Dave Pack: The Long, Slow Crawl to Atonement

 

The Long, Slow Crawl to Atonement

David C. Pack of The Restored Church of God has been exceptionally boring over the last five months. After his 144th attempt at legitimacy failed on Pentecost (May 24, 2026), the Pastor General retreated back into the biblical dismal swamp to reconvene with his prophetic acolytes in the Third Floor Executive Imaginarium.

With the handholding of Coffee Kid and Pepper Boy, the trio recycled a successful strategy that has been useful in the past: Teach a date for coming Kingdom of God (kinda) that is way out there (probably) and spend months leading up to it belaboring every point possible while sprinkling pauses in the speaking schedule.

The last five months in The Restored Church of God have been all about how the Kingdom of God will arrive maybe here, or maybe there, but settled on the Day of Atonement (possibly in 2027, at first). A few weeks ago, Dave introduced the idea that the Kingdom to Israel would occur "about" one year before that. You know, in 2026-ish.

Dave giveth a third Kingdom, and Dave taketh away. The Kingdom to Israel IS the Kingdom of God.

The Kingdom of God Will Arrive on the Day of Atonement
Tishrei 10 – September 21, 2026
(But if not this year, then next year. Or the year after that.)

The more interesting developments for exrcg.org have been behind-the-scenes. There was notable blowback from the NPR/PBS broadcast in July, mainly due to Kevin Denee publicly stating he is writing a book about his experiences.

·      I had a five-hour lunch with Randall Pack (Dave’s oldest son) and numerous conversations with him and his brother, Robert. There were a lot of concerns about what and how I report on RCG. I received plenty of notes for improvement.

·      I wrote a letter for David C. Pack and gave it to Randall. His dad read it.

·      The Director of Church Administration called me on my cell phone to caution me about the "facts" I publish and warned me that there are "dangers" in continuing such actions.

·      The Director of Church Administration urged five staff members to write to me personally to “set the record straight” “if they wanted to.” Two ministers and three lay members sent unsolicited, sternly worded emails in which they demanded that I not share their information with anyone.

That information will be shared soon.

But in the meantime, it has been a long, slow crawl to Atonement. Tishrei 10 will begin next Sunday night on September 20, 2026.

 

There has not been much content worth posting on exrcg.org. David C. Pack's new hesitation and prophetic timidity created a lack of compelling video content. Based on my discussions with Randall and Robert, their dad has expressed a desire to pull back on "the date setting" and has privately regretted going down that road.

Too little, too late on the whole false prophet issue, however. Regardless of how much Dave wants to reinvent himself as “just preachin’ what the Bible says,” he is permanently disqualified from ever being a true minister of Jesus Christ or someone you can believe, even if he just tries to tell you the time.

The last sermon I analyzed was “The Greatest Untold Story! (Part 629)," given on March 28, 2026, in the article Certain Uncertainty, when the most gullible in The Restored Church of God were still hoping for a theological Hail Mary to happen in mid-2026.

What wonderful prophetic material have the members of The Restored Church of God been force-fed on their Sabbaths since? Here is a summary of the last five months. If you invest the time to read each one, the patterns of hilarity reveal themselves.

Part 630 – April 8, 2026
The Passover should be a festive, joyful occasion and will no longer be somber in RCG. They will eat real unleavened bread instead of small bits of matzo and drink more than just a thimble of wine. Children may be allowed to attend.

Part 631 – April 11, 2026
RCG dissolves ministerial “ranks.” The Worldwide Church of God did not understand the true Government of God. All men are ordained as “elders” and only once. Being an evangelist or prophet is a “gift” but not a rank. Local elders and preaching elders have been dissolved, and Dave admits Herbert W. Armstrong invented those positions so more men could avoid the Vietnam draft. Dave knows the "exact date" the Kingdom is coming, but would not say.

Part 632 – April 18, 2026
The Kingdom of God will come on the Second Passover this year, or there will be a one-year wait.

Part 633 – April 25, 2026
Nothing will happen on the Second Passover. Zero chance, in fact. But what about Pentecost?

Part 634 – May 2, 2026
There are three kingdoms once again. God is helping Dave explain that the day that “cannot tarry” is Pentecost. He reiterates that he is not Elijah the Prophet (yet) and excuses himself from the consequences of being wrong in the past.

Part 635 – May 16, 2026
There are two kingdoms once again. The Kingdom of God coming on Pentecost is perfect. But we will not really know if a date is correct until it passes and the Kingdom's arrival reveals it.

New Moon Special Comments – May 17, 2026
The Kingdom of God will not come on Pentecost. God acts in His own timing, and things will happen when He decides it. Dave became "most uncomfortable" with Pentecost.

Part 636 – May 30, 2026
Being on the path to the Kingdom of God is an incredible privilege, and Dave has great respect for those in RCG who have remained faithful.

Part 637 – June 13, 2026
Dave is the victim of many false stories and big lies. You cannot imagine. One member quit because his daughter died, and Dave blamed the man's bitterness for his departure. RCG will eventually know the day that "cannot tarry," but not yet.

Dave does not carry a cell phone, but he has a cell phone. He does not believe he will ever be tempted by pornography, but his denial did not sound all that convincing.

@ 1:11:08 I don’t carry a cell phone. “Mr. Pack, what? You don’t carry a cell phone?” No, and I never will. I have one,that, I guess, if I in an emergency, I could use it. But it's a complete waste of time. There's too much in there that I I don't ever want to be tempted with. I don’t think I’d be tempted to go to a porn site. I haven’t. I don’t. I’ve never felt the temptation. I guess if it was in the palm of my hand, maybe it'd be a little different.

Part 638 – June 20, 2026
A period of watching for the Kingdom of God is a range of days. Dave teases a list of 159 truths RCG has learned, whether restored or discovered. Thankfully, he does not read it all, and he will not post it in Member Services because “evil men” would post it publicly.

