Anyone to counter Weinland for IdeaCity ’11???

Up here in Canada, we have a network called Vision TV which is mainly a relgious and spiritually themed network. This is music to James Pate’s ears: they did show 7th Heaven on the network (but I believe no more but I believe they have some old episodes of The Waltons). They have the Word of Faith, preachers like Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, Creflo A. Dollar (or properly put Creflo Needs A Dollar) and the like.  They have a Catholic program (including a mass), Jack Van Impe and his prophecies, Day of Discovery (if you want good sound teaching for alternative for the names I just mentioned), other shows that talk about other faiths than Christianity like Hinduism and Islam (if you’re Islamophobic, watch Reflections On Islam, you might learn something), various documentaries, other old shows (Murder She Wrote) and yes—even religious programs from the Church of God splinters: Rod Meredith’s Tomorrow’s World, Beyond Today (the United Church of God) and The Armor of God (Church of God, International).  Successful broadcaster, innovator and the founder of City TV, Moses Znaimer has bought the network of Vision TV as of late and has some his originally themed programs on it. One of them is Idea City (fill in the year ’07,’08,’09, ’10 and so on). This program is like TED, where a specialist from his or her chosen field talks about their ideas to an audience.  I have known for some time that XCG leader Ron Weinland spoke at one of these meetings of last year. Coming from a hard days work,  surfing the internet and watching TV (yes multitasking), I finally came to see him on the program. I remember Ron Weinland at Feast of Tabernacles in Niagara Falls during the late ’80’s  to early ’90’s. At that time I wasn’t impressed with his speaking. I was even trying to give the guy a chance by listening to a feast tape for the second time on “healing of the mind” but couldn’t get into it for some reason. For some reason in the late 2000s and early 2010s, Ron Weinland for some reason has become smooth and cool. I’m seriously thinking that Kevin Spacey SHOULD be in a movie role playing him. Don’t worry, while I can get up in the charm of Weinland—I made an oath and commandment to myself that I won’t get fooled again.  I have stated on here, that I believe Ron Weinland is a cultist and denies the essentials of historic Christian faith and those who are not grounded or willingly ignorant not to be grounded the essentials of historic Christian faith will be TOTALLY immersed in the charm of Weinland. There is NO way I will NOT renounce the triune nature of God a second time—it is simply irrevocable and strictly non-negotiable! An examination on scripture without the help of XCG literature confirms this! I don’t know Ron Weinland still believes in the “spirit in man” doctrine—which I think was a cheap, tacky, slutty imitation (on HWA’s part) of what the historic Christian faith always believed that one’s spirit after the body dies—IS CONSCIOUS and is in the presences of God either as eternal friend (heaven) or foe (hell) and we have a responsibility right now to decide what’s it going to be for eternity. One can presume from Weinland and other splinters, I’m a “pagan protestant” (which is an oxymoron anyway)—but that’s neither here nor there.  Yes, his lecture was all about the end of the world—and of course at the end of his lecture he had  to say to the audience “Time is up!” Nothing about a Messiah to come unite humanity together. Nothing about the redemption of the earth and the universe. Nothing about a need for personal salvation—I’m not talking a physical place of safety as such—but a spiritual safety in Jesus Christ where he says don’t worry about those who can kill the body—but rather fear the one who could (and can) destroy both BODY and SOUL in hell. Nothing about an opportunity for humanity to live not for a few more measly short decades but forever! His lecture was NOT the Gospel–which means Good News. It was the “Badspel” plain and simple. Smooth voice but same old, same old for the rest of us of have heard this badspel in the historic Worldwide Church of God and it’s offshoots for decades. We say enough is enough. I say, for equal time, someone needs  to counter Ron Weinland for Idea City ’11. I wouldn’t mind Aggie because she ran a blog to counter Weinland but Aggie is very, very, very (yes I mentioned very 3 times for reason for emphasis) guarded about her anonymity. I can safely assume it will be a very long time (let’s say when the 2020’s roll around or maybe beyond that) when she changes her mind. Myself? I wouldn’t mind it (okay I would love the opportunity)  but it is not the time. I am hoping that sometime this decade that I will grow in prominence and influence. Right now I am a working class person trying to survive and better myself. I am hoping and praying for a time I will be succeeding, not just surviving. It is also no secret to some that I want to have a political career someday. So either being on Toronto City Council in 2014 serving under the good man Rob Ford (whom I known for 14 years) who becomes Mayor of this city today—or if Ontario PC Leader Tim Hudak is our next Premier of this province in 2011  and I am darn good and serve in his cabinet, let’s say 2015 or so—perfect opportunity! But until then…I can only dream about giving such lecture.  Actually, I think this person might be a best candidate to counter Ron Weinland for equal time. Glynn Washington, an African American broadcaster on NPR (the PBS of radio) who details some his experiences in the historic Worldwide Church of God called Snap Judgment. All is I can say he’s one wickedly brilliant storyteller. Check him out here. You’ll love it! I believe the IdeaCity ’09 episode repeats itself at 5 a.m. in the morning. I set my DVD Recorder to tape it. I hope I can give you some excerpts here and we can discuss in greater detail why Ron Weinland and his badspel is bad news.

