Lying Wonders and Orginal Belief?

 

Church of God groups love to assert the belief that they are all practicing 1st Century Christianity just as the apostles did. Nothing could be further from the truth than that statement.

The other day our favorite crackpot property, the illustrious and all-knowing Bwana Elijah Bob Thiel had this to say:

Lying Wonders and Original Beliefs 

Were lying wonders part of why Greco-Romans changed their beliefs? What doctrines did Gregory Thaumaturgus (the ‘Wonder-Worker’) promote that got accepted? What about the impact of ‘Marian’ apparitions and delusional people? Where did the rosary and brown scapular come from? Does the Great Monarch, with pagan prophetic ties, sound like the Beast/King of the North, that the Bible warns against? Should books based on scripture and history be considered “bad books” by faithful Christians? Could a church with ties to the original apostles be considered a “false religion” that “appears” in the end time? What have pontiffs Benedict XVI and Francis written about truth? What about misunderstandings about the gospel of the kingdom of God and salvation? What does the Bible teach is truth and the faith to contend for? In addition to addressing those issues, towards the end of this video, Dr. Thiel goes over a chart of original catholic beliefs that the Greco-Romans have changed. He concludes that the Continuing Church of God is more faithful to the original faith once delivered to the saints than Greco-Roman Catholic or Protestant groups.

It is funny to watch Bwana Bob salivate and slobber all over Catholic and Protestant writers when what they say seems to fits his deluded scenarios, and then turn around and say crap like he does above.

Instead of ridiculing the Catholics and others, why doesn't Bwana Bob look inwardly at the lying wonders that he uses to bolster his personality cult in others' eyes.  From his self-appointment to the so-called double blessing and including the nightmares that he and a couple others have had are just as deluded as the pagans he loves to quote. Their myths and outright lies are just as silly at times as Bwana Bob's lies.

God no more had hand in starting the improperly named "continuing" Church of "god" than he did with starting Dave Pack's or Gerald Flurry's personality cults. The myths that he promotes in his little group are nothing like what those first-century Christians practiced, including forcing his members to tithe. Absent are any teachings on grace, sanctification, justification, or even mercy. Instead, they rely upon an old pissy god that can't wait to annihilate most of the earth's population so that COG members can take over.

Never in the history of the Church of God movement have we seen so many liars in our midst.

Must've been awe inspiring to stand on the ark's deck and look down...

From a COG Face book page...picture added to words

And, this is what the church taught its children. 

It's no wonder there are so many psychotic COG leaders today.
 

In Personal Hindsight

 

In Hindsight...

Only after leaving a Cult does, one realize they were in one. When one is in it, it is a "True Church".  In politics, of course, one has the "True Views".

Pointing out that one might have been in a cult can make those who were also in it angry for making the observation as the process of admitting it is different for everyone concerned. Some can never admit it because we all feel we are "smarter than that" and never would or could have been taken in by any such thing.  

But in my own hindsight, I was. It was the 60's after all!  Civil rights riots, American cities on fire, Cuban Missile Crisis, Wars in the Middle East, Political assassinations, Viet Nam, Hippies and Woodstock. Jesus simply had to be on the way!  Prophecy Comes Alive!  I suppose today is not much different with only the topics shifting around that need to be "fixed", however one thinks the fixing needs to done. 

It was embarrassing and humbling to admit to myself that not only was I in a cult but I was a pastor in a cult. I was a salesman for the leader. My education in "theology" only matched that of the leader and forsook all other realities about the Bible that did not fit the program or what I may have personally need to believe whether it was true or not. When I believed it, I thought it was true or I'd not have believed it.  But I admit it to myself. I was in a cult. Others views of their own experience may differ. 

Being in a cult is not the "fault" of the member. It is the fault of the authoritarian leader whose personality disorders, need to control and self absorbed behaviors manifest in the lives of others as they inflict their personal form of chaos on those they attract.   It is also very profitable for the authoritarian.  

There cults can form in any environment where people find commonality, community and need to belong. Cults can be as innocent as collectors who obsess over their Action Figure and Star Wars Collections and are harmless, except maybe to one's finances. Cults of concern usually develop in both religion and politics. It is most often in religion and politics that cultic personalities survive and thrive.  History is strewn with them and the chaos they bring to society. 

In my view and experience, I naively joined a cult when young. I became a salesman for the cult. And only after stepping out of it was I able to see that I was drawn to it for all the classic reasons and the leadership had all the classic symptoms of cultic leadership. 

My only personal reconciliation with the issue as it presented itself in my own experience is that I could not now be here, if I had not then been there. 

Reasons People Join Cults

(and don't know it)

Seductive Recruitment Processes

Post Breadk-up Blues

Striving for "Perfection"

Finding a Higher Purpose in Life

Low Self-Esteem and the Need to Feel Special or Chosen

The Need to Feel "Taken Care Of"

Trying to Save the World

Fed up with "The World"

Ignorance of the Fact One is in a Cult

Cults Explained-Netflix

A remarkably insightful presentation

I will be participating in a second interview with WCTV Public TV in  Wadsworth, Ohio on the Restored Church of God and it's WCG roots as well as my own perceptions of my personal experience with it on Monday. I can post it or not depending on sensitivities here but I it will be easily found after posted by WCTV on YouTube when it is available.