Bob Thiel is back once again, attempting to smear COG7 and the work they do as the dead Sardis era. That's pretty rich considering COG7 is growing in members while every single "true remnant" Armstrongist COG is dying a slow, agonizing death, splintered into hundreds of little groups.
Thiel’s argument only works if you first accept a 20th-century Armstrongist map of church history, then treat that map as if Jesus wrote it. Under the New Covenant, that map is not required, not implied, and not how the letters in Revelation actually function.
What Thiel is actually claiming
The article he wrote is not a neutral history of the Church of God (Seventh Day). It is an identity brief. The load-bearing claim is: Revelation 2–3 is a timetable of successive “eras.”
COG7 is the leftover “Sardis era”: a name that it lives, but it is dead.
Thiel's "proof" is that it rejects church-era historiography, does not treat the annual holy days as binding, is relatively preterist on much of Revelation, and is therefore unwatchful.
He therefore claims most of its hundreds of thousands of members are being “connected to error” and will be overtaken “as a thief.” Imagine that, an Armstrongist COG leader claiming others are "connected to error". Bob has not looked in his mirror lately.
He restated the same scheme as recently as 2025: Sardis dominant c. 1600–1933, “but some are still in it”; Philadelphia dominant c. 1933–1986, “but some few faithful are still in it.”
Notice the date that does all the work: 1933. That is not a date Jesus gave. It is the year Herbert Armstrong broke with the Church of God (Seventh Day). The “era” doctrine is then used to baptize that organizational split as prophecy.
Why church eras are not a New Covenant doctrine
1. The letters were written to seven living churches at the same time
John is told to send the same book to seven congregations on a known Roman mail circuit in western Asia Minor (Revelation 1:11). In the opening vision, Christ walks among seven lampstands at once (1:12–13, 20). The refrain at the end of every letter is not “hear what the Spirit says to your era.” It is:
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
That is contemporaneous and corporate, not sequential and exclusive. A historicist overlay can be imposed on the text. It is not read out of it. Even conservative commentators who like a broad historical application usually treat the letters as types of churches that can coexist, not as a franchise timeline with one “true” corporation per century.
Several letters assume Christ’s coming is relevant to that congregation (Revelation 2:25; 3:3, 11). That sits badly with a scheme in which Sardis “ended” in 1933 and Philadelphia “ended” in 1986.
2. The New Covenant does not run on “mantles” and era headquarters
Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews 8 describe the New Covenant this way: the law written on hearts, sins remembered no more, and “they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.” The mediating structure is Christ, not a human apostle who assigns your congregation a Revelation nickname.
Paul’s church is one body with many members (1 Corinthians 12; Ephesians 4). It is not a relay race in which COG7 is dead because it did not accept British-Israelism, a 19-year time-cycle chart, and Armstrong’s 1933 restart. “Philadelphia” in Revelation 3 is a local church commended for keeping Christ’s word with little strength. It is not a trademark that passed from Eugene, Oregon, to Pasadena, then to Charlotte, then to Grover Beach.
Once you drop the era machine, Thiel’s central sentence collapses:
No other group throughout recent history fits Jesus’ description of the Sardis church more than CG7-D.
That is only “obvious” if you already decided that Revelation 3:1–6 is a dossier on Denver.
3. The scheme is self-serving and unstable
Armstrong borrowed a Protestant historicist habit (Scofield, Larkin, and others also sliced church history into seven ages) and then customized the dates so that his departure from COG7 became the Philadelphia dawn. Different historicists use different dates. That alone should warn you that you are looking at a homiletical grid, not an exegetical necessity.
Thiel himself cannot keep the scheme clean. He needs Sardis to be “over” so COG7 can be the dead church, and he needs Sardis remnants to still exist so he can keep scolding them in 2026. He needs Philadelphia to have been 1933–1986, and he needs a Philadelphian remnant that is, conveniently, his Continuing Church of God. Every other Armstrongist split does the same trick in the opposite direction. After 1986 the movement became a demolition derby of “we kept the mantle / you became Laodicean.” That is not New Covenant discernment. It is succession politics with proof texts. Proof texting his the only way Armstrongism can exist.
