An Extraordinary 4½ Years, Pt. 5

Ron Weinland

December 30, 2017

This will be Part 5 of the series entitled, An Extraordinary 4½ Years.

Last week we left off after going through some of the verses in the Book of John where Christ addressed the matter of how we tend, by our human nature, to judge matters, and why we think in the way we do when it comes to matters of judgment. This was under the heading there, of where we were at that point in time, under the section entitled, "Righteous Judgment and God's Government."

So in order to get some of the context, again, of where we were, I'm just going to read that last verse again that we read there in John 5:30. To me this is one of the most awesome things a person can keep in their mind, if they can live this way and strive to think in this manner, because it is the right way of judging. Christ explained how he judged when he did. He didn't use his own viewpoint about matters as we do as human beings, but as he said here, John 5:30—Of my own self I can do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just. Now, we tend to think we are always just in our judgment and how we think about things and decisions we make, but so often that's the major area where we need to kind of back up a little bit sometimes before we judge a matter and think about what we are choosing and what we are deciding because the vast majority of the time we're actually thinking carnally. We're thinking by our viewpoint, by how we see it, by our own experiences and our own experiences are not always the right way to judge unless you read the rest of this and judge according to that.

But as a whole we do not tend to judge automatically righteous judgment at all. We tend to judge by our own viewpoint, by the way we see it, by the way we think it should be when we're looking at different matters, especially in other people's lives. He said …and my judgment is just because I do not seek my own will. I don't judge like we do as human beings. The vast majority—I mean, not the vast majority, all of us—this is our natural inclination. We judge by our own will, by the way we view it, by the way we think it's right, and we always, as a whole, think we're right. We don't think automatically that something is wrong with our thinking, that maybe we're not right, that maybe we ought to rethink something or step back a little bit and reanalyze this and ask God for help. We generally just have something that's automatic. That's the way we tend to think.

He says, goes on here …but I do not seek my own will but the will of the Father who sent me. So when you're seeking God's will in a matter that means you're looking at God's law, God's way, and how we're to judge one another, treat one another, if you will, act toward one another, respond to one another. On and on it goes, and make sure it is according to God's law and God's way of life and not our own viewpoint because there are many ways of doing things. That's one of the biggest things right there. There are so many ways of doing things—I don't care what it is in life—as to how people live their life day by day. And oftentimes we as human beings tend to look at others, how they are doing something, and especially if something didn't go right in their life, and judge that according to why it's wrong, why we see it's wrong, why we think it's wrong, and how they should have been doing it in the first place. Yet that's not always the case. A lot of times it's just there are a lot of ways of doing things, and sometimes things just go wrong in life, in physical life. But again here, we tend to be harsh in judgment oftentimes, quick in judgment oftentimes, and not doing it according to God's law and God's way of life, just our own viewpoint. And sadly, so often our viewpoint isn't right. We don't always have all the information that we need. We don't always have the right thinking to go with it.

But anyway, going on here:

Until God revealed in 1974 that Pentecost was to be observed on a Sunday, God’s people were judged by what God had revealed to them before that additional truth about Pentecost was given. The timing for when this portion of truth was revealed was totally in God’s control.

That's so simple to keep in mind, but so many people have not done that in God's Church, so many people through time who have gone by the wayside, even in recent time, let alone throughout Philadelphia and Laodicea, of which I'm familiar with and lived through so much of. All the way through time it's been that way, as a whole. If people could understand how God works and understand this, that God's in total control and He is the one that has to reveal truth. We can't figure it out. We can't come up with truth on our own by any kind of study or because we are so sharp and keen and we can grasp certain things. God has to give us, basically, everything that we know. He truly does.

And you can lose everything that's basic. You can go back to putting up the Christmas tree. There are a lot of people who have. I had that experience this past week of seeing someone that had done that and had taken their family back, and so proud to show pictures of all the family, who grew up in God's Church and they're in front of a Christmas tree with all their family. You think, how in the world do people do things like that? But you can. You think you can't? You think you would never do that? You don't know your mind, what it's capable of, especially once God's called you, given you the truth, and you leave it. It's dumbfounding what the human mind can do at that point in time. Going on:

Therefore, up to that change in 1974, God’s people were to assemble on a Monday, and they were judged [judged by God] by their response and obedience to what they knew to that moment in time.

It wasn't their right. It wasn't their right to go through and study, as I even mentioned last time, one individual that did, and because of his study he felt that it should be on a Sunday. He was right, but if you understand how God works, that there are things that He has to give to us in His timing and He's in control, then we're not to be presumptuous and decide we're going to do something a certain way. Because we can still be very wrong. He just happened to be right at that particular moment in time and that's hard sometimes for people to understand in God's Church. There is a way that God gives you truth. It’s always been that way and it is not up to any of us to decide, to live in the sense of something that is an example to others, or that others can see, that's wrong because it hurts people. It can hurt people. It can lead people away from the truth. It can foul people up. So we have to be very careful of how we live (by what people see), because like I mentioned last week, the individual who did this, people saw that and that wasn't healthy for others. "Well, he's keeping two days. He believes it's on this other day, but just to be sure he's keeping it on both." What does that teach other people by example? What would that teach other family members? What does that plant in their mind if they have high respect for this individual, which he had high ordination in God's Church, okay? So if people look at that? You think people aren't swayed by something like that? Absolutely.

So even by example he was teaching, even if he didn't speak it and say, "This is what I believe is true," which would have been that much more wrong. So we can't be presumptuous in those things, and we have to understand how God works with us. Going on:

This example teaches us much about how and why God works with us as He does (much of which we have already covered). This also teaches a great deal about how God’s government works in our lives…

The very word "government" is about how God governs. It's about how God works in our lives and how we are to respond to how He governs. It's first and foremost, obviously, by His law. We're to be governed by that law and by that way and if we understand how God works in the Church and gave the truth to us and gives the truth to us, that's how God governs that portion of His Church, His spirit, literally, that works in our lives. If we resist that government, if we resist that process whereby God works in us, we're resisting the power of God; we're resisting God's very spirit, of how He works. So it's expedient upon us to understand how God works. We have to work to be in unity and harmony with that. That's an awesome thing to understand and to live. So again, this also teaches a great deal about how God's government works in our lives.

