The Philadelphia Church of God, one of the more restrictive controlling personality cults of Armstrongism, has a new article by Ryan Malone. It is titled: How To Repel People.
This is pretty rich coming from a church that has worked overtime in repelling people, including their own members. This includes the blatant worship of Gerald Flurry, the worship of Malachi's Message as equal to the Bible, telling members to abandon children at the mall if they have health issues or are troubled so that the state can take care of them and the parents can send that money into the church, to the appalling prohibition of members from talking to spouses, children, parents, grandparents and friends who have left the church. Dividing families repelled a huge number of people.
Anyway, this is what Malone said in his idolatry of Flurry:
When I first started working at headquarters in 1998, I assisted in the editorial department. Right at that time, we had just come into a possession of a sermon recording of our pastor general from long before he held that position—back when he was a field minister in the Worldwide Church of God.
This sermon was the most profound we’d heard on the subject of self-righteousness, and my co-worker Joel Hilliker was working on turning its transcript into an article—which would be the very first piece I edited at my new job. The article made the July-August 1998 Royal Vision, and I remember a particularly life-changing sermon from our department head Stephen Flurry later that summer which explored the article and elaborated on some of its poignant points. The article has since been immortalized as the third chapter of the Church’s book How to Be an Overcomer.
Every time any of us reviews a piece of Church literature, our life experiences are like a different set of highlighters causing certain statements to stand out. When I reviewed that chapter recently—now as a minister overseeing the singles program of God’s Church— several statements stood out about how self-righteousness impacts relationships. Four passages are particularly relevant. As we consider our relationships, we can all benefit from considering these.
Here is the first quote, which describes how a self-righteous person makes others feel:
Have you ever been around a person who made you feel guilty, or very unrighteous, because you felt this person was doing so many righteous deeds? You didn’t want to become close friends with him because he always made you feel so unrighteous. Job had that effect on people. We need to understand that self-righteousness repels, while the true righteousness of God draws people to you as it did to Jesus Christ. People liked Christ. He was a nice man to be around because He didn’t put people down or make them feel inferior.
Armstrongism made a money-making empire out of making people feel guilty and constantly being unrighteous. The self-righteousness of the leaders, so many in the ministry, and the local kiss-asses have repelled generations of Church of God members. Every day it gets worse.
The "true righteous" mentioned above have been few and far between with many in the church, particularly since most COG leaders are repelled by Jesus and the New Covenant message. They would rather prostrate themselves at the altar of the law which they have never truly kept.
This comparison between a self-righteous person and Jesus is immensely insightful. We need to examine which example we gravitate toward.
Now, if we flaunt our “righteousness,” it might not be from arrogance, but from a feeling of inferiority—because we feel we need to prove something. This is still vanity. We must realize that instead of impressing others, this repels them.
Gerald Flurry has always felt inferior to others in the church. This is why he and almost every single splinter group leader decided to start their own group. They needed to impress others with their superior knowledge and righteousness and expected large swaths of members to follow them. Every time a new group started it repelled huge numbers of people. Just look at what has happened with Bob Thiel! He has probably repelled more people than Flurry ever has! Over 11,000 people in the LCG refused to follow him! That is major repelling!
Mr. Flurry describes how the religious elite in Christ’s day—the Pharisees—exhibited this relationship repellant:
They were wearing their righteousness outwardly—a big spiritual flaw. That is why we feel uncomfortable sometimes around people who flaunt their self-righteousness. If we are self-righteous, that will turn people off more quickly than anything—guaranteed. If we want friends, we can’t go around feeling superior to them. On the contrary, we should work to make all people feel like royalty.
Have you ever seen a more self-righteous group of people than those in ordained positions in today's COG groups? They flaunt their positions and power as they lord themselves over others. Servant leadership is not a common thing with most of today's COG groups.
Of all our potential flaws, self-righteousness is the quickest turnoff. This quote’s last sentence alone is cause for deep reflection: Do I work to make all people feel like royalty?
This "royalty" crap is a prime example of PCG's self-righteousness.
Here is another piercing passage from the book:
Self-righteousness makes you a person without much compassion because you just can’t understand why people have so many faults. If you don’t look deep down and see your own problems, you are going to be very critical of other people. You will be a difficult person to get close to, because who wants to be put down all the time?
