"A KICK TO THE STOMACH"
by Richard Burkard
It seemed in the summer of 1998 that the Worldwide Church of God was calming down from its massive changes. Dozens of ministers either resigned or were fired three years earlier, to create United Church of God - what one WCG pastor called at the time the "biggest threat yet."
But then came some fireworks on the Fourth of July. This cc-mail was sent from WCG Southeast Regional Pastor Allen Barr to Pastors in his area - read 7/4/98 at an after-services "Family Meeting" in my congregation. The Pastor there allowed members to make copies of it. My thoughts and comments about it will follow.
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My wife and I just returned from the conference in Pasadena which was truly wonderful and unifying. What a difference between the RD/RP [Regional Directors/Regional Pastors] conference of Nov., 1997 and the conference of 1998. We saw the Holy Spirit bringing us together to agree on the liturgical calendar. It is clear that we as a denomination must allow our theological understanding to be reflected in our liturgical practices. Mr. Tkach has made it clear than we must celebrate in the Christ event and not in the Exodus event. We are finding it difficult to mix a Hebrew calendar with a Christian calendar.
We understand that the liturgy of the Worldwide Church of God has primarily been the product of a misunderstanding of the New Covenant. Although there are very important promises found in the Old Testament, and there are prophecies that are Messianic in nature, our Old Covenant practices have been toxic to many in our fellowship, and an obstacle to the understanding of New Covenant theology. I know this is not true for everyone, and I know that many have been able to experience Christocentric worship, but we find that many are in our fellowship not because they agree with our theology, but because "we have the right days."
To try to make the Exodus event a Christ event is like pouring new wine into old wineskins. You can pour in some new wine, but as the pressure builds, the wineskin will burst. We can try to mix two separate events (the Exodus event and the Christ event), but this leads to confusion, and the gospel message becomes adulterated. For example, people have said that the Old Testament holy days foreshadowed Christ, but this is also true for the animal sacrifices, the Levitical priesthood, the temple and everything that is found in the Old Covenant. But that doesn't mean that we should practice animal sacrifice, or have a Levitical priesthood, or build a temple.
Some may ask, "What do we mean by the Christ event?" The Christ event is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our theology is centered on the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Our theology should produce a liturgy which is used to proclaim the gospel. What you rehearse week after week, and year after year is what will be remembered. We don't want to forget the Old Testament which is filled with deep meaning and prophecies fulfilled in Jesus Christ, however, this does not mean that we have to continue an Old Covenant liturgy which emphasizes and rehearses the redemption of the nation of Israel from Egypt. There may be some similarities between the Exodus and the Christ event, but there are a lot of dissimilarities. And there are many parts of the Bible which more clearly predict and rejoice in the Christ event.
We must also look at the liturgy of the rest of the body of Christ. If we believe that there are Christians in other churches, and we also believe that the Holy Spirit has worked in the body of Christ down through the centuries, then we must ask ourselves why has the rest of the body of Christ rejected an Old Covenant liturgy. Even though there are variations in how the body of Christ it is clear that with one voice the Christian world has rejected an Old Covenant calendar.
Mr. Tkach stated at the conference that the festivals of Israel are not holy, and that the Hebrew calendar is not sacred, and that we need to stop referring to them as such. He also said that we need to lead our people away from an Old Covenant liturgy to a Christian liturgy. In one congregation in our region, during a Q&A, when I was asked "What is the future of the sabbath and the holy days in the WCG?", I responded that one issue we would discuss at the conference is whether we were going to have a Jewish or Christian liturgy. Several people in the congregation responded, "Jewish!" They learned to be "Jewish" in the Worldwide Church of God, and they preferred that t being Christian. This is not preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ/ As we lead people away from an Old Covenant liturgy, we need to explain to them that we don't need to be Jewish to be Christian.
We are finding those who truly want a Christ centered liturgy leaving our fellowship and going to other denominations because of criticism from those in our fellowship concerning the celebration of the Incarnation and the Resurrection. We need to ask what we will look like five or ten years from now.
We as Pastors must ask ourselves if we can be the kind of shepherds who can lead our people from an Old Covenant liturgy to a Christian liturgy; from superstition about pagan contaminations to an excitement about worshipping Jesus Christ in a tradition rich in historicity and meaning in Christian culture. Headquarters leadership and the Regional Directors and Regional Pastors all agree that we must lead our people away from an Old Covenant liturgy to a Christian liturgy. We do not want to force, pressure, or mandate. We want to lead. However, we must realize that some in fellowship might decide not to follow our lead. Yet, we must be courageous enough to lead those who will follow our lead. We may have to get smaller, but Christ will use us for His glory if we make Him the center of our worship and liturgy and our lives.
