Doctrines
Fundamental Beliefs
Armstrongism refers to the teachings and doctrines of Herbert W. Armstrong while leader of the Worldwide Church of God (WCG), and was professed by him and continues to be held by his followers as the “restored true Gospel of the Bible”. Armstrong said they were “revealed to him by God” during his study of the Bible. The term “Armstrongite” is sometimes used to refer to those that follow Armstrong’s teachings.
Armstrong’s message has been described by critics as an eclectic mixture of cultic doctrine, Jewish observances and Seventh-day Adventism. The church strictly observes the Sabbath on Saturday, the annual Jewish festivals described in Leviticus and strongly advocates the dietary laws of Leviticus 11.
Members are asked to give up to 10% of their incomes to the church as a tithe, while also being told that another 10% was to be saved for annual festival observances, and every third year an additional 10% had to be sent to the church.
Dating outside the church is strongly frowned upon and there is a dress code for members while attending services. Those who refuse to follow the church’s guidelines are excommunicated. Members are influenced by church teachings not to wear make-up nor celebrate birthdays and are taught that the Bible warns believers not to celebrate holidays such as Christmas, Easter and Halloween.
A major component of Armstrongism is “British Israelism,” which is the view that America, Britain, and much of Western Europe are the descendants of ancient Israel. Armstrong rejected the traditional Christian views of Heaven, Hell, eternal punishment and salvation as “non-biblical”. He also taught that members of the church would actually become members of the God family themselves after the resurrection.
Armstrong taught that most of the basic doctrines and teachings of ‘mainstream’ Christianity were based on “heathen traditions”, including absorbed pagan rituals, rather than the Judeo-Christian Bible. His teachings have been the source of much controversy. Shortly after Armstrong’s death in 1986, the Worldwide Church of God started revising its core beliefs towards the concepts, doctrines, and creeds of mainstream Christianity. This resulted in many ministers and members leaving the WCG to start or join other churches, all of which continue to believe and teach Armstrongism in one form or another.
DISCLAIMER: The following is a listing of the primary points of dogma for extant COG groups to date. Doctrinal rebuttals against Armstrongism can be found online. Silenced does not endorse a particular religious or philosophical belief, and is not concerned with the veracity of these beliefs, as there are countless schools of doctrinal thought in every religion. Instead, we are concerned with how these beliefs are used to control, scare and defraud people. People can believe whatever they like, but they cannot DO whatever they like if their actions harm other people, including their own families.
It should additionally be noted that due to Armstrong’s odd mix of doctrines, the beliefs of WCG mirror those of Orthodox Jews, Mormons, Seventh Adventists and Protestant Christian schools of theology. The following is not an attack on the adherents of any religion. Again, the focus is on how Armstrong and his disciples concocted a collection of beliefs for the expressed purpose of manipulating his followers.
Doctrine: Armstrong was an Apostle
Herbert W. Armstrong was a prophet of God and an apostle. Anyone who denies this is viewed by LCG, PCG and smaller splinters as an apostate and a heretic. More “liberal” groups such as UCG and COGWA do not mention Armstrong nearly as much during services and literature, though it is very common as a part of church culture for members to still personally hold this belief as a throwback to WCG.
Why this is harmful: When an authority figure is granted the attributes of ‘divine appointment’, they become nearly infallible in the eyes of his followers. As in the case of the Roman Catholic Pope, this leads to all manner of personal and administrative faults as being overlooked and ignored. In the case of Armstrong, his was a life fraught with dishonesty and hypocrisy, yet speaking with the average member of a COG cult, they cannot name a single fault in the man. The ‘ordained’ authority possessed by Armstrong has been claimed by other COG cult leaders after his death, the policy extended to them. This leaves members blinded to corruption at the top.
Doctrine: The God Family
“The God Family” doctrine holds that the Godhead is not limited to God (the Creator) alone, or even to a trinitarian God, but is a divine family into which every human who ever lived may be spiritually born, through a master plan to be enacted in stages. The Godhead now temporarily consists of two co-eternal individuals, Jesus the Messiah, as the creator and spokesman (The Word or Logos), and God the Father.
According to this doctrine, humans who are called by God’s Holy Spirit to repentance, who accept the gift of eternal life made possible by Jesus’ sacrifice, who commit to live by “every word of God”, and who “endure to the end” would, at Jesus’ return, be “born again” into the family of God as the literal spiritual offspring or children of God. Armstrong drew parallels between every stage of human reproduction and this spiritual reproduction. He often stated that “God is reproducing after His own kind — children in His own image.”
