Good morning, brethren, on this beautiful Sabbath day in Upper Michigan.  The title of today’s sermon is “Coming Out From the Shadows.”

Not so long ago something remarkable was taking place on the earth.  Tens of thousands of people heard God’s call through the voice of one man.  God’s call was that if you love Me and obey Me and keep My commandments, we can do a great work together as the body of Christ.  People from all walks of life heeded the call and rallied around the man Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong.  From very humble beginnings a mighty work did, indeed, grow!

THE FRUITS OF HERBERT ARMSTRONG
Psalm 133 was Mrs. Armstrong’s favorite verse.  Psalm 133:1 says, “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!”  More or less, that became the motto of the Philadelphia Church era of God.  If you were to look up “unity” in the Hebrew, you would find that it is yachad which means as a unit, unitedly or to become one.  The body of Christ works as a unit.  It is a well unified body with many different parts put together to accomplish something greater than what we could do physically, because obviously there is a spiritual component to the body of Christ.  That is the mind of Christ (the Holy Spirit).

This one body with many parts was dedicated to doing God’s will.  The Plain Truth was read around the world.  Thousands upon thousands, and eventually millions, of people heard the word of God.  Thousands of congregations sprung up across the earth who were keeping the Sabbath together in unity.  Huge gatherings took place on the holy days and during the Feast of Tabernacles.  Sometimes ten or fifteen thousand people gathered in one place.  They were of one mind and one purpose, and that was to keep God’s days, to praise God and to fellowship with one another.  Eventually 8.5 million Plain Truth magazines were going out monthly.  The Church could boast such achievements as the Ambassador Auditorium.  It was a beautiful building that was dedicated to the Great God.  Ambassador College was dedicated to recapturing true values and taught them to our young people.  Yes, indeed, it was a tremendous work.

If you would, please turn with me to Mark chapter 16.  We will read about some of the signs that follow people who are being blessed by God.  Mark 16, verse 15:  “And He said to them, ‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.’”  Mr. Armstrong said the main commission of the Philadelphia Church of God was to preach the gospel of the kingdom to the entire world.

Continuing with Christ’s words in verse 16:  “‘He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.  And these signs will follow those who believe:  In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.’”

Brethren, these are signs that follow the work of God.  Many, many people were healed. Demons fled before the Church of God!  This idea of taking up serpents means we could handle the things that Satan’s demons would throw at us.  What the serpents would throw at us we would be able to handle without getting hurt.  The Church was attacked many times, but it always came out stronger and better after each attack.  These signs are what followed Mr. Armstrong and the work of God.

Mr. Armstrong did speak with a new tongue.  He had a new dynamic way of approaching the gospel and bringing it to the world.  It was a very powerful witness through media.  He used television, radio, and the printed media.  It was definitely a Church being blessed by Jesus Christ and God the Father.

Now, if you would, turn with me back to Luke chapter 6.  We find something interesting here.  It is the only reason why God would bless such a work, and that is because you know a tree by its fruit.  Verse 43:  “‘For a good tree does not bear bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit.  For every tree is known by its own fruit.  For men do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush.  A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil.  For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.’”  Certainly out of the abundance of the things that were in Mr. Armstrong’s heart, his mouth did speak with great effect around the world.

THE SCATTERED CHURCH
Now we come to this point in time where everything Mr. Armstrong did seems to be undone and ruined.  Was it all a waste of time and effort?  No way, brethren!  In spite of what you see around you (the devastation in the Church), God was and is moving forward.  He is using everything that has happened to the Church to great effect to finish the work.  It is time for the next and final phase to take place before Jesus Christ returns. Brethren, it is time to heal the breaches and the divisions that have caused the scattering and the shattering of God’s end-time Church.

Toward the end of his life, Mr. Armstrong became concerned about what would happen to the Church after his death.  He wanted to protect God’s flock in the event of his death or disability, so he did certain things.  We have record of them.  Because of his love for the Church, he wrote this letter in March of 1981.  It is a six-page letter, but I am going to just quote a little bit from page 6.

“God could take my life in the next breath or He has power to keep me on the job as His instrument for as long as He deems necessary.

“I have NEVER SAID I expect to live until Christ comes.

“But, just in case of my disability for any reason, to prevent Satan from causing division [our emphasis on ‘to prevent Satan from causing division], I feel God has inspired me to delegate power to the Advisory Council, during any such complete disability, to take full charge of the Work and all its assets and activities.

“The CHURCH must not be scattered.  It must not become scattered, because there is no COMPETENT, CHRIST-CHOSEN SPIRITUAL SHEPHERD, TO BECOME MEAT FOR BEASTS (human) OF THE FIELD!  (See Ezekiel 34:5).  This is a safeguard for YOUR protection.”

Mr. Armstrong knew it was Satan’s great purpose to destroy the Church by shattering it and scattering it.  He had seen that there was no single man to turn over every aspect of the Church’s authority and its power and to go forward and continue the work.  So he set about making a council of elders to protect the Church.  They were the wisest people with the most inspiration and guidance that he could see in the Church to run it in case of his disability or his death.