 

PS—I checked from the DVD recorder and the SOBs decided to put on another episode (IdeaCity 05) at 5:00 a.m. For those in Canada, make sure that one catches the episode when it repeats itself  again.

Intelligent Quote of The Day

If conservative forms of Christianity can be criticized for clinging to beliefs in spite of mounting evidence that they required revision if not outright rejection, liberal forms of Christianity have been criticized for jumping too quickly onto cultural bandwagons, only to find their reputation …

Blogger James F. McGrath, Associate Professor of Religion and Clarence L. Goodwin Chair in New Testament Language and Literature at Butler University, Indianapolis, Indiana giving his two cents on “peer-based” Christianity on his blog Exploring Our Matrix.

Rabbis take on Religulous

On this blog you have seen Robert Morey’s and Father Robert Barron’s critique and rebuttals to Bill Maher’s 2008 documentary movie Religulous. Now you will hear some Jewish Rabbis make their own critique of the movie. I hope you will find their conclusions and statements as just as riveting and fascinating.

Keep an open mind about NDE’s

It is almost two years ago this coming January that I showed some clips from The John Ankerberg Show on life after death. I told everybody of every belief to keep an open mind. I ask you again, with this clip (even if some have very hard-line left of centre thinking, just ignore for a moment that this is originally from Fox News) to keep an open mind. There are many hard-line atheists that would automatically conclude that the father of this son who had an NDE is implanting stories in his own child’s head. Of course, there are those in Armstrongism who totally dismiss this as demonic (believing dogmatically in soul sleep contributes to this thinking)—to only  conclude that it was Satan and the demons totally deceiving this poor child? Sadly, Evangelical Christians (to be fair, I will say most) are dismissive of NDE’s because of their occultic-New Age leanings. I can understand their suspicions—I, for one have no desire to be under the bondage of Oprahism, after slowly but surely and nicely recovering from the bondage of Armstrongism (but that’s neither here nor there and we’ll save that statement for another topic for another day). Former WCG member and British Christian Apologist Robin Brace believes that it is time for Evangelical Christians to reconsider a position that is a little too dogmatic. Read his proposal for reconsideration right here. Also, this might whet your appetite as well: Robin also has an article on his apologetics site which is called : Scientific Evidence Grows that Mind and Brain Are Separate! On this clip, the father and the son describe heaven as a place of young adults! As one who turned 40 this year and is going through the early stages of “middle age”, it was music to my ears that I will be a “young adult” again! I would like to wait at least 40 to 50 more years to see that and eternally enjoy it! 🙂

 

Why We DON’T GET OVER IT!

Read this from Exit and Support Network. It almost makes you feel sick to your stomach. How can one’s parents reject one’s daughter like that? Frankly they have failed as parents. Period. Thank you Philedelphia Church of God about child rearing. Also see this from The God Discussion. Ron Weinland spewing out hatred and curses upon people who who disagree with him labeling them “mockers of God”. May Aggie and others make this man’s life a living hell as he chooses to be a Master of Evil. The followers of these fanatical groups continually play their mind games and mental manipulation (and strangely never tire from it) of any and all bloggers who speak out against  the abuse of the groups by telling them to GET OVER IT! The answer is NO!  People who have a conscience and have a high sense of justice for all will not in any way GET OVER IT.  As the old saying goes, for evil for to triumph is for good men to do nothing. Armstrongism in it’s various splinters is an evil and cruel religion, it is not Christian but purely anti-Christ (I know this is not politically correct language but tough) and those who have a conscience will do anything in their power to confront and hopefully someday defeat  this toxic combination of egocentric (and some alcoholic) leaders and members who are scared of the outside world and are afraid of using their intellect who share very deep issues with mental illness. Speaking of Exit and Support, they will e-mail you some books online in PDF format describing the rotten fruit of Armstrongism. Some of the books they have ready are—The Broadway To Armageddon by William B. Hinson, 1977, Armstrongism: Religion or Rip-Off? (An Expose of the Armstrong Modus Operandi) by Marion J. McNair, 1977 and The Truth Shall Make You Free: Herbert Armstrong’s Empire Exposed by the late John Tuit, 1981. ESN  will soon also have a PDF of the most controversial exposure on the founder of the historic WCG,Herbert Armstrong’s Tangled Web (An Insider’s View of the Worldwide Church of God) by David Robinson, 1980. E- mail them at refuge@frii.com. Free you mind and your behind shall surely follow.

