Miserere mei, Deus

 

David Hurd's Psalm 51

If someone had told me twenty years ago that I would be smearing ashes on the forehead's of people tonight I would never have believed them.  Tonight was Ash Wednesday at the church I attend.  A night that signifies the start of forty days of self examination.  An examination of our fallibility, our mortality, our participation in oppression and injustice to others.  At this time we are particularly drawn to Jesus' call for justice: freedom for the oppressed, release of the captives, good news to the poor and recovery of sight to the blind.  It's about confronting the power of death in all it's forms, terror and tyranny, corruption and greed, disregard for creation and all the forces that prevent people from living life in it's fullest.

It's not about giving up chocolate, sweets, meat, dropping a dollar in the swear jar, or other things.  It's about being authentic to yourself and to God, while you get off your rear end and make a difference in the world around you.

Growing up in Armstrongism I listened to endless sermons by ministers and evangelists mocking and deriding those that kept this day as insincere and a total waste of time.  Meredith came up with some of the most absurd  and inaccurate comments that anyone could dream up.  Actually what he said was and still is, a blatant lie!


Seeing the wide eyes of little kids kneeling in front of you with tears in their eyes, or huge smiles as they experience something that only a child can through untarnished minds.  They look into your eyes with a look of awe.  And then they turn to their parents and look them in their eyes with a deep connection only a parent can ever see. Probably like the kind of the look we should be having with God.  Totally free with no baggage. Oh, to be a child again!

I saw a blind young man tonight who is wheelchair bound with a body that is wracked by cerebral palsy, rhythmically moving in slow motion due to the muscles in his body twisting and writhing about, sit there with tears streaming down his cheeks as he attempts  to stop his body from moving when the ashes are placed on his forehead, clearly and distinctly saying 'amen' afterwords.  He does the same thing when the Eucharist is brought  to him.  His body stops moving as he takes the wafer in his distorted hands and places it in his mouth.and sips the wine.  He understands something that I probably never will.  Something deeper and more meaningful than any HWA sermon, booklet or book ever did. Something deeper about the mystery that surrounds us, the mystery of the unknown yet knowable, the grain of the universe that calls to us into something we cannot fathom, something so foreign to us that we let it slip past us the minute we walk out the doors of the church into the real world.

I saw people in attendance tonight that I know are agnostic and a couple of atheists who have no idea what or who God is.  Yet, they admit something draws them back, week after week. Something they cannot understand but want to be a part of.  They are involved in feeding the homeless, knitting prayer shawls for the sick and dying, caring for those with AIDS, working in hospice or visiting the  sick and home bound. They too have the opportunity to delve into something deeper and more mysterious with new ways of looking and understanding thatI can never have.  It is a delight to be around them

I am grateful for my journey out of Armstrongism. I regret  many opportunities lost because of its aberrant, absurd and irrelevant teachings, yet there was a lot I treasure. How I came out halfway sane is a miracle!  :-) I am grateful for Gavin's web sites and blogs over the years and for Dennis's unwavering self examination and willingness to question without apology.  What a ride it has been and continues to be!

Gary

How Finding 'Grace' Sent Malm Into Fits of Rage Today

Interesting things have been going on over on James Malm's 'Glowering Darkness' blog today.  He seems to be going into meltdown mode.  . He is posting things that are getting crazier and crazier every day.  Conspiracy theories, demons, Russian witches, Judaizing, UCG accusations, and theological ignorant ramblings.The entire world is a conspiracy and a tool of Satan to keep us from keeping the law and doing 'works.'


Malm is going ballistic over Bible translations that he claims are 'new age' and are products of demonism inspired by Russian witch Madam Blavatski.  Malm says Thomas Edison was one of Madam Blavatski's acolytes and got many of his inventions from demons.   Since Satan is an angel of light, he inspired Edison to create the light bulb........ He also claims Hitler was one of her acolytes as well as Henry Ford.


Malm says President Roosevelt never made a decision without first consulting spirits in seances and that Chruchilll was a druid who worked with demons. And that the Anglo Saxon world is rotting away because of demons, Theosophy and Madam Blavatski.


So what stirred up this conspiracy theory lunacy?  It was something that you would never have guessed.


An ex-UCG member who spent time studing his bible without any HWA, UCG, related booklets and articles and discovered GRACE!  That simple little word that turns rabid Armstrongite's into frothing at the mouth rage!


If you believe in God's grace you are a damnable heretic committing all kinds of  wantonness because being grace filled means you are an unrepentant, sodomizing, adulterous sinner.  Oy!  The lies Armstrongites love to tell in order to keep people enslaved to the law!

This is the false religion of license to sin, through the grace of God; which was prophesied to come in the last days.  This denies Christ even though it purports to emphasize Christ.

This false permissive “love” removes the AUTHORITY of Jesus Christ and the need to recognize that authority and to obey him and his Father.  This deceitful insidious evil, preempts obedience by producing the attitude that it really does not matter because we shall all be forgiven anyway.  The law is then  pictured as something Pharisaical and an unnecessary heavy burden; when in fact the law delivers us from the burden of sin.

