For several weeks now pictures have been floating around on news and web conspiracy sites about speculation that a cross and remains of a structure have been seen on Mars. The fact that Bitter Bob, a certified false prophet, is searching conspiracy sites for his "religious" articles proves what a charlatan he is.
Anyone in their right mind knows that a cross would never be on Mars. But then, there's doubly blessed Bitter Bob who in his hatred of the cross and that dude he never discusses in any of his articles or web stories has to use the story as an attack on the cross. If ever there was enmity between Jesus and a COG leader it is has to be the cross.
So what is so evil about this non-cross on the desolate plains of Mars that has the prophet's knickers all in a wad? Some Christians might use it as a tool of unification between Protestants and Catholics. Say WHAT??????? Who's brain can imagine such absolute stupidity other than an entrenched Armstrongite?
The first is that it may have ecumenical and interfaith appeal. It may be that those that do may consider the Mars’ ‘cross ‘ (presuming it is not a shadow or something) as proof of its ‘universal’ nature. This may encourage some to embrace the interfaith and ecumenical agendas that the Church of Rome is promoting. Especially if the Vatican ever accepts the possible existence of this Mars’ cross as valid.
The second is that Catholic prophecy indicates that a cross will be used as a way to separate its supporters from others in the future.Then in his outraged bitterness he makes this absurd comment:
The Bible is opposed to the idea of ‘holy relics’ like crosses. Here is one admonition from the Apostle John:
21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols (1 John 5:21).John is no more talking about the cross than he is the Easter bunny. What Bitter Bob, Meredith, Pack, Flurry and Kubik ignore when they push Jesus to the sidelines in favor of the law, is grace.
That cross is a metaphor for radical grace. Radical grace in Armstrongism has been bastardized into wanton licentiousness through its reinterpretation of it. A Christian believes that through it, what ever has separated us from God has been taken away. Wiped clean. Something the law, sabbath keeping, kosher eating and holy day keeping cannot do.
36 comments:
Bitter Bob must be aghast. Since so many forms of natural crosses occur right here on earth among plants, rock formations, etc... to find yet another one on Mars must be truly upsetting to him. I wonder if he's called his utility company to demand that the vaguely cross shaped power poles near his home be removed before the Vatican uses them to fulfill a prophecy?
I have never seen a church of god leader come off looking so stupid so much of the time.
As I commented on another site this morning, extreme or radical people for some reason often seem to be attracted to radical sources. The fact that they consider these sources to be viable indicates the degree to which they are off-balance, and in many cases, they don't even realize that this is abnormal. This was something I learned in the past, as I attempted to "help" a conspiracy theorist. Unfortunately, like some people from our collective past, his view was that he and the people who thought like him were right, and mainstream types were ignoring the "truth" and in error.
The people who believe that crosses are pagan, or that Jesus was not crucified on a cross should probably do a little more research, and go deeper this time. They may want to start with the root words for our English word "crucify". They may also learn that in Roman times, the condemned were sometimes pre-nailed to the cross-piece of the cross, and then taken to the site of the presunken poles where the final assembly was done. That may be where the misconception came into play that the Romans used poles.
You can tell a lot about people by their reactions to what they might see and hear. I know a lot of people who, if they saw the cross on Mars, would probably think something like, "Isn't that great? Man oh man, we serve an awesome God!" Only the types of people whom I described in my first paragraph would have a bad reaction to it. Even our atheist friends would most likely just look at it, consider it a purely random arrangement of materials, and just move on. Somehow, Bob Thiel assumes that it has to fit the Armstrong prophecy mold, and is therefore a sign of the end times, and an indicator that persecution is right around the corner. Unbelievable!
BB
It is so obviously a cross marking a grave site for Martian British Israelism.
All sorts of things are found on Mars. There are faces, statues, crosses, etc. Canals were once found on Mars. These are all figments of overly active imaginations. Mars is basically just rocks, but the Red Planet has been toying with human beings ever since the erroneous canals were identified. My theory is that Mars is the Place of Safety. After all, what could be safer than being off of Earth when human beings blow it up? And Mars does look a lot like the area around Petra. In fact, Jordan is precisely where the movie makers go when they want to film a Martian landscape, and that was done most recently for "The Martian". The landscape scenes in that movie are actually Jordan. So those prophesied wings of eagles are not earthbound jets after all, but rather spaceships which will take the chosen to Mars. Which means we have a while to go before the end is at hand because right now the technology for getting many people to Mars is either not available or is not being deployed due to cost. So relax. Eat, drink, and be merry.
