others who aren't DOING all the crap you've slowly been ratcheted up into thinking you have to DO just to barely please the deity.
People really shouldn't be so competitive, ambitious, and downright greedy about getting themselves "set up" in epic style in the hereafter. Let's face it, the afterlife is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get.
Upshot? Conservative christianity (read: Armstrongism) is NOT a recipe for a sound mind.
Although I’d like to congratulate Joe for cumming before God in his absolute best attire, I don’t think that was the type coming before the Lord HWA was always harping on. In the hindsight of having recently learned a bit more about HWA, I may be wrong.
Since Joe’s Sabbath sex-scapade was a virtual service, I don’t think that counts as him becoming a member of the COG equivalent to the Mile High Club. However, that may make for an interesting post: how far did you go at a COG service or event?
However, since a UCG service is a certified birth control agent and sexual depressant, I’m sure Joe was in full rebellion against his COG and thereby mocking the inspired word for the day.
Joe Moeller said, “Confession---once stayed home and was watching the live streaming in the bedroom from Cincy, when wife and I decided to play a little "Adam & Eve" and have some marital fun! It felt naughty and mischiveous doing such in the middle of the online services. Im not promoting this idea, but am coming clean that the Moellers are human like everyone else!
MY COMMENT – Joe, this just goes to show you are Laodicean. I remember sermons from the 1960s Worldwide Church of God (Philadelphia era) pulpits where ministers announced marital relations were prohibited on the Sabbath – sundown to sundown.
Hopefully, you and your wife were at least “doing it” in the Apostle approved positions as articulated by Herbert W. Armstrong. Otherwise such debauchery, particularly on the Sabbath day, makes you both good candidates for the Lake of Fire weenie roast.
Please repent of your ways, get back to your first love (the Philadelphia era Church, not your wife), and send more money into headquarters. Thank you, and thank you for sharing your most intimate personal matters with your brethren in the true Church of God.
Richard
I just can't believe the stupid things some people come up with! They believe in an omnipresent, omniscient God, and only worry about Him seeing them on the sabbath! Now I know why some of the kookaboos don't want their members using the bathroom during services! It would be disrespectful to take a crap on the sabbath in the presence of God! Better always wear underpants, too!
BB
"Small churches/Small minds" Kinda like "Small towns/Small minds"
kinda/sorta
"Makes sense to me!"
"It would be disrespectful to take a crap on the sabbath in the presence of God!"
Amen, brother! And besides that, you might get some poo-stank on your best clothes, which I'm sure must make you and your best clothes ceremonially unclean for at least 24 hours. No pooping, peeing, or farting on the sabbath!
"They believe in an omnipresent, omniscient God, and only worry about Him seeing them on the sabbath!"
Whoops, my bad. No pooping, peeing, or farting EVER!
And Joe, staying home in bed shouting "Oh god! OH GOD!" does not constitute going to church. And seminal emissions for sure make you ceremonially unclean for the duration. Shame on you! lol
What does James Malm say about this?
Is Nathan more strict than Malm or less strict? If he's more strict, he's a nit-picking Pharisee; if he's less strict, he's an ungodly reprobate.
I never got the obsession with suits in WCG. Even in 90+ degree weather with no air conditioning, the minister would cop an attitude in the announcements if people were taking off their jackets. Yeah, how disrespectful to not want to be all sweaty and gross while packed in with dozens of other people in tightly-arranged steel folding chairs for two hours.
Looking back, I did more work on the Sabbath than the rest of the days of the week. Yep, had to get up early on Saturday morning and get breakfast (previously prepared on Friday) down three kids who don't want a bite of it - get three kids dressed (usually two or three times because one will spill something and they all have to get in it). The wife is cleaning up after breakfast and the kids are underfoot because they have to see what mom is doing. And, if you think spanking helps, you're wrong. That only makes it worse, plus louder.
Finally, everybody is ready and we all pile into the car - but, wait, one of the kids has to go pee and another will before that one gets back. But, finally again, we are on the road to church - only 65 miles away. On the way, a tire will blow or a radiator hose will break or the oil light come on (cause we're tithe payers and can't afford a good car).
Then, finally, we arrive maybe five minutes before services. After services, everybody is completely give out but everybody has to talk to you for another hour or so while the kids get in and out of the car a dozen times and the wife is in a quiet, resigned to her fate mood.
Then, if we're lucky, and don't have another flat tire (this time without a spare) we make it home by late afternoon about half starved.
Then, off come the church clothes and on go the everyday comfortable clothes. Then, if the wife isn't totally used up by then, she goes to work in the kitchen and prepares what she previously prepared Friday so that she wouldn't have to cook on the Sabbath.
After eating a bite of yesterday's warm overs, the kids fall asleep and the wife and I sit on the couch in a daze and look at the clock until we pass out from exhaustion. 'Cause, you see, we were already tired from working all week and we really did need a day to rest. Sunday...nope, gotta mow the yard, wash the car, go get groceries, buy a new tire...
I've noticed a pattern, and I have to say I've really simplified my life just about as much as possible. At the end of each day, after working with customers and vendors, I need about two hours of decompression time before I can feel normal and ease into my evening routine or relaxation. At the end of the week, in addition to this, I need about 24 hours decompression time just to start feeling normal again. If I had to put up with any of this WCG OC sabbath bullshit, the "brethren" would be calling bad attitude on me, because all day Saturday I don't feel like going anywhere, doing anything, or being around people, period! Gotta be careful and exercise extreme restraint even going to the supermarket!
By the time Sunday comes, I feel like myself again, and can be productive and plan for the coming week. Don't know what all this means, but it seems to be a function of basic biology. Even when I did WCG sabbath, We got in and out of services as quickly as possible. There weren't a heck of a lot of people that I had much in common with, and I wasn't about to try to climb any ladder by volunteering to "serve". No point in discussing Bible verses either, because you could only come to the "approved" viewpoint, or were seen as being Lao or having an attitude problem. My parents had dragged us into the mess, made it as painful as possible, but we endured it to avoid greater pain at the hands of the Germans, promised for 1975. The minute that stupid and depressing prophecy failed, I was out the door! Can't even imagine how there can even be Armstrongism, but it's still around, although slowly dying.
Blogger Corky said...
Looking back, I did more work on the Sabbath than the rest of the days of the week...
Yes I agree completely with this. I never felt like I got any rest on the Sabbath. No wonder most were not in a spiritual state of mind at services. Too much physical and no time for spiritual. Then you had to put up with all the unspiritual, stressed out gestapo ministers on their high horses who had zero wisdom and always gave you bad advice.
I never understood the "no marital relations on Sabbath" mentality.
It is a God ordained activity, but some see sex as naughty, sinful, or whatever (RCC for one)...I guess in that context they wouldn't want us to do it on Sabbath.
Well, what Joe did was much better than what many other UCG members commonly engage in, which is just like masturbating to the image of Herbert W Armstrong.
No wonder the UCG refuses to remove the huge portrait of Herbert W Armstrong that hangs prominently at their headquarters. It's Armstrong porn- the very porn that the UCG and other Armstrongist folks need to get off with!
To paraphrase Woody Allen, if sex is not naughty and sinful, you're not doing it right.
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