Those crafty men at Philadelphia Church of God have some humor after all. They have an article up about "Throne Room Culture". Oh, wait! Not THIS kind of throne room...sigh.
Ryan Malone writes:
Throne-Room Culture
God’s inspiring plan to export a way of thinking
and living that Satan has suppressed for so long
PCG will do anything it can to justify the millions of dollars they spend a year on entertainment in its mini-me auditorium. Trying to emulate Herbert Armstrong and his love of classical music, Gerald Flurry started his own "foundation and built the mini-me version of Pasadena's Ambassador Auditorium.
After getting flack for the millions spent on Irish dance spectacles and training of the elite in Edmond to dance it, Malone and others are fast to defend the expense, as God ordained quality.
God “endowed man with the power of mind,” Herbert W. Armstrong wrote in The Incredible Human Potential. “It seems obvious that human minds were made to function in the same manner as the Creator’s, although in an inferior way. But how do we humans use our minds? We are endowed with something akin to creative powers.”
This ability makes the human being a unique creation. No animal has this ability. God gave it only to man, because of our unique and special purpose. Part of the unique God-like mind that humans possess is the ability to appreciate creative, artistic endeavors.
The Cultured Mind of God
God—creator and possessor of this mind power—is the most cultured, brilliant and sophisticated Being. He appreciates the finest things. He is a God of quality.
God gave us such mind power so He could create His character in us. And His character is that of a perfectionist, of creating the highest quality, of appreciating the finest things. “[T]he Bible teaching upholds prosperity, culture, education and acquisition of right knowledge, good quality, proper attire in clothes,” Mr. Armstrong wrote in his March 1978 Plain Truth personal, “Is It Wrong to Be a Cultured Individual?” He continued: “The Bible reveals human nature as being lazy, slovenly, yet full of vanity and greed. When people brag about being poor, uneducated and uncultured, that is merely vanity. It is usually self-excusing shiftlessness, neglect, lack of effort.”
God is surrounded by brilliance and sophistication.
And then there is this:
In Revelation 5, we read that these 24 elders sing a new song before the throne (verse 9).
What a visually rich environment: pure gold, precious stones, fiery crystals. And what aurally rich conditions—harps, singing and constant music. Verses 11-13 reference an angelic chorus of 100 million voices!
All this, you could say, is God’s throne-room culture.
Only the elite in Edmond gets to enjoy this amazing culture. Those in the field churches are bled dry of their finances making it virtually impossible for them to attend local symphonies and other cultural events so they can experience the "finer" things in life.
Never one to write an article about anything wihout mentioning Herbert Armstrong, Malone writes:
Students in the colleges were learning how to be ambassadors for God’s way of life in practical ways. Mr. Armstrong established spokesman clubs throughout the Church “to qualify Church members to better represent the Kingdom of the Eternal, living God by training in character development, leadership within God’s Church, effective organization of right thoughts and ability to put them across in plain, understandable speech” (Spokesman Club Manual). He built an auditorium to promote the highest artistic achievements of the human spirit.
Our Work today consists of the same kinds of cultural opportunities, training us how to better represent God’s culture as His ambassadors. God is blessing His people with opportunities to grow in this kind of culture. Even Church members living in far-flung places around the world can live-stream many of the performances from Armstrong Auditorium. Witnessing the gold standard of performance art is a rare experience in human history. Historically, for people to witness such performances, they would had to have been born into a privileged palace—and one that patronized the arts.
Nowadays, it is more common for people to be able to watch great performances in the form of live concerts, particularly with the advent of television and film. Art museums are also affordable and attainable for many. But this still applies mainly to the First World and Israelite-affected nations. The vast majority of humanity today is unable to partake of anything of this sort.
Utter crap! Herbert detested country music because GTA liked it. Does liking country music qualify as the "gold standard"? What about live rock performances? Do they qualify? Not everyone in the world likes classical music, especially the Irish dance crap that PCG is pumping out lately.
Of course, when it comes to Armstrongism, there is a hidden meaning to the "finer things". Enjoying that kind of music, wearing expensive clothes, eating fine food, etc is all meant to inspire people to know what it will be like to be a god or goddess.
A time is coming when all will partake of the finer things! These include fine food and drink, singing and dancing. And this is a lifestyle that, in Satan’s world, was only enjoyed by a privileged few. Verses 12 and 14 show that this all typifies spiritual bounty. These physical things represent God’s goodness.
