Church of God,1955: God Intended For Beautiful, Not Straggly Hair. Avoid Permanents and Wash your Hair More!

In the never-ending saga for the Church to mold every woman to their every expectation, women were made to feel as if they needed the Church's direction in every aspect of their lives. 

No, the admonition to avoid the use of makeup on the face wasn't enough. And the admonition of how and in what manner to cut hair was also not enough. The question arose about "permanents" - and the Church was quick to answer!

Mothers were never taught how to care for their hair, and most women never learned how to appear neat. So, because of their ignorance, they have "resorted", without need, to the use of permanents. Was there ever a moment when a person in the church was not judged about something? 

So because permanents could possibly damage hair, the Supreme Court of the Government of God under Admiral Herbert dictated the command that permanents were to be avoided. It had been deemed that it simply isn't hard for a woman to learn the art of using curling pins and water. 

Oh, and apparently, some of you are washing your hair too much, and some of you aren't washing your hair enough at all. I guess they threw that in there to let it be known to you that it has been noticed. So pay more attention! Listen to your minister Gods in training! No excuses!

The micromanaging of every detail of a person's life knew no bounds, especially when it came to the details of self-expression in the lives of a member of Armstrong's Millennial Utopian Boot Camp. I'm surprised the grooming of, shall we say, areas that Garner Ted would know too well, was not covered here! 

Choice was not permitted in the Church. The standard practice of asking the ministry permission on the simplest things was enabled and developed here. Members were treated as children, not as the adults that they were. The importance of appearance to Herbert Armstrong was paramount. 

Fortunately, in the long run, Armstrong's reign would be the one thing that would never become "permanent". 

guest writer: SHT

A Moment in History - Christian Evangelist Took On Herbert Armstrong In Three Open Letters

For those who have not read these open letters, you may want to do a little bit of historical reading as a Christian Evangelist takes on Herbert Armstrong in the form of three open letters. 

Maurice McArdle Johnson (November 28, 1893 – December 12, 1979) was a Christian Evangelist, Pastor, and Teacher, predominantly in the Southern California area who, early in his career, went through a process of separating from organized religion. He was instrumental in establishing Christian assemblies across the United States which are mostly still in existence." (Wikipedia, deleted archive) 

Photo from Maurice Johnson Archives

"MR. ARMSTRONG: After I began announcing this "Open Letter," is it true that you began making recordings of some of my radio messages in the hope that you could get material for a "slander" suit against me?

YOU accuse me of slander? You who have slandered every Christian preacher and Bible teacher who ever lived; you, who slanders the Lord from heaven; you, who slanders the gospel of the grace of God; you, who slanders the holy 10 commandment law of God by your miserable pretense of keeping it; you, who slanders the TEMPLE OF GOD yet to be restored in Jerusalem by having your silly little "Feast of Tabernacles" and "Feast of Passover" over in Gladewater, Texas, in that puny little shed [unfinished tabernacle]; YOU are hoping to sue me at Ceaser's court for slander? Maybe the report is ill-founded!

God willing, before I shall have completed these "Open Letters" to you I will have given clear, unforced proof of my accusations concerning your slandering the Christ of the Bible and your blasphemous caricature of "the church of God," called by you "The Radio Church of God."

From: Three Open Letters To Herbert W Armstrong

Guest contributor: SHT

1959: Don't Plant Cucumbers Next to Watermelons, They'll become Perverted! Peas and Beans in Corn is Fine!

Gotta watch out for the perverted, defiled crops! The horror! 

So much emphasis on the physical while the spiritual was completely ignored....... 

Did you know that one of Satan's biggest deceptions against humanity was cross-breeding watermelons and cucumbers?  

In its never-ending need to control church members lives, Herbert Armstrong also laid down rules on how to raise watermelons.  

In the early years of the church a large percentages of the members had their own gardens and grew their own food. These people were not idiots and knew how to grow produce. That made no difference though to the well-kept boys in Pasadena who rarely dirtied their hands or had callouses from hard work.  It was so easy to read some books and then tell the members what to do.

Ultimately though, this went far deeper than watermelons. 

In thinly veiled race-based comments, church embers were told not to breed hybrids, whether in family life or in their gardens.  