Has there ever been a more compassionless COG than the PCG? Who can forget in 2016 when George Witt told a family to take their disabled son to the mall and leave him there so that the state could take care of him. The money they were spending to take care of them would better be used by the PCG to preach its gospel (which was actually for paying for dancing lessons for Flurry's grandkids). See: UPDATE: Philadelphia Church of God: Take Your Disabled Child To The Mall And Abandon Him - Let Someone Else Take Care Of Him
Reflect on how much compassion you have, and that you extend to others. If you lack patience with others, as the above quote says, it could be because you’re not honestly evaluating yourself. Lack of consistent self-examination makes someone “critical” and “a difficult person to get close to.”
The final passage I’d like to draw attention to is in response to Job 42:6, which quotes Job as saying: “Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” Mr. Flurry comments:
Consider the fruits we will bear if we have this attitude. Sometimes we have little problems with other people. In that situation, self-righteousness can produce a defensive attitude. We end up thinking, I try to get closer to people, but this person criticized me, and it causes us to hold back. But if we really saw what Job saw here, we would abhor ourselves. Then if somebody makes a negative remark about us, so what? It doesn’t really matter. We can go on and love them and be friends with them. What difference does it make what people think of you? All that matters is what God thinks.
Consider all the relationship advice in that paragraph! Self-righteousness can cause you to be defensive. Your own self-righteousness can cause you to distance yourself from drawing closer to others. Godly relationships actually start with each person abhorring himself as Job did—specifically, seeing himself accurately as compared to God’s immeasurable greatness. A self-righteous person will be wrapped up in what others think of him and get agitated by little remarks. But those in a consistently repentant and humble attitude overlook those things, because they care only about what God thinks.
The more we shed self-righteousness, and the more make God’s estimation the only one that matters, the more positive fruit it will bear in our relationships!
We did not need an article from a questionable brainwashed cult member telling us to be careful of repelling people. It has been a blatant fact from day one when Gerald Flurry set off to do his own mini-me Church of God group. repelling people is in the DNA of the COG leadership.
The PCG has placed Gerald Flurry right up there next to the creature they call "christ". Gerald is the new KING of the Church of God and now sits on the throne of the so-called "christ" he claims will return soon to sit on it and be crowned King of Kings as the PCG dances around the throne with Irish Dance. This also has repelled people.
It wasn't long after starting the PCG that Flurry stole Jules Dervaes' Letters to Laodicea and pawned it off as his own revelation from his god as Malachi's Message. This book is esteemed by the PCG as standing right next to the Bible in holiness and truth and is the "foundational" text of the PCG. Flurry claims it is the "true history" of how his god removed the lamp from the Worldwide Church of God and placed it in the PCG.
Malachi’s Message is a history book to us. That can be a hard concept for our parents and the previous generation to grasp sometimes. If they came out of the wcg, that book explained current events that were unfolding before their eyes. They probably have an “I saw Mr. Armstrong speak live” story. They can put bearded faces to names like Joseph Tkach and Joe Tkach, Jr. They also remember the changes. They remember the books and booklets being taken out of print. They remember the Who Was Jesus? booklet. The things you read as history, they heard from the pulpit.
Malachi’s Message is one of the foundational writings of this Church era, and the revelation from God that showed many true Christians where He had moved the lamp. Our inability to imagine what that time period was like should drive us to learn from our elders about their experience with that important book.
The idolatry of this fraudulent book is appalling:
Our appreciation of Malachi’s Message needs to be far deeper than just a surface reading and an intellectual understanding. That book changed peoples’ lives, and our generation has to work to understand that in a deeper way.
Talk to your parents if they came out of the wcg. Seek out the older members in your congregation and learn their history with that foundational book. Make Malachi’s Message come to life. Make Malachi’s Message more than history.
To make the idolatry even worse, Gerald reportedly gave a copy to his disbelieving son (Lil'Stevie) who then took the book with him to Robber's Care in Oklahoma. There, the heavenly hosts opened wide the doors of heaven to reveal to Lil'Stevie that the book was true. (If this suspiciously sounds like the crap of Mormonism when readers are supposed to get a "fire in their bosom" when they read it the Book of Mormon, it most likely involves the same entity "revealing" this "truth".)
This idolatry of a stupid little book has repealed a lot of people.
How can we forget the Irish Dance crap the church now promotes as gospel truth to gullible public members who go and watch their stage shows.
Here are just a few of the issues we have covered over the years of this repellent activity:
Are Philadelphia Church of God Elite Children Now Dancing to Honor the Sun - Their Lord and Father?
