Basic HTML Version
WORLDWIDE CHURCH OF GOD
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91123
HERBERT W. ARMSTRONG
PRESIDENT and PAST0R
February 25, 1985
Dear Brethren and Co-Workers with Christ:
A drastic, world-shaking turn of events may occur
unexpectedly this year.
This is the "Fortieth Year" and historically the 40th year
has been the year of a drastic turn in national and world events.
It was after 40 years that Moses left Egypt as a prince and
fled to Midian. It was at the end of another 40 years when God
called Moses at the incident of the burning bush to lead the
Israelites out of Egyptian slavery in the great migration to the
promised land. It was at the end of that 40 years that Moses died
and Joshua led the Israelites across the Jordan river into that
promised land. These were actually turning points in national
events of world significance in history.
It was at the foot of Mt. Sinai that the nation of Israel
was born at the great ceremony after God had in a voice of thunder
spoken the words of the Ten Commandments in the hearing of the more
than two million people that composed the new nation of Israel. It
was at the end of 40 days of fasting atop Mt. Sinai that Moses
received the two tablets of stone on which God with his own finger
had engraved the words of the Ten Commandments. It was at the end
of 40 days of total fasting that Jesus qualified to wrest the
government of the whole earth from Satan after the great temptation
recorded in Matthew 4.
And now in 1985 we are at the end of 40 years since the
founding of the United Nations and 40 years since the dividing of
the continent of Europe right down the middle as a result of the
Yalta Conference, February 4 to 11, in 1945. The nations of Europe
had been involved in wars among themselves, culminating with the
Second World War. That conference made a drastic change in the
nations of Europe. The Eastern bloc of nations was gobbled up by
the Soviet Union--came under Soviet domination. The Western bloc
of European nations came under the military protection of the
United States.
Thus Europe was divided right down the middle, between the
world's first two superpowers, the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.A. Germany
was divided with the eastern area under Soviet domination and the
western area dependent on United States power to protect it from
communist takeover.
Dissatisfaction has been mounting in Europe. The Western
nations of Europe are tired of being under the American umbrella.
The Eastern bloc of Europe has suffered increasingly in economy and
insufficient technological progress. Now there is growing talk
about Germany being once again united in the "Fatherland."