Bill Watson: Still Wandering Around Mt Sinai Searching For Something Yet To Unfold

Bill Watson's Feast of Trumpets

In a new post on his own blog, CGI Pastor Bill Watson wrote about the meaning of the Feast of Trumpets. Unfortunately, his musings on the subject are devoid of much insight into this important festival. Like Herbert Armstrong before him, Mr. Watson fails to understand that ALL of the Torah festivals point to Jesus Christ! Moreover, like the Israelites before them, they will soon embark on a wholly physical, mechanical and repetitive attempt to observe the festival. In other words, Pastor Watson's perspective on the day misses the spiritual significance of this day for Christians!

In The Feast of Trumpets: A Vision For Our Future, Watson wrote of the day: "It represents reflection and preparation, as it opens a 'Holy Day Season' imbued with prophecy and promise. As we reflect upon this day, unraveling its layers, we discover insights that connect our past, present, and future within God’s grand design. It’s a Time of New Beginnings and Recommitments. The Feast of Trumpets is more than a commemoration; it is a bridge between future promises and actual prophetic fulfillment. As the shofar sounds, harkening us back to the ancient traditions of Israel, it also heralds the Christian anticipation of Christ’s return. The day also marks the beginning of the Days of Awe, a ten-day period that invites introspection, repentance, and rededication, culminating in the Day of Atonement. This period challenges us to realign our lives with divine principles. It ensures that we are spiritually ready for the eventual restitution of all things promised by God at Christ’s return!"

In his own words, we can discern the glaring error inherent to his interpretation of this festival. Instead of Christ having fulfilled the meaning of the day (Matthew 5:17 and Colossians 2:16-17), Watson sees the day as finding fulfillment at some point in the future. Instead of pointing to the life and work of Christ, Watson sees the day as being focused on the unfolding of "God's grand design." For the pastor, "the Feast of Trumpets is more than a commemoration; it is a bridge between future promises and actual prophetic fulfillment."

Nevertheless, in the twenty-third chapter of Leviticus, we read: "Give the following instructions to the people of Israel. On the first day of the appointed month in early autumn, you are to observe a day of complete rest. It will be an official day for holy assembly, a day commemorated with loud blasts of a trumpet." (Leviticus 23:24, NLT) First, please note that these instructions for its observance were intended for the people of Israel, NOT Christians. Second, it was to be a day of holy assembly for the Congregation in the Wilderness, the Church of Israel under the Old Covenant. Third, they were informed that this was to commemorate (serve as a "memorial" in the KJV) of the blowing of Trumpets. Why would the Israelites want to memorialize/commemorate the blowing of Trumpets? AND How does all of that point to Jesus of Nazareth?

In Torah, the children of Israel were instructed to use trumpets/horns/shofar to signal the people to assemble for different purposes. There were trumpets sounding at Mount Sinai when God presented his covenant to the people through Moses (see Exodus 19 and 20). Indeed, they were instructed to make two silver trumpets to use for just about everything connected to God's covenant with the assembly (see Numbers 10:2-10). Hence, we see that Torah associated the blowing of trumpets with signaling the entire assembly of the people of ancient Israel.

Now, how exactly does this all point to Jesus of Nazareth and the Christians of the New Covenant? We must go to the book which best explains what we read in Torah in terms of the Christ event. In the anonymously written epistle to the Hebrews, we read:

Hebrews 12:18 For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,
19 And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard intreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more:
20 (For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart:
21 And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake:)
22 But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
23 To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,
24 And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel. (King James Version at Bible Gateway)

The Greek word panegyris is here translated into English as "assembly" and it denotes a "mass-meeting" or "general assembly." The same source goes on to describe its biblical usage as "a festal gathering of the whole people to celebrate public games or other solemnities - a public festal assembly."

