Once And Future Kingdom - Part II

In the first part of this series, we looked at how the Armstrongist view of the Kingdom has some contradictions. Contradictions in who it belongs to, where it is, and when it is. We saw that they are only contradictions when the Gospel butts heads with Herbert Armstrong's Adventist demands for prophecy. In other words, the belief that these things are all for a future time with very little if anything for the present besides an exclusive promise. I proposed a both/and approach. A little now, a lot more later. The once and future kingdom.

At the end of that post, I said we need to go back to the past. The events leading up to the first century church tell so very much more of the story of the Gospel and the Kingdom. The good news is so much more than just a chance to win a prize in the far future. This is definitely "once and future kingdom" material we're getting into.

This is a post about what the Gospel is, and your part in it.

A word of warning... There is a lot packed in here. I do not intend to flesh out. I am only going to skim the surface. You might want to dig in more on your spare time.

MI CHAMOCHA BA'ELIM ADONAI
(Who is like You, O Lord, among the gods?)

If you recall from my post "Just What Do You Mean ... Gospel?", an euangelion is about wars and kings, their birth and accomplishments. Those things are what a gospel was to people in the first century. When they heard "euangelion", those are the things they thought of. Kings and accomplishments. That is entirely true here. There was a grand victory imminent in Jesus' day, and it was not only about Jesus dying for our sins. But to see it, you need to understand the backstory. This is the highly abbreviated backstory.

-----

In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve ate the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. This act, and the knowledge that came with it, guaranteed their deaths. It also initiated the plan of salvation. In other words, it also guaranteed Jesus' death. The plan absolutely required a death (HEB. 9: 22) because God is not only a God of love but of justice, and both need to be satisfied. The plan of salvation commenced immediately. It is important for today's post to be aware of this fact.

Mankind was then evicted from the Garden, partly in punishment and partly for their own safety. There is something about that good Tree of Life that concerned God. If Adam and eve ate from it, they would be in terrible trouble. They were already alienated from God for certain, but if they ate from that other tree, irredeemably so. See my post "Banished Or Saved From Eden?" for more.

Mankind was now on its own, each one sinning, and sin was growing worse and worse in the world. God eventually decided to end the experiment. Good news for us, Noah changed His mind about that (GEN. 6: 7-8). We lived to sin another day!

Mankind, ever immune to good sense, learned precisely nothing from all of that. We built cities and filled them with idols. We worshipped everything that walked or crawled. We even decided we were going to build structures that ascend toward the sky so we could walk among the gods.

There wasn't just one Tower of Babel. Ziggurats dotted the landscape. If you only read the Bible, you miss a lot of the details of what the people who built the Tower of Babel were really doing. The gods preferred to live in gardens and on mountains, you see. The higher, the better. But here's an idea -- what if we build our own mountain? Ancient documents from Mesopotamia seem to indicate the ziggurats were meant to recreate the environment the gods lived in, so to bring the gods closer to men in order to extract magic and knowledge from them more easily. If you had a mountain in your city, your god could live there, right in your back yard, and your priests could commune with them directly and hopefully get from them knowledge and protection and all sorts of things. As an added bonus, it makes the king look pretty important. That's just what they did.

The question many people have is -- did it work? Some think it might have.

God found this to be quite enough. He decided to disown mankind. If they didn't want to retain Him, the God of gods (JOS. 22: 22; DAN. 2: 47), as their God, then so be it. He gave them what they wanted. He placed them under the control of lesser spirit beings. You can get a short glimpse behind the curtain in this regard in Daniel 10: 13, 20-21. Paul called them, principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this age, spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places (EPH. 6: 12).

So, God scattered mankind and left them to their fate (GEN. 11: 9). These people would eventually be called Gentiles - "the nations". God would bring about the plan of salvation without them. The Messiah would not come through them. They were banished to their false gods and their idols of wood and stone.
The true God would only be accessible by one nation, whom He reserved for Himself out of all the earth: Israel. One tiny nation in a speck of land. Immediately after the Tower of Babel incident, God called Abraham. Through Abraham, a Gentile, Israel would be built. Israel would be the means for the arrival of the Savior.

Notice something here. Even from the very beginning of the Gentile banishment, Abraham was meant to bring about the undoing of this Gentile punishment.

(GEN. 12: 3b) And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

That good news right there is referring to Jesus. The Gentiles were banished, but not permanently.

The challenge was keeping Israel in tact until the Messiah could come. God's chosen people needed to remain separate from the Gentiles and their idolatry (GAL. 3: 24-25). After all, idolatry is what set this path in motion in the first place. Can't have that. But it's more than just statues and decorations and trinkets. The Gentiles were given over to devils. This is very real. If Israel followed after the Gentiles, they would belong to devils, too.

(EXO. 20: 3-5a) I am Yahweh [the LORD] your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 3 You shall have no other gods before Me. 4 You shall not make for yourself a carved image - any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; 5 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous [zealous/passionate] God...

Well, that didn't go smoothly, even with priesthood and the promises and the law and the prophets. You won't even get through the book of Judges and the Israelites are already failing. Israel did not keep themselves from idolatry, so off they went to Assyria. Judah took the mantle. Judah did even worse than Israel! So, off they went to Babylon.
Persia eventually allowed them back, where they rebuilt and started again. They overcorrected and went into the other ditch. They turned Torah into an idol, and the law into an end unto itself. Malachi's message was they had failed in almost every expectation, the priesthood was useless, and their Covenant was an utter trainwreck.
Yet, they succeeded in this, the most important mission: the Savior did arrive. The world owes Israel a debt of gratitude.
...and then they killed Him.
To be entirely frank, we all killed Him, in our own way.

Who is man that You should be mindful of him?

Mankind, proving ourselves utterly unworthy over and over, were whittled down and whittled down until there was only one small, poor, unassuming family, from the wrong side of the tracks, robbed of their royal birthright, sheltered in a barn of all places. Just when things seem darkest and most hopeless, the Savior is born. An euangelion can include the birth of kings. The long-awaited arrival of the Savior was the first part of the good news to the people of Jesus' day.

(LUK. 2: 14) Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace to people of good will.

Are we sure the Gospel isn't about Jesus? Not even a little?

(EXO. 15: 11) “Who is like You, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like You, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?

FORWARD TO THE PAST, MARTY!

Euangelion is about the births of kings and their accomplishments. If the first part of the Good News was the Savior had arrived, the second part of the Good News was the time for the restoration of Babylon had also arrived.

Wait. What? The restoration of Babylon?? Yes!

Don't take that in the wrong way. I don't mean Babylon would be rebuilt, as a doomsday worldview would be inclined to take it. I mean something quite different than that. I mean a healing. A reformation.
Not the restoration of that evil empire called Babylon. I mean a healing of what happened after the Tower of Babel.

The time for the restoration of the scattering that happened at Babylon, and the promise that Abraham would bless all nations, had arrived. The Jews were waiting for the regathering of scattered Israel ("Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?"), but the real story was much more than just that. The Gentile banishment was over, and the Gentiles would be gathered as well.

(ACT. 1: 8b) ...you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.

It is easy to see the Jews expected to be regathered, and somewhat easy to see how God will one day restore Eden, but it is not so obvious that God would regather the Gentiles to Himself as well. Not so obvious until you go looking for it (PSA. 67: 2-4; PSA. 72: 17; ISA. 11: 10-12; 40: 22; 42: 1-4; 49: 6; 56: 7; 60: 1-3; 62: 2; 66: 19; JER. 4: 2; 16: 19; DAN. 7: 14; ZEC. 9: 9-10; ZEP. 2: 11; MAL. 1: 11). Just look at all of those. It's there! Hidden in plain sight. Hinted at. Here a little, there a little.

Israel became the means to bring the Messiah after Babel, but the plan to bring the Messiah began before there was an Israel. Indeed, the plan was initiated in Eden. The Savior of Israel is for all mankind, not just Israel.

Think of Jesus' first coming as a pivot point. History progressed to this point - or maybe regressed down to it - but now the direction is reversed. We are going backward. Or is it forward, to the past? The ultimate goal is to get back to Eden. But first we needed to undo what happened at Babylon. 

Recall that after the Tower of Babel event, these two things happened: 1) humanity was split into Jew and Gentile, and 2) Gentiles were given to the control of lesser, created spirit beings.

At first, all preaching was to the Jews only, then Peter preached to the Gentiles, and then Paul was sent to bring the Gospel to them. Gentiles were to be gathered with the Jews.

(GAL. 3: 28) There is neither Jew nor Greek [Greek here represents the idea of Gentile], there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Now, in the church era, the division between Jew and Gentile is gone. They are no longer split. But let's not ignore that second part. Jesus is taking back the Gentiles from the lesser spirit beings and the idolatry they were given up to.

