January 2008:

• New year on different calendars

  January 1, 2008 is the first day of the new year on the Gregorian calendar. Many people who celebrate it will stay up late waiting for it to arrive. On the Gregorian calendar old days end, and new days begin, at midnight. This is a good time to remember that on the Hebrew calendar the new year begins in the spring time rather than in the middle of winter. Also, old days end, and new days begin, at sunset rather than at midnight. The first day of the new year on the calculated Hebrew calendar this time will be on Sunday April 6, 2008 on the Gregorian calendar. For special dates in the coming year go to the Annual Holy Day Calendar for 2008.

  
  

February 2008:

• David C. Pack wants access to all your wealth NOW!

  To the public, the so-called Churches of God (COGs) try to project an image of generously giving away free literature in the public interest. On the inside, it is a different story. The more strict so-called Churches of God (COGs) are infamous for wanting lots of money from their followers. With groups like David Pack's own Restored Church of God (RCOG), even the little bit of "free" literature that they do send out to impress people seems to get cut off if the recipients are not quickly impressed to send in some money.

  Members are expected to send in a tithe (tenth) of their gross income each year, which might seem reasonable since it takes money to run a large organization. Members are also expected to save up a second tithe (tenth) of their gross income each year to cover their expenses of attending the annual conventions, and send a tithe (tenth) of this second tithe (tenth) to headquarters. Any leftover second tithe, referred to as "excess second tithe," is expected to be turned in to headquarters. Every third and sixth years of a seven year cycle, members are supposed to send in a third tithe (tenth) of their gross income to headquarters. This "third tithe" is supposedly for such things as helping poor church members, which sounds good, but it no longer seems to find its way to them in groups like Gerald Flurry's so-called Philadelphia Church of God (PCG) or David Pack's own Restored Church of God. Guys like Gerald and David seem to find other uses for the third tithe money. They like to brag that they are faithfully collecting third tithe in their groups, but don't mention that they are not faithfully helping their own poor members with it. Also, at each of the church's seven annual Sabbaths, members are supposed to give generous offerings above and beyond their required tithes.

  Typically, even all the regular required tithes and offerings are not enough money to satisfy the leaders, and special appeals are made for even more money from the members. Merely paying the three required tithes (tenths) of their gross income and giving offerings at the seven annual Sabbaths is considered to be only doing what is required of them, and makes them "unprofitable servants." So, they then find out that they are expected to give extra, generous offerings above and beyond the regular required tithes and offerings, to support building programs, etc. The leaders even want people to neglect their own families and relatives, and will their estates to the church when they die. But, the need and greed for more money is so great that the self-appointed church leaders cannot even wait for their own members to die! They want to help themselves to their members' estates right NOW! And, just as the Pharisees of old would devour widows' houses and make long prayers, so the modern--and even worse--crooks will devour everything in sight that they can and make long explanations in seemingly endless writings and preachings to justify it. They try to give the world the impression that their church knows how to live the abundant, good life while in fact their own members are being absolutely plundered. David Pack wrote a booklet called End All Your FINANCIAL WORRIES. Little did his followers suspect when they went with him that their financial worries were just about to begin.

  Mark 10 contains the story of a rich, young man. "Jesus looked at him and loved him. 'One thing you lack,' he said. 'Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me'" (Mark 10:21, NIV). It was not a poor man, or even an average man, but someone with "great wealth" (verse 22). He was told to give to the poor (not to con-artists pretending to be poor). Notice that he was not told to hand the money over to Jesus, or to Judas Iscariot who carried the money bag and was a thief (John 12:4-6), or to the church, or to the synagogue. Rather, he was to give it to the poor. It is very interesting when some supposedly stricter COG groups can't even stand to help their own poor members with the third tithe money that was supposedly collected for that very purpose. Members are expected to live within their means and have the faith to send in the third tithe money, as well as all sorts of other tithes and offerings. Yet, the leaders of these groups don't seem to live within their means, or have the faith to use these directed funds for their stated main purpose.

  David C. Pack started his own money machine, which he called the Restored Church of God. At its Web site is posted a sermon called Clarion Call--The Time is NOW!, given on November 3, 2007. In it the aggressive, competitive David Pack is going for the gold--your gold! Another Web site, called the Exit & Support Network (ESN), has an article about it called Exposé of "Clarion Call--The Time is Now!" (Pt. 2) posted online at http://www.exitsupportnetwork.com/artcls/pack3.htm. Before anyone follows David Pack anywhere, or sends him a dollar, they should have a look at this article. It could give them some valuable insight into what is going to come in the future from the Pack man: he is going to gobble up everything he can. If a member does become destitute as a result of the whole experience, he cannot count on receiving third tithe assistance. He probably can count on being told to get a job and get back to work.

  The March 2008 issue of The Real Truth magazine that David Pack produces had an article called America's Banking Crisis--A Financial Tsunami Approaching! to frighten people with stories about the economic problems that might come in the future. Members of his own Restored Church have already been hit by a financial tsunami that could leave them all washed up.