…this also teaches a great deal about how God's government works in our lives through the leadership He has established to be upon His apostles and prophets. God has chosen to construct His Church through this exact structure. It is by this way that He is creating Elohim…

That's awesome to understand. The very method, the very means by which God molds and fashions people, especially once the Church began, because that was unique in how God worked with people, because before that it was directly, individually for 4,000 years. Then Jesus Christ came along, died, and all of a sudden the Body of Christ, the Church of God began, 31 AD. God began to work with more people in a different manner than He ever had and there's a process. Before, how He worked in creating Elohim, and then afterwards through what was taught and how it was taught and how people received a calling and how they receive the truth and how they responded to it, and to changes that came along or growth that was given, etcetera, etcetera.

Just like the matters about circumcision that came along very early on. They were accustomed to that in Judaism, and they were told, no, it's of the heart, it's of the mind. It's not a physical thing. That's not what God wants and looks for. It's totally different. And then to go to the gentiles! Those things that happened in the very beginning there that they had to begin changing in their thinking.

God has chosen to construct His Church through this exact process. It is by this way that He is creating Elohim in all who will receive God’s government [how He governs life, how He governs in our lives, let alone how we respond then to His government] in all who will receive God’s government and God’s way of revealing truth to them through these offices He has established: “And (we) are (being) built [it's a process] upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone in whom all the building is fitly framed together…"

That's the creating of Elohim. We all are being worked with to fit in different places, in different functions, and how we're going to work and function and later on in time. It's up to us to yield to that process, otherwise, God can't use us and what He is going to create in us is the thing that will make us the most fulfilled in life, the most excited about the Great God and His purpose and plan and we can't understand those things because we're not there yet. We get a little bit here and there along the way.

"…in whom all the building is fitly framed together and grows [spiritual growth, transformation of the mind] into a holy temple in the Lord” (Eph. 2:20-21).

Candidly, there is no other structure whereby God leads and directs His Church.

Because then it wouldn't be His Church. This is how He functions in His Church. Jesus Christ is the head of the Church and God works through Jesus Christ to fulfill His purpose and plan until everything is given back, in essence, to God, when there is full peace once again, when it's fully been established.

That is why what has happened in the 600 plus splinter groups that have formed out of the Apostasy and scattering of the Church after 1994 is so absurd. Only one can be God’s Church through whom He works.

That's a simple thing, and yet there are some today that are taking on the Protestant viewpoint, "Well, I'm here and I'm going to stay where I am, but I believe that God is working with you in another way to kind of bring us all together sometime in the future here, to where we're all one again." In some ways that's how the Protestant world thinks about others. "We're all a little different but God's working with all of us, all the different denominations, because we're all so different. And so there are different ways of working with us, and one day He's going to bring us all together." You think, that's so opposite of the way God is – unity, oneness, oneness of spirit, oneness of truth, oneness of doctrine, oneness in faith. There is only one faith, one thing to believe in that's true and right. And yet you have all these different ideas. So it was with the 600 splinter groups, all different, because if they really thought the same wouldn't they be in one? It's amazing!

By definition and teaching, anything else could not be God’s structure of government, as it would oppose God’s order of unity and singleness of teaching and belief among His people. There cannot be any who are “on their own,” who are not led by God’s one and only true ministry; for that is simply how God works in His Church.

It's just the way it is. It's not a matter of pride, because if there was pride that wouldn't be a part of God's Church anyway, a part of God's government because God doesn't work through pride. Now, that doesn't mean pride doesn't exist, but God humbles us because that's the only way that God can work with us. We have to be of a humble spirit. That's why I love what it says back in Isaiah there, basically, that that's what God can work with, "of a poor and a contrite spirit." That's the way we have to be or else He can't mold and fashion us. Because if we're not pliable, if we're not yielding to that and we're resisting and fighting, He can't deal with that. He can't work with that because it's not submissive to Him; it's not chosen to be yielded to Him. We've got to choose it. And so if we don't want it He doesn't force it upon us. He doesn't force us to change. He gives us opportunity to make choices and willingly choose what He places before us. And then 1 Corinthians 12:27:

“Now you are the Body of Christ, and members in particular. God has set some in the Church…”

It’s a word used for order and position in government. That's what this word "set" means. We came to understand that after the Apostasy when we came to understand what it meant in 2 Thessalonians 2 when there was one who would "set" in the temple of God as though he were God. It was about government. That's what that word tends to mean as it's used and it's spoken of concerning Christ's life and so forth and what God has had purpose for him. So it is here. It's a matter of order. It's a matter of government.

“God has set some in the Church: firstly apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers…” (1 Cor. 12:27-28).

So this matter of "teachers" is broken up in many different categories. I think of Worldwide, the way it used to be. There was a point where there were pastors, there were preaching elders, then there were elders who were hired, and preaching elders were over them. So it's a matter of order, it's a matter of the way the Church could work, but all a matter of fitting into this category of those that God would use in teaching in various forms or another. Then after that there were local elders who were not paid, but they were in a local area serving as elders in the Church.  So God has used different things at different times. We use a different structure today similar to that down to pastors, as what it gives here and back in Ephesians, especially, and then after that we have the system there of senior elders, of elders, and so forth and it just is whatever is good for a particular age and a particular time and God allows that, but all fitting within this category here of how God works in our lives. Going on:

So the identity of God’s Church and where He is working is a most basic truth. This has so much to do with the first great truth that is attributed to being re-established (restored) in God’s Church through Herbert W. Armstrong — the truth of God’s “government.”

I marvel at that every time I read it because I think what an awesome place to begin because that's how God was re-establishing order in the Church – government, how He could govern within the Church because the Church had gone way off and was basically dead spiritually. That's what it came to in the period of Sardis.

God tries and tests His Church to manifest those who do and those who do not judge this truth about government righteously.

So we have all kinds of things that happen to us through our lifetime or through our period of time in God's Church, whatever that might be, of being tried and tested, and especially when it comes to government, because it's one of the most basic things. How do we receive things that God gives? How do we receive truth? How do we receive guidance, direction, correction, etcetera, etcetera, and change, whatever it might be? And God uses those things to see how we think, to reveal sometimes then, indeed, how we think. God already knows how we think, but He wants to make it manifest so that we can see it ourselves and sometimes so that the Church can see it and work with it.

God tries and tests His Church to manifest those who do and those who do not judge this truth about government righteously. God expects everyone to judge themselves [first and foremost] and “their” own group or organization by this most basic truth about His government.

Greatest Proof of God’s True Church

During the Feast of Tabernacles in 2005, God mightily separated His Church from all other scattered groups who formed due to the Apostasy.

So again here, here is something that took place after 1994, 1995, and continuing on after the Apostasy there and things that were happening in some of the scattered groups. Then it wasn't until 2005 that this came along.