It was no coincidence that Jesus had the discussion He did right at the "Gates of Hell", a pagan holy site called the Cave of Pan, at Caesarea Philippi. It was there God the Father inspired Peter to declare Jesus the Son of God, and it was there Jesus openly declared war on the lesser spirit beings. From that moment on, He prepared the Apostles for His death. His victory would come in the form of a resurrection and a church, and the Gates of Hell wouldn't withstand them (MAT. 16: 13-21).

It was no coincidence that on the very first Pentecost, as people from scattered areas all around the realm stood listening to the Apostles preach, they all heard and understood the message (ACT. 2: 1-11). This miracle was symbolically the reversal of the confusion of languages. Where there was scattering and confusion, now there was gathering and understanding.

(MAR 1: 15) The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.

This is such a pivotal verse! The time was fulfilled back then. The Kingdom of God was at hand back then. This was why Jesus declared the Kingdom of God was at hand, because the effort had begun. He has delivered [past tense] us from the power of darkness and conveyed [past tense] us into the kingdom of the Son of His love  (COL. 1: 13).
In other words, anyone from that time on who accepted Jesus as their Lord were then snatched away from the powers and principalities in the Kingdom of Death and transferred into the Kingdom of Life.

The Apostles got their theology from the Old Testament. You recall Isaiah 9: 6-7, the verses that start "For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given" (v6). A child is born. That is one of the parts of euangelion. It talks about His glorious titles and His government on the throne of David. Then, it says this, "From that time forward, even forever" (v7). I want to state that again - "from that time forward". Notice it doesn't say anything about His second coming in these two verses.

I could go on and on with more verses. The Sheet Vision, the dialogue in Acts 15 and 21, the two loaves of the Wave Loaf ceremony at Pentecost which were made from the Wave Sheaf at Passover, the Prodigal Son, etc etc. (Like I said, I am not going to flesh everything out here.) The banishment of Gentiles created after Babylon is undone! The reclamation of the Gentiles is a big part of the reason why we needed a New Covenant - the Gentiles who were excluded from the Old Covenant needed to be included, too.

If a victory at Marathon was euangelion, how much more was this! If the Jews were in diaspora, how much more the Gentiles? The Gentiles were rejected for 2,000+ years, removed from the face of God, but now the promise to Abraham has come. That is exceedingly good news! (It's not a competition. Both are being regathered.)

Are we sure the Gospel isn't about Jesus? Not even a little?

(ROM. 1: 16) For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek.

The power of God, it says. Which of these two projects a message of power:

A) "You have a chance to win! Avoid certain meats, Sabbath really hard, and believe you might make it."
-or-
B) "I have been given all authority. I am taking you back to Myself. I have declared war on the powers in heaven and they will not withstand Me. Repent and believe."
??

I am choosing B.

The Gentiles were reclaimed in power and authority. By no means is the Kingdom only about the second coming. It includes the second advent, yes, but that is the culmination of efforts, not the start of it. And what do we see at the second coming, when the effort is complete?

(ISA. 21: 9) And look, here comes a chariot of men with a pair of horsemen!” Then he answered and said, “Babylon is fallen, is fallen! And all the carved images of her gods He has broken to the ground.”

(REV. 18: 2) And he cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird!

In Hebrew, repeating something twice in a row like that is a way to emphasize an idea. The "is fallen, is fallen" means VERY fallen. It is a complete fall.

There are those - whose prophecies fail over and over and over again - who tell us Babylon is the Catholic Church. Oh, if only it were that simple. I am unhappy to inform you they are woefully short of the mark on just what Babylon really is and where it is. You're soaking in it, right now.

THE WORLD TODAY

If we hadn't reviewed the past nature of the Gospel of the Kingdom, there might be someone out there still wondering what does the Gospel of the Kingdom have to do with the present. As you can see, it has much to do with the present.

Herbert Armstrong said the coming Kingdom of God is the Gospel. Prophecy. Adventism. That is what the Kingdom is in Armstrongism. The Gospel is diced up, huge parts tossed out, then everything that remained is kicked into the future. A future you can only participate in if you are legalist failings make you fearful enough to pay, pray, and stay with your Armstrongist splinter church.
But the future is only part of the story. An important part! But not so important that we should ignore the present reality because of it.

That post "Just What Do You Mean ... Gospel?" addressed how the Gospel is not only about the future. The Gospel is about who Jesus is, what He preached, and what He accomplished. The post "Once And Future Kingdom - Part I" addressed the Kingdom is both/and. The Kingdom is the Father's and the Son's and ours, in heaven and on earth, now and in the future. It's all of the above. A little now, a lot more later. Once we untie them from being only about the future, we can see how there indeed was an immediate message for the people of Jesus' day.

We still needed to flesh out what that message for the present is. That is what today's post is meant to do.
It would help if you stop relying on material from people who really are only interested in pushing an Adventist narrative of prophecy and a cherry-picked list of laws.

What happened at Babylon is reversed. All things that separated Jew from Gentile is undone. All that was banished is reclaimed. All authority that was given to the principalities and powers is revoked and given to Jesus. And all of this was done at that time. He declared war on them - on the principalities and powers. It is about God vs all that opposes Him. That effort is our task today.
We are ambassadors in Babylon of the Kingdom of God.

The Gospel message is complex. When we tie in yet another post "The Gospel and the Powers In Heavenly Places", we see the Gospel is not just good news for mankind, it's also terrible news for false gods and idols. Their power is revoked. Their captives are freed. We are no longer theirs, they are fired, case dismissed, we are free to go.

Are we really sure the Gospel isn't about Jesus and what He accomplished at His first coming? Not even a little?

What does it say if you are fearfully awaiting judgment because you didn't Sabbath hard enough? Where is your citizenship? Whose family are you in? Don't you know who He is? Don't you know who you are? You don't know if you will be in the Kingdom or not until you're there (or not)?? That is the message of fear and doubt, not assurance and faith. How can you deliver a message of power to others if you lack that message in your own church? How much less when your church commands you not to deliver a message to others at all, because you aren't qualified and they are fallen and cannot receive the Gospel?? That isn't a message in power by any stretch of the imagination! That does not reflect Jesus' accomplishments, or His authority, or the reclamation of the Gentiles.

My underlying point in this post is about who you are. Right now. If you have incredible value in the future, then it stands to reason you have that value right now. Value that has been sapped away from you by a message of hunting through news reports for tragedies and lamenting your failures to keep the law as you think you should have. What I am telling you is, you don't need to wait for some untouchable future. You have assurances right now -> because of who you are --> because of who Jesus is and what He really did accomplish. Because of the Gospel. The REAL Gospel ...of the Kingdom.

The Gospel of the Kingdom wasn't just about, "Good news, everyone! I will be back in a few thousand years. For now, shut up, grab your folding chair and head to the Alps, and hope for tragedies in Judea until I get back. And if you Sabbath hard enough, and vacuum enough crumbs at Passover, you might just get collected up! Who knows?" The absurdity of that statement of mine reflects the absurdity of the Armstrongist position. Think about it.
Jesus shows up exactly when He did for no discernable reason, goes through all of this ... and then intentionally keeps most people from turning to Him while He waits thousands of years for permission to restore His Kingdom? Ridiculous! In His 7,000 year plan, He spends the last 2,000 of that sitting around, calling at most 24 people - of ancient Israeli descent, specifically - per year (144,000 people / 6,000 years = 24 people per year). Nonsense! In the "last days" He calls a series of plagiarizing, self-aggrandizing, false prophets to heap titles to themselves (like Spokesman of the Two Witnesses, Elisha, Zerubbabel, and The Inkhorn, to name just a few) and to build auditoriums around the United States. Ludicrous! And it all hinges on your personal ability to adhere to a cherry-picked list of laws you don't actually keep. Is that a powerful Gospel? No!

CONCLUSION

Have I melted anyone's brain today? I do apologize. There is much to chew on here. I wish I could flesh it all out. Such is the way of blog posts. I do not have the time or space.

Today, we saw the Gospel of the Kingdom of Heaven is for the world today and tomorrow. We saw how mankind messed up epically in turning to other, lesser "gods". So, they were given over to what they wanted. We saw how the plan of salvation marched on all the same through Israel, and then Judah, getting whittled down more and more as it went until there was only one poor family in a barn. We saw how all authority was given to Jesus at that time, and He and declared war on those principalities and powers at that time. He redeemed us right out from under them, and they helped Him do it. The Gospel is great news for us, but terrible news for the principalities and powers. We saw how Babylon has been reversed, both the Jews and Gentiles are reunited, and we are marching back to Eden together, where this mess began, reclaiming the lost as we go. We saw how there is yet a goal to return to Eden. We are not there yet. The battle goes on.

This is a big part of why faith is so important in the New Covenant. We need to choose our loyalty. Will it be Jesus, who is true God and has real authority and died for us, or will it be devils, who are called gods and usurp authority and want you to die for them? Take your pick.
Choose the sovereignty of Yahweh, have assurance of what is not fully here at this time, and then stay loyal to it. That is your New Covenant calling. That is why the Gospel is in power and assurance (ROM. 1: 16; I THS. 1: 5).

