THINGS THAT DON'T ADD UP
If the reader's religious experience is anything like that of the author, having been called by God into His Church and having been taught so much about Him and His amazing work, then this "letter" is intended to be first of all a confirmation of those things that are true.
At the same time, however, it is meant to be a warning regarding teachings and practices that undeniably characterise this final Church era as Laodicean.
I can remember when I first began receiving Worldwide Church of God (WCG) material written mostly by Herbert W Armstrong (HWA) and being absolutely amazed by subjects like the Sabbath, the three days and three nights between Christ's crucifixion and resurrection, the United States and Britain in prophecy, and the validity of God's law. Those were exciting times of learning about the one and only true Creator, the purpose for which He had made mankind and the plan that He is working out here on Earth.
After some time however, unsettling experiences began to occur.
In the beginning, I can remember keeping the Sabbath at home for some 18 months, usually waiting for the sun to go down on Saturday nights before venturing out to buy dinner. Once I was so impatient that I didn't wait, but felt so guilty afterwards that I resolved never to do that again. Nevertheless, I found myself breaking that resolution no more than a week or two after I began attending the WCG, when I was taken out for dinner by some of the other men after Sabbath services. To my amazement I found myself sitting in a restaurant with at least two hours left until sunset, feeling bewildered after all that I'd read about God's dedicated people who would rather lose their job, or in times past even suffer martyrdom, rather than transgress God's Sabbath. Upon enquiring about my unease one of the brethren reassured me, saying, "It's okay; Mr Armstrong said it's okay". That seemed to be the end of the matter; Scripture was not referred to.
After a few years of attending and counselling, the day of my baptism arrived. Just as my WCG minister was putting me under the water, he pronounced that he was baptising me "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit". I was dumbfounded and remain so to this day. After everything I had read and heard concerning the erroneous doctrine of the Trinity, my minister was baptising me in the name of the Trinity!
I later learned that this was the custom in the WCG. I had never asked, but must have assumed, after reading about the fictitious I John 5:7, that Matthew 28:19 would also have been understood as a Catholic insert in Scripture. It wasn't until close to 25 years later that I learned the truth about this matter.
Over time, questions regarding the leadership of Herbert Armstrong became too serious to ignore. This was supposed to be the true Church of God (COG), yet it had the same leadership structure as the much maligned "great false church". The leader of that church was ridiculed because he claimed to be "infallible", and yet when it came to questions of Scripture or Church doctrine, "Mr Armstrong" was believed to be "God's apostle" who had "restored all things" and was held in similar reverence and awe.
True Church government was taught to consist of one man at the top, with a council of elders under him. The apostle Peter was supposedly the first one who had occupied this one man role. The Scriptures, however, show that Christ appointed twelve men over the Church, and at no time in the New Testament are the other eleven apostles seen to be functioning as Peter's council of elders. Significantly, all twelve have the same rank, that of apostle.
Another problem was that some aspects of prophetic interpretation didn't seem to add up, including the timing of the last three "seals" of the book of Revelation. The fifth seal was supposed to be a "great tribulation" lasting two and a half years, and the seventh seal was a "day of the Lord", lasting one year. The combined time allotted to these events just prior to the return of Jesus Christ was three and a half years and yet the sixth seal was said to be somehow squashed in between, even though there is no time available for it. This never seemed like a plausible explanation. Also, the fact that prophetic numbers were sometimes taken literally, and at other times figuratively, was inconsistent and illogical.
Teachings regarding the Church eras of Revelation 2 and 3, especially the identification of the Philadelphia and Laodicea eras, were also questionable. Even though in HWA's time the return of Christ was deemed to be imminent, the Church was still considered to be in the Philadelphia era. The Laodicea era was not expected to begin until the arrival of the "great tribulation", and it would only last for two and a half years! It never made sense that an "era" would be so brief.
Clearly, God's people have been in the Laodicea era, described in Revelation 3:14-22, for a very long time. The Churches, however, have created a variety of theories to circumvent the reality of this highly corrective passage of Scripture. One such theory is that multiple eras run in parallel at the same time. Another theory is that one group is a "Philadelphia remnant", while all other groups are Laodicean. Some groups deny the existence of Church eras altogether. Men will do anything to get away from the sobering and frightening reality of the rebuke contained in the final Church message.
