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

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18
WCG: Coming to the Point of Accepting Deliverance

When Moses was told by God to return to Egypt and deliver the Hebrew slaves, he didn't want to go. That is understandable. But imagine how impossible it would have been if the Israelites didn't want to leave? What then? Could God have delivered His people?

That is the present situation in the WCG!!

God can only help you if you want to be helped. He can't deliver anyone who wants to stay where they are.

Jesus didn't say "Blessed are those who pray to God." He didn't say you would be blessed by going through the motions, by adhering to a religious formula. Blessings of deliverance come when you are in the right mode to accept what God offers.

The Beatitudes are all about right approaches or attitudes. When we have those, we can receive God's spiritual blessings. If we lack them, and harbour wrong attitudes we forfeit the fruit of God's goodness. Righteousness and blessings are all bound up in attitude or approach - a matter of the 'heart'.

What Must Precede Deliverance

All the experiences in our lives are to bring us to the point of receptiveness before God.

He could not deliver Israel until Israel wanted to be delivered. Suffering had to precede the deliverance, or the people would have been content to remain in Egypt.

Likewise, God's people today cannot be delivered from whatever demonic oppressions they are bound under, until they want to be delivered. Prior to that, of course, they have to come to realise that they are under demonic subjugation.

Most Christians are abysmally unaware of the demonic strongholds in their lives which are binding them. It is not unrealistic to say that the majority of those who believe in God, who set out to obey Him and do what pleases Him, are bound by the devil in some way. That does not mean they are possessed. There are degrees of oppression. The devil can influence others, even strongly, without actually taking complete possession of their bodies or minds.

For example, two or three years ago, the Dunstable congregation of the WCG publicised to their Plain Truth readers that there would be an "Open House". Readers were invited to attend services of the church. They were encouraged to bring along their friends, too. It sounded quite a jolly affair.

A friend of ours received this invitation and showed it to us. After praying, God showed us we should attend.

I didn't want to go, humanly. I know I am not welcome at any WCG meeting. There is such unbridled hostility towards me that sometimes I have wondered whether I would get my face smashed in!

Well, Moses didn't want to go back to Egypt to 'face the music' there, nor did I want to go back to the carnal WCG. But I obeyed.

Our first visit was clearly a strain for the WCG welcoming party, but they put on a good front. The next week, however, things were very much different. We were physically resisted, and only after a vigorous struggle did I manage to get in through the door. I have never heard of an "Open House" meeting in any church in the country where you have to fight your way in!! It is another example of the classic duplicity of WCG behaviour.

What provoked WCG hostility were my words the previous week. I had vented some wrath on two WCG ministers who needed a bit of straight talk. They had ignored a spate of letters from me over several months. They had simply stonewalled me because they knew they were in the wrong, so the best thing to do, they thought, was ignore me. I told them what I thought of their hypocrisy and deceit, so they reacted with hostility by trying to bar me entry.

All this is evidence of demonic oppression. None of this is what could be termed "fruit of the Spirit". These ministers were not behaving in a godly manner. They were not open, honest, frank, or sincere in their desire to find peace with me. In fact, it was always me who had to try to instigate proceedings to effect peace. They clearly didn't want it!

"Blessed are the peacemakers," Jesus said. The antithesis could be stated: "Cursed are those who don't care for peace." The WCG is under a curse today for not seeking peace and reconciliation with those who have been oppressed or wronged in the past. They should seek to rectify their mistakes, not ignore them.

If someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles (Matt 5:41,42, NIV).

The WCG does not practice this. They practice riding roughshod over the weak and powerless, and ignoring them when they cry out in justifiable anger for being abused. WCG treatment is not love. It is demonic behaviour. The WCG is good at it!

On the third of our unwelcome visits to the Dunstable "Open House" farce, hatred was boiling up even more against me. Most tried to stay calm and, with numbers on their side, they didn't have to put up a great struggle to keep our small party out of the meeting. But some tempers did get frayed and the caretaker lashed out at me and grabbed my throat with two hands in a vice-like grip. He was trying to strangle me. This is another example of demonic involvement.

"You will know them by their fruits."

In self-defence, I slapped him on the cheek, which made him loosen his grip and I managed to get away from his vicious attack. But to add insult to injury, one WCG member, whom we knew to be demonised, saw what happened and ran inside the hall to tell others who had not witnessed what took place that I had attacked the caretaker. He slandered me.

