Happy 26th!

Dennis On: ""For God So Loved the World...." A very sincere question to consider

"For God So Loved the World...."

A very sincere question to consider

I would like to seriously and sincerely reopen a question I have had for years about the teaching that God gave his only son, Jesus, as a sacrifice for us.  I believe this audience would be able to draw on scores of scriptures to this effect so I will not reproduce them here.  

What I would like to ask, and sincerely so, is "In what way is Jesus death a real death and in what way did God give his son?"

I know our initial reaction is "on the cross" or "he turned his back on Jesus and abandoned him at death," or "Jesus gave his life for us..."  etc.  But in what way? From my perspective, it was not in anyway I can identify with as a human and the "loss" God suffered is not like any loss I have seen in the faces of parents who lost real children in death.

My personal problem with the concept is that from all accounts, well most, Jesus knew he would die but also that he would return better than ever in a mere three days and not in the flesh, but back at the right hand of God.  In what way is that a sacrifice?  Every sacrifice that died in the entire Bible stayed dead.  Jesus merely appears as a sacrifice but in a way that is not really like all the so called '"types."  Jesus death was not like human death.  It was almost like a play that has a really good ending once we get to the end.  It seems more like going through the motions but not really the emotions.

Now granted, it is no fun to die at a young age, but hundreds of thousands and millions have done it before and since Jesus.  But they are all dead and gone.  I can't imagine any grief lasting long if the families and friends of those who have died would have had to wait a mere three days to get them back better than ever. I can't even imagine any of those who died being all that upset if the knew, as Jesus and God evidently did that they would be back shortly better than ever.  That's not dying.  That's stepping out for a bit and coming right back.  That is not what humans call death nor parents who have lost a child, a tragedy that eats their soul up for the rest of their lives. 

God the Father knew, evidently, what his plan was and could bring his "only begotten son that he gave  back quickly.  I can't do that.  No parent of any children I have buried can do that .  How can this be said to be the most amazing parental sacrifice in the history of the world?  I can see if  the figure of Jesus STAYED DEAD and was not himself ever to be part of the coming Kingdom.  Now that would be a sacrifice on the part of both Jesus and God the Father.  But this mere "weekend inconvenience," seems to fall far short of that?  I ask sincerely for an answer.

In what way would God have agonized over Jesus death if it was merely a short weekend event from which God would easily recover the life of his son?

In what way is this the most amazing sacrifice of all time?  (Thousands of humans have been crucified, skinned alive , boiled alive and burned to death which would seem far more hideous than any six hour death on a cross.)  I have my doubts about Jesus being "marred above any other," as well but will leave that for another time. Death on the cross is generally a days long event where no burial is afforded the criminal and the body is left to fall off the cross to be eaten by dogs.  Jesus had the burial of a King with little of the humiliation that would normally accompany such events.  I'm sure many would have said in his day that "Jesus got off easy. He died really quickly."  

I have recalled how this question came to me when a client told me she lost her only child in an accident.  After telling me how little help her church had been trying to encourage her with, "God won't give you more than you can bare," "at least you have other children," (She didn't) or "At least you will see her again in heaven," the Pastor himself made the mistake of his theological career.  He told her that "well, God lost his only child too."  

"Uh oh.." I remember thinking.  He sure stepped into that.  I asked what she said and she assured me that she screamed "NO!" at the minister and then said,  "Jesus seems to have known he would die and come back in three days. God knew He was going to resurrect him in a mere three days better than ever.  My daughter is still dead!  A real sacrifice should stay dead.  Jesus death was merely a weekend inconvenience for both Jesus and His Father."

Ugh....I just listened and thought that she , in her grief and clarity, had hit on something so deeply disturbing to me that I later wrote about it.  I asked what the minister said and she said he just looked at her and said NOTHING.  Probably the best think he could have done under the circumstances.

It is a sincere observation and it has raised a deeply troubling but sincere question in myself since then.  

So in sincerity I ask,  In what way did God so love the world that he gave his only begotten son....?  How was it the most amazing sacrifice of all time?  Should not a real sacrifice stay dead?  And why would Jesus actual death which quickly was remedied by a better than ever resurrection be considered some kind of substitution for ours?