To commence is not to complete. In part I of this series, we talked a lot about how things are partial now but will have a fuller fulfillment in the future. It's the same here. The Great Commission will not be finished until He returns a second time. It's a process. Therefore, we see the time had come and the time was yet to come. The Kingdom was at hand and waits for a future enlargement. You don't have to pick one or the other. It's both! Like a mustard seed, it grows and grows. Yet, it is no less a mustard plant when it is small. We may have reversed Babylon, but we haven't gotten back to Eden. That's our true destination - Eden. So, you see, it's both now and future.

Forcing all these things into a purely future fulfillment makes absolutely zero sense, especially given all the verses that say He received His Kingdom right then and there, and how we are citizens of that Kingdom today. It distorts the reality of the Kingdom into something unrecognizable. The verses and plotlines one has to throw away in order to keep this view grossly outweigh those retained.
I contend the only reasonable solution is one that merges the now with the then. A little now, a lot more then. That is the answer you have been searching for all these years. The once and future kingdom.

And if you were wondering, yes, there is a lot more to it that I haven't gone into here. There is a bunch more for you to explore on your own. For example, just read Miller Jones' article "The Kingdom of God: A Different Kind of Authority". 

I pray the Holy Spirit guides you to a prayerful study and a deeper understanding of the Gospel and your part in it.

************

It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

************

The Gospel and The Powers In Heavenly Places

(EPH. 3: 9-11) ... 9 and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ; 10 to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, 11 according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord...

Have you ever noticed these verses? I know you've read them and had them read to you, but have you ever stopped to contemplate them? There are some very deep, very strange ideas in there.

What do you see in that verse there? There are (at least) three very important points:
1) Something was hidden from the very beginning.
2) It is now being revealed by the church to the "principalities and powers in the heavenly places".
3) It has to do with what Jesus accomplished.

VERY deep stuff there.

How often have you heard messages about this? God has sent the church to deliver a message about what Jesus has done not necessarily to the world (only) but to some vague spiritual authorities. Not often, I'd wager.

What do you not see there?
The law.

You can imagine these verses to be speaking about a range of things, but among the least likely is the Old Covenant law.

Was the law hidden? No. The law was a lot of things but hidden is not one of them. So the thing hidden was not the law.
Was the law being revealed? No. It was never hidden, so it was not being revealed by the church. One thing Armstrongism has stressed over the years in order to maintain its own sense of election is that the law is only revealed to those who have the Holy Spirit in-dwelling. If the law is being revealed to those outside the church, that claim would have to be false.
Was the law what Jesus accomplished? Jesus did fulfill the law! Of these three points, the law only seems to fit here. That would be fine if this point stood alone, but it does not. Taken all together, the law only fits 1/3 of the equation. So, it is not a good fit after all.
Just look at the target audience - spiritual authorities. Are spirit beings going to be surprised by a weekly Sabbath? "Curses! Foiled again by doing nothing for one in seven days! Why didn't we see this coming? If only there had been like a Decalogue or something." No. The law is not a good fit.

If the law is the least likely, what is the most likely to fit all three?
The Gospel.

CHRISTIANITY 101

I need to briefly remind you of the Gospel.

If you are not from an Armstrongist background, you might be wondering why I am about to explain the Gospel. The answer is because what Mainstream Christianity understands the Gospel to be is not what Armstrongism understands the Gospel to be.

As a rapid summary, Armstrongism believes the Gospel to be about the coming Kingdom of God and how those who follow Herbert Armstrong's message of Old Covenant law-keeping will be promoted to rulers in the Millennial period. They teach the Gospel is not about Jesus Christ or His accomplishments or the salvation by faith. Now, many will say that's a grossly oversimplified summary. Granted. It is. But it is nonetheless accurate, and this post is not about what Armstrongism believes the Gospel to be. I am only mentioning this at all to show the contrast.

If one were to ask us at ABD how we would summarize the Gospel, we would say it is thus:

“Jesus was a literal man as well as literally God. The second person of the godhead became a man, lived to fulfill the law and the prophets, died as a propitiation for our sins, and was resurrected in fulfillment of scripture on the third day. This was planned before the foundation of the world. His death destroyed the Old Covenant and ratified the New Covenant. He now lives in Heaven as the executor of the promises of God towards us, the undeserving beneficiaries. Man was hopelessly condemned to death, and the Gentiles disinherited from any participation with God and given over to the rule of idolatrous gods. Israel was called as a means to bring the Messiah into the world. Jesus the Messiah paid the ransom in full to redeem mankind from death and idolatrous gods, to tear down all that separates Jew from Gentile, fulfill God's justice, to offer God's mercy and grace, and to finish the work of salvation. The Gentiles are at long last again invited to participate with God. By humble faith in Jesus Christ, a Christian receives absolute forgiveness of sin as well as the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and with the Holy Spirit comes participation in the body of Christ, and with participation in Christ comes inheritance with Christ in such things as the promise God made to Abraham. The proof of the Spirit's involvement is fruitful Christian growth throughout our lifetime; we will never come near to perfection in this flesh. Therefore, salvation is absolutely guaranteed - for the faithful who remain in faith - by the life, death, and life of Jesus Christ our Savior, and nothing besides. It is by promise, not by law. This is God's good pleasure. Glory to God!”

Do you see how that fits better than law? That Gospel message was hidden but not impossible to find, it was revealed by Jesus, and it is an affront to the powers. And that's what Paul leads with in Ephesians 3.

We have a lot more detail on the Gospel at the very top of our FAQ page.

THE GREAT COMMISSION

I needed to briefly review the Gospel so I could review the Great Commission.

The Great Commission, which most people recognize, is:

(MAT. 28: 18-20) 18 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.

Armstrong taught "observe all things that I have commanded you" is a reference to the Old Covenant law. I disagree. But that's beside the point. I want to focus on something else. Once again, there is something hidden here. It is hidden in plain sight, and it goes hand-in-hand with Ephesians 3.

Note how it starts with a declaration of Jesus' authority. Why? Because, precisely as Paul says in Ephesians 3: 10, one of the purposes of all this is for the church to proclaim a message to the principalities and powers in heavenly places. It is not just God's wisdom, it's not just His accomplishments on the cross, it's not just the gift to mankind, but His intent and His authority to accomplish His intent.

To say this as plainly as I can --
God disinherited the Gentiles after Babylon, giving them over to idolatry and demons. Israel alone was kept by God as His people (DEU. 32: 9). With Jesus, the Gentiles are now reclaimed by God, taking them away from idolatry and demons. That message to be delivered is, to take a phrase from the television show The Apprentice, "You're fired!" The church by its very nature proclaims this message to those powers.

So, when I say the Gospel fits all three, I hope you can now see why I say that.

The commission Jesus gave to the Apostles was to get the ball rolling. The time of the powers is over. Go into the world and win people back to God away from the powers in heavenly places that oppress them. And the Apostles would call disciples to join themselves to the Body of Christ, and they would call others, and so on and so forth until this very day.

When Jesus was here, He took the Apostles to the temple of Pan at Caesarea Phillipi and that is where He purposefully initiated a conversation that led to Peter confessing He is the Son of God, and where He predicted His death and resurrection, and where He told them to follow Him (MAT. 16). This is yet another summary of the points Paul made.
This was all done for an important reason. He stood at a temple of the powers and proclaimed His identity, His authority, and His mission right in front of them. He declared war. The powers were about to be replaced and their people taken from them. And from this point on, His ministry was headed full-steam to the cross.

In the same way, Jews from areas controlled by these powers were preached to by Peter on that first Pentecost. In the same way, Paul was sent to areas controlled by these powers. These were all the same areas mentioned in Genesis 10, which we call "the table of nations."

Do you see how it all fits? All was for a reason. All had a purpose. All the biblical narrative flows. God is working in stages to restore Eden.

NOT THE LAW

The law, which was introduced to guard Israel during that period between Abraham and Jesus, was never intended to reclaim the Gentiles. The Old Covenant and its law specifically excludes the Gentiles. It cannot be the message spoken of here. It was only intended to guard Israel until their destiny could be realized (GAL. 3: 19). The law is not the message to the powers in heavenly places that their reign over the Gentiles has ended. The church being joined to Jesus in faith is.

God called Abraham shortly after the Babylon event. He called a Gentile first to be the father of Israel and later to be the father of all the faithful. Israel, as rebellious as it often was, is owed a debt of gratitude by all Gentiles for the purpose they ultimately fulfilled despite themselves - the coming of the Messiah. The Messiah had come and the usefulness of the Old Covenant was depleted. The New Covenant was instituted. (Read all of Galatians 3.) The breach at Babylon is healed, the Gentiles are no longer disinherited, and God is taking back what is rightfully His.