Intelligent Quote of The Day

My real fear for our nation is not what politicians will “do” about health, poverty and job creation; but rather that they will “do nothing”, because they are too busy making devils out of the other parties.

The vast majority of the differences we see in political spheres today are only matters of degree. Even where theory of government is diametrically opposed between Democrat and Republican – there are always areas in which to compromise and make meaningful changes to our healthcare and education systems, and towards reducing the national debt.

When one party resorts to demonizing the other party just to move ahead in the polls, the result is not hyperbole, it is lies. And beyond the fact that lies are sinful, lies make honest, productive conversation impossible.

—A poster on Roger E. Olson’s blog about the spiritual dimension of the hyper-partisan mood in American politics.

A New Day for Joy and Splendor for Britain?…YES!

Remember this neatly packaged “gloom and doom” message for Britain?

 

Thankfully Britain will have another day of Joy and Splendor.Finally Prince William and Kate Middleton have agreed to the tie the knot nearly 30 years when Wills parents tied the knot. Wonder what weird prophecies the current XCGs will make of this. One thing is certain, their prophecies like others will not come to pass.  Blessings for the couple to be.

Richard Burkard’s personal UCG crisis

(I did say that I would have my thoughts about the crisis in the United Church of God but here’s something a little different. Here’s one of the more prominent members of that group, Richard Burkard detailing his own personal crisis (originally posted in Mark Tabladillo’s Jesus Loves Fellowship Message Board). Believe it or not, this has nothing to do “directly” with doctrine but with “special music”. I wish some could take this advice from someone in the XCG movement who recently said, “Churches should not be in the business of micromanaging members’ lives.” That’s a first step of recapturing true sanity—Editor’s note)

I came home today from the Feast of Tabernacles, kept with UCG in Daytona Beach, FL.  It was a memorable Feast in many ways — especially for the song I was not allowed to sing.

During the summer I recorded a rendition of “Amazing Grace – My Chains Are Gone” (the CCM version Chris Tomlin made popular a couple of years ago).  I did the recording after a Sabbath service, to submit as possible Feast special music submission.  The Pastor came to me after the last note, and said I needed to sing that song during a service.  (In fact, I already had for Pentecost last year — and I sang it again in my congregation before the Feast this year.)

The Special Music Coordinator for Daytona Beach invited me to sing that song and one other at a Sabbath Senior Brunch.  I prepared accordingly, taking my accompaniment tracks on the road.

Then at 5:15 Friday afternoon, the coordinator called my hotel room — to tell me “Amazing Grace” had been vetoed and would have to be replaced.  He explained in Canada, “out west” and in some places “up the Eastern seaboard” it would be fine.  But in the Southeast U.S., it’s considered “too controversial” a song.

Talk about a 5:00 surprise!  I live in Georgia — as Southeastern a state as they come.  But I had a backup song ready since I was scheduled as a backup Special Music singer, so I replaced “Amazing Grace” with that.

Yet I was stunned and saddened by what happened.  In 2010, UCG (or at least some members) apparently still can’t handle songs about grace?!  Not even at a brunch, as opposed to a worship service??  After all, grace is the way by which we’re saved (Eph. 2:5) — and God’s grace was good enough for Jesus as He grew up (Luke 2:40).

By the way: UCG President Dennis Luker was not the one who made the veto.  He told me so himself.  He was at the brunch, and I told him practically everything I’ve written here.  Mr. Luker didn’t know anything about the veto — but he agreed with my disappointment and promised to “look into that.”

I don’t have any idea what will come of this.  I still don’t know who vetoed the song.  But when I sing “Amaizng Grace” from now on, I plan to introduce it by mentioning how controversial it is — even to the point of being banned from a Christian church convention.