Armstrong borrowed a Protestant historicist habit (Scofield, Larkin, and others also sliced church history into seven ages) and then customized the dates so that his departure from COG7 became the Philadelphia dawn. Different historicists use different dates. That alone should warn you that you are looking at a homiletical grid, not an exegetical necessity.
Thiel himself cannot keep the scheme clean. He needs Sardis to be “over” so COG7 can be the dead church, and he needs Sardis remnants to still exist so he can keep scolding them in 2026. He needs Philadelphia to have been 1933–1986, and he needs a Philadelphian remnant that is, conveniently, his Continuing Church of God. Every other Armstrongist split does the same trick in the opposite direction. After 1986 the movement became a demolition derby of “we kept the mantle / you became Laodicean.” That is not New Covenant discernment. It is succession politics with proof texts. Proof texting his the only way Armstrongism can exist.
Where the article itself goes wrong
Jesus seems to be warning Sardis to know its history, stop changing doctrine, and pay attention to prophecy
That is not what Revelation 3:1–6 says. Jesus says:
they have a reputation for life but are deadwake up and strengthen what remainstheir works are not completeremember what they received and heardhold fast and repentif they will not watch, he will come as a thiefa few have not defiled their garments
Thiel translates that into: accept Armstrong’s church-history reconstruction, keep the holy days as Armstrong defined them, and adopt his futurist reading of Revelation 13 and 18. That is a massive smuggling operation. “Remember what you received and heard” in a first-century letter is not “restore the Radio Church of God package.” Then, and only then, will you be allowed to understand when it is time to flee to Petra, where those who make it there will be treated to 3 1/2 years of Thiel preaching.
Size as a weapon, then as a trophy
Thiel notes that COG7 once pointed to its size as evidence it was not Sardis, then replies that size only means it is connecting ~300,000 people to error.
COG7’s own current public figures are more modest and still large by Armstrongist-Church-of-God standards: about 14,000 members and 230+ congregations in the U.S. and Canada, and more than 200,000 affiliated through its International Ministerial Congress in 40+ countries.
Meanwhile, the old Worldwide Church of God shattered. The larger English-speaking Armstrongist bodies are now in the low tens of thousands at most; UCG’s recent attendance figures are in the neighborhood of 12–14,000. Thiel’s CCOG claims “thousands” worldwide and “fastest growing ex-WCG group,” heavily concentrated in Africa—claims that have been repeatedly contested on the ground.
Two things can be true at once: Institutional headcount is not the test of faithfulness.
A man who treats COG7’s size as proof of mass deception, while treating his own claimed growth as a fruit of Philadelphia, is not applying a consistent rule. He is keeping score.
Armstrongism did not “gloat into” a larger, more alive Philadelphia. It fragmented. COG7 did not vanish. That does not make Denver the one true church. It does make the 1933 “Sardis died / Philadelphia was born” story look like organizational mythology.
Holy days: disagreement is not “Sardis death”
Thiel spends a long stretch rebutting COG7’s seven reasons for not binding the annual festivals. Some of those rebuttals are fair as internal arguments among Sabbatarians (Genesis 1:14 and moed; 1 Corinthians 5:7–8; early Quartodeciman practice). Others are weaker:“Ceremonial” is not a magic word, but Colossians 2:16–17 really does call festival, new moon, and Sabbath a shadow, with the substance in Christ. That is a New Covenant text, not a “liberal slide.”
Thiel spends a long stretch rebutting COG7’s seven reasons for not binding the annual festivals. Some of those rebuttals are fair as internal arguments among Sabbatarians (Genesis 1:14 and moed; 1 Corinthians 5:7–8; early Quartodeciman practice). Others are weaker:“Ceremonial” is not a magic word, but Colossians 2:16–17 really does call festival, new moon, and Sabbath a shadow, with the substance in Christ. That is a New Covenant text, not a “liberal slide.”
The agricultural setting is not a “red herring” if you claim the Leviticus 23 calendar is still legislated for Gentiles in Phoenix and Nairobi.
“The calendar can’t be reconstructed from Scripture alone” is a real problem if you are going to make festival observance a mark of the true church.
COG7’s historic stance is: Sabbath as creation/moral distinctive; annual feasts as old-covenant national liturgy fulfilled in Christ; Lord’s Supper / Passover retained. You can argue with that. You cannot pretend Jesus’ letter to Sardis is a voting guide on Leviticus 23. That is Armstrongism using Revelation as a club.