Part 639 – June 27, 2026
Figuring out prophecy is a long and complex process that produces a picture with alternatives. Dave believes the Kingdom will no longer end on a weekly Sabbath, but an annual one. Dave grew suspicious of a fascinating date. Maybe it could be Av 10, but maybe not.

@ 46:24 We are watching. Not with absolute certainty, but uncertainty. Not with absoluteness, but with possibility. We’re supposing. Or wishing that it’s the right date.

Part 640 – July 11, 2026
Dave agonized, but there was a sudden "bang," and it was so easy to see. The Kingdom of God is coming on the Day of Atonement, and Dave is so certain, he stakes God's name on it. But is it this year?

@ 1:00:07 He [Jesus Christ] was sent to preach the Kingdom of God. I'm gonna say, on the authority of Almighty God, His Kingdom comes on the Day of Atonement.

Part 641 – July 18, 2026
The Kingdom of God can only come on Atonement and potentially only this year. There is an avalanche of proof. Dave’s goal is to lock the day. If it is not this year, then “don’t bother looking for any other day.” He admits that RCG does not understand the 1335 correctly.

@ 1:14:23 But I’m trying to show you that it is absolutely Atonement. It’s a lock.

Part 642 – July 25, 2026
Does the Kingdom of God arrive on the Day of Atonement this year?

@ 48:53 And the main purpose being to show the Day of Atonement is immutable. It's impossible that that's not the date. A different year? We'll we'll get into that.

@ 1:26:34 It's impossible that the Kingdom of God does not come on a Day of Atonement. It's impossible. Not improbable or highly unlikely. It's impossible.

Part 643 – August 1, 2026
There are three kingdoms once again. The Kingdom to Israel comes before the Day of Atonement and before the Kingdom of God. Dave baits RCG members at the beginning of the sermon.

@ 00:47 The Day of Atonement for the Kingdom of God, lasting seven and a half years to a Passover and the and the Millennium, and then the second iteration of the Kingdom of God are set and established. They cannot move. They’re immutable. And it’s just helpful to state that that that can’t change.

And he pulls a switcheroo at the end of the sermon.

@ 1:32:16 It says it closes with one bad month. So you can figure out the Kingdom of God is not coming this Atonement. On the other hand, we may learn this Kingdom starts before we ever get to Atonement.

@ 1:32:44 So on the one hand, I'm gonna just tell you the Kingdom of God is pushed off. But the Kingdom to Israel could start well before what would have been Atonement.

Part 644 – August 1, 2026
God conceals His truths through grievous mistranslations. The Kingdom of God will not arrive on the Day of Atonement until 2027. The Kingdom to Israel will probably come this year, but when is up for discussion. Dave gives himself another pass for teaching false prophetic dates.

@ 18:35 So I'm not predicting anything. I'm explaining verses in the Bible.

Part 645 – August 8, 2026
Dave hoped this would be his final message. If the Kingdom was just one year long, then it would start August 21. RCG is on a short clock. Potentially.

@ 17:51 Nobody knows about this Kingdom. It took me 11 years to be clear about it. But we not only know about it, we know how long it is. And basically almost exactly when it starts. I think.

Part 646 – August 15, 2026
Dave continues to "lock down" that there is a First Kingdom, which is the Kingdom to Israel. It will arrive on an undetermined Sunday at dawn “sometime ahead.”

@ 1:39:21 For now, every Sunday dawn, every one is a candidate. There's some evidence that Elul is in play.

@ 1:40:24 We'll just have to see when God has planned. And I'm waiting to be able to show an unbreakable date that cannot be exceeded. I sincerely do not know. I'm suspicious of some things, but know that a Sunday dawn away from a Sabbath, holy day, or new moon would completely disguise God coming as a thief on the fast Day of Atonement over a year later. Whenever that would be.

Part 647 – August 29, 2026
Dave rejoices at the “simplicity in Christ” finally arriving, but fails to see the irony of his convoluted theories. He provides a list of 95 proofs why there are three kingdoms, but reveals another list of 65 points that prove that wrong. He explains why there are other fascinating possibilities for when the Kingdom to Israel may start and how long it could be, because it could be three years instead of one.

@ 1:37:18 Now, you know, if it's a Sabbath, okay [chuckles], I guess we could sit and say there are six possibilities that exist for the for the other Kingdom. Maybe it's not Atonement. We could we could say. Even Tishrei 3 is a moed. It's wonderful. But you've got five Sabbaths plus Atonement. There's six Sabbaths in Tishrei, so I don't know. Could it be different? Could it be rounded in some way? Could the Second Kingdom start at Tabernacles, or the Last Great Day, or the last Sabbath of the month? I don't know. Is it technically the First Kingdom is days upon years? I don't know. That's that's a hard one to know. But there are six possibilities.So, you know, Trumpets is the first one.

 

Simplicity in Christ has indeed arrived at The Restored Church of God.

Part 648 – September 5, 2026
In The Restored Church of God, lying to brethren on the Sabbath while speaking in God’s name is acceptable when it has dramatic value.

Dave announces at the beginning that “nothing’s changed.” Until it does twenty-four minutes later, when he removes the shot glass Kingdom to Israel off the table because the Kingdom to Israel is also the Kingdom of God. There are only two kingdoms once again.

Dave drags RCG members through another laborious exercise to illustrate how hard Bible prophecy is to figure out and gives options for how maybe it is the Day of Atonement this year, after all. 1,500 days from Atonement 2026 to Atonement 2030 just makes a heck of a lot of sense. For now. 

Consider yourself caught up.

Five months of doctrines in The Restored Church of God summarized in three pages. And for the spiritually depleted brethren, it has been a long, slow crawl to the Day of Atonement across nine sermons.

But remember: If it is not this year, then it could be next year. Or the year after that. Or the year after that. Or the year after that.

The RCG brethren have a longer, slower crawl to nowhere if they keep listening to David C. Pack.

Marc Cebrian

See: The Long, Slow Crawl to Atonement

The COG Watchmen that No One Even Knows About

In COG lore, the Watchmen stand at the wall, warning the world about their impending doom. Every COG claims to have one, yet NO ONE in the world even knows who they are.