The Laodicea era is said by God to be "blind", meaning that the vast majority of brethren fail to see that there are a large number of major errors among the teachings and practices of the branch of the Church they attend.
The following examples are meant to be a starting point for investigation and contemplation. It is anomalies such as these that this "Letter to Laodicea" seeks to identify and explain.
1) How can the Churches of God expect to make sense of Biblical prophecies when their interpretation of prophetic numbers is inconsistent?
The greatest piece of prophetic literature published by Herbert Armstrong was "The United States and Britain in Prophecy". It was based on J H Allen's "Judah's Sceptre and Joseph's Birthright" from 1902, which in turn was based on earlier publications on this same topic. As indicated by the fulfilment of this prophecy, the Bible here uses the "day for a year" principle, where a day in prophecy pictures a year in history. This concept is explained in Numbers 14:34 and Ezekiel 4:5-6, and also seen in Daniel 9:24-27.
According to Leviticus 26, the Israelites were to be punished by God for a duration of "seven times" if they disobeyed Him. The British Israel theory correctly interprets these "seven times" as seven prophetic years of 360 days each, making a total of 2520 days which picture a period of 2520 years. This time frame is shown to fit very well with the sudden increase in stature of the British Empire, the United States of America, and the Northern European democracies, 2520 years after the ten tribes of Israel went into captivity. All this is well known to the people of God and needs no further elaboration here.
Why then, with this very strong evidence of fulfilled prophecy in hand, do we not consistently apply this "day for a year" principle to all other prophecies of duration?
If "seven times" means 2520 years, then "time, times and half a time", found in both Daniel and Revelation, pictures 1260 years. If 2520 days means 2520 years, then 1260, 1290 and 1335 days, as also found in Daniel and/or Revelation, mean 1260, 1290 and 1335 years.
In the "Seventy Week Prophecy" found in Daniel 9, seventy weeks picture 490 years. Here the Churches of God again accept and apply the "day for a year" principle.
However, if we were to be consistent, wouldn't that logically also mean that a prophecy about five months (Rev 9:5,10) would involve 150 years, and a prophecy about 42 months (Rev 11:2, 13:5) would involve 1260 years?
People may point to the Creation account in Genesis where a day pictures a thousand years, as reiterated in II Peter 3:4-8. However, the seven days of Creation are much more than a prophecy; they picture the entire foundation of time within which God is doing His work of reproducing Himself through man. I refer to the Creation week as a seven day blueprint (see the page "THE SEVEN DAY BLUEPRINT" for more information).
Within that 7000 year framework, almost all number based prophecies that involve duration of an event use the "day for a year" principle. From where we stand in history today, many fulfilled prophecies clearly bear this out.
The only exceptions are prophecies that mention "days" and "nights" together. The "three days and three nights" that Christ spent in the grave (Matt 12:39-40), and the "forty days and forty nights" of rain in Noah's time (Gen 7:4) show that God uses this particular wording in prophecies that involve literal days.
Our failure to apply the "day for a year" principle has led to major misunderstandings regarding the timing of many prophecies. Worse, it has led to the COG's repeatedly proclaiming as future events prophecies that have already been fulfilled.
Please see "DAYS, WEEKS, MONTHS, YEARS AND TIMES", "THE TWO WITNESSES", "THE TIMES OF THE GENTILES", and the chart on the "HOME" page for a lot more information on this.
2) Why are the Churches of God not able to correctly identify the "Beast" powers?
The prophecies of Daniel and Revelation list a total of 18 powers, collectively called "a beast" in Revelation 13:1. These powers consist of seven heads, ten horns and a little horn that becomes an eighth head. The Scriptures identify these as powers that rule over Jerusalem, starting with Nebuchadnezzar's Babylon, and ending with British Palestine. The three times that the "little horn" is foretold to overthrow one of the ten horns, are simply the three occasions in history when "Christian" forces conquered an Islamic power occupying Jerusalem. Taking their eyes off Jerusalem, the Churches have mistakenly looked for the identification of some of these powers elsewhere.