Prophecy: preterism is an error or a school; it is not the Sardis label
Thiel’s October 2025 follow-up is clearer than the older piece: he is angry that Robert Coulter and CG7-D read much of Revelation 13 and 18 as already played out in medieval church-state history. Fine—say you think they are wrong about the Beast. Many historic Protestants were partial preterists or historicists; many futurists disagree with Thiel’s specific Beast package too.
What he cannot do is equate “they do not watch for my prophetic sequence” with “they are the dead church of Revelation 3.” 1 Thessalonians 5 tells the brethren to stay awake. It does not create a Philadelphia office that alone knows the chart.
The Luther paragraph is a smear, not an argument
Whaid Rose praised Luther as a Reformation figure who recovered justification by faith. Thiel answers with Luther’s antisemitic tracts and concludes Rose is not among the “few names in Sardis who have not defiled their garments.”
That is guilt by historical association. You can reject Luther’s later viciousness—and should—without treating any appreciation of 1517 as “the ecumenical agenda” and proof of defilement. COG7 is not Lutheran. Citing Luther on sola fide is not the same as adopting the Diet of Worms as the church’s finest hour in every respect. Thiel needs the Protestant scare because his identity system requires COG7 to be a dying husk sliding toward Sunday and Christmas. Actual COG7 materials still call the Sabbath God’s will “from creation to Christ,” not an elective.
Drift happens in every tradition, including his. Using a magazine essay about Luther as Revelation 3 evidence is not exegesis.
“Fewer and fewer are likely to be true Christians”
That sentence is the tell. Once “true Christian” means “person who accepts our era chart, our holy days, and our prophecy,” the conclusion is guaranteed before the study starts. It is unfalsifiable gatekeeping.
The New Covenant alternative
If the New Covenant is in force now—and Hebrews says the first covenant is obsolete and vanishing—then the people of God are those in Christ, sealed by the Spirit, not those correctly tagged Sardis or Philadelphia.
If the New Covenant is in force now—and Hebrews says the first covenant is obsolete and vanishing—then the people of God are those in Christ, sealed by the Spirit, not those correctly tagged Sardis or Philadelphia.
There is one church, not seven successive true denominations.
Revelation 2–3 is a pastoral X-ray of attitudes that can exist in any congregation: lost first love, faithful suffering, compromise, dead reputation, little strength that keeps the word, lukewarm self-satisfaction.
You do not need a 1933 corporate reboot for God to have a people.
“Watch” means moral and eschatological wakefulness, not subscription to one splinter’s newspaper.
Armstrongism mocked COG7 as Sardis while claiming the open door of Philadelphia. Forty years after Armstrong’s death, the heirs of that claim are small, split, and still excommunicating one another over who holds the mantle. Thiel’s latest articles are the same move: keep the era mythology, keep COG7 in the villain slot, and treat disagreement on festivals and futurism as spiritual death.
He can argue doctrine with COG7 on Sabbath practice, festivals, and Revelation. Those are real debates. What he cannot honestly do is promote those debates into Jesus’ verdict on a first-century church in Asia Minor, then use that verdict to explain why his group is the last faithful remnant in human history. That is not the New Covenant. That is a 21st-century Armstrongite succession myth proof-texted into oblivion.
Here is his letter article badmouthing COG7: CG7 member denounces Denver group's loss of doctrine
According to Nietzsche, Paul totally reinvented the religion that Jesus started. So all bets are off. There was a lot of deception going on in those days, just like today. Nothing is new under the Sun.
ReplyDeleteWhat I've noticed over the years, is that the Armstrongite literalists actually know what metaphors and analogies are. They misapply those words to scripture when doing so supports their belief system, and yet take obvious metaphoric scripture and interpret it as being intended literally when it suits their purpose and agenda.
ReplyDeleteArmstrongism has never been absolute, immutable, or eternal. It has always been the by-product of interpretation by a human being whom members insist was an Apostle, and one to be held above the real Apostles of the First Century because he is allegedly the end times Apostle. His end times prophecies have failed, and his empire splintered and dissolved, but I digress.