For decades, the Living Church of God, Bob Thiel, and the wider Armstrongite movement have told their members they occupy a unique, urgent office: they are God's watchmen. Their job is to warn the modern "Israelite" nations-chiefly the United States, Britain, and related countries-of coming catastrophe unless those nations repent of sins such as abortion, homosexuality, and transgenderism. 

Doug Winnail of the Living Church of God recently restated the claim in familiar terms:

The Watchman's Message

Throughout history, God has sent prophets to warn His people that, if they disobey His laws and despise His statutes, they will reap serious consequences (Leviticus 26:14-19). Yet modern Israelite nations are largely ignorant of this sobering warning. Today, political and religious leaders are actively promoting values and behaviors that clearly violate the laws of God, such as abortion (Exodus 20:13), homosexuality (Leviticus 18:22; Genesis 2:24), and transgenderism (Deuteronomy 22:5). The Bible labels these actions sins and abominations. Isaiah was told, "Cry aloud... tell My people their transgression" (Isaiah 58:1). Jeremiah warned that nations forsaking God's laws would enter a time of trouble as a result (Jeremiah 2:19; 30:7). Ezekiel was given a commission to be a watchman and carry this warning to the Israelite nations (Ezekiel 3:16-21; 33:1-11), and that is our mission today. Let's pray for strength and help to complete that mission. -Douglas S. Winnail

The language is borrowed from Isaiah, Jeremiah, and especially Ezekiel 33. Herbert W. Armstrong applied it to himself and the old Worldwide Church of God. After Armstrong died in 1986 and the subsequent doctrinal collapse of that organization, nearly every splinter group inherited the same self-description. The problem is not merely that the groups disagree with one another. It is that the claim no longer describes any observable reality.

Hundreds of groups, no audience.

The Worldwide Church of God once numbered well over 100,000 members and reached hundreds of millions through the decades through The World Tomorrow and The Plain Truth. After 1986, it fractured. Researchers have counted 300 to 400 offshoots; the Church of God Network later identified more than 1,500 congregations across the surviving organizations. The largest remaining bodies-United Church of God, Living Church of God, Church of God a Worldwide Association-still number only in the low tens of thousands at most. LCG's 2025 Feast of Tabernacles drew 11,326 attendees worldwide. The Philadelphia Church of God is estimated to be well below its claimed 5,000 members. Many of the rest are far smaller. 

These organizations do not present a single, recognizable voice. They present dozens of competing voices, each insisting it alone continues "the Work." Gerald Weston leads LCG. Gerald Flurry leads PCG. David Pack of the Restored Church of God has spent years declaring himself prophet and setting dates that have failed more than a hundred times. Bob Thiel of the Continuing Church of God operates a prolific website and claims growth, much of it in Africa, while remaining virtually unknown outside the same small circuit. None of these men is a public figure. None commands the attention of governments, major media, or the general population of the nations they claim to warn. The result is predictable. No one outside the movement is shaking. Politicians do not adjust policy because a Charlotte, Grover Beach, Wadsworth, or Edmond minister issued a booklet or popped off at the mouth. Newsrooms do not treat Tomorrow's World or The Philadelphia Trumpet as a prophetic alarm. Ordinary citizens do not encounter these messages as a trumpet blast from the wall; they encounter them, if at all, as one more obscure religious broadcast or website among thousands.

It is just a message for the insiders to make them feel special.

The watchman doctrine functions far more effectively inside the congregations than outside them. It gives members a sense of cosmic importance: they are not simply attending a small Sabbath-keeping church; they are part of the only group commissioned to deliver a life-or-death warning before the Great Tribulation. That narrative justifies high commitment, multiple tithes in some groups, and loyalty to a particular leader even as the surrounding culture ignores him.

It also explains why the groups spend so much energy on one another. If there can be only one true watchman work, then every other splinter is either Laodicean, apostate, or simply not doing "the Work." The warning to the world is frequently interrupted by the warning against rival Church of God organizations. The public, which was never listening in the first place, notices none of this intramural combat.

LCG's Tomorrow's World telecast and magazine represent the most professional remaining outreach. Older promotional materials claimed availability in tens of millions of households and hundreds of thousands of weekly viewers. Actual cultural impact remains modest; the associated YouTube channel sits at roughly 18,000 subscribers. That is not nothing, but it is not a watchman standing on the wall of a nation. It is a niche religious program competing with every other niche religious program. 

A watchman in Ezekiel's day stood on a city wall and blew a trumpet the inhabitants could hear. The modern application assumes the same logic at a national and global scale. Hundreds of minuscule, mutually exclusive groups cannot occupy that role. They lack the platform, the recognition, and the unity required to deliver a single, unmistakable warning. The claim survives because it is never tested against results. Success is measured by literature mailed, websites maintained, and members retained-not by whether the intended audience actually heard and trembled.

The original glory days of old - the Armstrong-era work, at least, possessed size and visibility. The successor groups possess conviction and a recycled script. Conviction is not the same as commission, and a recycled script is not the same as a message that lands. Whether the speaker is Weston, Pack, Thiel, or Flurry, the world continues on its way. The farce is not that these men believe they have something to say. The farce is the insistence, year after year, that the world is listening.

LCG: Please Review the Booklet "Germany in Prophecy" Before Satan and the Beast Notice Your Airline Boarding Pass”

Living Church of God, ever true to Roderick Meredith's hyperventilating past, has started hyperventilating again. Germany is "rising." Members need to dust off Germany in Prophecy. The AfD just scored a major win in Saxony-Anhalt. Get ready for jackboot Germans taking over the world. Arroyo Grande and Charlotte, here they come. Oh noes!!!!!!!!! 

Then they instantly pivot to a plane that ran off the runway at Heathrow, airports shutting down because Anak Krakatau is coughing ash. Satan, we are told, is so furious that COG members are heading to the Feast that he is personally disrupting air travel. All because of them.