For more on this please see "DANIEL 2 - INTERPRETATION ERRORS", "DANIEL 7 & 8 - JERUSALEM'S CONQUERORS", "REVELATION 13 - THE BEAST" and "THE TWO WITNESSES".
3) Why do the Churches of God still proclaim another European resurrection of the Beast, involving ten separate entities, when this does not fit the parameter of duration assigned to the Beast powers?
In Daniel 4, the Beast powers are, by typology, assigned 2520 years, which fits perfectly with the prophecies of Leviticus 26. Their power involved control of Jerusalem, as confirmed by Christ when He said, "They will fall by the edge of the sword, and be led away captive into all nations. And Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled" (Lk 21:24). This period of 2520 years came to a dramatic end in 1945 with the conclusion of WW2, after which the Jews regained sovereignty over their country and their capital city Jerusalem.
Please see "THE TWO WITNESSES", "THE TIMES OF THE GENTILES" and the chart on the "HOME" page for more information on this subject.
4) Why are the Churches of God not able to see that the current demise of the Christian democracies is a fulfilment of the prophecy of Revelation 18?
After many decades of the abandonment of God’s laws, the Western democracies are weakened to the point of being on the brink of collapse. Crime and violence are escalating, and law enforcement is limited to only the most serious of transgressions. Criminals have virtually free rein.
The moral decay as a result of the departure from Christian standards has had frightening consequences, robbing the nations of what moral strength they had and often leaving authorities too weak and too fearful to act.
All this was foretold in the Bible, which describes this world's form of Christianity as "Babylon".
Revelation 18:2 says, "Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit". This is the point in history we are at right now.
Please see the page "BABYLON IS FALLEN" for more on this.
5) How can the Churches of God in general still adhere to the position that the fulfilment of the Seventy Week Prophecy of Daniel 9 begins with an edict of Artaxerxes Longimanus, rather than the edict of Cyrus, when the former is clearly a chronological impossibility?
This mistaken belief adds almost 50 years to the chronology of the Persian Empire, so that now, in 2025, it incorrectly places us well past the year 6000 from Creation. The problem here is that the clear teachings of Scripture have been twisted in order to reconcile the Biblical account with the questionable records of man, in this case astronomer Claudius Ptolemy. To circumvent this problem some COG's have erred even further by cutting years away from various periods of Biblical history to make their chronology fit within the 7000 year time frame God foreshadows in Genesis 1 and 2, where the seventh 1000 year period pictures Christ's rule on Earth.
As a number of Bible commentaries testify, but unknown to most brethren, the belief that the above-mentioned edict was given by Artaxerxes Longimanus requires the historical existence of TWO leaders called Ezra and TWO leaders called Nehemiah, to harmonise the accounts in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah with the records of Ptolemy. It also requires other far-fetched explanations.
See "BIBLE CHRONOLOGY", "THE SEVEN DAY BLUEPRINT" and the chart on the "HOME" page for more details.
6) How can the Church era prior to the emergence of Herbert W Armstrong have been the "dead" Sardis era of God's Church, supposedly covering more than 350 years, when this was a "Golden Age", both in the history of man and the Church?
The years from the Reformation in the 16th century up until the second half of the 19th century undoubtedly witnessed the highest standards man has ever achieved in the areas of literature, painting, music composition, architecture, construction, craftsmanship etc, as well as in general conduct and manners. It was also a period of great Biblical awakening. The invention of the printing press and the widespread translation of the Scriptures brought about, for the first time, the opportunity for ordinary people in many countries to read God's Word in their own language.
From the early 1600's, Sabbath keeping congregations began emerging all over Britain, and subsequently the United States. In Britain these brethren endured considerable opposition from both church and state authorities, but most stood firm in the face of persecution and even imprisonment.
This period spanned the years from the courageous and inspirational reign of Queen Elizabeth I, who liberated England from Catholic oppression, until the splendour of Queen Victoria's time. This was an era that saw the emergence of the greatest empire of all time, i.e. the British Empire, as well as the greatest single nation of all time, i.e. the United States of America. It was the period in history when the Israelite nations received Abraham's blessings and were truly at their peak.
