It's Friday and time for the weekly smackdown for Living Church of God members who just can never seem to do anything right. Today, they are failing to recognize the "more sure word of prophecy" that LCG claims to have. Not only that, LCG is the Watchman! This is sure to set off that other false prophet who claims he is the Watchman and has the "more sure word of propehcy" due to the fact that LCG refused to listen to him and now are ignorant of real prophecy. Given the track record of self-appointed prophets in the COG and their long history of lying to the members, whenever anyone hears a COG claim to have a "more sure word of prophecy" it is a guarantee they do not. The church has had no accurate prophet in its midst in the 80 some years of the Armstrong COG movement.
Pay Attention to Prophecy: Jesus told His disciples to stay alert and watch for the fulfillment of specific prophecies that will mark the approaching end of this age (Matthew 24; Mark 13; Luke 21). He also warned, in the parable of foolish virgins, that many will be caught napping and unprepared by the surge of events that will precede His return (Matthew 25:1–13). God has given His Church “a more sure word of prophecy” (2 Peter 1:19, KJV) so we can warn the nations of Israel and the world about the prophetic significance of world events. It is also an awesome responsibility to be commissioned as a watchman (Ezekiel 3 and 33). Satan has deceived the world and many in the Church to discount the importance of prophecy. We must never take prophecy lightly (1 Thessalonians 5:20). As we watch world events building to a prophetic crescendo, let’s make sure we continue to study Bible prophecy, build a closer relationship with God, and learn to live by every word of God (Matthew 4:4).
Have a profitable Sabbath,
Douglas S. Winnail
25 comments:
It would probably not be well received by LCG or the self called prophets in the COG's to understand nothing in the NT remotely prophetic applies to them or today. No one writes prophecy for a couple thousand years from now. However prophecies that are vague enough to apply forevermore and string the gullible along with the prophetic carrot works nicely and can be effectively be used to promote "send it in" and seat gyrations even next week God is giving them more time and revealing what "we" never understood before. It's so obvious now! The math is correct! lol
https://ezinearticles.com/?The-Second-Coming-The-Eternal-Carrot&id=94672
Wow! Doug didn't wait long before reworking a November 2020 item for re-use in June 2021! That takes a special kind of lazy!
Doug says so we can warn the nations of Israel and the world about the prophetic significance of world events……
I agree with my friend Dennis. LCG and the other ACOGs want us to believe they have the sure word of prophecy, whatever that means. They have no idea what world events will be tomorrow, next week or next year. We can guess. I think tension will increase between the US and Iran. I think China will continue to have trade tension between the US. There will be more hacking of US companies. Are these comments prophecy? It seems to me these comments come from reading and listening to world news.
In 1964 I started attending WCG. I believed everything Herbert said about “the soon coming world tomorrow”. Christ would return in the next few years. While attending AC, I was told wild animals would be roaming the streets before I finished AC. I was then told there would not be time enough for me to get married. I graduated and got married. Then I was told there would not be time enough for my wife and I to have children. Then I was told, I even has a chart taped to the back cover of my Bible, that the tribulation would start in 1972 and after 31/2 years Christ would return. Then when that didn’t happen, the message was changed to Christ would surely come in the next few years. Over and over the message would be very soon, the next few years. I now have grandkids. I am still waiting. Rod carried on the message. I heard him say long after Herbert died, “we probably don’t have more than 3 or 4 years.” World events have been speeding up for the past 80 years.
Dennis has written about the phrase “behold I come quickly”. If I tell someone I will see you soon. That does not mean 2,000 years later. Behold I come quickly never happened if it meant Christ would return to that generation.
LCG or any other COG does not have a clue as to interpreting any scripture they think is a prophecy. If I am wrong, please point out exactly when a prophecy is going to be fulfilled and give me details that are yet to be known. Make a believer out of me
Jim-AZ
I thought Bob Thiel was the standard-bearer of the "more sure word of propehcy"? Or, should it be the "more sure liar about propehcy"?
The “sure word of prophecy” being whatever Gerald Westin got freaked out about on newsmax this week.
