For those who have not read these open letters, you may want to do a little bit of historical reading as a Christian Evangelist takes on Herbert Armstrong in the form of three open letters.
Maurice McArdle Johnson (November 28, 1893 – December 12, 1979) was a Christian Evangelist, Pastor, and Teacher, predominantly in the Southern California area who, early in his career, went through a process of separating from organized religion. He was instrumental in establishing Christian assemblies across the United States which are mostly still in existence." (Wikipedia, deleted archive)
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| Photo from Maurice Johnson Archives |
"MR. ARMSTRONG: After I began announcing this "Open Letter," is it true that you began making recordings of some of my radio messages in the hope that you could get material for a "slander" suit against me?
YOU accuse me of slander? You who have slandered every Christian preacher and Bible teacher who ever lived; you, who slanders the Lord from heaven; you, who slanders the gospel of the grace of God; you, who slanders the holy 10 commandment law of God by your miserable pretense of keeping it; you, who slanders the TEMPLE OF GOD yet to be restored in Jerusalem by having your silly little "Feast of Tabernacles" and "Feast of Passover" over in Gladewater, Texas, in that puny little shed [unfinished tabernacle]; YOU are hoping to sue me at Ceaser's court for slander? Maybe the report is ill-founded!
God willing, before I shall have completed these "Open Letters" to you I will have given clear, unforced proof of my accusations concerning your slandering the Christ of the Bible and your blasphemous caricature of "the church of God," called by you "The Radio Church of God."
Guest contributor: SHT
17 comments:
Herbert was such a narcissist that he would have ignored the man. All he had to do is say the man was unconverted and that ended the subject, even though everything the man said was true.
This is what the liars in charge do today. God has blessed them, set them apart to restore true faith, and since the rest of the unconverted so-called Christians might mean well, they are deceived and frauds.
Love his statement in letter 3 "There's not a money thirsty collection agency in the land that couldn't learn something from "God's $ucce$$ful idea man," the one and only true Apostle, Herbert W Armstrong."
Love THIS:
"How ridiculous the verse would be if "under the law" means "LAW-BREAKING." Any fool should know that if one does NOT sin, then sin COULD NOT have dominion over him. In that case he wouldn't need grace ( undeserved goodness ). On the other hand, if a Christian is "under grace" only when he "keeps the ten commandments" then just one sin dooms him and all other sinners to the lake of fire, and there are NO ten commandment KEEPERS on earth today. So, if God's grace is only for LAW-KEEPERS there will be no one saved by grace for grace, according to your distortion of Rom. 6:14, is only for those who need no salvation since they "keep the law." Herbert which one of your 'brain-washed" assistants was it that wrote in "Plain Truth" ( plain trash ) about preachers who use MUMBO-JUMBO double talk. Most of you law and grace "adulterers" are satanic experts in mumbo-jumbo double talk.
Your whole scheme of doctrine centers around the lie that God created Adam and Eve with "carnal natures" and mortal bodies. You argue that having finally and painfully learned that their "God-created" natures were lawless and dying , maybe they might decide to "keep the commandment law of God" in order to (afterward) get the Holy Spirit and thereby become a "begotten son of God." But since this is what you teach about Jesus of Nazareth also, with His "God-created carnality" ("Flesh and blood mortality") and His MERELY "begotten" (not yet born) spiritual life--I say since your "Christ" was a mortal man with nothing but a "germ" spiritual life, He was neither above or superior to PRESIDENT ARMSTRONG, for instance. Move over, Lucifer!"
Maurice Johnson was a great man of God. Herbert Armstrong was of the devil.
Fascinating. Thank you for sharing these. I'm curious about when these letters were written and what HWA might of written in his own letters and writings. Anon 11:59 I'm not so sure this would have rolled off HWA's back. Narcissistic personalities actually have very fragile egos, they are constantly trying to affirm their greatness and entitlement. In looking over transcripts of his sermons HWA was often putting down other well known preachers such as Billy Graham and placing his own achievements up higher.
Whether you agree with Maurice Johnson's theology or not he certainly had a number of strong points against HWA. The lifting of scripture out of context, the plagiarism, the hypocrisy, all pretty well laid out quite nicely. Pity he couldn't have reached a wider audience.