This lifestyle will be possible partly because the world will be ruled by a spirit family of God beings—a family whose achievement, again, will be far greater than Lucifer’s ever could have been. In John’s vision recorded in the book of Revelation, he saw 144,000 of those Family members singing a new song “before the throne” (Revelation 14:1-5)—contributing to the throne-room culture.
God gives us a foretaste of this kind of world today: every Sabbath, every Feast, in the continual experiences He gives His Church. This is because wewill help bring this throne-room culture to the Earth.
It does not stop on Earth though! Isaiah 51:16 states: “And I have put my words in thy mouth, and I have covered thee in the shadow of mine hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and say unto Zion, Thou art my people.”
The Earth is merely the foundation for planting the heavens!
God wanted Lucifer to fill this universe with godly culture. Instead this is our job. God is ensuring we have the abilities to perform this! For we are about to fill this Earth—and this universe—with God’s throne-room culture!
14 comments:
I worked hard all week fixing peoples' machines so they could create products which people will buy, and the company owners will use the profits to pay their employees and themselves, and to reinvest some of the profits in the company. I meet all manner of people from all different cultures and from the entire socio-economic spectrum. And, I like all these people and respect them. Right now, I'm eating a big burrito that I bought at a local Mexican take-out restaurant, have doused it with diablo hot sauce and am washing it down with a nice tall can of Budweiser. During my off hours, I wear my comfortable old Levis or Wranglers, and usually black T-shirts. I do not dress up to go to the supermarket, or for a commercial plane flight.
Because I have a wide variety of aquaintances, I have a wide variety of clothes, so if I'm invited to a banquet, I'm there, used to the clothes, so I don't look pretentious. I hate classical music and ballroom dancing, and you'll never see me at the opera, unless we're talking about the Who's Tommy.
My belief is that we should be comfortable with and able to relate to a wide variety of people, enjoying all of humanity, not just be hobnobbing with the hoity toity and walking around as if a corn cob has been shoved up our arses!
Malone is a meaningless airhead.
God's notions about his people being kings and priests are very different from the PCOG notions regarding those things. For God, kingship and priesthood are all about love and service to others - NOT about having others cater to your every whim and need! Unfortunately, most of the ACOGs have absolutely no conception of servant leadership.
Living in HQ, you can tell how everyone is two-faced and appear to act righteous and godly around others during the sabbath, but little do the ministers know what’s really going on in their houses lol
I recall one of the justifications for the building of Ambassador Auditorium and all the other expensive investments of the Church and college contrasted to the "Soon Coming Kingdom of God and imminent return of Christ, was "Blessed is that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns" which, of course, is wretched out of its context.
So it is with, "God wants us, to have nice things."
It's why one Gospel turned "blessed are the poor" to "blessed are the poor in spirit". This was a bit of an edit to justify having lots of stuff and not to discourage the wealthy converts. Or perhaps Luke's disagreement with Matthew's take on the topic of being poor in the church.
Luke 6:20 "Then Jesus turned to His disciples and said, “God blesses you who are POOR, for the Kingdom of God is yours.'
Matthew 24:46 “Blessed are the POOR IN SPIRIT, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
This Millerite preacher wrote: "God wanted Lucifer to fill this universe with godly culture. Instead this is our job."
This statement reflects a misunderstanding of who God is. In opposition to the notional statement above, we have the following Biblical statement:
"Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world." (Acts 15:18)
There is no "instead" with God. He is not like a man who plans and then has his plans fail and then must go to Plan B. Humanity is not Plan B. And God is absolute. He does not engage in the strategy of "fall back and re-group." These Millerites need to begin to think in terms of the grown-up version of God instead of their cherished juvenile version contained in the anthropomorphisms of the Old Testament.
100% of the (so called) amazing things that men can see with their eyes, that are built by men, are ALWAYS built by using human fuel., cannon fodder, and some type of slavery or wage bondage.
Same goes for the "elite headquarters" of the various COG groups.
Please tell me PCG, just how will created, finite, non self sustaining, imperfect people become uncreated, self sustaining, perfect God? In Him, and only Him is life, uncreated, underived and infinite. As He asks over and over in Job, where were you when I created the curb of the Pleiades and the bands of Orion? Tell me if you know! Or the dozens of times in Isaiah where we are told by God that before Him was no god made and after Him shall no god be made. Tell us PCG ministers, if you know!
As for the finest, so-called, things, have you not read that ALL will be burned up? Did Jesus live in royal splendour and preach about buying the best quality goods? I seem to recall He did not. You are fools and only fooling yourselves. Get your noses out of those satanic booklets and into the Word of God. You shame Him with your filthy lies, scripture twisting and GREED, GREED, GREED.