God did this through the 21st Truth [or 42nd over all, but the 21st that we had by this time] that is attributed as being revealed to the Church of God - Preparing for the Kingdom of God through me.

It's just the way God works and did work. So that's something that people have to address and people who come up to a point in time where they're having a battle of some sort because they're not dealing with a test well they've got to come back to this. One way or another God's going to hold them accountable to come back to this because it's not a human being, it's not anybody, it's not any minister that they reject. They reject God. That's what it comes down to. It's a spiritual thing. Going on:

No other scattered group believes this truth!

"The 21st Truth," again, 42nd overall, "states, ‘God the Father is Yahweh Elohim…’” When I read this I am dumbfounded. But you know, until it's given you can't see it. But it's really kind of dumbfounding that we could look at all the examples of what it says about Yahweh Elohim in the Old Testament and in the New Testament and not grasp that, wait a minute, is this God the Father or is this Jesus Christ? Because the teaching basically, and the belief was, that this was Jesus Christ. But there were so many contradictions in scripture that by reading it, it couldn't be him. Amazing, it was the part of the leftover process of the Trinity. Incredible.

The 21st Truth states, “God the Father is Yahweh Elohim and He alone has eternally existed.”

No one else has eternal life in them, inherent in them. Jesus Christ had a beginning and everyone else does as well. That's why people had trouble with angelic beings, because they were spirit, composed of spirit. It's hard for the mind to grasp then, well, if it's spirit it can never die. Hmmm, God created it, gave life in a spirit realm. Can He not change and alter those things in a spirit realm? Absolutely! He can take that away. He gave it, He can take it away. It didn't exist before He gave it; He's the only one who has immortality in Himself. He has life to give to others from Himself; He has the power to do that. How long it continues? It's in God's hands.

“God the Father is Yahweh Elohim and He alone has eternally existed. The teaching that Jesus Christ had always existed is a holdover from the teaching of traditional Christianity of the Trinity. There is only one Almighty God who has eternal existence” (“The 57 Truths of God”).

It's beautiful! It magnifies God the Father that much more. It magnifies Jesus Christ that much more because of what he went through and what he did. He wasn't a member of the God Family who somehow gave up his power to be born of the virgin, Mary. That would make him the Father! If he put himself there, because of what he did, who is the Father? Anyway, people don't think things through, or we didn't. Going on:

The purpose for covering this truth in this article is to illuminate more fully that it is this truth above all others revealed after the Apostasy that proves where God’s true Church is and through whom God is working as His apostle to this end-time.

It is just a matter of fact. It's just the way it is. People who go by the wayside, you would think it would be a simple matter to address. That's why it boggles my mind. Because, you see, this is not over with. The cleansing of the temple is not over with, okay? There are going to be more who go by the wayside. There is more trying and testing that's coming. There are some who aren't fully throwing themselves into this way of life either and to be able to continue on to live into a new age, we have to want this, we have to desire this with all of our being. We have to be fighting against self. We have to be yielded to this process whereby God works with us, to be at one with all the truth that God gives to us. That's what has to be in our minds, to be working on our personal relationships. We can't have hypocrisy in God's Church where people don't get along! If people can't get along then what are we living? Are we living the way God says we're to live toward one another? Do we truly love every person in the Body of Christ, or do we get in conflict with them? Do we, after spending a little bit of time, are there clashes? Even in marriages sometimes, are there clashes? Because if there are, why does that exist? What's wrong? Why can't we live in peace?

Because that has to do with God's way of life. Either we're living it or we're not. It's really just that simple. Anyone that's getting into constant arguments and not dealing with those things, fights and not dealing with that, hollering at one another, saying really bad things to one another, where does that come from? It doesn't come from God. So we need to yield and change and want to change that and ask God for the help, because we can all change that. We can change the way we act to one another, toward one another.

So I hope the Church in every way is getting that message, that this Church is going to be cleansed. It's going to be cleansed as much as humanly possible in human beings. Because you can always repent. And the more you repent, the more you fight against your own nature, the more you acknowledge, "God is right; I am wrong. I've got to change. I can't keep doing the same things, the same wrong things. I can't keep responding to the same person in the negative ways and fighting with them and getting into bouts with them and thinking bad thoughts toward them." It's just got to come to a screeching halt or we're out in the courtyard. We're not in the temple. If that's what's happening, we are not in the temple.

I can't get any clearer. I've never known a time in God's Church where this is being preached, because it hasn't been, because we weren't there yet. We weren't at a point in time where Jesus Christ is about to return. We weren't at a time when the transition is being made in the world of those who are going to be able to live on into a new age and those who won't be allowed to live into a new age. And God has the power to do that.

So we have to yield to this and we have to want it. So we're asked how much do we want it. So it blows my mind that we can throw something away, that people do, many since the Feast, far too many since the Feast. There have been several people who are no longer with us since the Feast of Tabernacles. I hate that. But they're not in the temple so it's better. It's better for the Body. But it could be changed with repentance. It can be changed with humility. So do we hear? Do we really hear what God is saying and taking it to heart?

Again, it is something so basic here as this particular truth that was given. Where else is God when you leave? It blows my mind that some people either just quit altogether or they go to some other group out here. How can anyone do that? Either we believe this truth here or we don't! Jesus Christ has not eternally existed. It's very simple. He had a beginning. Only God the Father has eternal life inherent within Himself. That's most basic.

Now, if we believe that, we know this is God's Church. There is nowhere else that that's taught. Nowhere. There is no group that keeps the Sabbath and the holy days believe such a thing. On the contrary, they think you're nuttier than a fruitcake. They'd laugh, "How could they believe such a thing? It's so obvious, you know, that Yahweh Elohim is Jesus Christ, and he's eternally existed. The scriptures say so!" No, they say just the opposite of what you're reading into it. People, the mind can twist and distort things, just like it was with Pentecost. That was distorted to think it was on a Monday. Then when we came to understand it, man, it was clear. We had to shake our heads, "How could we ever believe such a thing? It's so clear that it's on a Sunday."

The bottom line is that we get weak in spirit and we can't see anymore. We get weak in spirit in something that seems to be so clear to us, like the reality that Christmas is wrong and the Christmas tree is not right, and he wasn't even born that time of year. Those things that are so clear begin to not be so important. They get muddied up if we become weaker in spirit.