False accusations are a favourite ploy of the Adversary. And what is better than to accuse the innocent of the very thing perpetrated by the guilty party? Ignorant people believe the lies, and the devil has achieved his object. The innocent are condemned.

Little did this man know that he was being used by the enemy of mankind. He didn't think twice about attacking a former friend - one who had taken him into his home and fed him, entertained him, spent time with him as a friend. But then, so did Judas spend time with Jesus before he betrayed Him.

The devil knows how to destroy relationships and how to ruin the lives of those who let him. You must not let him. You must take a stand against evil, especially evil that invades the Church. If you don't, by default you are in complicity with the devil!

We are in a war, and if you let the enemy dominate you, he will. He won't let you go, either, until you are prepared to fight like hell to get out from under his grip.

God cannot deliver you until you want His deliverance. He cannot help you until you really want to live His way. And He cannot give you His love until you really want it and want to give it to others.

When Will Deliverance Come?

I pray for the day when former friends who hate us, because we have been so outspoken against WCG corruption, can come to accept us and show the love which God makes freely available. When there is that acceptance, there can be reconciliation and harmony. I look forward to that day.

But it will not come until those who have opposed what God is doing through us, come to recognise God's hand and lend their support.

Some are coming round to see the light. But a lot more must follow suit.

Despite the way the WCG treated us, I didn't encourage others to leave the church. I wasn't filled with venom and hatred towards it. WCG folks who came to us for advice or help were not always advised to leave the WCG. For some, it was better that they stayed. That was four or five years ago.

Since then, however, there has been a dramatic shift downward. The church has plunged into the demonic abyss and I now say to anyone there: GET OUT!! If you don't, you will be corrupted by damnable heresies and contaminated by demonic associations. Paul was under inspiration when he said:

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

MANY IN THE WCG ARE BEING MISLED! And they are being dragged deeper into demonic pits. They are pits that contain all manner of evil. And it is not easy being delivered from such places, because the deceptions that hold you inside are so subtle.

God allows this because people ask for it. They choose demons instead of Him. They choose devilish ways instead of God's good ways. God lets them indulge themselves in evil until they are sick and tired of it. He leaves them to wallow in the effects of their compromise until they have had a belly full. When they come to hate it - which sometimes cannot happen until they have endured some suffering - then He can deliver them. Not a moment before.

A couple of years ago I talked briefly on the phone with a deacon in the WCG. It had to be brief because this man refused to talk with me since my wife and I were slandered from the pulpit and ejected from the church. He had been made hostile towards me by the innuendo and vindictive comments WCG ministry circulated. They pumped him full of distrust, suspicion and resentment.

During the course of this conversation - which I taped for the record - he told me something absolutely astonishing for a 'free-thinking', mature, accomplished person! He told me to bow down to Satan!

Now, he didn't use those words, of course. What we were discussing was how to behave in the situation I found myself in - thrust out of the WCG by a minister who insisted I comply with his views, even though they had no support in the Bible! This deacon said: "Malcolm, why don't you just forget it and come back?"

I said, "Do you mean to tell me that if I am abused that I should submit to that abuse?" His reply was simply "Yes." He said that he had been abused, he had suffered injustice at the hands of church ministers, but that he had learned to put up with it and just carry on. He didn't 'retaliate'. He hadn't sought justice. He had merely tolerated it.

I could hardly believe what I was hearing!

He was saying that if abuse takes place in the church, don't challenge it. If Satan comes along, hurts someone, lies about him, don't challenge him. If a minister of Satan masquerading as a minister of God opens fire on the brethren, don't do anything about it. Just carry on. Comply with his wishes.

That may be a formula for the minimum disturbance. It may be a way to avoid unpleasant confrontation. It may be an easy way out. But it is not right!!

Here was an upstanding member, a man I highly respected and whom I thought was a man of God, a man of high reputation in the WCG, telling me that I should not fight against evil, but simply comply with it!

That is the result of demonic subjugation. It is the end result of a very successful course in mind control, orchestrated by Satan himself!

That poor man will not be released until he has suffered enough to want release. It is a sad thing to have to say, but there is no other way. I pray for the day when WCG folks can be delivered!

Malcolm B Heap, February 1998