  
  

• Gerald R. Flurry wants to get into the entertainment business

  Gerald R. Flurry is planning to build an auditorium at his Philadelphia Church of God (PCG) headquarters in Oklahoma. The cost of this 800-seat performing arts center is estimated at fifteen million dollars with completion scheduled for late 2009 or early 2010. While it is called a "house for God" it is really just an auditorium for musicians, singers, and actors (hypocrites in Greek). Just playing with round, loose numbers, if $15,000,000.00 is extracted from 5,000 people, it works out to about $3,000.00 a sucker. The three grand will be above and beyond their regularly required tithes and offerings. A letter about this new development has already been sent to the people who will be paying for it. If sales of tickets for the shows does not cover the cost of upkeep and hiring performers, the PCG members might have to subsidize this thing on into the future. Instead of supporting the truth of God, their money can go to support the high-paid musicians, singers, and actors of the world. No doubt, some PCG members will come to regret having been ripped off, and will wish that they had used their 3K+ to buy their own personal entertainment system for their own home.

  When he started his PCG cult, Gerald initially talked about what a "short work" they were prophesied to do. He said that they were not only in the end time, but "the end of the end time." There was even talk about being in the "last hour." Many members took this to mean that they would soon flee to a "place of safety" (expected to be Petra in Jordan). Now, after so many years of such talk, Gerald has started working on a massive building program for himself and his buddies. Any questioning of all this would, no doubt, be considered a sign of a "bad attitude."

  Even with inflation picking up, fifteen million dollars is still something, and could be used to spread the truth of God. But, it won't be. Whenever someone gets his hands on enough money to seriously spread the truth of God, they are struck by impulses to waste it on something else. In Gerald's case, he never had the truth of God anyway, so it is better to spend the money on entertainment than on spreading his misunderstanding of Malachi. Now, the people at PCG headquarters will have more than just a boring, little clown to entertain them. When his ranting gets monotonous, they can go watch a different show.

  The example of HWA's building program seems to have started the strange custom among some splinter groups of trying to build an expensive auditorium for worldly musical performances and plays to try to impress the world, and calling the auditorium a "house for God"!!! According to Herbert Armstrong's booklet called 1975 in Prophecy!, the end of the age and the return of Jesus should have come soon after the Ambassador Auditorium was completed, but HWA later explained that his 19-year time cycles had actually ended up being fulfilled by the WCG getting to put advertisements in the Readers Digest magazine, and by the church obtaining some financing.

March 2008:

• How to spot lying false prophets--like Ronald Weinland, for example

  A man by the name of Ronald Weinland was a minister in the Worldwide Church of God (WCG), and then a minister in the United Church of God (UCG) for a couple years, before starting his own little splinter group called The Church of God--Preparing for the Kingdom of God (COG-PKG), which has a Web site at http://www.cog-pkg.org. You can get his latest updates about his shenanigans at another one of his Web sites at http://www.ronaldweinland.com. He wrote a book called The Prophesied End-Time (288 pages) in 2004 and another book called 2008--God's Final Witness (244 pages) in 2006. These are two books that you do not need to bother reading.

  One of Ronald Weinland's Web sites at http://www.ronaldweinland.com had a February 7, 2008 update that said, "the final countdown has begun, as the 1335 days before the actual day Jesus Christ returns began on February 2, 2008." It also mentioned "the return of Jesus Christ and the establishment of God's Government over all the earth in the fall of 2011." Another page at his Web site at http://ronaldweinland.com/?page_id=5 claimed that God made him a prophet in 1997. He also claimed to be one of the "two witnesses" mentioned in Revelation chapter 11, but said that he would not know who the second witness was until at least April 2008. Anyway, Ron will be the spokesperson for the two.

  After the complete doctrinal change and break-up of the Worldwide Church of God (WCG) in 1995, many people who still believed some things began to search for the one true splinter group that they assumed must exist. Unfortunately, many fell for the various, different, self-appointed prophets that appeared out of the wreckage of the WCG. On page 16 of his second book, called 2008--God's Final Witness, Ron wrote that,

  "It is now with boldness, confidence and great clarity that I give to you what God has given me. I am to announce, through God's direct revelation, that I am one of those two witnesses."

  This claim certainly catches one's attention. After all, one does want to listen to any message from God through any true prophet, or witness, of His. In Old Testament times, God told Aaron and Miriam, "Listen to my words: When a prophet of the LORD is among you, I reveal myself to him in visions, I speak to him in dreams" (Numbers 12:6, NIV). But is this what happened to Ron? Is this how it was revealed to him? Apparently not! Rather, he just felt that God had "directly revealed" something to him through his "study" of the Bible and his daydreaming. He just imagined that he was onto something, and wrote up some theories of his own devising. And that is where it all falls apart and goes bad. You cannot just make up stuff in God's name. God has to give you the message. The Apostle Peter explained that, "Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit" (II Peter 1:20-21, NIV). Yet, people continue to make up prophetic theories of their own and expect God to bring them to pass. This is an ancient problem. God once explained, "They say, 'The LORD declares,' when the LORD has not sent them; yet they expect their words to be fulfilled. Have you not seen false visions and uttered lying divinations when you say, 'The LORD declares,' though I have not spoken?" (Ezekiel 13:6-7, NIV).