I simply have no answer for this observation and if I were still a minister and this was thrown in my face while someone was grieving the real loss of a child, would have nothing to say but,  "that's a good question.  I don't know."

 
Dennis C. Diehl
DenniscDiehl@aol.com

Dale Schurter: The Master of Flip Flopping (Updated)

A reader commented on the  "The Dale Schurter Propaganda/Resignation Letter":

We had him for a pastor for awhile in UCG. Dale flip flops in his beliefs in unbelievable rapid fashion. In this letter he uses the names God and Jesus Christ. Last I knew in UCG he was using the " Sacred Names"....and admonishing UCG members they should be doing the same (to the point of members getting very upset with him). He had come to believe that using the names God and Jesus Christ was very evil. Now it seems he is using them quite frequently.

Also, the last I knew, Dale believed in keeping the new moons. And had some very different ideas than HWA about what will happen when Christ returns....like the bride will go to heaven (the sea of glass) and live there for awhile...I forget all the details, but it was radically different from what HWA taught.

He also claimed to know (via Ron Wyatt propaganda) to know where the Ark of the Covenant was (in a cave under Golgotha with Christ's blood on it), not to mention, where Noah's ark was, Sodom and Gomorrah (he even brought some sulfur smelling rock to church and in his sermon invited people to come up later to smell it...claiming it was authentic rock from Sodom & Gomorrah). Plus the true crossing of the Red Sea site by the Israelites, plus more. And also, the Sabbath doesn't begin and end at sunset...it begins before sunset (unspecified time) and ends after sunset (again unspecified time).

Oh, I could go on and on....oh yes, he also claimed to believe that members should have input and that he believed in a team effort...not the old top down stuff.

So now fast forward just 6 years or so and now he is claiming to believe in everything that HWA taught. RCG has it all just right and is God's only true church on earth. Yet it was UCG that tolerated Dale's "different" beliefs, and didn't boot him out on his behind.

So my question is: has Dale now changed his beliefs back to what HWA taught (has Dale now gotten "back on track"?) or does he still hold to some of the beliefs he was teaching in UCG (one week instead of sermon we had to watch a Ron Wyatt tape)? If he has reversed a lot of what he was teaching....I guess he will be OK in RCG. If he hasn't...and is "just pretending" to put a good face on to the Packman...then trouble is ahead for Dale because I do not think RCG will tolerate his beliefs for long...after they finish using him as a propaganda tool.

Added 1/15/12    

According to Dave, the earth is millions of years old. According to Dale its 6000.      Is the Earth 6,000 Years Old?

So "Mr. Dinosaurs lived with man" is already at odds with his new guru.

Dennis On: "Getting Back On Track"

"...among other things, and some have again committed to “get back on track.”

 

Not Again!

 

 

"Maybe we should reconsider this route?"

 

If we have heard it once, we have heard it a thousand times.  "God has put his work back on track!"   It used to be "we are in the gun lap," but evidently there were so many gun laps, they all ran out of bullets. 

 

What did that mean?

 

Back in the day it always meant that HWA had been spending so much time flying around the world preaching the Non-Gospel of the Soon But Not Real Soon Kingdom of God to world leaders , that when he got back for a few days, he found out the mice had been playing. 

 

Mouse play could have been anything to a drop in income while he was gone to publishing an article or a PT cover that was less than pleasing and for sure was done without his permission.  Often times he probably had given permission but simply forgot.  And so after the appropriate sermon blasting everyone for "not getting it,"  the Church was put back on track and the appropriate member was sent out declaring it to be so. 

 

The Church got put back on track in 1968, 69, 70 ,71, 72,73,74,75,76,77,78----all way up to 1986 when it derailed again because the Engineer had died while the train, now on another right track was speeding ahead throttle up knowing that his end was near and unwilling to admit it or ask someone to take his place.  One of the conductors had spent a lifetime telling all the passengers that the Engineer could not die and would live until the train pulled into the station, but that was just rail road talk. 