Gerald Weston writes:

Greetings from Charlotte,

There is a lot happening of late. The AfD party in Germany scored a major win, causing much concern over a far-right party eventually gaining power over the whole country and taking Germany down a dangerous path once again. Messrs. Rod McNair and Douglas Winnail authored the booklet Germany in Prophecy, which points out that the country is given to sudden dramatic changes. Please review this resource as you see changes taking place in Europe. The wars in Iran and Ukraine continue to escalate along dangerous lines. Meanwhile, London's Heathrow Airport, Miami International Airport, and some Indonesian airports were shut down due to technical issues, a plane going off the runway, and the Anak Krakatau volcanic eruption-stranding and disrupting the plans of literally hundreds of thousands of travelers worldwide. We must never forget who the god of this age is and how he hates the Feast days that are now upon us. Let us pray for the safety of all our members and Festival sites and do our part in traveling safely. And let us never forget the reason we observe these important days. -Gerald E. Weston

There it is. The whole operating system on one index card: Europe is becoming the Beast, your passport is a spiritual target, and Lucifer runs air traffic control.

Armstrongism exists because fear works. Not because the forecasts aged well. Herbert's dates slid. 1972 and 1975 came and went without the nuclear fireworks package. The "final revival of the Holy Roman Empire" has been imminent for longer than most members have been alive. What never went out of print is the feeling: you are special, you are hunted, and the only people who can read the map are the men in Charlotte holding the booklet.

The racial machinery is still the engine. British-Israelism says the United States, Britain, and the white Commonwealth are Ephraim and Manasseh - the lost tribes with the birthright. Germany is recast as Assyria, the rod of God's anger, the coming king of the North who will punish those same "Israelite" nations for Sunday-keeping, Christmas trees, and insufficient third tithe. That is why a state election in Magdeburg is not allowed to remain a state election. It has to become Genesis-plus-Isaiah-plus-Revelation with a 2026 dateline. If the chosen nations are not in danger, the chosen church loses its plot. 

Notice the second move. After the German alarm comes the travel snarl - and Satan is credited as the author. In this universe the Accuser is not a defeated rebel. He is the most competent character on the stage. Christ, the one they claim to follow, is oddly underemployed until the sequel in which He returns to slaughter the portion of humanity that refused to follow Gerald Weston, Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry, or Bob Thiel. Until then, the devil gets the airport, the volcano, and the headlines. The Lamb gets the footnote and the offering envelope.

Why keep members in a fearful frenzy? Because calm people start reading Galatians. Calm people notice that "neither Jew nor Greek" is a wrecking ball aimed at a racial prophecy chart. Calm people notice that Colossians 2 does not say, "Let no one judge you except headquarters, and also please consult Germany in Prophecy before you book the Feast." Calm people notice that the New Covenant does not require a German election to prove God is still interested.

The New Covenant offered an alternative and Armstrongism treated it like a competing product. Grace does not need you anxious about Saxony-Anhalt. Union with Christ does not need your ancestry to be Manasseh. The Spirit is not a frequent-flyer program Satan can cancel with volcanic ash. Perfect love casts out fear. That is precisely why fear has to be restocked every week before the Feast.

Weston's note is not analysis. It is maintenance. Review the booklet. Remember the god of this age. Pray for Festival sites. Travel safely - and never forget why you keep these days. Translation: stay inside the story in which Charlotte holds the decoder ring and the rest of the church holds its breath.

The satire writes itself, but the theology is older than Meredith's eye surgery. A system that must turn every runway excursion into spiritual warfare is a system that cannot afford a Savior who already said "it is finished." If Jesus is sufficient, you do not need jackboots in the middle distance to keep the lights on. If identity is in Christ, you do not need gold countries on a map and gray countries as extras. If the devil is not the most powerful god in the room, you can fly to the Feast without narrating yourself as the reason Krakatau woke up.

Armstrongism lives on fear because fear is the only fuel that still burns after a century of revised dates. The New Covenant lives on a cross and an empty tomb, which is why it does not need AfD's 43.8 percent to remain true. 

If the gospel requires a German statehouse, a Heathrow runway, and a volcano to stay interesting, it is not the gospel. It is a subscription. Weston can keep ringing the Assyria bell. Meredith's heirs can keep discovering that Europe is "given to sudden dramatic changes," a sentence that would also describe weather, teenagers, and the church's own prophetic calendar. Meanwhile the New Covenant sits there, unpaid and un-hyperventilated, insisting that the dividing wall is already down, that days do not commend you to God, and that the one they claim to follow is not waiting in the wings until He can out-perform Satan at travel disruption. Charlotte will call that Laodicean. Scripture calls it news. The jackboots can wait. The booklet can wait. The frenzy can wait. The alternative already arrived, and it did not need Magdeburg to close the sale.

Future World Administrators: The Law Division

Reading this article, Preparing for Rulership by J. Charles Ogwyn,  feels like flipping through the strangest recruitment pamphlet you've ever seen-welcome to the Davidic School of Future World Government. 

Not everyone gets in. 

The curriculum? The law. 

The hands-on training? Your entire life. 

Job placement? That's reserved for a select few in a corner of the Churches of God. 

Jesus? He's conveniently listed as King, which makes sense, because someone needs to sit on the throne while the fresh batch of administrators walks the world through ancient statutes.

There's a running joke where the New Covenant keeps returning their application, stamped with "wrong job description." Want to apply? The listing says: "Rulers. Must love the law. Christ experience a plus."

"God has chosen each of us individually," says the brochure. But in this context, it's not a wild celebration of grace-a Father who loves the undeserving. Here, it means a small, informed group who think they've been picked to be the future world's teachers of the law. Everyone else in the faith? Well, they can just be grateful for their baptism-as long as they know not to expect a leadership gig.

There's a lot of bravado packed into a tradition that's spent years splitting over dates, forms of government, or who gets to wear the legacy crown. If the nations are banking on a united legal faculty from here, they should probably keep their options open.

