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I've just been preaching to you about, and I will do it. He directs
this letter to me in my office and says:
"Dear Rod: This is to inform you and to confirm the decision that I
have made this day to disfellowship from the Worldwide Church of God and
all its related organizations for cause... " I see he doesn't spend 15
minutes trying to convince me that he has the right to be the apostle
or convince you, so I guess we'll have to have a little faith in Christ
and in Mr. Armstrong, "...the following."
So you listen carefully, and all of you, as you know, are forbidden to
associate with, and to eat with, or fellowship with, and if you're
really loyal, you're not going out and commiserate with people and
say: "Oh well, let's all be the underdog and yak it up and try to
judge God's apostle." But these people are disfellowshipped by Mr.
Herbert Armstrong directly, and by me personally, as I have to do it
in my responsibility, and I'm sorry I've come into this office in a
time of seige , but perhaps it had to be. I'll just tell you that in
advance. It would be so much nicer to come into a peaceful time rather
than warfare. We are in a war. Let's see whether we are faithful
warriors. Continuing with Mr. Armstrong's letter:
"The following men are to be disfellowshipped this day. Mr. C. Wayne
Cole, Mr. David Antion, Robert Kuhn and Benjamin Chapman." I understand
now that Mr. Rader is here and is going to explain some of that to you
directly for Mr. Armstrong.
"I further instruct �ou to mark these men before the Church for causing
division and offenses contrary to the doctrine they and the Church
have learned and to avoid them according to Romans 6:17. We are to mark
them and to avoid them (Romans 6:17) and so we are to do this in the
interest of doctrinal and adminstrative peace within the Church of God.
Sincerely, in Jesus' name, Herbert W. Armstrong."
And so now, I'd like to introduce Mr. Rader and ask him to explain for
Mr. Armstrong. I'm going to stand here with him, because I share this
responsibility and may wish to make some final comments, but I'm going
to ask Mr. Rader then, as I understand he's here, to come on out and to
explain to you why Mr. Armstrong has chosen to make these decisions.
MR. RADER'S COMMENTS
Greetings,
ryone!
do no more
e ay·
than
for the grace·a.nd the
deal today.
This has been a very eventful week and if I can
to make you realize what almost happened, but
will of God, I will have accomplished a great
Now what happened this week was something that was fairly well predicted
by Mr. Armstrong in May of 1978.
For the past 7 or 8 months, he has
been watching very carefully, has been weighing the conduct of all of
us, what we have been saying, what we have been doing, our overt acts
and the like. He has not been inaccessible. He has been reached by
hundreds of people by telephone, by letter and in person. And he has
had to weigh and sift through all that he has been made aware of during
that period of time, as well as the impressions and the knowledge that
he had gained in some 46 years as Christ's apostle.