Steve
From time to time I send links to your site/blog to all the people I know and below is an example of an ex-WCG response. (He’s now with a former PCG group–Don Roth, TCOG, Wisconsin.) Some people are so tied to HWA errors that they can’t see the whole picture even when linked to scriptures. “Doctrine” is whatever came from HWA.
Pat Homan
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Subject: Re China
Date: Sat, 11 Jul 2009 17:37:23 -0400
Just read Collin’s blog re China. Guess I’ll have to take it with a “bag” of salt. While that may be their plan and parts of it are working, Europe will beat them to the punch in getting rid of the USA, and Britain, etc. The Beast in his scenario doesn’t have a religious component, and neither does the “Left Behind” one for that matter.
We will be out of the picture when it the Day of the Lord, the first and second Woes, or wars between Europe and the Asians[Gog and Magog], and the third Woe, intended to be the tie-breaker, will unite them to fight the “alien from outer space”, Christ.
Gog and Magog attack the “peaceful” kingdom at the end of the Millenium
Eze 38:8 After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land [that is] brought back from the sword, [and is] gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them…11 And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,
but they won’t succeed.
Rev 20:7 And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, 8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom [is] as the sand of the sea. 9 And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.
MYREPLY
Pat,
Thanks for forwarding the negative comments from your ex-Worldwide Church of God friend. This question of the two “Gog and Magog” attacks keeps coming up repeatedly. I don’t usually respond to anonymous criticism, but will do so this time as you can account for the authenticity of his criticism. His comments reflect the deep-seed misunderstanding of prophecy that existed in the old Worldwide Church of God (WCG) under Herbert Armstrong. I can address those misunderstandings quite knowledgably as I was in that church during my younger days (from 1969-1978). The WCG taught vehemently back then that a European power would emerge and become re-Nazified and heavily militaristic, and that it would “carry captive” the people of the USA even as the ancient Assyrians carried captive many Israelites millennia ago. This prophetic scenario was expected to unfold in 1972. Obviously, the WCG prophetic scenario failed spectacularly, but that has not stopped some who were indoctrinated in WCG prophetic teachings to hold on to that failed expectation. The WCG prophetic ideas of a European attack vs. the USA in our modern world has four major weaknesses.
A. No biblical scripture exists to support it. There would need to be a prophecy stating this fact clearly, but none exist. This doctrine was cobbled together using very speculative scriptures, an assumed parallel between 721 BC and the latter days (which is not stated in the Bible) and the misconception that all of Germany is modern “Assyria.” As readers of my books and writings know, the Israelite tribe of Gad is dominant in Germany, but some modern Assyrians do live among the German people. However, Numbers 24:24 (a latter-day prophecy) states the descendants of Asshur (Assyria) and Eber (which includes all the Israelite tribes and the other descendants of Abraham) will be allies in the latter days who are attacked in the latter days by a common enemy.
B. The God-inspired timing of the Ezekiel 38 and Revelation 20 attacks by Gog/Magog are totally different. The Ezekiel 38 attack will occur in “the latter days” or “latter years” of our current age (38:8, 16), but the Rev. 20 attack will occur at the end of the millennium. These two events are separated by about 1,000 years from each other.
C. Ezekiel 38:2-6 declares which nations will attack “Israel” or “the House of Israel” in the latter days. Not one European nation is included in the list of attackers. Indeed, even the WCG agreed that many European nations were of Israelite descent, so it never made any sense to assert that Europe would attack America in the latter days. That would have resulted in Israelite nations attacking their own fellow tribes. That makes no biblical sense. Ezekiel 38 states nations mostly from Asia (Russia, China, Iran, etc.) will attack all the tribes of Israel in Ezekiel 38-39 as the entire “house of Israel” has to bury the bodies of the dead attackers after this “Armageddon” war at the end of this age (39:12). Europe is destined to be attacked by the Gog-Magog nations along with North America, Australia, etc. It is actually rather laughable to assert Europe will attack anyone in the modern world. They have mostly disarmed themselves (as blogs in my “Archives” document) and are pacifist. They would be hard-pressed to defend themselves from an exterior attack by Russia and its allies or even an insurrection of the very large Muslim population in European nations.
D. Your friend rightfully asserts that at the end of the millennium, Gog and Magog’s forces lead all nations to attack a “peaceable kingdom” which will consists only of those living in a “beloved city” which God defends. That has to be Jerusalem. However, the nations of Israel attacked in Ezekiel 38-39 are definitely not a peaceable kingdom. They are armed and God tells them to unleash their weapons against Gog-Magog’s attackers (38:21). The Israelite nations are sinful and don’t really know who God is when the Ezekiel 38 attack occurs (39:7 confirms this). Verse 11 (about Israel being a nation of “unwalled villages” actually is a statement that the latter-day nations of Israel will have foolishly “let down their defenses” as the ancient terminology of “unwalled villages” meant defenseless cities which have been careless about attending to their defensive needs.
I would say that, based on biblical prophecy and real world geopolitics, it is the old WCG prophecies which need to be taken with “a bag of salt.” I suggest you send you anonymous friend the link to my article “What Ezekiel 38-39 Reveal about a Future World War III,” available now as the recommended article at my homepage.
Steve