Jim, In the COGs, "quickly" "Soon" and "shortly" in scripture means "Sooner or later, we'll just have to see. Not sure really but eventually maybe. You believe the Bible don't you? But no matter, don't be a scoffer if you notice it's not your kind of quickly, soon or shortly because it isn't and God's ways are not your ways. He laughs at your wisdom and there are observations that might seem to be right to YOU but they will end in your death. So send it in and we'll keep you posted".
In a modern trained theologian it means "That wasn't for us and it failed to happen."
Dennis
Your right. I think we both know “sooner” or “quickly” or “shortly” can mean whatever a modern day cog minister wants it to mean. I appreciate what you have written about behold I come quickly. As you said they thought it was going to happen in their lifetime. It didn’t! Nuff said.
Also enjoy your pictures taken along the Columbia River.
Jim-AZ
It troubles me that Winnail teaches "God has given His Church “a more sure word of prophecy” (2 Peter 1:19, KJV)". When one reads that verse (in context), we see that it is Jesus who has fulfilled the OT prophecies regarding Himself. Unfortunately, he even quotes from the KJV which promotes this error- most updated translations will correct. Even the NKJV reads "And so we have the prophetic word confirmed". However to read it as Winnail does promotes the gnostic idea of a special knowledge revealed to the leaders of the Church and hence another arrow in the quiver to promote heirachy.
What gets me is how bland Dougs message is. I read many blogs with a narrow focus, but they always have articles with new information and slants. Religion by contrast is very broad, yet no new material is presented.
What gets me is how bland Dougs message is. I read many blogs with a narrow focus, but they always have articles with new information and slants. Religion by contrast is very broad, yet no new material is presented.
Doug is lazy even by ACOG standards. It's obvious that Winnail doesn't give much care or concern about what he communicates to the entire LCG membership every Sabbath. How hard would it be for him to write 200 new words once a week to give LCG members encouragement, advice, guidance, or news about the coming week ahead? Instead, he typically finds a previous comment, changes a few words here and there, and presents it as his comment for the week. I don't know which is more strange, that Gerald Weston continues to pay Winnail more than $100,000 per year to be so lazy, or that LCG ministers and members accept Winnail as a credible director of the ministry.
I noticed that last year when reading the passage; glad I’m not the only one!
"What gets me is how bland Dougs message is"
That is the problem with all of the COG's today. They are bland and boring. None of them are trying to be courageous Christians but instead are myna birds saying the same tired old message about keeping the law versus being followers of Jesus.
The blandest COG speaker of all is Bob Thiel.
Behold; Jesus does come quickly!
Everyone will bow before him soon.
Some get 70, 80, 90, or 100 + years.
However, the end of each of us is near.
Hallelujah; Jesus will meet us with grace an mercy as we meet our individual end!
Doug Winnail, of the hair so fair, spends more time dying his hair than he spends preaching about how his people can be saved.
What will it profit his people, if they know everything about prophecy but don't know how to be saved?
The people of LCG think they know prophecy, but they don't care to know anything about grace.
Doug dyes his hair, while his people perish!
Ephesians 2:8
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.
4:56 brings up a good point. When the surrounding context of 2Peter 1:19 is consulted, the verse doesn't seem to say what Winnail seems to think it says. The "Church" as in the modern institutional LCG or COG hierarchy isn't the one given the "more sure word of prophecy" which would be understood by them as their interpretation and view of end time events, but rather the more sure word seems to be referencing what has been handed down to us by the prophets of scripture, and confirmed by the glory of Jesus Christ as witnessed by the apostles and others which the surrounding verses seem to confirm this passage to be talking about. The Berean Study Bible, as quoted from Bible Hub translates the passage and surrounding verses this way,
"For we did not follow cleverly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to Him from the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”And we ourselves heard this voice from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain.
