Now, more so than ever, in the COG universe, the various splinters make steady use of the term "little flock" to make excuses as to why their membership is so low. Is it really because "true" believers are so few or the fact that today's crop of church leaders and ministry are some of the saddest excuses we have ever seen for being representatives of Jesus Christ, that dude most fail to acknowledge 90% of the time?
When a person looks at the stories in Christian scriptures about Jesus feeding the 5,000 and other stories, you can't help but be struck by the deep fascination people had for Jesus and how he was able to draw them in. Whether it was mass groups of people or a few in a room, his dynamic magnetism drew people into a cause that ended up being the largest belief system on earth today. People have been willing to die for that cause.
And yet, here is the Church of God today, struggling to stay alive and relevant in the 21st century.
LCG's Davey Crocket writes:
The Little Flock
The bare trees make a silhouette on the horizon in the winter morning light, beautiful to behold in the cold, clear, crisp air. Not much traffic on a Saturday morning, a far cry from the crowded roadways on weekday commutes for most workers.
The radio news is relatively quiet, except for analysis of the still-ongoing political issues and talk about the big games scheduled for the weekend.
Being out early is a regular routine for traveling ministers, who often make trips to visit the small congregations of the Church of God that are sprinkled around the country and the world. There aren’t enough ministers for each little congregation to have its own pastor, so most of them are served by ministers who make a circuit to visit these small groups. A Sabbath visit from a visiting minister will involve a sermon based on a biblical topic, such as Christian living, prophecy, or the Holy Days—useful, practical messages that are helpful to those who are striving to live by every word of God.
Some will have questions that the minister will try to answer. Some attendees will request prayer and anointing for healing, a practice found in James 5. Fellowshipping goes on until folks must leave for their homes, sometimes quite a distance from where services are held. As they head home, most are already looking forward to the next Sabbath when they can be together again.
Why make these journeys to speak to and serve these people? There are precedents found in the Bible. Down through time, the people dedicated to following God’s way of life have often been few and scattered, as they are today.
In ancient times, the prophet Samuel regularly made a circuit to serve the people. “He went from year to year on a circuit to Bethel, Gilgal, and Mizpah, and judged Israel in all those places” (1 Samuel 7:16).
Jesus also used this method: “Then He went about the villages in a circuit, teaching” (Mark 6:6). Later, the Apostle Paul was known for his journeys as he raised up churches and spread the Good News of the Kingdom of God. In 2 Corinthians 11:26, he spoke about being “in journeys often.”
Why do this? Why go to the trouble? Jesus made it plain in His instruction to the Apostle Peter before He ascended into heaven: “So when they had eaten breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter… ‘Feed My lambs…. Tend My sheep…. Feed My sheep’” (John 21:15–17).
So, all around the nation, as in many other parts of the world, there are dedicated ministers who are on the go, making regular visits to small congregations, striving to follow the instructions of Jesus Christ by feeding the flock that God has called. You won’t find these little flocks in large church buildings or in sumptuous surroundings. Mostly, they meet in rented halls, realizing that a church is not a building but the people in the building.
At the end of the day, the bare trees make a beautiful silhouette on the evening winter sky as the circuit-traveling preacher makes his way home, tired, but happy to have been of service to a little flock that was eager to hear what he had to bring them on the Sabbath day.
These little flocks in the COG today are aging members who think they have nowhere else to go and must remain true to what they had originally learned. Very few, if any outside the COG movement are drawn into full membership in the church. Some or many may be fascinated by telecasts and magazine articles but not enough to join them. COG leaders write this off by conveniently claiming "they are not being called at this time."
Are people not being called or is it really a result of ineffectual leaders and ministry spread across the Church of God who have placed their faith in the law while ignoring the one they claim to follow? Christians see through that theological mess and that is why so many of the splinter groups have turned into such failures. They have nothing to offer that sparks the desire for Christ in people's hearts like those that were drawn to him during his lifetime.
15 comments:
When Jesus referenced the "little flock" in Luke 12:32, He was definitely NOT making a prophecy. Nothing like "you will always be a little group". No. In fact He instructed them to go and make disciples of ALL nations. For these ministers to attempt to reassure the tiny congregations that Jesus expected them to be small, is nothing more than a coverup for the poor job the ministry is doing.
It is now evident that "Hebrew Roots" congregations are spontaneously springing up all over the country, often with 50-100 people who believe in Jesus, love the Word of God and keep the Sabbath and Holy Days. And who have no centralized government. If God was ever working with WCG, that day is fading; the baton is being passed.
A good post and telling.
The ‘church’ is flourishing and growing.
Witness the large numbers from the Islamic world coming to faith in Jesus Christ.
The message of the gospel is going out as never before and it is being heard.
A quick glance on YT will attest to that. As the scripture tells us, some preach Christ from the heart and some preach for ‘gain’ but that the name of Christ is preached is what is important.
And lives are being changed for the better.
There is much to be grateful for.
Armstrongism is deeply flawed, and that reality is readily available to view via social media and websites such as this one.
Armstrongism is dying and will soon pass on and be remembered no more except by those impacted by it, for better or worse.
Our salvation is in Jesus Christ and not in any particular organisation that claims to be the ‘true’ church. For many claim the same, in and out of Armstrongism.
