Response to Anonymous 6/29/22 comment on Ch Ch Ch Changes post

In response to the question "- you stated that the ABC "denies Christ came in the flesh". Is this true?"

The ABC has three basic doctrines: the Foundations from Hebrews 6, the Creation teaching and the Revelation teaching. Beyond that, they are mostly stagnant with an undue focus on placing burdens on people, rather than setting them free.  

To answer your question directly; is there a specific teaching in the ABC that states Christ did not come in the flesh? No.  

However, the matter for which I was “eternally judged”, and told I could not speak a word in my own defense was this. In answer to a question about whether Jesus sinned when he stayed behind in Jerusalem to teach in the temple at age twelve, I stated Jesus did not sin against God, but may have trespassed against his parents by making them go out of their way to fetch him. His parents had traveled a full day into the desert before discovering Jesus was not with them. This caused them to leave the caravan, then travel back through the desert all alone for another full day to go find him. People traveled in caravans because there were thieves, robbers, and other perils. There was safety in numbers so they traveled in groups. Traveling back through the desert alone would have been very risky. Once back in town they frantically searched for three more days before finally finding Jesus at the temple teaching. This was a noble endeavor on Jesus’ part, but it also caused his parents much worry and grief. These were Mary’s scolding words to Jesus when she finally found him “Son, why have You treated us this way? Behold, your father and I have been anxiously looking for You.” So, five full days passed, causing his parents great anxiety and the loss of their caravan. This was undoubtedly not a small expense. 

Under the old law there were two types of sacrifice. One for a sin and one for a trespass. The first a bull, the second a goat. A dove if one was poor. Sin and trespass are not equivalent. Sin is against God; trespass is against another person. Did Jesus sin against God? No. Did he inconvenience his parents, put them at some peril, and undoubtedly cost them some money to acquire another caravan?  Looks that way. A trespass against another person is not any more a sin against God than if I accidentally stepped on a person’s toes. Jesus wasn’t belligerent in his actions, in his youthful mind it seemed the right thing to do. It wasn’t. Being on the caravan was the right thing to do and his trespass was accidental as he was not born with an adult mind. To a twelve year old this likely seemed the rational course, but he was still reliant on parents for guidance.

Jesus set aside the Godhead and became flesh, like any other infant or boy. Jesus was born to Mary in the flesh, and lived among us in the flesh. He became subject to everything we suffer, yet without sin against God. There is an entire book written about Jesus as a boy doing things such as accidentally using his “power” to kill a playmate. It’s a ridiculous book and carries the "Jesus as God on earth" concept to the absolute extreme. Jesus came to earth with a mind and body appropriate to his age. He was not born with adult thinking. He was not born talking and teaching before learning to read, write and all those other things his siblings learned along with him. He became the "Son of God" at his death and resurrection, not at his earthly birth.

When Jesus was on earth, he set aside being God until after his resurrection. I have no doubt he behaved in much the same manner as any other boy his age and needed to be taught how to behave properly. We know this is true because it is written in the gospel of John "For not even his brothers believed in him." His siblings saw him only as their sibling as he was growing up, not as a different creature with savant characteristics.  

Was Jesus staying behind at the temple a sin against God? No. Did he inconvenience his parents? Of course, he did. It took them five days to find him, put them in peril, and likely cost them money. While his cause was noble to “be about his father’s business”, he was not where he was supposed to be at age twelve. 

When they found him, He said to them, “Why is it that you were looking for Me? Did you not know that I had to be in My Father’s house?”  Their response was not to say, “oh, sorry, yes, we understand now. You are God on earth so, please pardon our interruption. Please continue with your father’s business while we get out of your way” Instead,…"they did not understand the statement which He had made to them.” Jesus then had a change of mindset “…and He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and He continued in subjection to them…;” Like any other boy realizing they have accidentally hurt their parents he subjected himself to their parentage and delayed going about “his father’s business” until he was an adult. So, was Jesus unlike a normal child that needed to learn obedience? Not according to scripture. Jesus had to learn obedience.

I was not allowed to speak at the ambush, but I spoke up briefly for a moment to state my father, the one who started the ABC, would have agreed with me, and had stated this same fact to me many times. I was immediately shouted down by Bruce Leonard who stated my father would never say such a thing, as though he were somehow privy to every conversation my father and I had in the nearly eighteen years we lived in the same household. My father and I had many conversations about whether Jesus was like a normal boy when he was young, or if he was different. His conclusion was that his family did not see him as any different until much later in life, so he was likely just like any other boy growing up. This thought, Gilbert Larson, Bruce Leonard, and others felt was my “blasphemy” when I referenced it in my answer.  I was enticed to the ambush by a lie spoken to me at IHOP by Andy Atwell and a man named Mark. I was then judged for all of eternity to be a blasphemer. I lost every “friend” I had in one day simply because I had stated Jesus behaved like any other boy in the flesh and did not behave like a “god” on earth.  

