Does God Let People Deliberately Die In Order To Save Them From Future Calamities?

Texas church shooter, 26, who killed at least 26 people - 

including eight members of one family

Today a Lutheran pastor and a conservative has set off a firestorm after he wrote the following concerning the church shooting in Texas this past Sunday:

"For those with little understanding of and less regard for the Christian faith, there may be no greater image of prayer’s futility than Christians being gunned down mid-supplication. But for those familiar with the Bible’s promises concerning prayer and violence, nothing could be further from the truth. When those saints of First Baptist Church were murdered yesterday, God wasn’t ignoring their prayers. He was answering them.

We also pray in the Lord’s Prayer that God’s will be done. Sometimes, his will is done by allowing temporal evil to be the means through which he delivers us from eternal evil. Despite the best (or, more accurately, the worst) intentions of the wicked against his children, God hoists them on their own petard by using their wickedness to give those children his victory, even as the wicked often mock the prayers of their prey."

"We also pray in the Lord’s Prayer that God’s will be done. Sometimes, his will is done by allowing temporal evil to be the means through which he delivers us from eternal evil. Despite the best (or, more accurately, the worst) intentions of the wicked against his children, God hoists them on their own petard by using their wickedness to give those children his victory, even as the wicked often mock the prayers of their prey. "

"So when a madman with a rifle sought to persecute the faithful at First Baptist Church on Sunday morning, he failed. Just like those who put Christ to death, and just like those who have brought violence to believers in every generation, this man only succeeded in being the means through which God delivered his children from this evil world into an eternity of righteousness and peace."

“We do not need to fear the day of persecution that’s coming to the church, because God said it’s going to come. He warned us over 2,000 years ago the day was coming. And rather than fear it, He said just endure it. Now ‘endure it’ is a hard word. ‘Endure it’ doesn’t mean that they might take your ice cream away today. ‘Endure it’ means it may be a rough day. It may be a rough few years. But the one who endures to the end will be delivered.”   See:  When The Saints Of First Baptist Church Were Murdered, God Was Answering Their Prayers

The above quotes from the Lutheran pastor are by no means unique to him.  This has always been a common theme in the Church of God.  I cannot even begin to count the number of times I have heard ministers and members say that when a person has died from either a horrible accident or in their sleep, that God was saving them from the soon coming tribulation.  They had fought the good fight and God was saving them a little early.

Even when small babies or children have died, callous ministers and members have said the same thing.  God took their lives so that they might have a better life later.  Who in the hell wants to hear that shit when they are grieving?

While the Christian hope certainly is in a better life to come, God certainly is not letting unborn babies or 98-year-old women be murdered in church just to save them for something better.  This kind of thinking is just one more piece of rotten fruit lobed into the already putrid basket of legalism.

 

Dixon Cartwright On Why he Is Shutting Down "The Journal"

The Painful Truth blog reached out to Dixon Cartwright regarding the reason he has chosen to shut down The Journal in January of 2018.

One of the comments Dixon made in his letter to the PT was this:

My original intent for my newspaper was to help people maintain contact with other COG Christians across the boundaries of the various COG groups and also to provide a forum. We were kind of like a blog before there were blogs. We were different from In Transition in that John’s aim was to have two of his trusted friends check out articles before they were published in In Transition for correctness of doctrine. The friends were Ron Dart and Leon Walker. I did not share the view with John that that was an appropriate consideration for my newspaper. Rather, I welcomed creative essays, even those advocating unorthodox versions of doctrines, and did not feel the need to make sure they were correct or for me to agree with them. As a result, we printed many such opinion pieces — editorials, letters, essays — with many of them disagreeing with each other, frequently in the same issue of The Journal. My main consideration was that writers deal politely with each other in their doctrinal and political discussions, especially since people with different interpretations of Scripture can reasonably prove their varying doctrines from the Bible.

I think this is what made The Journal more widely accepted than some other venues.  As crazy as some of the ads and articles were, he gave them a place to share their viewpoints.  Armstrongism has had a horrible track record in doing everything its power in shutting people down over the decades.  The Internet has changed all of that and none of them have any control over the flow of information anymore.

I think the Ambassador Report was the forefront in starting all of the blogs, websites, and other venues that have popped up over the decades since the late 1980's.  Church members were hungry for information and news about the constant upheavals, whether over doctrine or administration problems, that they eagerly read anything they could get their hands on.  After Ambassador Report stopped being published, John Robinson started In Transition to document the ongoing issues in the Churches of God. The Journal filled a unique void in the church news sphere and was also instrumental in sharing the constant drama during all of the doctrinal changes in the Worldwide Church of God.

Read the entire letter here:  Dixon Cartwright. Why he is closing down the Journal

The McDonald Twins: Living Church of God Family

You may have seen this story in the news lately.

New life, apart: Rare surgery to separate brothers conjoined at head

The parents say they are telling their story to honor the medical staff for taking care of them over the last several months -- and they hope their message can help other parents struggling with a sick child. "To let them know these things that are difficult," Christian says, "can be a blessing in disguise." 

Nicole, 31, worked as a pediatric physical therapist and has been helping the boys with their motor skills, preparing them for being separated. Her favorite thing now is sitting quietly in the living room, listening to them babble back and forth in their bedroom, as if they're talking to each other.  

For Nicole and Christian, life nowadays is a collision of fear and joy, of excitement and anxiety. There are so many unknowns about prognosis and survival the McDonalds have had to find comfort in uncertainty. Christian says they understand that "one or both twins can be neurologically challenged, or they can have a mental or physical handicap" as a result of the operation. 

"We know that is definitely a real possibility, but we're still going to love our boys," the 37-year-old father says. 

Formerly conjoined twins return home