Post-WCG Life and Theology ARCHIVES

Dear Richard!

I cannot believe it has been 9 years since I have known you via the internet and it will be exactly 9 years this coming fall at one of my last feasts with the Worldwide Church of God in Toronto that I met you in person. You were and still are quite a character. Talk about a cross of Rush Limbaugh (with a greater social conscience than he has) and one of my former WCG pastor Neil Earle. You were very charitable in paying for both of our meals at the feast in Toronto, I hope some day I can return the favour. Swiss Chalet Restaurant is truly the best! I am eternally grateful at your kindness. We agreed on many issues. We disdained Joe Jr.'s ideological campaign to rid the WCG of the Hebraic roots liturgical calendar in favour Western (Roman) Christian liturgical calendar. This was one of many things that the broke our trust in Joseph Tkach Jr.---forever! In your website, you chronicled your last days in the Worldwide Church of God, like mine , they were difficult and completely confusing times that no one should ever repeat in their lifetime. You also chronicled your visits to various Sabbatarian churches until you final eliminated it to one: the United Church of God. It is been now over a half a decade you have been involved with the UCG. That too has been a ride. On the outside, it seemed like an open minded liberal organization of all the splinters. It seemed like it was the WCG in the 1970's---free and easy before Ayatollah Armstrong took away the fun in the '80's. The UCG, what you have discovered, has not what it has appeared to be. There are many good people in the United Church of God but again I feel that the system itself is tainted and when an organization says its a continuation of the 18 truths of Herbert W. Armstrong (which some of those truths have been proven to be theologically false) creates serious problems than it does solutions. This is why I said to you on Mark Tabladillo's Jesus Loves Fellowship board, "You are getting to wise for these people" (I mean the UCG clergy) and I still stand by my statement.

Yes Richard, what I am saying is, "It is your time to go again!" You know that there are geniune Christians in many other denominations beside the XCG's. The UCG still officially grasps with that concept. I remembering visiting an UCG congregation in toronto in '98 and a local elder whom I knew sort of lambasting well-respected Canadian televangelist David Mainse (former host of 100 Huntley Street)in saying that if you mention to David Mainse about "laws and obedience" you would lose him. This is not true and grossly unfair! Pastor Mainse does believe in "laws"---but he'd argue it is the law of Christ and yes he does believe in obedience IN Jesus Christ. Pastor Mainse may believe that some parts of Old Testament law is relevant (and it is highly like it is a smaller fraction than what the UCG believes). The UCG still does graple with the issue of grace. They may say (and they say it loud), "We believe in grace!!!!" But in reality they charge a price, they might even say it is a small price but a gift ceases to be a gift. Richard, you may plead in their defence by saying that they do not communicate this issue properly. The fact is, that the Church of God (Seventh Day) has a better understanding let alone communication of what grace is. Time to go way back what the father of the sabbatarian XCG's has to say. It might do some good. It is time for you to go again because they will not investigate deeply and thoroughly on subject. You did.

Of course Richard, as I left the WCG in '98 (which started as a leave of absence and grew to a permanent departure), it was a very lonely experience. So-called friends (let's call 'em what they really are---users and manipulators---and proud of it!) do not call you up to see how your doing. The probable exception is a ploy to stay within "The Church". That's it! You are nothing but a target to be used by these people. I find it is usually the people who left any kind of Armstrongist XCG are the real friends at the end of the day. At first, you think they are trouble-makers, crap disturbers but the fact remains they have the best interests for you at heart. Their only crime is to desire for you to have your sanity back. If you know some of these people (I don't care if it's via internet) HOLD on to them dearly! Respect what they have to say. They usually have helpful information on life after a splinter group. It is time for you to go again to discover a journeyful life after the XCG churches.

May I add in the process of leaving the UCG, quit trying to look for the perfect church. It is simply not there! Whether it is Sabbatarian or Sunday---all churches, I believe, are in a state of confusion as we speak. This is not say don't visit any church, what I am saying that it would be completely unwise and stubborn to have a list of churches and a process of elimination to find the right fit a second time. In more stronger and harsher terms, this would be proving Albert Einsten's point about insanity. I am not being mean, I am just telling you in the possible way that it is time that you do not be fooled again. You can still practice the principle of a day of rest in the comfort of your own home. I do find some Christians of New Covenant Theology persuasion a little too neurotic and devoid of reason when they shout and scream words and slogans like, "Legalism!!! Bondage!!!! Rest in Christ is all YOU EVER NEED!!!" I would like to say to these people (and trust me some of them you can't tell them anything, it childishly their way or the highway) is: GET A FLICKIN GRIP ON REALITY GUYS!!! I see nothing wrong in continuing a spiritual discipline of a day of rest that benefit the mind and soul as long as one does not make it a sacrament of salvation (in which Traditional Adventism and Armstrongism gleeful fall in that trap). I think North American society can learn something from a day of rest from worldly and business pursuits. Sadly it seems in North America with both Christian churches and the world, it seems stary eyed when it comes to consumerism and when you take out that principle of resting the body and soul it is inevitably problematic. North American Church as a result has become hyper-dualistic in its thinking and has no room for the holistic---but that's another topic for another time.

