The Wonderful World Tomorrow

 

The World Tomorrow.

It was the final hope, and dreams, and aspirations of anyone and everyone who was involved in the religion of Armstrongism. We knew in our hearts and minds that there was no such thing as heaven. No, such a belief and such a way of thinking was a deception brought on by years and years of deception by the Catholic Church, we were taught. Certainly there is no such thing as an immortal soul – we thought such a belief was blasphemy. Why, when you die, you just die. You didn't go to heaven – scriptures in the Psalms prove that, we thought. Believing that we could “go to heaven” was akin to accepting everything the world stood for – everything wrong about religion – everything against what the pastor general had revealed to us. Anyone who believed that, we thought, didn't know the Bible and certainly didn't know God. We were proud of knowing “the truth”, and we knew that the second that you died, in our mind, the next thing that you'd see is the face of Jesus while rising in the air as a spirit being at the time of the second coming of Jesus Christ.

But we wouldn't rise “all the way” - that was against our beliefs. We'd instead, after meeting Jesus halfway up in the sky (I'm guessing it was about the height of a jetliner), come right back down with Jesus enforcing the Kingdom of God as it begins on the earth. We believed we would be pioneers in reconstructing a whole new world – a world that would slowly learn the ways of God as we enforced with power and strength Jesus' command and conquering rule over the rebellious who refused to submit to the kingship of Jesus Christ.

So much had to be done, we would imagine. Cities would have to be rebuilt. Weapons would have to be retransformed to plowshares. Water systems would have to be re-constructed. Debris from the tribulation would need to be cleared away. Grass, flowers and beautiful trees would need to be replanted. Buildings and fountains (lots of fountains!) would need to be constructed along with parks and recreational areas that would enjoy the ever beautiful weather.

Lions and Tigers and all sorts of previously wild animals, we believed, would now be tame and able to be petted. Pets that were unable to be kept as pets would be able to be kept as pets now under the

reign of Jesus Christ – lions dwelling wih lambs, peacefully playing with children. Snakes that would not bite, and birds that would land gently in your hand. 

 

All would have to go to church on the Sabbath day – and the holy days would be kept by everyone. Those who refused to go to the holy days would be under a suffering plague – as we took Zachariah 14 literally. We would be the ones to enforce the rules strictly and severely. We literally would force the world to be happy, removing all doubt from them and making them pay the piper for their wrong choices. The World Tomorrow, the beautiful utopian fantasy land of a paradise – would be our domain with Christ to force people to learn that God's way works. And it would take a thousand years to teach them exactly how to be a real Christian – the Armstrong way.

To get there, of course, we had to qualify – we had to make it. We had to endure every temptation, and make it through every trial. We had to trust God in all things, and obey His ministers in every area. We could not doubt, nor could we question – to make it, we payed, we prayed, and we shut our mouths and trudged on, taking every fall and hit as a test and temptation instead of self-imposed agony. After all, we – the Church – were future kings, and priests – and the only ones in the whole world to understand the plan of God and be a ruling part of the soon-coming Wonderful World Tomorrow. We knew what it would be like – and in our minds, we knew we would be there – in just a very few short, little years – certainly never past the year 2000.