  Will Ronald Weinland be so full of the Holy Spirit that he will have the power to help people? He himself writes not to expect it. You should note what Ronald wrote on page 12 of 2008--God's Final Witness:

  "You should note that God did not use the gift of healing or the performance of other miraculous signs to deliver the Israelites from Egypt, and He will not use such signs in the end-time to reveal where He is working and with whom."

  Those who have read the Bible, or even just the book of Exodus, might recall that God did use miraculous signs and wonders to deliver the Israelites from Egypt. Rotten Ronnie is just trying to discourage people from asking for the healing that he knows he has no power to do, even though he claims to be a prophet and one of the two witnesses. Perhaps deep down inside he wonders why a man of his position has no power, and why God does not talk to him. He is neither the first guy, nor the last, to imagine that he is one of the two witnesses, and to be still waiting to receive his power. He has now been reduced to hoping for the deaths of the leaders of the other splinter groups to fulfill his own guesses and desires.

  What can one expect from the "two witnesses" when the true ones really do appear? The Bible says, "If anyone tries to harm them, fire comes from their mouths and devours their enemies. This is how anyone who wants to harm them must die. These men have power to shut up the sky so that it will not rain during the time they are prophesying; and they have power to turn the waters into blood and to strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they want" (Revelation 11:5-6, NIV). They will stand out from all the false witnesses who came ahead of time. You can expect that they will actually wear sackcloth like the Bible says, rather than reason around like Ron that it just means that they are humble.

  Technically, false prophets like Ronald Weinland should be stoned to death. God said, "But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded him to say, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, must be put to death. You may say to yourselves, 'How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the LORD?' If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously. Do not be afraid of him" (Deuteronomy 18:20-22, NIV). Fortunately, with Ron's guesses, one won't have to wait the usual three to five years to figure out that he was just another nut case. Three to five months should be plenty. Then, some of those who have had their time, and energy, and money worse than wasted might begin to understand why God had such a drastic penalty for telling lies in His name.

  The New Testament contains this warning from the Apostle Peter: "But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them--bringing swift destruction on themselves. Many will follow their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping" (II Peter 2:1-3, NIV). It is easy to ignore all the ham-eating, Sunday-keeping false prophets in the world. Obviously, such ignoramuses don't know anything. The big problem today is with all the false prophets that came from within the Worldwide Church of God.

  A serious problem has arisen these days as many former members of the Worldwide Church of God started their own groups that observe the biblical seventh-day Sabbath, and call their groups by the name Church of God (COG), yet make up lies in God's name and pretend to be His prophets. This certainly does "bring the way of truth into disrepute." The only reason that most of these goofballs know any biblical truth at all is that they learned it from guys like Herbert W. Armstrong (HWA). So far, so good. But then they point out that not all prophetic knowledge was revealed to HWA, so they take it upon themselves to fill in the gaps by making up crazy new theories of their own. They also say that HWA did not quite figure out everything, so they come up with new doctrinal ideas that contradict what he taught. Even while praising HWA they disagree with him and change what he taught, and not for the better. Ron is just one example of many who do this. Here is a quote from page 205 of 2008--God's Final Witness:

  "Although Mr. Armstrong understood that the Trinity was a lie, God did not give him full understanding of what was true concerning Himself and His Son, Jesus Christ. God did not fully lead him out from the pollution of the false Trinity doctrine. Mr. Armstrong still believed that Jesus Christ had eternally existed. God gave Mr. Armstrong enough to conclude that the Trinity was a lie, but He did not lead him fully into the truth. God reserved this revelation until now, at this very end time, during the time of the opening and the fulfillment of the Sixth Seal of Revelation."

  People need to stop and consider that if the God of the Bible really does exist, He can and will carry out His own plans on His own schedule. There is no need for anyone to make up lies in His name, other than to fulfill the prophecy that many false prophets will arise and deceive many. People need to read the Bible for themselves, and hold on tight to the truth of God that it teaches, while rejecting all the time-wasting and money-wasting false prophets who come around telling ridiculous lies that they have made up. It is truly amazing how many greedy, outright liars came out of the WCG. But then, Jesus did warn that "many false prophets will appear and deceive many people" (Matthew 24:11, NIV). As this problem continues, some people might start to take more seriously Jesus' warning about false prophets.

  
  

April 2008:

• Cost Update: David Pack's "vision" grows more expensive by many grand

  In a sermon called March 2008 Update: The Vision Grows Grander, the self-sent apostle David C. Pack announced some of his great building plans for the future. Below are some quotes from his sermon.

  "We have to have a building. We cannot go forward as the final work of God on earth any longer without a building."

  "We have secured quite a few acres...."

  "We are planning a building of four stories with an incredible view that will boggle your mind."