The man told Armstrong the truth and I loved all the adjectives he used for him. Armstrong ruined a lot of peoples lives with his negativity and threats to feed his greed in the name of his god (money). Jesus was not part of his equation. My grown offspring are still suffering from all of this all these many years later. And I am in therapy to overcome the guilt of having raised my offspring in Armstrongs satanic cult.
I couldn't figure out what this guy is saying either. Replacing one form of illogic with another is hardly an improvement. It's more just yelling my theology is better than yours.
man...that dude is messed up!
and to think that you folks poke fun at HWA....lol
ole Maurice is in for some more surprise when he wakes up in a little over 1000yr.
hopefully it's take the ball and run with it.
11.05 PM
I thought his theology 'messed up' as well. But that doesn't invalidate every complaint about Herb. It's beneficial to have another minister challenge Herbs self exaltation of Pope Herb the infallible.
The 144,000 in Revelation follow Christ, not some minister or church culture. You don't hear that in Herbs splinters.
Maurice is probably in heaven right now. You might be getting some surprises, though.
we agree...HWA's idea that he led the entire Church is completely wrong...
who in their right mind would think that you can't be in The Church unless you are affiliated with his organization?...
and his whole "government" thing was/is totally unbibilical...along with the idea that God always works through 1 man...sheesh, there were 13 apostles out there doing the work, and nothing indicates that Peter was the boss.
there will be many many more in the first resurrection that never heard of HWA than there will be that had.
The problem with some of the followers of Armstrong is the ability to separate doctrine from conduct. They think they have such complete and whole doctrine that nothing else matters. Someone could make valid criticism concerning Hwa or a leading minister they would look for one scripture the person used that they disagree with to invalidate the critic. Imagine if Christ had some great sounding doctrines but he was a liar,cheat,thieve, would that invalidate his claims of being the son of God? So when ministers do these things consistently through the years does it invalidate their claims of being God's true ministers? I once heard Dr.Meredith say that if you criticize God's ministers you'll never make it to the kingdom. He also had the guts to say that it is better to blindly follow the leading minister even though he may be wrong than to not follow him and he be right(context was the place of safety). People are conditioned to think the way they do from the pulpit and they don't even recognise how their minds and critical thinking skills are being tampered with. Its something else since so many people that just had the intention of worshipping God in a bible based church are being manipulated and brainwashed to the delight of many crafty Leaders.
The problem with some of the followers of Armstrong is the ability to separate doctrine from conduct. They think they have such complete and whole doctrine that nothing else matters. Someone could make valid criticism concerning Hwa or a leading minister they would look for one scripture the person used that they disagree with to invalidate the critic. Imagine if Christ had some great sounding doctrines but he was a liar,cheat,thieve, would that invalidate his claims of being the son of God? So when ministers do these things consistently through the years does it invalidate their claims of being God's true ministers? I once heard Dr.Meredith say that if you criticize God's ministers you'll never make it to the kingdom. He also had the guts to say that it is better to blindly follow the leading minister even though he may be wrong than to not follow him and he be right(context was the place of safety). People are conditioned to think the way they do from the pulpit and they don't even recognise how their minds and critical thinking skills are being tampered with. Its something else since so many people that just had the intention of worshipping God in a bible based church are being manipulated and brainwashed to the delight of many crafty Leaders.
Maurices open letters, even if they had been widely publicized, would probably have fallen on deaf ears among HWAs followers. Johnson relies on and provides an argument based on the Bible as well as later Christian thought. Armstrongs followers probably would have found much of that puzzling; they were used to HWAs text-advertising style in which a hyperbolic threat or assertion was followed immediately by a carefully chosen (sometimes overly cropped) prooftext. As a result, no matter how logical Johnsons argument may be, the Armstrongist finds it unexciting and easy to dismiss.
HWA wasn't alone in putting down the ministers of those other denominations. I remember
very well GTA ridiculing them on the old WT radio program back in 1962. Forgot what he called
them at the time. Came close to slander or what would be today. A real prime example of what NOT to say about others. But they got away with it at the time.
Anon 9:53 AM, this still goes on in LCG. HQ pastor Mike DeSimone has become infamous for teaching the brethren to obey the ministry unthinkingly, and has divided families with this teaching.
Yes. In some you do.
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