Gerald Flurry: Why Dancing A Jig On Friday Nights Is OK For His Grandchildren But Not For Regular Members
In 2017, Gerald Flurry then proceeded to repel more members, COG members, and the public with his demand that he have a jet at his disposal so he could take the gospel to the world (which he has never done). All the jet has been used for is to fly Flurry family members around the country for stage shows and dance competitions, to England, and to Israel.
FYI: Yesterday in a play-all-areas sermon entitled “Abraham’s Vision”, Gerald Flurry mentioned that he is now considering buying a private jet! The rationale behind this unbelievable decision stems from experiences Flurry had last year on his flight to and from a US feast site. Apparently his trip left him feeling so unwell that it took several weeks to fully recover his energy levels. During the message he commented that modern air travel is now very unpleasant and that breathing in recycled air was unhealthy for him. He also complained how in the US passengers needed to get to the airport in sufficient time to allow for security screening, sometimes requiring that they arrive up to 3 hours before an international flight. He concluded by saying that owning a private jet meant he would be able to travel and do more for the work, especially being able to travel quickly between the two campuses in Edmond, OK and Edstone, UK.
What that all translates into is this: After buying a multi-million dollar stately home in the UK, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars refurbishing it, literally pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into a fruitless UK TV campaign for his son, after building a multi-million dollar music and Irish dance facility for the Edmond compound brats, all of which is financed by an ageing and declining membership, the PCG is now going to buy a private jet so Gerald Flurry's children Stephen and Laura and their children and friends can travel the world like rock stars and not have to rub shoulders with the unwashed masses. This unbelievable decision has been made during a time when PCG is experiencing a current 25% drop in income!
You seriously have to wonder about the long-term stability of the PCG and who is really running the church behind the scenes. Repeatedly throughout his message, Flurry referenced Josephus and how this ancient historian taught that Abraham was an educated and cultured man who introduced fine arts and music everywhere he went. Each time Flurry made that statement, after the expression, “fine arts and music” he would quickly add “and dancing”. I know for a fact that “Wittle Laura” and “Wittle Stevie” are both obsessed with Irish dancing, perhaps this is where the pressure is really coming from to buy that oh so needed Lear jet!
See:
Gerald Flurry Follows in HWA's Steps and Buys Gulfstream G450 Jet
PCG Members Expected To Send In Money To Fund $80,000.00 Jet Rides For Lil'Stevie And The Grandkids
More On Gerald Flurry's Extravagant Con Game To Own His Own Private Jet
As Income Plummets 25% Gerald Flurry Set to Buy Jet Plane So Stevie and His Kids Can Fly In Luxury
Perhaps the most repellent thing Flurry has done is name himself King and claim to sit on the very throne that Christ will return to!
Can you imagine those early pioneers of the Church of God as they gathered in Belknap Springs envisioning what absolute vile filth that the Church of God would descend into with the current reign of apostate leaders (Pack, Flurry, Weinland, Thiel)? They would be appalled that people could descend to this level of spiritual degeneracy!Gerald Flurry has taken this spiritual degeneracy to a new low. He has crowned himself king. He dug up an old rock that Herbert Armstrong supposedly prayed at and has brought it back to Edmond Oklahoma where it is revered in awe by devotees as the very rock Christ will come back to sit upon...AFTER Flurry is officially crowned as KING before Jesus receives his crown.This new throne changes God’s Work significantly!The new throne elevates our royal standard.Having this throne, we must come to think about ourselves in a royal way.We have to think about and study this throne deeply to appreciate what God has given us. We possess the very throne from which Jesus Christ will rule, and the very law He will administer, in the World Tomorrow! God wants His Church today to demonstrate to the world as best we can what that rule will be like! That is quite a responsibility. But we are doing all we can to fulfill it.
Remember that God also uses His ministers to give counsel (Ephesians 4:11-16). The ministry is there to give guidelines, to encourage and exhort, but not to make decisions for you. God wants you to learn how to make decisions.
We are judged on how we incorporate God’s instructions into our lives. We must not resist Him. By judging those in authority—employers, ministers, parents, teachers—and then deciding that since they are not perfect we don’t have to look to them for guidance, we are denying God’s authority over us.God judges us on how we treat those under our authority and how we submit to those in authority over us. We rule and are ruled.How do we react when “mistakes” are made? Perhaps we need to ask God what He is trying to show us about ourselves. PCG: Ministers Are Here To Rule Over You. When They Make A Mistake You Need To Ask Why It Might Be Your Fault
