Basic HTML Version
PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, June 27, 1980
Page 3
baptized. I tried to appoint one of them who seemed to be somewhat of a
leader, to continue leading the new little group in either a Sabbath
School or a tiny local church. But they were not trained or ordained
ministers, and in no case did these newly raised up little groups con
tinue longer than six weeks or so.
I saw that I was wasting time carrying on evangelistic work, result
ing in new conversions, unless there was a trained and competent local
shepherd to feed and protect the newly-begotten sheep. That led to the
founding of Ambassador College.
But I did have a number of years of experience pastoring the very
parent church of the present Worldwide Church of God. And I thought,
this morning, the longest day of the year, that some of my experiences
there might be helpful to some of you.
I learned, before we became a church of many local churches, that one
encounters problems with people, and with human nature in a local church,
just as we now do in the Church at large spreading around the world.
I found we had, on occasion, troublemakers. We had some I had
believed to have been converted and to have received the Holy Spirit of
God, who were in a carnal and bad attitude. And I learned this--even as
you may have--or you will: one in a rotten attitude CANNOT BE REASONED
WITH OR DEALT WITH. You might as well drop them.
Now first understand this: among the carnal and unconverted, some
have a pleasant, cooperative attitude--some go to the opposite extreme of
a rotten, hostile, and totally uncooperative attitude. Even one who has
received the Holy Spirit of God has not been filled with the loving, kind,
helpful, cooperative attitude of God. One receives the Spirit of God by
degrees. Jesus Christ was filled with the Spirit of God totally and
completely--fully. He was begotten of God and not of a human father. He
had God's Spirit in its fullness from birth--none of us has.
A newly-begotten Christian has received a certain degree of God's
Spirit--actually, some more, others less. But all "babes in Christ" still
have the same old "HUMAN NATURE." Satan starts injecting that human
nature--the nature of contention, self and selfishness, coveting, lust
and greed, jealousy, envy, competition and strife, rebellion against
authority--in every human as early in a child's life as the mind begins to
develop--while a very young child.
This spirit of Satan (human nature) is absorbed in different people
in varying degrees. Some become criminal-minded even in their teens.
Some are more or less compatible and cooperative. Even human nature
varies.
At real conversion one receives the Holy Spirit from GOD--but in a
certain measure or degree. That is the DIVINE NATURE taking root within
(II Pet. 1:4). But the human nature is likely to dominate, until one so
yields to God, to His Word, and is diligent in prayer and GROWS in grace
and the knowledge of Jesus Christ (II Pet. 3:18), that finally the DIVINE
NATURE dominates--one comes to be led more by God's nature and His Word
than by the carnal nature of Satan.
And all this happens in varying degrees in various individuals.