"While ministers claim they are speaking godliness, truth, life, and hope,
70 years of historical fact and evidence has proven it has been a
volatile, cancerous mass of lies, deceptions, greed, and life-sucking, vampire-like,
materialistic full-blown deception straight from the depths of the most harmful and destructive methods ever used by religion for greedy,
unconscionably executed acts."
Over and over again, in the New Testament writings, on every occasion while talking with the Pharisees and the Sadducees, Jesus exemplified the greater elements of the Law which are activated and enabled by the Spirit of God. These attributes are defined by the Fruits of the Spirit, such as gentleness, meekness, love, temperance, patience, peace, mercy, joy, and self-control.
These have been the qualities of perfection that Jesus continually said to strive for – to bring the soul and spirit to perfection in Jesus – through the power of the Spirit. To become more like God – in love, in attributes – and less like Satan – who is defined by actions that are contrary to the fruits of God as listed above.
What the Churches of God in Armstrong did – and continue to do – is completely and totally disrespect the foundation and function of the intention of the Law of God through the highlighting of activities that do nothing whatsoever to blossom the spiritual fruits of the Spirit of God.
Sabbath keeping – as good in intention as members are to try to please God by keeping the Sabbath – fall short, for one very glaring reason. You can keep the Sabbath with complete physical compliance and completely break it by the slightest impure thought, the slightest illegal transaction – and a million other possible code violations of the Spirit. Jesus continually tried to hammer this point home to the legalistic Pharisees whenever they boasted at how they were the chosen and called ones because of their compliance to the Law. They were not. The Spirit of God calls for a higher code than Sabbath keeping.
The same exact principle is in play for Holy Day keeping (another form of Sabbath Keeping). There is absolutely no way, as good in intention as anyone possibly could be, will meet God's standard no matter how compliant one is physically. Because regardless of sunset times, work avoidance, looking at the moon, barley, or any other physical compliance of an ancient national code, these activities never touch the attitude and the fruits of the Spirit. In fact, it's quite the opposite.
Whenever you focus on the things of the physical over and above the things of the Spiritual, you begin to amplify and magnify the things of the physical. It's a law that when you begin to believe you are qualifying of yourself through your actions to salvation – which is, denial or not, what each of us believed – the negative spiritual fruits begin to take root. The chief of which is pride, which grows in conjunction and parallel with works. Once pride begins to take root, every other negative fruits of the physical begin to also take root – one of the biggest of which is judging (condemned by Jesus). This happens every time, over and over again, without fail. The pride of works also brings a certain arrogance that works against the Spirit's commands of love and understanding – facilitating the very hubris that leads to the self-righteous indignation that promotes the hatred, bigotry, and intolerance of the most religious and pious of professing Christians.
Of itself, Sabbath and Holy Keeping – without the revelation of faith and love – served a wonderful purpose. It promoted a system of order. It signaled a coming change from being cut off from God to being at one with God. It served a purpose of foreshadowing a time when humanity can be reconciled and at one with God, fully indwelt with his Spirit through Christ in His Rest. Yet those who were commanded to keep the Sabbath and the Law of Moses were absolutely not aware of the realities that had not yet been revealed. They couldn't be. Yet they were being made ready for such a time to come through and after Christ fulfilled all that the Sabbath, Holy Days, and the Law foreshadowed.
After the higher order was revealed – the things of faith, hope, and love – the New Covenant, and the revealing of Jesus Christ, and the reconciliation of God to Man – the book and the ways of God were then made known to man. These are the ways as taught in the entirety of the New Testament. These ways include the Beatitudes. Servitude. Kindness. Compassion. Being merciful. Giving. And the new commandment that Jesus gave to all man – to love one another.
What the Church did – what Armstrong did – and what leaders of Armstrong splinters do – constantly – is magnify the physical, and thereby the fruits of the physical, which, in itself, shuts off the very substance of faith, hope and love that was revealed in Christ. What the Church and Armstrong and Splinter leaders do is promote a system which is based on the magnification and promotion of sin, all while claiming it is godly (while the fruits thereof are entirely and purely wicked.)
