Bobaniah's ADD has kicked in big-time today. He has a new "sermon" up for his few faithful and it is a doozy!
In this sermon, Dr. Thiel answers questions that have been submitted to the Church of God on many topics, such as:
What about using expressions like gosh and OMG?
Can Europe get together?
Is mercy killing (euthanasia) allowable?
What about stopping medical life support?
Is it alright to become pregnant during this time?
Why aren’t you supposed to boil a goat kid in its mother’s milk?
Did Ezekiel see the throne of God?
Can you participate in gambling games of chance?
Is bankruptcy acceptable?
Should Christians avoid gelatin?
What does “until Shiloh comes” mean?
Did Jacob engineer selective breeding?
Where did the Germans come from?
Is Germany the Assyria of biblical prophecy?
Where is the location of Golgotha, the site of Jesus’ execution?
Was Jonah swallowed by some type of great fish?
Did Jesus observe any national holidays, like Hanukkah?
What is the CCOG position on vaccines?
Dr. Thiel goes through scriptures, facts, COG documents, opinions, and historical information to provide answers.
The dumbing down of COG ministers continues unabashedly! Imagine having to sit through this handwaving mind-numbing drivel and never hear anything about Jesus Christ, what he did, what he accomplished, and why no Christian needs to worry about any of this kind of crap in their daily walk.
38 comments:
I've got Bob running background instead of streaming a radio station. What last caught my attention was Bob trying to work out how Thiel is a variation of Dietrich. Riveting stuff indeed...
Did Bobus discuss the use of euphemisms in Kiswahili? If you speak Kiswahili, is it still wrong to say "OMG" or "Gosh" since those are just nonsense sounds in Kiswahili?
Answers
1. is ok
2. Probably not and so what?
3. Depends
4. Fine, ok and do it.
5. Only if you have sex
6. It annoys the goat kid
7. No, he saw the night sky
8. Sure, life is a chance
9. Yes, think of it as a moment of Jubilee
10.Nah, Don't be so picky
11.No,
12.Germany
13.No
14.Jerusalem near the bus stop
15.No, it's a whale of a tale
16.No idea
17.None of their business should be their position no matter their position.
This is what a prophet does when he waits until the last minute to come up with a sermon. This he can wing with no prep. Does Bobus ever prepare a sermon? I think not! And the ones he does are topics that few care about anyway. Jesus Bobus! Ever hear of him?
Really? That is what occupies the minds in the COG’s?
How about this question: should you follow Bobby (or any of his ‘Co Prophets’ in the other COG’s? Or should you start looking for God?
How could Dr. Thiel answer a question about Jesus possibly keeping Hanukkah WITHOUT telling us "anything about Jesus Christ" or "what He did"?
Exaggerating again?!?
This is the best headline ever! I tuned in to listen to some of his sermon and had to stop. The hand gesturing and the bouncing in his chair is annoying, not to mention the stuff he is talking about. I know of no one, in the church or out, that cares about these topics.
How could Dr. Thiel answer a question about Jesus possibly keeping Hanukkah WITHOUT telling us "anything about Jesus Christ" or "what He did"?
If there's a "possibly" as you say, Bobus hasn't told us about what He did, only what He may have done. It's not the same thing.
I hate to say it, but I know all the "pat" answers to these questions. And I know why many of the pat answers are wrong. Rather than these old queries that have been kicked around until they are ragged, a good minister should be answering questions like:
1. In view of the Shema, why is Armstrongism polytheistic?
2. Why did God permit the patriarchs in early Genesis believe in monolatry?
3. How does one reconcile the semantic evidence that the Torah was composed by 4 distinct groups of writers with the tradition of Moses as the single author.
The list could go on. There are many such questions, current and relevant, that need careful consideration. No need to reach back into The Good News Magazine of 1950s and dredge up a bunch of dubious Hoehist material that will elucidate nothing.
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Notice how subtle Bobus is when he claims these are questions submitted to the Church of God. He never says these are questions sent into the Continuing Church of God, but rather to the COG. Not one question he has listed was ever asked by his current members, but that all of this stuff is from old Worldwide Church of God reprint articles. Everything about Bobus is a fraud.
