Herbert W Armstrong

   NBC News asked me, "Do you believe the world is going to end soon?" I had to say, "No, I don't. And as a matter of fact, the gospel of Jesus Christ has nothing whatsoever to do with the end of the world."

   Oh no, that's gonna be like a cold shower to some people. Why them fighting words, didn't Jesus come preaching and teaching about the end of the world? The answer is absolutely not. He came talking about the end of an age, and he came talking about the dawning of a new age. And I don't mean the age of Aquarius. I'm talking about an age where every problem that is so enormous, so big, most of us choose not to even think about the problems are predicted in your Bible to be soluble, to be within the reach and the grasp of the power of God.

   But you know, they are not within the reach and the grasp of human beings. And that's what I want to talk about—this whole business of what is the Christian message. What is the gospel? What do I preach? What makes me different from anybody else? Am I just laying false claim to being different and preaching what I call a different gospel, which people haven't even heard, which is the gospel of Jesus Christ of Nazareth?

   Let's take a look at what happened at Explo '72. Here were, as it was reported, up to about 80,000 people. Many, many of them young people, sincere people. I had had an opportunity to go, and then the thunderstorm came along, and I had to get back out to Pasadena, California, that evening instead. And so, I was able to catch a couple of bits of it. I wasn't there, unfortunately. I would like to have been at Explo '72, certainly in some of the big rallies out in the Cotton Bowl. But they were there to talk about Jesus Christ.

   Now, which Christ came into their consciousness? The Christ that was pictured in their minds, I can't be sure of. I'm not here to say one word about anybody's sincerity, good intent, and the attempt they were making to put together a kind of a movement which would gather steam and which would bring about some change. I do very definitely worry and concern myself with some of the accuracy of these thoughts and programs. And I'm here to tell you that Jesus Christ of Nazareth would be sincerely concerned himself because the message he brought plainly tells us that it is utterly impossible for humankind to bring about the far-reaching changes that are really required, which could, number one, keep humankind alive on this earth.

   We cannot save ourselves. That's all there is to it. Number two, to solve the big, agonizing problems that continually divide humankind. We are powerless to change our own nature. We're powerless to rid ourselves of vanity, jealousy, lust, and greed. We are powerless to bring about the absolution of chauvinism, of nationalism, tribal and group instincts, and racism. We cannot, of and by ourselves, do what many people think we can do. So that kind of a movement is, in a sense, doomed to defeat before it ever begins, no matter how much we idealize it, no matter how much we might desire to see it so.

   You know, people seem to get the attitude that if enough human beings can replace the attitude of hatred with that of love, the attitude of selfishness with the attitude of altruism and giving, the attitude of jealousy with one of compassion, racism with understanding and tolerance and brotherly love, and become imbued with all the noble desires, that we can kind of pick up a head of steam and have an avalanche going downhill. That will snowball to such proportions. We can run around and tell all the rest of the world what Jesus means to us, what a wonderful Savior he is, that he died for the sins of the world, that Jesus loves you. That's the message. And they think that is the gospel.

   It's the truth that Jesus does love you. It's the truth that he loves all of humankind, but that, my friends, is not the gospel. Now, don't get mad at me for saying that. I intend to prove it to you over and over and over again. Jesus came preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God as a witness, and he predicted to his disciples that that gospel would be preached as a witness. And a witness means a testimony against—it says a witness against them, a witness unto them. He said, "They won't listen." And they didn't. No, no, they just did not.

   Let's go over a quick history and let me put you in the picture where we rightfully belong at this moment. Even after Jesus' death, in those earliest days that are recorded in the Book of Acts, as the apostles went out and bore witness of his resurrection, I cannot find a single sermon by Peter, James, John, or anyone else that went around talking only about how much Jesus loves you. That message is embodied in Christ's message toward the church and the letters of John, and how Christian brethren are to feel toward each other, how God so loved the world. That is in your Bible, you bet. But every single sermon you see in the first chapters of the Book of Acts was the message about Christ being alive. They bore witness to the fact that he walked out of the tomb, that he was resurrected, that he lives, that he is a living Jesus Christ.

   And if that is true, what has he been doing for the last 2,000 years? And where is he now? I hear evangelical types talking about, "Jesus died for you." Well, he also was raised for you, raised from the dead. You know, your Bible does not say that people are saved by his death. It says we are saved by his life.