Identifying this period as "Sardis" does not add up, because it saw a proliferation of people walking with God, and so was not a period of spiritual decline or death, as Sardis is depicted in Scripture.
See the page "THE TRUE CHURCH ERAS" for more on this.
7) How can the 20th century have produced the Philadelphia era of God's Church, when during this time both the world and the Church experienced great turmoil and witnessed an enormous decline in standards and attitudes?
The 20th century saw the advent of the First and Second World Wars, the two bloodiest wars in history, which caused the death of some 100 million people. From that point on, mankind’s departure from God’s values went into freefall.
Today, as man’s 6000 years of self-rule are coming to an end, the moral deterioration of the world is at a level that would equal or surpass that of Sodom and Gomorrah. There has never been a more self-righteous, self-centred and perverse generation on this Earth. The final days of man prior to the return of Christ have seen the normalisation of depravity, and the legalisation of the violation of many of God’s laws.
The printing and distribution of the Scriptures that began in the 15th century, and the Reformation that followed, led to a high level of awareness and appreciation of all things pertaining to God which lasted for two or three centuries. In the 19th century however, a distinct reversal began to be attested to by writers of that time. Since then, there has been a rapid decline in godliness in the "Christian" nations, with every generation becoming progressively worse.
As explained on the page “THE TRUE CHURCH ERAS”, the world and the Church mirror one another.
Therefore, the slide in standards in the world has also been clearly observable in the Church, which has witnessed a serious decline in Bible knowledge, a casual attitude towards Sabbath observance, a lack of interest in spiritual matters, and the embracing of self-professed prophets.
For a world in terminal decline over the last hundred or so years to have coincided with the highly praised Philadelphia era, does not add up.
See the page "THE TRUE CHURCH ERAS" for a logical explanation of this topic.
8) Why has the Church of God in our time been told repeatedly that the Church prior to HWA's time had lost most of God's truth?
A close examination of the writings of earlier Sabbath keeping brethren shows this to be the exact opposite of the truth. The era prior to HWA was one of growth in knowledge through the widespread availability of the Scriptures. People of that era were not distracted by worldly pastimes and pleasures in the way that we are today, and so God and His Word were far more in the forefront of their lives.
These earlier writings reveal around 40 significant beliefs held by the Church prior to Herbert Armstrong's time that he continued to teach throughout his ministry.
The page "THE END TIME ELIJAH" elaborates on this.
9) Herbert W Armstrong claimed he was "the end time Elijah" who "restored all things". If he was, and if he did, how could he teach that it is not a transgression of God's law to do business on the Sabbath, i.e. visit restaurants, when this is a direct contradiction of the Word of God as recorded in Nehemiah 10:28-31 and 13:15-22?
Every prophet sent by God brought His rebuke for the transgressions of His law. For a man who called himself a prophet to actually lead people in the transgression of the fourth commandment, God's test commandment, is alarming.
Please see the page "TEN BROKEN COMMANDMENTS" for more on this crucial subject.
10) If Herbert Armstrong "restored all things", why did he, contrary to New Testament example, install "one man rule" as the form of government in the Church of God?
Jesus Christ appointed 12 apostles, not one. One man rule is the form of government employed by the "great false church". Far from restoring all things, one man rule brought the WCG to its knees after the death of HWA.
God the Father and Jesus Christ live in perfect harmony as two Beings. They plan, create and sustain Creation in total accord with each other, as expressed in the mindset of "let us make man in our image" (Gen 1:26).
On the other hand, who wants to govern as sole spiritual ruler, taking all power to himself? Who has throughout history inspired evil human dictators to do likewise, bringing much pain and misery to many people? It is Satan the devil.
Read the page "THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD" for a detailed explanation.
11) If Herbert Armstrong "restored all things", meaning all things that the early Church taught, why did he teach and practise baptism "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" when the New Testament only records baptisms in the name of the One who died for our sins, Jesus Christ?
For at least a hundred years, significant incriminating information has been available showing that the above-mentioned baptismal formula was inserted into Matthew 28:19 by believers in the Trinity.
