I had a great laugh last week seeing the topic of a splinter personality cult leader's article to his few hundred members. This guy is the epitome of self-deception. No, I'm not talking about Dave Passover Elijah Pack. I'm referring to Bob Thiel.
Thiel writes in Self-deception Can Be Costly:
Researchers are concluding that there are costs associated with self-deception:
People who take shortcuts can trick themselves into believing they are smarter than they are, says Tom Stafford, and it comes back to bite them. …
For once Thiel quotes some truth. His self-deception has come back to bite him repeatedly. He foolishly declared himself a prophet in the Church of God. He believes an LCG minister elevated him up with a "double does" of the Holy Spirit.
Armstrongism has a great track record of foolish men who have lived lives of self-deception that cause them to declare themselves prophets, apostles, Elijah's, Joshua's, Two witnesses, and much, much more.
Thiel continues:
The top five deceived men in the Churches of God are: Pack, Thiel, Flurry, Weinland and Meredith. While there are many other deceived men leading splinter personality cults, these five are the worst. They have all created scenarios in their minds where they imagine themselves as God's personal representatives and founts of truth. They get so puffed up in their own glories that they take on new persona's, such as Joshua, Elijah, Apostle, end-time witness, and more. The Bible ends up being the story book of their lives.Jesus taught that Satan was a liar and the father of lies:
44 You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it (John 8:44)Of course, Satan takes advantage of deception and encourages humans to
Thiel ends, with this:
Although most Laodiceans do not believe that they are deceiving themselves, Jesus said that they were. Jesus said that Laodicean Christians needed to repent–they need to change.
In addition to doctrine and how they lead their lives, there are serious prophetic deceptions that the Laodiceans have fallen for. A list of 30 prophetic deceptions that various Laodiceans believe is in the article The Laodicean Church Era. Believing several of these will insure that Laodiceans will not realize that the Great Tribulation is here until it is to late for most to flee (cf. Revelation 12:14-17).
Self-deception is common. Try not to fall for it. The word of God is truth (John 17:17), hopefully you will believe it enough so that you will resist Satanically-encouraged self-deception (cf. James 4:7).
Thiel gives a perfect description of his mindset. He does not believe he has deceived himself. His prophetic deceptions have been epic failures and will continue to be. Theil fell for self-deception in a big way. He is just as bad as Dave Passover Elijah Pack and Elijah Joshua Flurry, but without the members or money.
4 comments:
Another pot without a clue how dirty he is. Or perhaps, he does but lectures his handful of members on self-deception to help them along down that road. You decide.
Interesting.
The fact is that any "prophet" who bases his predictions on the possibility that English-speaking nations are modern day Manasseh and Ephraim (you know, those half-Israelite, half-Egyptian sons of Joseph?), that Germans got a race change and are actually Assyrians, or that there are such things as "church eras", let alone Philadelphians and Laodiceans, is practicing horrible self-deception. Not only that, his prophecies cannot and will not come to pass! Historically, we have witnessed these combined ingredients as one constant recipe for failure. If you grade for ultimate fear factor, it gets an A+. Manipulative value, A+. Fleecing tool, A+. However, if you grade for actual fulfillment, it earns a Double F.
When you co-opt some extra-biblical theories, and then "prove" these theories by labeling someone as an apostle, and using "Mr. Armstrong says...." as your only proof, or sole authority for these theories, you have been deceived into building your house on quicksand by the very people who told you to prove all things. The "prophecies" that are rooted in such fantasies are going to fail until perhaps someone discovers the correct model, one that earns at least a B-.
Can there be upswings and downturns in the economy? Absolutely! Famines, earthquakes, forest fires, and melting glaciers, and polar ice caps? Affirmative, chief! Wars, and other examples of man's inhumanity to man? You bet! But it is self-deception, defying all logic, to consider these normal, cyclical or random events as evidence that British-Israel-based prophecies are being fulfilled in the presence of two church eras, right here and now, in living color.
Who would even want to be part of an eternal kingdom that was an extension of Armstrongism forever and ever, and ever? Only those adept at self-deception!
BB
The hypocrite liar Gary has no ethics or class. He is a true son of HWA.
Well now I don't know who to follow:
Ezekiel? Double-Dose? That Prophet?
I demand a Sign!
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