The cross is a talisman against tithe-sucking vampires!
"Joined the Dark Side, JazzHands has. Lies, deceit, creating mistrust are his ways now."
"Hope holds to Christ the mind’s own mirror out to take His lovely likeness more and more."
DBP
I think you're on to something there, k-baradanikto!
I'm sure Mr. E.W. King is on his way to bamboozle Elon Musk!
DBP
Is he against women "crossing their legs" too??
"A Christian believes that through it, what ever has separated us from God has been taken away. Wiped clean. Something the law, sabbath keeping, kosher eating and holy day keeping cannot do."
So, after having the slate "wiped clean" does this mean we can willfully continue to do what we were doing WRONG, that which "separated us from Yehovah", without impunity?
cheers
ralph.f
I guess The Doubly Blessed Prophet Bob has never heard Louie Giglio talk about Laminin, which is a cell adhesion protein that holds the human body together.
Laminin exists in the shape of the cross.
So, perhaps if The Prophet learned about Laminin, he’d find it better to cut off this wicked, offending part of his body then to be cast into hell with cross-shaped Laminin throughout his body.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0-NPPIeeRk
March 5, 2016 at 1:00 PM
Black Ops Mikey wrote...
"It is so obviously a cross marking a grave site for Martian British Israelism."
LOL
Since the theory that DNA science refutes British/Israelim and it has been proved that DNA can be changed, how can such a grave site be marked?
I have been given to understand that you can even change your own DNA.
Listen to a 30 minute discussion here:- https://prophecywatchers.com/videos/tom-horn-and-joe-ardis-inhuman/
Copy and paste, tag doesn't seem to be working.
cheers
ralph.f
ps . correction
In my last post the last two words should read "with impunity".
No, Ralph. That would be what is known in theological circles as "cheap grace"
However, so long as we are human, it is impossible to keep from reoffending. It's a good thing that Jesus paid the price for mankind's sin debt past, present, and future!
Also, one must be sure that whatever teacher is allowed to define sin actually has a good understanding of the New Covenant, as explained in Romans and Galatians. Haughty Phariseeism certainly becomes a deep and offensive sin.
BB
Ralph:"So, after having the slate "wiped clean" does this mean we can willfully continue to do what we were doing WRONG, that which "separated us from Yehovah", without impunity?
YES!! Let HWA and his posse be your guides! Well, at least that is how HWA lived it.
DBP
That tired old "sin with impunity" caricature? Get a new argument, Ralph, or get out of your house more.
on March 5, 2016 at 10:30 PM
Byker Bob wrote:-
"However, so long as we are human, it is impossible to keep from reoffending."
Yes BB, couldn't agree more. Even so, shouldn't we do the best we can to NOT reoffend. For example, I read sometime in the past that HWA, while continuing to teach the dietary laws would eat pork if it was set before him him at a meal with VIP's he was trying to impress. His reason for this was so as not to be seen to offend. To me this would seem to be a 'willful sin'. Not offending his hosts but offending against Yehovah. What do you think?
I am reminded of this scripture:-
"Rom 6:1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?
Rom 6:2 God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?"
also:-
"....whatever teacher is allowed to define sin...."
I believe the best 'teacher' is the Holy Bible with this verse:-
"1Jn_3:4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law."
and I understand the 'law' to be the DECALOGUE and its extensions.
cheers
ralph.f
Ralph, I have never run across a single Christian church that teaches that the Christian can continue to sin with impunity. That's not to say that such churches don't exist, but if they do, they are certainly not in the mainstream of Christianity.
Also, what would you make of Exodus 34:27-28?
27. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write thou these words: for after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel.
28. And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, THE TEN COMMANDMENTS.
This is from the King James Version of the Holy Bible, the version favored by HWA/WCG, and it plainly states that the words of what we now call the Old Covenant were in fact the Ten Commandments.
BB
"However, so long as we are human, it is impossible to keep from reoffending."