I will write more concerning the conference. Let me say that those in Florida, except for the panhandle, will get a new Regional Pastor some time this year. I will continue to be Regional Pastor for most of Georgia, Alabama and the Florida panhandle.
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A letter attached to this was also read at the meeting. I don't have a copy of that letter, and admittedly did NOT take complete notes. But it was called a "working draft" of a new WCG liturgical calendar. Its highlights:
* The calendar will add days marking the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, along with the Advent season and Epiphany. (My Pastor said he didn't even know what Epiphany was!)
* The Days of Unleavened Bread, Atonement and Trumpets will become OPTIONAL days. (NOT Pentecost, however, if I heard it correctly.)
* The Lord's Supper will be observed on EITHER "Holy Thursday" or Nisan 14; apparently each congregation will have the choice. It can be taken at other times in the year as well.
* The schedule for collecting Annual Offerings will change - with some current days deleted, and a new Offering Day added on the fourth weekend of Advent.
* The Feast of Tabernacles will continue, with local three-day weekend sites or regional eight-day sites - but NOT LOCAL eight-day sites. (My Pastor was trying to arrange such a site, but Headquarters vetoed it on grounds of maintaining the regional presence.)
* The letter from Mr. Barr also urged Pastors to consider moving service times to Sundays, as "40 U.S. congregations" now meet on that day. As of July 5, 1998, the Atlanta WCG began meeting on Sunday - and in a telling sign, Pasadena added a Sunday service to the current Saturday meetings.
Immediately after reading all this, my Pastor led the meeting in a prayer - during which he admitted his "human reaction" to the letter was that it felt like a "kick to the stomach." During a short comment session, I stated I was not surprised by the news - by 1998, little surprised me about the WCG anymore - but was disappointed. (The congregation I attended took a "go-slow" approach to many of the WCG changes.)
What disappointed me? Let's take the letter from the top:
1. What WAS the difference between the 1997 and 1998 RD/RP conferences? A brief summary of the 1997 meeting in the November Worldwide News said nothing about the calendar issue at all - much less any dissent or dispute.
2. The WCG seems to be saying our "New Covenant understanding" of the Holy Days has been invalid. The book Transformed by Truth noted the days celebrate salvation (pg. 198). This seems sensible and logical to me. And personally, I haven't considered Feast-keeping or Sabbath-keeping "toxic"; in fact, the only pains come when I CANNOT keep them in full due to work conflicts.
3. Why should the WCG feel forced to fall in line with the rest of the Christian world about which days to keep? Especially if it's "keeping the right days" already? They're "right" because they're Biblically-based - and Mr. Tkach said in a 1998 video sermon that the "Bible is the final court of authority." Where is there Bible precedence for keeping four weeks of Advent? Or Epiphany? (That's January 6, for those who don't know.) The arguments made in literature such as Christmas Reconsidered are NOT that persuasive and compelling.
4. Related to this: the WCG seemed inconsistent about what acts are allowed or not allowed based on the Bible. Mr. Barr, uh, barred people from doing some Charismatic eccentricities in Atlanta services, such as holy laughter. He correctly said they're not Scriptural. Yet Advent and Epiphany celebrations are not Scriptural, either. To borrow from Mr. Tkach, there seemed to be cognitive dissonance from the ministry.
5. Why couldn't WCG say any longer that the "festivals of Israel" are holy? Didn't the WCG a couple of years earlier WE can declare days holy if we chose, based on Romans 14:5-6? "One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord."
It was obvious to me in 1998 that WCG expected more members to leave because of the change in calendars. And sure enough, it happened. In fact, the Regional Pastor shut down the congregation in my city after I left in 2000 - only to reorganize it weeks later, with people still loyal to what WCG/GCI was doing.
(On the day he read the letters, my Pastor urged everyone NOT to leave WCG - urging the group to pray and fast about the situation. Yet that Pastor was suspended two years later, then fired for disputing the course Pasadena was taking.)
For me, this letter boiled down to a matter of doctrinal "distinctives." The old WCG had many. Today's GCI seems to have very few. (In fact, we challenge you to list some.) Those distinctives could have been used to teach members, as Mr. Tkach cited in his book. Yet the differences which brought me from Methodism to WCG/GCI eroded away - and if they go, why shouldn't I?
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