The reality is you can just lose whatever God gave to you in your mind because God Almighty, and God Almighty alone, gave you every truth that you have. God Almighty and God Almighty alone (and His Son Jesus Christ), are the only ones who can help you continue in that truth, to sustain you in that truth. They're the only ones. You can't keep yourself in the truth. They're the only ones who can through the power of His holy spirit and it's that holy spirit that comes into our minds, that gives us the ability to see things so clearly. And if we begin to cut off the flow of that spirit or we get cut off from it, we begin losing it, and if we're cast back into the world it's even worse. It's even worse. Because basically Paul made it clear we're cast back for Satan's use and whatever he desires to do. That's some scary stuff.

So where are you? What are your convictions? What do you believe? Are you crying out to God everyday for help to be able to hold on to this way of life and the truth that you've been given, to not lose any of it, that God Almighty and Jesus Christ continue to live and dwell within you and you are able to live and dwell within them? Is that your prayer day by day? That you want them, that you know you need them, you need that strength and the power because you have the truth only because they sustain it in your mind? And if that spirit is gone, it's gone. You'll lose it. It's gone in those who have gone, who have gone by the wayside since the Feast, and all before that. Every year people have gone by the wayside, ministers included. No one's immune.

I'll tell you what, God has really been pleading with us. He really has. Sabbath after Sabbath after Sabbath, ever since the Feast, pleading with us to take these things to heart because we're in a time of great judgment in God's Church: "Judgment is upon the house of God," in a speedy fashion, in a speedy manner, in a way that I have never, ever, ever seen it in God's Church. Things are not remaining hidden in any manner. God's bringing everything to the surface and trials and tests do that. It brings things to the surface that have to be changed and addressed. And if they're not addressed and changed the dross is going to go. Either we do it ourselves because we see it and say, "Father, forgive me. Have mercy upon me. Help me to conquer this and overcome this," or it comes to the surface and the Church will take care of it. That's what God has given as a whole.

…. No other group or organization from the Apostasy believes or teaches this great truth. It was after God restored this most powerful truth yet, to His Church, that He began to inspire the writing of the book 2008 — God’s Final Witness.

And what is amazing to me, things still might be that bad when they happen. There may be no one. Just because extra times is given and God's showing He is a merciful God and He's giving opportunity to different ones in this world to repent doesn't mean they will. The pride may be so great. Talking about that here the other day, the pride may be so great in different peoples and nations and so forth that they just will not accept God. Amazing! Going on:

The identity and greatest proof of God’s true Church through the end-time and up to Christ’s return can only be received by those to whom God gives it. Once God has revealed such a “present truth” [the 42nd truth about God the Father, again, Yahweh Elohim being the only one who has eternally existed, so that's the present truth being talked about here] then to each to whom it was revealed is judged individually by their own judgment of where God is working and their judgment of this specific truth. For those who have left and have been removed from the fellowship in God’s true Church, their judgment rests on this truth alone. [It's powerful!] Anyone who truly judges righteously must judge whether they believe the 21st Truth (42nd overall). If a person has believed this truth and then separates themselves from God’s Church (PKG) [from PKG, the organization, because it's just a physical organization; God's Church is a spiritual body, the Church of God] then they multiply the judgment against themselves because they know no one else believes or teaches this truth. Only God’s true Church does!

Do you grasp the magnitude and importance of this great truth being taught and believed by only one scattered group of people?

That's the question. I feel like everybody who's attending today, listening today does in their own mind, in their own thinking, but it doesn't mean it's going to stay there long, in some cases, if we're not addressing certain things in our lives that need to be changed. You know, if God's bringing certain things to the surface in your life, certain matters of pride and haughtiness, certain attitudes of how we think about people and things, or whatever it might be, certain harshness that we think toward someone else in the body, those have to be conquered. You know, there might have been a time, and there was in times past, where more time could be given to address some of these things and to have these things come to the surface, but this is being speeded up right now. We don't have a whole lot of time to address these matters. That's why you're under more of a kind of a pressure cooker right now and it's going to continue on until this is over with because we have to address things one after another in our lives.

Where are we? How do we think? Are we yielded to God? How much do we want God? How much do we want this way of life? How much do we believe these things? Or do we begin to think, "Oh, I better plan until next thirty, forty years, cause it may not happen, may not happen now." Ever since I've been in God's Church, Mr. Armstrong even used to have us, talked to us about this in that manner (at least it was given through the Church) that we'd plan maybe ten years ahead knowing that within this period of time God may have Jesus Christ return to this earth. Things can begin to happen at any moment in time. And this goes all the way back to 1969 and what we believed at that moment in time about '72 to '75. Then as we got closer to '72 it was like, well, it can't be there because it takes – the mindset, especially at that time – a full 3½ years, so we plan ahead again another ten years. We're thinking ten years ahead. Then later on kind of got down to five years, thinking five years.

Do you grasp that you have to think that way? If anyone starts thinking twenty, thirty, forty years down the road it will do something to your mind, if you start believing that it might not be until then till Jesus Christ returns and you lose a sense of urgency and you begin to think that way in every facet of your life, and you begin to live your life that way. We as God's people do not live our lives that way! You can't and be in unity and harmony with God. You just can't or you begin to think in different ways that are not spiritually healthy. I hope that makes sense to you. Going on:

It now needs to be pointed out that there is also another reason of great importance to this truth being revealed when it was. Toward the end of Sardis, only three great truths remained when Herbert W. Armstrong was called to restore truth to the Church during Philadelphia. Satan and the demonic realm had the world so deceived and confused by this time that the Church was nearly dead, but God began to raise up a new era through Mr. Armstrong. Truth that Satan had worked so hard to destroy was being restored and revived within the era of Philadelphia.

One of the greatest blows that Satan ever dealt to the truth was when he began to deceive the world about God Himself. This was done in 325 AD through the Nicene Council and the establishment of the doctrine of the Trinity. It wasn’t until the Feast of 2005 that this false doctrine was finally fully removed from having any influence upon God’s people — the Church of God - PKG.

All through Philadelphia and all through Laodicea this still had tremendous impact upon God's Church and our thinking, on people's thinking, because only the matter of the holy spirit being the power of God had been addressed and that it wasn't a being. It wasn't the "holy ghost" and some kind of mysterious being and that all three were God and one was God and all three were God and… anyway. So it wasn't until 2005 that this was fully finally restored.

The restoration of this great truth (21st Truth) removes Satan’s last and greatest deception.