Oh, now I understand how Roderick Meredith managed to avoid committing any major sin after his baptism. He's not actually human.
from March 6, 2016 at 10:12 AM
Byker Bob, by writing " and it plainly states that the words of what we now call the Old Covenant were in fact the Ten Commandments."
are you inferring that the Ten Commandments constitute the Old Covenant and have become redundant because of the New Covenant?
cheers
ralph.f
Yep, Ralph. First of all, those verses are not original with me. I didn't make them up. But, what you asked is indeed the case. The new ones from the New Covenant are the ones Jesus repeated, calling them "my commandments". These are the "two great commandments of the Lord" (TGCOL), and also His admonitions in the Beatitudes, and the Sermon on the Mount, and any others to which He called attention to during His ministry. The original commandments have been expanded to their full spiritual intent, encompassing the royal law of love rather than physical legalism. HWA didn't understand 1/3 of God, so had to substitute and enforce all of the fulfilled physical legalism of the O.C.
BB
Then, if you read Paul, Ralph, Christians are under the New Covenant and grace, while "the law" still is the standard that convicts non-Christians. If you want to remain under the law, you must keep all of the law, and perfectly. As we know, that has proven to be impossible for everyone except the Son of God.
BB
Someone recently mentioned "cheap grace".
But, I'd like to point out COGs and Ralp preach "Cheap Law".
Regarding the law, God only accepts perfect obedience to the entire law.
COGs and Ralph preach less than God's demand for perfection by picking their law favorites and then failing to come close to performing perfection.
That's "Cheap Law" - haphazard choice of law with haphazard delivery - and God is not impressed.
Coincedently, COGs and Ralph have little understanding of, use for, and a long record of ignoring grace.
However, grace and justification deliver one hundred percent perfect righteousness.
One, among many, ways to prove GOGs do not understand the New Covenant is simple counting.
One can count the articles, telecasts, sermons, and conversational mentions of law and any of the New Covenant terms.
Law, or rather COGs' self-styled "Cheap Law", is millions of mentions beyond the hallmarks of the Superior Covenant.
from March 6, 2016 at 4:13 PM
Byker Bob, you wrote:-
"Then, if you read Paul, Ralph, Christians are under the New Covenant and grace...."
So BB, what do you see as the New Covenant?
cheers
ralph.f
on March 6, 2016 at 5:50 PM
Anon wrote:-
"Regarding the law, God only accepts perfect obedience to the entire law."
Where is that written and what do you see as "the entire law".
cheers
ralph.f
Ralph,
The example in the New Testament involves believing that Jesus Christ paid for our sins, being baptized which symbolizes the death of the old self, receiving the Holy Spirit, and then living by Jesus' commandments. The New Covenant is embodied by the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, the Two Great Commanments of the Lord, and what has been called the Golden Rule. It is further explained by Paul especially in the epistle to the Galatians. Also, by the edict from the first Jerusalem Council, delivered by James in the book of Acts.
Try reading Galatians, now with the passages from Exodus in mind. Those passages provide the key to understanding Galatians.
BB
The passage regarding the keeping of the entire law, or being under a curse, is somewhere in Isaiah or Jeremiah. As a working man, I don't have time to research it out this morning. But it refers to the entire 613 of the Old Covenant.
BB
So Ralph, are you saying God does not require perfect obedience?
So, how lazy ass are you allowed to get with the law?
For the answer to your question about what level of obedience God requires, please see the entire Old testament.
BB - I think you were referring a verse St. Paul re-stated in Galatians 3:10:
For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.”
Poor cursed Ralph and all the cursed COGers. They don’t have to be cursed but, their long-standing and extensive record of rejecting the terms of the New Covenant and their haphazard attempt at keeping the defunct Old Covenant leave them in a miserable spot.
I’ll also throw in Galatians 3:11-14 for some New Covenant terms that COGers like to ignore while doing their superiority dance:
Clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God, because “the righteous will live by faith.”[f] 12 The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, it says, “The person who does these things will live by them.”[g] 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.”[h] 14 He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.
Couldn’t resist a few more I came across this morning:
Galatians 1:6
I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—
I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”
Galatians 3:18
For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on the promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise.
Ephesians 2:8
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—
Ahh BB and the rest.
