Dear Brethren and Co-Workers with Christ,
It’s happening! For more than 60 years, I have been preaching and writing that most of the great “sea gates” which God promised the descendants of Joseph (Genesis 22:17; 24:60) would be taken away from us unless we truly repented and turned back to God. Now, only two of the eight or ten major “sea gates” in the entire world are still in the hands of Britain—Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands. Each of them is in a strategic area controlling entrance and egress from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic and—regarding the Falkland Islands—control over the great sea passage around the tip of South America. Now, all of a sudden, the Spanish and the Argentines are beginning to try to gang up on Britain and take away these sea gates which God promised our Israelitish-descended peoples. Most of you have probably read newspaper reports about the tension between Spain and Britain over Spain’s claim to Gibraltar. Yet, as all historians know, Britain has controlled Gibraltar for some 300 years under the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht. As recently as 2002, Gibraltar residents resoundingly rejected return to Spanish rule. But now the Spanish are “tightening up” on the citizens of Gibraltar by searching all cars leaving Gibraltar and other acts to try to break the will of the locals and take this great sea gate away from the people who were originally promised this great sea gate by God in His inspired Word. In describing the tension between Spain and Gibraltar over control of this important outlet, The Wall Street Journal (August 10, 2013) describes how “Fish and chips outlets are prominent, along with portraits of Queen Elizabeth II and Horatio Nelson, victor over the Franco-Spanish fleet in the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar—fought not far from Gibraltar, then as now a British naval base—that helped give England mastery of the seas for more than a century.”
But right now, as God begins to “break the pride” of the power of the British-descended and American peoples (Leviticus 26:19) it is evident that these blessings which were given our peoples by God will soon be taken away unless our nations turn back to the real God—the Creator of heaven and earth!
As our American and British-descended peoples are slowly but surely humbled by the Eternal God, our Jewish friends are also in mortal danger more and more with each passing month. For the Iranian backed Hezbollah fighters are now preparing to destroy the Israelis and, as a senior military official warned, the next war with Hezbollah would be “far more painful” for Israeli citizens than any previous experience (“Israel fears next war with Hezbollah,” latimes.com, August 8, 2013). This article continues, “Hezbollah is now believed to have 60,000 to 100,000 rockets that boast longer ranges, improved accuracy and larger warheads. ‘This will be a whole new ballgame,’ the official said. Israeli officials fear that as many as 2,000 rockets a day could be released against all parts of Israel. Most of the launching sites are in southern Lebanon, where Hezbollah militants use private homes and farms in about 100 villages.”
My friends, we all need to realize that the next very few years are shaping up to produce big changes on the world scene. There are going to be horrible wars in the Middle East and elsewhere, financial crises here in America and continuing upset weather, disease epidemics and powerful earthquakes beyond anything experienced in modern times. For God is not mocked! As we increasingly turn away from God, as we even condone same-sex “marriage,” as we turn back to drugs, other forms of illicit sex and violence, the Eternal God’s divine punishment is definitely prophesied to come upon our people. Interestingly, The Wall Street Journal (August 8, 2013) just reported, “Heroin Makes a Comeback.” With prescription drugs tougher to get, addicts are increasingly turning to heroin. So the spread of illicit drugs, perverted sex, abortions and other diabolical behaviors are increasingly taking over many of our people—especially our youth. God help us!
Yet, there are exceedingly “good things” happening within the Work and Church of the great God. Just last night, my wife and I returned from an eye-opening visit to our own youth camp located near Columbus, Ohio. It was one of the most inspiring visits of this kind I have ever experienced. Almost 300 campers and staff welcomed us as we arrived. As we went all over the campus inspecting the entire camp and visiting with scores of our young people, the joy, the unity and tremendous enthusiasm were evident everywhere.
Wow!
These young people seem to be “so happy they couldn’t stand it”! After I preached to about 325 brethren and guests on the weekly Sabbath, a beautiful closing banquet and dance were conducted. Again, the warmth and enthusiasm of nearly everyone was palpable. We flew home the next day very encouraged with what Christ is doing in the lives of hundreds of our youth and we thank the Eternal God for all He is doing in the lives of young people and in all those connected with this Work. For we have been given the wonderful Truth from Almighty God and great blessings come upon all of us to the degree that we follow and live that Truth.
