HERBERT ARMSTRONG, 93, DIES
HERBERT ARMSTRONG, 93, DIES; EVANGELIST AND A BROADCASTER
Special to the New York Times
Published: January 17, 1986
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 16— Herbert W. Armstrong, the broadcasting evangelist who was founder and pastor general of the Worldwide Church of God, died today at his home in Pasadena, Calif. He was 93 years old. Church officials said no official cause of death had been established, but they added that Mr. Armstrong's health had been declining about four months because of a heart ailment.
Mr. Armstrong presided as the ''Chosen Apostle'' of God over the wealthy fundamentalist Christian church, as well as over the Ambassador College and the Ambassador International College Foundation, both in Pasadena. The Ambassador Auditorium on the campus is a lavish concert hall where famous musicians and artists have performed.
The church publishes Plain Truth magazine and broadcasts television programs on 374 stations around the world, David Hulme, a church spokesman, said.
Officials of the 80,000-member church announced last Tuesday that Mr. Armstrong had named Joseph Tkach, 59, as his successor. Ralph K. Helge, the church's general counsel, said in a statement that Mr. Armstrong had felt it was time to ''pass the baton'' and establish a new spiritual leader to avert dissent when he died. Advertising Career, Then Radio
Herbert Armstrong was born July 31, 1892, to Horace and Eva Armstrong in Des Moines. In 1934 the young Mr. Armstrong abandoned a career in advertising to found the Radio Church of God in 1934 with the first broadcast of his program, ''The World Tomorrow.''
He incorporated his California ministry in in 1947 as the Worldwide Church of God and began spreading his conservative beliefs with alternately fiery and folksy sermons. The religion is a blend of fundamental Christianity, non-belief in the trinity and some tenets of Judaism and Seventh-Day Sabbath doctrine.
Members pay the church at least 10 percent and as much as 20 to 30 percent of their income, and celebrate Passover and Yom Kippur as holy days rather than Easter and Christmas. Mr. Armstrong espoused creationism and enjoying material wealth as a sign of divine favor; he held that he was preparing his followers for a Utopia to be ruled by Jesus. Controversy and Feud With Son
The church has been embroiled in controversy, ranging from the estrangement of Mr. Armstrong and his son, Garner Ted Armstrong, to lawsuits by former church members and an investigation by the state Attorney General of reports of mismanagement of church funds.
As membership swelled in the mid-1970's, trouble arose between Mr. Armstrong and Garner Ted Armstrong, his youngest child and heir apparent. The son appeared weekly on 165 television stations across the country as the voice of ''The World Tomorrow'' and was executive vice president of the church.
The church had a strict policy against remarriage for divorced people that required new church members to dissolve second marriages and remarry their original spouses. Garner Ted Armstrong vehemently opposed rescinding that order and his father's subsequent marriage in 1977 to a second wife, Ramona, 44 years old and divorced. His first wife, Loma, died in 1967. He divorced the second in 1984.
Mr. Armstrong and his son also argued over control of the college, the auditorium, and other holdings. Herbert Armstrong excommunicated his son in 1978. Case Led to Curb in Law
Garner Ted Armstrong, supported by some former church members, subsequently charged that his father and other officials had spent millions of the church's estimated $60 million annual income on personal expenses. In 1979 the Attorney General's office got a court order to place the church in receivership, saying the officials had ''looted'' $1 million a year from tithed funds.
The case was dropped in 1980 after a new state law, prompted by the Armstrong case, prohibited the Attorney General from investigating the finances of religious groups for fraud and mismanagement.
The father-son rift was never healed. ''I tried repeatedly to contact my father up until two weeks ago, but it was all to no avail,'' Garner Ted Armstrong said in an interview from the headquarters of his Church of God International at Tyler, Tex. ''He had a heart condition, and I knew his health was failing quite rapidly. My sister said he died quietly while sitting in a chair.''
Herbert Armstrong also leaves his daughters Beverly Gott and Dorothy Mattson, eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Arrangements for private funeral services are pending.
photo of Herbert Armstrong (AP)
23 comments:
32 years later and the church has nothing to show for its self. Hundreds of splinter groups, dead leaders, ruined marriages, suicides, rampant sexiual immorality, destroyed lives and wannabe prophets. What an absolute pathetic mess!
HWA is rolling over in his grave at the thought of Bob Thiel starting his own splinter group to carry on the truth. HWA would have kicked Dreamy Bob to the curb so fast it would have made his head spin. What a farce.
It would have been great if his body was fed to rabid dogs.