This was always the plan. It was a hidden plan.

(I COR. 2: 6-8) 6 However, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, 8 which none of the rulers of this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

The law we knew. It excluded us and killed us. The Gospel, on the other hand, we did not know. It welcomes us and gives us life.

CONCLUSION

Did you know you are to give a message to powers in heavenly places? You do now!

This message is one the powers will not appreciate receiving - Jesus is Lord and He is taking back what is His.

This is a post about the Old Covenant law and the Gospel, and how the message of Christianity is not about Sabbath-days and meats. The Gospel really is about Jesus Christ after all, and our participation with Him in faith.

The base message of Armstrongism is primarily in two parts: the Old Covenant law, and the second coming of Christ. In this view, from the days of the Apostles until the second coming, the church is a tiny and insular group that practically hides form the world. Its main message is to sit around once a week avoiding pork and making sure "Church of God" is somewhere in your group's name. How is this of value given what we read in Ephesians 3?
It isn't. Only the Gospel explains what we read in Ephesians 3.

Once again, we find what Herbert Armstrong taught is off the mark.

Now, don't hate me for this, but I intentionally left this post a little vague. I am not going deep into explaining these things. I am not reviewing the details of how God's intent was hidden in plain sight from Abraham's day. I am not telling you who these powers are. I am not explaining why Jesus had all authority at his resurrection but to this very moment we still we see these powers are active in the world. I am not touching on the second coming and what ultimately is the end of these powers. I do this for a reason. I hope to whet your appetite to explore this line of thinking more deeply on your own.

This is a gigantic topic, dear reader. If you want to explore it you might want to be ready for a wild ride. Take my word for it!

God bless you and keep you.

************

It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

************

What the "Holy Day Plan of Salvation" Means for You

Last time, we looked at the someone tenuous origins of the traditional Church of God doctrine that the Hebrew holy days represent God's ongoing, progressive plan of salvation for humanity. I also threatened, or rather, promised to explain why I find this doctrine so troubling.

So what's my problem with the holy day “plan”? Besides that it's just a theory passed off as rock-solid, salvific Bible truth? A theory used by many in the COGs to self-righteously disparage what they call "counterfeit Christianity". Those are issues, for sure. But they're not the biggest one.

The COG's teachings on plan of progressive salvation diminishes the significance of Christ's sacrifice and lures believers back into salvation by works, a fact which groups like the United Church of God and others vehemently deny, yet consistently reinforce in their literature.

“The sacrifice of Christ constitutes that important first basic step in God's majestic plan of salvation,” wrote the late John Ross Schroeder in a July 2010 article on the Holy Day plan. “Nonetheless, an subsequent passage in Ephesians shows other essential steps.”




I turned to the passage Schroeder referenced – Ephesians 1:9-10. I don't see any other “essential steps” Christians must take. Let's look at the whole passage, in context. This time, I'm turning to the ESV, because this passage is convoluted, even to me, in the NKJV. I'll emphasize verses 9 and 10 for you.

In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth.

Hmmm. I don't really see any evidence of Christ's sacrifice being the first step in a progressive salvation plan here. The only thing I really see that rings a bell is the word “plan.” Basically, in this passage, we have God revealing His Son at the appointed time in history, opening our minds to the fact that Jesus was God's Son, redeeming us and forgiving our sins through the shedding of His blood, and eventually setting right the fallen world.

This passage bears almost no resemblance to the COG narrative of this plan, which goes something like this:

1. Jesus died for your sins on Passover. (so far so good).
2. We then put sin out of our lives, which is pictured by the Days of Unleavened Bread. (hmmm.)
3. We receive the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (Wait. How did we put sin out of our lives without the Holy Spirit?)
4. Jesus Christ returns at the Feast of Trumpets. (debatable, but it's a possibility)
5. Those who have successfully completed these “essential steps” celebrate their millenial reign during the Feast of Tabernacles (where they have achieved divinity, despite what Isaiah 43:10 says).
6. Satan is put away on the Day of Atonement (wasn't Jesus our Atonement? 1 John 2:2)
7. Humans who never had a chance to learn about God's plan will receive another chance to accept God's way at the Great White Throne Judgement on the Last Great Day (despite 2 Thessalonians 1:8, which tells us Jesus will judge both those who don't know God and didn't follow the gospel at His return).

But I'll admit, UCG leaves the salvific significance component of our works vague. But competing sister splinter COGWA does not. Consider what Jeremy Lallier, a full-time writer for COGWA's Discern magazine, recently wrote on his private Sabbath Thoughts blog for the Feast of Trumpets:

“As Christians, that trumpet will be the moment that defines us for eternity. As our Lord and Savior descends through the skies and voices from the heaven proclaim Him King of kings and Lord of lords, we'll either rise up to meet Him... or we won't. Those are the possibilities. There isn't a third option.”

Wow! You have my attention! That paragraph alone made me sit up two inches straighter in my chair.

“What kind of life did you live? What kind of choices did you have to make along the way? What did you value, and what did you let go of? What did you have to overcome? What aspects of your character changed – and what stayed the same?”

Hmm....

“How did those changes happen? What habits did you develop or break that helped lead to them? Who influenced you – and who did you have to step away from so they'd stop influencing you? What sacrifices did you have to get used to making, and what things were so important you vowed to never let go of them?"'

I'm starting to notice a trend here - a whole lot of "you, you, you" and not a whole lot of "God, God, God." But let's hear him out.

“Keep stepping backward from your future until you get to the present, then connect the dots.

Well, at least he isn't pulling out a sticker chart. Yet.

“Using the tools we've been given, we chart our way to the finish line, plotting out a life that leads to hearing, 'Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Woops. I spoke too soon. I stand corrected.

“This isn't just a thought exercise. Your destiny hangs in the balance. If you want to make sure it's a good one, now's the time to reverse engineer it.”

All right. I've had enough. It's intellectually dishonest, at best, to claim to teach that salvation is a free gift, but then state that we are responsible for plotting our own destiny to a heavenly crown. If we make our own destiny, then we have reason to boast, which directly contradicts scripture:

What then shall we say that Abraham our father has found according to the flesh. For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace, but as debt.  - Romans 4:1-4

I'm glad you brought up Abraham, our COGWA friend would probably say, at this point, in our imaginary debate. Doesn't the Bible tell us that Abraham was justified by his works when he offered Isaac in James 2:21.

Why yes, it does. But is that the whole story? Let's look at the passage rather than a single verse.

Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar? Do you see that faith was working together with his works, and by works faith was made perfect? And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” And he was called the friend of God. You see, then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only. -  James 2:21-24

Abraham's true faith was confirmed when he attempted to sacrifice Isaac upon the altar in Genesis 22. But his faith was accounted to him for righteousness – God justified him – much earlier, in Genesis 15, even according to James. His decision in Genesis 22 was evidence of what happened in Genesis 15.

And what kind of life did Abraham live? What kind of choices did he make along the way? What aspects of his character changed, and what stayed the same? Let's see. Abraham made some good choices. He left Ur. He rescued Lot, and then let him have his pick of the land. He attempted to sacrifice his son when God told him to do so. He also lied about his wife to try to save his skin. Twice. Once was even after God “counted him righteous.” He doubted God. He fathered a child with Hagar.

If we plotted and charted Abraham's life, what kind of picture would we see? Someone who secured his own destiny through grit and determination? Or a sinner who, like Paul, warred against his nature throughout his life and relied upon the grace and mercy of his Creator? What about YOUR life?

There are many reasons that Christians should live godly lives:

1. We are bondservants of the Lord purchased with His blood.

For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. - 1 Corinthians 6:20

2. Since we have died to sin and have been raised  with Christ, we are living sacrifices.

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is good and acceptable and the perfect will of God. - Romans 12:1

3. We are representatives of God's kingdom.

Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given s the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed us to the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God. - 2 Corinthians 5:18-20

4. To witness against those who mock us.

But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear; having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed. 
- 1 Peter 3:15-16

5. To turn others to God

You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
- Matthew 5:14-16

There are these reasons, and many more. But noticeably absent is the goal of securing our entrance into God's Kingdom through an elaborate, metaphysical game of connect-the-dots. We can neither obtain nor maintain that destiny.

This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?   - Galatians 3:2-3

We can't reverse engineer, connect the dots or force out enough fruit to sell for a ticket into God's kingdom. Thankfully, the ticket is free and the fruit is a by-product, or evidence that we are connected to the True Vine. With that assurance, we can rest in Christ, knowing that He is the author and finisher of our faith.

A holy day plan that reveals an ongoing “plan of salvation” sounds tidy, inspiring, even desirable. On paper. But in real life, a checklist of “essential steps” means that you must achieve in order to progress to the next step. And if you don't achieve enough by the time the last step comes, then you fail.