We are also busy doing the “Work” of the great God. We were able to report to the public in a press release issued just a few days ago:
Tomorrow’s World TV Program Now Airs in Russia
Russia, Ukraine and the countries of the former Soviet Union are now hearing The Tomorrow’s World telecast presented with a Russian voiceover, announced the Charlotte, North Carolina-based Living Church of God, the program’s sponsor (www.lcg.org). The program features reports on current news events in the context of biblical prophecy. Its religious content presents Christianity as it existed in the first century, including observance of the biblical Sabbath, the Christian Passover, the biblical Holy Days and the return of Jesus Christ.
In the U.S., the Tomorrow’s World program airs on 105 TV stations in addition to 5 networks which add another 93 stations plus cable and satellite. Internationally, the program is on another 17 stations, networks and satellite channels. The program offers a free magazine, Tomorrow’s World, which has a circulation of about 415,000 worldwide. All of the church’s literature is free, and no follow up requests are made for money.
“We believe in the way of give—not get,” said Dr. Roderick C. Meredith, the church’s Presiding Evangelist. “Our growing church has congregations in North America, Europe, South and Central America, Africa and Asia totaling 49 countries worldwide. The church’s voice has now expanded into over a dozen additional countries.”
God continues to open up major new doors for us to preach the Gospel even more powerfully over television and the Internet. Very exciting plans are currently underway to continue to expand the Tomorrow’s World telecast even beyond our recent expansion over a global, Russian-language satellite network. We are very thankful for your prayers because God has already used this new Russian network to produce literature requests and inquiries from throughout the Russian-speaking nations, ranging from Kazakhstan to Russia and elsewhere. We are excited to see what fruit God produces from these efforts throughout this vast region! But beyond this recent expansion, God willing, we will be able to make some very exciting announcements in the near future about broadcasting to all of Europe over Sky TV. We hope to begin broadcasting to this vital region over this powerful satellite network this winter.
Our @TomorrowsWorld reach on Twitter has exceeded more than 46,000 followers, not including those who follow our other Living Church of God Twitter sites—both in the English language and in other languages. Our Tomorrow’s World TV YouTube channel has also been rapidly growing over the past months with many videos receiving 50,000 or more views, and some videos receiving over 100,000 views from all around the world. Additionally, the Tomorrow’s World Facebook page has also rapidly grown from 2,240 “likes” (fans) in December of 2011 to 34,450 “likes” in December 2012, and now as of August 2013 has well surpassed 62,000 fans! This gives us a very powerful reach where at any given time, 15,000 to 20,000 Facebook users are often engaged reading or talking about our material, and we are able to reach more than 22,000,000 Facebook users who are friends or fans of our Facebook page. And very encouragingly, our TomorrowsWorld.org Web site continues to experience double-digit year-over-year growth and all of our Web sites are serving many millions of people every year who read our literature and watch telecasts and sermons in multiple languages all around the world. God has truly been blessing both our television and Internet efforts. We do sincerely thank God for calling us to be part of this tremendous Work which He is doing through weak, human instruments at the end of this age. It is a wonderful opportunity which we all have which will certainly allow all of us who are involved to “lay up treasure in heaven.” So thanks to all of you for your part in helping this Work move forward and have an increasing impact on the entire world. We thank every one of you for your prayers, your tithes and offerings and the help you continue to give. For, as I am sure you know, we could not possibly do this increasing work without the earnest involvement and support which our members and co-workers provide. Also, it is “Christ in you” which causes this to happen. So we thank Him—and we thank you for yielding to Him—that this Work may go forward and that we may be able to reach more and more people before the darkness falls. We will all certainly look forward to hearing Christ’s words, “Well done, good and faithful servant… Enter into the joy of your Lord” (Matthew 25:21, 23).
Please keep on earnestly praying for this Work. And do all you can to help in every other way that God makes possible. Truly, we are involved in the “final crusade” to prepare the way for the King of kings who will soon come back to this earth to bring a kind of peace and joy which the world has never experienced.
With Christian love,
Roderick C. Meredith