Many in WCG and RCG did NOT believe Herbert Armstrong was an Apostle, never mind Apostle of Apostles. Alot of Herbert's man worship came from unconverted and calculating men who could see how weak Herberts ego was to flattery.
DeleteI never met any practicing members of the original WCG who did not believe HWA was an apostle, 1:24, but then again I am a dinosaur who left when 1975 failed.
ReplyDeleteI sat in the Ambassador Gym in Pasadena many times, hearing GTA on Sabbath, refer to HWA as "God's Apostle, my father" although i understand that he changed his mind on this after his banishment.
Actually, I hope your last paragraph is correct. But, I also have to remember that HWA once wrote a Good News article stating that disagreeing with him
was blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. It was highlighted either here or over at Painful Truth. I don't recall which.
Flurry was only baptizing people if they acknowledged HWA's apostleship, as were other of the more extreme groups referring to themselves as Philadelphians.
As employees of AC, we actually were required to sign oaths of loyalty to HWA in the mid 1970s when Dr.Martin, Al Carozzo, Richard Plache and others were leaving and church members were following them. Unless you were leaving, you just didn't imply that HWA, even in subtle ways was not an Apostle!
Garner ted in his RCG/WCG era was ironically as much a PR advertising product Herbert & Loma sold to the world as the free Plain Truth magazine was.
DeleteHe most probably knew it too. What GTA really thought he kept to himself in RCG/WCG.
In CGI his real personality shone through which was less charismatic and less popular than RCG/WCG members would have recognised. To his credit he repeatedly taught the biblical recognised qualifications for the 12 Apostles and repeatedly said his dad was not an Apostle. He levelled the field by talking alot about his mother and what she did.
He also repeatedly humbled his dad's autiobiography by calling it 'a work of fiction'.
And, yet GTA never again reached the lofty heights that he had attained while working in league with his father, in spite of the fact that he "came clean" in certain areas.
DeleteOne theory at headquarters in the early '70s was that HWA would die, and GTA would start the Laodicean Era. GTA used to say the only way he would leave the WCG was "boots up" (dead) He also said many times that he anticipated dying a gruesome, violent death, most likely because his was the voice on the radio at that time, and he would be the natural lightning rod.
You know the old saying, "If you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans!"
There are only 12 apostles of Jesus Christ - Rev 21:14.
ReplyDelete7:30 So what does this mean for Paul?
ReplyDeleteThe names may be the eleven in Acts 1:13 and Paul, and time will tell.
DeleteArmstrongism has its own rendition of the Torah which neither agrees with the scriptural Torah nor the Rabbinic Torah. The Armstrongist mini-Torah is a product of such people as HWA, Hoeh, GTA and Meredith. But Armstrongism also possesses an unacknowledged Talmud. Like the Judaic Talmud, it is a corpus of application and interpretation. But it does not contain debate like the Judaic Talmud because while debate always existed informally in Armstrongism, it was never really documented by the organization. The autocratic government of the WCG did not permit any kind of formal debate. I don’t know if HWA ever asked for viewpoint on any controversial issue.
ReplyDeleteThe Armstrongist Talmud contains traditional ideas that may not have an associated Biblical exegesis. For instance, the idea that the church eras in historical sequence are prophesied in the book of Revelation. This belief is supported by interpreting history rather than Biblical exegesis yet it has the gravitas of doctrine. Another idea that is found in the Armstrongist Talmud is the idea that Sukkot is symbolic of the Millennium. There is no exegesis for this. Yet I have heard people say, when many options became available for the Feast of Tabernacles, that they wanted to attend a service where The Meaning is preached. They did not understand that the meaning they referred to is a denominational product rather than an exegetical understanding. Both the idea church eras as history and the idea of the Feast as Millennium are part of the Armstrongist Talmud. We could say the same thing for the tenuous idea of HWA as apostle. The Talmud has only denominational gravitas because it lacks consensus exegetical roots.
Overall, I believe Armstrongists do not want to recognize the existence of their Talmud. They want all their denominational words, actions and ideas to be regarded as doctrine with the same level of inspiration as scripture. But in the Talmud, interpretation and application do not always equate to revelation and exegesis. It is cultic fervor that elevates the Armstongist Talmud to the level of the Torah.