Only quality people keep their produce pure...hint, hint.

 graphic courtesy of SHT

The COG Chicago Congregation, went so far as to find out where segregation would be when Christ returns

 The COG, Chicago Congregation, went so far as to find out where segregation would be when Christ returns, apparently....

These were done by the Chicago Worldwide Church of God in 1965.  

You will notice as the illustrations advance from tribal draped Blacks in the first picture to the Asians in kimono's in the second looking like they are wandering, to the emergence of chosen ones, always illustrated as whites, all going steadily forward in their Sabbath wear, to the first-class white people in their long gowns and tuxedo's heading off to the marriage supper with the Lamb in the last picture. 

To see the charts more clearly check it out here.

ht: SHT for the charts

Ron Weinland: People are adrift! Quit messing around!

Ron Weinland, the convicted felon and epic failure as a prophet, has recovered from his recent heart attack and is back lambasting his shrinking church. Weinland has been losing members rapidly over the years as one prophecy after another goes down in flaming humiliation. Each time it does, he loses members.

As more and more of his men leave the church he has resorted to ordaining women to be preachers, including his loony wife and money-laundering daughter. Weinland even went as far as to proclaim himself and weird Laura as the 2 Witness of revelation. No one knows what she has been witnessing over the last many years other than being the official gossip of Church of God Preaching the Kingdom. Even when Ron was in prison earlier and recently recovering after his recent heart attack, the  Second Witness has never preached a thing or mad any prophecy.  Heck, even her husband will not allow her to be in the same room when he is preaching.  She is apparently such a hot mess that she distracts him.

So as his church rapidly shrinks, he pulls the usual Church of God blame game.  It is not his fault, it is his members fault.  They do not seem to respect the ministers.  This has been an ongoing problem that frosts his prophetic butt, big time.

"But this is a time to be sobered. This is a time to be sobered. That blows my mind to think that we’re not fully trusting in God, if you will, that we’re not zealously seeking to live as we need to live, desiring with all of our heart, with all of our being to be in the temple, desiring to be stirred up in God’s spirit, desiring to live right, desiring to fight against the things that pull us away. As I have mentioned, I know people get wrapped up in drama in their lives – their own personal lives – in family, in job, or whatever it might be. And so often when those... 

And in the Church right now that’s happening! And when that happens you don’t know that you’re being pulled aside. You don’t realize that your eyes are being taken off the goal and the purpose that God has called us to. And of all times for that to happen! You think, “Am I going to let that pull me away? Am I going to let that begin to cause me to drift and not be zealous for this way of life?” We can’t deceive ourselves; and yet we do. “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked,” God says. And that’s good to understand! “The heart is deceitful above all things!” And our hearts are! We want to deceive ourselves as human beings. When we want to do something different from what God says we will work overtime up here [mind] and not even understand that, to deceive ourselves that we are okay, that we’re... Even if we’re not in the temple, “We’re okay where I’m at. It’s the way I’ve always lived.” "

"And I said a mouthful there if we could grasp all that on a spiritual plane. But to understand “The heart is deceitful above all things,” that’s something to be on guard about. Because if you don’t believe that you’re not going to be on guard, you’re not going to be moved and motivated to fight this fight like you should.

And so I hate to see people letting down, letting up, getting pulled away, because it’s still happening. And right now we can’t afford to do that as a Church, because we’re still going through this process of the temple being cleansed. And so how do we see ourselves? Do we think we have it made? Do we think everything is okay? Or do we realize this is a battle to the end? It is a fight always to fight ourselves, to fight this selfish human nature that we have, because it stinks. Only God’s nature that we’re able to imbibe of, that we’re able to experience to varying degrees depending on where we are at any moment in time, to where there, and to the degree in many ways that we’re actually trusting in Him, that we’re praying and asking for His spirit to dwell within us, for His mind to be in us. We want it. We need it. We don’t want our own mind, our own selfish nature and mind. We want God’s mind. We want to be right in how we think toward others. We want to be right in how we truly think about others in the Church and out of the Church." 

It all boils down to one issue with his church members, they don't respect the ministers, nor do most other COG members, at least in Ronnie's eyes.

