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A parting glass for Greg Reagan

Greg Reagan, a longtime Church of God member, died alone here in December. He had recently moved from Houston to Austin, Texas, and had started attending the Austin Church of God.

The congregation welcomed him. We all enjoyed Greg's wit and charm and respected him.

It was obvious that Greg was talented, hardworking and a devoted father of his children.

Greg had been very successful in the marketing and brokerage industry and was a talented golfer who gave up a potentially lucrative golfing career to observe the Sabbath..

After services I had many enjoyable conversations with Greg, partly because we shared a New York-Boston Irish culture but also because of his insight into what has been happening to the Churches of God.

Greg recounted his past interactions with many in the present COG leadership. His testimony regarding their behavior and his assessment of their motivations was sobering.

At a recent Sabbath service I noticed Greg's seat was empty and asked if he was all right. I was told he had died the previous weekend.

When I heard the news I felt like a hole had been ripped open inside my heart. Greg had died sometime Sunday alone. His devoted daughter Jessica found him later that night, Dec. 23, 2013.

The thought of Greg dying alone bothered me, but after thinking about it I am more at peace because none of us in the faith truly dies alone (Psalm 116:15).

As for me, I will remember Greg as the fine man he was and raise a glass in his memory, especially--and he will appreciate this--whenever the Green is worn.

I will miss you, Greg, my brother and my friend.

Dr. Richard F. Griffiths

Elgin, Texas

 

Tell me ’bout the good old days

As I hear about yet another split among the greater Churches of God (see "Nine Ministers Leaving CGIC Hold Organizational Conference," The Journal, Dec. 31, 2013), I am reminded of what my grandfather, who raised me, one of the wisest men I've ever known, told me.

I asked him when I was maybe 10 or 11, "Grandpa, why don't you go to church?"

He replied: "Mac, the older you get the more you'll realize that in any church there's one group that runs it and another group that wants to run it, and they'll keep things in constant turmoil."

He also advised me that, if I got involved in a church, I should pay attention to the sermons and the opportunities to help others but not get involved in church politics.

So, except for the mid-1990s, when it became necessary to go to battle for the soul of the church, I've tried to follow that as best I can (not always perfectly).

When I entered Worldwide in 1972, I told him, "Grandpa, I found a church that doesn't meet those criteria."

But I was more naive in those days.

Mac Overton

Gilmer, Texas

What's wrong?

Is there something wrong with the First Commandment in Exodus 20:3, where it says "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me"?

Of course not. The translation of the Hebrew in Exodus 20:3 is wrong and therefore totally misses what God is saying and what He wants us to know and understand.

The correct translation of one word in this verse shows us exactly what God wants us to see. That word is have. The Hebrew word translated as "have" in Exodus 20:3 should correctly be "exists" (No. 1961 in Strong's).

So here is what God is telling us: "No other gods existed before Me."

God is not telling us it is okay to worship false gods but that He, the one true Supreme God, is worthy of all worship.

Paul and Micki Herrmann

Metairie, La.

Grain and weeds

I'm writing this letter in support of Pastor Dave Havir's article on disfellowshipping that appeared in the Dec. 31, 2013, issue of this newspaper [under the headline "Here Are Some Thoughts About Disfellowship"].

Like the pastor, I belonged to a church organization that taught and practiced disfellowshipping.

As long as I wasn't the object of the doctrine I didn't think much about it. However, when the tables turned I became very interested in the teaching.

Like Pastor Havir, I studied the issues of authority and what exactly made one a member of God's church and reached most of the same conclusions he came to.

It has always been interesting to me that people who espouse this teaching almost never mention the Parable of the Grain and the Weeds. It reads:

"The Kingdom of Heaven is like a farmer who planted good seed in his field. But that night as the workers slept, his enemy came and planted weeds among the wheat, then slipped away.

"When the crop began to grow and produce grain, the weeds also grew. The farmer's workers went to him and said:

"'Sir, the field where you planted the good seed is full of weeds! Where did they come from?'

"'An enemy has done this!' the farmer exclaimed.

"'Should we pull out the weeds?' they asked.

"'No,' he replied, 'you'll uproot the wheat if you do. Let both grow together until the harvest.

"'Then I will tell the harvesters to sort out the weeds, tie them into bundles and burn them, and to put the wheat in the barn'" (Matthew 13:24-29, NLT, emphasis mine).

Lonnie C. Hendrix

Fayetteville, Ark.

Personal accountability

Lonnie seems to believe that attraction (something pleasing to the eye or mind) between individuals is not or cannot be connected to a person's pursuit (to advance the thought or action) of an individual.