While Armstrong claimed godly fruits, he was issuing false prophecies, lies, and speculations. While Armstrong claimed godly fruits, he was abusive in many ways, raging, dis-temperate, scandalous, greedy, impatient, and worldly. This is the same with many other Armstrong ministers, which lead to scandal, drama, crime, and intrigue. These very fruits of wickedness led to cover-ups of actions of wickedness, which defined the culture of the church from the inside and out.
While other splinter ministers followed the same formula as Armstrong, the exact same physical fruits of wickedness have borne dark fruit: Greed, materialism, spiritual extortion, crime, abuse, lies, and false teaching. It has happened before, it is happening now, and as long as the same wicked and satanic formula is being used, the same will continue to happen. Because while physical laws are being exemplified by the Armstrong Churches of God, spiritual laws are concurrently being violated, leading to an infiltration of wickedness and evil, all claiming to be godly when it is satanic. It is a masterful, cunning, slick deception to volatile, well-meaning members who are being slowly assimilated into the fold of darkness.
This cancer of Armstrongism – this drug of spiritual wickedness that has formed so many addicts – entraps members into actually enabling, supporting, and being an accessory to the very wickedness that the so-called “ministers” use as their fuel to rob, steal, and destroy. Members begin to lose all sense of rationality – blindly trusting in the untrustable, blindly following the blind, and obeying those who should never be given the time of day, or listened to. All of which is blatantly oxidized by pure, brilliant, paralyzing, and hypnotizing fear.
While ministers claim they are speaking godliness, truth, life, and hope, 70 years of historical fact and evidence has proven it has been a volatile, cancerous mass of lies, deceptions, greed, and life-sucking, vampire-like, materialistic full-blown deception straight from the depths of the most harmful and destructive methods ever used by religion for greedy, unconscionably executed acts. Those trapped in the system become deaf, blind, mute, and desensitived to the harm, instead, steadfastly supporting the very evil they claim to abhor, following the ministry of death in favor of the law of the Spirit.
This is the legacy of Armstrongism. It is never found in a wicked power system which favors the powerful and craps on the peasants. It is never found in a system that has been proven as archaic, destructive, and obsolete. It is never found in a system which has a historical record of lies and deceit, while claiming to be Godly. It is never found in a system of oppression, isolation, and dissapointment.
Armstrongism is a destructive, deceptive, satanic cult which has hid itself as a ministry of light. Though some have made the best of a tragic situation, it does not change Armstrongism for what it is, and has been, and will continue to be, as proven by factual evidence of truth. And once one looks to truth and fact – and focuses on the things of God and not of the physical – blinders can be lifted. Materialism can be a very addictive drug. And Armstrongism was a powerful overdose of materialistic human nature, which some still defend to this day as righteousness. May sanity prevail in those still addicted to the powerful drug of Armstrongism, and the road to rehabilitation be available to those consumed by it's destructive nature.
courtesy of SHT
Our whole past scene was out of balance. You have two great laws: Love for God, and love for fellow man. Rather than using these to compliment one another, Herbert Armstrong taught that love for God was expressed by slavish obedience to the laws he carefully picked and chose from the 613, and so far as love for fellow man was concerned? “Let the dead bury the dead”. The law was kept selfishly and often spitefully, in such a way that fellow man ended up being hurt. That is the origin of the bad fruit.
ReplyDeletePharisees would be incapable of inventing flight. For that, you need physicists. Physicists understand that you can only make something fly by juxtaposing the laws of physics, combining these laws with one another in unique ways soas to overcome gravity, channel wind resistance, regulate speed and lift, and do all of these things with precise stability. A physicist’s bad fruits usually come to the forefront in a controlled lab situation, or in the experimental phases of his work.
There is much for the Pharisee to learn from the Physicist!
BB
This article almost convinces me to leave Armstrongism and go mainstream Christianity or so-called back to Jesus Christ except that nobody gives me a satisfactory answer to this question: How about those who have died who never heard of Christ or in other worldly religions going to have their one and only chance for salvation according to the Bible? Only Armstrongism has this answer.