What an incredible thing, to begin to deceive the world in such a way, to distort things so powerfully that a great church, and later on a lot of daughter churches that came out of her, held on to this very powerfully so and it had a tremendous impact through time eventually upon God's true Church. Yet God allowed that. God allowed that to continue. God allowed lies about Himself and about His Son that diminish and take away from the truth and that which glorifies and honors God and Jesus Christ themselves. He allowed that to continue through two of the last eras of His Church. Awesome, to understand that! Because until it's God's time that's just the way it's going to be. God has to be the one to reveal or to give the timing of when He's going to reveal certain truth and it's in His power and no one else's to do so. Incredible to understand those things! Going on, reading this again:

The restoration of this great truth (21st Truth) removes Satan’s last and greatest deception. This lie was having a strong influence upon distorting the truth to God’s Church about God’s eternal majesty and the profound importance of Christ’s beginning in human life as our Passover.

Before that it's just robbed, it's robbed that, deeper appreciation and understanding of what he lived. Truly did! Going on:

The timing of this revelation of truth is so important to events that followed, as this freed God’s Church to accelerated spiritual growth, insight, and highly empowered faith.

Because you didn't live through Philadelphia and you didn't live during Laodicea you don't understand this, as a whole. Most of you don't. You came in, you know, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008, and most came in around 2008, and if this applies to you it's hard to grasp this, what this  means. You've been called into a time where you are able to grow; you're able to have more knowledge and understanding than anyone else that's ever lived in God's Church! That's awesome to understand! There are so many things here the Church was never given to understand. It was never given such insight and understanding of what's going to take place in a short length of time, what's going to take place in the Millennium concerning women and their place that's been screwed up for 6,000 years. The Church has never known that. No one has! No one through time has known that except Jesus Christ. Incredible to understand that you live in a time when these things are being given. The more that's given to you the more you can grow, the faster you can grow.

God has made it possible in this age, at the end of an age, that you're able to go through trials and tests and things of such a magnitude that you can have molded and fashioned within you within ten years what it's taken forty and fifty years in people in times past, and they didn't know as much as you. They didn't have as much as you. Do you think that's a small thing? Do we not grasp the magnitude and opportunity that God has given to each and every one of us, to live through this age and to be thrust into a new age, and then the responsibility that goes with that? Because there's responsibility with that knowledge and the carrier of such knowledge and understanding that can be shared. "You lived at that time and you knew those things?" Boy, people are going to want to know you and talk to you. They're going to esteem you in their minds immediately. And if you can't handle it and deal with it, if you're not able to do it in a way that honors God, if you're one who takes it to yourself in any fashion or form, which so often in life we have something, something happens in our lives and we feel lifted up by it. That's so foolish, to ever feel lifted up by things, to feel important, to feel more important than someone else, to feel we know more than someone else and we're better than someone else. Has that existed in anyone's mind out here? Because I know it does. I know it does. It exists in people's minds, too often in God's Church, that they consider themselves to be better than some others, that they know more than some others.

That is an unhealthy thing, an unhealthy state. We have what we have because God gives it to us and He gives it to us to share with each other in a fellowship. It's not a matter of somebody being better than or more important. That's not what any of this is about. It's about how we live toward each other, how we think toward each other, how much we love each other, how much we know we need each other, how much we cherish that in each other, the ability to be together.

Out in west Texas visiting some elderly people. They may not think of themselves as being elderly, but I think today, yeah, I'm elderly, getting up there in age, have fought through things during Philadelphia and Laodicea, have seen so many things and now getting to a state in life where a lot of medical problems, a lot of weakness, a lot of things happening, you know, that happen in your body. And they're strong and holding firm to this way of life. I think of one that I've known since I first came in the Church, the one I've known the longest in God's Church today, and she's basically confined to a wheelchair, as a whole, and it's hard. It's difficult, not able to do and get around like she used to in times past, and I love all of them with all of my being, and I wish I could give them strength physically, but they don't have it. It's hard to watch some of those things.

But I respect so highly their stance in this way of life because they have fought battles that you have never had to address in your life, because they've seen so much more; they've had to go through so much more. And the one woman, the oldest of the group, she’s 93 and sharp as a tack. I visited in her home and I felt a little uncomfortable different times. She'd talk about how honored she was to have us in her home. And I thought, "No, it's the other way around. I'm honored to be here; someone who's lived what you've lived and you continue to fight to the end." And they're set. They're all set in this way of life. It's a refreshing thing to see individuals who have made the kind of choices and battles they've gone through and they're set. The choice of this way of life, it's absolute. This Church? Absolute. The truth, 57 Truths? Absolute. They're there, not a question in my mind whatsoever. So it was a very humbling thing being able to be there.

Can we think that way toward other of God's people? You know, to honor and respect God's people? And sometimes there are those who just can't seem to get along. What's missing?

You know, that's more important than anything else. I don't care how much you know. It's just God's used it as a process, of an accelerated process to grow, and so forth, as far as all the truth that we have. But you know, the most important thing is love. It always goes back to that. You can have all the understanding of prophetic things, you can have all the understanding of everything there is about God's purpose and God's plan, and He says if you don't have love, if you don't have God's agape (and that takes God's spirit living in you), if you don't have that, all the other is absolutely worthless. Now, that's amazing to understand! All the rest is absolutely of no value if we don't have love toward each other because the most important thing is how we think toward each other. It's how we love each other. It's how we honor and respect one another.

This process of accelerated growth, where we are, what God is doing in our lives is still to me an awesome thing because if we yield to it and live this way of love toward each others we have opportunities that God is using, candidly, to reveal His power in a greater way than ever. Because for 4,000 years He just worked with individuals. As a whole He worked with individuals on an individual basis, not very many for 4,000 years! Not very many out of 4,000 years are going to be a part of the 144,000. But once the Church began an awesome process began to work with, to mold and fashion thousands and thousands and more, and to understand now we're at the pinnacle of that ability of God to create Elohim? Because that's where we are! He has brought mankind to a point in time (and the Church to a point in time), where that ability and power of God Almighty is at its height. We're blessed to share in it. We're blessed to be a part of it.

It's hard for us to grasp that because we see our lives as kind of ordinary, not so much, not so important. What's important about my job? What's important about where I live? What's important about me? Well, with God, that changes everything because that's what's important. It's the power of His life living and dwelling within us and what He's called us in to share with us to be a part of that is so extraordinary. More than any other time in the world, 6,000 years, and you get to be able to experience that! And yet I see people who just let it go by. You know, it just aggravates the tar out of me, to thumb one's nose at God, because that's what it is, like we don't appreciate and love what we have! We don't grasp what we have! We don't grasp the magnitude of the truths that God and Jesus Christ have sacrificed to give to us! But they have.