Whatever the changes brought about by this new entrance of humans into God’s family, God the Father will always be the omnipotent sovereign and sustainer of both the universe and the spiritual realm, forever to be worshiped as God by the children of God. Jesus, as the creator of the universe and savior of God’s children, will always rule the Kingdom of God, which will ultimately grow to fill the entire universe, and He likewise will forever be worshiped as God by the children of God.
Why this is harmful: Being a member of the God family, a “king and priest” in the coming Millennial reign of Jesus Christ on Earth, is the carrot dangled in front of COG members by Armstrongism. All of their literature, sermons and other teaching tools focus on humans as being ‘baby Gods’ who may be eligible for eternal life and limitless power. Members are scared into being as devout as possible, which translates into spending as much as possible in donations to the church, lest they ‘lose their crown’, God’s promise of eternal salvation for the chosen. This ‘special knowledge’ additionally makes these so-called Christians believe they are ‘called’ and therefore better than others.
Doctrine: The Sabbath
The observance of the Sabbath from dusk on Friday to dusk on Saturday was the first non-traditional religious practice that Armstrong adopted. Armstrong decided that there was no sound scriptural authority for Christian worship on Sunday, but rather that the Apostles and the first generation of Christians, both Jewish and gentile converts, continued for decades after the establishment of the Church age to set an example of observing the seventh day of the week (Friday at sunset to Saturday at sunset) as the Sabbath.
Why this is harmful: Jews across the world observe the Saturday Sabbath, and it is true that there is no explicit change of the Sabbath day from Saturday to Sunday found in the Bible. A Sabbath Day of rest is a part of the lives of millions across the world. Yet, under Armstrong’s teachings and within WCG and its splinters, it takes a damaging turn. The Sabbath is taught as a law that ‘sets apart the people of God’ from the rest of the world. The Sabbath is kept at the exclusion of friends and family outside of the church, and a legalistic interpretation of ‘Sabbath rest’ is enforced. Like Jews in the Orthodoxy, members are to cut themselves off from the rest of the world, meaning no TV, radio, cooking, cleaning, internet and in some cases electricity. Working or doing anything involved with one’s profession is strictly prohibited. Food is prepared before the Sabbath on Friday afternoon.
Members, both adults and children, spend nearly the entirety of the Sabbath being indoctrinated with church teachings, through personal studies of COG magazines and booklets, followed by church services including two sermons and song services, often followed by a ‘Bible study’ where ministers conducted a very controlled Q&A session from members and ensure that everyone in is lockstep. Children are often whisked away from their parents either during or after services to be instructed by elders or deacons in ‘Sabbath School’ where they are taught Bible stories through the filter of Armstrong’s teachings.
Doctrine: Holy Day Festivals
Eventually, Armstrong accepted and observed many principles and laws found in the Old Testament and taught converts to do the same. These included the celebration of high Sabbaths, or annual feast days such as Passover, Pentecost and the Feast of Tabernacles. The Holy Days of the Old Testament are still to be observed by Christians, and teach symbolically the seven steps of God’s master plan of salvation for humanity. This seven holy day rotation unraveled annually as follows:
Passover
The Feast of Unleavened Bread
Pentecost
The Day of Atonement
The Day of Trumpets
The Feast of Tabernacles
The Last Great Day
Why this is harmful: Again, the original Jewish versions of these religious festivals are observed by millions, but in COG cults they take on entirely new meaning with entirely different traditions and practices attached to them. Each of these days is an opportunity for the leadership to draw ‘freewill donations’ from members already mandatorily giving 10% of their incoming to the church. They use the Levitical concept of an ‘offering’ attached to these holy days in the Bible and translate it from animal sacrifices to monetary donations where baskets are passed around to collect checks from men, women and children alike.
Each holy day depicts a different stage of ‘God’s plan’, beginning with Christ’s death and ending with his return and judgement of the dead. Each stage of this plan, as defined by Armstrong, is reinforced in member’s minds in sermons on during each of these festivals. This is an annual cycle of brainwashing into Armstrong’s teachings, without variation or exception, leaving these concepts fresh and ever-present in the minds of the cult’s followers.
Doctrine: Church Authority
Armstrong taught the Bible is the authoritative Word of God. He taught that the Bible, while inerrant in its message, had been distorted through many conflicting interpretations, and it was not until the 20th century that God had restored the full Gospel message of the Kingdom of God, as understood by the original apostles, to the Church through him by opening his mind to ‘the plain truth’ of scripture. Armstrong taught that all other churches calling themselves “Christian” were not merely apostate, but actually counterfeits whose history could be traced back to the first century.
Why this is harmful: This creates a built-in antagonism of other religions, including other Christians, which is decidedly un-Christian. It encloses members off from conflicting ideologies, as they are viewed as ‘Satanic distortions’ of Biblical truth and ‘outright lies’. They view those outside of the church as being ‘asleep’ and ‘not called to God’s truth’. This reinforces a cultish environment and guards the minds of members from questioning what they are taught and told to do. In their minds, if it is taught by the church, it is the only truth. This doctrine is especially prevalent in extremist groups such as PCG, RCG, and PKG, but has reared its head very recently in UCG, leading to a split over what ‘church authority’ truly means.
Doctrine: British Israelism
Armstrong was a proponent of British Israelism, which is the doctrine that people of Western European descent, especially the British Empire (Ephraim) and the United States (Manasseh) are descended from the ‘Ten Lost Tribes’ of Israel. Armstrong believed that this doctrine provided a ‘key’ to understanding biblical prophecy, and that he was specially called by God to proclaim these prophecies to the ‘lost tribes’ of Israel before the coming of the ‘end-times’. Grace Communion International no longer teaches the doctrine, but many offshoot churches continue to teach it even though critics assert that British Israelism is inconsistent with the findings of modern genetics, archeological findings, and historical records.
Why this is harmful: Not only do members consider themselves ‘spiritual Israel’, or God’s ‘chosen people’, the largely white European membership believes they are physical Israel as well. This leads to a certain amount of racism, as along with a belief that Western Europeans and Anglo Saxons are ‘Israel’, they also proscribe to viewing the rest of the world’s nations through an Old Testament filter. To them, African ethnicities are descendants of Noah’s son Ham, therefore they are “cursed” based on an incident in Genesis, Asian ethnicities are descendants of Noah’s son Japheth, and Caucasians are descended from Noah’s son Shem, hence why they are ‘blessed’ as the offspring of Noah’s favorite son. They break these categorizations of people down further based on Biblical genealogies found in Genesis and Numbers.
When it comes to the specific belief that Britain and America are two of the twelve tribes of Israel, Joseph’s sons Ephraim and Manasseh specifically, there is also a culture of nationalism, as the United Kingdom and United States become ‘blessed nations’ and their histories are filtered to portray these nations as ‘instruments of God’ and ‘superior peoples’.
Doctrine: Tithing
A system of tithing in which 10% of one’s total income is donated to the church (“first tithe”) for its operation and for sharing the gospel with the world; a second 10% was to be saved for the Christian family’s expenses during the Holy Days (“second tithe”), and during the third and sixth year of each seven-year cycle, a third 10% was to be used for the indigent, widows, and orphans within the church (“third tithe”).
In contrast to many other churches’ religious services, the practice of the WCG was not to pass around offering plates during weekly church services but only during holy day church services (seven days each year). These funds were considered “freewill offerings” and regarded as entirely separate from regular tithes.
Why this is harmful: Armstrong managed to convince his followers to steadily pay the church, monthly, 10% of everything they made. COG groups manage to suck the second tithe, another 10%, away from members during the holy days by charging for overpriced special church-sponsored events such as dances, dinners and game nights. The third tithe is not required by most COG groups, as 30% is a tough sell even for the brainwashed. However, this has led to families living beneath their means, vanished college funds for children, and abject poverty for some.
The money goes to media projects to expand their membership, church events, which as mentioned they then charge for again, and most importantly, ministerial salaries, which in the early days were quite extravagant. While WCG members lived a lower class lifestyle of sacrifice to ‘preach the Gospel’, Armstrong and church leadership flew around on private jets, purchased mansions and dined with golden dishes and utensils. COG splinters have not achieved this level of wealth due primarily to the drastic drop in membership since the 1970s, yet the policy of mandatory tithing remains, and judging by the lack of media penetration by these groups, most of it seems to be going to large salaries and bonuses.
Doctrine: The Ten Commandments
The strict observance of the ten commandments is a voluntary response of Christians to receiving the “unearned gift of salvation from God”. The ten commandments are an eternal and inexorable law set in motion by God which brings about every good effect when obeyed, but which exact pain, suffering, and eventually death (especially an ultimate spiritual death) when violated.
Why this is harmful: Children are frightened from a very young age with the punishment of death for breaking even one of these commandments. They are taught that to break one is to break them all, and that lying or taking God’s name in vain is as bad as murder. This fear keeps people in line, as even though they believe that Jesus Christ died for their sins, they also fear that their sins will cause them to ‘lose their crown’, forfeiting their place in the government of the returned Jesus Christ. The ten commandments have been turned from a moral code to a tool for behavioral control.
Doctrine: Satan the Devil
Satan, the fallen Lucifer who ‘fell from Heaven’, is a real being is actively trying to rebel against and undermine God and destroy his followers and cause them to fall before the end times. He knows his time is short and is trying to tempt the followers of God with an ever-pervasive secular culture and his influence and that of his demons must be fought on a daily basis.
Why this is harmful: Armstrong called Satan ‘the great broadcaster’ constantly bombarding the airwaves with his deceptions (ironically, Armstrong was a broadcaster doing largely the same thing). Popular culture was just one means of delivering Satan’s influence. Demons, in Armstrong’s view, were constantly possessing and haunting people and working against God’s people. The COG ministry has frequently claimed to perform exorcisms. Mental illness is rarely acknowledged by the ministry and demonic influences are always considered first and foremost. This creates a fearful, paranoid, nearly medieval view towards mental health, the media, and simply setbacks in daily life. When everything that goes wrong can be blamed on Satan and his demons, it only serves to further feed the persecution complex built into the COG culture.
Doctrine: Anti-Science
Due to their fundamentalist viewpoints, science was often not only ignored, but attacked in WCG literature and publications as being ‘a deception by Satan’. Scientists were viewed as atheistic ‘God-haters’ who concoct evidence against Biblical accounts, such as the Flood and Creation story, so they don’t have to ‘be under the thumb of God’s law’. Scientific ignorance was rampant among ministers in WCG and promoted within congregations.
Why this is harmful: Hit-pieces written by Garner Ted against Charles Darwin were run on an almost annual basis to renew the fervor against scientific facts such as Evolutionary Theory, even though those writing these articles show little to no understanding of the subjects they’re criticizing. ‘Young Earth Creationism’ and other forms of pseudoscience are often cited and championed by WCG in place of actual, proven scientific evidence, as that is viewed as a direct threat to the the veracity of their beliefs.
Garner Ted Armstrong wrote several mocking, venomous articles against the Evolutionary Theory, and demonstrated laughable ignorance regarding what it actually states and what evidenced backs it. His handful of salient points that pointed out some of the issues that scientists had in the 70s have since been solved or debunked, however his booklets on the subject are still circulated among COG members as if they were valid, up to date, or relevant, which they are not.
Doctrine: Divine Healing
In 1952 Armstrong published Does God Heal Today? which provided the details on his doctrine on healing and his ban on doctors. Among his tenets were that only God heals and that medical science is of pagan origin and is ineffective. He believed that most illnesses were caused by faulty diet and that doctors should prescribe proper diet rather than medicine. He taught that members are not to go to doctors for healing but must trust in divine healing alone. This was his teaching despite his father’s death in 1933 after ‘an all-night vigil of prayer.’ This teaching has been the cause of much controversy as individuals influenced by such teachings came to die.
The use of medicine and doctors was discouraged because members were expected to place their faith in God for healing. Various members suffered discomfort and even death due to reluctance to resort to medical help, yet Armstrong made use of doctors and medicine later in his life. Modern medicine was replaced with ‘faith, prayer, and ministerial anointing’, along with the eating of whole grain and organic foods. Homeopathy and other pseudo-medicine were also commonly practiced by laymembers, though not officially endorsed.
Why this is harmful: Members with terminal or serious illnesses often found themselves in the hospital when they found they can no longer cope with their symptoms and only after submitting a congregational prayer request, getting anointed, and trying any number of ‘natural cures’ before bringing themselves to a medical professional. Members with cancer who misdiagnosed themselves had come before doctors and given only weeks to live because they did not catch the illness quickly enough, due to the church culture where modern medicine is a last resort.
Doctrine: Baptism
God’s children are not actually “born again” into spirit until after the return of Jesus to the Earth, but water baptism as exemplified by Jesus Christ is required for each church member to be officially ‘converted’ and to receive the Holy Spirit. Members usually council for baptism from age 18 onwards, as opposed to the Catholic teaching of infant baptism, because Armstrong felt that baptism was a choice, and only once the ‘old man’ was cast aside and a person repented of all of their sins could they be justly baptized by an ordained WCG minister. Members are baptized in a pool of water by one or ministers and elders, usually with other members present as observers.
Why this is harmful: Those who are baptized are ‘sealed’ as members of the church. There is no turning back, no leaving of one’s own free will lest they risk condemnation, disconnection and persecution from one’s own friends and family. Baptized members essentially become apart of a special club within COG groups, as only they are allowed to partake in Passover services and eat the bread and drink the wine normally associated with Catholic communion, and only committed, baptized members are allowed to hold any position of influence in their congregations or the greater church. Even those running the sound production for a service or accompanying on a piano must be baptized. Non-baptized members, whether children or adults, are treated like second class citizens, regardless of how much they have given in time and money to the church.
The process to get baptized is essentially a concentrated dose of brainwashing in preparation to take the plunge. All of Armstrong’s doctrines must be accepted by the candidate in full and all of their ‘sins’ must be repented of and forgiven by God and the ministry. Becoming a baptized member is a serious commitment, as they believe that God imparts the Holy Spirit on the baptized person, resulting in their ‘eyes being opened’ and special understanding and powers being imbued upon them. Though this does not happen, members have invested so much in their baptism at this point, and to deny it afterwards is unfathomable. In this respect, baptism does change the member forever, as their induction into the cult is nearly permanent.
Doctrine: Three Days and Three Nights
Christ died and was in the grave for three days and three nights before being resurrected and ascending to Heaven. This did not happen during the time period of Easter as promoted by the Roman Catholic Church, but during the time of the Jewish Passover.
Why this is harmful: This may be the case, as the Bible revolves around Jewish holy days in both the Old and New Testament. This is a fairly benign doctrine, the only impact being the dates when the church’s religious festivals are observed. However, it has led to a number of schisms and heated disagreements resulting in expulsion from the cult based entirely on debates over “God’s calendar” and how it translates to our current day system.
Doctrine: Repentance
Before converting and becoming a Christian, all human beings must repent of their sins, meaning they must acknowledge all of them, ask God’s forgiveness, and NEVER partake in them again. Without repentance, there is no forgiveness, and without forgiveness there is not salvation.
Why this is harmful: While most Christian denominations preach repentance, the primary ‘sins’ that the COG ministries focus on when it talks about repentance are usually fairly petty, such as foul language, improper Sabbath observance, not tithing, breaches of the dress code at services and other points focused on conformity into the fold. Other ‘deadly sins’ it focuses on are sexual in nature such as suggestive clothing, movies with suggestive themes, and homosexuality which it expressly and strongly condemns. The doctrine of mandatory repentance, rather than serving as a means of reconciling one’s own soul with Christ, serves to single-out and persecute those who choose to live their lives and conduct themselves differently.
Doctrine: Military Service and War
Christians are not to partake in military service nor go to war, even in a non-combatant capacity. All members must file conscientious objector status in the case of a draft.
Why this is harmful: Many churches preach against military service, citing primarily the sixth commandment of “thou shalt not kill”. However, as is often the case, this doctrine takes on a special spin in the view of Armstrongism. COG groups base the prohibition on military service on John 18:36, where Jesus states “My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight.” To COG members, this is not God’s world, and the military is not a divine army, therefore they will not take up arms to fight on behalf of a ‘secular government’. While the prohibition against murder is cited as an additional reason, Armstrongism views the true war a spiritual battle of God’s people against “the world”. This is yet another way to divide its membership from their identities as citizens of their own countries. The same beliefs are used to prohibit members from voting or partaking in jury duty. If this were the Millennium that Armstrong preached, then COG members would take up arms and fight, but not in the world where the rest of us have to live.
Doctrine: Anti-Paganism
Armstrong taught that the celebrations of Christmas and Easter were inappropriate for Christians, considering them not of biblical origin, but rather a later absorption of pagan practices into corrupted Christianity. Any and all traditions and observances with pagan roots were banned in WCG.
Why this is harmful: There are many extra-Biblical influences on Roman-based Christianity, including Christmas, Easter and Christian symbology and imagery. They refuse to use the Christian cross or any images of Jesus Christ. There is nothing particularly harmful about not adopting these symbols and practices. What is harmful is the outright ideological crusade against others who practice mainstream Christian traditions, the belittlement of others with different beliefs, and the disconnection of families from friends and relatives who do practice these things. Members are forbidden from taking part in Christmas and Easter celebrations, which in modern western culture are popular times for families to come together. Extended families have grown distant from their relatives in COG cults as they remove themselves from family activities centered around these traditions.
Doctrine: Unclean Meats
Abstinence of eating unclean meats listed in the Old Testament such as pork, shellfish, and the like was taught and enforced in WCG, which is against traditional mainstream teachings. This policy continues in all COG splinter groups, though Grace Communion International has reversed this doctrine in its modern form.
Why this is harmful: Jews and Muslims traditionally hold similar beliefs, however in the case of Armstrongism, they take it to a legalistic extreme. During the golden years of WCG, restaurants in cities where the Feast of Tabernacles was held would be strong-armed into altering their menus for a week to banish the presence of ‘unclean meats’, and in those days they had such clout and produced so many tourists that restaurants were compelled to comply to cater to their needs at the expense of everyone else.
Doctrine: No Afterlife
Armstrong did not believe in the traditional doctrines of Heaven and Hell, but rather spoke of a “sleep” state of the dead, meaning the dead have not yet been judged, rewarded, or condemned, but rather wait to be resurrected. Humans are completely mortal, but salvation is the free, unearned gift of eternal life in God’s family as children of God, given upon the prerequisite of faith in God and repentance from sin, which then results in a motivation to completely observe God’s eternal laws.
Why this is harmful: This is similar to Jewish belief, which is fine, however in COG groups, this is used to instill the fear of the oblivion of death into its members. They are taught that the soul can be destroyed by God and will be in the ‘Third Resurrection’ if they do not repent and conform.
Doctrine: Prophecy
All Biblical prophecy was viewed by Armstrong as 100% true, and those that were not fulfilled eventually and imminently will be. Armstrong made several of his own predictions, most of which never came to pass, however he viewed his interpretation of the prophecies in the Bible, especially those found in Daniel and Revelation, were divinely inspired and inerrant.
Why this is harmful: This has led to a revisionist view of not only the Bible but history. Members believe that every single prophecy has been fulfilled, and that historians and archeologists are ‘deceived by Satan’, creating further animosity against scientific understanding and consensus.
Armstrong predicted Jesus Christ would return in his lifetime according to a sequence of events he believed the Bible indicated preceded the return of Jesus Christ. For years, he had written about his beliefs that a sign of the end times would be a dissolving of the Soviet Union, followed by the formation of a ‘United States of Europe’.
In August 1985, his final book, Mystery of the Ages, was published, Armstrong calling it a “synopsis of the Bible in the most plain and understandable language.” It was more or less a compilation of his theological concepts which concluded that the Bible was ‘a coded book’ to which he had been given the key, and which those ‘blinded’ by Satan’s world could not understand.
He predicted in his book 1975 in Prophecy! that the end times would begin in 1972, resulting in Christ’s return in 1975. This caused his legion of followers to brace themselves for the end of the world. Many family’s cancelled future plans such as marriage, starting a family, buying a house or similar life milestones, and started to prepare for the impending apocalypse. As 1972 approached, it became clear that these prophecies would not come to pass. While the European Union was a concept in the making, it took another 20 years for it to come to pass.
This was Armstrong’s last failed prophecy, but not his first. The ex-member hub The Painful Truth presents a full listing of the failed prophecies Armstrong made throughout his 52 year ministry. A smaller list can be found at On Doctrine.
Doctrine: Apocalypse
Revelation speaks of a ‘Great Tribulation’ upon the Earth in the End Times that will nearly destroy all human civilization in a great war. Armstrong believed every word of the prophecies in Revelation and made several predictions as to a specific date when those events would transpire. Before all life on Earth is destroyed, it says that Jesus Christ shall return to Earth and establish his kingdom.
