At a point about 5 minutes before the end of ILFPRW's sermon of June 28, he made an ironic but truthful statement: ".... if you're following me, you're doing the wrong thing." Of course that was part of a larger point which was that people should be following the "lamb".
Elsewhere in the sermon and in the previous week's sermon False Prophet Ron sells the point that people were right to follow Herbert Armstrong on the Monday Pentecost thing even though HWA was wrong. Further that it would have been wrong for them to have observed Pentecost on Sunday before HWA changed it. This is an attempt to justify following Ronald Weinland despite his own failures. And a contradiction to when he says ".... if you're following me, you're doing the wrong thing."
Give it up Ron. You know you're full of it, just grasping at straws to keep your following. Give it up. Don't drag your church members through any more of your deluded drama.
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People who buy into Weinland's teachings, as with other apocalyptic end-of-age cults, are a results of the heavy influence of the mass media (doom and gloom). It is known as cultivation theory posited by George Gerbner.
What people see (consume) on their television shapes their social construct. I.E., our reality is shaped by what they perceive on television (and now the Internet).
The thing is, we are living in a time greater than any other. Sure gas prices are high in the U.S., but look at Europe! They've had $8 per gallon gas for a long time. Natural disasters are NOT increasing dramatically. There's no scientific evidence to support this.
If you are scared of flying, then with every little bump on the plane you think it may be disaster. Likewise, if you are scared of living, then every little bump or bad news is viewed as disaster about to happen.
If you live in that state of fear all the time, not having that fear does not feel normal. But, just as people who are scared of flying can get over that fear, so can end-of-time phobics.
It's just a matter of having trust, and more likely Who you put your trust in. You don't need some person who claims to give you the answer to life, to lead you into the promised land. Most likely, and we have seen it with Ron Weinland, that person doesn't have the answer.
I don't understand how anyone can really listen to this guy. He blabbers on and on in his sermons which are neither interesting nor inspiring. How did someone like him get any credibility to begin with to have even a small following?
He began as a minister in the Worldwide Church of God. When WCG instigated what is colloquially referred to as "the changes", Weinland then went to United, taking most of his WCG congregation(s) with him. From there, he split off into Church of God, Toledo (controlled by a board of directors), which he took his United congregations, and three other "independent" congregations he had groomed, into.
In 2000, Weinland attempted to take control of the CoG-T's finances, by disfellowshipping the board. Legal advice was sought on both sides, and eventually, Weinland and the CoG-T parted ways, with Weinland ending up with an undisclosed amount of money.
A certain number of the members of Weinland's CoG-T congregation went with him at this time. By 2005, the core membership of the church (approximately 300 members) was starting to solidify.
After the Internet marketing campaign got underway, the church grew to probably somewhere in the neighbourhood of 500. Most of the new recruits were underaged children, and/or did not know the true history of Worldwide, and from whence Weinland really came.
After the failure of the first round of prophecies (when the world was NOT "shocked and in horror" on March 18th, when the seventh seal was opened), membership began to decline, and has been on a steady spiral downward ever since.
Especially with the retraction of Weinland's "if by Pentecost" promise, the failure of any of the trumpets or the thunders to materialize, and now the church's "reboot" of the former prophetic timeline.
Anyone still in at this point is hanging on out of sheer refusal to accept the humiliating fact that they have backed, yet again, another losing horse. (Just like all the other false CoG prophets that have come before RW, and will come after.)
In some cases, the remaining members have been waiting (and tithing) for a kingdom, any kingdom, to come for fifty years or more. This close to the ends of their lives, the last thing they want to have to face is the fact that they have wasted their lives following a jigsaw theology, and wasting their money on the greedy little men who have fleeced them in the name of faith.
In my opinion.
Ronald Weinland is only in this scam to try and recoup the retirement pension that he did not get out of the Worldwide Church of God, then the United Church of God, and finally out of the Church of God, Toledo, from which he abdicated in 2000 with an undisclosed sum of money.
As with every opinion I offer on Weinland his group, the above comment is only my opinion.
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