Anyway, I wanted to read this again, the middle of that paragraph:

The timing of this revelation of truth is so important to events that followed, as this freed God’s Church to accelerated spiritual growth, insight, and highly empowered faith [if we're yielding to it]. This played a great role in thrusting God’s Church into a most unique time of God’s final witness [and what took place during the period of time we experienced before this and let alone the added year here making this 4½ years, talking about it]. It has often been told to God’s people that they should go back often and review all the truths God has given us.

If you're not doing that, it's not good. It's important to review all 57 Truths and to do it on a periodic basis, to make sure that we are in agreement with everything that's there, just to refresh our minds. It helps us to be more in awe of God and to realize there are different stages here. You know, to bring us the 18 after the 3 of Sardis there was a lot of hurt, pain, sorrow, and sacrifice that went into bringing us those truths. All you have to do is read Mr. Armstrong's autobiography. And if you're not moved by that, of his life and what he and Loma went through and what they experienced, and then what they experienced in the latter part of their life, by themselves, one son having to be put out who seemingly had been molded and fashioned to be groomed, who has incredibly charismatic way about him, but was choosing something else – a liberal way. He wanted to bring liberalism into the Church, wanted to water down various things, and wanted to live kind of his own way in a way that wasn't God's. Mr. Armstrong had to deal with that. Those things are hurtful. Those things are painful, people who had to experience those things, and no one had to experience it to that level and to that degree, because of who he was.

So sometimes we don't realize sometimes the sacrifice that has gone before to bring us to what we have today. Those of you who have been in since 2008, there are some people who went through a kind of hell during 1994 and 1995 and on that you can't know. You can read about it. You can be told stories about it, but if you haven't experienced something, you don't know it like some of us know it. It's just the way of life. What Johnny and Myrtle witnessed there in Atlanta when the Apostasy took place, right there witnessing what was happening – changed everything. The whole Church. They knew when they walked out the door, "This may be it. It may be just you and me, you know, the two of us." Amazing! And all the suffering that goes with things like that, people you see go by the wayside.

That's why I'm cut so deep when I see people who just continue to go by the wayside. I have lived this since 1969 where I've seen people every year leave God's Church. I have known hundreds and thousands in God's Church – hundreds of ministers alone – whose minds today are snapped shut, who I know will not be in the Millennium, who I know will not be given opportunity because of what they did. And only by the grace of God there go I. And we're all here by the grace of God, not because of how "great" we are, but because He's going to share something with us. It's about His purpose and His plan. I shouldn't go on and on here, but it's to make a point. There's been a lot of sacrifice to give to God's Church today, especially if you've come in since that time, 2008, in through there, to give you what you have. Sometimes we don't grasp that; we don't grasp the sacrifice of what people lived through.

I think of the apostles. You think there wasn't sacrifice to give you this book? To give you the New Testament and what's written in there? Sacrifice! To be beaten as many times like Paul was? To be drug out of the city? They thought he was dead; he was lifeless. To be in chains? To be shipwrecked? To be bobbing around in the Mediterranean, you know, like a cork, gasping for air, trying to hold on to something to keep afloat until you're rescued? Most of the time when things get just partially that hard people in God's Church begin to think, "I must be… I'm doing something wrong. I must not… Where's God?" It's like, "Where's God? Because, why am I suffering like this? Why am I going through this?"

You know, there are people who have left God's Church because of that kind of thinking. It's like, "Where's God? I pray about it. I've asked for intervention and nothing that I can see has happened." That can cause doubts in one's mind. But who was Paul? It’s powerful what God did through him, you know, the truth going out to the gentiles and all the things he was blessed to write in this book, incredible things that have been given to us and passed down to us through him to the Church. Awesome! But it came with a lot of sacrifice.

That's not even talking about all the prophets that went before, before Jesus Christ came. Then Jesus Christ himself—we don't tend to think that way—had that spear rammed up in his side, you know, nail, one nail driven through his hands here and one through his feet and on that pole like he was until finally a soldier came around and stabbed him in the side because it had to be fulfilled prophetically that his blood had to spill out to the earth. He's the Lamb of God; he has to die that way. So he did. So beaten, so beaten with a cat-o-nine tails, you know, the kind of whip they used, ripped skin off his flesh. People couldn't even tell who he was! Skin was ripped off of his face, ripped off of his back, ripped off of his front, ripped off of his body… to give us what we have today.

My wife and I, we've gone through a lot. Johnny and Myrtle, they've gone through a lot to give you what you have. I'm not trying to say anything about how important it is. I'm just telling you there's been a lot of suffering sometimes that people don't know. It hasn't been easy. You've had suffering in your life as well to get where you're going. You have to. It's a part of the process. But do we think about those things that we have, the truths we have that have come with a lot of suffering over 6,000 years, to bring us to the pinnacle of where we are now in God's Church, that we have more than any other age? To be so blessed to see what we see?

Then sometimes we just don't grasp how great a calling God has given to us because it's awesome who we are, if we really see it. Who are you? Do you think it's just kind of an ordinary life you're living? That's why this was given the title it was. We live extraordinary lives, extraordinary lives because of the calling God has given to us. We have been given an opportunity, and not to latch on to that with all of our being? To let some pitiful thing happen in our lives, something, really, in the scheme of things, that are so unimportant take us out of God's Church? Because everything I've ever seen people leave over is so foolish, so minor compared to what God is offering!

See, what I'm feeling, what I'm expressing to you Sabbath by Sabbath, I know it's coming from God, and I think, "Wow, is God pleading with us!" To hold on to what we have, to fight for what we have, to stand up for this Church, to stand up for this way of life regardless of what anyone else thinks or does. This is God's Church. You're one of God's children and we should carry that name knowing we carry the name of God. We do! We have the impregnation of God in our life. Who are we? Wow, to answer that, to answer that!

I talked about that first speech I gave in Spokesman's Club, "What can I say; I've just lived an ordinary life." You know, grew up in Kansas, and ran a combine growing up. What do I have to tell people? It's kind of an ordinary life. Who wants to hear about that? Well, what makes it extraordinary is God Almighty. We have to see that, brethren, and fight for it. Change! Grow! Seek this way of life!

So again, reading, starting that paragraph again:

It has often been told to God’s people that they should go back often and review all the truths God has given us. Indeed, the greatest and most profound for God’s Church in this end-time is that 21st Truth [or 42nd overall, about God Almighty eternally existing and Jesus Christ beginning a life once he was born of the virgin, Mary]. God’s truths are our power and strength. [They really are. They are your power and strength. The more you're at one with them there is a lot of power there.] It is the truth that sets us free. It is by the word of truth that we are begotten.