Sadly and of course, rabid followers of Herbie will totally miss the humongous happy herbified hot-dog humor. They are the "must-tards" attempting to provide pervasive perverse pretzel logic personality to potential recruits.
What an absolute pathetic mess!
And in his annual tribute to HWA's death, Bob Thiel again posts a photo of "everything else is pagan" HWA sporting his Japanese "Sacred Treasure" medal. And Bob posts some of HWA's self-congratulatory text, including, ironically, the Seven Laws of Success...
In some ways I really don't know what is worse...being in a COG organization with HWA alive or dead? Even though people appeared to be "united" while HWA was alive, most were just playing church.
Now, that most are in splinters (and/or using on-line resources), we have a chance to be more serious about what we are doing. With the smaller groups their is more access to the Ministry.
Their are some smaller organizations with Ministers who try and teach The Bible (and have a much greater understanding than what HWA had). It has taken many of us years to realize that he wasn't an Apostle or Prophet.
Meanwhile, PCG ministurds are combing the news looking for anything they can attiribute to HWAs death date. Oh, hey, a guy in Alberta fell off the roof of his house. GODS FAITHFUL ELECT MUST NEVER FORGET HWA QUOTING "LET HE WHO IS ON THE HOUSETOP NOT COME DOWN"!!!
Interestingly enough, Joe Tkach Sr. and HWA are buried in the same cemetery according to the website "FIND A GRAVE".
Anon 10:07 your comment:
32 years later and the church has nothing to show for its self. Hundreds of splinter groups, dead leaders, ruined marriages, suicides, rampant sexual immorality, destroyed lives and wannabe prophets. What an absolute pathetic mess! ....... COULDN'T HAVE BEEN SAID MORE PERFECTLY!
It is all like a bad dream that never goes away and grows exponentially worse.
Pagan religions are not evil. They are just religions. Pagan religions are having a revival in Europe where Christianity is seen by some as an import from a foreign culture and a foreign land (the middle east). There is a significant number of people who want to return to their European roots. When the pope said Europe should rediscover its roots, this is not what he was hoping for. Their real roots are pagan.
Anonymous on January 16, 2018 at 10:07 AM said...“32 years later and the church has nothing to show for its self. Hundreds of splinter groups, dead leaders, ruined marriages, suicides, rampant sexiual immorality, destroyed lives and wannabe prophets. What an absolute pathetic mess!”
Herbert W. Armstrong taught the following:
Sardis era: The Church of God, Seventh Day.
Philadelphia era: The Worldwide Church of God under HWA.
Laodicea era: The current ungodly MESS.
Remember this and think about it often.
This is currently the LAODICEA ERA.
They SAY that they are “rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing” and know not that they REALLY ARE “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked” (see Revelation 3:17, KJV).
To make matters even worse, some people joined satanic imposter cults led by raging false prophets like Flurry, Pack, Weinland, and Thiel.
9.36 PM
We have thought about it often. If Herbs era was genuinely the Philadelphian era, this blog with its exposure of minister gangsterism would not exist.
I suggest you try doing your own mental heavy lifting rather than just hitting us with other ministers 'cut and paste.' Think about that often.
Anon 9:36PM, if you free your mind and look at the facts, doesn't it seem that we are TODAY in a "Sardis Era" with so many scattered little groups -- many more such scattered little groups than were present 100 years ago or even 500 years ago.
The major fault of the Thyatira Era is that it looks to a Jezebel instead of Jesus Christ. In WCG, people would say this meant Ellen G. White. Today, can't we easily add Herbert Armstrong to that mix? Many groups have taken HWA's message and turned it into a message about HWA.
We are told that God entrusted the Jews with the oracles. The Jews believe we are in year 5778. What if they are right and the WCG's spin doctors were wrong? Maybe we are right now transitioning from Thyatira to Sardis, with the Philadelphia Era still in the future.
The Philadelphia Era is characterized by brotherly love, not by the two top leaders of the church committing incest and widespread fornication. Look at the ministerial backbiting throughout WCG and its splinters, and I have a hard time labeling that "Philadelphia" Era behavior.
There are no church eras. That is a false and extra-Biblical doctrine. William Miller, author of the first disappointment, taught church eras and that the Laodicean era started in the 1840s. This is Hebrew year 5778, if you also believe the extra-Biblical doctrine of “6,000 years for man and 1,000 years for God.”
The earlier poster, 10:07, had it right. Actually, HWA/WCG were completely irrelevant. Had they had “the truth”, we would have been in the Millennium starting in 1975. God could have validated HWA by making that happen, but took a pass on that opportunity, making HWA just like Flurry, Pack, Weinland, and Thiel.