(See Mr. Hendrix's articles on same-sex attraction in issues No. 155 and 157 of The Journal.)

He states that humans finding each other attractive is a mindless (lacking good sense or intelligence, devoid of intelligence, purpose, direction or meaning; giving or showing little care or attention), effortless experience.

Lonnie also says it takes only a glimpse for a person to find (to decide on and make a declaration about) another human attractive.

Lonnie says most of our resulting thoughts (acts and processes of thinking, which begin at the moment we first see, hear, smell, feel another human) are never acted upon.

Lonnie admits that what transpired in that split-second glimpse was significant enough to impact the mind so much as to lead the person to consider his or her thoughts and choose to act upon them or not.

Yes, Lonnie, sexual attraction is in our DNA, which includes our thinking minds, which choose the direction we go.

Is Lonnie not contradicting himself and talking out of both sides of his mouth and avoiding personal accountability for what enters and exits our minds?

D.H. Henderson

Edmonds, Wash.

Getting Sodom straight

Regarding the articles by and about Lonnie Hendrix in issues No. 155, 156 and 157, including "Ezekiel: Sins of Sodom Were Not About Sex":

Sounds like you should rerun my "Getting Sodom Straight" (tinyurl.com/sodomstraight) article to keep the pot stirred up.

Or how about something on neither Sodom nor Gomorrah ever actually existed or were filled with gay men.

If Lot thought they were all gay I seriously doubt he'd have thought to pitch his daughter out to them to do with as they wished. It would be one big "Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww--not a girl!"

Dennis Diehl

Greenville, S.C.

The blessing of little kids

I read in the last issue of The Journal that David Hulme agreed with one of his ministers when the minister would not bless a child because the parents did not attend Sabbath services often enough.

If this report is accurate, I think it is horrible that these two ministers took it out on this poor little kid.

Besides, there are many people who rarely attend church services but have an excellent religious background because they read a lot and get much religious information from radio and TV.

I remember when David Hulme split away about half of the UCG membership in the San Francisco Bay area in 1998. I lost a lot of friends in that split. I wonder how he feels now that his group is splitting.

David Hulme, like some other COG leaders, takes Bible passages in a context that allows them to justify their dictatorial leadership in their church organizations. They preach top-down leadership.

Good reasoning puts Jesus Christ at the top of top-down government, but these leaders want to insert themselves in the middle as dictators.

Earl Cayton

San Francisco, Calif.

One-God movement should consider preexistence

Why is it not at least considered by the Church of God unitarian movement that both preexistence of Jesus and a unitarian God are a possibility?

The only rational explanation I can see for the "Let us make man in our image" statement is another being existed who was already in the image of God.

If someone denies preexistence, it would seem a requirement to remove Genesis, John and Hebrews as well as other gospel statements from the Scriptures.

Though it seems that indeed a unitarian God is the only alternative to polytheism (any teaching that includes more than one person within the name El), it would seem that even the book of Genesis would not be understandable without there being a preexistent being in the image of God.

Gary Wilson

Via the Internet

Mr. Neff walked the walk

Lester Leroy Neff [who died Jan. 28, 2014; see the article on page 1 and the obituary on page 7 of this issue]: I knew him since 1970.

Mr. Neff was one of the finest men I knew in the WCG. He did not just talk the talk. He walked the walk. Probably had the least ego of any VP or evangelist in the organization.

And he was a solid teacher. I had him for OTS, Old Testament Survey. First half was with David Jon Hill, and last two months with Mr. Neff. Quite a contrast in instructors.

Really a quality man. More men like him and the group would not have gone down the toilet.

He was diagnosed with prostate cancer a decade ago but had no treatments. Lasted longer than many who got cut, burned and poisoned! It finally spread, and he spent the last week in hospice care over in Tyler.

Michael Kusheba

Kilgore, Texas

Correction

Regarding a photo that ran on page 8 of issue No. 157 with the article "David Hulme Disfellowships S. Andrews; P. Nathan Quits":

Mr. Hulme does not live in the COGaic [Church of God an International Community, also abbreviated CGWA] headquarters office on Marengo Avenue in Pasadena. That is exclusively a church building. Mr. Hulme lives 30-40 minutes outside of Pasadena.

Name withheld

Via the Internet

Correction

The photograph that you have of the demolition of the Ambassador College library on the Pasadena campus is not by Victor Kubik. I took that picture, along with many others.

Gary Leonard

Via the Internet

The photograph Mr. Leonard took was correctly credited in the online version of The Journal (at thejournal.org). The photo appears below with the correct attribution.


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