Hind sight is perfect.  We know what did happen after Mr. Armstrong died was exactly what Mr. Armstrong did not want to happen.  Mr. Armstrong was absolutely correct about the source of the trouble.  It is Satan.

Let’s turn to Daniel chapter 12.  Speaking of the end-time Church, Daniel was given a prophecy to record in verse 7.  “Then I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, when he held up his right hand and his left hand to heaven, and swore by Him who lives forever, that it shall be for a time, times, and half a time; and when the power of the holy people has been completely shattered, all these things shall be finished.”  In the King James Version it says, “scattered,” and the word actually means shattered and scattered.

Certainly, brethren, we can see that the Church is, indeed, very scattered, very shattered and a very broken body of Christ at this time.  It has taken 21 years to get the Church in this poor state that we have today, but that did not mean God failed.  As we said earlier, God is using everything that happened to continue to move forward.  God’s great purpose in this sifting and sorting is to assay the character of the people.

ENOUGH ROPE TO HANG OURSELVES
He is assaying the character of those who answered the call.  Of the tens of thousands who answered the call, how many really loved the truth?  How many really loved one another?  How many really wanted to overcome the sins in their lives and grow in holy righteous character?   How many really wanted to get rid of the spots and blemishes in the bride of Christ?  That is what this is all about.  He is finding out who really cared.

There is a true saying and one that my father used often, “Give a man enough rope, and he can hang himself.”  We have all had enough time now (21 years since Mr. Armstrong’s death) to leave quite a track record of the type of people we are.  We have a personal record that is recorded in heaven.  It is our personal history.  It is the legacy of our character.  That is a scary thought, brethren, because we have all been given 21 years of rope.  Some of us have been doing an excellent job of hanging ourselves by not overcoming our spots and blemishes.  We have been harsh towards one another.  We have been harsh to the people in the world by teaching lies and deceptions and so many other things that we have seen in the Church of God.  I do not want to shift into judgment mode. I do not want to assassinate anyone’s character, but it really is time to say enough is enough!  It is time to help each of us to sort things out in our own lives, and try to do the best we can with what time is left.  It is time to do the right thing in God’s sight.

Rather than judge, we want to take to heart the words of God such as in Luke 6.  Please turn back to Luke chapter 6.  Verse 37:  “‘Judge not, and you shall not be judged.  Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned.  Forgive, and you will be forgiven.  Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom.  For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you.’”

We want to remember those words as we are discussing the condition of the Church.  It is important to recognize what has happened to us, but not to blame and assassinate people’s character.  It is time to forgive those who have caused these offenses.  We all cause offenses.  Forgive the offenses.  Heal the breaches, and help put this broken body back together.

I John 1:8 says we are all guilty of sin, so we all have sins.  There is no point in pointing a finger at somebody else, because we all have three fingers pointing right back at us when we do that.  But we have to call a spade a spade and realize that there are things we need to fix in the body of Christ here in the last days.

abomination in the spiritual temple
Turn back to Daniel chapter 11.  God knew this would happen, and thousands of years ago He wrote these words so that we would understand and be comforted.  We can realize there is something that can be done, and there is a great purpose being worked out here in the very last days.  Daniel chapter 11, starting in verse 31.  “‘And forces shall be mustered by him, and they shall defile the sanctuary fortress; then they shall take away the daily sacrifices, and place there the abomination of desolation.’”

Of course, in Matthew 24:14-15 we know that after the gospel of the kingdom is preached to the world as a witness (which Mr. Armstrong did so effectively), that the abomination of desolation would once again take place.  But it would not take place in a physical building like it did in Solomon’s temple or in Zerubbabel’s temple.  No, it would not be exactly like that.  It would be in the spiritual temple of God, the Church of God (the sanctuary fortress).

Continue reading Daniel 11:32-35.  We see, brethren, that many would fall in the last days to refine them and make them white.  This is not a physical death.  It is a stumbling and a falling by sin, by flattery, by intrigue and by the things that we saw happen over the last 21 years.

If we drop down to Daniel 12:10 we can see what God’s purpose is ultimately.  “‘Many shall be purified, made white, and refined, but the wicked shall do wickedly; and none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand.’”  You see the whole purpose of what we have been going through for 21 years is to be purified, made white and to get rid of those spots and blemishes.  We need to be refined liked gold and silver are refined and assayed by getting rid of impurities.

The wicked will continue to do wickedly.  These are those who knew better and would not use their calling properly.  The people in the world are not condemned, because they do not know what they are doing.  One has to reject the truth or waste their calling to actually be wicked (to be wicked in a way that is not getting rid of spots and blemishes and not allowing one to be refined).  The wise will understand what is going on, and it is time for us to understand and do something.

There is no shame, brethren, in stumbling.  We all sin, and we all stumble.  The shame is in not getting back up, not repenting and not letting the Holy Spirit work with us to overcome these sins.  It is a shame not to apply the blood of Christ to our sins.  There is shame in repeating them over and over, and becoming harder of heart and more offensive to others.  It is time, brethren, to determine who really is attacking the covenant people.  It is time to determine who seems to want to divide, scatter and shatter the body of Christ.  Who are the people who really want to overcome, or who are just caught up by events?