   Very quickly after the death, burial, and then the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and very quickly in that very first church era, people began to be killed for that message. And they went out preaching and teaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God, just like Paul did to the Gentiles and just like Jesus did all of that three and one-half years of his ministry. He said, "Think not I am come to bring peace on earth." And everybody thinks he did. They believe in the little kiddies, they are taught, you know, in the pack-and-plays in the Christmas time and so on, to talk about how the angels are supposed to have said, "Peace on earth, you know, joy to the world."

   Jeremiah was a bullfrog. Well, we have all of our songs today, and maybe the desire of some of those songs is right. Maybe the attitude, what is intended, is right. But the words sometimes get a little mixed up. You know that there is not one scripture in the entirety of the Bible that says, "Peace on earth, goodwill toward men." You stop to think about that for a minute. What an empty statement that is. Every single year at Christmas time, with war going on usually somewhere—there have been more than 50 wars that could be graced with the term since 1945—and people would take time out to eat a little bit of turkey, maybe in a helmet, and go back to the business of killing one another the very next day. So, all of these centuries, people have been saying, "Peace on earth," when it isn't even in the Bible.

   Now, somebody's gonna take issue with me and say, "Yes, it is. I know where it is." No, you don't. What you've done is misread that. That scripture really in the original reads as follows: "Peace on Earth among men of goodwill." That peace will be on earth among men in whom is goodwill. And because goodwill does not really motivate most men and men's minds, we don't have peace on earth.

   You know, one historian said that after the early 1st, 2nd, and even 3rd century of Christian experience, that which emerged from behind a cloak of obscurity was absolutely unrecognizable as being the church that you read of in the book of Acts. And I'm going to take issue with that and show you exactly what some of those changes were and how it is that Jesus Christ as a person, a great personality, a great figure, a great leader, a wonderful man, a person who was martyred—his name, his attitude, his love—all of this was appropriated, but his message was absolutely thrown to the ground. And most people have yet to hear the message Jesus Christ brought.

   The Ambassador College publication, "What is the True Gospel?," answers one of the most divisive questions of our times. We live in a world of many different religions. While teaching peace and harmony among men, their people are led to war against one another. Witness the Hindu-Muslim conflict in India and Pakistan, the Protestant-Catholic confrontation in Northern Ireland, and the Jew-Arab crisis—all believing they have true religion. Ironic, isn't it? With over 400 denominations in the Western Christian world, haven't you ever wondered which one is right? Who teaches what Jesus taught? Our free article will help you understand that message in the light of today's world.

   Send for "What is the True Gospel?" Your copy is free, there is no charge or follow-up. It's called, "What is the True Gospel?" Send your request to Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales.

   Jesus Christ of Nazareth came with a message about world government, about the need for the solution to man's biggest and most urgent needs—the crying ills, the divisiveness of mankind, racism, poverty, squalor, misery, disease. He gave definite signposts, way points along the way that would indicate the setting up of his kingdom was getting near. Now, people ask me, as I was asked on NBC News, "Do you talk about the end of the world?" And my answer is absolutely not, because Jesus Christ did not. He didn't predict the end of the world. He talked about the dawning of a new age, the beginning of a new age, and he talked about the phasing out of an old age.

   Now, those way points that he gave are listed in Matthew 24. Where it talks continually that you will hear of all kinds of false religious revivals, false Christs, false prophets, false movements, false religion. How do you know it's false? You don't unless you check it for yourself. Your Bible warns that even miracles will be done. When you see somebody walking on water, standing around in midair, people are going to fall to the ground. They're going to be absolutely shocked if they see fire coming down from heaven. The Bible claims that people will have power to produce phenomena, miracles that would defy any kind of scientific or rational explanation. But it goes on to caution people: even though somebody has the power, the Bible warns, to produce a miracle, if he says you're not to obey the laws of God, then go you not out after them.

