Woe be to any COG minister in any of the splinter groups who wants to come over to Dave's personality cult. Before you do you need to be prepared to be publicly humiliated and then be reeducated. You will be exiled from RCG until you can bow down ad Dave's feet and kiss them as the feet of God's most highly favored servant. You will need to inculcate all of Dave's extra biblical teachings and prostitute your self to all things Dave all the time.
You have seen that all happen before. Dave poaches ministers form LCG and UCG, blows his fog horn for several days, then these people disappear and you never hear from them again.
The remnant MINISTRY will be told in verse 19 that before they can do more work (pastor and serve brethren) in God’s Church—before they can even receive God’s basic blessing again—they must remember their former shameful conduct. They must never forget the paltry fruits of their collective efforts when they were cut off from God. The next verse continues this reminder from God.
2:17: “I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labors of your hands; yet you turned not to Me, says the Lord.”
This is strong language by God—and action. God says He SMOTE the ministry’s labors with blasting, mildew and hail. The Hebrew for “smote” involves a long, sobering definition. It means “to strike, beat, give wounds, kill, make slaughter, punish, slaughter, slay, smite, strike, wound.” Obvious symbols are again used here because blasting, mildew and hail cannot be literal. God is not sending actual hail onto ministers or groups, or hot, dry winds (blasting) on them. These three elements represent destruction, but not complete destruction. The Hebrew for “blasting” can also mean “blight,” which is disease. Hot, dry winds would certainly have no effect on a church. This picture describes the scene in all the splinters today. These organizations truly are afflicted with spiritual blight and disease. Also, mildew does not refer to too much moisture present. It comes from a Hebrew word that means “paleness, whether of persons from fright.” See the point. God is sending FEAR into these groups in an attempt to WAKE THEM UP. The kinds of things God is doing has left people pale with fear. GET THIS because conditions will grow worse.