“Watch and pray always that you be accounted worthy to escape all these things and stand before the son of man”

A comment from the previous post that deserves its own space:

For me, this topic post was a timely topic post. A previous post topic entitled “Why the Church” got me thinking and didn’t have time to post questions that came to my mind before other subsequent topics moved it into archive.

The Radio/Worldwide Church of God once had a booklet entitled “There Is A Way of Escape”. One of the hooks that drew people into the Church was the promise to escape the Great Tribulation which the booklet explained. “Watch and pray always that you be accounted worthy to escape all these things and stand before the son of man” Luke 21:36. Classic Armstrongism taught the Great Tribulation occurring in the first week of January, 1972 (end of second 19 year time cycle) with the German attack on America. The Philadelphians are taken to a Place of Safety and the remaining “Lukewarm” Church members left were the Laodicean Church era going through the Great Tribulation. Classic Armstrongism taught half the Church would be taken to Petra Place of Safety and the other half would be tried in the Great Tribulation (another Lake of Fire type fear threat). “Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left. "Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your LORD will come. Matthew 24:40-42

So the question that arose in my mind when I read “Why the Church” post was how do the splinters and HWA wannabes teach Matthew 24:40-42 today? If each splinter and HWA wannabee teaches that their own splinter (and their splinter alone) are the Philadelphian era remnant and all the other Splinters are the Laodiceans in the Laodicean era, then how does the math work for the fulfillment of Matt 24:40-42 the way that classic Armstrongism always taught; i.e. half the Church taken to place of Safety and the other half remaining to go through the great Tribulation tried by fire?  

If “the elect” have been spread among all the splinters, and each is claiming that they are the Philadelphian remnant, then the numbers don’t work 50%/50%. Even if they still taught classic Armstrongism; i.e. that within their own splinter group, 50% will be taken to a Place of Safety while 50% are left behind to face the Great Tribulation with all the other Laodiceans in the other Splinters, the math still doesn’t work overall to fulfill Matt. 24:40-42, thus the question I posed.

If the Armstrong Churches of God are as many as 50,000 people today consisting of two types of people: 1) Philadelphian remnant in the Laodicean era; and 2) Laodiceans in the Laodicean era, then there is no one Splinter Group that is large enough for 25,000 Philadelphians (50%) worthy to escape all these things (Luke 21:36). Which means ALL of the HWA wannabees have to acknowledge that there are Philadelphians in other Splinter groups for the math to work. BUT WAIT, that would mean that, consistent with classic Armstrongism, we are still in the Philadelphian era and the two eras co-exist together. 

OH, BUT WAIT! It gets even better – Herbert Armstrong admitted that the dead Sardis era – the Church of God, Seventh Day – was also God’s true Church too, just doing a dead work!!! So do their membership numbers get included in the Place of Safety Matthew 24:40-42 prophecy that classic Armstrongism always taught that half the Church would be taken, and the other half left to go through the Great Tribulation? That would imply there are Philadelphians and Laodiceans in the Sardis era remnant.

Now that we are out of it, isn’t Armstrongism fun?  

Maybe the Doctor from the degree mill “Almost arrested for Sabbath keeping, doubly blessed” Thiel can prophesy an answer to my simple naïve question.

Richard

Church of the Eternal God: Norbert Link and Crew Don't Practice What They Preach

Norbert Link's man-made empire called the Church of the Eternal God, has a blurb up on its web site about people who give selflessly of their lives, sometimes even to the point of death.

That article is written by Robb Harris and is titled, "Reckless Endangerment".

While many have selflessly given their lives to help those in dire need, what about those who place themselves in danger by their own choice or ignorance?  The desire to climb Mount Everest has become a worldwide endeavor since Sir Edmund Hillary and Nepalese Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers confirmed to have reached the summit of Mount Everest. Since then, “Some 290 people have died climbing Everest in more than a century of attempts, according to the Himalayan Database, an archive that tracks expeditions in the Nepalese Himalayas going back to 1905. About a third, 94, have been Sherpas (npr.org).”

While many might argue that Sherpa deaths are part of the job they have chosen to take part in, it still doesn’t excuse so many deaths merely for man’s folly in desiring to conquer a mountain.

Like any typical COG leader, the brethren, in their eyes, are incompetent idiots who can never do anything right. So as usual. the blame members for not being in the right frame of mind.  That wrong thinking then allows "believers" to be led astray by unscrupulous men like Bob Thiel and James Malm...and Norbert Link.

When we seek to conquer and overcome our own mountain of human carnality, are we being conscientious in how we attain that goal?  Spiritual recklessness can cause our own defeat and quite possibly that of those around us. Christ warns of this mindset and the dangers it poses, “‘But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea’”(Mark 9:42).

There is no place in God’s Family for those that lead believers astray. Those words are terrifying in implication and will be the ruin of many who have walked this earth lead by deceit. But the warning given by Christ should not dissuade us from trying to do good. We must continually lead by example and be lights to those in darkness. Christ didn’t call us IN perfection, He called us TO perfection. Paul, with all of his troubles, understood this quite well. “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6-8).

All of these men who have started the various splinter groups set themselves up as the chieftains of their empires.  God had no part in it.  These self-appointed upstarts are the ones leading brethren astray and down paths that lead them further and further away from the One, they are supposed to be following and finding their rest in. Jesus Christ died and is still on the Masonic Lodge or high school gym floor where he remains till next year. They never seem to go any further than that death. What it did and accomplished are rarely discussed.  If they did, there would be zero excuses in running CEG or any of the other splinter groups that these charlatans use to deceive members.

Adult Wake Up Call ":Will Christians flee to a place in the wilderness? "

… If so, does the Bible give any clues as to where?"

Dr. Robert Thiel

In my view and experience, the concept and teaching in WCG and now most splinters,  of  fleeing or going to the Place of Safety to experience God's protection during the final times before the Second Coming was and still is one of the most dangerous misapplication of scripture they ever came up with.  It was the theme of Gerald Waterhouse's long winded and fanciful sermons, along with loyalty to HWA and belief in his all wise leadership, as he toured the churches spreading the Gospel of Fear and "How the hell is THAT going work?"  

Waterhouse added the extra fact, one of many,  that it was not just a place of safety but a place of final training to be, as I assumed, God as God is God and ruling over the nations.  I detested Gerald's visits, from my youthful self until the end  and told him in the end that he caused more fear, worry and questions in the congregation than he answered and that I was no longer going to answer for him after he left.  I have related that at the same time I asked him what he was going to do when HWA died. I never thought he wouldn't. He said that he'd believe it after three days and three nights.  That was one of the last straws for me and he never had many straws to deal with from me to begin with over the years. 

The Place of Safety is, by far, the most dangerous and ill conceived teaching of WCG and HWA or those around him. Let me be clear. I never believed it and like BI, divine healing only and divorce and remarriage, never gave a sermon on it. I handled questions on it personally and privately and reminded folk that much of this was speculation and simple opinions that we could wait and see about.  BI never made a big impression on me as the NT did not care who your ancestors were from all I could tell nor made a point of it.  But the prophecy based WCG/HWA was hooked on it for any number of reasons.

 I took it as wild speculation based on scripture hoping along with cut and paste theology and wasn't about to tell any church I might have pastored at the time that "it's time to go."  I may have lacked faith, but I did not lack common sense.  That was just never going to happen. 

It is an insane teaching based on taking practically all scriptures related to the topic wildly out of context, both in historical and even some kind of future context.  Ass kissing Evangelicals are trying every way they can to put their idea of how such end time fantasies can be brought about by POTUS, who we all know said  with a straight face , "No one loves the Bible more than me" and Evangelicals fanaticize as being chosen by God.   (I like the concept that this might be so only if God has run out of Locusts:)

Nevertheless, Bob Thiel teaches it as in days of old.  

COGwriter

https://www.cogwriter.com/news/prophecy/will-christians-flee-to-a-place-in-the-wilderness-if-so-does-the-bible-give-any-clues-as-to-where/

"Are some of God’s people actually going to flee right before the tribulation?

According to Jesus, the answer is yes."

"Let this be perfectly clear, there are two groups of God’s people mentioned in Revelation 12–one which goes to a place of safety and one which does not." 

"The idea that those going to the place will undergo final training is one that we in the Continuing Church of God also embrace. We do not believe that the faithful are simply going to save their physical lives, but also be trained so that they can be more effective servants of God. To learn to better spread the love of God to more of humanity.

Most end time Christians, however, are not Philadelphian, but Laodicean and are not promised the type of protection that Jesus promised the Philadelphia Christians."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I believe most here know the routine and most of the reasonings and meanderings through scripture to "prove" that a Place of Safety, most likely in Petra, Jordan or vicinity is a supposed very real promise for the true church (there is no one true church) today. .(Or ever).

 It falls on deaf ears to say that the Book of Revelation is a failed first century prophecy meant to encourage Jewish Christians trapped in the final days of the Temple in Jerusalem under Roman assault. In this case, as in the days of the Maccabean uprising, the Romans won again. Any fleeing to be done has been done or was unable to be done but it is all done. Take the Book of Revelation as a guide to our times at your own risk.  I'd be a bit careful following a Bob Thiel out into the Jordanian countryside to get away from chaos in the Middle East or anyplace else on the planet. Certainly a Dave Pack, as failed a seer as he has proven to be cannot be trusted to get this right as if was the right thing to teach or do in the first place, which it is not.

The Book of Revelation is not for today and of course, that will start a brawl right there.  It does not predict helicopter gun ships with the faces of men and is full of hyperbole which was a perfectly fine way to write apocalyptic literature. "So only today could we get a 200 million man army" is a bogus and inappropriate response just as much as trying to figure out how the stars of heaven could fall to earth knowing, as we do today, the nature of stars.  It is, however, exaggeration at its best. It was most likely written sometime between January and September of 70 AD,  just prior to the Fall of Jerusalem and never even made it to the three and a half year mark where Messiah would come. The Romans put an end to that pipedream in 8 months.   Whole other topic.

As noted in The Religion of the Orient, which I have quoted in the past:

"Revelation was the swan song of Militant Jewish Christianity. When Jerusalem was destroyed, when Rome waxed grater and more powerful, when the False Prophet gained more and more followers, when the book itself was proved totally false within two years, when it became evident that the Jewish Messiah-Christ would not come, the Hebrew Christians lost their virility and their cult faded under the combined assault of orthodox Judaism and of Gentile Christianity."
pg 479-

So to the point.  The teaching of a Place of Safety and/or Final Training is the most dangerous and anxiety fraught mistaken belief of the WCG and now most splinters of note. It is foolish and a formula for a disaster in religious shenanigans. While the writers of the day may have themselves felt this to be true if one just waited to see, they were as mistaken then as they would be now again.

Christians and humans have always looked for safety and hope in troubled times. Revelation was written for just such a purpose.   Relying on the proof texting waltz through scriptures by those so inclined or the cobbling together of scripture on the answer to this troublesome question of physical survival until the Second Coming is looking for deliverance in all the wrong places.

It never seems to occur to these folk that "If only you would hide me in the grave and conceal me till your anger has passed" found in Job might be safer for all concerned.  But then facing death graciously as all have in the past and must still is not a strong view of the Church either.  Getting out of it seems more the way to go and the teaching of The Place of Safety goes a long way in the specialness that does not really belong to the Churches of God to begin with.  They will be as mistaken about "we shall not all sleep, but we shall be changed" (I Cor 15:51) as Paul was when he had to come to grips with his own mistaken views on the soon and shortness of his times.