Articles for the Benefit of Members and Ex-Members of the WCG

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13
More of Halford's Hypocrisy

Here is more about the unacceptable duplicity of John Halford, regional director for the Worldwide Church of God in the UK. Religious leaders who are sinning should be reprimanded publicly, as an example to all in the Church (1 Tim 5:20). Sorry if that treads on your toes, but that's scripture!

Do not be misled: Bad company corrupts good character (1 Cor 15:33, NIV).

If you have bad religious leaders, you will have correspondingly bad standards in the church. If you have vibrant, spiritually alive elders, totally devoted to Christ's service, the spiritual echo in the church will be correspondingly good.

By their fruit you will recognise them, Jesus said (Matt 7:16,20).

Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognised by its fruit (Matt 12:33, NIV).

Jesus was referring to genuine spiritual fruit. I mentioned in the article Satan Is Coming that leaders of the Worldwide Church of God are fostering satanic attitudes in their subjects. The fruit of this organisation betrays it.

It is not the words of its leaders which define it as a good Christian organisation. There are many deceivers around who know how to mouth the right words to give the right impression. But how they conduct their lives reflects the real inner truth.

The real inner truth of the WCG is not a nice story. The fruits reveal much which is of Satan which has yet to be expunged.

Arrogance and Intimidation

Writing to the WCG membership in The Worldwide News of 10th June 1997, under the title Letting God finish His work, John Halford tries to a paint a good picture. A WCG member wrote to say that he notices "arrogance and intimidation" from some of those in charge.

A perceptive member! A rare person indeed! He is right of course. There IS arrogance in the WCG leadership. There has been from time immemorial. Pride was endemic in the ministry and still has its clutches on ministers who are in the WCG, and on those who have left to form other organisations such as Church of God International, Philadelphia Church of God, Global Church of God, United Church of God, and others. Even though Halford prefers to be willingly ignorant of such spiritual corruption, it does not alter the facts. It is there. And it is one of the main roots of trouble.

This member went on to say that the congregation has been "hi-jacked".

Where ministers obtain total authoritarian rights over members, they can be Hitlers. Dictatorship has gross weaknesses where the dictator is a human being. John Emerich Edward Dalberg, 1st Baron Acton, declared: Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

He also noticed perceptively that: Great men are almost always bad men.... There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it.

And both maxims are true in the WCG! A minister, while he holds office in the WCG, is invariably exonerated in any cases of dispute with members. In other words, if there is a disagreement between a minister and a member, the minister has superior rights and privileges and his word is invariably preferred. Where a member claims one thing and a minister another, the minister's word prevails. This is often the case, irrespective of the true merits of the dispute.

The exceptions to this unspoken rule are where it would be so obvious to the congregation that a minister is in the wrong that to uphold his integrity would damage the office.

The purpose of elevating ministers to this élite position is to enhance and maintain ministerial control. This is hierarchic - a system of rulership which has its evil origins in Babylon, from which true believers are told to come out (Rev 18:4). Lording it over others is another bad feature of WCG ministerial domination.

The WCG member who dared to speak out and claim that his congregation has been hi-jacked was quite right. Of course, it takes courage to say so. Most keep quiet out of fear of intimidation and ostracism. Jeremiah predicted it this way:

The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and My people love it this way. But what will you do in the end? (Jer 5:31.)

The end is a spiritually derelict church. A dead church - Sardisian (Rev 3:1).

Halford's Hypocritical Noises

To persuade this member to stay in the WCG and also stem the tide of others leaving, John Halford does his best. But he's not honest to the Word of God, nor to the situation.

Firstly, Jesus described the place of nourishment for his flock in plural terms. He didn't say there is one pasture into which you are called, where you are meant to stay for good. The parable in John 10 describes in symbol that there comes a time when you are meant to follow Jesus out of your present situation and into fresh pasture (vs. 3,9).

The "gate" (NIV) in this parable represents Jesus who opens the way for you to learn elsewhere. When the pasture is getting stale, it is good practice to find fresh grazing.

When He has brought out all His own He goes on ahead of them, and His sheep follow Him because they know His voice (John 10:4).