Why this is harmful: COG members believe that this world is ending ‘immanently’, and while only a few dare to set dates anymore, they have ceased having any hope that the world will improve, and unlike some other religious followers, do not go out of their way to better society or help their neighbors. After all, what’s the point if it’s all going to burn anyway? For many, the end of the world is the only hope they have left, the final confirmation of their beliefs that will justify their lives up to this point. It creates a kind of bloodlust, and schadenfreude for world events to take a turn for the absolute worst, a nuclear World War III.
Doctrine: The World Tomorrow
God will set up His government on earth, under the rule of Jesus at his second coming, rescuing humanity from sin and self-annihilation, inspiring mankind to voluntarily turn to God’s law, and ushering in a 1000 year period of peace, prosperity, and justice under the rule of the children of God, who are the biblical saints and faithful members of the Worldwide Church of God who are “born again” as spirit in the 1st resurrection at Jesus’ return to the Earth.
Why this is harmful: People who have spent their lives separating themselves from ‘the world’ are trained to believe that they will have the wisdom to understand and instruct them in the ‘ways of God’ as ‘kings and priests’ in a utopian, however theocratic, government instituted by the conquering Jesus Christ who will return at the end of the Apocalypse. They view themselves as being destined to be “chosen” and set above everyone else during Christ’s 1000 year reign, and that they will help rebuild the world as a perfect divine dictatorship where nobody can hide their sins from God. Despite the despotic overtones of this belief, they look forward to this era beyond all else.
Doctrine: Christian Reward
Those who are the ‘firstfruits’ or the ‘elect’ will be resurrected as ‘kings and priests’ as spirit beings in the Kingdom of God and will help Christ rebuild the world. The most faithful will be made rulers of their own cities and fiefdoms and they will teach those who were not called in the Second Resurrection the ways of God and show them the error of their ways. They will live forever alongside God in his “family.”
Why this is harmful: COG members are trained to believe that death is to be feared and eternal life desired. They also believe that their bodies and minds will be “made perfect” as god beings, therefore they don’t need to spend much time bettering their own wisdom and understanding in this life. Instead, they simply blindly conform to receive their eternal reward and become awesome, infallible beings upon their resurrection at the end of days. Why learn anything if omniscience is guaranteed as the reward for a lifetime of servitude to the church?
Doctrine: Resurrections
Non-believers are not yet eternally judged, having a future opportunity for salvation after a mortal resurrection.
The vast majority of all people who have ever lived will be saved, thus the relatively small number of true Christians of this age are predestined to be merely the early “firstfruits” of God’s harvest to help teach the majority of humanity raised by the Second Resurrection. Armstrong taught there were three resurrections of the dead:
1. Faithful believers as the first fruit harvest at Jesus’ second coming
2. Non-believers temporarily resurrected to mortality for an opportunity to learn and accept God’s way
3. Resurrection to final judgment of the incorrigibly wicked—those whose minds had been fully opened to God’s truth, either in this age or after the second resurrection, and rejected it—mainly those truly called but who fell away, and those who incorrigibly rebel in the “Wonderful World Tomorrow.”
Punishment of the incorrigible is not an eternity of torment in hell, but rather a merciful annihilation, through fire, by the edict of God.
Why this is harmful: People who turn away from the church, especially after baptism, are viewed as ‘condemned’ to the final judgement and the ‘Third Resurrection”, along with homosexuals and witches. Everyone else, who is simply asleep and not chosen by God in this life are looked down upon as being destined for the ‘Second Resurrection’ to be taught by church members in the Kingdom of God. They view themselves as the ‘firstfruits’ destined for the first and greatest resurrection of the dead, as God’s eternal children and co-rulers of Earth and the entire universe. This is delusion run amok.
Doctrine: Beyond Today
A celestial heaven apart from the created universe is not the reward of saved humans, but rather the remade Earth under the rulership and personal presence of God is coming to Earth. After the 1000 years is up, the Earth will be burned up and God and his family will take to the cosmos to create life on all of the other decimated planets, which Armstrong taught were destroyed in the Satanic Rebellion described in the Bible has having taken place before the Genesis Creation.
Why this is harmful: The influence of Mormon ideas on Armstrong really shines through in this doctrine. COG members are taught that every dead planet in the universe has been ‘set aside’ for one of them so they may someday create their own life on it and repeat the process all over again. This has lead members to deny the idea that any planet has ever been destroyed by a supernova, as “nothing has been created in vain,” and each planetary body was created for each of the chosen who has ever lived. It serves only to enhance the delusional egotism rampant among these “chosen” COG parishioners and ministers.
