Chapter Nineteen – Final Points—Final Questions
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Important points and a series of crucial personal questions remain. These are necessary to examine, and form the book’s conclusion. In fact, it is not complete without them. Think most carefully about all that you read in this final short chapter. The material immediately following sets up other points and serious questions that you cannot now avoid.
Goods Vs. ;Services
The worldwide pursuit of materialism and pleasure in every form, particularly in the Israelitish Western nations, has had a much greater impact on the thinking among God’s people than most brethren would suspect. Let’s understand how.
Almost everyone recognizes the economy of every nation is defined by a combination of goods produced andservices offered.
Now turn your attention to the prevailing mood in America. As its citizens have demanded more services in their constant pursuit of ease, pleasure and entertainment, America’s economy has largely retreated from and lost its world dominance in the manufacture of durable goods. People want services: restaurants, amusement parks, movie theaters, health spas, golf courses, casinos, concert halls, professional sports stadiums and arenas, computer and cell phone access, new forms of entertainment, tourist attractions, beautiful supermalls, and many other kinds of pursuits and escapes. But this has come to mean that other nations now produce many of the items that Americans prefer to enjoy and consume, rather than to design and make.
Using this economic analogy, The Restored Church of God has produced—has ;manufactured—what could be called the ;hard goods of the Church of God, meaning vastly more literature to do the Work and feed the flock than anyone else. Yet, we have retained the essential ;services, including several that no one else has! (In fact, under careful examination, we are actually seen to have a number of services either in place or on the way that some of the big organizations lack. You have read about some of them.)
On the other hand, copying America’s economy, the big splinters reflect the opposite. They have generally emphasized ;services—more local halls, more pastors, more Feast sites, more youth camps, more projects and programs, and all kinds of socials and activities to satisfy what their ;citizens—their tithe-paying ;consumers—demand. While these things are of course not wrong in proper balance, these organizations no longer want to manufacture very many ;goods—and it is too late to start now. They well knew this would have meant too much work and not enough play.
When understood, this mindset is one of the reasons some of these groups fall into simple contributing to relief organizations—check writing!—rather than warning the nations being punished. Thus, well over a decade later, and after having each received hundreds of millions of dollars, these organizations do not have much literature—not very many goods—to show for their efforts! While they will never admit it, they spent too much time and money playing—and in some cases arguing behind closed doors about little more than nonsense. (Think UCG, LCG, COGwa and COGaic.) We have had to show a steady, patient endurance, so lacking in Laodicea. To repeat for emphasis, they were simply not willing to do the ;heavy lifting and to ;bear the heat of the day, so vital to having the tools that Mr. Armstrong knew to be necessary. Also like America, which is no longer willing to drive the world’s economic engine and has fallen behind other nations as a result, these organizations no longer careto drive the ;economic engine of the Great Commission.
The result? They have fallen far behind those God is using!
Grasp this. Without the goods, God simply could not use them, even if He were leading them—and the fruits, including things you have seen throughout this book, THUNDER that He is NOT!
Stop—think—analyze—understand. Make yourself come to grips with these things. Come to God’s conclusion!
Powerful Parallel
Then understand the astonishing historic parallel at work here. Exactly what occurred to brethren in the ancient city of Laodicea has occurred to most of God’s people today. They have been deeply affected by the service environment in the world around them—as in BEING SERVED by their organizations instead of GIVING God’s truth to the world! While brethren should have seen this change coming, they did not because spiritual blindness(Rev. 3:17) had already become widespread by the late 1980s. Most now want to enjoy the ;creature comforts offered by the big splinters, instead of zealously supporting the true Work of ;taking to market around the world the vast array of uncompromising books, booklets, articles, and other publications produced and offered only by Philadelphia’s remnant. (This includes over 125 powerful videocasts and 300 broadcastsfound on one of our websites.) Those of brotherly love would want to thoroughly—and LOUDLY!—warn their fellowman of impending calamity!
Consider carefully rereading this analogy and parallel until you cannot miss its message.
Hundreds of additional brethren throughout the splinters have been joining us. So are others, called from the world—now perhaps about 50 percent of our overall growth—and both facets of this growth have also been accelerating. More deacons, elders and other leaders are also joining us.
God’s presence, coupled with the ;durable goods produced (literature), is why our statistical growth in both size and the reach and impact of the Work is exploding past the collective efforts of the ;service-oriented splinters. However, as we have often stated—and God has proven more than once—you have not seen anything yet!
Another Man ;Sent?
All of what you have read throughout the book introduces an enormous question that cannot be left unaddressed or unanswered in your mind. Near the end of Chapter One, it was explained in detail (and this was demonstrated) that God has used many men in ages past to either record in His Word prophecies about the kingdom of God or to announce it. Recall that I planted a seed in this regard.
In the New Testament, a particular man may be selected by Christ—directly sent—and used by Him to announce to all the nations of the world the coming of the kingdom of God. This man’s duty in the time of the end would also necessarily include being sent with a blunt and urgent warning, directly from God, to the greatest nations in the world, as well as to spiritual Israel—those of His Church who had become blind and grown lukewarm with God’s precious truth. Before these two groups could be sent into terrible punishment, we saw that a loving God would WARN them.
Therefore, someone would—someone must!—be sent to issue the warning!
When it is evident that these SPECIAL COMMISSIONS—being sent to the whole world with the gospel, and to Israel, as well as to the Church, with warnings—have been designated by the Head of the Church, Jesus Christ, the man chosen has been given the office of apostle. His fruits become the confirmation. Understand, and this is the point, that when this designation has been assigned, it is, of and by itself, enough to prove that the Great Commission is not finished, and will experience a thunderous ;final chapter. Such was the case with Mr. Armstrong in the twentieth century. It is for the reader to prove if this office has been given again (Eph. 4:11; I Cor. 12:28)! Remember, Mr. Armstrong revealed that God always works starting through ONE MAN—no matter the age or period in history.
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