 

Pretty quickly though, a new Engineer put himself as far as we can tell into the cab as all the conductors once again put the train back on the tracks.  Or at least back on tracks because these were different tracks than previous tracks.  Very often in the past, the impression was given that the train was always put back on the same right tracks as God and Jesus, I mean Christ, would have done if they were actually here helping with the heavy lifting.  But often, while close, it was at best a parallel track yet a little more right of center than the last.  Derailments were generally blamed on falling off the tracks on the left side. 

 

At any rate, it did not take long to see that the new Engineer, a Mr. Weaver, was unlike any Engineer WCG had ever had.  These can't be the same tracks as all the others we suspected.  He really had little training as an Engineer as far as one could tell and was prone, as was the original WCG Engineer towards nepotism putting close relatives and friends in charge of the train, the station , the conductors and all the passengers who wanted to be on the train on the right track.  I think they even took over concessions as far as I can tell. 

 

However, it was not long before it was obvious this Engineer was on Jesus Drugs and the train plowed into a miracle caused by Jesus, who was quite different from the Christ of WCG.  Well they said it was a miracle, but I say it was one of those abutments that announce this track is going no where and one has reached the end of the line.  I think you are supposed to stop when you see that coming up, or even be smart enough to know the route being taken actually ends up ahead and slowing down would be in order. Not being there in the first place would be even better.  But alas, no one on the train seemed to understand this or at least assumed the Engineer would know this and stop in time.  Wishful thinking evidently. 

 

When the train, Engineered by Mr. Weaver hit the end of the line, ugh...bodies everywhere.  The momentum took the wreckage clear into the little town of Evangelical where it burst into the flames of the Holy Spirit.  Conductors and passengers alike, who survived crawled out and off to join new railroads and work on safer and more predictable trains.  Some even started their own railroads and put those trains back on the right tracks all over again. 

 

It wasn't long before we could see dozens and then hundreds of separate trains each with their own unique passengers, crews and Engineers lined up, one behind the other, yet all on the same "right track."  What a site.  Have you ever seen a train behind another one on the same track try to pass the one ahead of it?  Not pretty and certainly not easy!   I guess when you are in a line anyone of them can claim to be at the head of the line and the one ahead is really at the end of the line, it's just that you caught up with it.

 

Pretty soon there were hundreds of right tracks all part of the one true railroad and lead by the one true Engineer barreling down the right track.  New stations sprang up all over the country and then the world, all claiming to be the true and right railroad and back on the true and right tracks.  Problem is, they all forbid their passengers from ever riding or even reading the brochures of the other trains on the right tracks and surely never even thinking of riding on their same but different true but false railroads not driven by God's chosen Engineer.  

 

Soon we had competing one true railroads all on track.  There were the PCG, RCG, LCG, UCG , GCI, and dozens more railroads, all back on the same right track yet denying that each other really were.  We had "That Engineer," "And yes brethren, I am an Engineer," and even "We are the Two Engineers," of all things.  I was concerned that two engineers on the same train would cause conflicts, but was relieved to see that the one engineer never spoke and really didn't know how to run a train on the right track anyway.  Anyway, we also have, "Presiding Engineers," and "Engineers for life. " He runs the GCI line but doesn't seem to have much of a route. 

 

I tell you, all these trains back on the same right track makes me nervous.  Sometimes conductors from one true train on track jumps track and lands on the same right track again but different.  I can't figure that one out.  They say the last true right track train was true but is now less true and on a track but maybe not THE track.  I don't know.  Some say that some railroads pay conductors better than others and, of course, that is the real reason for jumping trains. 

 

Anyway, sometimes it crosses my mind that all these Engineers blowing their own whistles and stoking their own fires really aren't back on the right track after all.  I think they are on a track, but the right one?....not sure.  Well, pretty sure they aren't actually.  No, positive!  I think you can put a train back on the same WRONG track and just think you are on the right one....until you see that bumper thing at the end of a dead end staring you in the face and you going way too fast to slow down, much less stop and avoid yet another train wreck with casualties.