We also have the word of the prophets as confirmed beyond doubt. And you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture comes from one’s own interpretation. For no such prophecy was ever brought forth by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." 2Peter 1:16-21
It's interesting that in the verse after the one quoted, Peter warns that "no prophecy of Scripture comes from one's own interpretation." Pulling verses out of context and assigning your own meaning in order promote your own group, yourself, or your own interpretation of scripture doesn't exactly inspire a confidence in the validity of that interpretation, and seems to be what Peter is telling all of us to be careful about.
Concerned Sister
“19...The Jews always preferred prophecy to the voice from heaven. Indeed they regarded the latter, the bath qol, ‘daughter of the voice’, as an inferior substitute for revelation, since the days of prophecy had ceased. And as for the apostles it is hard to emphasize their regard for the Old Testament. One of the most powerful arguments for the truth of Christianity was the argument from prophecy... In the word of God written, they sought absolute assurance, like their Master, for whom ‘it is written’ sufficed to clinch an argument... [Peter] is saying, ‘If you don’t believe me, go to the Scriptures’. ‘The question’, says Calvin, ‘is not whether the prophets are more trustworthy than the gospel.’ It is simply that ‘since the Jews were in no doubt that everything that the prophets taught came from God, it is no wonder that Peter says that their word is more sure’...
“20-21.. In the preceding paragraph, Peter is not talking about interpretation but authentication. His theme is the origin and reliability of the teaching about grace, holiness and heaven. The same God whom the apostles heard speak in the transfiguration spoke also through the prophets. The argument in verse 20-21 is a consistent and indeed necessary to the preceding paragraph. Thus, we can rely on the apostolic account of the transfiguration because God spoke. The prophets did not make up what they wrote... true prophecy came from God and, men as they were, the prophets were carried along by the Holy Spirit.
“Peter, then, is talking about the divine origin of Scripture, not about its proper interpretation...
“It should now be apparent that Peter has been replying to two charges by the false teachers. To their contention that the apostles were purveying myths about Jesus, his power and coming, Peter says ‘Not so: we were with him at the transfiguration. We were eyewitnesses.’ He then adduces the Old Testament as a witness which is even more unimpeachable than the apostles themselves, and should be common coin both to the sectaries and the orthodox. But they respond by rejecting the authority of the Old Testament, denying its divine origin, and saying that the prophets simply produced their own ideas. So Peter strongly reasserts the conviction, common to Jews, Jesus and Christian alike, that the Old Testament has indeed a divine origin, and when the prophets spoke the prophecies recorded in Scripture they were men in touch with God who acted as his spokesmen...” (Michael Green, 2 Peter and Jude, TNTC, pp.109-10 & 112-13).
Revelation 22:16 calls Christ "the bright morning star." So it seems the prophets in 2Peter1:19 are mentioned in the context of pointing to Christ.
Btw. Satan was also called the morning star. But his light has gone out, becoming like a black hole that sucks the life out of everything.
Maybe Doug doesn't write anything new because he hasn't learned anything new. If he isn't reading anything much more than what the church publishes, he has nothing new to write about. If he believes that HWA has been given lost truths, does that mean that he had ALL the truth there is to learn? Are there not other sources of truth, perhaps a lot that was never "lost"? Do Jewish commentaries have some insight into the Hebrew scriptures? Do other writers from other traditions have anything that is true that Doug could learn? I remember my first week at AC in Pasadena. All the new students went down to the publications center and walked away with an armful of literature. We thought we had discovered a gold mine of truth. It turned out to be more a toxic land fill.
Anon wrote on June 26th @5:22am, Btw. Satan was also called the morning star.
According to Ellicott's commentary: The use of the word, however, in mediaeval Latin as a name of Satan, whose fall was supposed to be shadowed forth in this and the following verse, makes its selection here singularly unfortunate. Few English readers realise the fact that it is the king of Babylon, and not the devil, who is addressed as Lucifer.
The name or word satan is not found in the book of Isaiah, whether in Hebrew or English.