ReplyDeleteI won’t matter because all revealed religion is man made and spins from mythology. Deism offers reasonable ideas.
DeleteHow about grace? Or mercy?
DeleteConsidering how many articles about this very "man on an island" question popped up on a simple google search...
DeleteActually, the doctrine of Universalism, which is making a comeback in mainstream Christianity, says that all souls will eventually be saved, whether or not they heard of Christ in their physical lives. You could also become a Unitarian. Or you could read a bit of history and just leave Christianity altogether...
DeleteCould it be that both Armstrongism and mainstream Christianity are wrong about salvation? Maybe there is no salvation. We all would like to believe that there is a better life after our life on earth ends but in reality there is no evidence of that future life. We can just hope that there is. Do you know of anyone who has ever come back to tell us what a wonderful life awaits us after this life ends. No one that I know has ever returned to tell me that.
ReplyDeleteAnon 8:29 PM, the Jews believe that most of mankind is judged not by their 613 impossible-to-keep commandments, nor even by the Ten. Rather, they say, most people will be measured against the "Noahide Laws" -- a simple seven (not even Ten!) commandments that outline a life of justice and fairness and mercy.
ReplyDeleteYou are mistaken, by the way, to assume that all of mainstream Christianity sends sinners to eternal hell because they lived on a remote Pacific island or grew up in a Muslim household. HWA brainwashed you into believing that only he had the true answer, but if you look around the Christian world you will find that Catholicism (and a very few Protestant denominations) has an answer, Purgatory, which unlike HWA's version adheres to the Bible's "once to die and then the judgment" statement, which HWA has to twist around for his theory to work. Additionally, Purgatory avoids the weird but common ACOG notion that for a thousand years mankind's main task in the Millennium will be to build facilities for the population explosion that will occur at the GWTJ.
If you don't like the idea of Purgatory, there are Protestants outside the ACOGs who teach annihilationism like HWA, and there are Protestants who teach some form of universal salvation. Go to a library, and you won't even need to spend the six months that HWA spent in order to find the truth about Christian views of salvation.
such an angry, troubled person.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all - welcome back SHT!
ReplyDeleteAnon 8:29PM - I believe the Bible had the answer first - in Revelation, the rest of the dead get raised and appear before God and of course the Ezekiel vision of the valley of the dry bones which is commemorated in that old lovely African American spiritual.
Please don't insult the Pharisees - many of them converted to Christianity including the Apostle Paul.
The problem ignored is that Acts 15 allowed for the Gentiles to be Gentiles while the Jews still remained Jews keeping the law of Moses.
This is further aggravated by claiming we are really Israelites - which has been debunked by DNA.
Ever figured out how we would fit 30 to 50 million "Israelites" into the land of Israel in the start of the Millennium?
The Rotten Fruit of the Armstrong Churches of God
ReplyDeleteIn reading this posted message I feel the need to make a comment that may not be accepted, but it is l what I believe Jesus Christ would point out. It is evident that the person posting it is not a Christian. I spent 42 years fellowshipping in a number of local COG congregations and the vast majority of the people were dedicated to God through Jesus Christ. I spent 30 years working with the people and watching the congregations grow. Those who would be classed as rotten fruit were few when compared to the whole. As a Christian I cannot believe hatred and destructive comments are supported by God and His Word (Jesus Christ). ASB
8.29.PM
ReplyDeleteJehovah's witness's Charles Russell believed in the 'fair chance' doctrine whereby everyone through a physical resurrection would be given an opportunity to accept Christ as their saviour. So the doctrine is not unique to HWA. And it appears Herb 'stole' it from Russell. But that's only one doctrine. As this article points out, there's much more to the ACOGs than the odd doctrine.
You seem like the common Herb member who ignores the forest and harps on one tree. Make that a twig on one tree.
Money is the fuel of materialism. Eliminate the money out of religion, and lot more things come into focus.
ReplyDeleteNext energy booster of materialism, is vanity, status, and hierarchy. Eliminate those in religion , and remember that it is a "Priesthood of Believers" and not one of rank for power and prestige, and you also go a long way towards enlightenment.