All I know about Chris Tomlin is his music, so I can’t really say if he’s a Christian or not.  I realize not everyone who sings “Christian music” always acts like one.  (Examples: Michael English, Kirk Franklin and even Amy Grant.)

As for defining worship music — ohhhh, you and your tough questions!

I’d say real worship music should relate directly to God or Christ.  I call some songs “pseudo-Christian” because they really don’t do that.  Such songs could include CCM “love songs” such as God Gave Me You, as well as classical music compositions played as offertories at COG Holy Day services.

I’ve heard BBN’s Lowell Davey (who refuses to allow non-traditional music on his radio network) point fingers at CCM songs for not mentioning God or Christ.  I e-mailed Dr. Davey a reply several years ago, pointing out the standard verses of Amazing Grace don’t mention those two words, either!  (The Chris Tomlin rework adds the line, “My God, my Savior has ransomed me.”)

Worship music isn’t an issue of drumbeat or orchestration to me — it’s more the words and the direction where the music is pointed.  Classic hymns have been turned into nice CCM versions in recent years.  I hear a CCM cover of Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing on Christian radio in my city, for example.

P.S. I’ve now been told Amazing Grace was one of the musical selections at another UCG Feast site in Branson, Missouri.

Christian blogger challenges controversial belief on the Eternal destiny of Anne Frank

Hat tip to James Pate.  Some will be offended at this article and shout and scream, “God is sovereign and does what He wants! Who are YOU to question Him!”  or “Our ways is not simply God ways.” These are just mere ploys to just to shut people up and stop them from using their heads. Nothing more.  Blogger, Rachel Held Evans is absolutely defiant in this approach. Rightly so. She expresses her troubling thoughts of what some, especially in American Evangelical Christianity believe that famous Holocaust victim, Anne Frank is in hell just because she supposedly did not accept Jesus Christ as her personal Savior. All is I can say is that I can thank God I’m still a wider-hope Christian and I blame this dilemma on Augustine and John Calvin who constructed the most misanthropic theology that God is shutting the doors of heaven to many.  I too with Rachel Held Evans reject the notion that God predestined Anne Frank to eternal wrath for His glory. Mental nonsense. For those who want to go apecrap on me, I still believe that there is salvation in Jesus Christ and no other. For those who God makes a righteous provision on the unevagneglized, it will be because of grace, not their works. To read Rachel Held Evans thoughts, click here. By the way, check out Neal Punt’s Evangelical Inclusivism for an alternative view on the unevangelized dead. He’s not a cultist but a man who subscribes to the essentials of historic Christian faith.

An inspiring message from Dr.Pryor about the Book of Hebrews

No comment about the current state of the United Church of God, Felix??? Don’t worry, I’ll try to work on something with more detail but I think J of Shadows of WCG has some good stuff and has done a great job. The blog Ambassador Reports has also pulled it’s weight too and there a whole host of others that are not giving the protectors of Armstrongism an even brake and I salute them all to keep up the good work.I don’t want to dwell too much on it but this means I do not care the people in them. I do. This is the “light side of the force” in me that I can be humanitarian. My heart is very concerned and it is my hope and prayer that in 2011,  the people in the UCG whether they are lay or clergy will finally have their patience run out and have the testicular fortitude to come out of this spiritual Babylon.  As I have mentioned before, alternatives do exist and they should be examined.

This leads me where I really want to speak about. On this blog I have spoken a little bit about a scholar who specializes in the Hebraic roots of the Christian faith by the name of Dwight Pryor who leads the Centre of Judaic Christian Studies. I have advertised his Feast of Tabernacles celebrations on this blog a few times and have linked to some insightful articles from his ministry. Doug Ward of Grace and Knowledge fame had these kind things to say about Dr.Pryor: “I highly recommend the Center for Judaic-Christian Studies, the teaching ministry of Dwight A. Pryor. I think of Dwight’s congregation, the Church of the Messiah in Dayton, Ohio, as a model for what WCG could have become (Editor’s note, sadly that ship has sailed both for the WCG/GCI and the UCG). Dwight teaches about Jesus and Paul in their first-century Jewish context. He upholds the teachings of historic Christianity and at same time brings out the value of Hebraic traditions like the Sabbath and biblical festivals. He’s a balanced, inspiring Christian teacher.”

Yes, I want to link you up to his site again and be inspired. He has an audio presentation discussing The Book of Hebrews. I hope all will enjoy it and be furtherly enriched by it.