Only a few English bibles translate the Hebrew helel as Lucifer (from the Latin lux for light, and fero for bringing). With the exception of NKJV, modern bibles translate it as 'morning star', 'day star', 'shining star', or 'shining one'. This word is found in Isa 14:12, which is part of the proverb against the king of Babylon, to whom it is referring (Isa 14:3-23). Several verses in this parable clearly identify the king of Babylon as a mortal man (Isa 14:16b, 19a, 20a). Isaiah is taunting or mocking (some translations use these words instead of parable) the king of Babylon by using the story of Athtar the awesome's climb of Mt Zaphon (click here) as told in the Ugarit (Ras Shamra) myth. Notice the similarities with Isa 14:12-15. Athtar is identified with Venus, one of the wandering planets that can be a morning star. The Hebrew word for north in Isa 14:13 is zaphon. In both texts, there was an attempt, that failed, to usurp a throne. The end of both is similar, one in the underworld, the other in Sheol or pit.
Athtar the awesome climbed Mt Zaphon,
He ascended the throne of Ba'al the almighty.
His feet did not even reach the footstool,
His head did not even touch the headrest.
So Athtar the awesome resigned: "I cannot serve as king,
I cannot dwell on the heights of Mt Zaphon."
So Athtar the awesome descended,
He stepped down from the throne of Ba'al the almighty.
Athtar became a ruler in the underworld,
He became the overseer of the river of the dead.
The king of Babylon is Nebuchadnezzar who invaded Jerusalem, destroyed the Temple and exiled the inhabitants (2 Kings 25:1; 1 Chr 6:15; 2 Chr 36:7, 10). The Holy of Holies was the representation of God's throne room in heaven (Isa 6:1).
Nebuchadnezzar is liken to the morning star which shines brightly for a short time until it is eclipsed by the sun.
According to Merriam-Webster, morning star is a a bright planet (such as Venus) seen in the eastern sky before or at sunrise.
DennisCDiehl said...
It would probably not be well received by LCG or the self called prophets in the COG's to understand nothing in the NT remotely prophetic applies to them or today.
Hahaaaa! DD you never fail to crack me up here on Banned. I actually think that you make these posts just to troll people.
How many excuses are you going to make for Matt 24 and everything listed there that is happening today? I guess you will say that COVID is natural and caused by "climate change", like little Greta Thorndud. And what about all of the other events taking place: famines, floods, murder hornets, locusts, wars, etc etc?
Also, what about "Operation Sea Breeze 21" which is fixing to take place in less than 48 hours in the Black Sea, pitting NATO against Russia?
Of course you will argue that NATO is not the military force of the King of the North and that Russia/China are not the Kings from the East...but they are. Just like Dan 11:40-44 says. Or that the G7/Club of Rome Zones are not the seven heads and ten horns of Rev 13:1, but they are. Iran is the King of the South, and my gut tells me that Trump will be back in power to fulfill his role as the King of the North leading the USA/NATO military block. (waiting for Bobby to steal my info).
How can you deny the cold hard facts of current world events lining up EXACTLY like scripture states? But I know you will indeed deny cold hard facts on the ground just to comfort your confused atheistic mind.
Sea Breeze 21 kicks off in a few hours on June 28.
anon111
Even when the 10 nation United States of Europe appears, Dennis will insist that it's only a co-incidence, and not worth being concerned about. Dennis turns evidence on and off to suit his narrative.
Well written anon 5:22 AM.
Anon, June 26, 2021 at 5:22 AM, wrote:
"...Revelation 22:16 calls Christ "the bright morning star." So it seems the prophets in 2Peter1:19 are mentioned in the context of pointing to Christ.
Btw. Satan was also called the morning star. But his light has gone out, becoming like a black hole that sucks the life out of everything..."
******
Yes! Christ's light is light but Satan's light is darkness!
Job 18:5-6 Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out, and the spark of his fire shall not shine.
The light shall be dark in his tabernacle, and his candle shall be put out with him.
John
No, I tell you; but IF YOU DO NOT **REPENT**, you shall all likewise PERISH”. (Luke 13:3) This was SO IMPORTANT that it is REPEATED again in verse 5. FOOD FOR THOUGHT
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