That's where our begettal begins; it's the word of truth that God puts in our mind. And how much more have we been given?

It is by the word of truth that we grow, AND it is by this one great truth that God’s people should have the greatest boldness, faith, confidence, and strength of where God’s true Church is today — of where God is working and leading His people. There is no other place to go for God’s truth that is being taught by God’s ministry Sabbath-to-Sabbath.

And I think up here in 2 Timothy 1, I'm just going to read this to you. You can turn there if you want to, to verse 11. 2 Timothy 1:11—Wherefore I am appointed a preacher, an apostle, and teacher of the gentiles. I marvel how many times sometimes that they were to tell who they were. I think of an individual high in ordination in God's Church in the end-time here, not too long ago, who's no longer with us, who when I began to talk about being a prophet basically criticized me for it, but was just questioning it, "Why do you have to do this? Why?" It's like, I don't know what it's like, but it's like, "Why do you have to do this?" Well, how can I say it just straightforward? "Because God told me to." No bush, but I know what God gave me to do. So, you know, you either believe what God gives or you don't, and how He gives it. And if you don't, I can't help you. I didn't say that to him at the time but told him, "I'm supposed to."

But over and over again they were to tell who they were. It's not a matter of pride and haughtiness; it's a matter of just a reality, and either people accept it or they don't. Most don't, obviously, unless they're being drawn and called, and then they can respect it and honor it for what it is.

Wherefore I am appointed a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher to the gentiles. For which cause I also suffer these things. He talked about those things he suffered and went through in his life, and mentioned them. People needed to know. The Church needed to know by how they were able to receive the truth. It didn't come to them easily, you know, things that Paul did to get to where he was going at times. Nevertheless, I am not ashamed. You know, what he's saying is here, things that the world would look down upon because of what you have to go through, those things don't matter. It's the truth. It's what God is doing that matters.

He says, for I know whom I believe, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him unto that day. Hold fast the form of sound words, logos, the word of God, and that means the truth of God because those are the words of God. Every truth you have, they are logos. They are the words of God because they come from God. They don't come from human beings. They come through them, but God has to give them. God is the one who gives those things. So all the truths we have, have to do with the word of God. They reveal God. They reveal the thinking and the mind and the being of God. They truly do. It's awesome! And the more you see them and the more you're in oneness with them the more you love God, the more you will love God, truly. The more you see and understand the logos. Because what is it? It's the revelatory thought of the Great God of the universe to our minds. That's what it is. That's what logos means. It's the revelatory thought, His mind to ours, His thinking, the way, who He is. The more you see those things, the more you love them, the more you love Him because you think how awesome our God! How awesome!

Hold fast the form of sound words… It's like another scripture talks about, "Your word is truth." That's what it is. That's why I told about the truth. …which you have heard of me… Now, it's not "of me"; it's not about him. That's not what he's saying here. Sometimes these translations of things into English are not really good because they don't understand the truth, they don't understand what Paul is saying, they don't understand the way God works. But, basically, the word means here, means "from," "which you have heard from." The word literally means "beside me, from me." In other words, they're with me, but they've come to you.

So anyway, that you have heard from me in faith and love. "In faith." What does that mean? That has to do with belief, what you believe. So the word is there, and we have the choice to receive it or not. And if we see it and believe it's the truth, believe it's the truth, then we start living by it. That's what we do. We live by the truths that we're given. That's what faith is. "And love." You can't separate them because that's the most basic of God's mind, of God's way of life, and why He gives us all the truth He does. It's about His love toward us, a desire to fellowship—the word "fellowship"—and His desire to have fellowship with us and we with Him and His Son, and then with one another. Awesome!

…and love, in other words, indeed your love of the word of God, the truth of God, which is in Christ Jesus. So it has to do with relationships. It has to do with the truth. It has to do with this way of life because that's who God is! The logos is God. It's the mind, the revelatory thought. He gives those things to us. That's what reveals who we are. What's in your mind, how you think, what you think, reveals who you are. That's who you are because you act on those things, you live by those things, your talk. What comes out of your mouth reveals those things of what the mind is like. Could be good; could be bad. Some is good; some is bad. Some has to be repented of and changed.

…in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. That good thing which was committed to you… "That good thing" – that word, that logos, that mind, that truth – keep by, or as it is here through, it even shows you how you do it, through the holy spirit which dwells in us, because there is no other way to hold on to this. That's why we have to be so close to God, because you can't keep hold of this way of life, you can't keep in agreement with all 57 Truths and love them. That's why I mentioned here recently, do you love those truths? Do you really love them? Because it reveals the degree to which you love God, if you get the picture. It reveals your love toward God because that is God. That is God. It's the way God thinks. It's what God wants to share with us. We have the choice to receive it or not. Beautiful.

Then another one here. I'll just read it to you, 2 Thessalonians 2:10. This is right after talking about there is going to be a man of sin and a son of perdition, and so forth. Then it finally says, 2 Thessalonians 2:10 ...and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in those who perish, because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved. That's what happened through the Apostasy. We didn't receive the love of the truth, the love of 21 Truths. We began to think differently and did not love them, did not love God to the degree it should have been there.

So again, this certainly stresses the importance of learning to love the truths of God that God has given us, and understanding of present truth, because it becomes all that much more important at every moment in time where we are, in the present truth that God gives to us.

I was thinking about that. I guess that's why I wrote part of this here. What we have today we've referred to as the "present truth." I've come to love that expression because you can go back through time and you realize people were judged by different things at different times. And especially in the first 4,000 years, they didn't have a lot. They really didn't in the sense of what we recognize was restored through Mr. Armstrong during Philadelphia and what we've been given to this point in time.

I think of an expression, this reminds me of something that a former ambassador from Israel said on the occasion of the moment when President Trump made the announcement that the United States would move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. He was being interviewed; this former ambassador from Israel, I believe, it was to the United Nations from Israel or to the United States, one of the two. But he was an ambassador and was being interviewed, and he said something to the effect that "this present time was indeed a gift." He was very moved by it. I don't know if any of you saw some of that, on this one news channel, probably the only news channel that showed it anyway. On the site of the old city walls there that have been reconstructed, at the front there, they had the picture, because it was night time there by the time this happened, and they were showing the flag of Israel and the flag of the United States and it said something about Trump and what he had done, but it was a tremendous honor to him, in that respect, and they were interviewing different people. You could tell the Jewish people, the people in Israel, they were deeply moved by this.

