178 years ago one of the forefathers of Armstrongism whipped up a frenzy along with Samuel Snow in upstate New York that Jesus would return sometime between March 21, 1843 - March 21, 1844. Miller finally set the date of October 22, 1843. Like clockwork, Jesus did not return and his followers were disappointed.
Tens of thousands of devoted followers solid their homes and business to await the coming of Christ. Many of them sat on their rooftops and surrounding hillsides trying to catch the first glimpse of Jesus returning. The press made a mockery of them for that:
October 22, 1843 was the date Miller predicted after he carefully dissected prophetic passages in the Holy Bible. In order to be saved from the eventual destruction of Earth, he ordered his followers to find higher ground and wait for a cosmic sign that would signal the coming of the lord and savior.
In the days before the event, the Millerites gave away their material wealth, said their good-byes to loved ones, and gathered on top of hills, roofs and other higher grounds to await salvation from a world that was about to end. But, October 22 came and went… without incident. William Miller and the Advent of the Second Coming
Snow later went on to take Miller's calculations to set a precise date of October 22, 1844.
As usual, Christ failed to return then too. Tens of thousands of people were affected by this apocalyptic frenzy. Tens of thousands left his group. Some left the church altogether and some went on to form the Advent, Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh-Day Adventists, and other groups that are in the family tree of the Church of God.
| What Happened on October 22, 1844? | Attitude toward Prophecy | Reaction | Numbers of Millerites | Current groups |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No Second Advent | 1844 date invalid prophecy invalid | Abandoned their beliefs | Tens of thousands | Majority left Christianity Minority rejoined former churches |
| No Second Advent | 1844 date invalid prophecy valid | Jesus coming soon Some set other dates | Many hundreds | Advent Christian Church, Jehovah's Witnesses |
| Second Advent occurred – Spiritualized | 1844 date valid prophecy valid | Short lived “holy flesh” movement | Hundreds | Joined Shakers |
| Date not about Second Advent | 1844 date valid This interpretation invalid | Cleansing of Sanctuary meant Pre-Advent judgment Second Advent still coming | Dozens | Seventh-day Adventist Church |
As easy as it is to mock those deluded followers of Miller in the mid-1800's we are no better off today in 2022. Thanks to the ongoing epic failure rate of Church of God prophets down through the last 8 decades, hundreds of thousands of followers of Armstrongism have passed through the doors with many never setting foot in a church again or went on to form even more appalling splinter groups. (When the Worldwide Church of God was imploding in the late mid to late 1990's the church estimated that throughout its lifespan that over 500,000 people had passed through its doors. Many find that amount to be hard to believe, but if you include coworkers and contributors, that would swell the ranks.)
Sadly, COG leaders and many ministers never learned from Miller's mistakes nor from the false prophecies of hundreds of COG leaders down through the decades. This brings us to 2022 where we are witnessing modern-day "William Millers" make absurd prophecies that continue to fail every single day.
In the Church of God movement in 2022 we have some of the most egregious liars ever imaginable: Gerald Flurry, Dave Pack, Bob Thiel, Ron Weinland, John Rittenbaugh, and Alton Billingsley. Each of these men claim God is speaking directly to them revealing in dreams and visions just how things will shortly be. Every single one of these men has been proven to be liars and yet a remnant few remain loyal to them.
Today, in Wadsworth Ohio, the devout are waiting in eager anticipation for Christ to return and usher in a glorious new kingdom where they will be transformed into gods and will be teachers of humanity in the truth of God. Like William Miller's followers, these people have sold their homes, and businesses, cashed in retirements and insurance policies, and have given the money to Dave for some kind of mighty push.
Come Monday morning, June 6, Dave will make a new proclamation and set yet another date. If he keeps to his word, which he never has, he will declare Pentecost 2023 as the next date and remain silent till then, but we all know Dave can't keep his mouth shut and wait that long. More sermons and special announcements will be made.
If these people genuinely followed the Christ they claim to then they would have no need to worry about dates and prophecies that Dave and other COG leaders espouse. Instead of resting securely in faith in Christ as millions of Christs do every single day, these remnant believers live lives of constant dread and fear over present situations. They so desperately need that kingdom to come to be proven right. While Christians also wait for a kingdom to be coming, many work today in the world to help bring it into fruition by doing good works, without expectation of reward, to bring a foretaste of what that heavingly banquet will be like.
The COG movement has isolated itself from those around them, creating an insular movement that looks inwardly at itself where goodness and all truth are perceived to be dwelling while all around them, even in the midst of trouble, goodness and truth preside.
It is my hope that after tonight that some will wake up in the Restored Church of God and leave and find true freedom, but sadly we know this will not be the case.
12 comments:
We normally point to Herbert W. Armstrong as these charlatans' godfather or primary influence. But, it seems increasingly evident that that old carni-barker Gerald Waterhouse was also a huge influence on them!
Well done! This is a great article. I am surprised that no one is commenting on it.
The church has always pushed William Miller and the rise of Adventism to the background and found convenient half-truths to replace it with regarding COG history. Bob Thiel is good at those lies.
Watching and waiting is not necessarily a bad thing. Watching and waiting because someone you trusted for spiritual guidance has lied to you once again is quite a different matter. It would be preferable and less damaging to have been lied to about Santa Claus.
Gerald Waterhouse,
Yes I remember him one sermon saying how the South African church was concerned they wouldn’t make it to Petra because SA didn’t have diplomatic ties to Jordan.
He commented that Mr Armstrong would just call up King Hussein and ask him to let the SA brethren in.