  "We are never going to finish the work of God on the second floor of someone else's building."

  "This is not my work, brethren. If it is, we're all in big trouble."

  Besides a headquarters building, David Pack said he wants to build a college campus and start a two-year college program so that the first crop of students can graduate on Friday June 4, 2010, exactly 39 years after his own Friday June 4, 1971 graduation from Ambassador College. He also wants to have a youth summer camp and a full-time worldwide ministry. He plans to have all sorts of gardens with one being called the "Footprint Garden," which will be the size and shape of the auditorium he plans to build, and hopes will be the final "house of God" in this age. If you listen to his sermon, which is posted online at his Restored Church of God (RCOG) Web site at http://www.thercg.org/sermons.html, pay careful attention to his comment near the end that if it is just his work they'll all be in big trouble. Actually, David would still come out of this OK. The financial backers might be a different, sadder story.

  Why the need for the headquarters building, and college campus, and auditorium? The early work of Jesus and His Apostles did not seem to need an expensive building program. Apparently, things are different now that it is the final work of God. These future dreams are always very inspiring. The actual past history is a bit more sobering.

  After Herbert W. Armstrong's (HWA's) initial foray into prophetic guessing was proven wrong by the passage of time, HWA moved to Pasadena, California and built the headquarters for his Worldwide Church of God (WCG), as well as the Ambassador College campus. Later, the beautiful Ambassador Auditorium was built.

  Building a Christian college always seems like a great idea. However, these things do not always work out as well as one would hope. Without serious, ongoing, active effort they can degenerate into worse places than a regular college. One might even wonder what the point of it all is when one thinks about all the Ambassador College sluts who fooled around with Garner Ted Armstrong (GTA) and others during the Armstrong era of the college. Or the godless sluts who dropped out pregnant after one year, or the godless sluts who graduated "with distinction" under the Tkach era, before the whole sordid cesspool was shut down. One graduate, Gerald Flurry, became a drunken, lying false prophet with his own cult full of lying, slandering, sex maniacs. Another graduate, Ronald Weinland, makes up so many prophetic lies in God's name that one wonders how a grown man can lie that much in God's name without blushing. And there are many other greedy, lying kooks who came out of that place. In fact, it is sickening to think about all the BAD characters who came out of Ambassador College, with many of them passing themselves off as ministers in order to collect a paycheck.

  The example of HWA's building program seems to have started the strange custom among some splinter groups of trying to build an expensive auditorium for worldly musical performances and plays to try to impress the world, and calling the auditorium a "house for God"!!! According to Herbert Armstrong's booklet called 1975 in Prophecy!, the end of the age and the return of Jesus should have come soon after the Ambassador Auditorium was completed, but HWA later explained that his 19-year time cycles had actually ended up being fulfilled by the WCG getting to put advertisements in the Readers Digest magazine, and by the church obtaining some financing. In similar manner, David Pack has his followers thinking that the end of the age and the return of Jesus will come within about half a dozen years after they have completed his buildings. Once again, time appears to be short. So, yet again, people must scramble to sacrifice and give to a building program. To modify a phrase someone else came up with, those who do not know or remember the past are condemned to rebuild it.

  
  

May 2008:

• The COG Auditorium as a "house for God" versus the Temple of Jerusalem

  The Church of God (COG) Auditorium as a "house for God"

  Around the late sixties and early seventies Herbert W. Armstrong (HWA), and his Worldwide Church of God (WCG), built the beautiful Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, California. While it was dedicated to the Great God, and was called a "house for God," it was really an auditorium that was used for performances by secular musicians and actors for their own profit and glory.

  Trying to copy the example set by HWA, a false prophet by the name of Gerald R. Flurry, and his cult called the Philadelphia Church of God (PCG), started to talk around 2007 about building an auditorium that he called a "house for God."

  Not to be left out, another WCG splinter leader, David C. Pack, and his Restored Church of God (RCOG), mentioned in 2008 his big plans to someday build an auditorium. So far, all he has is plans for a "footprint garden" the size and shape of the auditorium he wants to build.

  Herbert Armstrong's building program cost plenty, and he had to constantly badger his followers for more money to support it. The relatively small WCG splinter groups today, like the PCG and the RCOG, can be expected to build much lesser buildings and to extract the costs from much smaller groups of followers. These relatively small groups like the PCG and RCOG seem to plan to do it by extracting from their followers their entire estates when they die, or, if possible, long before they die.

  This seems like a good time to point out that the biblical "house for the Name" was NOT an auditorium, and no secular musicians or actors were allowed in it. Even the Levites descended from Kohath, who carried the holy things, were not to go in to look at the holy things, even for a moment, or else they would die (see Numbers 4:17-20). A brief review of what has been called the Temple of Jerusalem seems to be in order at this time.