Here is what set Malm off the deep end today: Grace may be entering the UCG (FINALLY!!!!)

This is what happened in the WCG with the Tkach era and it is what is now happening in the UCG.  In May there will be another Conference and election: WATCH the direction that is taken after that.  The fruits should become clear by the fall Feast.

I received a message from a man in the UCG, who is now taking a sabbatical to write a book on Law and Grace in preparation for the coming changes. His Blog is an excellent placce to see the subtlty of the new take on the Covenants, and Law and Grace; that are slowly being inserted into the UCG.

Michael Mynard’s Blog  will put right before  your eyes in a  nutshell; what will be done subtly over many months in the UCG. His web site is now under construction.  By all means look through this Blog and its pages to see the subtle errors. See how he says that the sons of the King are “above the law” subtly twisting a scripture on the temple tax to somehow include all the law.  Be sure to notice how many “New Age” quotes and translations he uses.

Read through this Blog and then take a listen to the New Covenant series of audios by Robin Webber.  Look for the subtlities, the inferences, the allusions and the little twists, as he uses a six or seven part series to put over the new UCG agenda and bury it in a multitude of words.  “Church family is to love one another; we obey God because we love him and for no other reason because we no longer have to obey,

Double speak to confuse and distract as the subliminal message of “love trumps law” is entrenched in this phsycologiocal warfare of the spirit. Teaching us that we should just wink at and tolerate sin; and compromise with God’s law anytime the going gets difficult.

Teaching that “love” is the “easy way” and that when the going gets tough we should just push the “easy butten” and compromise with God’s law because he is love and will understand and forgive.

One reader who mistakenly thinks Malm is endorsing Michael Maynard's blog sends Malm into meltdown with his response.  Careful Bro!  You are going to pop a blood vessel!

I AM NOT ENDORSING HIS BLOG! I AM PRESENTING IT AS AN EXAMPLE OF THE EVIL THAT WOULD BE THE ULTIMATE RESULT OF THIS “LOVE TRUMPS LAW” GARBAGE; SLOWLY BEING SEEPED INTO UCG.
Michael’s blog is the anithesis of sound doctrione and true reliogion; his positions are an abomination and utterly disgusting to me!!! James

Malm also has this to say about "'love is the fulfillment of the law' hype"

It destroys faith and without faith we cannot please God. It also destroys “works” and there can be no faith without works for only the “doers of the law will be justified”. A terrible and most subtle evil is seeping into the organization. The whole concept that UCG is now following is to focus people inward at serving each other and loving each other and the organization. The problem is that the focus is being changed from God to US; the focus is being changed from serving God and achieving unity through our unity with God to unity by and through ourselves

Michael's blog is here The True Doctrine of Christ
and here  Unraveling Armstrong's Doctrinal Errors
Here are some interesting quotes from Maynard's blog that I am SURE that set Malm off today:

I told  Dave Treybig, the Tampa United Church of God's former pastor, by email this past July, I was taking a sabbatical to write a book on a biblical topic. My topic had to do with investigating the UCG’s doctrines that teach a blend of Old Testament Laws including Holy Days, Tithing, and Circumcision, with New Testament theology that can never be fully reconciled from scripture.  This area of UCG theology has always caused me, and many others I know, internal conflict because it obviously contradicted the new testament aspect of Salvation through Grace.  This caused me to attempt to ignore this conflict between Bible truth and  UCG (Armstrong) doctrine. But sooner or later I knew I would be forced to face this seeming “paradox.” On what level I did not know until now.

The general membership of the UCG and other churches that adhere to Armstrongism  know that  observing all of the Old Testament "annual sabbaths" or holy days is a doctrinal requirement for church members. Further it is reasoned that is  the only way the church could fully understand God’s plan of salvation. However based upon the writings of the Apostle Paul, this doctrine is clearly anything but Christian and not supported by any New Testament scripture. The first era Church of God never observed these days. Not one instance of observing the Feast pf Tabernacles, or other Feast Day Observance is recorded after the first Pentecost where the Holy Spirit was given thus beginning the New Covenant Church of Christ.

Salvation  is offered by God by Faith through Grace alone,  the Gentiles knew nothing about the Laws of Moses. They were never bound to observe the law of Moses by the apostles of Christ. 

 

 There was no salvation, no eternal life obtainable under the Old Covenant.

According to All  New Testament Teachings          ..especially those of Paul...Herbert W. Armstrong taught a theology that CUT HIS DISCIPLES OFF FROM CHRIST and LEFT THEM FALLEN FROM GRACE! CUT OFF FROM SALVATION! 

RIGHT NOW, ALL WHO FOLLOW

ARMSTRONGISM ARE LOST!

(as Paul writes in Galatians 5)

FOR INSTANCE, BY KEEPING THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES THIS YEAR YOU HAVE CAUSED THE LOSS OF YOUR SALVATION!

Michael Maynard has discovered many of the things a lot  of us discovered years ago.   Being free from Armstrongism is such a great thing!