If you remember in the parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25, the entire Church (all ten virgins) fall asleep at the end.  When they wake up, five are wise and five are foolish.  That has happened to the Church, and we are not to point fingers because we all fell asleep at the switch!  But it is time to wake up and be part of the wise.  It is time to realize we do not have to bear bad fruit and teach bad things.  We do not have to be hardhearted and unforgiving.  We have a choice in the matter.

Remember, going back to what I said about Mr. Armstrong, a good tree bears good fruit, and God will bless it.  Obviously, it would stand that a bad tree can bear bad fruit and does.  Trees are representative of people, specifically teachers.  That is why John the Baptist told the Pharisees, you are trees ready to be cut down!  In Matthew 3 he said, you are ready to be cut down because you are teachers who are hypocrites, hardhearted and a brood of vipers (serpents)!  Jesus Christ handled those serpents and so did John the Baptist without getting hurt spiritually.  That is the sort of thing that God did through Mr. Armstrong and blessed him.  This was also true of the 12 apostles and all of His servants over the ages.  He used them to deal with the serpents. But the serpents who are people in the Church of God should actually know better.  Those Pharisees could have listened to what was being said and could have changed.  There were a few that did, like Nicodemus.  They said, I do not have to be a hypocrite, and I do not have to be hardhearted.

GOD’S MANAGED FOREST
Abraham Lincoln once said, “Character is like a tree and reputation is its shadow.”  The shadow is what we think of it, and the tree is the real thing.  Every tree not only drops a type of fruit, but it also casts a shadow.  That shadow is its reputation.  You can know the tree by its fruit.  You can know the tree by the shadow it casts.  All begotten children of God are, indeed, saplings.  That is why David said, I am a tree planted by the riverside. We are saplings that should be destined to grow into beautiful fruitful trees, mighty powerful pillars in the kingdom of God.  We should be trees that will bear good fruit for the world, so that we feed the world and help the world have a beautiful Millennium.

In a forest it is the healthiest trees that grow tall and strong and form the canopy that is atop the forest.  They are the ones that catch most of the sun’s rays because they shoot up and grow up and take in the warmth of the sun and all of the nutrients that the sun can provide.  To stay healthy, every forest must be culled because in every forest there are some trees that are not worth having.  They grow up, they take up space, they block out the sun from other trees.  In a natural forest, they naturally get culled.  You can go out into any forest and find the trees that are weak by disease and parasites.  They first lose their leaves, and then the branches start to fall.  Some day in a big wind storm there is a mighty crash, and the tree comes down.

In God’s managed forest, He allows the storms and the tempests of life (the trials that we have been going through in the last 21 years) to clean the forest of the dead wood.  This gets rid of the trees that are causing shadows on the rest of the saplings that are trying to grow.  They are blocking out the sun’s light and dropping bad fruit.

It is time, indeed, to evaluate the forest of God.  It is time to evaluate that part of the forest that we dwell under and that part of the forest that we are a part of.  We need to be evaluating the shadow that we cast as a sapling for God and the shadow and the fruit of those that we dwell under (that we learn from).

THE QUALITY OF THE FRUIT
Measuring the shadow means we are measuring the people we are dwelling under and learning from.  We also have to measure the quality of the fruit.  What is the fruit of the group that we are a part of or the organization that we call ourselves in this broken mess of God’s Church at the end of the age?  What is the fruit of all of these splinter groups?  Is it good?  Or when we look at it and we measure it, is there a lot of anxiety and fear?  Is there repression, abuse and unhappiness?  We have to measure these things against God’s Scriptures, and the best place that puts it all together in my mind is Matthew chapter 5.

If you would, please turn to Matthew chapter 5.  It is often called The Beatitudes.  Read Matthew 5:1-16.  This is a wonderful place to examine ourselves and measure the fruit of the trees that we dwell under and dwell with.  Is there humility?  Do they mourn what has happened to the Church?  Are they hungering and thirsting for righteousness?  Are they pure in heart?  Are they peacemakers, or constantly causing division and putting down other groups of God or other people in the Church?  Are they willing to take persecution for God’s name’s sake?

We are the light of the world and the salt of the earth.  We are to let people see the love of God by the way we live and the way the Church operates.  We are to protect the world as salt preserves.  Brethren, if we lose our ability to preserve in all of these ways, then we become part of the problem.  That is actually what is meant here.  If you were to look it up in the Greek, you would see losing the savor is like becoming foolish in God’s eyes.  We know that we are supposed to keep the commandments if we love God.  We could look at those Scriptures.  I made a note of John 14:21-24.  In Psalm 119:142 and 151 we are told to speak the truth.  We are told to speak the truth in God’s name.  We are told to comfort those who are downtrodden and to help those who are weak and frail.  We are to help the fatherless, the widows and the orphans.  The teachers and their teachings and our own example should be to edify, to unify, to encourage, to root out falsehood and to root out trickiness, craftiness and deceit.

Turn to Ephesians chapter 4.  Beginning in verse 1:  “I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”  It says endeavoring to keep unity and peace in the Church of God.

Continue reading Ephesians 4:4-10.  That is Jesus Christ who died and rose again for the rest of us and looking forward to the resurrection of His saints (the body of Christ).

Read verses 11 through 16.  Brethren, the institution of the hierarchy in the Church, which is apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, was to preach lowliness, gentleness, longsuffering and bearing with one another in love.  They were to bring about unity in the bond of peace.  Therefore, if the fruit of the group (or the tree) that we are dwelling with is one that is not promoting these things, but instead we find anxiety, fear, judgmentalism and hardness of heart, obviously there is something wrong.  Because the fruits of the tree should be good fruit.  The shadow that we are casting should be a good shadow.

We are told in Luke chapter 6 to love our enemies, yet right within the body of Christ there is so much hatred and so much unforgiveness and hardheartedness toward one another.  How can the hand say to the foot, I hate you?  Get away from me!  How can the eye say to the ear, I do not need you!  Get out of my life!  Separate from me!  How can this be possible in the body of Christ?  Yet that is what caused the shattering and the scattering, that among other things that we are going to discuss today.  We are to love our enemies and pray for those who deceitfully use us and forgive them.  It is by forgiveness (a balm) that we can help heal the divisions in the body of Christ.  This is how we can get ready here in the last days to fulfill the destiny that we were called for and to use all the trouble we have gone through for great purpose.  We need to be getting rid of the spots and blemishes in the body of Christ and help us all to overcome.  Then we will be able to get the reward that will eventually allow us to be good trees and good teachers in the kingdom of God.

This division and scattering and shattering is the opposite of what God wanted.  But He can make lemonade out of lemons, and He is.  He is taking the trials that we have allowed to come upon ourselves to find out who really cares.  He will see who really wants to do something here at the end of the age to help things move forward and bring about the beautiful Millennium.  God is using everything that we have seen to a great effect.

Turn to I Corinthians chapter 11.  Here Paul is teaching the brethren and pointing out certain things very similar to what we are going through today.  He says in verse 18, “For first of all, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and in part I believe it.  For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you.”  He says there must be factions.

Continuing in verse 20:  “Therefore when you come together in one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s Supper.”  Then he goes on to talk about getting ready for the Passover and judging ourselves lest we be judged.  He talks about cleaning up our own lives, so that God does not have to judge us harshly.

Paul goes into that whole dissertation by starting with, I know there are factions.  I believe it, but there must be.  It takes offenses to practice forgiveness.  It takes hurts to learn how to have a soft heart.  In other words, he knew there would be difficulties, but God would use them to good effect.  Obviously, we have seen that in spades today.  There is so much hurt in the Church.  There are so many offenses.  There is so much deceit and trickery. We need to use those experiences now because the same principle applies.  These things have been allowed to occur, so that God may see who does not want to be that way.  He wants to see who is not satisfied with that way of life.  God is, indeed, measuring the body of Christ and the shadows that each of us cast.  He is checking the fruit that we bear in our lives.  It is time to do something before we run out of time.

What kind of shadow do we dwell under, and what kind of shadow do we cast?  What kind of fruit are we producing?  We have our personal responsibility in this whole situation, and we have to accept that responsibility.  We have covenanted with God at baptism.  We want to fulfill our side of the bargain.  The rewards are far greater than we deserve, but we do have certain things we have to pay attention to and work on.  Coming out from the shadows and bearing good fruit in God’s Church is one of them.

Turn to II Peter chapter 1.  Read verses 5-11.  Brethren, we do all stumble.  We do all offend other people.  We are not always as kind and loving as we should be, but we should be working on this.  Every time we do stumble, we should apply the blood of Jesus Christ to our lives and those sins.  We should get up from our condition and do something positive.  To bear good fruit is the only way to be fruitful.  We just saw what these fruits are:  kindness, longsuffering, perseverance and a willingness to take persecution.  We certainly should not have an accusatory spirit, for Satan is the accuser of the brethren.  We should not be judging harshly toward others, but rather be judging ourselves.

PARABLE OF THE TREES
There is an interesting parable back in the Book of Judges, coincidentally.  There is a parable called the “Parable of the Trees.”  It is very applicable to our time in history in the Church.  Read Judges 9:7-15.

Brethren, the teachers in God’s Church and those who are saplings (which is everybody who has the Holy Spirit) are trees.  Are we selecting leaders to dwell under that are going to give us the oil and the good fruit, or are we going to choose to dwell in the shade of a bramble bush?  Brambles and thorns are not good.  That word “bramble” there in the parable is atad in Hebrew which means to pierce and to make fast, a thorn tree.

If we, indeed, dwell under Satan’s thorn trees, we are going to pick up thorns and thistles. We are going to be struck with many piercings (many sorrows).  We are not going to bear good fruit.  The light of the sun will be blocked, which is what the shade of a bad tree does.  It blocks the light of the sun, so we cannot properly grow into the sapling and eventually the big beautiful tree that God wants.

Brethren, I think too many of us are picking from the thorn tree and from the bramble.  That is why God said in Luke 6 a good tree does not bear bad fruit and a bad tree does not bear good fruit, but you will know them by their fruits.  Look at the fruit throughout the Church. We have a lot of selecting to be done. We have to start choosing good teachings, healthful trees to be giving us the fruit, to be teaching us from God’s word so that we can, indeed, grow up to be good and healthy trees ourselves.  We want to cast a good shadow.  We want to bear good fruit.  We do not want to be full of thorns and thistles and start bearing those types of fruit.

If you have ever worked among thorns, thistles and briars like I have as a hobby farmer, you will notice they pierce you.  They prick you.  They tear your clothes.  They irritate your flesh, and they can make you bleed.  They can cause infection, red welts and boils.  They stick to you like glue, especially if they get in your hair.  It is very hard to pull those thorns and thistles out of your hair.

CROWN OF THORNS
Did you ever wonder why at Christ’s crucifixion, Satan inspired those Roman soldiers to make a crown of thorns and then press it into Christ’s head?  That was a way of humiliating Jesus Christ, and Satan knew it.  He wanted to humiliate Jesus Christ and say, You are King of kings all right!  We will put that on the sign on your cross, but we are going to put a crown of thorns on your head because you are the King of a bunch of sinners who cannot repent.  You are the King of a bunch of good-for-nothing people, who cast bad shadows and who are willing to follow my bramble bush and get devoured by fire because they do not want to repent.  It was a tremendous humiliation, but Jesus Christ knew that by His sacrifice and by His blood, He would win.  The Father would be a farmer that would have good fruit.  The question is, what kind of fruit are we?

What are we doing in our life to cast a good shadow and bear good fruit?  Are we repenting of the thorns and the thistles in our lives?  Are we pulling them out even though it hurts?  We have to get those out of our lives in order to get cleaned up.  We have to make God’s garden a beautiful garden.

When I plant my garden in the spring and I put my corn seeds, bean seeds and the squash seeds out, I have to go out there and constantly weed it, so that the weeds do not take over the garden.  As we have studied in the past, each of us is a garden for God.  The Church itself is the overall vineyard which the body of Christ forms.  We want to keep it clean by getting rid of the thorns and the thistles.  Brethren, it is hard work, but the reward is tremendous.

EIGHT POINTS TO EVALUATE THE TREES OVER US
I want to go through a few points of what to look for, so that we can come out from the dark shadows and bear good fruit.  Then we can get rid of the thorns and the thistles in our lives and start healing the breaches and divisions within God’s Church.  I have numbered them.  There are eight points.  We will start with division since we were just talking about division.

1. PROMOTING DIVISION
The first one is separation and division.  Is the tree that we are dwelling under (the group that we dwell under) actually helping to promote division in the body of Christ?  Is it preaching elitism like they are special?  Do they say they are somehow the anointed ones at the end of the age who are going to get everything done and the rest of the Church is Laodicean? Often in these groups they preach, we are the Philadelphia remnant.  We are the Philadelphians, and the rest are Laodiceans.  Often they also promote no contact with other churches, because they want to keep the brethren they have to themselves.  Do not let the eye have contact with the ear.  Do not let the foot have contact with the arm and the hand.  Keep the body disjointed and cut off.  In other words, prevent God from doing the work He intended to do.  Or do they preach, we are different?  We are not like the rest of them!  We are special and the very elect.  We are the Philadelphia remnant.  We are okay in God’s eyes, and the rest of them deserve to die!  What a horrible thing to say about our brothers and sisters in the condition they are in!

Does the teaching in our particular group cause more breaches and more parts of the temple wall to fall down?  Does it cause the love of many more people to grow cold and cause many of the brethren to grow weak and faint?  Brethren, there are too many splinter groups that are pounding on God’s people.  They are beating the sheep. They are causing lameness, injuries, infections, and they do not help to heal them.  We cannot read all of Ezekiel 34 because of time, but let’s read the first five verses.

Turn to Ezekiel 34 which, by the way, has the verse that Mr. Armstrong used in his letter to say, I want to prevent the scattering and the shattering that Satan wants to cause after my death.  I want to prevent that by putting my most loyal men in charge to protect the sheep. It did not work out that way, but God knew this would happen.  Here is the record that He did know.  Read Ezekiel 34:1-5.

That is exactly what happened!  Constantly more and more brethren are suffering beatings and abuse.  I am talking about verbal abuse and spiritual abuse.  As far as isolation goes, shunning and disfellowshipping is taking place.   Sometimes this is done for no reason at all.  Also pain is caused by separation by causing families to be split apart, relatives to be split apart, and in some cases husbands and wives to be split apart.  They do not want this to be healed while they feed themselves from the flock of God!

2. DOUBTS ABOUT HERBERT ARMSTRONG 
The second point I want to look at is we need to check the tree (the group we dwell with) as to whether they are ridiculing or casting doubts on Mr. Armstrong and the work that he did.  Mr. Armstrong is where we all came from.  He is our legacy.  It is where our roots go back to.  It is where our roots come from.  Without his teaching and without hearing that voice, none of us would be here today!  We would not have been keeping the Sabbath and the holy days like we were.  We would not have entered a covenant with God.

Was Mr. Armstrong perfect?  No.  Neither was Moses or King David or the apostles perfect.  But was he used by God?  Yes, he was.  We had better not disparage his memory, minimize his work or cause doubt in people’s minds about who he was.  He was the Elijah sent by God at the end of the age to prevent death and utter destruction of the earth.  We need to remember those things.

We need to be proud of the fact that we came into the Church in the Philadelphia Era, and we had such a man of great courage, wisdom and steadfastness as Mr. Armstrong who went forward.  He proclaimed a difficult message and had the gospel of the kingdom out to the world as a witness in a more powerful way than it had ever been done in history! Those are our roots, and we should be proud of it and very pleased to have been called to be a part of it.  So we need to recognize whether our group actually puts him down and disparages his work.

We can also be part of a group that makes a fool out of Mr. Armstrong by raising him as some sort of demagogue.  Putting him up there can make people say, look how these people worship this man!  We are not to worship Mr. Armstrong.  We are not to say every word he said was inspired by God.  No man has ever been able to do that.  Only the words recorded in the Bible that God wanted recorded are guaranteed inspired by God.  If they are not part of the Bible, they can have mistakes in them, which includes sermons, teachings, booklets and books.  That does not mean he was not a man of God.

When Paul and Barnabas argued, would it have been right for the people of the day to say that cannot be the true Church of God because these guys are arguing?  We are not perfect yet, but it is the inspired word of God (the Bible) that we want to believe God is speaking to us from without error.  Do not castigate Mr. Armstrong for some mistakes he may have made.  None of us are perfect, but by the same token, do not elevate his words, his books, his writings and his preaching to be somehow equal to the Bible.  That is not right either.  Knowledge continues to grow.  We know more than what Mr. Armstrong understood because we have gone into the next Church era.  Mr. Armstrong was afraid of scattering and division, but he did not know this would happen for sure.  He could not possibly have foreseen what took place in this Church era.  It is for us to know and understand and do something about it.  It is up to us to get rid of our spots and blemishes and stop dwelling underneath bad trees.

3. MEGALOMANIA
Another type of tree that is very dangerous to dwell under is someone who is basically a megalomaniac.  That would be dwelling underneath someone who is so proud of their mighty work, their job and their title that they think God has given them.  I could go on and on and come up with different characteristics, but I am going to name a few.  There are a number of men walking on this planet today who claim to be one of the two witnesses, or the voice of the two witnesses, or teaching and training the two witnesses.  There are some who claim to be Elisha.  There are many who claim to be prophets and have been given a prophetic message.  Mr. Armstrong taught over and over again that there are no more prophecies to be written.  A prophet now is just an inspired speaker. Today there will no more writings like Isaiah.  There are no booklets that anybody is turning out that are prophetic.  The prophecies are in the Bible to be understood.  You can write a booklet to help understand a prophecy, but you cannot write prophecy.  There are so many men out there (and in some cases women) claiming to be prophets.  There are no more in that sense of writing prophecy.

Adding to the Bible is a very dangerous thing.  The very conclusion of the Bible says you must not add to the word of God.  If we do, we are in grave danger of having Him take away our entire reward and our spiritual eternal life!  Setting dates, making predictions, making prophecies, claiming to be something we are not and leading people astray are not good things in God’s eyes.  If we kept reading Ezekiel 34, we would see that every person who sets themselves up as a minister, or is indeed a minister, is going to give the flock that they care for over to Jesus Christ at His return by their hand. God is going to check over those sheep in the condition they are in.  If they are in bad shape, that teacher has some answering to do!  We had better take this seriously, because we are about out of time!

4. FALSE SIGNS AND LYING WONDERS 
The fourth point I want to make is preaching false signs and lying wonders.  We have spoken about that many times in sermons and in our booklets.  It is good to go back and review.  Digest Number 8 is about signs and wonders.  Look at these false signs and way markers.  God is not going to determine Christ’s return by the price of oil, by a tsunami somewhere, by physical famines and drought, by wars and rumors of war and pestilence.  Yet, there are men preaching all of these signs and more as a sign of Jesus Christ’s coming.  In Matthew 24:3-7 Christ said do not believe those signs.  They are deceptions.  He repeats that warning in Mark 13:14-22 and Luke 21:7-9.

There are no physical observable signs of Christ’s return, which is why He is going to take the earth and the Church by surprise.  We can understand about the earth not knowing because they do not know their right hand from their left, but the Church should not be shocked at Christ’s return.  Yet, He says, you will be.  I will come at an hour that you do not expect.  Why is that?  There are too many teachers (too many trees) pointing to the wrong signs and wonders.  It is the Church itself that is for signs and wonders.  If you get a chance, listen again to the series “Seasons of the Church” or go back and read Digest Number 8 about signs and wonders.

Let’s go to Isaiah right now.  Isaiah chapter 8 sums it all up that the church (God’s people) are for signs and wonders.  Verse 16:  “Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples.  And I will wait on the Lord, who hides His face from the house of Jacob; and I will hope in Him.  Here am I [Jesus Christ speaking] and the children whom the Lord has given me [the children whom the Father drew toward me]!  We are for signs and wonders in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwells in Mount Zion.”

Jesus Christ and His body (the Church) are for signs and wonders.  It is a beautiful and fascinating study, but when we look to the Church and to Jesus Christ for the signs, we will see the true signs of His coming.  If you were to continue reading in Matthew 24 verses 30 to 32, you are going to find one of the very last signs is a fig tree budding again.  It will be coming back to life.  That cannot be a physical fig tree on this planet.  There are thousands, maybe millions of fig trees.  He is talking about His Church when it has nearly completely died.  There will be no more foliage.

The fig tree begins to bear new fruit, which we can now see with this understanding we have.  We can see we are getting back some of the loving, forgiving attitudes which is how we bear fruit for God.  We are starting to bud.  Little leaves are starting to come back on the fig tree.  That is a sign that Christ is at the door!  It is at the very end of the age that we see this final sign.  These are the signs we want to pay attention to and not your nightly news.  We do not want to pay attention to the prognostications from economists. We do not want to pay attention to wars and rumors of wars, famines, earthquakes and pestilence.  We need to be paying attention to the correct signs and wonders.

5. ANARCHY
The fifth warning bell that should go off is if we are following people in the Church who preach anarchy.  Some of their statements that you may hear in such a group are, “I will never follow another man again.  Never!”  Or, “We are all teachers.  We are all equal. There are none of us here who are any different from anybody else.”  That is denying what we just read in Ephesians 4 that there are apostles, prophets, teachers and evangelists.  God put government in the Church.  It is just supposed to be a loving, compassionate, kind and helpful government that brings about the edification of the body of Christ and to grow into the stature of Christ.  You cannot throw out the baby with the bath water.  You cannot have anarchy.

Anarchy will get you nowhere.  So many little groups around the world today have broken up into chaotic little groups full of anarchy.  Everyone wants to be equal.  Everyone wants to be a teacher.  There is no government, and they despise government.  That is just as bad as too harsh of a government.  That is going from one ditch to the other.

6. FALSE DOCTRINES
The sixth warning sign is: are we following winds of false doctrines?  So many people in the Church today are following men and women who have added to the Bible, as I have mentioned before.  They are writing books that they call prophecies.  Or they are bringing books other than the Bible into services and Bible studies, and telling people they are inspired by God.  I do not want to even name these filthy books!  I have run into several books lately that people study and bring to their congregation or to their group that are not the Bible, yet they claim they are inspired by God.  That is very dangerous, and that is bringing winds of false doctrine.  It is pushing the brethren to and fro.  It is harming the sheep.  Any person or minister who is doing such things is going to have to explain it to Jesus Christ at His return.

Concerning winds of false doctrine, you have a number of men now preaching that they are teaching or have written the seven thunders of Revelation 10. If you read Revelation 10 carefully, it says these seven thunders should not be written and they should not be said.  If you have preaching in your group about the seven thunders of Revelation 10 and preach they have the word of God, you are following a very dangerous person.

7. A PHYSICAL PLACE OF SAFETY
Those are six of the warning signs.  The seventh point is this concept of a physical place of safety.  It is possibly the most selfish doctrine to ever enter the Church, because it espouses saving our own skin at the expense of the entire world.  Just as long as God keeps me safe during this horrible time that is coming is all I care about!

Brethren, what we want is a spiritual place of safety where we are protected from the hissing of the serpents.  We want to be protected from false doctrine.  We want to be protected from bad fruit.  This is what we want to have and not physical protection.  Yes, it is wonderful if God protects us from a disaster or an accident in our own lives.  Or it is wonderful if He heals us from a disease.  But He promises nowhere to give us a physical place (a cave or a hidden place) to put His own special elect while the rest of the world goes up in smoke and flames.  That is a very selfish doctrine.  It is one that promotes selfishness.  It actually turns us into hardhearted people who are waiting for the rest of the world to be destroyed.  It is a concept that should be foreign to the body of Christ.

You will remember the Scriptures that Christ often used about picking up your cross and following Me.  He died for our fellow man, all mankind.  If we are going to pick up our cross and follow Him, it is not to run into some cave somewhere while the rest of the world dies in a horrible cataclysm at the end of the age.  We need to be willing to lay down our lives.  Christ said perfect love (true love) is being willing to lay down our lives for our friends, our fellow man and for our neighbor.  This is what true love is all about.

Go back and read in Isaiah 28 where God despises the concept of wanting to go to a place of safety at the expense of the rest of mankind.  In Isaiah 28, verse 9 it is speaking about the end of the age.  “‘Whom will he teach knowledge?  And Whom will he make to understand the message?  Those just weaned from milk?  Those just drawn from the breasts?’”  This is referring to new Christians (babes).

Verse 10:  “‘For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little.’”  It takes a long time to learn God’s word in order to put it together.  God can put it together in our minds so we understand where He is going with His plan.  He says there should be people who have had much education in the Scriptures.  Yet He is having trouble finding anybody who wants to do this and whom He can do this with.

Verse 11:  “‘For with stammering lips and another tongue He will speak to this people, to whom He said, “This is the rest with which you may cause the weary to rest,” [speaking of the Millennium coming] and, “This is the refreshing;” yet they would not hear.’” People do not want to hear that everything is going to come out roses at the end, and that God is going to have an innumerable multitude from every nation, kindred and tongue.  People should want to hear the beautiful news (the good news).

Continuing in Isaiah 28:13.  “‘But the word of the Lord was to them, “Precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little,” that they might go and fall backward, and be broken and snared and caught.’”  Falling backward is symbolic of falling into Satan’s clutches by false doctrine, instead of understanding the truth here at the end of the age and what God really did accomplish through Mr. Armstrong as Elijah.  He prevented utter destruction from occurring.

Verse 14:  “‘Therefore hear the word of the Lord, you scornful men, who rule this people who are in Jerusalem…’”  This is speaking of spiritual Jerusalem.

Verse 15:  “‘…because you have said, “We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol we are in agreement.  When the overflowing scourge passes through, it will not come to us, for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood we have hidden ourselves.’””  This is a concept of wanting to be protected while the rest of the world is in a covenant with Sheol (a covenant with death).  It is a covenant with Satan.

Continuing on in verse 16.  “Therefore thus says the Lord God:  ‘Behold, I lay in Zion a stone for a foundation, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation; whoever believes will not act hastily.’”  This means they will not set dates, prophesy and make prophesies for the last days with false signs.

Verse 17:  “‘Also I will make justice the measuring line, and righteousness the plummet  [He is measuring the Church with justice and righteousness.];  the hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters will overflow the hiding place.  Your covenant with death will be annulled, and your agreement with Sheol will not stand; when the overflowing scourge passes through, then you will be trampled down by it.  As often as it goes out it will take you; for morning by morning it will pass over, and by day and by night; it will be a terror just to understand the report.’”

People who will not repent of preaching death, destruction and judgment, and who have a harsh attitude toward others are going to live to regret it.  God says so.  He will annul this deal with Satan over a place of safety.  So please only desire spiritual safety.  Let God protect us physically if He wants to in our individual circumstances.  Do not plan on fleeing anywhere.  We are the salt of the earth sprinkled around the earth to help preserve the earth.  We have a wonderful purpose as the body of Christ, and it is a good thing.  We do not want to lose our savor or put out our light.

8. MAKING MERCHANDISE OF BRETHREN 
The eighth point to watch out for is for those who make merchandise of God’s brethren, that is buying, selling and trading in the body and souls of men.  There are so many back-room deals over the brethren.  There are so many ministers who are free agents, who are taking the flock that they have for purposes of their own gain like we read in Ezekiel 34. They move among the groups, or they get rehired by different groups.  They get better benefits such as pay, a fleet car, health insurance and these sorts of physical things.  They feed themselves off the flock of God without taking care of the sheep.

A good shepherd should be willing to lay down his life for the sheep and not be looking to trade, buy and sell in the bodies and souls of men.  They should be willing to do it for nothing, if necessary.  They should be willing to work like Paul did and support himself, just so he would not discourage or hurt anybody’s faith.  Yes, he was entitled to tithes and offerings, and people should have willingly given them to him.  But he said, I am not going to offend people and force them to.  I would rather make tents than do that, and he did.  We need to try and emulate that in our little fellowships wherever we are.

WE WANT TO HELP
The conclusion of the matter is just as sure as trees bear fruit (some good and some bad), we have had enough time now to find out what kind of tree we are following.  We can know what kind of fruit is being produced in our group wherever we are attending in the splinters of God’s Church.  Is there pain and suffering?  Are there healings taking place? Is there an inordinate amount of anxiety and depression (in some cases even suicide)?

Unfortunately, I just read in the paper recently about a Church member from the 1960’s who was an Ambassador College graduate who committed suicide.  It seems like every year there are a number of Church people we read about in this way.  That is not a fruit of the Holy Spirit, brethren.  We have been worn down to a frazzle.  The oppression in the Church and the abuse of the sheep have caused us to lead lives of fear and become hardhearted and bitter.  This has allowed more shattering and more scattering, and it has taken the power of the Church away.  Faith is so diminished.  We are so weak!  It is the opposite of the fruits of the Spirit.  We need to get back to a way to produce fruit and a way to grow in power, and we can do that.

We have been poor, blind, wretched, naked and miserable long enough!  We do not have to dwell in the shadows of unhealthy trees.  We do not have to eat bad fruit and devour bad food (bad teachings).  If you are hearing this message and you are downtrodden, if you are oppressed, if you mourn what has happened to the beautiful organization that we were just a short time ago, we want to help you.

If you are willing to forsake the ways of cruelty and oppression yourself and to stop following deceit, there is still hope.  There is still time to get it right, but very little.  Time is running out.  It is now time to come out from underneath the shadows and become a sapling that gets stronger and stronger.  Please contact us if you think we can help you.