Keep reading religious material from many sources---always keep an open mind but at the same time continue to have low BS meter when one tries to major in the minors in their theology which tragically minimizes the gospel of Jesus Christ and what he stood for and what he has promised for all mankind is thrown out the window because of their petty doctrine which has no consequence. Now is the time to make the stand! To stay with the UCG any longer than you have to is just another journey to a dead end street to nowhere. Come along with the adventurous journey, it is rough, it is tough but in the end it will be worth it. The consequences for taking that journey is beneficial for the long term.

God Bless!

YBIC,

Felix Taylor, Jr.

Glenn:

I think you suffer somewhat from coming into the COG world at a late date. If I recall from another post, you had some contact with WCG in the '80's, then faded away, then got serious in the mid '90's right about the time things started falling apart.
The problem with the ACOG's is that they've pretty much always done what you describe, only in the past it was easier to hide and there was no other place to run. Gerald Waterhouse would proclaim in sermons that Harmstrong had the right to take the members tithes and set fire to it in the middle of the Sydney Harbor bridge. GTA said that he was too important to the work, ergo, God overlooks his marital infidelities. Tkach Sr. writes himself a check out of third tithe in order to not pass up a rare investment opportunity. Jet fuel for the airplane gets paid out of the widow and distressed fund (third tithe).
Every year at the FOT the ministry received a subsidy to attend (since they didn't have to tithe, being "Levites"), driving their corporate cars, staying in the finest hotels - and all this after haranguing the members about not spending their second tithe properly. Mis-spending would include things that lasted beyond the term of the FOT, such as clothing, tires, etc. No matter that between taxes and tithes most WCG members were living off of less than half their gross income.
It should be no surprise that the self proclaimed heirs of Harmstrong should wish to continue in their ways of privilege, but unfortunately for them everyone received a dose of NC theology and the concepts it brings, whether they ended up believing it or not. Besides, if one group gets to be too annoying, you can leave and attend somewhere else. The lake of fire is not longer the only option.
The other systemic problem the ACOG's have is an over infatuation with the law and with ruling. The law was emphasized, and grace was not. Fresh college grads were sent out to tell their local members how to live: out with white sugar, out with bleached flour, don't buy red cars. Of course, they don't say those things anymore, but no one has given up the authority to do just that if they please.
But law and ruling also resulted in a bent understanding of our relationship with God. In a time when Jesus said that the Comforter would lead us into all truth, the ACOG's place their ministry between us and Christ. In a time of grace, they preached law and wages of sin. Are you truly picsed off at God? Perhaps he never really said that he was to be your butler.
That's one thing I had to wrestle with. I was a good cult boy, followed the law as best I could, certainly better than the heathen around me because I tithed, I kept the sabbath and Holy Days, and prayed diligently for the work and Harmstrong. Why did not God bless me like that man in Psalms 1? In other words, howcome my butler didn't do what he was supposed to do?
The trouble was my thinking was still colored by an overbearance of law, not grace. Paul tells us we are saved by grace - are we then so inconsistent to think that God rewards us according to law?
Just before his crucifixtion, Jesus called his disciples his friends, and we are his friends if we follow his command to love one another. Consider the blessings in your own life - does your wife love you because you so perfectly keep the law? Certainly your care and love for your children has no basis in law keeping, but is a grace you extend to them. Certainly you have rules of how everyone is to behave in your home, but do you love each other less when they are broken from time to time? I think not.
I didn't mean to preach, so I'll stop with that and just recommend to you any of Philip Yancey's books. I think I have about half a dozen of them or so now, and Where is God when it hurts may be one that you'd find helpful now. If I remember correctly, he contrasts two people with severe injuries: one party stayed bedridden and prayed diligently every day for healing, being very confident that one day tha healing would come. Another party learned to live with injury, getting about in a wheelchair and leading a productive life. I can't make judgements here about who had the greater faith - but one party sought only one answer, while the other looked for other answers to how life is to be lived.
When I left WCG, I felt that my church had already left me. One or two people may have called from the local group, but most left off contact when I stopped attending. I don't fault them, as they were only doing what had been taught for years, and apparently still lives on today. When I tried talking about these things with friends that stayed in WCG I got a response that it was "an emotional subject", as if everyone had been given some talking points. JLF was a place where we could all freely talk, even if it did get raucous in the early days.
If you can bear a suggestion, I recommended taking another look at what God is really like. After all, friends are not your butler.