Let's talk Moses. He said, "I can't speak." God just said, "I'll be with you." The article, though, hears a modern pitch about "leaning into your calling"-cut from the same cloth as your average TED Talk, more branding than burning bush.

What kind of king does God actually want? The article lines up Saul and David and nails the first bit: God cares about your heart, not your LinkedIn photo. But then it fumbles: "So, better start shaping a David-like heart by treating the Mosaic code as your professional development plan." The New Testament already filled that blank in. God's ideal king isn't a more devout David with a perfect performance review and a calendar bursting with feast days. God chose David's Son. The one who kept the law, took its curse, and then finished the job for good. Paul says it straight: "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." That shreds the whole brochure. If salvation and standing with God still somehow depend on outperforming the rest at law-keeping, then Christ died to set up just another apprentice program.

Sure, the old covenant had a kind of glory. But Hebrews just calls it "obsolete." The tablets of stone were death's ministry, but the Spirit's ministry blows past it. Every time the old covenant gets read without Christ in view, a veil drops. Only Christ lifts it. David loved the law he had, but the law was pointing to someone else.

Faithfulness, trust, time spent with God, zeal, humility, correction-all of that still matters. But the focus has shifted. Faithfulness isn't about quietly keeping sheep and food laws anymore. It means not drifting away from Christ's finished work and back toward ticking old boxes. The tutor's time ended when the heir showed up.

Trust in God? Still everything. Difference now is, in the New Covenant, that trust lands on something specific-a risen Lord who's already handed down the only verdict that matters. It doesn't mean training for your future spot in a world government.

Spending time with God makes the same divide but on different terms: David meditated on the law because that's the only light he had. We have the Light Himself. The article's proposal? Step backwards into the shadows, digest the code all over again, and hope we come out better. Jesus had a word for that: "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have life, but they point to Me, and you won't come to Me."

Zeal still counts-Saul's fizzled, David's danced, Paul's was intimidating on any résumé. Paul tossed his zeal in the loss pile, though. Zeal that never comes face to face with the Son is just busywork in religious packaging.

Humility? It still looks like David heading back to the sheepfold, not like a church group declaring they've been specially prepped to outrank the entire spectrum of Christianity as the Millennium's law faculty. Revelation 5 isn't an exclusive mailing list. It's a celebration-every tribe, all bought by the Lamb, made into a kingdom and priests. Royal priesthood isn't a jump up the ladder. It's an identity won with blood.

Even the response to correction still splits Saul from David. The most urgent correction now is Galatians 2:18-if we rebuild what Christ tore down, we prove we're transgressors all over again. Turning the law into the end-all, be-all constitution for the future, with Jesus reduced to law enforcement? That's a rebuild. Real confession is, "We confused the signpost with the destination."

The future, honestly, is incredible. But organizing it like a flow chart isn't the gospel. Yes, God's people will reign. Yes, the world can't limp on as it is. But the hope for the nations isn't that some law-trained inner circle finally gets their day. The hope is that the Lamb is on the throne, and His sacrifice unlocked something entirely new.

Rulers in the Kingdom aren't different because they passed an advanced Mosaic law course. They're different because they're one with a King who washed feet, bore sin, and fills hearts with the Spirit. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus sets us free from the law of sin and death. That's not a footnote. That's the headline.

Everything you suffer isn't a leadership practicum. It's the Father shaping you into the image of His Son. That image doesn't need a Future Administrator badge. It needs the cross front and center, with the law finally in its right place: fulfilled, not sitting on the throne.

The pamphlet/article pushes a code. The New Covenant introduces a King. Only one is still hiring.

Prophet Bob vs. the Thermometer: El Niño Is Forming. Bob's Patience With This Blog Is Not

God's most favorite self-appointed crackpot prophet, Bob Thiel, has once again detected the unmistakable scent of the Last Days in a weather report. Europe had a hot summer. California is hot because an El Niño is forming. Therefore, the Fourth Angel is warming up his bowl; then that nasty scoffer website Banned by HWA  fulfilled 2 Peter 3, and anyone who points out that weather still happens is walking according to their own lusts.

This is the same raving lunatic who has been announcing the beginning of sorrows since at least 2009. Every flood, every drought, every slightly-above-average August is further confirmation that he, and he alone, is reading the fine print on God's climate policy. When Banned by HWA dares to note that heatwaves also occurred in 2003, 2019, and pretty much every year someone needed a headline, Bob clutches his leather-bound Bible and cries "scoffers!" as if Peter wrote that chapter specifically about a blog that makes fun of him.

Let's apply a little New Covenant thinking, since Crackpot Bob still quotes Deuteronomy 28 like the ink is still wet and the audience is still ancient Israel. Under the Old Covenant, God threatened bronze skies and iron earth if the people didn't keep the statutes. Under the New Covenant, Jesus said the Father "sends rain on the just and the unjust." Weather is no longer a divine performance review for whether you kept the Feast of Tabernacles or avoided pork. It is weather. Sometimes it is El Niño. Sometimes it is climate change. Sometimes it is just July and August. None of these require a 14-minute video titled "Prophetic Scoffers and Earthquakes" in which Crackpot Bob reminds everyone that he was mocked. Oh, the humanity!!!!!!!!!

Crackpot Bob's actual grievance is never the theology. It is that Banned keeps noticing when he does the same routine: take a real event, bolt it onto Mark 13:8, declare it a warning from God, then act wounded when people laugh. The laughter is the persecution. The blog post is the fulfillment of prophecy. The fact that his predictions have the same broken track record as his spiritual daddy, Rod Meredith, is never mentioned. Longsuffering, you see. The Lord is not slack. He's just waiting for Bob to finish another article about how hot it is.

The pattern is now so reliable you could set your air conditioner by it:

• Something meteorological occurs.
• Bob posts scriptures + old Worldwide Church of God quotes + a reminder that he called it in 2009.
• Banned by HWA says, in so many words, "weather exists."
• Bob writes 2,000 words about scoffers in the last days and how they willfully forget the Flood.
• Repeat next heatwave.

