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� God?" I answered "Yes." Then Dr. Herman Hoeh said, "Mr. Armstrong,
you have said that most errors are based on a false PREMISE which
appears so correct it is never questioned, but is assumed. And when
the premise is proved false, the arguments or reasons based on it
topple with it. Now suppose the General Motors Corporation makes a
legal contract with United States Steel Corporation. Is GOD concerned?
Does God bind that contract?"
I answered "NO, because this world is CUT OFF from God." "Then,"
pursued Dr. Hoeh, "are not the Aborigines also cut off from God?" He
was right.
Next step. My son came to me one day saying, "I find there was
more divorce and remarriage going on in the area in which the apostle
Paul worked than there is today. Yet the D & R question never seems
to be mentioned as a problem in the Church in Paul's writings and today
it is our biggest problem. WHY?"
At least the three of us, and perhaps more, began studying to
find the answer. I remember going back for perhaps the 57th time
over I Corinthians 7. Now I saw something that somehow had escaped
us before.
Paul first gave instruction regarding the unmarried single persons,
and then regarding the marital state. Then, verse 8, "I say therefore
to the UNMARRIED..• " and in verse 10, "And unto the married I command
•..• " Then, verse 12, "but to the REST speak I..:-:-ri Who were "the
rest"? Paul had just spoken of the unmarried, and then of the married.
The context now became for the firsttime clear: "If any brother hath
a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let
him not put her away." Then the same applied to the woman member with
a non-believing husband. Then, verse 15, "If the unbelieving depart,
let him depart. A brother or a sister /Church members7 is not under
bondage in such cases." And those I was counseling with on the
doctrinal committee agreed that such member is not bound -- that is,
the marriage is no longer binding. God has not�lled us to strife
and contention, but to peace. And often the unconverted mate insists
on strife and contention because of his mate's belief. Later, I
believe it was, Dr. Hoeh came up with the fact that the leaving or
putting away here was not an "annulment" but a "divorce" -- unbinding
the innocent member -- free to marry within the Church.
You will find my mind open, on PROOF. If I am proved wrong, I
shall change. But I shall HOLD FAST uncompromisingly with proved
proof!
In what I have outlined above, God's Church continues precisely
as it was in the first generation of the Church of God.
Jesus had personally instructed the apostles. After His ascension
to heaven, the only function of a prophet, as one through whom God
reveals, seems to be to convey a message from God to the apostle. How
ever, the word "prophet," from the time of the King James translation,
more often meant one who preaches, usually not casual te�ching but
inspired preaching with conviction and power.