New Moon 1/4/34/120

Dear Friends,

This is the Fourth Month called Tammuz because of the false worship that entered Israel over the Golden Calf. The sequence is covered in the paper The Ascents of Moses (No. 70) and the paper The Golden Calf (No. 222).  It was from this time that Moses began to clean up the false systems in Israel after the law had initially been given from the beginning of the Third Month. So too the church found itself cleaning up much of its operations from the Third Month this year and now inducting many new churches from this time onwards.

We have found that we had to dismiss a small group of corrupt officers and now reorganise many churches that have been waiting for induction for a long time. You will note some changes in the East African web sites with some groups deleted and many new ones being added. Some of our faithful officers are literally travelling the length and breadth of Kenya and Tanzania interviewing each church and each officer and documenting all the brethren so we can be sure of their loyalty and dedication to the faith. We are contacting every one that has contacted us previously. So far we have something like 54 churches still awaiting inductions in Kenya and who knows how many more in Liberia, Nigeria and West Africa generally. We have also removed at least five churches in Kenya so far that are not true CCG churches with insincere coordinators or members that do not know enough or not dedicated enough to be fit for the Church of God. There will be a lot more to go.

What has impressed me most of all is the sheer dedication of most of the officers I ordained of the seventy in Kisumu in April 2009. Many had not been contacted through negligence. Many were in remote locations. They waited in faith and continued on awaiting direction from head office. They are now reorganising with renewed enthusiasm.

The importance of the faith is that we are in the Last Days and there is not long to go before the coming of the Messiah and there is not a long time left to prepare and to induct and baptise the remainder of the 144,000 and the Great Multitude of the First Resurrection. This is a job we have been entrusted with by God and one we must fulfil with diligence. Some do not understand the importance of the tasks that we are faced with and have to complete in such a short time.

Recently we were able to uncover a scam commenced by a small Roman Catholic group, the leaders of which had been involved with an RC brotherhood and who had been dismissed from them for similar reasons. In my contacts with the brotherhood we were able to put together identities and locations and we are now able to take legal action against the perpetrators. One never ceases to be amazed at the stupidity and short-sightedness of some people. To have been given the gift of salvation and then appointed to the highest rank on the planet (although not the highest in that rank) and throw it all away like Judas and Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5) for a trivial physical benefit is truly baffling. It is not a new thing. We have had to remove a number of officers over time for negligence and dishonesty. 

One is reminded of the slaughter of the idolaters at Sinai over the same period. The Levites were used to slaughter the 3000 and so too are these people being dealt with and they face spiritual death if not actual physical death. We have all seen people misuse the Churches of God and die in 40 weeks to the day for their sins.  Many of us know and saw the leader of one of the Churches of God give a sermon doing away with the Law of God. He died forty weeks to the exact hour adjusted for time difference from where the sermon was given to where he died in agony.

We have all seen God shout from the rooftops theft and dishonesty in the Churches of God. A secretary-treasurer of CCG died some forty weeks after she left CCG and was discovered to have retained tithes unlawfully. God is not mocked.

Trust is an important thing in all walks of life let alone in the Churches of God. My mother used to say when I was a child: “You can lock things up from a thief but you cannot lock things up from a liar.” I knew from a child that implicit honesty was expected of me in all things and I would be punished severely were I found to be dishonest. I expected the same standard of my children and I expect the same of their children. God expects us to swear to the truth to our own detriment. 

Neither a liar, nor a thief, will inherit the kingdom of God. Make sure that we all speak the truth in all things. No lie is found in the mouth of the 144,000.

Remember the saying at law: “Fiat justitia pereat mundus.” “Let justice be done though the world collapse.”

Do not consider the consequences of the just decision in order to alter the just decision. Do justice for justice is righteousness. Read Exodus 23:1-2. Do not raise a false report nor follow a multitude to do evil. Curiously it was a philosopher that drummed that text into me at university. I never heard it mentioned by a minister of any religion, because they all broke that ordinance regularly.

The Church of God is the Temple of God which temple we are. Do not throw away your inheritance. Let no man take your crown (Rev. 3:11). Hold on to the faith once delivered to the saints (Jude 3).

Keep order in the Body of Christ. Esteem others better than yourself. We have had to send officers to the Sudan and the CAR to settle disputes. Power is not something to be grasped at in the Churches of God. In the Sudan the organisation was settled by the votes of the coordinators of the churches. Let it be the Body of Christ that determines the leaders and we will endorse those decisions, as did Moses at Sinai under Christ’s instructions.

Let it also be remembered that no man with two wives can be a leader of God’s people. Do not seek to grasp after such a position nor cause division in the Body of Christ. It does not matter what country you come from and what laws under which you were married. You are obliged to pay for all your family and all your offspring. If you have put your wife away and married another do not go back. Let her marry and be at peace.

Remember the duties of the brethren and the officials of the church. Work together in harmony. Look to the future that lies ahead of us.

This month marks further and new development in the Churches of God and we expect to see a strengthening of the Body of Christ progressively as we move on to the Feast and further onwards into the times ahead.

Pray for our protection and our development and our growth.

Wade Cox
Coordinator General