  The Tabernacle of Moses

  In Exodus, God told Moses to take up an offering of various materials from the Israelites from each man whose heart prompted him to give. God said, "Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them. Make this tabernacle and all its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you" (Exodus 25:8-9, NIV). Exodus chapters 25 and on in the Bible tell about God instructing the Israelites under Moses to build Him a sanctuary, or tabernacle, or Tent of Meeting, with its related furnishings (ark of the Testimony with its atonement cover, incense altar, table and plates for the bread of the Presence, seven-branched lampstand), and the courtyard with its equipment (altar for burnt offerings, basin for washing), and the sacred garments for Aaron the High Priest and the other priests who would be ministering in the sanctuary. The Bible records, "So the tabernacle was set up on the first day of the first month in the second year" (Exodus 40:17, NIV). That is, the second year after the Israelites had come out of Egypt.

  The Temple of Solomon

  Hundreds of years later, II Samuel chapter 7 tells about King David being concerned that he lived in a palace of cedar while the ark of God remained in a tent. God mentioned that He had never asked any of the rulers of Israel why they had not built Him a house of cedar. God also told king David that one of his own sons would be the one to build "a house for my Name" (II Samuel 7:13, NIV). I Kings chapter 6 says, "In the four hundred and eightieth year after the Israelites had come out of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv, the second month, he began to build the temple of the LORD. The temple that King Solomon built for the LORD was sixty cubits long, twenty wide and thirty high" (I Kings 6:1-2, NIV) "In the eleventh year in the month of Bul, the eighth month, the temple was finished in all its details according to its specifications. He had spent seven years building it." (I Kings 6:38, NIV) This first glorious Temple, built by Solomon, was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, in 587 BC.

  The Temple of Zerubbabel

  When the Persians under Cyrus the Great rose with stunning rapidity to defeat the Babylonians and to dominate the whole of Asia Minor, the Jews were given permission in 538 BC by an edict of Cyrus himself to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their Temple. Various difficulties meant that the project to build the temple was not completed until 515 BC, under the Persian king Darius. "The temple was completed on the third day of the month Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of King Darius" (Ezra 6:15, NIV). A man by the name of Zerubbabel was instrumental in the rebuilding project, and traditionally he gives his name to this replacement of Solomon's Temple. Zerubbabel's Temple always fell short of its great predecessor in the eyes of those who worshipped there. Squeezed between the glories of Solomon and the majesty of Herod, the temple of Zerubbabel has always been the poor relation. Nevertheless, it stood for 500 years until Herod's Temple replaced it in 19 BC. There were three different buildings known as the Temple of Jerusalem: Solomon's, Zerubbabel's, and Herod's. You can read about the rebuilding of the Temple and Jerusalem in the time of Zerubbabel in the biblical books of Ezra and Nehemiah.

  The Temple of Herod

  Herod came to power in 37 BC and ruled until his death in 4 BC. Herod's act of rebuilding the Temple was so grandiose and so successful that it earned him the sobriquet "the Great." He designed the Temple to be one of the very largest buildings in the Roman Empire. Herod himself is repeatedly scorned as ambitious, violent and thoroughly undeserving of his sobriquet 'the Great': the Temple, however, is celebrated and honoured as the second Temple, as if it were no more than the rebuilding of Solomon's first shrine, as Herod himself expressed his proposal, and as if Zerubbabel's Temple, which stood for 500 years, was somehow absorbed into Herod's design, rather than totally destroyed. The third Temple, according to orthodox Jews, will be built only when the Messiah comes, and when God orders it; for many Christians this will herald the Second Coming. For both groups it will mark the End of Days. So Herod's Temple is always known as the second Temple.

  On August 28, 70 AD, the Roman supreme military commander Titus began the final assault on Jerusalem. The temple Titus destroyed had been built by Herod and had stood for less than ninety years. Its lavish decorations had been finally finished only six years before their destruction. The Jewish revolt of 66 AD had led to the total destruction of Herod's Temple in 70 AD. Among the plunder, Titus took the Temple's famous seven-branched golden lampstand back to Rome, where it was paraded in triumph before the citizens, a victory celebration recorded for posterity on the Arch of Titus. In 132 AD the Jews, led by Bar Kochba, once again tried rebelling against the Roman Empire. After the rebellion was crushed, Judea was renamed Syria Palestina by the Romans (the first use of the word 'Palestine' for this area as a whole) to silence the connection between the land and the nation; the Temple mount was ploughed over and a temple to Jupiter was built there, and the Jews were banned by imperial decree from entering Jerusalem.

  Plans for a future Temple

  In 1948, the modern State of Israel was formed, and in 1967 Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount, came under Israeli governance following the Six Day War. Since the fourteenth century the Temple Mount has been under the legal control of the Islamic authorities (the Waqf), and it remains that way even now that Jerusalem is ruled by the Israelis. For most orthodox Jews it is against religious law either to go on to the Temple Mount or to try to rebuild the Temple before the Messiah comes. However, there are some relatively small, obsessed groups that think otherwise, such as the Jerusalem Temple Foundation, the Temple Institute, and the Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement, which are in constant battle with the state and the courts of Israel to build a Temple.

  Anyone interested in learning more about the Temple of Jerusalem can read a book called The Temple of Jerusalem by Simon Goldhill. See also The Temple Mount in Jerusalem Web site.

  Herbert Armstrong's changing prophetic theories

  A book called Herbert Armstrong's Tangled Web by David Robinson mentioned Herbert W. Armstrong's changing prophetic theories about a future temple on page 18:

  A rather disturbing event occurred late in the summer of 1969, just after the first men landed on the moon. Apparently, in a personal response to HWA's prophetic messages concerning 1972, a follower of HWA in Australia, Carl Rohen, took it on himself to try to burn down the El Aqsa Mosque, which is located on the site of the old Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. While damage was extensive, the mosque was not destroyed. What did result was wide news coverage.
  
  HWA had written not long before that the Jews didn't have a day to lose in order to get their temple built to comply with his prophetic timetable. Apparently Rohen had taken him seriously in Australia and acted on what he believed to be a message from God. He would personally remove the obstacle holding up HWA's prophecy--the Arab mosque that was holding up construction of the necessary Jewish temple. This temple had to be built, according to HWA, in order to fulfill the prophecy of II Thess. chapter 2.
  
  The resulting threat to HWA and the Worldwide Church was immediate and serious. Official church denial of any responsibility was immediate and continuous. This denial worked. The storm blew over. Most of us at the time were unaware of the seriousness of the situation.
  
  From that time HWA no longer preached the Jews would have to build a literal temple in order to fulfill end-time prophecy.

  A place for Auditoriums and Church Buildings

  None of the above is meant to imply that it is necessarily wrong for an organisation to build an auditorium or church building for use by its members. However, financially draining members to build an auditorium for the profit and glory of worldly musicians and actors, while calling it a "house for God," is really just a big waste of everyone's time and energy and money. Trying to impress the world with your entertainment is not a good goal to have.

  
  

September 2008:

• Wayne Blank's Daily Bible Study

  A former Roman Catholic Canadian by the name of Wayne Blank has a Web site called Daily Bible Study at http://www.keyway.ca/htm2002/roadsign.htm. He also has weekly audio sermons that you can listen to online at http://www.keyway.ca/htm2002/progrep.htm. Below is a partial quote from his Web site:

  Wayne Blank

  The Church of God Daily Bible Study A Ministry Of God's Word   4,100+ Bible Studies, 180+ audio Sermons All freely available online

  Readers naturally wonder about the origin of this Daily Bible Study. Is it sponsored by a particular church group, or denomination? And what about the author(s)? Who writes Daily Bible Study every day?

  Although read by numerous and widely-varied churches, educational institutions and individuals around the world, Daily Bible Study is independently written and produced by me. Unless otherwise noted, I am the sole author and source of the studies and the online sermons.

  I was born and raised as a Roman Catholic, but I have had nothing what-so-ever to do with that organization for over 35 years, since the early 1970s, the time that I began basing my Christian beliefs solely upon the Word of God, the Holy Bible. I now strongly disagree with the Church of Rome, or any other Christian-professing church organization, Catholic or Protestant, that contradicts the pure Word of God as written in the Holy Scriptures. I have never been a member of any other church organization. My church membership today is that of the Biblical Church of God. According to the Holy Scriptures, church means the people, the "called out ones," who truly live by the Word of God.

  I write the studies for those who choose to visit the web site and read what is made available. If you are willing to accept what the Bible plainly says, there is a very good chance that you will find Daily Bible Study useful and enjoyable.

  This Daily Bible Study is the fruit of over 35 years of Bible-based Christian study. During those more than 3 decades (I'm 53 now), I have read the Bible, in its entirety, in many different versions, over 200 times - a practice that I continue every day. I have also carefully studied a tremendous amount of material, Christian and secular, pertaining to the many aspects of Christianity - the history, the people, the places, the things, the archaeology, and the prophecy. I say this in humility, as a simple statement of fact to answer those who have asked, not as some sort of boast. Those who are called to teach must first learn.

  I produce this web site solely to encourage people to read the Bible (see 52-Week Bible Reading Plan), to study the Bible, and especially to believe the Bible. The Word of God is where the absolute Truth will be found, not from anywhere, or anyone, else.

  Like water from a mountain spring, I believe that Christianity is most pure at its source. While there are fine and honorable Christian teachers and ministers here and there around the world, there remains a very fundamental question: Can the word of any human be more right than The Word of God?

  Although I honestly believe that what I write is correct, having carefully and painstakingly researched all studies that are published, I make no claim what-so-ever to infallibility. Being a mere sinful human, it's certain that I am wrong in places (no human is infallible, nobody) - hopefully, very few. That's the reality of being human that even the writers of the Bible itself had the honesty and courage to admit.

  This is a very interesting site. Just one caution: With so many Bible studies to read and so many audio sermons to listen to, you might never actually get around to reading the Bible itself. Many people have started many great works over the years that have produced much writing and speaking, and all with the purported intention being to get people to read their Bibles.

  Why mention this guy? Simply for the sake of those who are still interested in the teachings of the Bible. If God really does exist, and if the Bible really is His inspired word, then it will always be around regardless of how corrupt most people become. God will always have people somewhere who read His words, believe them, and obey them.

  This is not to say that Wayne Blank is perfect. For example, Wayne seems to think that some Sunday-keepers who wrote songs that contain doctrinal errors nevertheless "certainly had the heart." Actually, it is debatable whether they ever had the heart--or the mind, or the eyes, or the ears. Moses told the ancient Israelites, "But to this day the LORD has not given you a mind that understands or eyes that see or ears that hear" (Deuteronomy 29:4, NIV). The idea that it is ok to sing religious songs that contain doctrinal errors just because he thinks they sound nice is a serious mistake. Lies and error should never sound nice to one's ears. The truth is that many of those people "certainly had the mouth." In his 200+ claimed readings of the Bible, Wayne should have come across what Jesus said to some religious types in the first century. He said, "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: 'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.' You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men" (Mark 7:6-8, NIV). Wayne might be finding it difficult to accept just how blinded and deceived the whole world is, including the Catholics and Protestants who imagine themselves to be Christians.

  Also, don't buy into that idea that Wayne seems to have that God's laws about clean and unclean animals in Leviticus 11:1-47 are just a matter of health and not a matter of righteousness. Near the end of these rules, God told his chosen people, "I am the LORD who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy" (Leviticus 11:45, NIV). So, it seems to be a matter of holiness, not just a matter of health. Obeying God's instruction is very important. The New Testament explains that, "Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness" (I John 3:4, NIV). "Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning (I John 3:7-8, NIV). Taking God and His instruction seriously is the right--or righteous--thing to do. If anyone thinks otherwise, perhaps they need to start at the beginning and read the Bible through one more time. Maybe this time around they will notice that the first recorded human sin was some woman eating something that God had told her not to eat. The Devil, ever so slippery, encouraged her to eat the forbidden fruit. The Devil made it sound like it was ok to disobey God's instruction. The Devil made it sound like it was not even a matter of health. But, God was displeased with the disobedience, and the woman did eventually die as a result of eating it, which sort of affected her health, and sort of proved the Devil to be a liar from the beginning. If they had been around back then, virtually all the religious leaders of today would have also encouraged her to disobey God and eat it.

  While talking about some of the wrong ideas that Wayne Blank has adopted, something should be said about the annual Sabbaths and festivals that God gave. Wayne has learned that not only is there controversy about when to observe Passover and Pentecost, but also about when to observe every other festival as well. Wayne said that it is "fine" for different people to observe the annual Sabbaths at all sorts of different times as long as they "leave others in peace" and "have respect" for their many different ideas about when to observe these things. This is, no doubt, intended to sound nice and reasonable. Yet, something does not sound either reasonable or "fine" about people who claim to be God's followers being in complete confusion and observing His festivals on all sorts of different days because the spirits that are guiding them are not leading them into all truth, or even into truth at all. The world is full of people who observe Sunday rather than God's weekly Sabbath because they are either spiritually blind or else simply rebellious. That is not "fine." Maybe just reading the Bible 200 times will not help unless God also opens the reader's mind and reveals the truth to the reader..

  The Worldwide Church of God (WCG) under Joseph Tkach, Sr. openly turned away from the teachings of the Bible at the start of 1995. He replaced the biblical teachings that they once had with the usual old myths, such as Sunday-keeping, Christmas and Easter observance, the Trinity, etc. The WCG members and ministers who went along with the changes were the very ignorant and very sinful ones. Although it was claimed that God was behind the changes, the WCG quickly decreased to a very small fraction of its former size.

  Sadly, even under Herbert W. Armstrong (HWA) the people had to endure five decades of wrong guesses about when the end of the age would be, and the related pressure to send in more money to support the latest wrong guess. (The killer question that some fear to face is simply this: What sort of person would make up such lies in God's name?) Their money also supported sex addicts like HWA's own son, Garner Ted Armstrong (GTA), so he could fool around with their daughters when they went to Ambassador College (AC).

  With Tkach's major doctrinal changes in the WCG, literally hundreds of splinter groups formed, to the delight of some people who liked division and confusion. Most of these splinters now appear to have been no good at all. Most are so small and bad that they could better be described as slivers--thorns in the flesh. Some splinters, like Ronald Weinland's, come up with so many silly false prophecies that they bring the way of truth into disrepute, and are an embarrassment to just about everyone.