KMS

Personal perspective on the state of the COG's I originally started writing this message as a private e-mail, but as I got into it I decided it would be appropriate to instead post it publicly. Basically it's a broad "state of the COG's" overview from my perspective. Up front I want to make it clear that I'm not "picking on" the COG's. I'm well aware that many of the problems I relate here are not unique to the COG's and can in fact be found in religions and political systems around the world and that such things have been happening for thousands of years - as Solomon noted, there's nothing new under the sun. I single out the COG's here only because that is my background, not because I believe they have a monopoly on such problems.As I indicated in previous messages on JLF, my current spiritual state is pretty much nil. I still believe more or less the same things I have for years but I'm very much disillusioned with religion in general and the COG's in particular - not so much for their core teachings, but for their way of doing things. The WCG and its spin off's - or ACOG's (Armstrong COG's) as some prefer to call them - always seem to find a way to do the wrong thing no matter how many opportunities they have to get it right. As many have told me over the years, an apple doesn't fall far from the tree. The practices and policies of Herbert Armstrong continue to influence everything these Churches do.On the left you have the current WCG. It may have thrown out much of Armstrong's doctrine, but it definitely retains his abusive "government" and cultic style of "leadership". On the right you have the HWA purists like Gerald Flurry's PCG and David Pack's RCG who have finely honed that abusive government into little gulags. These are instruments of finely crafted deception, expertly tuned to attract anyone who has ever been caught up in the personality cult surrounding Herbert Armstrong.In between these extremes you have groups like UCG and LCG who are schizophrenically trying to both embrace and distance themselves from HWA. And sprinkled throughout are all the "splinters" and "slivers" (as David Pack calls them - as if he and his group stood apart from and above all the rest). These range in size from a small handful meeting in a living room to a few hundred meeting in tiny groups around the world.To one degree or another all of them compete for a rapidly shrinking pool of aging tithe payers - generally current or former WCG members. A few of them have outreach programs to try to gain new converts, but such efforts are only marginally effective. Truly "new" members (people who never heard of Herbert Armstrong) are few and far between.As competitors many of them routinely "betray and hate one another" - like so many predators fighting over a carcass. And to the degree they practice HWA's "government" they also betray and routinely demonstrate hate towards their own members like a predator eating its own children. Thus there is a steady stream of dazed, confused and disillusioned members either moving from one "fellowship" to another or dropping out of the COG's altogether.It's not all bad. There are some groups which appear to be more or less benign and have not become addicted to power and lording it over others. And all of these groups (even the most extreme) have members, deacons, elders, ministers, etc who love God and are genuinely trying to serve and give and do what is right.But in many cases these people are fighting a losing battle against an irresistible tide. There is tremendous pressure on them to compromise and betray their own principles. They are told to "be a team player" and "get with the program" and to stop being "self willed". It's all too easy for even the most honest and upright servants to cave into such pressures, soil their garments, and begin to beat their fellow servants and drink with the drunkards.Most ironically, such people are often "disfellowshipped" or "marked" for doing *PRECISELY* what their Church teaches and claims to practice. As if by magic, "truth" apparently loses its validity when applied to a "minister" or to a favored lap dog or upper bracket tithe payer. Iniquity abounds, and the love of many is fiercely and mercilessly driven to become cold.Am I being overly harsh? I don't think so. I say all these things based not only on my own experiences but on the experiences of *MANY* others as well. Through e-mails, phone calls, internet forums etc, the stories are all a little different, and yet nauseatingly familiar. Early on I tended to ignore such accounts, writing them off as "a root of bitterness"... until I experienced first hand things I had been warned would probably occur. The Bible says in the mouth of 2 or 3 witnesses a matter is established. In the mouths of a great many such witnesses it is beyond any shadow of any doubt.I know and count as friends many individuals in these groups - people who have proven themselves over time to be truly "of God". But as a whole, I cannot believe most of these Churches are truly "of God" as their names all claim them to be. Taken as a whole, if these groups truly have the love of God shed abroad in their hearts then I'm not sure I want to know such a God. Jesus said his disciples would be known by the love they have towards one another. What can then be said about a bunch of competing, backstabbing, spiteful little groups trying to destroy one another and all the while claiming an exclusive franchise on God? What an ungodly and unholy mess! No wonder people are so confused.