At no point does it occur to him that a prophet who needs a new "I was mocked" post every summer might not be the watchman on the wall so much as the guy who keeps yelling "fire" every time the oven preheats.

The world is hot. Crackpot Bob is hotter. And the only thing melting faster than the glaciers is his composure whenever someone refuses to treat his weather commentary as inspired.

September 11 and the Churches of God

It is hard to believe that 25 years have passed since the World Trade Center was attacked by Islamic extremist vermin. Today, in 2026, an entire generation knows very little about that horrendous day. The entire world stopped and watched. Some in Gaza cheered and celebrated. Europeans were shocked. Commercial air travel evaporated within hours. Inbound international flights were diverted to Canadian airports, where citizens of small towns opened their homes, schools, and churches to care for thousands of stranded travelers.

The only known Church of God member working in the World Trade Center that morning was Adrienne Johnson of the United Church of God. She worked on the 37th floor of one of the towers and escaped safely with coworkers. The United Church of God issued a statement the next day confirming that all its members were accounted for and expressing horror at the loss of life.

Here on the West Coast, Pasadena shut down and the streets were empty. I remember the Ambassador College campus and the surrounding area being totally quiet. At noon I went to Circuit City to buy a portable radio with an earpiece so I could follow the news while I worked. Authorities were anticipating a possible attack on downtown Los Angeles, so much of the city effectively shut down.

Three of the four hijacked flights-American 11, United 175, and American 77-had been scheduled to fly to Los Angeles International Airport. That is why so many of the passengers were heading to Southern California, and why LAX and downtown high-rises were placed on high alert and partially evacuated that morning as a precaution.

Al-Qaeda had considered West Coast targets in earlier planning. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed originally proposed a larger operation striking landmarks on both coasts, including the Library Tower (now the U.S. Bank Tower) in downtown Los Angeles. Osama bin Laden scaled the plan back to the East Coast for September 11. A later "second-wave" plot to fly a plane into the same Los Angeles tower was discussed after 9/11 but was disrupted in 2002 before it could be carried out.

The various Armstrongite Churches of God, of course, wasted no time slotting the attacks into the prophecy charts they had been updating since the 1930s. By September 12 the United Church of God had issued a pastoral letter of genuine shock and grief, then immediately noted that all their members were safe. Other splinters (Living Church of God, Philadelphia Church of God, etc.) followed the same script: horror, prayers, then the inevitable Leviticus 26 citation. "I will even appoint terror over you... I will break the pride of your power." 

According to Armstrongite mythology, America is modern Manasseh, one of the lost tribes, so of course God would use terrorists to humble the pride of His favorite (if currently very disobedient) nation. Gerald Flurry of the Philadelphia Church of God was particularly pleased; he had already declared in May 2001 that the world had entered its "last hour," and 9/11 arrived right on cue to prove he was paying attention. Sermons and articles for years afterward treated the attacks as both a divine warning and further evidence that only their particular remnant was delivering the real end-time message. They also liked to point out that the death toll "could have been much worse," which in Armstrongite theology is usually presented as God's mercy rather than, say, the fact that the hijackers only had four planes. 

By this time the Worldwide Church of God had already abandoned most of Herbert Armstrong's distinctive doctrines by 2001, so the prophetic heavy lifting fell to the competing successor groups, each of which remained convinced it alone understood why the towers fell. It was an orgy of melodramatic end times malarkey from the splinters, and today, in 2026, the competing COG groups will put out articles marking this as the start of America's decline that they so vitally need and wish for. They so desperately need to be proven right. 

Malachi 3:10, Iowa Edition: Bring the Whole Tithe Into the Barn: The Storehouse Is Open. The Squeegee Is in the Closet.

 

For sixteen years, Samuel W. Kitchen would not touch the tithe. Not a dime. Not a widow's mite. Not even a spiritually significant Amazon gift card. He labored with his own fingers, as Isaiah apparently requires, and he did this because he believed a man cannot handle the holy tenth without proper authorization from Jesus Christ.

Then last year Christ worked through an ordained elder in the Philippines who was between COG church-hopping jobs at the time, who issued the missing paperwork directly channeled from Christ himself. The windows of heaven opened. The windows of Iowa, regrettably, did not.

Kitchen's latest pastoral update explains the situation with the calm of a man who has just discovered that declining personal revenue and rising ecclesiastical privilege are the same miracle wearing two hats. 

"This last year, since receiving authorization from Jesus Christ, my personal labors has been shrinking," he writes, "but at the same time God has replaced it with tithes and offerings from the Church!"

One can almost hear the squeegee hit the bucket.

He is careful to insist this is not panhandling. Panhandling is when a man asks strangers for money because work dried up. This is different. This is when a man asks followers for money because work dried up and a verse in Zechariah now points at his household. The distinction is doctrinal. Also postal. Checks may be sent to P.O. Box 126, Fairfield, Iowa, in the name of Support Services of the Worldwide Church of God, or simply to Samuel Kitchen, who is not making himself anything.

For sixteen-plus years he denied himself the tithe. Christ dispatched Jonathan Dicen, an elder who authorized the collection of Tithes and Offerings in the USA and then, in a plot twist worthy of the Book of Acts, took another position with another COG and severed the connection. Does a departing co-signer void the note? Kitchen has thought about this. No. Otherwise, marriages would be null, ordinations would be null, and more importantly, the P.O. box would be empty.

He is not ordained by any man. He is merely authorized to receive the money that ordained men receive. The difference will be explained after the deposit clears.

Kitchen's credentials are otherwise airtight. In 1991 his father held him up like Hannah with Samuel, which in Iowa is how one applies for end-time employment. Nineteen years later - a complete time cycle, naturally - the work came online. A demon-possessed woman once shrieked at his father in a Wisconsin Dells restaurant. Gerald Waterhouse once implied a special job. Kitchen originally assumed Dad was one of the Two Witnesses. He now realizes Satan was after the children the whole time, which is convenient, because the children are the ones with the website.

