Has the Church of God ever been unified? Decades and decades before the upheavals of the 1990's scores of groups had already broken off of the Worldwide Church of God. Not a month went by without some minister or member declaring themselves God's new and improved leader and took a few people with them. Church members have been gullible dupes over the years to one fraudulent man (and a couple of women) after another. Each one always more enlightened and godly than the previous.
Then, Herbert Armstrong had to go and die. Damn! What a mess. Even though he declared that he had reached all of the world with his message, one self-appointed prophet after another have had hissy-fit 's and left the church huffing and snorting. Thousands of gullible members bought into their outright lies and followed them. Then, once reality sat in, church members quickly saw that the same perverse habits they had left behind were still occupying the minds of their new enlightened leaders. Corruption abounded and the lies became more outrageous. More families, marriages, and lives were ripped apart by deviant church leaders.
One of the groups that actually might have had a good chance in righting the wrongs was the United Church of God. It, however, got off on a wrong foot as its leaders plotted and schemed while still in the employ of the Worldwide Church of God on how to start their new and improved church. Membership lists and addresses were stolen in order to send out letters letting the faithful know that the truth was being carryied on in the new and improved Church of God, called United. United's goal was just that, unite the church members in one cohesive body to do an amazing work that HWA had already said he had completed.
Things rolled along well, till stories broke of church elders and members sexually assaulting women. Then there was the horrendous mess with the church member who embezzled hundred's of thousand's of dollars from the bank she worked at and with which she built a meeting hall for UCG. Once the government discovered what the church member had done she was arrested and bank regulators and the court confiscated UCG's church building and sold it. Corruption continued on unabated for years as one thing after another happened. Then, Jim Franks and 3/4 of the minister threw their own hissy-fit and started their own new most unified Church of God EVER (COGWA). More families, marriages, and friendships were shattered so that another group of selfish men could set themselves up as the final moral authority for the church.
A reader of UCG's magazines would never know the sordid past of the 20-year-old church. What one reads about today is the mess that Vic Kubik wrote about in his latest Letter from the President. A letter on how unified the UCG is today...um, someone needs to speak to Kubik about that!
As the Church of God and Christianity as a whole approaches Pentecost, Kubik is using the day as a reason to keep the UCG unified.
Kubik writes:
As we approach the day of Pentecost, let’s rededicate ourselves to our wonderful purpose, let’s all do our part to be a truly unified Body, a united Church for those whom God is calling.Remind you, this is the very same man who plotted and schemed to disunify the Worldwide Church of God so he and his buddies could keep their salaries flowing in.
On that original day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended upon those in the room, forever ending the idea that revelation and truth came down from human leaders lording themselves over the members. Members were enlightened. Their minds understood things in new and glorious ways and they were empowered to go forth with that message, each according to their own abilities, yet unified (of one accord) in their mission to free the captives and restore wholeness to broken and downtrodden people overwhelmed by the rules.
Kubik continues with this:
If that is what Kubik believes and what he thinks UCG is all about, then WHY has he refused to "stick together" and remain "unified" with other COG members? He and his cabal of buddies have never truly been held to this standard.Allow me to share my thoughts and prayers about this day and what it truly means to be “of one accord.” They center on what Jesus passionately prayed for concerning His followers shortly before being tortured and killed.In that passage, Jesus is actually praying for us today! “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word [including you and me]; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us , that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one , and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me” (John 17:20-23, emphasis added throughout).And so, we see that it was Jesus Christ’s intense desire that His followers stick together and be united together in purpose and action.
However, according to Kubik, there is only one Church of God on this earth who is "sticking together" and is truly "united." One guess as to who THAT is...PCG? RCG? LCG? CCG?
The Church of God no longer has a purpose or at least one they want to share with other COG members. It plods along with one failed campaign after another. One mind numbingly boring telecast after another. The world is not interested in their message and COG members are not interested in what they do either. Even Jelly cannot hold the church together and unify it.I invite you to consider how the Vision Statement of the United Church of God is drawn directly from what is called the “unity chapter” of Ephesians: “The whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies , according to the effective working by which every part does its share , causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love” (Ephesians 4:16).Unity represents the outcome of having a shared purpose and vision, a purpose that we all actively work toward! To achieve it, we must get in harmony with Christ’s prayer and diligently, as individuals, strive to all support and advance that collective purpose as one body in one accord .
Peace is not simply the absence of conflict. Pursuing and supporting our great purpose as a spiritual assembly—preaching the powerful gospel of the Kingdom and preparing ourselves for entry into that Kingdom as the very children of God —requires great effort and work by each of us. When we do so, when we are so minded and motivated, we have peace and unity!Of course, unity cannot be achieved in UCG if members fail to support the human organization. Screw following Jesus, the "Org." is more important. Oh, wait, Jesus? That dude that disrupts everything we claim to believe yet fail to follow...
Peace is the glue that creates a spiritual bond. Jesus said: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matthew 5:9). We have to be willing to wage spiritual peace rather than war in our daily lives. Of course, the waging of peace represents a more difficult challenge. It is far easier to tear down than to build up. But it is worth the effort. With God’s help, we canovercome the baser parts of our nature. We can put out anger, envy and pride—the mental and spiritual states that lead to words that hurt and harm.If one truly acknowledges Jesus, then they know that "peace" has been accomplished. There is no more struggling or continually "fighting" to make one's self accepted. The fight has been won. The battle has been won. But since UCG still places the law above that inconvenient dude, they still have to fight and struggle while constantly being disunified.
As we approach the day of Pentecost, let’s rededicate ourselves to our wonderful purpose, let’s all do our part to be a truly unified Body, a united Church for those whom God is calling.Called into UCG? No thanks. Been there done that. Unified? Never in this lifetime.