I prefer the scriptural edition of the New Covenant, found in both the Old:-
"Jer 31:31 Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I WILL MAKE A NEW COVENANT with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah:
Jer 31:32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:
Jer 31:33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people."
and the New Testament:-
"Heb 8:10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:"
So, now I am able to "keep the commandments", the Decalogue and its extensions, not because I have to but "BECAUSE I WANT TO, WITH ALL MY HEART AND MIND."
A pity about the many who hide behind anonymous!
cheers
ralph.f
on March 7, 2016 at 7:24 AM
Anonymous wrote:-
"BB - I think you were referring a verse St. Paul re-stated in Galatians 3:10:
For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.”
So Anon, if this is also your belief then what do you consider to be "The works of the law"?
also:-
"Clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God, because “the righteous will live by faith...."
Concerning Galatians, to what 'law' do you suppose this is referring?
also:-
"....13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written:...."
What do you imagine the "curse of the law" to be?
Finally:-
Mat 19:17 And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God: but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.
Rev 22:14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
cheers
ralph.f
Ralph - Flashbacks of Armstrongism come at odd times. In the shower this morning, for some strange reason, I started singing “Oh How Love I Thy Law”. Then, after a good laugh, I started wondering if any COG congregation could ever sing “Oh How Love I Jesus”! I just couldn’t picture it.
One cruel joke I’ve played on COG friends and family is to challenge them to say things like: “Hallelujah, Jesus is my Savior” or “I love my Savior, Jesus” – then I watch them squirm. It’s difficult for them to repeat such Protestant sounding nonsense.
I’ve had to apologize for toying with them, and so I guess I must do the same to you too Ralph. I’m sorry; I should have known better than to try to discuss the New Covenant with an Armstrongite.
However, to answer your questions; yes, the law God writes on hearts in minds is not the same law as in the Old Covenant. As holy scripture states, the New Covenant is superior to and not like the Old Covenant. The laws God writes on hearts and minds is an application of the parts of the law known to COGers.
Regarding Matthew 19, Ralph, I’ve mentioned twice that you miss the context of the passage when you ignore the part about selling all your possessions to give to the poor. That willful ignoring of the words of Jesus should have sufficiently explained to me that there’s no use discussing the topic with you.
Regarding Revelations 22:14, COGers have no clue as to the law God is referencing here.
At times, COGers will admit that it is now forbidden to command that males be circumcised but, then they go mum when you mention that circumcision was a forever sign. However, even in light of discussing circumcision and animal sacrifices they will still insist that not one jot or tittle has changed from the law.
How can you argue with logic like that? They just don’t get what “all things” have been fulfilled and what Jesus meant when He said, “it is finished”.
Oh well; now for the sake of peace, won’t you join me in raising a glass and singing a rousing round of “How Love I Jesus”?
Ralph,
The best paper I've read on the works of the law is at
www.ewtn.com/library/ ANSWERS/WORK-LAW.htm
You did a great job of reminding us of the Herbert W. Armstrong version, but I believe Mr. Armstrong missed several key points and made some unwarranted leaps.
BB
"So, now I am able to "keep the commandments", the Decalogue and its extensions, not because I have to but "BECAUSE I WANT TO, WITH ALL MY HEART AND MIND.""
Good luck! Mother Nature can only be conquered through obedience!
DBP
Dear Booby T,
"booby t" sounds like a rap star's name.
But, just wait a minute thar, boobalooie!
Your "t" looks like a cross, sadly and of course the "t" in Thiel, and even unto the "t" in "Robert"!
And what about your math? Gotta get rid of that plus sign. It's a cross!
How about you replace "+" with something like, "plork"?
That way, "One dose + one dose = a double dose" becomes, "One dose plork one dose = a double dose"
Isn't that better?
You can call yourself "God's Boob of Holy Plorkage"!
Lol k-baradanikto,
I remember that when an astronomer mapped the surface of a planet, it was actually his "eye floaters" that he was mapping. I forget if it was Mars or even the Moon he was mapping, and even which astronomer it was.
Sorry I can't be more specific off the cuff, but I'm sure you get the jist.
Women "crossing their legs" is ok. That hides the naughty bits.
So is crossing the arms over cleavage, no matter how many layers of sweatshirts it's hidden beneath. I heard that today's youts can purchase X-Ray glasses from the back of a magazine.
Young impressionable youths shouldn't be allowed to be corrupted by seeing ladies' "Jezebels" and "Korahs"
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