Whether it's a progressive holy day plan, Lallier's subtle “we'll either rise up and meet Him... or we won't” or Herbert Armstrong's deity, who aborts Christians who don't grow enough, the message and theology are the same. Thankfully, they're not true. Thanks be God for His indescribable gift!

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:8-10.

************
It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )
Acts 17:11
************

Do the Holy Days Reveal "God's Plan for Mankind"?

If there's any phrase that brings to mind my years of holy day observance, it's “plan of God.”

God has a plan. Not the overused, Jeremiah 29:11 kind. The Leviticus 23 kind. The capital "P" Plan kind. One that reveals God's framework for redemption of mankind through the holy days. The one we must rehearse each year "throughout your generations forever" to keep it in the forefront of our minds. Or so the Church of God narrative goes.

So how exactly did the COGs arrive at their understanding of this Plan? Most splinters of the Worldwide Church of God explain it similarly. The United Church of God concisely explains it like this:

“God's overall plan can be discerned in the voluminous pages of the Bible. Yet it may be compared to a jigsaw puzzle in the sense that vital bits and pieces of that plan are discovered in different books.” wrote the late John Ross Schroeder
in a July 2010 article on the Holy Day plan. “It is the Church's sacred task to preach it to this world – crafting it together correctly, 'rightly dividing the word of truth' as the Bible puts it." 

Wait just a minute. This "Plan of God" thing is a theory? Like evolution and Pangea? Like relativity or cigarettes causing cancer? Like fluoride? No, I didn't say all theories were inherently wrong. But they are often controversial and must be explored with caution. So anyway, the holy day “Plan of God” appears to be a theory that someone pieced together from many different books of the Bible, at least from the admission of some COG's.

UCG's sister splinter, COGWA, simply sidesteps this detail and presents it as fact.

"We need God's festivals for what they picture," writes Eddie Johnson on COGWA's Life, Hope and Truth web site.

No mincing words for COGWA. They intuit and state that, "from this short passage" (Revelation 20:4-5) we can tell this chapter "records future events that are also represented in the last two of the festivals listed in Leviticus 23."

Hmmm. Maybe I'm just deceived, but I'm slightly uneasy eliciting the meaning of a celebration that's "required" for salvation from two short verses of scripture. I know, COGWA, it's my inexcusable "absence of biblical understanding in traditional Christianity" that drives my reluctance to label people "false believers" over the selective interpretation of a handful of isolated verses.  No, it couldn't be the years of study that I've done in the process of/years after leaving the COGs.

For example, I somberly take issue with COGWA's statement that every human who has ever lived "will be resurrected and come to understand the implications of all seven biblical holy days. Nobody who has ever lived can come to God, or knowingly turn his back on God, without first knowing and understanding God's offer of eternal life."

Don't get me wrong. I deeply wish this errant doctrine were true. It's about the only tenet of Armstrongism to which I am tempted to cling. Unfortunately, it directly contradicts 2 Thessalonians 1:8 (among other scriptures), which discusses what will happen at Christ's return:

In flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power when He comes, in that Day, to be glorified in His saints and to be admired among all those who believe, because or testimony among you was believed.                                                                        
                                                                                       - 2 Thessalonians 1:8-10

Those who do not know God are done, according to his passage. They do not pass go. They do not collect $200. They receive the brunt of the "flaming fire" and subsequent "everlasting destruction" at the time of the return of Jesus Christ. Not after some mythical "second chance." It is game over. I get no pleasure from relating this. I wish it weren't true. I only point it out because I want you to understand that this "holy day plan" doctrine is a theory, and further, not a theory without major holes.

So anyway, where did UCG and COGWA get these ideas? Who first put the puzzle together, and what assurance do we have that they got it right?

A man named Herbert Armstrong – who founded today's Church of God movement – taught that man was required to keep the Hebrew holy days. He claimed that the populations of Europe and the United States were descended from ancient Israel and had simply lost their traditions through captivity and migration. These claims, and his attempts to impose them on the Church of God Seventh Day, got HWA disfellowshipped from the organization. The only basis for the authority of his theories were his own claims of divine revelation, putting him on par with individuals like Joseph Smith, founder of the Church of God of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons).

Of course, Armstrong apologists might claim that the Apostle Paul's vision sounded sketchy, too. In which case, we must obey biblical admonition to judge our leaders by their fruit. So let's see. After his encounter, Paul was transformed from a zealous Pharisee intent on murdering Christians to one who was tortured for spreading the faith he persecuted. What of Armstrong? I cannot judge his heart, but I am commanded to judge his fruit.

BUT I absolutely am NOT judging the sincerity of those who have been taught to keep the holy days and believe they honor God by doing so. Many were drawn into Armstrong's theories during vulnerable, turbulent times, both in their personal lives and on the global scene. Others have been raised with these traditions since they were in diapers. I accepted the symbolism I was handed and celebrated these days for decades. They're listed in the Bible. They are given passing reference in the New Testament. Heck, the very first event Israel commemorated foreshadowed the entire basis for the Christian religion. The symbolism behind the other holy days is strong, too. Especially when your leaders make it up.

In a way, many outside the COGs DO believe that the Hebrew holy days revealed God's plan for salvation. And that plan was Jesus. Many, including Messianic Jews raised in Orthodox Jewish communities, believe that the festivals God gave to Israel were intended to demonstrate their own insufficiency to solve the problem of sin, as well as show them their need for a Savior. The Feast of Trumpets, Day of Atonement, Feast of Tabernacles  - they were shadowy symbols that could teach us lessons, but never stand in the place of the real thing. This is what Paul meant when he wrote:

But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. - Galatians 3:23-25

So, what's the big deal, Martha? HWA said the holy days revealed God's plan for salvation, you say that the holy days pointed to Jesus, who was God's plan for salvation. Same difference. Besides, it seems like your hero Paul still kept the holy days and even discussed them with the Corinthian brethren. Now what?

Fair point. But it's no surprise that Paul, an ethnic Jew, may have continued to keep the holy days. Although it's unclear whether he treated them as days of worship, or as opportunities to share the gospel with his countrymen. We know that many Jewish believers pressured gentiles to accept Hebrew worship practices, thanks go Acts 15 and pretty much the entire book of Galatians.  So, it's not shocking to see gentiles discussing holy day practices in the older books of the New Testament. I won't even get into the book's context and the Days of Unleavened Bread being a tangential theme.

Seriously, Martha, what don't you accept about not "one jot or tittle"?

Probably the same thing you don't accept about what is meant by "Israel," "forever" (Leviticus 23), "finished" (John 19:13), "covenant" and "obsolete" (Hebrews 8:13). This is Acts 15 all over again, except using binary code and keyboards instead of scrolls and speeches.

Whatever Martha. Peter and Paul kept portions of the Sinai Covenant and I'm pretty sure they “made it" into the Kingdom.  Even experts in your Expositor's Bible Commentary can't agree on what Matthew 5:18 means. Isn't it a safer bet to just continue keeping the holy days? What's the big deal?

I'm so glad that you asked. We'll talk about that next time.

************
It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )
Acts 17:11
************

Armstrong the Merciful

"Whereas, if MAN, composed of matter, sinned and refused to repent and turn from sin, he will die the second death - he shall utterly perish (John 3: 16) - he will be as though he had not been (OBE. 16). This reflects God's mercy."
-Herbert W Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 84

Some years ago I sat talking with a close friend of mine and trying to explain what Armstrongism believed about the afterlife. This was back when I was a believing member of the church. I was explaining to my friend who didn’t know the doctrines, and in my heart of hearts I was trying to defend the doctrine to myself. I thought I was right in what I believed, but at the same time I sensed the weakness of the argument.
It seems to be universal that when you are defending a weak position, you bluff and don't give away too much information. Even animals do it. Well, I knew my position was weak, so I reached for a fairly standard claim to reinforce my position: Armstrongism’s view of eternity is far more merciful than mainstream Christianity’s, vis a vis:
“Why would a merciful God send people to Hell? In our version, most everyone will find salvation.”

Well, I was quite happy at the time to see that it worked. My friend hadn’t ever heard anyone say anything like that before, was therefore unprepared, and didn’t know how to respond. Quite frankly, if it didn't work, I was unprepared to take it much further. Sometimes bluffing pays off.

I wondered to myself, what if my friend had challenged me? So, to answer that question, I have decided to argue against my earlier position. I will take the position of my friend and explore what they did not. I have to say, I learned a lot going through this! I write about it today so that you can see what I saw.

