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Recapture True Values

By M. John Alle

Any of you who have been around for any length of time will recognize the title of this message. Recapture True Values was for years the theme of Ambassador College. Like any other phrase or saying, if it is said too many times, it loses its impact and meaning. Today, I would like to expound on this phrase, because if Pentecost is to mean anything to us this year, I think this phrase says it all.

First of all, though, we would be insane to think that all is well. If I were giving a State of the Work message, similar, but more important than, the President's State of the Union address, I would not have too much good to report.

One of the reasons that almost every country on earth has its leader give a state of the nation address is because the act of doing so focuses the people on what is important. It focuses their minds on what has been accomplished and what still needs to be done. As the framers of our Constitution envisioned it, the state of the Union address was also to look forward to what needed to be done for the national good in the coming year, and was not intended to be a cynical political sounding board as it is today. But, after all, the nation's political system has become so venal and corrupt that our NATION had better RECAPTURE TRUE VALUES BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE!

We have become so confused as a nation that we no longer know right from w4rong, up from down, left from right, or black from white. Such, sadly, is becoming the case I the churches of God, I am sad to say.

So, what would I say to the church [and in fact I am doing so right now] about its present state? To sum it up, I would say that unless the church makes a concerted and prayerful effort to RECAPTURE TRUE VALUES, it will be lost. The ship will sink, and God will move His operations to a new ship that will go where HE wants it to go. There is so much that I could say that it would fill the space of many sermons, so I am only going to be able to hit the highlights today. The rest is up to you, as it always has been.

First, we must recall a little history. It's like what Mr. Armstrong always said to the world about why it couldn't understand it's problems. It was like coming into a movie in the last minutes and not understanding what is going on because we don't know what has gone before. So, let's review what has gone before.

Mr. Armstrong started this work with nothing but faith that God would provide. He always stated that "this Work moves forward on its knees," but, unfortunately, most of us just thought that was some kind of slick slogan after we had heard it so many times, and so it lost it's impact.

I want you t imagine for a moment that you were in Mr. Armstrong's position when he started this work. You had a wife and family in the midst of the Great Depression. You didn't have a dime to your name, but you had your name on plenty of past due bills. Sometimes your family went hungry. That's how poor you were, and that's how poor most people at that time were. The lucky ones had jobs. Few others did.

I want to bring this point home to you by reminding you of the macaroni story. This is the story of the day when the Armstrong's had nothing to eat that day but a little macaroni. No cheese. No butter if I recall. Just plain old macaroni that day and nothing else. Can you imagine how you would feel if that was all you had to feed your wife and kids? Its pitiful.

And yet, in the face of such grinding poverty, with holes in his shoes and a ratty suit for every day of the week, God expected Mr. Armstrong to get His work done! Today's corporate church executives with their fat salaries and plush expense accounts, not to mention that nice fleet car of years gone by, would say that it was impossible to preach the gospel under these circumstances. Most of these hirelings would just find themselves a job and say that they couldn't serve God this way. It was just too much to expect.

But that was not the case with Mr. Armstrong. He got offered some free time on a local radio station and he took it. That turned out so well that they offered him a show for $2.50 per week, which was a big sum of money back then, especially to a man who had nothing. He related over and over again how he set off for the radio station with only part of the money, usually only half, and that by the time he got to the station, he had the rest of the money by some miracle of God. This happened week after week.

These same miracles happened over and over again. The Plain Truth came out through faith alone. The radio broadcast went nationwide with no money. Mr. Armstrong bought the present property in Pasadena with no money down, or very little. He started the college with eight faculty members and four students. It was always ready to close for lack of money in those early years. The whole Work was always on the raw edge of collapse because of lack of money or because of something else. But, at the last minute, God would always provide.

But, as the Work progressed, people began to forget this. IN the late 60's and into the '70's the money started to roll in as God blessed His work mightily so that it could have a worldwide impact. God called Mr. Armstrong to a series of seemingly never ending meetings with Presidents, Prime Ministers, Kings, Princes, and Emperors the world over. The seeds for later preaching of the Gospel were thus being sown. Every meeting was a miracle in itself. At first, the leader would plan on a little 10 or 15 minute courtesy visit with Mr. Armstrong, but, many times, the meetings stretched into one, two and sometimes even more hours, totally destroying the leader's schedule for the day.

Why did this happen? The obvious answer is that it happened because God wanted it to, but, I think that these world leaders became truly interested and excited by a unique message and messenger. They caught the vision of the Gospel message if even for a fleeting moment, and they were reluctant to let it or the messenger go! It is amazing what happens when God is working.

Unfortunately, back home in Pasadena, trouble was brewing. A cadre of leaders grew up over a decade who forgot the faith of the past. They forgot the simple reliance on God for everything at every moment. They began to lose focus on the miracle that was happening each and every day. It seemed that it was MONEY that was doing everything along with PEOPLE. So the culture in Pasadena became one of MONEY, POWER, PEOPLE, AND POLITICS!