The fruit of Christianity is the individual. Each human is in the image of God, and was died for by the savior. Thus, they are the ultimate goal and "fruit" of the entire process. In a sense, we are only as strong as the weakest link. Success of a corporation, or of a hierarchy where only a handful of the "stars of the organization" are considered to have obtained the "chosen-ness" approval and love of God is totally upside down in its goals and mindset.
The job of ministry, of which ALL of us are responsible for, is to raise up , empower, and equip as many as can be done to achieve Christian spiritual self actualization, independence, and autonomy. Ministry is not about policing , monitoring and force. It is about teaching and helping the process of enlightenment for the believer. Again, nothing wrong with the 10 Commandments in the least, but the mindset must go far beyond just "thou shall not".
The "Veil being ripped in the temple" at the death of Christ , never was understood by HWA in its full implications. Likely because it would knock him off the wall. The laws of God are good, and demonstrate the mind of God for us to learn from. The Holy Spirit and the "small still voice of conscience" gives us the ability to navigate any unchartered waters of behavior by using intuitive righteous decision making ability , without the need for every "jot and tittle" to be spelled out in the modern age. The use of the Holy Spirit frees one from having to have a human monitor watching every action, and provides the compass.
I just thought of the old children nursery rhyme about Humpty Dumpty, and I think it applies here...
Herbert''s church was an evil cabal,
Herbert's church had a big downfall..
& All the church henchmen and all of Herb's men
Couldn't put Old Worldwide back together again!
Just like how God let the Temple be destroyed to demonstrate that he can not be held by human hands or builidings, the hierarchy of the past has been rendered impotent to again show that there are NO exclusive franchises that God has given to ANY human agency in the current age as well.
Tonto
ReplyDeleteI beg to differ that HWA didn't comprehend the 'veil being ripped in the temple' on Christ's death. The bible was his livelihood. He would have known that Christ said 'follow me' 23 times in the NT and over 50 times with variations. We would have known that the sin of the Nicolaitans was dominating others. And many other scriptures condemning lording it over others. He knew the truth and deliberately rejected it. You gave in to power lust, a Cain versus Abel attitude towards his betters, and accompanying attitudes such as murderous envy and sadism.
I've seen the guilt in ministers faces when I complained of their lording ways.
Herb and his minions are fully accountable for the evil they have inflicted on their members.
They are not in the slightest naive or honestly mistaken.
Thank goodness for the lake of fire.
Good riddance.
THE ROTTEN FRUIT OF THE ARMSTRONGISM LIBRARY BLOGSPOT
ReplyDeleteTonto:
ReplyDeleteYours is one of the best posts I have seen on this site. Some "think" this, but you stated it so well. :-)
Tonto's 8:57 first half is entirely in line with Renaisance philosophy.
ReplyDeleteSecond half is a railing not unlike Savonarola the Priest if we remain in that time period.
It is clearly beyond middle ages philosophy and places man at the heart and epithomization of creation.
Armstrongism placed the pure mind at the heart of creation and called it character. A mix between the classics, post modernity and renaissance.
(architecture of eckbo and mendenhall, the "aspiration" egret statue etc)
Nck
Blogger kingncjerry said...
ReplyDeleteHow about grace? Or mercy?
March 18, 2019 at 6:34 AM
well, mercy comes connected to truth, and since truth is rejected by the writer, there can be no mercy at this time.
Anonymous, March 17, 2019 at 8:29 PM, said: "...This article almost convinces me to leave Armstrongism and go mainstream Christianity or so-called back to Jesus Christ except that nobody gives me a satisfactory answer to this question: How about those who have died who never heard of Christ or in other worldly religions going to have their one and only chance for salvation according to the Bible? Only Armstrongism has this answer..."
ReplyDeleteAnd Jesus Christ, aware of His Father's Plan of Salvation, gives this answer: "Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:" Matthew 25:34
The Apostle Paul seemed to know something nice was happening in order to reconcile this world to God:
"To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation." 2 Cor 5:19
And time will tell...