Bear in mind that my goal is not to insult, disparage, castigate, or in any wise belittle anyone in Armstrongism or God or anyone else. God loves you, and I'm not here to mistreat those He died for. No doubt some people are going to feel that way as they read this, but that's only because I'm not affirming your beliefs in this post. If I affirmed your beliefs, you would love me ...and be bored reading this. I'm not going to be unfair. Fairness is one of my motivations here, but I am also not going to affirm the COG view. I spent 30 years on one side, and now I'm going to explore the other side. I don't know of a way that I can do this and offend no one in the process. I have to do this so that we can ask "Is the COG view as merciful as it claims to be?" I have to accept that someone will take this the wrong way. I am just going to admit this up front and state that it's not my intent to be insulting to anyone, and leave it at that.
Also, bear in mind that my goal is not to defend or argue for Hell. If at any point you misinterpret what I'm saying as a defense of or argument for the doctrine of Hell, then you've missed my point. The entire post is about mercy, not Hell. As I said, we are asking, "Is the COG view as merciful as it claims to be?"

Are you brave enough to challenge your own views in an ABD deep inspection with me today? Come and let’s take a critical look at the entire flow of the history of mankind as seen by the Church of God (COG) splinter churches ...starting at the start.

IN THE BEGINNING

"God is reproducing Himself", say the Armstrongist Church of God (COG) groups. According to the founder of the COG movement, Herbert W Armstrong, perhaps billions of years before Adam, God's first "children" where the angels.

"This earth, originally, was intended to be the abode of a third of all the angels."
-HWA, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 54

Did it work? No. After countless ages, Satan rebels, he deceives one third of all of the angels, all creation decays, horrific wars ensue in the heavens where the angels prove themselves unworthy to rule over what God has made. This apparently catches God off guard.

"As God surveyed this cataclysm, He must have realized it left Himself as the ONLY BEING who will not and CANNOT SIN! The only possible ASSURANCE of accomplishing His great PURPOSE was for Him now to reproduce Himself!"
-Herbert Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 59 [emphasis mine]

Must have realized?? So, he didn't realize this before?
As a plan B, the Godhead creates mankind with the intent of transforming them into God-beings like Himself so we can rule creation in place of the angels.

"God saw that no being less than God, in the God Family, could be certainly relied on to never sin - to be like God - who cannot sin. To fulfill His purpose for the entire vast universe, God saw that nothing less than Himself (as the God Family) could be absolutely relied upon to carry out that supreme purpose in the entire universe.
God then purposed to reproduce Himself, through the humans, made in His image and likeness, but made first from material flesh and blood, subject to death if there is in unrepented of - yet with the possibility of being born into the Divine Family begotten by God the Father.
And that is why God put man on earth!"
-Herbert Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 51

God does this, knowing that humans can and will sin and go astray without His direct participation, just like some of the angels did. God must infuse the Holy Spirit with our spirits or there is no hope.

"The spirit of man was in him [Adam] - but not the Spirit of God. God offered him freely the fruit of the TREE OF LIFE - which symbolized the HOLY SPIRIT. Taking of the tree of LIFE would have done two things: (1) opened his MIND to comprehend spiritual knowledge, and (2) imparted within him the GIFT of God's Holy SPirit, leading to ETERNAL LIFE."
-Herbert Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p.76

Does God work closely with mankind as is necessary? Yes!
Did it work? No. Adam and Eve soon sin anyway. The solution? Cut mankind off from the only thing that could have helped them.

"God made the needed second spirit - the HOLY SPIRIT - available to Adam. But on Adam's rebellion and taking the forbidden fruit, God had driven Adam out and closed all access to the tree of LIFE - symbolic of His Holy Spirit."
p.78

Rather than His direct involvement, which is the only possible way to achieve the goal of avoiding sin, God establishes a set of laws to give mankind direction.
Does it work? No.
To the COG groups, the law as defined in the Old Covenant is what God expects of mankind. Not just the Jews, but all mankind. They do not accept that the law was first given at Sinai; they believe it to have been there since creation (DEU. 5: 3). To the COG's it is mankind's means of growing in Godly character (ROM. 3: 21; 4: 13; GAL. 2: 21; PHP. 3: 9). They teach that Godly character is the result of law-keeping. Not the whole law, just some of it (it varies from church to church).
But there's the rub. The Holy Spirit is necessary before people can even so much as recognize that they so much as ought to keep the law in the first place, and is mandatory in order to have the ability to actually put the law into practice once it is known. The knowledge itself is spiritual knowledge, you see. Spiritual knowledge cannot be received without the Holy Spirit to complete our minds and make this possible (I COR. 2: 13-14). All Christians believe this to be true to some degree, but the COGs believe it in the most extreme sense.
So what do we see here? The COGs believe God put a law in place that mankind cannot hope to realize, thus God condemns mankind to a futile system of unguided "trial and error" as they hopelessly try and figure out on their own what is good and evil.
Mercifully hopeless and futile, that is.

Thus we have an enigma. The result of which is that now man can't even plead ignorance in their ignorance (ROM. 7: 7) because they had the law there ...which they couldn't understand to begin with without the Holy Spirit.

It gets worse! God leaves Satan here to broadcast sin into our heads against our will!
You read that right. The COGs teach that Satan doesn't just tempt us, he actually radiates harmful sinfulness like uranium radiates harmful energy. Satan can affect us without our knowledge just by being there.

So, mankind cannot know that we should keep the law, we can’t keep the law even if we did know, we are influenced by Satan to break the law even if we don't want to, and we can’t even plead ignorance because the law witnesses against us.
How's that for mercy?

I want you to notice something here. It is very subtle, but very important. First, a summary then I’ll get to what I want you to notice.

According to the COGs, Adam and Eve chose the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. God had been helping them, but they chose poorly. Now God refuses to give us the Holy Spirit as punishment. This teaching is necessary! Without this teaching, how can anyone in the COG churches be “called" and "elect” by God? The “calling” and “election” is the giving of the Holy Spirit so that they can know and attempt to keep the law. The mystery revealed to them which makes them "God’s Church" is law-keeping (with the help of the Holy Spirit). Not all of the law, not all 613, but a cherry-picked and highly modified subset  – especially the weekly Sabbath and annual holy days. And not perfect law-keeping, because they fail too, just like Adam and Eve and Lucifer, so it's just the attempt at law-keeping that they receive. Otherwise, if mankind *can* know that they should keep the law all on their own without the Holy Spirit, then there is nothing at all different between the members of the COG churches and anyone else and no reason for a special calling. There is no calling; there is no election. So you see the teaching that God revoked His Holy Spirit, even though it was absolutely critical for the success of the goal, is necessary to establish identity for the COG group.

But! Here comes two things that I wanted you to notice.

Baptism is where one receives the Holy Spirit. The COG initiate must know and keep the law before they are baptized and receive the Holy Spirit. One must prove one's worthiness and loyalty. But how? One must be baptized and receive the Holy Spirit in order to attempt to keep the law, but one must already be attempting to keep the law in order to be baptized and receive the Holy Spirit. A contradiction?
Next, regardless of the law, without the Holy Spirit how can mankind be held accountable and punished terribly for something they could not possibly have understood? Why give a law if we are incapable of understanding it? Indeed we are prevented from understanding! But then how can God make any exception for ignorance (LUK. 23: 34, ACT. 17: 30)? Another contradiction?
Something is seriously flawed here!

And not just this, but there is another related issue to discuss: angelic beings.

ANGELS AND DEMONS

The COG narrative both says that God blinds the hearts of mankind and that Satan blinds the hearts of mankind. God gives mankind over to blindness by withholding the Holy Spirit because of our wickedness, but we cannot know our wickedness unless the Holy Spirit works in us in the first place. So it is God’s doing. At the same time, Satan broadcasts evil like a radio station broadcasts music, and God gives mankind over to Satan who deceives us and darkens our understanding. So it is Satan’s doing.
As much as it pains me to even consider such a thing, there very much appears to be a tag-team in the COG doctrines of God and Satan against mankind.

Continuing on.

God, knowing the potential for our failure ahead of time, was prepared with a plan to save us. ...but not save the angels.
You see, the COGs do believe in a Hell. Oh, they most certainly do! They just prefer to believe the only ones that will be there are Satan and his demons. Here are some proof-texts often used to demonstrate this eternal fate:

(II PET. 2: 4) For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment
(JUD 6) And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day
(II PET. 2: 17) These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
(REV. 20: 10) The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

"Angels, being spirit, are immortal. Those who sinned shall go on bearing their punishment forever. Their punishment is NOT death. Their punishment is loss of the glorious opportunity God gave them to accomplish His purpose on earth, and to live forever in the resentment, bitterness, attitude of rebellion, and utter hopelessness and frustration of mind their own sins brought upon them. Once they perverted their own minds, they can never regain balance. Happiness and joy has left them forever."
-Herbert Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 84

So this far more merciful Armstrongism isn't really more merciful at all. There is a Hell. There is an eternal, conscious punishment for created beings. Just not for humans. That's not mercy; that sounds a lot more like opportunism to me.

You might say, "But the demons deserve it!". OK. You'll get no argument from me. But so do any humans who sin! In all fairness, any mainstream Christian should be able to tell you that God didn't create Hell for humans; some humans simply insist on going there and God refuses to force them to remain in His presence against their will. Yet consider this - it's not just the fallen angels who are punished. No! If you want to talk about something being unmerciful, consider the poor holy angels!

