LCG Friday Night Smackdown: LCG members need to strive to stop being instruments of Satan

First, we had Gerald Weston talking about how powerful his adversary is and now we have Doug Winnail doing his Friday Night Smackdown of LCG members and this same adversary. Apparently, LCG members are letting rumors, lies, false doctrines, and divisive ideas lead them straight into Satan's clutches. Their reprobate minds then lead them to thwart the plan of God so that his kingdom can't come when he had originally planned it.  Pretty heavy burdens to place upon LCG members' shoulders!

As usual, it is all LCG members' fault because they are so inept in stopping the crafty wiles of Satan from influencing them. Jesus might be able to help them if they only knew about him. Plus, their inability to resist Satan's influence has thwarted the Kingdom of God from happening sooner than needed and has delayed the return of Christ, again.

Satan’s Devices: God raised up His Church to preach the Gospel of the Kingdom of God (Mark 16:15), to warn the world of a coming judgment (Matthew 24), and to prepare a people to reign with Jesus Christ (Luke 1:17). Satan has tried to thwart this mission down through history. He inspired misguided individuals to physically attack and murder Jesus, go after His disciples, and cause division and spread vicious rumors and false doctrines to disrupt the Work of the early Church (1 Corinthians 1:10–13; 2 Corinthians 11:26; Galatians 1:6–9; 2 Timothy 4:14). Satan’s goal has not changed. The Bible reveals that we are in a spiritual war with a cunning adversary (Ephesians 6:10–20), who is still using the same devices today (2 Corinthians 2:11)—physical attacks, rumors, lies, false doctrines, divisive ideas, and doing whatever seems right in one’s own eyes (Judges 21:25). All this leads to confusion that distracts us from our mission and disrupts the Work of God. This is why the Apostle Paul urged the early Church to be of “the same mind and... the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10) and to “hold the traditions which you were taught” (2 Thessalonians 2:15). Peter also warned that we must be able to recognize and resist the efforts of Satan to thwart the plan of God with his divisive schemes (1 Peter 5:8–9). We must all strive to avoid being instruments in Satan’s hands if we want to be in the coming Kingdom of God.
Have a profitable Sabbath, Douglas S. Winnail

Satan is running rampant in the LCG just like he is in the world

 

Gerald Weston writes about the most powerful god of the Church of God movement, so powerful that faith in Christ cannot even stem his adversarial actions. He uses bitterness to infect church members' minds so that they no longer care about LCG's "truth". Once LCG members reject LCG teachings they are immediately consumed by hatred! Who knew? That pesky adversary uses rumors about LCG corruption to destroy the minds of members.

That creature is so powerful that he has complete reign to work anywhere he likes in the Church of God. Jesus is apparently powerless in his presence. Forget about the Holy Spirit at work in Christians, since he doesn't exist, Satan can have a field day doing whatever he can to lead LCG members out of the fold!

Greetings from Charlotte, 

 

In these opening comments I want to highlight a fact that even some in the world are coming to recognize.There is an evil spirit at work today dividing people: politically, ethnically, culturally, racially, religiously, and in every other way possible. One part of what has been called “The Lord’s prayer” is “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one” (Matthew 6:13). How often do we pray this? Satan is a far greater adversary than some realize, and he will use any issue he can to divide us, if we allow him to do so. But as Jesus implies in the sample prayer, this is not a fight we can win on our own strength. We need God’s Spirit working in us. Note also that Jesus, on the night in which He was betrayed, instructed His disciples, including Peter, to “Pray that you may not enter into temptation” (Luke 22:40, 46). We know how that turned out, as Peter’s emotions—in this case, fear— got the best of him. As humans, we too often allow our emotions to rule us and lead us to do things that we should not. Scripture warns us not to allow bitterness to take root in us (Hebrews 12:15). Once that happens, a person no longer cares about truth, only hatred and his or her perceived grievance. We know that we ought not act on rumors, but how often do we get caught up in believing things we want to hear but that may be totally untrue, or slightly altered or twisted to present a false reality? Satan is working in this world to destroy mankind, and he is working anywhere in the Church that he can to divide and destroy us. Let us remember to plead with God daily to “deliver us from the evil one,” and let us do our part by humbly drawing close to God so that the devil will flee from us (James 4:1–7).—Gerald Weston

Self Righteous COG Member Causes Issues Between Two COG Groups Cooperating With Each Other

“Blessed is he that considereth the poor: the LORD will deliver him in time of trouble.”

 (Psalm 41:1) 

“But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?” 

(1 John 3:17)

 

COGNews has an entry up from Bill Goff today about an issue he has faced due to a meddlesome COG member stirring up a stink between Goff and the Christian Biblical Church of God. CBCG is run by Fred Coulter.

Bill Goff has been running a successful organization in Kenya for many years now that feeds impoverished children and others, Kenya Hands of Hope.

Thank you for your quick response in helping to bring food to our impoverished Brethren. May God bless each and every one of you! As many of you know, another young girl from the Rongo congregation died from starvation. But thanks to your quick action, the hunger situation was eased. We distributed Maze and Beans to the starving groups. We also distributed Wheat, Cassava, Millet and Sugar to the widows and remote orphans so they could continue making nutritional porridge. Your Brethren are so Very Very thankful to you for helping them during their dire need. The children were also very thankful (and happy) to have food to eat as you will see in the pictures below — See August 12, 2022

Goff goes on to write about what transpired between Goff's organization and Fred Coulter's Christian Biblical Church of God:

Now I have something sad to report on and bring to your attention. I’m hoping that you will pray about it, because it’s a very serious matter. A while back I reported that Fred Coulter stepped in and joined hands with us in helping our impoverished brethren, and it was a wonderful thing, we were able to assist more of our suffering brethren by working together. Sad to say, that help came to an abrupt end yesterday. Apparently someone informed Fred that my beliefs differ from some of what he teaches. There are a number of doctrines that not only I, but other members of the Body of Christ differ on, but that shouldn’t stop us from helping our brethren who are suffering and literally starving to death at this time. 

 

Too many pulpits in the church of God are too quick to terminate all relation, and sever ties because of differences in beliefs. Now there are Scriptural instructions concerning this matter, and times when some do need to be dealt with, like in Romans 16:17 where we are told to “Mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrines which ye have learned; and avoid them”.
Let us be sure we understand what the Scripture is saying here: that word “divisions” means disunion, dissension, division, sedition. Sedition means to conduct or speech exciting people to rebel against the authority or a state or monarch, and division means disagreement between two or more groups producing tension or hostility. 

 

Brethren, I don’t think I fit into that category. We had no hostility or tension, and there was no rebellion against any authority. On the contrary, we were working together quite well. Fred was even sending me all of the contacts he receives from people in various countries on the continent of Africa, and I was checking them out. Even that was working out quite well. 

 

As I said, there was no problem between Fred and I, things were going on quite well. There was no contention or hostility between us, fact is there was much good fruit being produced, especially in assisting our impoverished widows and orphans who have been suffering significantly. 

 

Christian Biblical Church of God joining hands with us in assisting our suffering brethren was a wonderful thing, it was answered prayer. We have been praying for more to join hands with us to help our suffering and starving brethren. Whoever approached Fred, and caused him to stop assisting our suffering brethren should be ashamed of themselves. The sad part is that now more of our brethren will continue to suffer. Please pray that Fred will continue to assist them. Those funds go directly to our starving widows and orphans, no doctrinal issues should come between us in helping our brethren who are literally starving to death at this time. (This attempt to divide us is the work of our arch deceiver.)

Nothing would surprise me that this was a follower of Bob Thiel, bitter over another COG stepping into Africa. Plus, Thiel is very vocal with his hatred of cooperation between churches, whether they be "worldly" or Armstrongite Churches of Glod. When his group is the only right church then this creates an issue with cooperation with others. 

Plus, I can guarantee this person was an entitled American who has zero concerns about the plight of those in Africa, and most certainly a person who has never given financially to such organizations. After all, the official COG mantra has always been - Don't worry about them now, God will help them in the millennium to live properly like we do in America.

How can anyone look at the COG today as an example of Godly love? A love that is supposedly unsurpassed since the 1st Century Christians gathered together. A love that exemplifies the coming Kingdom of God. The Church of God today has very few groups that exemplify true love for others. 

Who would want to be part of a kingdom where these kinds of people will supposedly be teachers and right-hand assistants to Christ?