And the million dollar question: why this extensive-over the top-disclaimer NEO? Doesn’t make sense..
Yeah I wonder too.
With the exception of the blasphemy and euthanaisia questions the rest are quite trivial.
Although I see the covid vaccines development having the potential to be a major problem in the coming months within the COG groups.
but that all of this stuff is from old Worldwide Church of God reprint articles
In an earlier Q&A sermon Bob explained that someone gave him a folder with "official" answers to various questions received by Mail Processing.
Rather than sermons consisting of a hodge-podge of convoluted answers to questions that may be in the minds of his members Bob could just make these available on his CCOG website. Rather than making them FAQ, it would be better to label them SAQ (Seldom Asked Questions) or, more accurately, NAQ (Never Asked Questions).
Neo asks:
“In view of the Shema, why is Armstrongism polytheistic?”
Disclaimer, this is my argument so it may be/will be unsatisfactory:
Jn 20:28 And Thomas answered and said unto him [Jesus Christ], My Lord and my God.
Jn 20:17b I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.
For Thomas Jesus was his God (28). Christ tells the disciples, via Mary Magdalene, that the Father was also their God, not only that, the Father was also Christ’s God.
Rev 11:15b saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.
Who does “he” refer to?
“The singular (“he will reign”) emphasizes the unity of this joint rule” (Robert H. Mounce, The Book of Revelation, Revised, NICNT, p.226).
Dt 6:4 Hear [shema‘], O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:
When it comes to the “shema‘” perhaps God and Jesus Christ’s definition of “one” God is overlooked.
1Co 8:6 But to us there is but one God, the Father... and one Lord Jesus Christ...
“[Paul] has kept the “one” intact, but has divided the Shema into two parts, with theos (God) now referring to the Father, and kurios (Lord) referring to Jesus Christ... [Paul] is reasserting for the Corinthians that ... there is indeed only one God... but at the same time, he insists that the identity of the one God also includes the one Lord...” (Gordon D. Fee, Pauline Christology, pp.90-91).
Isa 44:6 Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God.
Does this mean that there is only one God-being? Based on how God and Jesus Christ see “one” God, I answer no.
The above appears to be related to the principle of “corporate solidarity” as in this NT examples:
Acts 9:4 And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?
Acts 9:5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest...
“The reply which he received showed that it was Jesus who was speaking, and whom he was persecuting. Thus the effect of the vision was to indicated to Saul that in persecuting the Christians he was persecuting Jesus (Lk 10:16), but above all that in persecuting Jesus he was persecuting One who had now attained to a heavenly status and was thus shown to be vindicated and upheld by God. Paul’s zeal for the cause of God had turned into an attack on the God who raised Jesus from the dead” (I. Howard Marshall, Acts, TOTC, p.170).
Rev 13:4 And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast
By worshipping the beast-person “all the world” is in effect worshipping the dragon/Satan. When Christ is worshipped, it is in effect, God being worshipped.
Ge 48:15 And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God which fed me all my life long unto this day,
Ge 48:16 The Angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads;
Ex 3:2 And the Angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush:
Ex 3:4 And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush
The ‘dynamic’ God-being that interacted with Jacob, and would later interact with his descendants, was the Angel of the Lord, the preincarnate Jesus Christ. For Thomas and Jacob, God and Jesus Christ were God. (NB I am well aware of the argument against this interpretation of the Angel).
I would suggest that God the Father is too “holy” to deal with human beings so he needed a “help meet” to do so. Typology suggests just as God took of Adam to “make” Eve, “the mother of all living,” except Adam, so God took of Himself and ‘created’ the Word, who made all things, “and without him was not any thing made that was made”, except God.
For a brief overview on the Documentary Hypothesis, and more, see Peter Enns, Exodus, NIVAC, pp.20-23).
Hoss wrote:
"In an earlier Q&A sermon, Bob explained that someone gave him a folder with "official" answers to various questions received by Mail Processing.
Rather than sermons consisting of a hodge-podge of convoluted answers to questions that may be in the minds of his members Bob could just make these available on his CCOG website. Rather than making them FAQ, it would be better to label them SAQ (Seldom Asked Questions) or, more accurately, NAQ (Never Asked Questions)."