Zechariah 6 involves his family. Josiah-Hen is the household where the tithes go so Joshua may be plucked from the fire and given crowns, which is the completion of the Philadelphia era, which is to say please stop funding the other groups. Those groups exist, Kitchen explains, because the devil does not want you protected. He wants you dead. The practical application is that your first tenth should not go to them.

Isaiah 17:7-8 is pressed into service as a business plan. Do not look to the altars. Do not look to the work of the ministry. Do not look to your own labors. Do not respect what your fingers have made. Look to God. God, in this rendering, looks a great deal like a small online fellowship that just decided it needs an office. Kitchen's trips were personally funded until God wanted square footage. God also wanted him to stop respecting the work of his own fingers at approximately the same moment those fingers were bringing in less work.

This is called faith.

The operation remains "small" and "very weak" compared with Herbert W. Armstrong, a comparison Kitchen loves to make.  A response is building. Phone calls have come in from around the nation. He gets nervous imagining growth. God will provide what he needs to handle it. What he needs, at present, is for the Church to stand up in Jerusalem by standing up at the mailbox in Iowa.

People have asked the obvious question: if you can handle the tithe, are you ordained? Kitchen's answer is a masterpiece of remnant logic. No man ordained him. Therefore, he must already be ordained, because otherwise he would not have authority to handle the tithe, which he now has, which proves the ordination he does not claim. The Oregon Conference laid hands on Armstrong as a sign they recognized what Christ had already done. Perhaps the remnant can do the same by recognizing Kitchen. Perhaps he is going off the deep end. He allows the possibility for one sentence, then returns to the fruit test. Either he is a wicked tree or a good tree. The good tree accepts checks.

He has undergone severe health trials this year to get the point strengthened in his own mind. The point is: stop looking at side work. Start looking at the storehouse. The storehouse is his. The tares are everyone still sending money to the other ninety-nine continuations of the one true church. When tribulation hits, golden oil will flow. Until then, oil is expensive and so is an office.

Armstrong, Kitchen reminds the flock, was not ordained by a Sardis minister either. Christ ordained him. The church merely caught up. Kitchen is offering the same courtesy. You may lay hands on the arrangement by laying a tenth on the envelope. You may also ignore him and be laughed to scorn in the wrong direction. He is willing to be kicked for the elect's sake. The elect, if they are paying attention, will notice the kicking goes a lot easier when someone else is covering rent.

For over sixteen years the family received no tithes to fund this work. He himself labored to provide personal funding, because he believed in authorization. Now he has authorization. Now he is viewed as wicked. The timing is unfortunate only if you are still looking at the work of his fingers. God says don't. God says look to Him. Him, in the current fiscal year, has a building fund, a website, AI-assisted hymn demos, and a growing sense that the Philadelphia era cannot finish itself on window money.

Bring the tithes into the storehouse. Try Him now in this. See if He will not open the windows of heaven. The other windows have already been washed.

In Jesus Christ's name, and in the name of whoever is still holding the letter from the Philippines.

How curiosity saved me from a doomsday cult | Gabrielle Steele | TEDxAirlie

 

What if the opposite of certainty isn’t doubt, but curiosity? Gabrielle Steele reflects on her 21 years inside an apocalyptic cult and how unquestioned beliefs can quietly shape identity, morality, and belonging. Through her personal story and research, she shows how curiosity disrupts inherited certainty and becomes a pathway back to empathy, responsibility, and freedom. 

Gabrielle Steele grew up in a cult — and lived to laugh about it. Now a clinical trials project manager with a master’s in Exercise Physiology, she blends science and satire to explore how we form and fiercely defend our beliefs — in cults, politics, and corporate culture alike. 

Through humor, resilience, and sharp insight, Gabrielle challenges audiences to question their certainties and trade judgment for curiosity. When she’s not speaking or writing, she’s mentoring others, riding her bike, and raising two sons — approaching life, like a long ride, with endurance, humility, and a little mischief. 

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

Thankful for the Truth Nobody Else Is Allowed to Understand

Armstrongism has always sold itself as the last unlocked room in the house of Christianity. Everyone else had the furniture. Only Herbert W. Armstrong, we were told, had the key. "The Truth" was not merely the gospel. It was a restored package: Sabbath from Friday sunset, annual holy days, meats, tithes, God as a Family, British-Israel identity, sequential church eras, and one visible organization still obedient enough to qualify as the Church Christ actually built.

That claim was exclusive by design. If God hid the meaning of Scripture from historic Christianity and then handed the decoder ring to one twentieth-century broadcaster, then gratitude becomes a membership perk. You thank God not only for Christ, but for being among the few who can see. Satan, conveniently, has blinded everyone else-Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, and, after 1986, every Church of God that did not follow your particular evangelist out the door.

Living Church of God still writes in that voice. Douglas Winnail's Sabbath reflection asks members whether they are thankful for truths "hidden from the world," including a real God guiding history, a purpose for life, and Christ's return to restore all things. Fine sentences, as far as they go. Then comes the Armstrongist turn: the capacity to understand the plan of God is a gift God is "only giving to a few at this time." The rest of the planet, apparently including two millennia of Christians who somehow managed to preach Christ without Ambassador College or the Worldwide Church of God, remains under a special blackout.

It is a moving piety, until you notice that Bob Thiel, David Pack, Gerald Flurry, and Gerald Weston can all read the same paragraph and assume it describes their flock. Each man inherited the same grammar. Each insists his group is the one still proclaiming what no other group quite proclaims. The binders are identical. Only the letterhead changes.

Herbert Armstrong taught that other churches were not simply wrong on the calendar. They were a counterfeit. God had restored lost truths through him. The true church would be identifiable by Sabbath, holy days, the name "Church of God," hierarchical government, and a message about the coming Kingdom. After his death, when the old Worldwide Church of God dropped most of that package, the system did what exclusive systems always do. It shattered, and every shard claimed to be the original vase.