Two thirds of the angels have never sinned, yet they are punished eternally too, only because Lucifer sinned. According to COG documents, Lucifer was such a magnificent creation that when he sinned it was proof to God that no angel was capable.

"As God surveyed this cataclysmic tragedy, He must have realized that since the highest, most perfect being within His almighty power to create, had turned to rebellion, it left God Himself as the only being who would not and cannot sin."
-Herbert Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 51

In other words, Michael and Gabriel might be superb holy angelic beings now, but some day they'll fall too. It's inevitable. This is the logical conclusion of what the COGs believe.
And what was the punishment for angels? The COGs believe that angels are immortal and cannot die. So what punishment can you give an eternal being?

 "Their penalty (they are still awaiting final judgment up to now) was disqualification - forfeiture of their grand opportunity, perversion of minds, and a colossal earthwide CATACLYSM of destruction wreaked upon this earth."
-Herbert Armstrong, "Incredible Human Potential", 1978, p. 57

Stop and consider, though, that this "disqualification - forfeiture of their grand opportunity" is also born by the holy angels! The holy angels have to live forever, rejected by God because of what Lucifer did, and ruled over by the humans who replaced them - yet they didn't ever do anything to deserve it.
Consider further, the angels who never sinned are not to be redeemed even though they are eternal while mankind who sins continually is to be redeemed even though he is temporary. If anyone should have been redeemed it should be the immortal beings. But no.

THE HIDDEN GOSPEL

How is mankind redeemed? The Word of God becomes a man in order to die so that with His own blood the sins of man can be forgiven. Now, if you can live a life of attempted law-keeping until death, you might qualify for a promotion to godhood when Jesus returns. You would think "in two millennia I'll return and I might even call on you" would be at least mildly encouraging news to people. But then God does something unexpected - He hides the Gospel …for 1,900 years!

Herbert Armstrong’s primary claim to authority was that he was an Apostle as great as Paul...

"And I can say now, with the apostle Paul, 'that the gospel which [is] preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. . . . But when it pleased God . . . to reveal his Son in me . . . immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood: neither went I [to a theological seminary, but I was taught by Jesus Christ, the Word of God (in writing)]' (Gal. 1:11-12, 15-17)."
-Herbert Armstrong, "Mystery of the Ages", p. 29

...who was chosen in the sunset days of mankind to bring us a final warning. The gist of the warning he supposedly was tasked to deliver was that we need to attempt to keep the law.

But wait. Wasn't this the same message given to Israel? Yes. So for 4,000 years the same warning supposedly went out? Yes. Hold on here! Wasn't this the same message that was supposedly given to Adam? Yes. So it's really 6,000 years the same warning supposedly went out? Yes.

Does it work? No. Did it ever work? No.

Recall you cannot keep the law, or even accept that you should keep it, without the Holy Spirit. What good is a warning to attempt to obey the law going to do people who cannot understand? It does no good. Why send a warning without sending the ability to heed it? It does no good. And why warn people at all if they aren't really "called" at this time anyway? None of this makes any sense!

Herbert Armstrong said over and over and over again that one of the proofs of his authority was that he was the first person in 1,900 years to teach the Gospel.
--If one rejects this critical claim, then one rejects all of the COGs and everything about them - because one rejects what the COGs are founded upon. You've rejected the Apostle and the Gospel he taught. If you reject Herbert Armstrong (as some say they do), then why follow someone who does not reject him? If you reject Herbert Armstrong, then why not attend at the COG7 church instead? Or become an SDA? Or a Seventh-Day Baptist? Or --

Consequently, this claim means that for 1,900 years the “Church of God” had no solid knowledge of the Gospel, ergo the Gospel is absolutely unnecessary for “calling” and “election” and salvation.

What is necessary? No one ever really defined that. In one place Herbert Armstrong says the entire duty of a lay Christian is to pay money and pray in support of the ministry of the Church of God.

“But this giving of their prayers, encouragement and financial support was God's assignment as the very means of developing in them God's holy, righteous character.”
-Herbert Armstrong, “The Incredible Human Potential”, p. 111 

“...as the very means for the general body of lay members to develop God's own holy, righteous character – by means of giving – giving their continuous prayers for the apostle, giving their encouragement, tithes and offerings.”
-Herbert Armstrong, “The Incredible Human Potential”, p. 112

But in other publications we see that the qualifications for being the “Church of God” included such things as Sabbath observance, or having the right name [Church of God], or full-immersion baptism, and etc. (See our study "True History of the True Church" for details.) Oh, not that you needed all of them at once! No. You really only needed one from this list in order to be identifiable as a Church of God. If you have more, great! But you only need one.

God kept His church technically alive for 2,000 years so long as they observed at least one thing from a list. So... one would think God could have just taught all mankind to keep that one thing and it would have sufficed. But He apparently didn't do that either.

Just so you know, when other non-COG churches keep at least one thing from the same list (like Baptists and full-immersion baptism or the SDA church and Sabbath-keeping) it doesn't count.

We touched on something a few paragraphs back that I want to dive more deeply into for a minute. The “true Gospel” is hidden for 1,900 years. Not accidentally lost. No. Hidden! Purposefully.
First God revokes the Holy Spirit, then God hides the Gospel.

What this implies is that mankind didn't "turn from the truth" on their own, they were driven there! We would often say "God has blinded the minds of the world." We would say that God did this because of the sins of the world. But if you define sin as breaking the law, and God revoked the Holy Spirit and then hid the Gospel, what possible chance did the world have against sin? No chance! So in response God piles on a third layer of guaranteed failure - the blinding of their minds?

That's merciful?

As for this end-time warning, recall that the last generation has no hope of accepting the warning because they don’t have the Holy Spirit. So why warn them? God hid the Gospel purposefully. So why reveal it now? God blinded their minds purposefully. So why call now? He isn't calling the world now. So why warn if you're not really calling? We were told time and again that God doesn't want these people in His church right now; He wants them in later on. So why punish them? And why wait until the last minute? God does almost everything possible to remove our ability to obey, then punishes us for not obeying. Not just punish, cataclysmically punish, to the verge of cosmocide! We're talking end of the universe here. But not all people are slated to be punished so hideously. He singles out a late generation to punish them unspeakably for the sins of all people throughout time. Sins which they themselves did not commit.

That's MERCIFUL???

A SECRET SECT

According to the COGs, the Word of God puts off being God completely and becomes fully man (this is akin to Kenosis and of it we must ask what happens to the spiritual component of the Word of God when He "puts it off"?). He then dies completely to wipe away our guilt (so the self-existent I AM can cease to be??). He is resurrected again so that He can lead us to the Father.
Does it work? No.

 
The forgiveness is only for past sins. Your guilt for past sins is forgiven but you better not sin again. By the end of the first century, all of Christianity en masse have supposedly gone right back into rank paganism. (This claim is accompanied by some pretty questionable scholarship, but it is what it is.) Only a tiny remnant remained.
   Cross = nullified!
In response, just as He once revoked the Holy Spirit, He now revokes the Gospel and blinds the minds of the world.

Wow! In the Armstrongist narrative, God is really having a hard time. Nothing He has done so far has been very successful.

Hope would be completely lost for us all, they teach, had it not been for the glorified Christ selecting a painfully small group of people to hide out in mountainous and far-away regions through the ages, observing at least one thing from the list of laws, and thus keeping the church technically alive. This secret church progresses through several "eras". Most of the COGs teach that the seven letters to the seven churches in Asia, found in Revelation 3 and 4, are actually Jesus prophesying to these church eras across time. 

So, the church actually ends up failing not just once at the start but over and over and over again.

At last, in the 1930’s, Jesus sends Herbert W Armstrong - a down on his luck detergent sales and advertising man from a Quaker family - to find the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel, preach the Gospel to them for the first time in 1,900 years, establish the Philidelphia Era of the church, and to deliver a warning for the final generation that they should attempt to keep the law before it's too late. A warning God apparently doesn't actually want the world to heed and has prevented them from heeding anyway.

To make it just that much more odd...
Throughout time God had been clandestinely selecting 144,000 people to become His "true church", who will rule with Him for a final 1,000 year period of post-apocalyptic paradise known as “the Millennium”. God “calls” and “elects” what amounts to 24 people each year over 6,000 years, and gives them His Holy Spirit, un-blinds their minds, and works with them so that they can attempt to keep the law (note, the Gospel is still not needed here). Why? The unofficial official answer is because He wants to have these people train others during a 1,000 year period of paradise. These "chosen" and "elect" people who form the "true church" will train anyone lucky enough to survive the Apocalypse.
People who until then were purposefully kept from the "true church".

Now I must ask the obvious questions. 