For Bob to do its he would have to tell the truth that he has no spiritually grounded training. He cannot preach about Jesus Christ because he knows nothing about him.
Anonymous (5:37)
I only skimmed your material. Forgive me if I did not catch some crucial piece of your argument. But what is more important is what Armstronism asserts about the nature of God.
Here goes. HWA wrote in his "Mystery of the Ages" - cited throughout:
"Therefore God's Word reveals that God and the Word - two supreme Personages - coexisted always . . ." (p. 44)
At this point we don't know if these two Personages (Later he uses the term Persons. He does not give a theological definition for either term.) form a bi-theistic or binitarian god. This is answered by how these Personages are related. He identifies this relationship as follows:
". . . one family consisting of two or more members - one church composed of many members - one group of several persons . . . In other words God is now a family of Persons." (p. 50)
And on p. 45 HWA explains that god will make many "god persons" and add billions of them to this family. From this we may deduce that he believes that a "god person" is a person in the same sense that a human being is a person: a unary sentient being - not sharing an essence with other persons but connected through a family relationship.
This is unequivocal polytheism. Two separate gods. Bi-theism in particular. Later to become a plethora of gods. This is not what the Jews understood the Shema to mean. This would have made a good Bible Study on the Field House on Friday evening. Didn't happen as I recall.
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The VERY FIRST WORD in the bible (beresheet, or in the beginning) is a composite of TWO words (bar ashat meaning I will send forth my son).
How's that for a spoiler, for where the story will go, in the bestseller of ages???
Nck
There is no indication that the Word (Logos) is a person (or personage) any more than than the Holy Spirit is a personage. Proverbs 8 clearly indicates that it refers to Godly wisdom.
Years ago, Robert Campbell an evangelical minister, labeled HWA as Mr. Confusion. It looks like Bobius has inherited the title!😉
"Later to become a plethora of gods."
Us humans are made in God's image, physically and mentally. Human psychology is in fact the study of the mind of God. Having a God plane mind means that we already are "gods."
Btw, HWA and his minions make a mockery of this by treating all members as literal children and sneering at psychology. Do I smell a hostile anti-God attitude in this?
Anonymous (6:30)
I take your enclosing the word god in quotation marks to mean that you understand that we are not to be "god as god is god" as Armstrongism asserts. Theosis is a prominent doctrine in the Eastern Church. In the Western Church it is referred to as sanctification or divinization. Nowhere does the doctrine claim that that we are inherently divine. Instead we will be partakers of the divine nature. Human beings are not accorded ontological equivalence with God though we may possess his image, however that is defined.
HWA taught that God was reproducing himself and that humans are made after the god-kind. This is echoed in the statement I referred to earlier from p. 45 of the Mystery of the Ages. It is the foundation of the embarrassing statement that humans will be "god as god is god." I do not know the historical origin of HWA's view on this. But it was a radically erroneous view and it is to this tune that the WCG waltzed out of Christian ballroom and into the sectarian parking lot. Once the nature of god is denied, I do not think subsidiary doctrines, no matter how carefully rationalized, can pull adherents back into the Christian fold. Time to start over at the top.
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I see that the blog owner allows this:
"Once the nature of god is denied, I do not think subsidiary doctrines, no matter how carefully rationalized, can pull adherents back into the Christian fold. Time to start over at the top."
Though I seriously doubt he'd allow this:
"If you believe this you're not a christian"
Though both statements are saying the same thing.
It must be great to be NEO, knowing who is and who isn't a christian!
How ya doing Billy Hohmann?
Let me say something further about the Armstrongist formulation of the nature of god. (A sidebar: Armstrongists desperately need to develop a doctrine of God. Anecdotal statements in little booklets just don't cut it. If nothing else is thoroughly developed in the Armstrongist belief system (I will eschew the term "systematic theology"), the doctrine of god should be. Its make or break.)
Is god a creatable being? HWA's model of god assumes that God is creatable. God can create "god-persons" just like Himself. And these beings are "god as god is god." This suggests some intriguing questions. Was god as Armstrongists know him created by some other divine being? Did God create the Word? (This is close to Arianism.) HWA's model of god permits these possibilities.