   Well, you know, people just don't seem to read the Bible. It's as if we don't need to pay any attention to what the Bible says. We can stand around and talk about Jesus, and I worry about which Jesus they mean. If they mean the pusillanimous pansy, the putrescent put-on, the historical hoax, if they mean the Christ of the crusades, if they mean that Jesus the people clasped to their bosom with their own kind of a perverted idea and went out and persecuted every other race they could think of—blacks and Jews and Chicanos and every other they can think of—if they mean that Jesus, that people can clasp to their breasts as a kind of an ivory-towered, cloistered little talisman, their own personal private religion, something they appropriate to themselves, and then go out and light a cigarette and step to the church and hate all black people, then that Jesus Christ, I say, is just a word. It's just a phrase. It's a name. It's kind of a lot of clanging brass. It makes a sound, it gets some kind of an idea into people's minds, but it isn't the Christ of the Bible. It just is not the Jesus Christ of the Bible because the Jesus Christ of the Bible would no more condone the kind of attitude that people have had to others of humankind that are part of their own brethren, their own bodily makeup, all of one blood on this earth. He would no more bless a soldier going to war. He would no more stand there and say, "Bless you, my child," while you're pulling the trigger of a machine gun, than he would think of hating or killing himself. It's an absolute gross perversion to take the name of Jesus Christ and apply it to some of the religions of man. That's all there is to it. It's not my belief. I don't care whether you think it's my belief or not. It's not a belief of mine. What I believe doesn't matter. I could believe that the moon is made of green Swiss cheese. It wouldn't change what's up there. I could believe the Bible doesn't mean what it says. I can sit here and use every kind of possible psychology to try to tell you the Bible doesn't mean what it says. But why bother joining the general mass? You've got enough people doing that. Why shouldn't I be different?

   It says right here. I want to quote to you Matthew the 10th chapter, in verse 34 (Matthew 10:34), one of the major opposites that we shall continue to discover as we go through what the Bible says. "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I am not come to send peace, but a sword."

   Now, young people of Explo '72, Mr. and Mrs. America and Canada, how does that square with your concept of Jesus Christ of Nazareth? It's in your Bible. Matthew 10:34. I didn't put it there. Jesus said it. It's a quotation, faithfully reported. Anybody who believes in the Bible had better believe in what Jesus said and not go around blue-penciling what he said, editing it out. He said, and I quote, "For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law." It's a strange and sad commentary upon our time. But sometimes parents, brethren, sisters, in-laws, when they see a person really go all the way with Jesus Christ, not stand there and kind of clasp their hands in prayer, which they saw somewhere in some ancient painting of some saint standing there in a long robe who never existed.

   I can't find any place in the entire Bible where people got a kind of a sick look. Listen, if you're sliding down a rope out of a fire, it's okay to pray. If you're hanging upside down in a well, it's all right to pray. If you're falling out of an airplane, it wouldn't hurt at all to pray. If you're about to sink and lose your grasp on a boat that's been broken up in the middle of the lake, it might be a good idea to pray. There is no prerequisite, no particular position of the hands that I can find anywhere in the Bible of making a steeple with your fingers or clasping your hands or doing something with them like you see people do to make it more religious or more spiritual. I just don't see that.

   Jesus prayed, but he stayed right in the dirt. Daniel prayed three times a day. David did, kneeling with head bowed, yes, and I suppose eyes closed. But you can't prove that in the Bible. I suppose it's only so people aren't praying to the pattern on the rug or only because they're not praying to the stuff they put in the closet. Although, do many people really go into their closet and pray in private? It looks to me like a lot of people really rejoice in praying in public these days. Jesus Christ of Nazareth says, "When you pray, enter into your closet, and your Father which sees in secret will reward you openly." He says, "Be not as the Pharisees, for they love to pray in the public places. They love to do their alms in front of men." So, they find all these types standing around, "Our Father, we just thank thee this day." And now, brethren, let me... and they don't even change, they don't even change their tone of voice between the prayer, the announcements, and the sermon. It's hard to tell, except by the content of the words, who they're talking to.

   Well, Jesus says don't do that. So, I don't do it. And my father before me, since 1934, from the beginning of the World of Tomorrow radio program on the air clear up in Eugene, Oregon, there has never been one prayer over the air. And while I'm certainly not against praying as a formal ceremony for a large gathering or something of that nature and would be very pleased to if called upon, that isn't my own personal prayer. That's the same thing as asking, like a dedication, like Solomon did at the temple. It was a large gathering and so on. That has its place. But so far as all sorts of prayers just for display, that also has its place and it isn't in God's word, I'll tell you that.

   But can we let Jesus mean what he says and say what he means? He says, "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth." And he didn't. He didn't bring peace. If we think that there is some kind of a struggle going on, that the world is in the clutches of the devil, and God is trying frantically and feverishly to get people to believe on his Son, and he is struggling with the devil, well, who's winning? The population explosion means that Christianity is actually diminishing. It does mean that in actual large, you know, gross numbers, the Christian religion is a minority religion in the world today. And there are far fewer Christians than there are Hindus. There are fewer Christians than there are people who just don't have any religion except animism and tribal religions and various taboos and superstitions. There really are.

