Ron, Ron, Ron...
Why not just come out and say it?
I was wrong... I am not a prophet... I am not a Witness... I am sorry... I was a dipstick...
As is clear from the latest post on Weinland Watch, that isn't happening. Instead, Ron is dancing his way toward Pentecost with qualifications, bombast and bulldust.
Pathetic, and a bit sad.
If he thinks he's being clever and Machiavellian, he's seriously delusional. It's clear that, having whacked himself over the head with his own piece of four by two, the sheep are beginning to move on to other pastures.
On to the next Elmer Gantry End Times sideshow? Let's hope not.
8 comments:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/0B84F824-B527-44F6-ACF7-066EFAA941D9.htm
I don't know where else to post this, Gavin, since you don't have contact information, but I thought it was an interesting commentary on the monarchy of Thailand, who so reverenced our own benevolent leader. --Kathleen
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/6A474FDC-C36A-40B9-8BE3-79B77471FE35.htm
Apparently the king doesn't like that freedom of speech thing any more than HWA did.
Ron could almost be a COG hero if he said, "I was very sincere, I felt God was calling me to this...but I was mistaken. I will return your money if you wish and if you want me to be your Pastor we can keep on with the hope we have. I was and am sincere, howbeit, mistaken on my role at this time."
I have no doubt, RW is sincere, perhaps mentally unstalbe and unaware of it, but sincere. I could be wrong too.
The Apostle Paul was wrong wasn't he? He had to backpeddle and ended up just "fighting the good fight." Of course, we don't have any record of the fallout of his "time is short," "let those that be unmarried stay as I am," etc....
It's what prophecy does to the human mind. The problem is the Bible.
Douglas makes a very important point: RW is actually doing us all a favour. And, as others have pointed out, it's at a time like this that the value of the dedicated efforts of Gavin, J, WeinlandWatch and many other concerned voices of reason really becomes clear.
By initially having had the courage of his (woefully misguided) convictions, the wolf in sheep's clothing has now cried "wolf" once too often. As the world watches (well, you know what I mean…), he is actually fulfilling his own conditional prophecy about being revealed as a false prophet! Now all he needs to do is admit it and (as he has promised to do) stop preaching. Incredible! I don't know of anyone else in the ACOG universe who has resolutely painted themselves into a corner like this so clearly and unmistakably.
I certainly don't think RW will weather this the same way as WCG weathered the early 1970s. Their approach was significantly different. Before he started writing books, perhaps RW should have studied HWA's Personal from TOMORROW'S WORLD magazine, February 1972 (in which he even made a few references to 1975 in Prophecy!).
There are a couple of phrases from that article that I've remembered almost verbatim over all these years (on checking, I find that they are the last 17 words in the quotation below):
"Emphatically, if we — in our dedicated enthusiastic ZEAL to get God's WARNING of the end of mankind's world before this sick, sick, world — DO, even though we intend not to, appear to set a date, I FEEL I DO NOT NEED TO APOLOGIZE! No one but the enemies of ALL GOOD will accuse!"
HWA, who had nothing but contempt for people who said (as he put it) "We don't know — we are ignorant!", was careful to point out that he did not consider himself to be a prophet, and he believed that he did not deserve to be labelled as a false prophet any more than those scientists who in 1957 picked a nice round number and predicted the "magical push-button world of 1975". RW has been much less careful. The whole debacle is sad for him, and tragic for the people who are wasting their life and resources looking to him for guidance and "saving knowledge".
Without wishing to venture into the realms of prediction, I would submit that RW's bold definition of a false prophet, as well as being his own undoing, may actually prove to be his most valuable legacy.
And I don't know who it is, but the person who has put so much of the original writings of HWA and others online at www.herbert-w-armstrong.org has also doing us all a favour. You can check out the TOMORROW'S WORLD Personal and much more there. If you want to refresh your memory or investigate the story behind "1975 and all that", there's plenty of source material readily available. Today, more than ever, ignorance (in this branch of "knowledge", at least) really is no excuse.
Maybe anonymous could repost that URL by embedding the usual <a href=http://that-url.com>click here</a> so we could all view it.
Douglas Becker said:
Gather a little crowd around you with the minister after services and demand to know why the church is honoring a false prophet! Stand with confidence. Have no fear. Have no doubt. And be certain to have a Bible open to the passages which show what people should do with false prophets! Make your minister read the passage right from the Bible. Tell your minister that you expect him to repent! That you expect the whole church to repent! And that you do not want to hear one more word of prophecy from the lectern ever again until at least something tangible comes to pass as was predicted by Herbert Armstrong exactly as he said.
REACTION!
AND THE WHOLE CONGREGATION RUSHED UPON THE HERETIC SCREAMING AND YELLING BODILY KICKING HIS ASS AS THEY THREW HIM INTO THE STREET, SAYING "MAY THE LARD GRANT THEE REPENTANCE FOR BLASPHEMY AGAINST MR.HERBERT ARMSTRONG, GOD'S ANNOINTED END TIME APOSTLE,THE ELIJAH TO COME, or was that has come and went? THE CHIEF WITNESS,AND PASTOR GERNERAL OF THE ONLY TRUE CHURCH ON EARTH TODAY"
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