John
You know when I was in my later teens back in the early 70s,after hearing that the beast power(Germany)would have no regard for the elderly,I would look at them,and feel bad about they'd have to suffer in the persecution.But there was no persecution,and at 66 years of age ,I am in the elderly class.And it doesn't seem there be any meat hooks stuck in me by the beast power. Well,maybe it will happen to my son-or granddaughters
ReplyDelete@March 17, 2019 at 8:29 PM said, "This article almost convinces me to leave Armstrongism and go mainstream Christianity or so-called back to Jesus Christ except that nobody gives me a satisfactory answer to this question: How about those who have died who never heard of Christ or in other worldly religions going to have their one and only chance for salvation according to the Bible? Only Armstrongism has this answer."
ReplyDeleteI would like to ask if you could provide us with some of the answers you've been given by those in mainstream Christianity on this topic?
Secondly, if Armstrongism has the answer that is satisfactory to you regarding this topic, then it sounds like you're not really interested in knowing what God says on the topic (Truth), but with making God and His word conform to what satisfies you.
“Science is a complicated, historically shifting interplay among nature, theories, data and a host of often-unstated nonempirical principles that shape our thinking, evaluating, theorizing and even perceiving. Since parts are so interwoven, changes in one part frequently have consequences for the content and contours of other parts. Parts do change over time - theories are replaced, shaping principles alter and so forth. And sometimes entire systems involving all three components are overturned and replaced by others” (Del Ratzsch, The battle of Beginnings, p.128).
ReplyDeleteTLA, as a person fascinated, perhaps blindly, by typology I cannot accept Science’s present understanding of DNA refuting the identity of the Lost Ten Tribes - perhaps I suffer from self-deception.
Return
Eze 47:14 You are to divide it equally among them. Because I swore with uplifted hand to give it to your forefathers, this land will become your inheritance. (NIV).
Zec 14:10a All the land shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem: and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place...
“The geographical dimensions and tribal allotments of the land are certainly not feasible today, nor have they ever been followed in time past. Geographical changes will be necessary prior to the fulfillment of chapters 45, 47-48” (Ralph H. Alexander, Ezekiel, EBC, Vol.6, p.943).
As noted above [that is, in “Britain and America in History and the Future - The Typologiocal-Prophetic Connection”] the high and low figures of ‘Israelite’ survival are around 30 million and 12 million respectively.
With the present population of Israel, the West Bank and Gaza at around 13.5 million, along with the future topological changes the land of the ‘forefathers’ will easily accommodate the lower figure. For the higher figure:
Ge 12:3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.
Zec 8:13 And it shall come to pass, that as ye were a curse among the heathen, O house of Judah, and house of Israel; so will I save you, and ye shall be a blessing: fear not, but let your hands be strong.
Ps 72:8 He [the Messiah, through human Davidic vice-regents] shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.
With Israel to rule the nations, typology may suggest that not all Israel will return to the Promised Land.
Ezr 8:15 And I gathered them together to the river that runneth to Ahava; and there abode we in tents three days: and I viewed the people, and the priests, and found there none of the sons of Levi.
“The Babylonians were cruel conquerors. They executed the leaders of a conquered people. They sometimes kept men in prison for many long years; sometimes they sold their captives into slavery. But the Babylonians were not cruel masters” (Solomon Grayzel, A History of the Jews, Rev Ed, p.20).
“... they [the exiles] became so comfortable that the majority did not return to Judah once the way had been cleared by the decree of Cyrus” (Eugene H. Merrill, Kingdom of Priests, p.482).
Jer 5:20 Declare this in the house of Jacob, and
publish it in Judah...
While the time of Jacob’s trouble in the earlier Babylonian captivity - the type - was vastly different to the time of Jacob’s trouble in the future Babylonian captivity - antitype, it is suggested that a good number, perhaps “the majority” will not return to the land of the forefathers, but will return (from the wilderness, Eze 20:35-36?) to their, strategically placed, modern homelands to begin Israel’s ‘blessing’ of the nations.
As John often says, Time will tell - [for argument sake: at least ten years before the start of WW3 - the type being September 3, 1929 and the high in the Dow and September 1, 1939 and the German invasion of Poland].