So, while you likely would not hear any person directly teach that Jesus did not come in the flesh, this action of eternally condemning me forever for speaking this truth speaks for itself. The ABC does not acknowledge Jesus came in the flesh, dwelt among us, and was subjected to human frailties, yet without sin. Trespass and sin are not equivalent. 

There was another time I was declared to be a blasphemer that would show the ABC believes Jesus did not come in the flesh. I address this in my post “Haímatos (αἷμα / αἵματος ), hīdrṓs (ἱδρώς) and the Fox”

In this teaching I am considered to have “blasphemed” Christ when I related the story of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, when he knew he was soon to die.  Luke described this moment as, “And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.”

I mentioned in my teaching Jesus, at that moment, when he was in great agony, suffered a human medical condition called hematidrosis. This is a condition in which blood enters the sweat glands, causes them to rupture and swell and the sweat becomes enlarged and bloody. This condition is only brought about by a person in extreme anguish and is exactly, precisely, what is described in Luke’s account of Jesus in the garden. We must not forget; Luke was a physician and he spoke as one who was a physician. The backlash was immediate. It was declared to me, Jesus was God, was therefore perfect, and could not possibly have suffered such a human condition. My words then were considered blasphemy against Jesus.   

This further shows the ABC does not believe Jesus came in the flesh. My words regarding Jesus being in the flesh were no small issue to the “leaders” of the ABC. After I was ambushed and “eternally judged”, while not being allowed to defend myself in any way, everyone I knew was then commanded not to speak to me under the threat that if they did, they too would be “eternally judged” in the same manner. They were admonished that they needed to decide if they were “in the body” or “out of the body”. The body of Christ is not just a few hundred people affiliated with the ABC. It is universal and none of these men have the right to decide who’s in and who’s out. That is arrogance.
Some still showed up at my door, even very late at night. One person even showed up at ten PM, unannounced, to shout at me that I was now a “stain on the body” for my single sentence. Others would show up to plead with me to do what the leaders told me, even if it was wrong. Secret letters were sent to my wife telling her to leave me and come back to the ABC without me. Secret phone calls were made to her work to convince her I was a "blasphemer". There was much, much more harassment, all provoked by Bruce Leonard at the behest of Gilbert Larson. My only option was to sell my house, leave my career position and literally go into hiding to remove myself from the incessant harassment of these self-righteous persons.

The ABC love bombs a person into membership. When you say, in reference to your ABC friend, “Although most of our conversations about the Lord end up at baptism”, this is because the ABC, a group of only a few hundred on this globe, believe the ABC baptism, by a member of the ABC, is the only valid baptism that exists. All other baptisms are “John’s Baptism” and are considered an invalid baptism, even if that person had proper faith toward God.  These friendly encounters you speak about likely have only one goal. To entice you into joining the ABC. This is likely not about being a friend. It is “love bombing”. 

In Revelation it speaks about an uncountable number of faithful and this is just the number that came directly out of the tribulation, not all those throughout all of history. How many is immeasurable? More than a few hundred? Juxtapose immeasurable with the few hundred persons of the ABC and do the math. Is it really possible the ABC has the exclusive franchise on truth and baptism? They do have a Greek Concordance that is difficult to use and causes spiritual myopia through an intense focus on words rather than truth. I speak as one who once suffered that same myopia, but I took off the polarized glasses obscuring my view. They will accuse me of “abandoning my foundation” but that is quite far from the truth. I just don’t keep laying it down over and over again, as they do. My view on the foundation has not changed one bit, but my focus has shifted to a focus on faith, the more important element in that list. It is a person’s faith toward God at baptism that saves them. Not the lineage of the baptizer, or the right words being incanted, or a witness assuring a nose tip might have not gone fully under which, if missed, supposedly invalidates the whole thing, per the ABC. All those rules were made up by Andy Atwell, but my father, the guy who started the ABC, did not ever meet these rules. They are a real stretch beyond putting faith in baptism, the faith being the thing that saves us. The physical baptizer is of no consequence. If that is a requirement, all in the ABC are lost because my dad was not baptized in the ABC way by this set of rules. All who followed after him are relying on his supposed ABC style baptism to assure a perfect spiritual lineage. That did not happen and I explain those details in several other posts.

Only the Lord knows those who are his. It’s not up to me. It's not up to them. When I do the math, it does not add up to the ABC having an exclusive franchise on truth and baptism. They speak of faith, but have little understanding of true faith towards God and not towards a baptizer. It is not their right or privilege to decide who is “in” and who is “out”.  That is up to the Chief Shepherd only.

TO MAIN SITE