The WCG does not teach its members how to hear and know the voice of the Spirit. They are trained to follow their human leadership. But what happens when a man climbs in some other way, who doesn't enter the sheep pen by the gate? In other words, what about impostors in the church leadership?

Halford says nothing about them. Why? First, he's not being true to God's Word and honest with you. But possibly, also, he is an impostor himself - a hireling who is only there to draw his wages, and not really care for the flock? There are many men who have clung on in Worldwide just to get their pensions. They have disagreed with 'official' WCG changes in doctrine or whatever, but have kept quiet for the sake of expediency. They have been willing to compromise with the Word of God in order to secure their wages. These men are not true shepherds. They are hirelings who have climbed into the sheep pen some other way than via the gate.

Jesus is not their way. They have chosen their own route. When the chips were down and they faced losing their salaries if they contradicted church policy from HQ, they failed the acid test. They followed men, not God. They didn't do like the apostles did (Acts 5:29). They were not prepared to forsake all to follow Jesus without compromise.

Do you want to follow men like that? They are there for you to follow if you want to continue looking to men. Jesus wants you listening to Him (Jn 10:3). When you learn to hear the voice of God's Spirit, you don't need men to direct you:

.... the anointing you received from Him remains in you and you do not need anyone to teach you (1 Jn 2:27, NIV).

Why was John saying this?

I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray (1 Jn 2:26).

The reason John Halford omits mention of false ministers in the church is because it would be too destabilising. But they are there. And if he is to be true to the Word of God, he should mention them, especially in the present context of massive doctrinal shifts in the WCG.

How can members tell whether the changes are true or false? They should be able to hear both sides of any argument. But they are not permitted that freedom. They are told what to believe from the pulpit. Such indoctrination is not blatant, of course. That wouldn't go down well. So it is done very subtly. It is done over a considerable length of time, because there is more chance of success by gradual indoctrination. Mental manipulation figures prominently in sermon and writing techniques. The victim is assailed by a barrage of intellectuality which he is not always capable of sifting through because of his insufficient grounding in the Word of God. Heresy is deliberately mixed with truth to confuse the recipient, and the more often this is done, the more the discernment of the victim loses ground to the forces of doubt and indecision.

This is how Tkach and his cronies have brain-washed their victims in the WCG. Always seen smiling in propaganda photos in the WWN, WCG leaders are presented in the most favourable light to their members. Members would not question their leaders' credentials as men of God. They look so nice. They sound so good. Their words are smooth as butter. "We can have every confidence in WCG church leaders."

And thus the church membership are led astray. Halford has done his part in contributing to this pernicious psychological manipulation of the flock.

All he could say in his article in the WWN was "go to your leaders and ask them if they would accommodate you and your needs?" (page 17.) What utter hypocrisy! The WCG doesn't accommodate anyone who dissents!

He says, "Now, if you try to approach those in charge and are resisted and rejected, I would want to know about it. I assure you that I, or Mr. Silcox, would have a word with the leadership of your congregation."

Rubbish! Even Halford and Silcox have resisted and rejected those who have come to them with complaints of this nature!! Not listening to dissenters and the downtrodden is an organisational disease!!

Halford laces it thickly: "If we really see ourselves as a community of people bound together by Christian love, we would do all we can to tolerate each other and be willing to adjust in a spirit of 'give and take'". The only give and take he knows is to give the orders and take your money! That's WCG policy in the raw. Don't let him kid you otherwise. It has been for decades!

The plain facts are that true love is lacking. It's not love that binds people in the WCG, but organisational factors - habit, belonging to 'my' religious club, pride in the WCG, exclusivism and church tradition. Halford hypocritically argues for "staying together and working out the problems" (central box). But when my wife and I were thrown out of the WCG as a result of false accusations levelled at us by a false minister in the church, he did nothing to help mend the fracture or work out the problems when we appealed to him! He turned away from paths of truth and justice.

"Let me know if I can help further", he concludes. What utter humbug! Hirelings can't help!

Malcolm B Heap

Further Reading

More about satanic inroads into the Church is covered in the booklet, Apostasy in God's Church (£2.00). Write to the address below.