Sabbath 21/3/28/120
Dear Friends,
Over the previous months we have dealt with the question of the love of the brethren and the capacity to defend one another and to defend the faith. Not surprisingly, immediately after Pentecost the Church and the brethren began to be attacked. No doubt that will continue to build up until the Reading of the Law. Each of us should examine how we reacted when those attacks came upon us. It is a useful exercise to examine our own reactions in times of stress.
We are all aware that this year is an important stage in the faith. The Reading of the Law is required to be conducted in each Sabbath Year. In each phase the reading assumes an importance relative to the witness of God. We know that the Church is followed by the Two Witnesses (No. 135), who are in turn followed by Jesus Christ. Each is a progressive and escalating step in the declaration of the faith and the judgment of the planet. It is our fond hope that this Reading of the Law by the Church will be the second witness in the sequence of the Last Days, which is then followed by the reading of the Witnesses in 2012, and then the final declaration by Jesus Christ himself before the Jubilee sequence in 2026-2027.
These sequences are critical phases in the process of bringing in the Kingdom of God. It is written that God does nothing except that He warns the people to be dealt with through His servants the prophets. Today that spirit of prophecy is carried also in the lamp stands of the Church, which Church we are. The Reading of the Law is vested in the Church that abides by and publishes the Laws of God and the Gospel of the Kingdom of God.
The end cannot come until the Church vested with the lamp stand reads the Law in each seventh year restoring the sequence of the Law of God and publishing the Gospel of the Kingdom of God as a warning to all nations, and then the end shall come. Once the Church does its duty, then the witnesses come and re-establish the nexus of the Law culminating in the return of Jesus Christ.
The Fallen Host resist this process. They will do anything they can to attack and stop this process. At the moment the world situation is such that they are limited in what they can do as they wish to bring in the final system of the Beast Power and ultimately destroy us all. To do that they are constrained in what they can do in the interim among the nations that are being used to implement this system.
Each of us is dependent upon our relationship with God. Our capacity to work with, and for each other is a measure of that relationship with God.
In this aspect, the Church of God has been dealt with on a
progressive basis since the Measuring of the
Temple (No. 137) began in 1987.
The Churches of God have degenerated into a defamatory series of organisations
and individuals that spend the time tearing at each other in the most incredible
terms and ways.
That process is a microcosm of the way the societies are degenerating. The New World Order will come together as a social structure, but it will be unable to stay together because of the dysfunctional way the individuals in the society are trained and think.
How did they actually get to such a sorry state?
The answer lies in the way they were taught to react to one another. Love of one another was not the ideal and the test of the faith. Obedience to the selective ministry was the guiding principle. Cliques developed around the way the minsters organised congregations and the divisions caused then were simply reflected in the formation of the offshoot groups as they formed and reformed.
CCG gets many strange people seeking to join it. One of the fascinating things we find is that often people assume that we are like the other Churches of God, being owned by a ministry with no responsibility or entitlements among the members. Many are baffled by our insistence on the determination and acceptance of doctrine and our administrations as formed under our Constitution.
When someone comes to us from a Church system, that has dissimilar beliefs to us, the first question that springs to mind is, “Why would they join us if they believed what this or that group believes?” When we insist that people study what we believe and prove it from the Bible and the Statement of Beliefs of the Christian Faith (A1), checking one against the other, some are offended. Much of it is from the hysterical conditioning of their induction to the faith under previous administrations. One of the Churches of God sent an evangelist around the world on a seemingly endless mission speaking against the democratic process, among other things. This was done so that people would not insist on the enforcement of the constitution of that church, so that it could be destroyed. It was so destroyed. That process and that message had nothing to do with the Holy Spirit and the Government of God whatsoever.
Does that mean that the democracy that is advocated and enforced by the current world’s systems is blessed of God? No, it does not mean that.
What is required of the brethren is to work together in these Last Days as we are measured by the way we treat and assist one another. Each day brings us closer to the coming of the Messiah. There are however, many more things yet to occur. In case you are wondering how far into the sequence we are, simply ask these questions: “What percentage of the trees of the Amazon and the Indonesian rainforests are burnt and destroyed? What percentage of the North American forests is under threat of either burning or destruction from another associated problem?” The current reported destruction is some 20% of the forests. That means only another 13% have to go worldwide before we have reached the culmination of the First Trumpet (see the papers The Seven Seals (No. 140 ) and The Seven Trumpets (No.141 ). We are living in prophecy right now. The wars of the Fifth and Sixth Trumpets are not all that far off.
Australia is in a dreadful drought right now, largely because the burning of the South American forests is causing a pollution of the skies with attendant Global Dimming, such that rainfall is seriously reduced in the Southern Hemisphere. That drought flow-on is affecting both Africa and Australia. Europe, through its pollution, has been destroying Saharan Africa and forcing drought and starvation on the millions there. The problems in Asia and Siberia are destroying North America. The capitalist system with the stock market and share driven corporate structure is destroying South America and is set to destroy the world.
What is required of us? Can we simply forget about banding together and stay at home because it is easier, or because someone hurt us in a previous congregation? The answer is “No”. We often get thanks from those in home churches for the work we do and for making it available for the home church system. Yet it never occurs to many such people to send assistance or ask what they can do to help. The body of Christ must function and we must be able to preach the Gospel of the Kingdom of God and to provide an environment that enables people to be baptised and educated in the faith among a properly organised body. To do that, love and self-sacrifice are required.
Each should ask the question: “If I disagree with these people only on administration, then why am I not with them?” We see many Churches of God that, to all intents and purposes, believe basically the same thing yet do not work together. They are apart not because of doctrine but because they do not wish to lose control of the administration and the finances. That is where we have come in the last half of the twentieth century. Now in the beginning of the twenty-first century we are ignorant of doctrine and have our minds concentrated on the self.
It does not appear to be getting all that much easier. Each year we progress through the problems of prophecy and still they do not repent. We all have problems. I am the most miserable of sinners. Yet we all have tasks to do and so few are working at them. The first thing to do is to concentrate on getting ourselves ready. Then we can worry about the specks in our brothers’ eyes.
Remember the Ascents of Moses and how they reflected the sequence of events up to the Feast of Tabernacles and the development of the relationship between the Church, as the Congregation of Israel and Jesus Christ who was the mediator with God (see the paper The Ascents of Moses (No. 70 )).
Do not be dismayed when people have ill to say of us for so they did to the apostles and prophets before us. Beware when people have good to say of us for so they did to the false prophets of old.
The time will come when no man can work but it is not yet. Pray for everyone and work for the faith to uplift everyone. Speak ill of no man. Work for the truth. God will open the eyes of the chosen and the rest will remain blind. Seeing they will not see and hearing they will not hear lest they turn and be saved before their time is come.
Love one another as God and Christ love us.
Wade Cox
Coordinator General
© Copyright 2005 Christian Churches of God, All Rights Reserved