   So, who does this make out as the one who is really winning the battle? It makes out the devil as being the one that's a real champ. You know, you stop to think about it. You see pictures of the devil. Well, he looks very masculine, powerful, handsome, strong. Well, he's got the little red cap and the two little horns. I don't know where they got that. They didn't get it out of the Bible. But you see pictures of Jesus and he's weak and sickly and effeminate. If you just swap those around and take off the horns and the pitchfork, which the Bible says nothing about at all—that's some completely paganistic, concocted human idea. There isn't one word about that in the Bible at all. It said that the devil originally appeared as a great archangel who was called Lucifer. That meant great shining star of the dawn or light bringer. But he appeared in absolute radiant beauty. But you know, why should we hurt people by telling them what the Bible says? We want to cling to our traditions. I say that facetiously because I don't think all of us do, but I think too many do. They like to hide their eyes from reality and run from the truth and kind of believe what they've always believed. So, the true message of Jesus Christ sounds so strange to them.

   The true message of Jesus Christ: "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I didn't come to send peace but a sword." The true message of Christ: "In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." The true message of Christ was "Repent you, and believe the gospel." What is the gospel? Analogy after analogy: the young nobleman that went to a far kingdom to get for himself a government, a crown, a kingdom, and to return and then to demand of his servants how well they had done in his absence; the man who found a great prize of gold in a field and sold everything else he had to have that one prize. Is that just a personal relationship with Jesus? Or is it doing what Jesus Christ said: "Go ye into all the world and preach the good news of the coming government of God, preach the gospel of the Kingdom of God"? Why? To convert the world? That is what he said. He said as a witness and then shall the end come. As a witness, as a testimony. It didn't say to convert the world. But we seem to have the idea that if enough human beings can get together—people have said if enough of the religious leaders could get together—that we could start the ball rolling. Well, then if we can do that, we don't need God, do we? God doesn't even need to exist, does he? A lot of people actually think he doesn't. They think Christ is a great man, but I think privately they think he's still dead. And they think that he kind of lives in us, but they're saying that more or less, like it's a personality that you can hang on to, that you can kind of identify with what he was. But so far as looking at a living Christ that is in heaven at this instant, his eyes blazing like the sun, having the energy of 10 billion hydrogen bombs, and then some, about a quadrillion centillion times over, a returning conquering King, a High Priest in heaven, the ruler of all the earth who is going to come back to the earth—how many people do you know who really worship that Jesus Christ?

   In this age of space flight and the mushroom cloud, young people are searching for meaning in life. They turn to drugs for escape and found that effect is only temporary. They've gone to Eastern philosophies—Buddhism, yoga, astrology—trying to find answers in the meditation and mysticism of the Orient. And now they're even looking at portions of the Bible and turning on with Jesus. Thousands claim to have at last found meaning in life, an ideal to live for. The Jesus trip is in. It's now. But is it right? Truly? There is only one way, but have these young people found it?

   The free booklet "The Real Jesus" will show you who Jesus Christ truly was, what he said and taught, how he lived with proof from your Bible. Write for and read "The Real Jesus." Send your request to Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales.

   I believe that science, by these discernible curves that we can look at, that we can analyze and measure—the population explosion—preaches that the end of the world could be near. The doubling of the population between now and the year 2100, the doubling of it again in another few years, maybe 17, the doubling again in about seven more, but doubling again in about 2 1/2 to 3 more. Does your mind begin to accept this? Are we living in reality? Are we living in the 20th century? Do hydrogen bombs really exist? Can a B-52 bomber carry in its bomb bay more explosive force and power than all of the destruction unleashed by all sides in World War II? Yes, it can. Yes, it can.

   Do we live in an age where the shortage of natural resources tells us man's span of allotted time on this earth is limited? Do we live in an age where drought, famine, food shortages, food wars, violent overthrow of government, racism, tribalism, and race war itself threatens not just world peace but threatens the survival of humankind? Do we live in a world where a faulty transistor, somebody miscalculating, just like some of the motion pictures they've sent out where we've got the DEW Line, the early warning system, where we've got ICBMs and IRBMs and Polaris submarines? Is this our world? Do you live in the same world I do? Am I missing anything?

