Saturday, December 3, 2016

Dave Pack: Is His "jesus" Returning First To Wadsworth, Ohio Before "It" Returns to Jerusalem Years Later?



Dave Pack is all giddy that his fake "jesus" is coming back to this earth multiple times.  "Its" first coming is specifically for Dave and his little group.  Is Dave trying to tell us that his "jesus" returning to Wadsworth first?  Dave says his creature is NOT coming to Jerusalem first, but to Israel.  Anytime an Armstrongite starts talking about Israel they are not referring to the nation in the Middle East, but are referring to the United States.

Dave surely cannot be referring to England because this is the place where Gerald Flurry will be waiting after he has stolen the Stone of Scone from Scotland and taken it to Westminster Abbey so his "jesus" can come and sit on it.  There is no way Dave will share the spotlight with Gerald Flurry, let alone Westminster Abbey.




Where the Kingdom Begins


The almost universally believed destination of Christ’s Return is Jerusalem. But is this what God’s Word says? Christ will of course ultimately rule from there—countless scriptures show this—but is this where His tiny mustard-seed Kingdom begins? Does His first-century coming provide a clue?
Notice Jesus was born to Mary in “a city of Galilee, named Nazareth” (Luke 1:26)—well north of Jerusalem! Far from a prominent city, Nazareth was scoffed at as a kind of dead-end backwater by Jerusalemites. After Jesus called the apostle Peter, He then called Philip who reported to Nathaniel that they had found Christ. Not convinced, Nathaniel asked, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (John 1:46). Clearly Christ’s first century coming was to an unexpected place. His arrival shocked and confused the masses: “Others said, this is the Christ. But some said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee?” (7:41). Both Nazareth and Galilee were looked down on by the elites of Jesus’ day.
Christ started His ministry away from Jerusalem—a pattern we will see holds.
The prophet Micah further establishes the Kingdom moves to Jerusalem: “O tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion, unto you shall it come, even the first dominion; the kingdom shall come to the daughter of Jerusalem” (4:8). It does not say the Kingdom—Christ’s rule long before events in Revelation, after which it picks up again to continue for 1,000 more years—is built in Zion or starts in Zion. (Nor does it say it arrives there from heaven.) Micah says it “comes” there, meaning it was initially somewhere else. Of course it was—in a location called “His place!”
Let’s look at one last description of the Branch in an unusual context. The setting is a great war that afflicts the nations of modern Israel—and the disastrous effect on Jerusalem and the tribe of Judah: “Your men shall fall by the sword, and your mighty in the war. And her gates shall lament and mourn; and she being desolate shall sit upon the ground. And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man [the survivors of the war], saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by your name, to take away our reproach” (Isa. 3:25-4:1).
Many other Bible passages detail the war that Isaiah references—where it starts, how it spreads, who it affects, and its unimaginable severity. This is a completely separate event that occurs long, long before Armageddon, but this is not our subject here. Those who think the world is already at war between clashing cultures will soon realize today’s events are essentially NOTHING. Conditions will grow infinitely worse and eventually engulf all the nations of the West. What is coming is beyond imagination. Therefore most will be caught completely off-guard.
Isaiah continues, showing what is happening alongside the war. Let’s read what no one ever sees: “In that day [by this time, when the devastation of war has grown great] shall the Branch [the growing, maturing sprout] of the LORD be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth…excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel [from the war]. And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he that remains in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem [many will have died]: when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof by the spirit of judgment, and by the spirit of burning” (vs. 2-4). Fiery judgment is involved, including the furnace we read about. Read Isaiah 31:9.
By this point the Branch and the Kingdom—having already been on Earth for some time—are flourishing! This is the result of the previously mentioned “Marvelous Work,” covered momentarily. The fruit is called “excellent and comely,” meaning an “ornament.” Christ is called “glorious” and “beautiful.” The latter meaning “in the sense of prominence; splendor (as conspicuous)”—by this time the Kingdom has become the opposite of small and hidden! It is conspicuous and prominent! At this point many millions of people will have come into the Kingdom. Try to make all of this—any of it!—fit the popular narrative! No one is teaching it, yet it is the truth of your Bible visible in PLAIN SIGHT on the pages.
Isaiah 59 brings another perspective of Christ coming to Jerusalem—again, years after His Kingdom began small: “The Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob, says the Lord” (vs. 20). Then chapter 60 begins, “Arise, shine; for your light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen [risen, not descended] upon you [remember, from a depressed placeunderneath and below view]. For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall ariseupon you, and His glory shall be seen upon you” (vs. 1-2). Ponder this. If Jesus started His journey in heaven, He would be described as descending—not rising—on Zion! Do not miss this! Many verses do confirm Jesus comes from heaven to His people. It is several years later that He comes to the Mount of Olives (Zech. 14:4) and shortly after that to Zion, which is adjacent to it.

Location of Christ’s “Place”

Certain passages further prove Christ relocates to Zion, and these provide clues about which nation He will come to. A prophecy for our time—the latter days—that almost no one talks about is found in Numbers 24. The prophet Balaam foretold, “In the latter days…there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre [Ruler] shall rise out of Israel [not Judah]…Out of Jacob shall come He that shall have dominion, and shall destroy him that remains of the city [this is Jerusalem]” (vs. 141719).
Called the “Star” here, other passages describe Christ as the “Sun of Righteousness” (Mal. 4:2), “Day Star” (II Pet. 1:19) and the “Bright and Morning Star” (Rev. 22:16). He brings His dominion—His rule!—to Jerusalem and Judah from a different modern nation of Jacob (Israel). This cannot be referencing Christ’s birth location because He was born of Judah, and in Judea. Many scriptures covered in my thorough book America and Britain in Prophecy make clear the distinction between Judah and the other 11 tribes of Israel. In fact, the very first reference to “the Jews” in the Bible shows them at war with Israel (II Kgs. 16:1-6)! The modern Mideast nation called Israel is in fact Judah, with the democratic, English-speaking nations of the West identified as the descendants of the rest of the tribes of ancient Israel. Jesus Christ first comes to one of these countries, NOT Judah!
Isaiah 41 contains more proof: “I have raised up One from the north, and He shall come” (vs. 25). “North” means “hiddendark; used only of the north.” It continues, leaving no doubt this is Jesus Christ: “He shall come upon princes as upon mortar [establishing His authority over all earthly leaders], and as the potter treads clay. Who has declared from the beginning, that we may know?…and I will [at this point] give to Jerusalem One that brings good tidings” (vs. 25-27). Here is a prophecy of Christ being “raised up”—think “growing up”—sprouting from—a northern country(a modern Israelite nation of the West) to defeat His enemies.
This intervention, coupled with good tidings—the true gospel—is absolutely necessary given that horror begins in Jerusalem the very day Christ’s little Kingdom begins.

The Church of God and Its Dystopian Society



The Painful Truth has a new article up on Armstrongism and the Church of God and its vision of things to come and how none of it has ever come to pass and what happens to people caught up in the deception.

Just what is a dystopian society?
  • A dystopia is considered a fictional society usually portrayed as existing in a future time, when the conditions of life are extremely dismal due to deprivation, oppression, or terror. 
Sound familiar? Remember the Good News magazine that spewed out the WCG’s view of what God’s utopia would look like? It was heaven on earth. But to enter into this wonderful time (the kingdom) would require you to do unending somersaults of law keeping, tithing, and blindly obeying those who really did not care for you or your family.  
Remember the Plain Truth? Have you ever read Meredith’s or Flurry’s rag? They fill your mind with a hopeless air of despair. 
The propagating of these ideas and others into the minds of their audience that future race wars are coming, or economic collapse is just a few short years away, are an ideology the ACOG’s place into print within their magazines in order to form opinions, prejudice and to mirror church doctrine. This conditions the membership not to jump ship and chance that they will be caught up in the fray when the projected SHTF moment materializes. Anyone who has spent a decade or more in one of these groups can attest that a SHTF moment is always just a few years off.
What the ACOG’s fail to foresee is the results of their endless negative prognosticating. When a human has confidence and optimism, the very joys of life itself stolen from them, you take away the zeal for life, you squelch the will to live. You destroy the individual. What you have left is a shell of the former and a slave which needs to be constantly managed in order to maintain his or her direction forward.  
The Dystopian standard-bearer (an advocate or champion of a particular cause or ideology) often feels trapped and is struggling to escape and questions the existing social, political, or in our case, religious systems. 

The article is well worth the read: Herbert Armstrong's Utopian Society


Dave Pack: 6,000 pages later and Dave Says, "I’m an okay writer who worked hard and you know, kind of got better."




The most magnificent and most educated Church of God leader to ever exist in human history talks about the struggles he goes through to write his booklets.   His brain is such an awesome machine that it constant is coming up with new ideas and concepts.  It is then initially important o him to add those new revelations to his booklets.  It is an awesome task and only he is the one able to do it.

I’ll tell you an interesting story. When I wrote my literature, I found something. It’s just the way my writing is. If I were like Mr. Armstrong, I probably would not need to do this. He was a great writer. I’m an okay writer who worked hard and you know, kind of got better. That’s the way I would describe myself.
I would write a booklet and then I would come back through and make another pass, and I would see certain things I couldn’t see when I wrote it. I would give the pages to my wife and she would install them. Then she would hand me the booklet again, and I would read through it again and see things that time that I couldn’t see because the other things I had installed blinded my ability to see it. I would continue to read it. It was a lot of work, believe me. Those who think the literature…“How did you write it all?…don’t realize I read and reread…and I am not a fast reader…I read and reread, just in editing my literature, anywhere from 10 to 40 times—6,000 pages—so you can do the math; that is just the books and booklets.
I would, eventually, know that the book or booklet was done when I could not read through and find anything else; then I said, “That is it. Print it!” That usually was six or seven times. The longer ones, I would sometimes add more parts. Whenever I did that, I would read all the way through a book. For instance, Anoint Your Eyes started at two hundred (and I think) sixteen pages and ended up 270, because I would always want to add other things to it. That’s a little different situation.
Some of the earlier booklets I went through many more times, because I just wasn’t a very good writer in my opinion, and you know, Why The Restored Church of God? I edited 44 times. That was the first booklet, but I got better, I had to or I would have been dead soon, or my wife would have been……
SaveSave

Friday, December 2, 2016

Church of God Leaders Turned On Me After Sexual Assault




The Church of God has had a long history of covering up for abusive ministers, leaders and members who have raped, assaulted, stalked and molested adults and children.  Many in the church stick their heads in the sand and say "well this happens everywhere in all churches so why should we be worried about."  While t his is trues, the those abused int eh Church of God face a double whammy.  The church in its outrageous arrogance claims to be the one true apostolic church practicing true Christianity.  How can the "true church" ever have abuse in it?  That is why it has been covered up for decades.  Church leaders have raped and assaulted women.  Others have stalked members to the point they drive countless miles so they can peer into bedroom  windows.  Others have molested children.

This people have been routinely moved to other church areas, left in leadership positions where they abuse again.  Then moved elsewhere.

The abused usually never receive compassion or help.  Most of the time they've been met with hostility, derision and contempt.  How dare they bring negative publicity to the church!  What did you do to cause the to happen?

The latest Journal of the Churches of God has an article from a woman who was sexually assaulted by a church leader and the shame she received from the church leadership.


COG leaders turned on me
The leadership in the Church of God turned on me. I was stonewalled and not spoken to. Except that I was spoken to, by the church leadership, to call me a troublemaker.
When I asked an evangelist who had intimate knowledge of the offender’s past, spanning more than 20 years of adultery and child molestation in the Churches of God, why the leader- ship of God’s church had recommended the offender to me in the first place, he cut me off and told me he was going to stop me right there because I was attacking the Church of God.
He reduced me to tears and I did not talk with him after that.
When I was at the Feast and tried to talk with another leading evangelist, he said no repeatedly.
I could not understand why he would not talk to me. He put his finger in my face and told me he would have deacons physically put me out of the hall and he would disfellowship me if I talked about the offender.
The offender stalks
The offender stalked me by calling and leaving recordings on my phone and via the Internet and E- mails, and calling me and letting me know it was he and then hanging up. 
I had a crisis in faith because I was being punished by the evangelists and leaders in my church.
I developed extreme PTSD. I did not want to live. I repeatedly begged God to end my life because the shame and pain were so overwhelming. 
The offender regularly moves his membership
My marriage, which I was trying to preserve through counseling with the man who turned out to be the sexual offender, ended. The offender went on to become a leader in another Church of God until it finally acknowledged the nature of the offender and put him out.
The offender to this day has a web- site trying to peddle his sermons to unsuspecting women and young girls.
Then she makes a telling comment about how help is better found OUTSIDE the Church of God.

Non-COG hope for survivors
Hope for survivors of pastoral sex- ual abuse can be found at The Hope of Survivors (thehopeofsurvivors.com). This group provides a support system for survivors of sexual abuse by min- isters that is grounded in biblical prin- ciples and not in protecting the abuser or the name of the church the abusing pastor is associated with.
I have found more hope and heal- ing here than in 20 years of ministers and other members stonewalling me and avoiding me like I was the chief whore in an ongoing whorehouse.
Women sexually abused by pastors are usually not wanton women, but women seeking help from their pastor and the pastor taking advantage of their vulnerability through their posi- tion as spiritual leader.
The woman is clearly not in the same position of power as the minister.