 

Personally,  I don't ride trains anymore because I am leery of the tracks.  None of these companies seem to do much maintenance or educate their conductors on how to take care of the passengers.  You know, "Jones pays the freight, give Jones what he wants,' as the old original Engineer used to say.  Shoot, their engineers haven't even gone to a real engineer school it turns out nor have they learned the many nuances of engineering.  They know nothing of the origins of real railroads or what constitutes right tracks much less how to get back on them when you drive recklessly and plow into reality.  Sometimes I think they even have the wrong book or at least read the directions half drunk.  Maybe they just filter out the stuff that they don't understand and make what they think they do mean more than it does. 

 

Anyway, once again, a conductor on one of the older new true railroads has jumped on to and even newer and truer one, even before the other once crashes.  He's sending passengers on all sorts of sorta true railroads and trains new schedules and wants to meet them at the station, the true station anytime they have time.  We'll see.

 

But, while the claim is made that once again, the true train has now been put back on the true tracks and the most true conductor and Engineer will meet you at track 29,  I have my doubts.  I have never understood how the passengers that survive can crawl from one wreck after the other and still sit on the latest train as if there never was a wreck or OK there was, but God put me on this track and damn it, I'm riding this train into glory!  Passengers are the biggest enigma to me.  They buy a ticket.  Step over the bodies, find a new train and let any glib talking, railroad reading , Engineer come lately take them along for the ride on tracks that have already proved less than safe and reliable.  Go figure.

 

Oh well.  Pardon me boys, is that the cat who ate your new shoes?  Ok, sorry, couldn't resist.  Personally I think you can be put back on the wrong tracks and never even suspect it the whole time you are on the train going nowhere.

 

 

 

Dennis C. Diehl
DenniscDiehl@aol.com

 

Dave Pack: "Freedom of the Press Is Not God's Way"

In looking through Pack's screed on being persecuted by the unjust he has this little tid-bit about the Internet and the press which now hold him accountable for his lies.

The arrival of the Internet, coupled with a long-time American institution, has forever changed communication and the “rules” within the Church of God. Let me explain.

Together, these changed everything. When disruptions now occur in the Church, everybody has a “story” to tell. The Internet provides them with a vehicle to do this. And dirtmongers are only too eager to help them. When Daniel said, “knowledge shall be increased” in the end time, he could not have remotely understood how the computer would play such a large role in this.

Freedom of the Press

Compounding the problem, America and other countries practice the principle of “freedom of the press.” While this has never been God’s way, it is certainly the American and modern way. The American Bill of Rights ensures that the flow of “information”—good or bad, right or wrong—can never stop. Therefore, Americans (and citizens of nearly every Western nation) consider access to information not just a privilege but a right. They could not imagine life without all of the various written materials that are made available through this freedom—and the Freedom of Information Act has allowed them to access vast additional amounts of once inaccessible material!

The attitude that people are entitled to complete “openness” from all institutions of government has been absorbed into the splinters. An expectation has developed that visiting certain websites, or reading “church culture” newspapers, is how to get the real story. Now, “investigative reporters” take it upon themselves to “just report the news” happening in the splinters. They view themselves as neutral or acting on God’s behalf, while distributing every conceivable kind of garbage, filth, muck, sewage, dirt and trash landing on their desks!

Obviously, these “journalists” are not dirtmongers in their own eyes. They see themselves as merely performing an “information service.” But they function much like the National Enquirer, The Star or other supermarket tabloids, so popular today. The difference is that they do this on behalf of the many splinters, assuring themselves that God is pleased with their efforts. Actually, these “journalists” directly serve the “god of this world,” who loves gossip, talebearing, slander, bad news, discord, division and every other form of human disagreement. While God hates these things, the devil and human nature feast on them. But try to tell them God hates what they are doing.

Additionally, most of these “information services” link their websites and newspapers. One “service” may specialize in muck, while another specializes in dirt. Still another in sewage, while yet another features trash and garbage. But since they all “cross-pollinate,” one need only stumble onto one source to find a veritable treasure trove of every vile thing under the sun—instantly available!

You must come to see that, in a host of ways, these sources have rejected Christ’s most basic teachings, and have departed from even the fringes of marginal true Christianity. (From Should Accusers Be Answered?)

The only people I know on the fringe are the legalistic splinter cults of Armstrongism who promote worthless legalistic mumbo-jumbo that enslaves.  They follow a weak, impotent little god who is powerless.