My two cents…
Scout
Thank you Scout. ‘But in the Talmud, interpretation and application do not always equate to revelation and exegesis..’ quite so and well put. Yes the Festivals and Tabernacles pointed to Israel’s sojourn in the wilderness as they journeyed to Zion from captivity in Egypt, as you pointed out in another comment. The ‘church eras’ stuff certainly consumed much time among many of us at wwcog. Many saw it as a vindication of the Armstrong movement, indeed of our own faith. This theory, as many have come to see is demonstratedly flawed, and cannot be defended. Cheers.
DeleteI agree, Scout. There is also the oral tradition from the pulpit. Often this expanded and intensified the written materials. As an example, the child rearing booklet appears relatively innocuous. If we had recordings of all the sermons and Bible Studies, counselling sessions, AC classes, and Spokesmans' Club discussions, people would be able to plainly see where the abuses came into play. That does not seem to be accidental.
ReplyDeleteReading this article and another article about Armstrongism makes me thankful that I did not grow up in a WCG offshoot. My mom and uncle both attended the original WCG in the early '80s. They met with a congregation that held meetings on Saturday mornings at the Westview Mall theater before it opened up for the day. After they were kicked out of the WCG for questioning some things (e.g. my uncle asking why women were not allowed to wear makeup), my uncle began to hold bible studies at home on Saturdays. My grandmother's old house which is now occupied by my aunt. Or at other people's houses by the mid 80s. My mom continued on with these WCG teachings and was dismayed to find out the church fragmented after Armstrong died including making many doctrine changes such as allowing members to eat clean and unclean meats, keeping the holidays, etc. My mom raised my older sister and myself in these WCG changes and became more strict the older we got including not allowing us to watch Saturday morning cartoons or any entertaining show from Friday at sunset to Saturday at sunset. It's bad enough I felt isolated because I didn't celebrate the holidays or my birthday most years. Keeping the Sabbath "holy" made me feel even more isolated. One thing to take away from all of this was that the original WCG taught their members lies. And the current WCG offshoots including COG7 are doing the same thing even as many of these groups are dying off.
ReplyDeleteThe stuff is convincing if "they" keep on hammering it, but if you study it at all on your own without their interruptions, much of it falls apart.
DeleteThe problem is that we humans are well aware of our own limitations, so we consult with other humans whom we suspect might be spiritually more advanced than self. It can be so easy to lapse into allowing confident-sounding others to do the thinking for which God gave us our minds to do ourselves. Single sourcing is always a risky proposition. There must always be third-party checks and balances in order for truth to triumph!
The Feast of Tabernacles picturing the glorious future reign of Jesus Christ, starting with the Millenium, was not invented by Herbert Armstrong.
ReplyDeleteMany different Biblical scholars, bible commentaries, numerous books and studies studying such scriptures as Zechariah 14:16, Ezekiel 45, Deuteronomy 16 and many more scripture point to the Feast of Tabernacles being about events yet to happen.
This year alone in Jerusalem thousands of Christians will travel there from all around the world for the IEC religious celebration of Tabernacles. They have zero connection to Herbert Armstrong. Highly likely to have never heard of him. Why don't you verbally tear them down?
Anonymous 12:35
DeleteOK. They are all dealing in idiosyncratic theology. Let them provide a reasonable exegesis that supports this claim. To the ancient Israelites the holy days were about the exodus from Egypt. In the NT the holy days are barely mentioned.
Millerites have an unhealthy preoccupation with the tribulation and the millennium, so they see both in the woodwork.
Scout
Will I see you in Jerusalem,12;35?
DeleteWill the 6000th year go out (Hebrew-"end" of the year-Ex 23:16) at the Feast of Ingathering? In 2026?
ReplyDeleteI can hear now the armstrongist laugh out loud at such a silly question. Don't I know "ingathering" refers to crops? Of course but there may be a spiritual meaning.
Don't I know the Great Trib has to occur first? No. Twas in Judea long ago.
Don't I know the calendar year begins in the spring-Ex 12:2? No. That verse in Hebrew indicates Nisan/Abib was to be regarded as the most important month, first in rank, of the year.
Don't I know the "beast", 2 witnesses, red heifer sacrifice, kings of north and south, etc yet have to occur? No.
Oh, well.