  Former WCG members who attempted to find the "one true splinter group" ran into such cruel, complete frauds as the so-called Philadelphia Church of God (PCG), produced in 1989 by Gerald Flurry with the help of Satan and/or the chemical imbalances in his own brain. Gerald suckered people into his cult by falsely claiming to be holding onto the truth that HWA taught, but then forced all the PCG members to accept his truly outrageous changes to HWA's teachings--major changes that he passed off as "new revelation." PCG members were forced to believe Gerald's own additional lies and nonsense or else get kicked out of the PCG. The PCG is simply no place for a true Christian, and you aren't likely to find any there either. You are likely to find plenty of shameful old liars and sex perverts in the PCG. The strategy employed in the PCG is for Gerald to do all his own evil in God's name to try to make God appear to be bad so that people will end up hating God. The real purpose of the PCG is to try to destroy people forever in the name of the "government of God" by having each lying, slandering local tyrant pass off his own satanic abuse as the "government of God." It is a FATAL ERROR to think of the PCG as any sort of true Church of God (COG). The PCG is, in fact, nothing less than a Church of Fraud (COF). It cannot be otherwise, as the PCG was founded on Gerald's own lies and his "little book" of lies instead of on the Bible. The good news is that those who are sincerely searching for the truth of God do not have to tolerate raging lunatics like That Runt at all. In fact, to be saved, they must utterly reject him.

  The largest of the splinter groups, the so-called United Church of God (UCG), formed in 1995 several months after the WCG had openly turned against everything that it had once taught. The UCG was formed by former WCG ministers who still believed the occasional teaching from the past and who were looking for a paycheck. They had gone along with most of the doctrinal changes that the WCG had made under Joe Tkach, Sr., and tended to despise HWA and think that they could do a better job than he did of running the church. Now, their UCG has turned into a hangout for unrepentant, unconverted unbelievers and sinners who behave badly. Any true Christians who ended up in the UCG risk being dragged down by the constant harassment of all the ignorant unbelievers and habitual liars in it. The story that UCG members "meet in peace" is simply a work of fiction by a dishonest writer. Even Aaron Dean, who was the young personal assistant to HWA in his old age, is faced with other UCG leaders trying to silence him and oust him. Worse than just disliking HWA, the UCG leaders also appear to dislike God's laws. And that is why their UCG social club is not really sociable at all. That is also why, after initially collecting some former WCG members, the UCG is not really growing at all. It appears to be stagnating until the unconfessed sins in it cause a major split or fragmentation. The UCG people are united only in their collective desire to be free to sin while pretending to be good church members. It will prove to be a frustrating exercise in futility for anyone to wait for the UCG to smarten up and repent. No improvement in the behavior of those who hang out at the UCG can ever be expected to occur unless and until a well-deserved "great tribulation" forces them to face up to the truth about their own bad behavior. The good news is that those who are sincerely searching for the truth of God do not have to go along with all the godless, lying, slandering unbelievers that the UCG is so full of. In fact, they should avoid such bad influences for the sake of their own mental and spiritual health. David C. Pack has mentioned that the UCG started with many errors already in place, and is now losing the truth that remains so rapidly that the UCG, like the WCG, might soon disappear back into the world. That remains to be seen yet, but it certainly is possible. Just a small step remains, as most people in the UCG act like they never came out of the world in the first place. Approximately half the people who hang out at the UCG are obnoxious and/or actually MALICIOUS. The other half, while not like that, certainly have no serious interest in the truth or in doing anything right.

  The situation in the splinter groups is so bad that one self-appointed splinter leader by the name of David C. Pack produced a video in which he called the other splinter leaders "evil men and seducers." The tragedy is not that he called them "evil men and seducers." Rather, the tragedy is that it is such a perceptive and accurate description of so many of them. David sometimes sounds frustrated that so many people went to the UCG, and that so very few go to his own Restored Church of God (RCOG). Other splinter leaders like Roderick C. Meredith (RCM) wonder why people went to the UCG rather than to his own Living Church of God (LCG). If these leaders really knew what sort of people went to the UCG, they might not be quite so desirous of having them hang out at their own churches--other than for the extra money they imagine they would get, of course.

  Reading the Bible, and obeying God, is what people really need to get back to.

  A lot of the teachings of Wayne Blank will sound familiar to former members of the WCG. There is a reason for this. Wayne did not come up with these ideas all by himself. Notice the quote below from his Web site:

  ... there are over a billion Roman Catholics in the world; however the day is coming when they, in great numbers, are going to discover how badly they've been deceived and they're going to rise up and free their minds and bodies from that Satanic deception, as this author did as an individual over 30 years ago thanks to a certain preacher in Pasadena, California whose "trademark" challenge was "Don't believe me, believe your Bible!" Daily Bible Study would not exist today if not for Herbert W. Armstrong, a very (as I later learned) imperfect, sometimes wrong (just like every other human), at times foolish, egotistical, arrogant, perverted sinner, and true man of God when it came to overall Biblical understanding (I can almost hear the cheers, and the boos, to that one) ...

  In his 200th online sermon, for October 11, 2008, called Branches, Wayne Blank said he was never a member of the WCG. He explained that he had tried to join the WCG in his younger days but the minister who interviewed him was too huffy and acted like a Roman Catholic Bishop. Sigh.

  At least Wayne has simple ideas and teachings. He has not yet fallen into the trap that has ensnared so many hundreds of former WCG members into thinking that they are prophets, or one of the two witnesses of Revelation, or some other great, deluded embarrassment full of wrong prophetic dates to waste one's time.