Maybe progress would be made if the question "Is god a creatable being?" were asked instead of "Is Germany the Assyria of prophecy?" BTW, the answer to both questions is No.
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BEST WAY TO ANSWER THIEL"S CONSTANT RHETORICAL QUESTIONS? ...
Use the Magic 8 Ball that we used to play with as kids or the Popomatic on the game of "Trouble"
(numbers on popomatic 1 or 2 = YES , 3-4= NO, 5-6= Maybe)
Nick (2:31 AM) needs to take a look at this:
The Bereshit Jesus in Genesis Argument Has No Merit
That humans can become 'god as god is god' is pure marketing by HWA. That God will give on a plate skills developed over trillions of years is not the way the world works. Rather, knowledge and skills have to acquired through hard work.
BEST WAY TO ANSWER THIEL"S CONSTANT RHETORICAL QUESTIONS? ...
Use the Magic 8 Ball that we used to play with as kids or the Popomatic on the game of "Trouble"
(numbers on popomatic 1 or 2 = YES , 3-4= NO, 5-6= Maybe)
No, Tonto, you got it wrong. Thiel's Magic 8 Ball is coded like this:
1 or 2: PROBABLY 'YES'
3: POSSIBLY 'YES'
4 or 5: MAYBE
6: POSSIBLY 'NO'
7 or 8: PROBABLY 'NO'
The more that I read and listen to Thiel the more I realize what a complete tool the guy is. I have never seen a COG ministers as pathetic as Bob, and I have been around lot of bad ones over the years, but Bob tops the list now a days
Oh come on Tonto! We all know that the magic 8 ball is giving more positive answers than negative ones.
Unlike the COG’s. Where it is all doom and gloom and losing your salvation if you don’t tithe and hand over all your money, your mom’s pension and your uncle Bob’s inheritance!
11:17
Thank you for your information.
The article adressed the composite of many letters, whereas I adressed the composite of two words. So they are different alternatives.
Even if mine can be proven as unsound, hebrew still is one of the most layered of languages. But that is beyond the scope of my remark and your interesting response.
Nck
NEO
Someday this lump of dust got wired with "conciousness", the bible is THE book describing humans journey developing that skill.
Perhaps the Illiad is earlier than the bible when those powerfull, warring GODS AND DEMIGODS before TROY suddenly decide to use their BRAIN AND CONSCIOUSNESS instead of raw power, by devising a trick with a horse to enter Troy. THUS EFFECTIVELY ENDING THE AGE OF GODS BASED ON POWER and replace that by brain, which makes human qualities more important than Gods.
My point.
At one poin in time, this gigantic powerful universe(al) all encompassing thing might have risen above the multiple universes and REALIZED for the first time. I AM, I AM, I AM.
Signalling the creation of God, the first cry of a human being and first time baby takes daddies phone and utters MINE, MINE.
nck
Tell that to the Apostle John Mike.
Who is John Mike? Is Mike his surname?
At one point in time this gigantic, powerful, universal, all encompassing thing might have risen above the multiple universes and REALIZED for the first time. I AM HAL, I AM HAL, I AM HAL.
https://vimeo.com/366762575
So ..... If God = HAL .....
Who is David Pack? Or Bob Thiel? Or Flurry?
C-3PO? R2-D2? WALL-E?
9:57
Historically only beautiful daughters of medical doctors are able to read my mind instantly.
It seems HAL is able to express emotions, but not able to feel them. Similarly, he seems to wish to transcend human emotion by trying to understand them but not feel them.
A bit like the OT God. ("I am a jealous God", the EXACT childish expression of emotions when HAL expresses fear, I am afraid David, as if to trick humans into empathizing)
There was this incredible need for Jesus, the "God who did go through and feel real emotions." The one who empathized with us and we can empathize with, because the emotions are real and felt.
1:17
C 3po dave hulme?
R2d2 b thiel?
Chewbaca pack? Likes to play games but not lose
Flurry wall e. Always "raising the ruins" or The Sith Lord
Gta han solo in the millenium falcon seducing leia
Tkaches Darth Vader attracted to the dark side of the force and drawing a pension from it while pretending to have severed ties with the force
Nck
Don't get out much?
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