This ambassador was deeply moved and he was deeply moved when he said, "This, at this present time, this is a great gift." He was talking about the present time, this moment in time, this present time. He used the word "present" "is a gift." He said that he was reminded that the word "present" has to do with or means "a gift" in essence. It means "a gift, a present." So even with the "present time" there, I think of the etymology of the word if you go back and look at it going way back in time, it does come from the word "gift." And it's a word that comes from the meaning of "a thing offered; what is offered or given as a gift." There are some similar words that carry this thought, "as a presenter; a presentation; to be presented." Again, it's talking about this concept, this thinking of a gift. So he was very moved by that and he looked at that moment in time. He said, "This present time," he said, "is a gift to us." You could tell he was very moved by that.

I couldn't help thinking "the present truth." It's God's gift to us. At any moment in time we are so blessed, because there has never been a time, whenever you lived, in God's Church, indeed it's God's present, it's God's gift to us. If you understand "a thing offered," because it has more of that meaning when you go back and look at the etymology: "To be offered." I think of sacrifice, all those things that go together that we should have deep in our minds. So, indeed, couldn't help but be moved by that when I saw that about what God has given to us as His gift to us.

Anyway, continuing on here and under the section here:

God’s Preparation Complete

Once God had fully re-established His Church by Pentecost of 1998, He began preparing it for the final witness He would establish for the “cause” or “controversy” of Zion.

I remember when writing some of these things and talking about this "cause" or the "controversy" of Zion. I didn't really grasp fully what or why there was such an emphasis being placed on this. But again, it's one of those things where I knew that's what I was supposed to write about. I understood it in part, but not to the depth I do today. That's why I think about some of the things that are written in this particular article. When we read it we can't drink everything in that God gives. God has given us some things at times that there's just no way you can drink it all in. I think about people that talk about going back and reading certain chapters or parts of the book, and it's like sermons, one Sabbath you hear something, and maybe listen to it again a few months later and you think, "I didn't hear that!" It's because all of a sudden something clicked up here that now you're able to see. It's this building process of like building blocks and you get to a certain point and finally it's like, "Oh, man, how did I miss that?" It's because we're building. God's building something in us. You can't see what you can't see at certain moments. So you're constantly building upon things. That's the way it is with some of this.

This "cause" or "controversy" of Zion, it's really very basic and very simple. It's about Elohim. It's about what God's creating. It's about what He has fought for from the beginning, especially when Lucifer did what he did and all this began to be magnified in a greater way, yet it was all for a purpose, but it's always been about, all of God's creation has been about Zion. If you look at man for the past 6,000 years and you think about controversy or God's cause for Zion, and this word "controversy" is in there as well because the world hasn't wanted it and so there's been this battle.

Prophets would go to the kings and there was controversy. "The only thing you ever want to tell us is bad things. What do you have for us today?" They didn't bring good news, as a whole, because the nations weren't living as they should be. Judah wasn't living as they should be. Israel was never living as it should have been, you know, after the time of king David, from that point forward and they split up, Israel, every king. And then Judah? Warm, cold, never hot. Well, there was one time, I guess, a couple kings there later on. Incredible, what has gone on in time.

It’s been a constant battle! God constantly battling with mankind. God battling with those whom He drew and has called, the Church, because He's dealing with people that resist Him. Your nature resists God. That's an awesome thing to understand. It's just natural, by its nature. When you get up in the morning your mind resists God! The more you understand that the better off you are. That's why your first judgments, as a whole, are not from God, and not because you're thinking about the will of God and the purpose of God and the truth of God. It's because you're thinking about yourself, every conflict, everything that's bad that happens to us in life, as a whole, when it comes to a matter of pride or jealousy or envy or whatever, argument, confrontation, unhappiness. Well, why are you unhappy? What's made you unhappy? It's always about self and selfishness. It really is. Impatient, whatever it is that we live in this age. There are constant battles day in and day out.

You have to fight for this way of life every day and if you're truthful with yourself you have to repent every day. You better be because no one's living a perfect life every day. If you're out here in this world, from the moment you get up to the moment you go to sleep, just take it to the bank, there's going to be selfishness in there somewhere. It is. If you're looking, it really isn't that hard to find, if you really think about it. That's good that you see it. Now, if you just let it happen and you don't think about it and you just live it, that's sick. But if you look at it and you realize, "Man, this is ugly." Selfishness is ugly. It really is ugly! It's sick! And the sicker you are with it, the more you should want to get rid of whatever, however it manifests itself at any moment in time. Going on:

Most of the truth that God began to give the Church had to do with the Apostasy and the first three Seals of Revelation that had been opened. These truths were new to the Church, as they had to do with prophecy that had just been fulfilled in this end-time. However, the first great truth that was “restored” since being given many centuries earlier is one that was lost shortly after it had been revealed to the apostle, John. [Now, this is awesome because it was never restored. It was lost quickly in time through the Churches.] There was no scattered group who understood or taught this truth, and although there is one that has since attempted to address it, it is still far away from grasping it. [And I believe I know where they got it.] This truth that was “restored” is the 14th Truth (35th overall).

This truth states, “We understand that Jesus Christ is ‘continually coming’ in the flesh of those who are in the Church of God” (“The 57 Truths of God”).

What an awesome thing that John talked about in those scriptures that most through the time, and all the ministry in the Church, took those scriptures to think that it was talking about a future coming of Christ or of something that had just happened, that he did come in the flesh. I remember having a conversation with one who was a pastor about that and he didn't understand at all, because it wasn't God's time yet.

This of course has to do with John 14 and other similar verses in 1 John 4 and 2 John that the scattered Churches misapply to a past or future literal coming of Jesus Christ to this earth. This is the first great truth that was restored to the Church of God - PKG that powerfully separated it from all others.

You know, what's a little frustrating sometimes in some of these things is that if we came along then in 2008 and we have all these truths, we don't realize that we haven't always had them. It's easy to take them for granted and not recognize the awesomeness of what we have been given and to be dumbfounded by how so much time went by. Well, for 1900 years—fathom that one—people didn't understand it. Incredible!

This is the first great truth that was restored to the Church of God - PKG that powerfully separated it from all others. To this point in time, it was the most important truth revealed to PKG that testified and identified where God was working and through whom.

I think we're going to stop here. So anyway, until next time here. We'll have Part 6.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1