Within Catholicism there is debate about whether the threefold baptismal formula was used from the outset or introduced later:
In a footnote to Matthew 28:19 in the Pope Pius XII inspired Jerusalem Bible it says the following: "It may be that this formula, so far as the fullness of its expression is concerned, is a reflection of the liturgical usage established later in the primitive community. It will be remembered that the Acts speak of baptising "in the name of Jesus". But whatever the variation in formula, the underlying reality remains the same" (The Jerusalem Bible, 1966, p64 - NT).
The Catholic Encyclopedia, whilst resolute in advocating the Trinitarian baptismal formula, can only offer this in regard to the formula used by the apostles and recorded in the book of Acts: "The most probable opinion, however, seems to be that the terms "in the name of Jesus" (and) "in the name of Christ" either refer to baptism in the faith taught by Christ, or are employed to distinguish Christian baptism from that of John" (see oce.catholic.com, article "Baptism", under the heading "Form").
When the late Australasia and Africa Regional Director of the Philadelphia Church of God, Max Rumler, learned the truth of this matter, he privately told the author of this website:
"Every time I've baptised someone, something in the back of my mind was telling me something was wrong".
The page "BAPTISM INTO THE TRINITY" explains this subject in detail.
12) How can Herbert Armstrong have been the "end time Elijah" when he advocated the Old Covenant practice of circumcising baby boys?
The Oct/Nov 1966 Good News magazine states that "Generally speaking, we urgently recommend circumcision of newborn infants for health and sanitary reasons" ("Are you circumcised? If not, are you breaking Gods law?", page 15-16).
Circumcision was the symbolic ritual which identified males as being part of God's nation of Israel. The Acts 15 Church conference was held mainly to address concerns about this rite under the New Covenant. As a result, the early Church stopped physical circumcision and instead taught spiritual circumcision only.
In Galatians 5:2-3, the apostle Paul says that a person who believes he needs to be physically circumcised places himself under the Old Covenant and is obligated to keep God's law perfectly in order to receive salvation.
Herbert Armstrong's reasoning was that circumcision was advisable for hygienic reasons. However, what if someone doesn't clean properly between their toes or behind their ears? Do we cut them off as well? There is nothing wrong or unhygienic with what God created. What He created was, and remains, "good" (Gen 1:31).
The Old Covenant had physical sacrifices, a physical High Priest who atoned for the people's sins once a year, a physical Temple, physical circumcision etc. The New Covenant has spiritual sacrifices and a spiritual High Priest who made atonement for the people once for all time. The Church is the spiritual Temple and requires spiritual circumcision of the heart.
13) Herbert W Armstrong learned about the keeping of God's holy days from the former SDA minister G G Rupert, who believed that he himself was the Elijah prophesied in Malachi 4. After Rupert's death, Herbert Armstrong also began keeping these days and claimed that he was the one who had restored them to the Church. However, if he was restoring a first century practice, why did he not reintroduce the first century method of determining these holy days, i.e. a calendar based on observation of the moon?
The writings of the Pharisees, known as the Mishnah, written at the end of the second century AD, show in numerous places that the calendar was, even at that time, still kept by observation, not by the much later invention of the "Hebrew Calendar", which is fixed by calculation.
In Emil Shurer's 1890 "A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ" we read "they did not in the time of Jesus Christ possess as yet any fixed calendar" and "they began a new month with the appearing of the new moon" (p366).
If Herbert Armstrong "restored all things", how could he neglect to restore the original method of determining the holy days, which was by observation? This does not add up.
Read more about this on the page "THE CALENDAR OF GOD".
14) One of the most audacious acts in the Church of God is the end time phenomenon of both Gerald Flurry (PCG) and David Pack (RCG) identifying themselves as "that Prophet", mentioned in John 1:21,25 (KJV), and referring back to Deuteronomy 18:15. Knowing that Christ warned repeatedly about deceivers coming in His name, and with John 6:14 clearly identifying Jesus Christ as the "Prophet", how can people still go along with such deceptions?
Why are some men so eager to elevate themselves over other men? Why are some men so desperate to turn other men into idols, rather than worship the invisible God?
In the final era of God's Church, many brethren have turned their favourite Church leader, be he dead or alive, into their own personal "golden calf".
Please see "THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD" and "THE END TIME ELIJAH" for more information.
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The following pages of this website will elaborate further on all the topics listed above.