In sprite of what many of us have experienced hope and faith live on, for that we can rejoice and live our lives fully and free from the embrace of HWA and his ‘movement’.
I feel badly for the obviouly sincere ones amongst the ACOG ministry. All that they can do is invoke the same old arcane cliches as their church continues downward in a death spiral which must be difficult to deal with. Back in the '50s, scattered brethren were similarly cut off, but had high hopes as rapid growth soon made them feel as if they were part of something much bigger than just themselves. The mercurial splintering of Armstromgism, coupled with the phenomenal numbers who became disgusted and left in search of something better, has robbed the movement of its power to get out any sort of message which would rejuvenate the church with an influx of new members. It must be like living near the Salton See, remembering its glory days as a prime resort area, even as one watches the rot and decay.
Growing Smaller
Since the WCG splinter groups cannot seem to grow at all, maybe they can compete against each other to see which one can shrink the fastest. The Dying Church of Rod can try to become the littler church, unless the Fizzledelphia Cult of Flurry beats it to the bottom. Or, maybe the disUnited Church of Godlessness can overtake both of them to the downside with another major split.
This is Bob Thiel's excuse for his poor performance as a splinter group.
Excellent post! The church has lost any power it has had because of poor ministers and worse leaders. The glory days of old will never be recaptured. No one cares anymore.
The members of some of these little flocks are often called upon to bear a horrendously unfair financial burden to fund the so-called mission of their group. People like Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry, and Ron Weinland are parasites in their members' lives. I call them flock suckers.
Let's make up our minds. In the early days, the criteria for the impending tribulation was to meet the 144,000 true members of the church before we were to flee. Every FOT there would be a head count collected from every feast area, and towards the end of the "glory days," it seemed like we almost got there. As a teenager, I watched that numbers count, thinking it'd soon be over. So now, it's the "little flock?" What gives?
If I recall, leaders in the WCG would say that the flock is small because not everyone is being called in this life. John 6:44, " No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. . ." But, they ignore John 12:32, which says, "But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself." God the Father only drew a small number to be among the followers of Jesus, until he died and was raised from the dead, then all men were drawn to him. Of course, being drawn to Jesus is not the same as being attracted to a religious organization, which oftentimes repels many believers. Going to a Masonic Lodge on a Saturday to be verbally abused by an overbearing, poorly trained pastor, is not a very attractive option. Giving up a job to observe the Sabbath and Holy Days and paying multiple tithes, etc. . . . No thank you.
Even back in the day I remember hwa saying such and such denomination cannot be the real church because they were too large to qualify as a “little flock”. The 144,000 was within hwa’s definition of a little flock when compared to all the churches in the world.
It occurred to me that this belief in the church being a little flock removes the power of the gospel in the eyes of cog members. Because the cogs claim that they are preaching the Gospel and because they believe they will never be more than a little flock, then necessarily the Gospel is weak to them because it converts very few people. Thus, in the cogs the Gospel is relegated to a witness and warning message only (not really good news or the power of God as Paul says).
So, in cog theology, they believe they will be able to tell all people including the much more active and serving Christian churches that they simply were not known by God and neither did they know God (direct quote from a senior cogwa minister during 2021 feast).
You see, the cog gospel works more like a club (witness and warning) to be able to tell all those that did not heed their ineffectual message that they have no reason to complain about Not being known by God because the cogs gave you ample witness and warning. So, put that in your pipe and smoke it! Figuratively, of course.
So many bad consequences arise from absurd theology. The wcg and cogs actually made a doctrine out of Jesus using the term “little flock” one time in the Bible when addressing a small group of followers. And because they taught in their theology that only a very small little flock would heed their version of the gospel, it led to pulling the loving redemptive power out of the gospel to call and restore many and replacing it with an ineffectual gospel that will primarily only serve as a witness and warning.
Even by their own theology, how many more people did God refuse to call because the ACOGs chose to adapt a abusive cult social system? Is God supposed to call hundreds of thousands to a church that infantilizes and strips them of their natural rights?
The little flock thingy is a cop out for these churches lawlessness.
Why don't you attempt to answer your own questions NO2HWA? After all you should know.
Why not address the modern day phenomenon of athiests and burned out Ministry. Spiritually dry bones.
Dynamic magnetism ? How's that fitting in with Isaiah 53 description of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ ?
Are lambs dynamic magnetic ?
Dynamic magnetism is a description that Satan the devil could claim no doubt.
LCG has gloried in its small-ness. "We are the little flock. If we grow too much we will be the dominant group of the era, the Laodiceans." Thus, Rod Meredith never had a goal to grow LCG. This explains why his mission had these two prominent points: 1) Preach the gospel as a witness even though Jesus never said to preach the gospel as a witness, and the idea of being a witness is only in one verse and has to do with your actions, not preaching, and, 2) Preach a warning message even though Jesus never said to do so, and the idea of warning others is only stated once, and directed to the already-called. Result? No Growth. But Rod was smart -- he gaged his success on TV response numbers, and avoided being held accountable for doing what Jesus actually commanded, "make disciples of all nations", something he didn't even try to do. Unless, of course, you want to include Rod's January 2010 call for the destruction of al the other churches of God so that the faithful might all come to LCG and do "a really big work". But even then, failure to grow would have beeen an even bigger failure.
Well said LCG Exp.
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