Pack's Restored Church of God says Christ's body is not divided into fellowships; it is one organization in full doctrinal agreement, and his is the restoration of the pre-1986 work. Flurry's Philadelphia Church of God says the apostasy was prophesied, Malachi's Message identified it, and Philadelphia continues in Edmond. Thiel's Continuing Church of God says the Philadelphia remnant can be documented by restored truths, early church history, and prophetic credentials the other groups lack. Weston's Living Church of God says it practices original first-century Christianity, restored through Armstrong and Meredith, and that members should thank God not only for being called into the truth but for being preserved in it.

The sarcasm writes itself, except the people in the pews are not a joke. They tithe, rearrange family calendars around holy days, and are taught that leaving the right corporation is spiritually dangerous. Meanwhile, the leaders treat one another as Laodicean, compromised, or simply not the Work. If "the Truth" were as self-evident as advertised, it would not need four incompatible copyright pages.

The deeper issue is not that these men believe Jesus will return. Plenty of Christians believe that. The issue is that they will not let the New Covenant be what the New Testament says it is.

Armstrong taught that the New Covenant is largely still ahead-a marriage covenant to be finalized at Christ's return-and that Christians now live between covenants, still bound to selected Mosaic requirements. Sabbath, meats, and holy days remain identity markers. The old covenant is "amplified," not administered into obsolescence. That maneuver lets a church quote Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews 8 while still policing belonging with Sinai's sign-laws.

Exodus 31 is blunt: the Sabbath is the sign of the covenant with Israel. Colossians 2 is equally blunt: festivals, new moons, and Sabbaths are a shadow; the substance belongs to Christ. Hebrews 8 is blunter still: in speaking of a new covenant, God has made the first obsolete. Armstrongism keeps the shadow in the display case and postpones the substance until the Millennium, when it will be safer to admit the new covenant has actually arrived.

So "the Truth" becomes a backward glance. Correct day. Correct diet. Correct feast. Correct era nickname from Revelation 2-3, as if Jesus mailed seven letters to first-century congregations so that a California radio ministry could later assign you a prophetic ZIP code. The future kingdom is preached with real urgency. The present church is managed like a museum of Leviticus.

They will say they do not teach salvation by works. Armstrong said eternal life is a gift. The successor groups repeat it. Functionally, though, assurance, identity, and often fellowship are tied to the package and the organization that claims to guard it. Grace gets you in the brochure. The calendar keeps you in the directory.

In Scripture, truth is not a secret curriculum restored in 1933.

Truth is a person. "I am the way, and the truth, and the life." Knowing the truth is knowing Christ, not passing an exam on whether America is Manasseh.

The New Covenant is not waiting in a file cabinet until the Second Coming. Jesus said the cup is the new covenant in his blood. Paul called himself a minister of a new covenant, of the Spirit rather than the letter. Hebrews says Christ is already mediator of a better covenant, and that the first is aging and ready to vanish. One may debate how Israel's national promises reach their public fullness. One may not, with a straight face, use that debate to keep the church under Sinai's worship schedule.

The law is not thrown in the street. It is written on hearts. That is not "a few insiders finally decoded the holy days." It is the Spirit forming people into the likeness of Christ. The moral will of God remains. The Mosaic covenant as the terms of belonging does not.

The church is not one corporation with a successor evangelist. There is one body, and it is made of those united to Christ by the Spirit-not those who survived the correct 1990s split. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 1 to rebuke "I am of Paul, I am of Apollos." Armstrongism cites the same chapter to congratulate a remnant for having information the rest of the household of faith missed.

And the gospel is public. When Paul said the god of this age blinds minds, he was talking about the gospel of the glory of Christ, not about people who celebrate the resurrection on Sunday or eat shrimp. The apostles preached in streets and synagogues. They did not require a proprietary restoration before anyone was allowed to understand.

Under the New Covenant, gratitude sounds different. You thank God that the veil is taken away in Christ. You do not thank him that your group finally obtained the decoder ring and that Satan has, for some reason, issued a communications blackout to every other pulpit on earth-including the three Armstrongist pulpits across town.

The tragedy of COGland is not that it takes the Bible seriously. It is that it takes Armstrong's restoration so seriously that Christ becomes the mascot of a remnant brand.

A faith that must keep insisting "no one else has ever understood this" is already nervous. A faith that then splits into hundreds of groups, each repeating the sentence, has confessed the problem out loud. If the truth were the person and work of Jesus, it would be large enough for the catholic church of all who belong to him. If the truth is a restored code plus the right human government, it will keep shrinking until it fits inside one man's office.

Winnail asked whether readers were thankful for the opportunity to understand truths hidden from the world. A better question: thankful to whom, and for what? If the gift is Christ, the Spirit, and sins remembered no more, then the thanksgiving is Christian. If the gift is exclusive sight, withheld from the rest of the body and located in one lineage of evangelists who cannot agree which lineage is real, then the thanksgiving is just the old boast in a Sabbath suit.

The New Covenant does not need a replica Armstrong. It already has a Head. He does not require four competing press secretaries to protect him from the rest of Christianity. The substance belongs to Christ. The shadows were never the prize. And a truth that can only survive by declaring everyone else blind is not the truth that sets people free. It is a flashlight fight in broad daylight.

Are You Thankful for the Truth?

The Sabbath is a good time to thank God for giving us an understanding of His truth—that there is a real God who is guiding the course of history (Job 12:23; Daniel 2:21; 4:17), that there is a real purpose for life (1 John 3:1–3), and that Jesus Christ is going to return to bring peace and justice to the world and restore all things (Isaiah 9:6–7; Acts 3:19–21). We are told that the saints will reign with Christ and fill the earth with a knowledge of God’s ways (Daniel 7:27; Isaiah 11:9). The capacity to understand the truth about the plan of God is a gift that God is only giving to a few at this time (1 Corinthians 1:26). The Bible reveals that Satan has blinded the rest of the world to these important and wonderful truths (2 Corinthians 4:3–4). Are you thankful for the opportunity to understand these truths that have been hidden from the world? —Douglas S. Winnail