Well here we are decades later and no HWA or Gerald Waterhouse and no King Hussein.
And the circus continues with other players now within the deeply fractured Armstrong movement.
I don't know about a deeply fractured movement, 5:39, it appears to me to be a huge, very intact, steaming bowel movement!
Good analysis, nicely written. In reading about the history of Millerism, I found myself to be puzzled by William Miller. He doesn't seem to have been an ego craving attention. It is more like he was struck with an idea and became pesonally consumed by it. Another point is that it seems like the prophetic failure of 1844 had a diversity of aftereffects. The monolith exploded and fragments of different sizes and shape scattered about. And one day Vernon Howell stood up to take over leadership of one of the fragments and rode it into the ground. I also believe it is good to remind Armstrongists that their denomination has a commonplace history. It did not marvelously appear on the scene after eighteen and a half centuries of darkness - as the legend goes. Herbert and Loma associated themselves with a Millerite sect - a sect that has doctrines similar to what Armstrongists observe today. So their association was not just meaningless and temporary. There was an actual transmission of Millerite theology to Herbert. Herbert absorbed it and augmented it with his own views - biting the hand the fed him by slamming them with the epithet of "Sardis Era." In spite of all the fancy footwork, Armstrongism remains a rendition of Millerism.
I believe it behooves everyone who is touched by Armstrongism to delve seriously into Millerism to understand the origins of HWA's beliefs and hermeneutics. Maybe they could even check out a few volumes of "Old Neo's Book of Practical Millerites" from the library and see if they don't find some things that are strangely familiar. Your post inaugurates a step in the right direction towards discerning the recent roots Armstrongism.
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The closet queen Gerald Waterhouse was one of the prime movers of the prophetic lies of the church. He has a special place in hell reserved for him.
In reading about William Miller, it's interesting to note that he wasn't a Sabbath keeper, but was instead a Baptist preacher. He drew followers from several different denominations, including but not limited to those who were or became seventh day Sabbath keepers. These people collectively became known as Adventists. It was from this movement that the Seventh Day Adventist movement arose, as well as others including those who later formed the Church of God Seventh Day, comprised of people who rejected the teachings of Ellen G. White, and formed their own group instead.
One article on Miller that I looked up said that after the Great Disappointment, Miller publicly acknowledged his mistake, and ceased to associate himself with others in the Adventist movement. He seemed to learn his lesson, and didn't set anymore dates. It was instead others who continued to set dates and make false prophetic predictions, and as was pointed out in the post, this shamefully continues within many of the modern day COG offshoots.
We pridefully point fingers at other groups including the SDAs for continued reverence of Ellen G White, but we fail to see that many among us have made the same mistakes in following and placing others on pedestals who have also set dates, and made prophetic predictions that didn't happen when or the way they said things would happen. Instead of learning from the mistakes of those who have gone before us, we instead turn a blind eye to their false predictions or make excuses for them, while continuing to read our own prophetic interpretation into every headline, weather event, war, etc.
This judgemental, blind, and hypocritical approach has resulted in a general loss of credibility that affects all the corporate COGs to one degree or another and is one reason among others that some of our young people have become disillusioned with the leadership of the corporate groups, and why the groups in general aren't drawing new people. It has absolutely nothing to do with God not "calling" people today, but more to do with our own infighting, our lack of transparency and humility in our approach to preaching the gospel, and our stubborn refusal to learn from past mistakes.
Concerned Sister
Concerned Sister:
Your use of "we" and "our" indicates to me that you are some variety of Armstrongist. And you seem to be calling for reform. The reason why this is likely not to be well received in Armstrongist quarters has to do with the allurement of prophecy for Armstrongists. Prophecy is the "magic" that converts an otherwise small, insignificant and cultic religous organization into an earth-shaking force - at least in the perception of some. Can you imagine what would happen in Splinterdom if apocalypticism and the accompanying lurid predictive prophecies were relegated to the cabinet of curiosities. A new Church of Prophecy would be started and the disenchanted prophecy fans would flock to it. Without prophecy the volatile drama is driven off and the stolid Christian residue that remains is not what apocalyptic Millerites are remotely looking for.
The psychological and sociological drivers behind conspiracy theories are just as applicable to prophetic views of apocalyptics as they are to political groups. Apocalyptic Millerites are not special in any way. They are seeking the "magical" meaining in worldly events just like the non-religious. And this "magic" satisfies a demand and cannot be easily reformed away.
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Nicely presented Gary
It's obvious that the ACOGs are setting dates of Christ's return as a tool to attract and motivate their members. But they must also be aware that this ploy means constantly throwing a number of victims under the bus. They would know this from the out cries of former deceived victims. People put off medical treatment, others made education choices that they otherwise would not have made. Some put off finding a mate, etc.
Lives seriously harmed so that so that some church leader and their henchmen can play church. They deserve a special place in hell.
The date setters are the least concerning in my humble opinion. In fact we should encourage these jokers as it relates to that.
Set a date of Christ's return and you set an almost immediate expiration date on any real relevancy.
The much more dangerous leader in this movement is the one that draws momentum on all the other fundamental teachings but does NOT set timetables. Speak in terms of lifetimes and general big picture prophecy and its the golden ticket. The masses will gather and the power accumulates if eloquence as a speaker is combined with this unique theology. It's never ceased to amaze me how zealous these adherents become with the story regardless of the details that surround them.
Anyway...set a date and then bye bye. That's very clear in the history. 2000 years of the rest of it not so easy
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