BB
"Herbert W. Armstrong taught the following:
Sardis era: The Church of God, Seventh Day.
Philadelphia era: The Worldwide Church of God under HWA.
Laodicea era: The current ungodly MESS."
Remember this...If Herbie taught it...IT IS ALL UNGODLY... and think about THAT often.
Just like Hitler, HWA is still alive and living in Argentina!
It's true Connie.
I am actually contemplating to acquire myself one of those Hollywood silicone faces of HWA and rent a white limousine only to pull up behind BB at the Walmarts and see his face.
I don't think I will survive it, either by BB's reaction or getting a heart attack from laughter.
nck
When I think of HWA, I automatically think of David Koresh of the Branch Davidians. The were both off-the-rails Millerites. Both shared a number of central beliefs. One was violent and the other was not. One was a racist and the other was not. So there are dissimilarities.
The legacy of both men is their lasting influence on their followers. The Branch Davidians survive to this day and still believe that the road to salvation is The Seven Seals of Revelation. Armstrongists church fragments still exist today and still believe much of what HWA believed as if he spoke Ex Cathedra. Both men are highly regarded by their followers as special men from God.
This is remarkable because in order to believe in the greatness of Koresh and HWA, both on the Davidian side and the Armstrongist side, so much must be discounted, overlooked and denied. We could say the same thing about Donald Trump's followers so it is a phenomenon that is widespread. It does underscore the fact that some people's minds will not change. And they class this as being faithful to the truth once delivered and do not recognize that it is actually being stubbornly persistent in error.
There is an unusual egocentricity to believing in Koresh and HWA. I am not sure there is a cure for this odd egocentricity. Maybe God has given such people over to reprobation. The outcome is that I think the influence of Koresh and Armstrong will be perpetuated by the working of this egocentricity in the minds of a small number of dogged people.
It's true. The Satan-inspired fake news would have you think that our Leader is deceased, but- GLORY TO GOD- He isn't!
I saw Him last weekend at a 7-11 in South America, next to Elvis, sipping on a Slurpee-
SCIENCE ALERT! After Herbie and Elvis got brain freezes from sipping those Slurpees, They declared that it was PROOF POSITIVE that 'Global Warming' was nothing but a Chinese hoax!!!
The advent of Mr. Armstrong's teachings ushered in the "Shithole Era" of Christianity.
Sadly and of course, many are still stuck in various Armstrongist shitholes.
Anonymous on January 17, 2018 at 4:30 AM said...“The Jews believe we are in year 5778.”
According to the “6,000 Year Plan” theory, and ignoring all the possible “time will be cut short stuff” before the date arrives, and all the possible “the Lord delays his coming” stuff after the date has passed:
6,000 years – 5,778 years = 222 years remaining.
This seems like a lot more time than is necessary for the LGBTQlmnop agenda to reach bottom.
This seems like a lot more time than is necessary for more countries to make more nukes and delivery systems.
Anonymous on January 17, 2018 at 10:55 AM said...“SCIENCE ALERT! After Herbie and Elvis got brain freezes from sipping those Slurpees, They declared that it was PROOF POSITIVE that 'Global Warming' was nothing but a Chinese hoax!!!”
MIT Professor Emeritus of Atmospheric Science Richard Lindzen talks about "man-made global warming" in a short video called Climate Change: What Do Scientists Say? (5 minutes, 4 seconds). Copy and paste this address into your browser:
https://youtu.be/OwqIy8Ikv-c
Anon 11:58AM wrote:
6,000 years – 5,778 years = 222 years remaining.
This seems like a lot more time than is necessary for the LGBTQlmnop agenda to reach bottom.
This seems like a lot more time than is necessary for more countries to make more nukes and delivery systems.
That's how people felt in 1840 when William Miller was ramping up for his prophetic disappointment.
We have only scratched the surface of cloning and genetic engineering.
A 200 million man army is a lot easier to manage if your generals breed it for themselves.
Pedophilia isn't mainstream (unless you are HWA screwing Dorothy). Necrophilia is still considered inappropriate, as is bestiality.
We're only in the infant stages of government mass-brainwashing of citizens through disinformation and social media engineering.
Every generation thinks it has reached rock bottom, but so far there has always been another bottom beneath that bottom. Another 222 years of that doesn't seem unreasonable.
The LAODICEA ERA appears to be a gigantic waste of everyone's time, effort, and money. Since HWA died, the splinter groups combined have probably wasted over a billion dollars. The people are split into numerous groups that are each teaching different ideas, and all will go into the Great Tribulation. None of them are worth listening to.
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