If He can make this special exemption for 144,000 people, why not just do this for all people? Why not do this from the start with everyone?
During this Millennium, God does give the Holy Spirit to everyone born, and gives them His Gospel, and is literally present with them, and gives them training, and gives them good examples, and gives them a perfect planet with no competition for resources, and even keeps Satan locked away. Thus proving He could have done this all along ...but refused to. Why?

What happens after this 1,00 years is over? After the Millennial period is over, all of the people who have lived and died prior to this Millennial period, who were not part of the secret church, will then be resurrected and given a second chance to get it right.
But... most of them only sinned in the first place because they were all but caused to sin. So why put most people through it twice, some people once, and some people not at all?

The non-official answer to "why" is, "because God wanted to teach everyone what life would be like if we disobey Him". Which, on the surface, sounds like a good idea and everything, but on closer inspection we see it has issues. Not the least of which is ... life cannot ever be without Him.
God is necessary. Nothing exists without Him. Why teach people so harshly what life would be without Him if that is utterly impossible?

Or, did they mean "without Him" in a spiritual sense? In other words, He wanted you to experience what life would be like if He exists, but isn't available to you. To put that another way -- He wanted you to experience Hell.
Being so far removed from God, His love, His forgiveness, His goodness, His mercy, His hope, as to practically exist without Him, IS THE PRIMARY ATTRIBUTE OF HELL!
So, the COG's teach there is no Hell, except the one we've been in these 6,000 years.

What the COG view inadvertently demonstrate here is that if God had only lived with us and given us His Holy Spirit and sent Satan away from the start, everything would have worked perfectly from the start and into eternity. For a 1,000 year Millennial period, God proves this. Thus conclusively demonstrating that there is a far better way to have gone about things this entire time. He just chose not to!

And that's by far more merciful than the mainstream view??

A BRIEF COMPARISON

At this point you might say to me, “Hey! Some of those things are what I read in the Bible. Prophecy talks of a 1,000 year reign and Satan being let out at the end. You are arguing against the Bible here. You go too far!”
Bear with me, dear reader, if you think this of me. As I said at the outset, it’s not at all my point to disparage God or the COG groups. In my defense, I am just doing what I said I would do - arguing against my past self. I am merely explaining things that the COG churches teach, only without the sugar coat. You might misunderstand what I'm doing as speaking out against God, but I do no such thing. I am merely explaining the unintended consequences of a particular worldview held by the COGs. I am looking critically at what I refused to look at critically for most of my life, and what most COG members refuse to look at. These same verses are a completely different story when seen through a different lens. I am not against the verses at all. I am against the COG interpretation of the verses.

If we take for example a Protestant view, we have humanity who is inherently flawed in their relationship with God from birth, their nature is fallen, but they can yet throw themselves at the mercy of Jesus Christ, their Savior and defense attorney, who accomplished what neither Adam nor they could.
In the extreme Protestant view, everyone is going to be saved. Everyone! God will work on them with His love and given enough time they will all choose Him. You want mercy, well you cannot beat that mercy right there.
Even in the Roman Catholic view, the only ones who end up in Hell are the ones who choose it. Look at Michaelangelo's famous "Creation of Adam" on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, for example. God is stretching out, straining to reach a 'ho hum' Adam. All Adam has to do is extend his arm and he has God in his grasp!

In the mainstream view, God runs across the finish line and pleads with us just to believe He's really done it. Jesus constantly reaches down to us here below to help us up.
But in the COG view, God abandons the angels to their fate, all but walks off with the finish line, and only shows it to a handful of people. God has made the target extremely hard to hit and missing the mark is called "sin". The only ones who succeed are the ones He drags across the finish line.

CONCLUSION

So, what have we seen today? According to the COGs:

God creates the earth for the angels but this fails when Lucifer unexpectedly sins. God abandons this plan. All angels are disqualified though most of them are perfect to this day. But if the best of them failed then it proves they all will fail, so abandoning them is the safe bet. Instead, God creates mankind, but this fails when they sin too. In response God withholds His Holy Spirit from man, which is a missing component in mankind's very design without which we can neither know nor perform God's will. Failure is guaranteed. God gives a law but this fails because we cannot keep it or know we should keep it without the Holy Spirit. The result is the law removes our ability to at least plead ignorance. God leaves Satan here on earth with the power to broadcast sin into our minds. The eternally self-existant Word somehow ceases to be eternal or self-existent and becomes a man. He dies for mankind to forgive our sins - not not the angels sins - and is resurrected to lead a new church. This fails when His church soon abandons Him en masse. In response, He hides the Gospel for 1,900 years - even from His own church. God keeps a tiny remnant of the church hidden away but technically alive through the ages by making sure they at least attempt to keep part of a list of laws. The church doesn't have to make many disciples because God isn't calling the world at this time anyway. At the last moment, God sends Herbert Armstrong to preach the Gospel and warn the purposefully blinded world with a warning they can't understand to keep a law they can't keep, right before God unspeakably punishes the last generation for the sins of all time. All of this is to teach the world a lesson of what it would be like if they sin. The next 1,000 years are a veritable paradise completely devoid of this lesson. It goes perfectly ... until Satan is released. After that it all goes wrong again. Finally, the incorrigible among men are annihilated, and Satan and the demons are sent to eternal damnation in conscious torment in a condition exactly matching Hell but care is taken to never referred to as Hell. The holy angels spend eternity as servants to the humans, now made into gods, who replaced them, through no fault of their own.

And this is supposedly far more merciful than the mainstream Christian scenario.
I find "God won't send humans to Hell" to be a candy-coated and grossly oversimplified version of the real Armstrongist position. This isn't nearly the whole story! This is in reality comparing a stylized and abbreviated version of what the COGs teach to a caricaturized and abbreviated version of what mainstream Christianity teaches.

No doubt many are going to dismiss what I say because they "do not worship Herbert Armstrong and never did". A valid point. No one should worship any man. But this article isn't about Herbert Armstrong. Neither is this blog. We aren't confronting Herbert Armstrong; we are investigating his doctrines. We talk a lot about him so that you can know where your beliefs come from. That's the real elephant in the room - you may ignore the man, but which of his doctrines do you reject? You can look in the Bible and see the law for yourself? Good! But you cannot attend a Church of God group and get from "I see the law" to "the law applies to me" without Herbert Armstrong. Reject the man all you like but you can't simply erase him from the church he founded. The fact that you feel defensive when you read our articles is PROOF of this. If we were only about the man, and if you rejected him completely as you say you do, then you'd have nothing to be defensive about, and then you could just walk off and attend any of a number of different churches.

Let's just admit straight out that all scenarios are going to run into issues with mercy eventually, because mercy is a highly subjective word. Mercy is always going to be in the eye of the beholder.

In either scenario, COG or mainstream, no one can succeed without God.
But in the COG version it really seems like God is small and contrary, angry and fickle. It doesn't matter what you do, it doesn't matter how badly you want it, it doesn't matter how much faith you have, it doesn't matter how often you call on Him, and it doesn’t matter what charitable works you spend your life doing. Even if your name is Mother Theresa, it doesn't matter. Unless! Unless you sit idle every 7th day - during the proper hours or it doesn't count (which are nigh impossible to determine on a round earth). He died for you, but if you don’t recall that during the proper hours after sunset on Friday, the deal’s off! Yet, at the same time, it didn’t have to be that way!

In either scenario, COG or mainstream, there is a Hell.
It doesn't matter if you call it "Hell" or not, the ideas are nearly identical in all respects. The complaint that COGs don't want to worship a God that sends His creation to punishment for all eternity is moot as even in the COG view God will send His creation to punishment for all eternity. Only, in the COG version it is just demons who will spend eternity in conscious punishment. Any human will get burned up and that's "merciful". Meanwhile the holy angels bear an eternal burden for Lucifer's failure. But there will be a Hell, so to speak.
As far as the claim that the COG view is more merciful in this point, I have to say in all honesty, I do not believe the COG view is more merciful. If anything it seems like the two views are even.

Now it occurs to me, this isn't really about mercy at all. At the heart of this is the debate about immortal soul versus Annihilationism. In the COG view, God sends anything incorrigible to punishment. If that being is immortal then that punishment is eternal torment, and if not then it's eternal death. There is every reason to believe He would have sent humans to eternal torment too, but the COGs teach that humans don't have an immortal soul. The COG teachings do have eternal conscious torment, so eternal conscious torment is not really the problem. The COG teachings do have a hell, so this isn't about Hell, it's about humans in Hell. So it's not really about mercy after all, but about the nature of the soul. The COGs don't want a God who makes man immortal; they want a God who makes mankind disposable.
Mercifully disposable.

At the end of the matter, I'm not convinced this is a winning strategy after all. This doesn't seem as merciful to me as it is opportunistic. I admit someone has to be right, but I don't see how a bluffing contest of "who is more merciful" is going to decide the point.

************
It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; ) Acts 17:11
************