As this was going on, Mr. Armstrong was away almost all the time. He was also getting old and was not able to keep a personal eye on everything. Then, things got worse when he went into a semi retired state at his home in Tucson, far away from Pasadena.

Then, God sent a wake up call. Mr. Armstrong almost died of heart failure in 1977. The hirelings in Pasadena began a scramble for power. They went after each other like a pack of ravening wolves. They were showing their true colors, which were to emerge again after Mr. Armstrong's death.

The hirelings made a grab for power, thinking that Mr. Armstrong was now safely out of the picture and was soon going to die. However, God inspired Mr. Armstrong to counterattack. He fired the most obvious ones he thought were off the track, but of course the culture of money and power in Pasadena was filled with the same type of men who had just been fired, except that they had been a little more cautious.

Then, Satan struck his master blow with the receivership. But, though a series of miracles, Mr. Armstrong regained much of his strength, and in the remaining years of his life, He used Mr. Armstrong to "set God's Church back on His track."

Unfortunately, the culture of money, power, and politics in Pasadena was just hiding under the surface, waiting for Mr. Armstrong to die so that it could come back. These men pretended to have the kind of faith Mr. Armstrong had learned over the years, but, privately, these men sneered and scoffed at him and his methods. They believed in the ways of modern corporate business. They believed that the church should be run like any worldly business according to worldly business principles. They also believed that God's College should be run according to the worlds' principles and ways of education instead of God's, but they just had to wait until the old man was out of the way before they could come out of hiding again.

As soon as Mr. Armstrong's corpse was laid in the grace, the handwriting was on the wall if any had eyes to see. The final decision Mr. Armstrong made was to close the Big Sandy campus and consolidate the college in Pasadena. Weeks after his death, that decision was reversed. This pattern of reversing everything Mr. Armstrong ever did has continued with this renegade administration in Pasadena to this day. And, despite God's cursing them every step of the way, they are DETERMINED to do things man's way instead of God's way, no matter what.

The same can be said for most of those who have left to form their own organizations. There is absolutely no SPIRITUAL reason for all of the splits and schisms. The REAL REASON for all of this is that each of these mane wants to be the top dog. Each is following MAN'S BUSINESS PRINCIPLES, and each and every one of them SNEERS AND LAUGHS TO SCORN Mr. Armstrong's lessons of faith. They just don't want to DO that anymore. They don't want to take pay cuts to get the work done. They don't want to volunteer to do anything, and, they most certainly DO NOT WANT TO COME TOGETHER AGAIN IF THAT MEANS GIVING UP THEIR OWN LITTLE EMPIRES!

But in all of this, brethren, the general membership of the church is primarily to blame for all of this. If the regular lay members were praying, fasting, and seeking and beseeching God as they should be, then God would not have allowed this atrocity to happen. If we all understood the principles of brotherly love, and how we are supposed to conduct ourselves towards each other, this could not happen. If we insisted that the so called leaders of the church behaved themselves in a Christian manner or we would not support them, all of this would not happen. If we were all filled with the Holy Spirit and had the power of God, GOD HIMSELF WOULD PERFROM THE MIRACLE OF OUR HEALING, BOTH INDIVIDUALLY AND AS AN ORGANIZAITON AND BODY!

To conclude, on this anniversary of the church, my State of the Church prognosis is very grim. I have seen some signs of change, but precious time is slipping by. God will not give us all the time in the world, because this is the end of the Age and not even He can or will give us much more time. He has a work to do and it will get done.

The history of the church is littered with the dead bodies of dead churches that God once used. The biggest of those dead bodies is the Roman Catholic Church. It has its money and power that it lusted after, which caused it to get into bed with the Roman Empire so long ago. But it and all of the other apostate churches will be destroyed. Our people are in grave danger right now of passing over the edge, of going too far in our apostasy, infighting, striving for money and power. The lamp is about to be extinguished and moved elsewhere. Only we can change this.

God's work will get done, but He will not necessarily use the church of God movement to do it. If we fail to wake up despite 13 long years of punishment and rebuke, God may say enough is enough and move elsewhere. We missed some important opportunities in the past months because of people's lack of responsiveness and hardness of heart and, frankly, just plain bad, wrong, and evil attitudes. There is nothing that you can do about the other person in whatever group you are in. But you personally, can fall down on your knees and ask for forgiveness, guidance, and help. You can also ask that you be filled with God's Holy Spirit, and He will give you all these things. I implore each and every one of you to do this before it is too late. Recommit yourself to God while there is still time, and you will have secured your own crown and place in His Kingdom. Neglect much longer, and you may find yourself being flushed down the spiritual drain like so many others are about to.

Spiritual blindness builds up over time, and so many of us have forgotten so much that I am afraid that few will heed today's warning. I am sorry that this is not a happy and upbeat message, but if I fail to warn you, then your blood would be on my hands. Now that I have warned you. It is totally up to you.