Jesus came to this earth to call a general assembly of all of the peoples of the earth, not just the children of Israel. Jesus said: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved." (John 3:16-17, KJV) In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is reported to have said: "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." (Matthew 11:28-29, ESV) Once again, in the Gospel of John, Jesus is reported to have said: "I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” (John 6:35-40, ESV) A little later, in this same passage, Christ asserted that anyone who came to him and believed in him was drawn to him by the father (John 6:44, 65). Clearly then, we are forced to conclude that is the will of both the Father and Son have invited EVERYONE to be saved through Jesus of Nazareth!

Even so, in accordance with Mr. Armstrong's teachings on the subject, Bill went on to write: "In ancient times, the sound of the shofar served as a call to worship, a signal for battle, and an announcement of significant events. Today, it represents a metaphor that looks to the anticipatory call of Christ’s return." For Bill and company, it's like the first advent of Jesus was an insignificant prelude to the main event - instead of the very thing that made his second advent possible! Pastor Watson went on to note that: "The Fall Holy Days link the sacred calendar to the present tapestry interwoven with prophecy. The Spring festivals are seen as fulfilled through Christ’s life, death, and resurrection, whereas the fall festivals symbolize events yet to unfold. These Holy Days, as depicted in Daniel, Micah, Isaiah, Zechariah, and Jeremiah, outline a future in which God’s law becomes central to the governance of the earth." So, according to Mr. Watson, only the Spring Holy Days have been fulfilled by Christ! He believes that Christ didn't really mean it when he said that all of the Law and Prophets pointed to him, or when he proclaimed just before he died that "It is finished." Moreover, while I would agree with Pastor Watson that God's Law will be central to the governance of God's Kingdom, his conception of exactly what constitutes God's Law is very different from Christ's. Mr. Watson believes that Torah will one day be imposed on ALL the people of the earth. Jesus of Nazareth said that God's Law boiled down to Two Great Commandments which "He" intended to be universal in application: Love for God and each other (see Matthew 22:36-40).

In Bill's vision of the Feast of Trumpets, "the role of the saints (the Church), who are predestined to serve as kings and priests in this forthcoming world ruling order" is an "integral" part of what this festival is all about. In other words, the festival is all about God's people, NOT the Christ! Watson concluded his remarks: "So, as we observe the Feast of Trumpets and the Fall Holy Days in general, take time to remind yourself of the extraordinary destiny that awaits you. This day invites us to embrace our roles in God’s unfolding narrative, prepared to share in His divine governance. It challenges us to adopt a vision that extends beyond earthly constraints, anticipating a future secured by faith, forged in righteousness, and revealed through prophecy...So, as we journey through these Holy Days, let us remain vigilant, assured in the promise that our efforts, trials, and faith will lead to a triumphant conclusion, serving humanity as immortal spirit beings in God’s Kingdom." After reading Bill's treatise on Trumpets, I have to ask: Is there any value in trying to observe something which was never intended for you, or of that which you have a very imperfect/flawed understanding of its meaning? What do you think?

Miller Jones/Lonnie C Hendrix 

UCG Preparing To Rehabilitate The Solar System and 5,830 Exoplanets

 

They never seem to ask the question as to who will populate all of these planets? Even if every person who has ever lived were suddenly alive, there would still be room on this planet for them all.

Therefore, Paul says the trials and sufferings in this life are truly not worthy to be compared with the glorious future in God’s Kingdom and enjoying eternity with this great inheritance as His beloved children! Paul describes it best, “But as Scripture says: ‘No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined, the things that God has prepared for those who love him’” (1 Corinthians 2:9, God’s Word Translation).

He now goes to the outer reaches of spiritual knowledge, saying: “For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing [the resurrection] of the sons of God. For the creation [or Universe] was subjected to futility [decay], not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption [or uselessness] into the glorious liberty of the children of God [who will help renew it]” (Romans 8:19-21).

As far as we know about cosmology, our solar system and the 5,830 exoplanets so far found are in need of renovation, for none is ready to be inhabited. It appears that Lucifer’s rebellion caused great havoc when he attempted to dethrone God in heaven and was cast back to the earth. As Jesus said, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven” (Luke 10:18, see also Isaiah 14:12-15).

This destruction will be repaired once God’s Kingdom arrives, which begins first by renewing the earth (Acts 3:21), and then the rest of the Universe. Romans 8:22-23 adds: “We know that everything in the universe is still in great pain now. Everything cries together in pain, like a woman who is ready to have a baby. It is the same for us who are believers. We have received God’s Spirit as the first of his gifts to us, but we also cry inside ourselves. We are waiting for the time when God will finish his great work. Then we will belong to Him completely as his children. Our bodies will be free from the power of sin” (EASY version).

Notes From The Real War: The Psychology of Being Christian

 

Waiting for Dust-off

Notes From The Real War

The Psychology of Being Christian

By Scout

There are some practical concerns about being a Christian that bother me. The psychological effect of living the Christian life is one of them.  We are common clay, but we have stepped into the big-time arena of eternal life and theosis.  It transcends all that we do know and can know. It means a re-interpretation of reality.  This will have an impact on our psychology.  I am going to lift an example of this kind of psychological effect from the war in Vietnam. m. 

The Surrealism of Dust-off

Dust-off refers to the medevac by helicopter of wounded soldiers in Vietnam. The U.S. armed forces had the ability to pluck wounded men out of the combat zone very quickly.  These men were brought to rear area hospitals for recovery.  Sometimes, from there, they would be returned to the United States.  The effect was that one moment you are in an intense firefight, and the next moment you are back home.  Your reality changed instantaneously.  

Though it is not technically dust-off, the same phenomenon happened with men who finished their tour of duty. They would be transported out of the combat zone and were processed out of the armed forces.  While this usually took a few weeks, sometimes a guy would be in a fierce firefight one day and a few days later would be sipping beer with friends in a bar back home.  Anne Linscott, a veterans disability attorney, wrote this:

Many mental health professionals in Psychiatry attribute the high incidence of PTSD in Vietnam-era veterans to a lack of “decompression” time. During the Vietnam War, it was not uncommon for veterans to be in combat one day and back home with their family a couple of days later due to the availability of jet travel that was not present in previous wars such as World War II.

While lack of decompression may seem like just an odd fact about the war in Vietnam, it has a profound relevance to Christians.  It is one of the many practical matters of being a Christian that nobody seems to discuss. 

Christians and Dust-off

This World wages war on Christians.  It is the real war.  The war for the human soul. The siege against all of God’s plans and purposes – prominently, human salvation. Paul refers to the battlefield as the “present evil world.”  When Christians die, one day they are combatants and a few seconds later they are at home in paradise sipping a beer with friends.  Just like soldiers returning from Vietnam. The change is instant and without decompression, apparently.  

What will this sudden change without decompression do to us psychologically?  The Vietnam vets did not fare well.  This is a problem with many facile answers, but nobody really knows what’s going to happen.  It is about human weakness colliding with divine eternity. We are, after all, psychological persons and subject to the ravages of human experience.  And there is a further point here that must be made about God and psychology. 

God Transcends Psychology

One can readily develop the mistaken belief that we are ready for paradise.  That we can embark upon eternal realms without trepidation.  Paul does refer to it as “being home with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8, ESV), like we are returning to where we should be.  But it may not be that easy.  If there is anything I have learned as a Christian about living life, it is that many things are not as easy as we might think.  My concern about our sudden transition to the afterlife is rooted in the fact that God is not a psychological person, and we are psychological persons.  God is at home in transcendental realms, and we are not. 

What does it mean when I assert that God is not a psychological person? From my perspective, God is beyond human psychology.  You cannot psychoanalyze God.  He is not subject to Pavlovian behavioral modification.  He does not develop psychoses.  He does not develop fixations and tics.   He does not engage in manipulation to get his way.  Psychology is a vulnerability, and God does not have vulnerabilities. He is not traumatized, nor does he need decompression to process difficult life changes. God creates reality; he is not subject to it as we are.  God in perfection transcends psychology. I am not saying that he does not have a personality. He has personality, but he is ever so much more than that. As created beings, our minds are finite. His mind is infinite. 

So, we are not ready for God’s realm out of the chute.  This caused C.S. Lewis, though an Anglican, to conjecture that there might be some form of Purgatory for us all as a preparation for paradise.  I might not align with the details of his view, but I think he must be right in principle.  Surely, there must be some onboarding process for paradise that we must all experience and benefit from. 

The Armstrongist Counterpoint

Let me not neglect to consider Armstrongism.  Just as Armstrongists believe that God has a human-like body, I think they also believe he has a human-like psychology.  The God-as-God-is-God idea of human destiny in Armstrongism implies that we as humans have the full Godly nature in just a temporarily attenuated form for now as humans. God, to Armstrongists, is a super-human power.  God is simply like us, only more so.  Rather than humans having a tiny subset of God’s unknowable, transcendent powers.  However, it must be stated that this is implicit in Armstrongist belief and not explicit. This view of a limited God makes the idea that Armstrongists will ultimately become God-as-God-is-God seem plausible.

This fundamentalist view, held by Armstrongists and many others, that God is a psychological being, is inadequate.  I believe God is a person and his personhood is perfect.  His perfect personhood is reflected in us in a limited form.   And this collection of limited traits of mind constitutes what we know as our psychology.  The behaviors produced by this limited persona are the object of the study of the discipline of psychology.  It is not a surprise that God’s uncreated personhood transcends what we know as the human psychological personality.  

For instance, psychology deals extensively with emotion.  I believe, like most theologians, that God is impassible.  He is the source of love, knowledge, reason, and relationship, but he does not have a fluctuating temperament conditioned by external circumstances like a human being.  God creates reality.  He has no need to make an emotional response to something he knows fully and generates himself. The language of emotion in the Bible is anthropomorphic, just like the language that portrays God as having a human-like body.   

Some will respond to this by asserting that God is then lying if he says he has a hand and he doesn’t have one. Or that he is angry, as we know anger, and he is not.  This argument does not have traction.  That is because the Biblical use of body parts and emotions pertaining to God is symbolic.  They are a vocabulary for conveying principles that we can understand.  It is the underlying principle that is the truth.  And, further, in theophany, God can appear to be whatever he wants to appear as.  If God wants to have a hand, he can have one.  If he wants to portray himself as angry in order to communicate sharply that something is wrong, he can do that. But theophany is not his essence.   In the last analysis, human emotionalism attributed to God is anthropomorphic. 

Summation

We are created beings, and we are not God, who is uncreated and never will be.  We will have the privilege of partaking of the divine nature to some degree. The division between God and humans can be seen in the fact that we are psychological subjects and God is not.  The limitations of our being psychological subjects present some concern.  For instance, how will we cope with the sudden change from life to afterlife?  This side of the afterlife, all we can do is render up our opinion.  In the meantime, I will be waiting for dust-off. 

 

Fishy Tales Out Of Grover Beach, CA

It has been a relatively cool summer here in California, but now late summer/early fall heat has finally hit California, and even the coastal regions are affected by it. It apparently is so hot in the Grover Beach/Five Cities area that the brain of our most highly favored self-appointed prophet of God has started to get overheated, causing him to say the following lie:

The Continuing Church of God, which is NOT Protestant, traces its history from the apostolic church established in Acts 2 and holds to the original, biblical doctrines that the early Christians had. 

 

Many biblical doctrines that early Christians held to are NOT held to by Protestants today. Nor the Church of Rome or the Eastern Orthodox for that matter. 

 

For that matter, many of the unbiblical teachings and doctrines of Thielism and Armstrongism were NOT held by early Christians. In fact, if those early Christians were to appear in this day and age, they would have no idea who or what they were witnessing when they saw Thiel's little cult. They would immediately brand it as a deviant apostate church.