Tuesday, January 19, 2016

Will We Soon Witness the Closure of Grace Communion International?



Several people have contacted us today relaying that they have received a letter from Grace Communion International (WCG) that the employee pension plan will be dissolved as of March 1, 2016.

We have also been told that the chance of the GCI totally dissolving as church is eminent.  GCI has been hemorrhaging members steadily for many years.  People are also not tithing or giving as the church had once expected.  Because of this there is less of a need for a "corporate" HQ overseeing the remaining churches.

One of the plans being considered is to let each church operate independently, keeping all the money in their own church area.  They could call themselves what ever they want and not be tied to the GCI denomination.

The West Valley GCI has always been the conservative church of the GCI, meeting on Saturday, keeping the holy days, and tithing.  Because they keep their money locally, they have $400,000.00 sitting in the bank.  GCI HQ has traditionally expected all church areas to send in 10% of their money, but now are asking West Valley to send in even more.  They are balking at that.  Their previous pastor retired and the churches now pastored by Ron Kelly for at least six more months.

Apparently Joe Tkach Jr. wants to step down, something he has been saying for the last 10 years.  With no one that can effectively step in and keep things as they are and not revert back to the old teachings, the next best thing is to dissolve the church.

This seems to be the trend in all the COG's right now.  With the soon coming implosion of LCG, UCG, PCG and COGWA, are we finally witnessing the total collapse of Armstrongism?  Attendance numbers are shrinking. None of the COG's can truly stand the other.  None of them want to give up control or power in order to merge.

For decades the church pictured itself being persecuted by the world and having restrictions placed upon it resulting in the "famine of the word."  Nothing like that has happened.  Instead we are watching them eat themselves alive and dissolve around us.  Hundreds and hundreds of little groups are out there doing nothing.  From whacky people like Stephen Gilbreath to the total nut jobs in charge at RCG and PCG, the Church of God is one complete mess. There is no need for some beast power or the  King of the South or North to rise up and persecute the church.  There is no need for the Pope to do anything.  The Church of God is destroying itself.

34 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have heard that the income is so low that they seriously cannot afford to pay their HQ employees anymore and that they are thinking about closing down the Glendora HQ building. The Glendora church is also shrinking. The last time I was there a lot of former members were no longer in attendance.

Anonymous said...

I have always thought that the money collected should stay with the local church area. I knew of so many people that went without and weren't being helped by 3rd tithe because requests had to first go through headquarters. Local churches are the best in deciding where the tithe money should be spent.

Anonymous said...

Ron Kelly needs to stay where he is and collect a retirement from his blue ribbon tithe payers.

Jr. is a quarter century late in closing the doors to the church (if you can call it that) and start digging a doomsday shelter for his wife and himself. Or maybe open a flower shop. Who knows!

Unknown said...

Tkach is brilliant! Absolutely brilliant! There should be an episode of "American Greed" on him!

Sell off $200 Million worth of assets, stay on as the unaccountable "Pope" and then get rid of every single responsibility of the Church , and every single payroll burden!

Frankly, one of the biggest HEISTS in history on any level!

The address for GCI is very telling...2011 E FINANCIAL WAY, glendora, California, 91741-4614

Anonymous said...

I just had a look at photos of a CGI meeting. Men coming to 'church' in crappy old jeans and sports tops. Where's respect?
Connie, I don't think it was a heist, but rather larceny.

Unknown said...

Well, well, well. I've been sitting back and waiting for the inevitable collapse for a long time now. All the way back to 1975, in fact. That's when I and several others began to see clearly and took off. We're all aged now, and many are already gone, but I hope to see the day when this theological abortion is finally buried. It's metastasized several times over the years and the cancer has gotten worse every passing year.

Anonymous said...

I hear that there are many members of the UCG that also have stopped tithing and whole congregations that are considering completely severing all ties with the home office.

Anonymous said...

6:27 PM '..whole congregations that are considering completely severing all ties with the home office.'

Not surprising. There are accusations of UCG sliding towards Protestantism.

Anonymous said...

I've yet to find any references to the 3rd tithe in the New Testament. 3rd tithe was ancient Israels social security system, for widows and orphans. There was nothing spiritual about it. People in the western democracies are already paying the equivalent and much much more through their taxes. So why do the Armstrongite churches have it all?

Anonymous said...

I said 'Connie, I don't think it was a heist, but rather larceny.'
What I had in mind wasn't larceny, but willful malicious destruction of property, the organized church, and the members lives. Perhaps murder is the best word.

Anonymous said...

It's been fun while it lasted, but all bad things must come to an end.

Mustant they?

Anonymous said...

seems like a wise old fellow once said something to the effect of "leave it alone, if it is of God you cannot defeat it, and if it is not of God it will collapse on its own."

you haven't seen The Church attacking GCI...we left it alone.

Anonymous said...

Jesus final miracle Ron...

Anonymous said...

Doesn't his wife Tammy drive a newish hot red Ford Mustang?

I doubt she'd give it up under any circumstances, although if her husband Joe Jr is in charge and sincere (which I doubt), she may be relegated to a hot red pogo-stick in the future.

Anonymous said...


The local Graceless Community of Iniquity (GCI) congregation's attendance is down by about 95% from its peak back in the Worldwide Church of God (WCG) days. Considering the type of people who went along with the Tkaches' apostasy, the income will be down even more.

If the GCI totally disappears down into the depths, its few remaining members can simply go hang out at the United Church of Godlessness (UCG), where the ministers pretend that everyone is “united” in their diverse sins. WCG ministers who had helped the Tkaches carry out the WCG apostasy jumped over to the UCG when their paychecks disappeared along with the sudden sinking of the WCG. Perhaps the time has now come for the grungy, little, left-over apostates in the GCI to make the jump too. That leaky Tkach lifeboat known as the UCG will not last forever. They need to jump soon before the UCG disappears into the ocean of the world. This way they can at least have an unsociable “social club” to attend for a little while, and if they want to they can even pretend that they had “stood up for the truth” (whatever that means).

The UCG is not like the WCG was under Herbert W. Armstrong, where people who attended were actually expected to know something and believe it and obey it. The UCG just wants people to attend for the sake of the attendance numbers, and does not care what they believe--as long as they do not believe what HWA had taught. The UCG leaders would like to come up with some sort of mission, and attract some followers, but this has never worked out, just as their deceitfulness back in their WCG days was also in vain. Their DELUSIONS that they were smarter and better than HWA, and that they knew how to grow the church better than him, would have been totally smashed to pieces (like some of the churches that they have presided over) after twenty years of bumbling around if they were not so SERIOUSLY DELUDED. Some godless GCI slanderers and sinners were already attending part-time with the UCG many years ago, and causing the sort of devilish division that the UCG minister thought was “meeting in peace.”



Anonymous said...

The quicker the better.

TM said...

As we all recall, the WCG predicted the End of the Age in 1975, 6000 years after the Creation in 4026BC (no year zero). Then at the FOT in Nanjing China in 1984, Herman Hoeh told us that he had recalculated the date of the Creation, using differences in the chronologies in Kings and Chronicles, and found it actually happened "41 to 44 years" later. That would bring the Creation plus 6000 years to 2016 to 2019. It appears that might be happening in 2016 to 2019 is not the End of the Age, but the End of Armstrongism. Unfortunately HLH is not around to do any more revisions to his predictions.

Unknown said...

Nothing is going to grow for any of them. Herb had an attention grabbing message that saturated the radio waves at a time when that was the main communication medium and that appealed to uninformed and poorly educated people who wanted to restore that old time religion he assured them hadn't been preached for 1800 years. Other churches grow by being well known and traditional with people from families that have been in them for generations or from being very visible to people who just want a church home to attend and to indoctrinate their innocent children into Christianity. All the COGs try to keep their local congregations invisible in rented halls, etc. and you have to pass muster to be "invited." Their dreams of growing are pipe dreams that will never come to fruition. The only direction is down as the old die hards simple up and die or begin to get wise.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, Anon 1030, but I can't quite deduce what you're trying to say - it's buried under too thick a layer of hyperbole.

DennisCDiehl said...

So Joe is dissolving his own pension as well as Ron Kelly's right???? It's only right I suppose. Good for him! Ok...well not his maybe....

Anonymous said...

If the essence of this is true, I'm guessing that the only ones' pension plans that won't be dissolved are those of the honchos who are doing the dissolving.
And if so, it should be interesting to see the spin they put on this one.
Last big thing they did, shrinking the church by a huge percentage, got the spin of being a "MEERKLE FRUM JAYSUS"!

It will also be interesting to see how individual congregations' assets are handled by HQ- especially those individual congregations owning their own buildings and having healthy bank accounts.

Remember that amicus curiae brief that GCI attorney Bernie Schnippert filed several years ago? In doing so, GCI seemed to be of the belief that property and assets of individual congregations weren't really their own, but rather all belonged to HQ.

(Anyone have any links to articles about that amicus curiae brief filing?)
Perhaps one can find prophecy by peering down Junior's briefs...LOL!

Anonymous said...

So Sad...

I personally know a Pastor of theirs, still hanging on part time, taking care of a small congregation. He actually cares for them. Too Bad he doesn't see how he someday, like the HQ employees will be cheated on retirement.

GCI was dishonest with the "changes" (whether you agreed or disagreed) to their own people 20 years ago.

Only the Top Dogs are getting fed. Everyone else is lied to or cheated.

And THIS is a CHURCH?

Anonymous said...

The CGI website states "It’s enjoying coming home to the unconditional love of the Father." Ha ha ha. What about the lake of fire and gnashing of teeth? Where's the unconditional love there. These are funny people.

Anonymous said...

GCI and the rest of COG's are really a "church" a hierarchical, Roman Catholic church system for the benefits of the clergy. Christ did not establish a "church" - a crook, abusive institution. He empowered a "congregation" - assembly, community, family (ekklesia) not a church (The Roman Catholic replaced the word and everyone seems to have followed). Abusive system abuses people. As simple as that.

Anonymous said...

"The CGI website states "It’s enjoying coming home to the unconditional love of the Father." Ha ha ha. What about the lake of fire and gnashing of teeth? Where's the unconditional love there. These are funny people."

Oh, sure, he might throw you into a lake of fire which is "never quenched" and where "the worm" never dies (eternal torment)...but he loves you!

But the "love" of "the father" wouldn't be the only unfalsifiable thing, would it?

Anonymous said...

12.39PM. God the Father is called by Father because His 'love' is very conditional. Mixing agape and philia love is dishonest


Anonymous said...

I wonder if Ted Johnston of "The Surprising God" Blog will be surprised that his pension has been dissolved by God?

Anonymous said...

Johnston won't need to worry. The ministers plan is separate from the ordinary workers who are low on the totem pole who will be cut off in March. The good old boys are set for life, no worries for them. The people that kept them in those positions are ones who are being hurt and they don't care! GCI is no more Christian now than it was under Herbert Armstrong's reign.

Anonymous said...

We live in the age of propaganda.

Biggest liar ever is ... Goebbels? Middle-finger Obama? Herbert? Joe Jr? Or the BBC?

The postwar image of Goebbels as a master dissembler is itself a propaganda distortion, explains French scholar Jacques Ellul in his classic study, Propaganda. He writes:

"There remains the problem of Goebbels' reputation. He wore the title of Big Liar (bestowed by Anglo-Saxon propaganda) and yet he never stopped battling for propaganda to be as accurate as possible. He preferred being cynical and brutal to being caught in a lie. He used to say: 'Everybody must know what the situation is.' He was always the first to announce disastrous events or difficult situations, without hiding anything. The result was a general belief between 1939 and 1942 that German communiqués not only were more concise, clearer and less cluttered, but were more truthful than Allied communiqués ... and, furthermore, that the Germans published all the news two or three days before the Allies. All this is so true that pinning the title of Big Liar on Goebbels must be considered quite a propaganda success."

Anonymous said...

in addition to money, they're also losing long time, very committed members. Is there any update on this?

Anonymous said...

what about the new news that GCI is going to relocate their "operational headquarters" along with the advisory board from Glendora to North Carolina?

Anonymous said...

This hate is coming from the Jesuits that took over the church ? This gci place , I read on one of their sites promotes the new age Jesus and mysticism?
They would like others to think that God's Church was destroyed? Quite the opposite. It is alive and well with thousands of people out there.

Stephen Gilbreath said...

In reply to TM -- while a student at the college in Pasadena, I remember Mr. Herbert Armstrong ("HWA") telling us in late 1970 that we would NOT be leaving for a place of nourishment (protection, safety, final training) in 1972. He explained that because of a certain verse of Scripture in Matthew 24 in which Christ said "But of that day and hour knoweth no man ..." (verse 36(a)) and because so many had misinterpreted what he was saying in the booklet, "1975 in Prophecy," and with college instructors and local ministers promoting phrases like "72 and we're through, HWA said 1972 would definitely NOT be the year those accounted worthy would be flown to the place prepared by God for the most faithful of the Church of God of this era. He expounded further that because of what people were saying including the words of Herman Hoeh, that the Father would definitely NOT be having Jesus Christ to return in 1975. HWA was saying that 1975 would NOT be the year for Christ's return AT LEAST FOUR YEARS BEFORE 1975.

Stephen Gilbreath said...

In reply to TM -- while a student at the college in Pasadena, I remember Mr. Herbert Armstrong ("HWA") telling us in late 1970 that we would NOT be leaving for a place of nourishment (protection, safety, final training) in 1972. He explained that because of a certain verse of Scripture in Matthew 24 in which Christ said "But of that day and hour knoweth no man ..." (verse 36(a)) and because so many had misinterpreted what he was saying in the booklet, "1975 in Prophecy," and with college instructors and local ministers promoting phrases like "72 and we're through, HWA said 1972 would definitely NOT be the year those accounted worthy would be flown to the place prepared by God for the most faithful of the Church of God of this era. He expounded further that because of what people were saying including the words of Herman Hoeh, that the Father would definitely NOT be having Jesus Christ to return in 1975. HWA was saying that 1975 would NOT be the year for Christ's return AT LEAST FOUR YEARS BEFORE 1975.