The Ark of the Covenant: Soon to be discovered by a Church God Group?

For many decades now the Armstrong Churches of God have been rife with conspiracies and soon to be revelations that certain people claim their god has told them. From declaring themselves Elijah's and Joshua's, to being the two witless witnesses, to apostles and prophets and the lunatic fringe who dream dreams and claim double anointing.  Every one of them has been abject failures.

But that has not stopped certain deluded men in the ACOG from self-appointing themselves and making all kinds of fantastical predictions.  Besides the lunacy of Bob Thiel, no one has been more out there than Gerald Flurry.  This guy has truly jumped off the deep end and hit his head on the pool bottom.

After traipsing through the woods of Oregon and digging up a dirty old rock, Flurry has now declared it as the very stone Jesus will return to and sit upon!  But before that happens certain major world discoveries need to happen in order for Flurry to be proved RIGHT in the eyes of the world.  Discovering that stone was just the first step in a bigger discovery to soon take place in Ireland. Gerald Flurry claims his group will soon discover the Ark of the Covenant.  He knows exactly where it is, but dangnabbit, those pesky Jesuit scum won't let him dig up Hill Tara.

Pretty soon though, he and his little group will dig it up and it will be tourist attraction until all hell breaks loose and Armageddon

On the Philadelphia Church of God's Watch Jerusalem site they have this article up:

Finding the Ark of the Covenant

Gerald Flurry writes:

The Ark of the Covenant has inspired a lot of curiosity over the years. The Ark was a holy chest that God instructed the Israelites to build. It represented the throne of God. In the past, it has been the subject of documentaries and movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark.  

Few people are talking about that artifact today. Yet a fascinating verse in the Bible says that in this modern era, many people will be talking about it. The implication is that very soon, the Ark of the Covenant is going to be found!  

That verse is found in Jeremiah, a book of prophecy that was written for this end time (Jeremiah 30:1-9). So this prophecy about the Ark is for us today. 

If the Ark were found, it would electrify many people around the world!  

People don’t know where the Ark is, but I believe that the Bible—and a certain nation’s history—tell us in which country it is located today.

Gerald then goes on to proclaim that the Ark of the Covenant will soon be a tourist attraction.

Examine Jeremiah 3:16 carefully. It says that once the Messiah comes, “they shall say no more, The ark of the covenant of the Lord.” They won’t say it anymore—which means they were saying it at some point. People are not saying it now, but according to this prophecy, there is coming a time when they will be saying it! “[N]either shall it come to mind: neither shall they remember it; neither shall they visit it; neither shall that be done anymore.”  

Notice that shocking statement: God says people won’t visit the Ark anymore! Do you know any place today where people visit the Ark? There isn’t any such place, but God here describes a time when people will visit the Ark of the Covenant.  

Remember, the time frame is leading up to the Tribulation and the coming of the Messiah. These scriptures refer to the time we are living in now. Just before the Tribulation, many people will be visiting the ark like a tourist attraction, according to this prophecy. It sounds like it has created a world sensation! I don’t see how you can understand this prophecy any other way.

So just how does Gerald Flurry KNOW that the ark is there?  Because none other thanHerbert Armstrong said so!   If he said it, it HAS TO BE TRUE! There can be no other explanation!

The ancient nation of Judah fell to the Babylonians in 585 b.c.e.In the siege, the king of Babylon killed all the sons of Judah’s King Zedekiah. Most people believe that the royal line of King David ended at that point. But if you study 2 Samuel 7:12-16, you see that God had promised to establish David’s lineage on that throne forever! If David never had another royal descendant—if the throne of David ceased with Zedekiah—then God’s promise would have been broken.  

However, as Herbert W. Armstrong proved in his book The United States and Britain in Prophecy, that throne did not cease. God kept His promise by keeping a royal descendant of David—not a son of Zedekiah but a daughter—alive. He preserved her with the help of the Prophet Jeremiah, whom God allowed to escape Babylonian captivity.  

“The real ancient history of Ireland is very extensive, though colored with some legend. But with the facts of biblical history and prophecy in mind, one can easily sift out the legend from the true history in studying ancient Irish annals,” Mr. Armstrong wrote.
[I]n 569 b.c. (date of Jeremiah’s transplanting), an elderly, white-haired patriarch, sometimes referred to as a ‘saint,’ came to Ireland. With him was the princess daughter of an eastern king and a companion called ‘Simon Brach,’ spelled in different histories as Breck, Berech, Brach or Berach.” This is Jeremiah’s scribe, Baruch. “The princess had a Hebrew name Tephi—a pet name—her full name being Tea-Tephi. … This royal party included the son of the king of Ireland who had been in Jerusalem at the time of the siege. There he had become acquainted with Tea-Tephi. He married her shortly after 585—when the city fell. Their young son, now about 12 years of age, accompanied them to Ireland. 

As Mr. Armstrong proved in his book, this royal line was thus preserved in the British Isles. It can be traced directly to the British throne. 

Irish annals show that when Jeremiah migrated to Ireland, he brought with him more than just the princess of Judah who carried on David’s throne. “Besides the royal family, Jeremiah brought with them some remarkable things,” Mr. Armstrong continued, “including a harp, an ark, and a wonderful stone called ‘lia-fail,’ or ‘stone of destiny’” (op. cit., emphasis mine).  

The “stone of destiny” is also called “Jacob’s pillar stone.” It is the stone the patriarch Jacob set up to memorialize the promise God made to him in Genesis 28—that his descendants would become as numerous as “the dust of the earth.” This stone remained with the nation of Israel throughout its history. And when Jeremiah fled Jerusalem, he took this stone with him.  

We know where this stone is today: It is in Scotland, in Edinburgh Castle. In recent years, faithless critics have tried to discredit the origins of this stone—but for hundreds of years its true origins were widely accepted and understood. Queen Elizabeth was crowned over it, as was Tea-Tephi’s royal son anciently. 

Notice that along with that stone, Jeremiah brought the Ark of the Covenant on his journey to Ireland!

Not only is the Ark in Hill Tara, but Flurry claims that the 10 commandments are there as well.

In Volume i of The Journal of the British Archeological Association, published in 1895, an essay called “The Hill of Tara” by R. H. McDonald referred to the work of the Irish archaeologist Dr. Denis Hanan: “‘Tara,’ says Dr. Hanan, is almost pure Hebrew for Torah, which means ‘law,’ and the original tables of the law were in the Ark which, curiously enough, Irish history says is buried with Tea.”  

Note that! Tara comes from torah—God’s law! There is a well-known connection between the famous Tara Hill and the law of God!  

This is amazing history. The tablets of the Ten Commandments were written by the very finger of God! (Exodus 31:18; 34:1, 28). God personally gave them to Moses, and they were placed within the Ark of the Covenant (Deuteronomy 10:5; 1 Kings 8:9).  

According to these archaeologists and historians, these tablets were buried with Tea-Tephi in Tara Hill! Why don’t we hear more about this history? It is clearly recorded in Ireland’s history books. This simply cannot be chalked up as a “legend” or “myth” of Irish history!

Flurry and the rest of the splinter cult leaders in the Armstrong Churches of God just cannot get past all of these "physical" things they claim we will all be worshipping or looking towards.  It is just like many who claim the temple will be rebuilt in Jerusalem and all of humanity will go there.

The problem in all of that is that if one is truly following the one claiming to be Jesus, there is no need for any of these artifacts or physical things pointing to something in a kingfom where the One is already there.  That "something" will already be here.  People will be rejoicing in that instead of standing in line to look at some rocks or other objects of desire.