Jesus was a servant. He washed feet. He was concerned with the heart and what comes out of it, which shows what you are. Jesus did not lay up treasures on earth. Jesus probably had only one or two garments.. and while it had no seam, it was probably utilitarian. He worked and did what He saw His Father do and said what His Father said. He did not consider the position He had in heaven as something to be grasped. He humbled Himself. We have been encouraged to be conformed to the likeness of Jesus Christ, not conformed to HWA who laid up treasures on earth.
The comment of Anon March 4 at 8:22 calls to mind conversations at Ambassador College during the 1959-60 school term about the film *Porgy and Bess*. Herbert W raved about Porgy's song "I got plenty o' nothin', and nothin's plenty for me." I don't remember the occasion; it may have been a Bible study. Anyway, Herb thought Porgy's attitude was admirable. Everybody should feel content with deprivation and feel dismissive about acquisition. We should accept our circumstances and sing cheerful songs no matter how little we may have. We should just keep track of it so we can give ten percent plus generous offerings to God, in care of Herbert W Armstrong, his representative on earth.
To claim this "I'm happy with nothin'" value system as his own, Herb often bragged about how little he himself possessed. His opulent campus and his fancy house with its color TV and his luxurious automobiles--none of that belonged to HIM. It all belonged to the CHURCH! I wondered how come the members of the Church never got the benefits of ownership.
I had vague misgivings about a minister who lived a life that contrasted so sharply with the lives of the membership. I had grown up in communities of Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Assembly of God members whose ministers lived lives comparable to theirs. My parents and other relatives took me to church often in those days. I usually sat in the back daydreaming and never paid much attention to the sermons. As a result I had little knowledge of theology. My head was not full of terms like "servant leadership." But that background among modest Protestants led me to a vague discomfort with Herb's lifestyle.
Now, with decades behind me to broaden my perspective, I see that Herb was committing the same offense we would call embezzlement if it involved taking cash instead of property for one's own use.
His theological offspring are trying the same trick. None of them have made such monumental edifices with their embezzlement as he did even though the deprivations they wrought are just as severe or worse. However, as the old saying goes, "It's not the money, it's the principle of the thing."
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6:59 writes:
“There is no "instead" with God. He is not like a man who plans and then has his plans fail and then must go to Plan B... He does not engage in the strategy of "fall back and re-group."
1Sa 9:17 And when Samuel saw Saul, the LORD said unto him, Behold the man whom I spake to thee of! this same shall reign over my people.
1Sa 15:11a It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king: for he is turned back from following me, and hath not performed my commandments.
Perhaps the observation needs qualification.
1Sa 9:2 And he had a son, whose name was Saul, a choice young man, and a goodly: and there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he: from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people.
Eze 28:15 Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.
1Sa 19:1 And Saul spake to Jonathan his son, and to all his servants, that they should kill David.
Mt 2:13b Herod will seek the young child to destroy him.
It could be argued that God and Saul were ‘types' of God and ‘Lucifer'. When Saul ‘failed' God soon replaced him with David. Satan failed and God will soon replace him with the Son of David.
Mt 12:26 And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall then his kingdom stand?
Jn 12:31 Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out.
1Sa 15:28 And Samuel said unto him, The LORD hath rent the kingdom of Israel from thee this day, and hath given it to a neighbour of thine, that is better than thou.
God is in the process of renting the kingdom of the air from Satan and will soon replace him in that kingdom with Jesus, the Son of David.
In the above the type is a ‘human’ son of David (though debatable) while the antitype is the ‘spirit’ Son of David.
2Sa 14:25 But in all Israel there was none to be so much praised as Absalom for his beauty: from the sole of his foot even to the crown of his head there was no blemish in him.
2Sa 15:6 And on this manner did Absalom to all Israel that came to the king for judgment: so Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel.
Rev 12:4a And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth:
Rev 12:7 And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,
Rev 12:8 And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven.
Absalom is also a type for Lucifer/Satan; and Solomon of Christ.
HWA claimed that he owned very little. But, as Stanley Rader would say, It's not what you own, it's what you control. HWA had all the benefits of wealth, but not the responsibility. The church cared for the maintenance of the house, car, etc.
Has anyone ever noticed this? In MOA H.W.A. writes (page 63) " I had never experienced anything like it, the steering wheel of my car------.A previous time,-------,-------, I encountered a similar experience." When I see something like that I know they are lying. Did he fool everyone in the church? I did think the people were smarter than that.
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