There's Something Screwed Up in the Thinking of Some COG Leaders - and it's not Just Them.

How is it that someone with a mediocre, negligible presence in the world can possibly think they are the most important person on the face of the Earth?

Sadly, this is the case of a few of the few who believe they are kings without portfolio. They talk, they act, and they think in such a way that you might believe they really are carrying out a mission not unlike the characters of Biblical fame. They truly believe that they are some sort of Superman - carrying out a message of warning as the only human who has that message of divine commission.

The problem of this is, that they are not alone. Not by any means. There are those who have this exact thinking from every little nob and corner in the wide world of religion, regardless if it is Christian, Judaism, Islam, Hindu, Buddhist, or any other iteration of religion that you can possibly bring up. Just to bring this point to life, simply go to YouTube and you will find hundreds to maybe even thousands of "prophets", "ministers", or "enlightened" people, each of then claiming they have divine inspiration in their words and their message - often with a warning of some sort of punishment if you don't believe it, or something like that.

I recall once, about 12 or so years ago, I was at a mainstream Christian event which had over 100,000 people in attendance. There was a lady there who claimed to be a prophet - and this was just after Hurricane Katrina. She was walking around on the stage in a fanatical frenzy, making proclamations about how Hurricane Katrina was the beginning of the end and within seven years or so it would all have worked inland and bring this nation to it's knees - and that hurricanes from that point on would get worse and worse. Of course, the crowd gobbled it up and soaked it all in, with the assortment of "Praise God's" and "Hallelujah's" interspersed within the crowd. This scenario never turned out. In fact, the following years really quieted down from the insane hurricane season of 2005.

There was another person I remember who claimed that they got a message from God that something would happen on an international level. It did not. This was fully presumptuous.

I know of an individual who was wrapped up in the "Name it, Claim it" doctrine of Word of Faith who would take God's authority and command people to be healed, command cancer to leave, speak it out - and then, nothing would happen, and one person that this person declared this too died. Another person told me once that sickness was a lie and they weren't really sick. That all they had to do was realize it was a lie and believe they were not sick, and they wouldn't be. I challenged that person and told them I have seen people believe that and die (because they didn't take care of themselves, thinking they were miraculously OK). This individual was forced to admit that people did end up dying who believed this, but that that does not invalidate God's Word. Where's the disconnect? Why can't people see it? Do they care to see it? Are they afraid to admit something might not be correct with their belief?

Which brings us back around to the COG Scene. Take Ronald Weinland, who has probably been the most pronounced, and the most epic prophetic failure of the entire Armstrong Church of God movement. Ronald got extremely specific, made extremely specific predictions, and even made promises as to what he would do if his prophecies failed. Of course, the prophecies failed spectacularly, and he never kept his promises as to what he'd do if they failed (I.E., quit prophesying). Then, he modified the dates (the first one was 2008, ten years ago!) to many other dates, and the next failure is about six or seven months from now.

We have another one - Dave Pack - who made specific predictions and point after point about things happening in 2013 that would bring everyone into HIS church - which ended up being nothing but fantasy, delusion, disappointment, and falsehoods. When proven wrong, deletions after deletions happened - because nothing ever happened like what was said to happen.

And these are not the only ones. The Armstrong movement has a long and detailed track record of "prophets" who think they know what's going to happen - and not one of them does. Not one. And out of the hundreds of people who have jumped out of the scattered and chaotic fold of Armstrongism trying to be King ("Everybody Wants to be the Pastor General"), not one of them has had one message that has made even the slightest impact on anyone in the world. It is not an exaggeration that out of the billions of people on the Earth - nearly no one - less than 0.00001% - knows a THING about Armstrongism, Dave Pack, Ron Weinland, Bob Thiel, James Malm, United, Living, Philadelphia, or any other offshoot of Herbert Armstrong's once slightly more obvious ministry. And yet, like all of the others - regardless of religion or denomination - they think that they are reaching everybody, just based on internet hits, or views, or whatever. I would challenge them to find ten converts out of every 500,000 internet views over a ten year period that are long-term disciples of one particular leader, excluding long-time COG members, who have not wised up or left., or fallen into doubt and moved on.

This grandiose way of thinking happens to people of all religions, all denominations, all groups, all ideologies. It happens to people who visit Jerusalem (the Jerusalem Syndrome). It happens to local pastors of local churches (who claim a world-reaching ministry, when they hardly reach their own community). They have this dream, this vision, this idea of being important in the religious world - reaching the pinnacle of evangelism and being anything from a witness to a Two Witness, to an Elijah or any other biblical character you can think of. Some even don white garb, or prayer towels, or other religious paraphernalia to increase their stature or appearance of knowledge. They are quick to condemn, and even to curse their opponents, using fear and prophesy as tools of power and deceit everywhere they go and with everything they do. They are smooth, cunning talkers who are quick to make people fear a date, or a time, only for it to pass and the victim to shake their head with a "What was I Thinking!" incredulous look. And then the cycle repeats. and again. And again.

Each one of them misses the point. Each one of them beats around the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And most of them seek to take your money to support their "ministry" of falsehoods, deceit, and false prophecy. Most of them refuse to stop doing the evil they do, even though they promise to do so, and sadly, a good amount of them genuinely believe they are right, and that they are who they say they are. It's a sad example of religion gone rotten, and I do mean, rotten to the core. Every one of them ends up in disappointment and spectacular failure.

Because they have a messed up theology because of the messed up theology of the founder of the whole mess of Armstrongism, there is little truth in them (All of them a smidgen of truth - enough to make you believe their words!). They - unintentionally or not - deceive, lie, distort, and pervert the Gospel of Jesus Christ, pulling people - unintentionally or not - away from the faith and the personal relationship with Jesus Christ, seeing only disillusionment and dishonesty. It's a trap from the pits of the depths of hell. It's a travesty against the Gospel. It's heresy, and it's abominable. And tasty for those who fall for it for a minute - until it's bitter center is exposed.

The only thing that will stop the cycle of spiritual abuse from those who take advantage of the 2% of all listeners that might unfortunately fall upon the smooth words of these deceivers are people who stand up and speak out about these scams. The only way to stop the lies is to share the truth.