“In all your ways acknowledge Him,” and, as in the context of some of this sermon in what we just finished talking about before this, is sometimes to acknowledge and understand those things that God has given through the Church, our mother, the mother of us all. Because sometimes that’s where we really mess up because we think we can do things our way, because, “Well, I don’t know, I don’t agree...”

I think of Mr. Armstrong. I think of things I heard in services and after services and I think of one family I used to catch a ride with at times traveling about a hundred miles to go to services there, that after the sermon was over all the way home—some people call it “roast minister”—chewing apart what was said! And you think, “What on earth are you doing?! What you heard, what God gave you that day you’re going to dissect it and decide what’s good and what’s bad, and candidly, most of what you’re blabbing about, most of what you’re complaining about is what you think is wrong and bad because “That was his idea. That’s his opinion.” No, he was placed there by God to feed you, you moron! Spiritual moron! Listen to what God gives to us because there’s a certain way He feeds us.

I’m sorry, but I think of some of those rides and people I heard in God’s Church, and people who were ordained that would chew apart what the ministry was teaching them. I get worked up, okay? I get worked up because I feel this deeply and I see things in what’s happening. And a lot of the things I see and have tried to tell different ones in the ministry depending especially even where they are within the ministry, is that when you are ordained God gives you certain abilities and power. Not because you deserve it, not because you’re special, but because it’s the way God works. And there are times then that if we can grasp and comprehend it within the ministry that God gives us the ability to see certain things that others can’t see for the purpose of serving the Church, for a purpose of doing a job. 

Ron is such a clairvoyant that he can read peoples eyes and tell who in his basement church don't want to come and talk to him or other members.

I say that because I want people to understand I see things in people’s lives because God gives it to me. Okay? I see the trend of things that happen within the Church. I know when people are... I about slipped there a little bit too much – messing around and not living this way of life like they should be. I know when you’re drifting, because of where it comes from. It’s not because I’m so talented and have such great abilities. Now, certain times through experience with the Church you grow in those things, but it’s by God’s spirit and He sustains it and He helps it to grow more and more and more. 

That’s why I know when an individual can’t come up and talk to me; I know there are big problems in their lives. I know that when some people visit in another area (in the ministry) and individuals and people won’t go up to them and talk to them and address certain things to them and greet them they’ve got big problems spiritually. Something is wrong deeply in their lives, see. And so I understand when an individual or individuals or whatever it might be, at any time can’t come up and talk to me. I know why. I understand why. It’s a spiritual thing, see. 

I see people drift. I see things and hear things that happen in people’s lives. I know where they are. I know what their battles are more than you can comprehend. And then God gives me the ability and the feeling and the emotion and the desire to cry out to His Church, “Quit messing around! We’re almost there! Why give up now? Why drift away now? Why let down now, of all time?” It just blows my mind, and yet God showed me a long time ago, and I’ve been preaching it over and over and over again it’s going to happen to the end, people falling by the wayside. Even as small as we are it’s not going to stop. Because, you see, you can’t help it. If you don’t get a hold of it as fast as you can right now it’s too late. That’s why you’re going to fall away at a particular point in time even after nuclear war begins. Because you become so weak for drifting for so long and drifting away from the truth you can’t help it. You can’t turn it around.

 The false prophet admits his church is small now and rapidly shrinking.

See the world doesn’t get attacked like that. We do. Because this is God’s Church. And there aren’t many left at this point in time that are still a part of the Body of Christ. Started small and it’s ending up very small, see. But for a purpose. It’s going to be very clear “Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit...” God’s doing it. God will accomplish everything that must be accomplished in the end of an age. But we get to share in it as small as we are. But it’s going to be abundantly clear we didn’t do much. I mean, how can we?

He also admits that hardly anyone knows who they are. Even their presence on YouTube is an epic failure, but his god is in charge!  Awesome!

We have a little thing on YouTube and how many do you think turn into that? Not that many. Not that many. So we don’t have much of an effect. It’s pretty obvious to us. It’s very obvious to me God has to do it. It’s God’s work. God is going to complete this and finish it. But He’s letting us share in it because there is going to be a Church that’s cleansed and ready, small...small as it will be, when Christ returns. Awesome!

Why is it that so many of the false prophets in the COG claim their god is going to finish the work through them, even though they are extremely small in size?  Every one of them have been failures and outright liars.