   Is it some narrow-minded, street-corner, long-bearded, white-robed, open-toed-sandal, black-hearted, weird religion to say we are living in the end of an age? Is that some weird, wild belief that I got? My belief? You know, what do you believe? "Oh, I got this belief, you know. I believe we're living in the end of the age." It doesn't make sense. We've got to be rational. We've got to look at the truth. We've got to face it. I know that we don't like to think about the very life support systems of humankind being used up. I know we don't like to admit to ourselves that nature itself cries out to us that we're fouling our own nest to the point we may exterminate ourselves.

   But Jesus Christ of Nazareth predicted it in his warning message. He said to his disciples, "I'll tell you what will be the signpost, the way points along the way that will herald my return to this earth. You'll hear a vast religious upheaval, religious confusion, religious revivals." And as the Apostle Paul said, a great falling away will come first. So that's number one. Number two, he said in Matthew 24 (Matthew 24:6), "You shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that you be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom." And he said there shall be famines, and there are famines developing in India and there have been drought and famine. You can say, "Well, we've always had those things." Wait a minute. We haven't always had those things, one on top of another, overlapping each other and rising to a crescendo. As Jesus said in Matthew 24 (Matthew 24:7), "There shall be famines, and pestilences," and that means enormous disease epidemics. And he said, "Earthquakes in divers places."

   So, what am I going to do? Run to a cave and say California is going to slip into the sea? No. Again, Jesus was not talking about a group of people grabbing a sack full of grapes and a can of tomato juice and sitting cross-legged in a cave, waiting for the end of the world to come. He wasn't talking about the destruction of all of mankind, but he was talking about these even natural phenomena as if nature itself was in upheaval. And then he said, "Many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. And because iniquity," that's lawlessness in the original Greek language, "shall abound," verse 12. And we live in a global crime wave, a time of lawlessness unparalleled in our society, which is basically a sick society. He said, "The love of many shall wax cold." And it has and it is. But he said, verse 14, "This gospel," what gospel? Well, the gospel about these great, global, earth-shaking, absolutely universal things that would occur. Not just the story of what a wonderful man Jesus was of and by itself. Not only that Jesus loves you, but this gospel, the gospel of the kingdom, shall be preached in all the world as a witness to warn, a witness. And then he said, "Shall the end come."

   Now, he dated it. He said, and I quote, verse 22, "Except those days," the days he described: drought, famine, disease, pestilence, earthquakes, false religious revivals, and wars, "except these days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved." He was talking of a time of the potential of human annihilation. That's his message. Something strange about that? I'm sorry, I don't think there is. I think science corroborates it. I know it does. It isn't talking about the time of the end of the world. It's talking about the end of an age and the dawning of a new one.

   You'll see the whole thing when you write for this booklet, "The Wonderful World Tomorrow." The good news Jesus brought, there will be a world tomorrow, which is what this program is all about. Now, maybe you heard me announce that before and maybe you've hesitated. You thought, "Well, there's gotta be something in there somewhere. There's gotta be a gimmick. There's gotta be a hook in it. What is it?"

   But for those of you who would like this free literature, I just want to tell you over and over again, it's absolutely free. There is no charge for it whatsoever. Now, I know I've said some surprising things, and that's what the World Tomorrow program is all about. We're trying to give you something that is so utterly different, so new, that there is some justification in taking up all the time and the money that it costs to get that time on radio and television to tell you about it.

   The gospel was a message about the soon-coming Kingdom of God, a world-ruling kingdom. It's talking about government. It's talking about solving the problems on this earth. Jesus came with a message that had to do with changing the economies of government, with changing the way of government, making the world all worship the same God. Therefore, vast global religious reforms, making the world all speak the same language eventually, so they understand one another. His message was global in its concern for all humankind.

   The good news of the coming government of God is best epitomized and set forth in this booklet, "The Wonderful World Tomorrow - What it Will be Like." That booklet is absolutely filled with dozens of scriptures that will show you where to find it in your own Bible. All you need to do is to request it by sending your letter to Post Office Box 345, Sydney, New South Wales. Be sure to tell us the call letters of your station. We need that. That's all, there is no cost. But tell us the name of the radio station to which you've been listening, the call letters, and then send your letter to Box 345, Sydney, New South Wales.

   Until next time, this is Garner Ted Armstrong saying goodbye, friends.

   You have been listening to The World Tomorrow. If you would like more information, write to Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales.