The World Mission Society Church of God claims that their founder “Ahn Sahng Hong, who restored the Passover of the new covenant, is the second coming Christ-God.”  Whether he was Christ, is another question, given that both his writings and his tombstone claim he was the Prophet Elijah (another spurious assertion dispensed with here), but what about the other churches that were celebrating the Passover before Ahn Sahng Hong established his church in 1964?  The Worldwide Church of God, established in the late 1930’s by Herbert W. Armstrong, was another SDA splinter group that not only celebrated the Passover, but all of the old covenant feasts.

How did Ahn Sahng Hong “restore” the Passover when it was already being celebrated in another “Church of God”?  By the WMSCOG’s logic, Herbert W. Armstrong should be the second coming of Christ because he “restored” the Passover about 30 years before Ahn Sahng Hong established his church.

The World Mission Society Church of God calls all of their churches “Zion”.  In an online sermon titled, “Let’s Aquire the Citizenship of Heaven“, the WMSCOG refers to Isaiah 33:20-22 and concludes that “We the people of Zion celebrate the feasts.  So it is clear that we have a heavenly citizenship.“  But what about Herbert W. Armstrong’s Worldwide Church of God?  They also celebrate all of the old covenant feasts.  Are all of Armstrong’s churches considered “Zion” as well?

Click below to watch a documentary about the Worldwide Church of God, and ask yourself how your experience with the the World Mission Society Church of God differs.

The World Mission Society Church of God teaches that observance of the Sabbath is required for salvation and celebrates the Sabbath from approximately 9 am until 10 pm on Saturday (yes that’s 13 hours in church every Saturday if you’re counting, and it is absolutely exhausting).  Despite the long day, many members stay until 12 am or later on the Sabbath to “study”.  When I was a member, I remember a WMSCOG Deacon explaining that “Jewish people do not observe the Sabbath correctly because they begin observing on Friday evening“.  I found this very strange.  I wondered how the Jews, who had been commanded to observe the Sabbath when the commandments were given to Moses by God in Exodus 20, could have gotten it wrong?  Did the Jews observe the Sabbath incorrectly, and did Moses fail to correct them?

What Does the Bible Say?

Interestingly, the Bible does provide some guidance on this topic.  In Leviticus 23, the Lord commands the Israelites to observe 7 feasts.  Included in the command to observe The Day of Atonement, the Lord says:

The above verse clearly states that the Sabbath was to be observed from evening to evening.  Some WMSCOG members have argued that this particular Sabbath is during the Feast of Weeks and therefore does not apply to all Sabbath observances.  Well, then why don’t they follow it when a Sabbath falls within another feast?  In the Bible though we find many other verses that explain that all feast dates were calculated based on the new moon.  For instance:

Why does God repeatedly refer to the feasts as “New Moon” feasts?  It is because the Jews observe a lunar calendar (sundown to sundown).  The first day of the month was calculated based on the new or full moon.  We, in modern times, have adopted the solar calendar (sunrise to sunrise).  The Jews have not adapted their calculations of the feast times to adjust to our solar calendar, thus observing the Sabbath as they always have, evening to evening.

The Sabbath is Evening to Evening

Therefore, according to the Bible, the Jews are keeping the old covenant law as the Israelites were instructed by Moses, after receiving the commandments from the Lord. On the other hand, the WMSCOG is not observing the Sabbath according to the Bible, and also makes other miscalculations when it comes to other feast dates.

Even the Seventh Day Adventists Observe Sundown on Friday to Sundown on Saturday

The Seventh Day Adventist Church, the same denomination WMSCOG leader Ahn Sahng Hong was a member of until he was kicked out in 1962, observes the Sabbath from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday. Perhaps this was one of the grievances Ahn Sahng Hong had with the SDA’s that ultimately led to his expulsion.

Conclusion

We see in Scripture that the Sabbath is to be celebrated from evening to evening.  The Jewish people have always celebrated it that way, and still do today.  Are the Jews, (whose Sabbath it is), the Seventh Day Adventists, and the Bible wrong, while the World Mission Society Church of God is right?  Extremely unlikely.

The World Mission Society Church of God claims that eternal life will only be obtained by those who celebrate the Passover.  Regarding the Passover the WMSCOG says on its official website:

Was the Passover Observed by the Apostles?

In a discussion I had with a WMSCOG member regarding salvation by observing the law versus salvation by grace, I asked if there was any evidence to suggest that the Passover was observed by the apostles after Jesus’s Resurrection.  The WMSCOG member said “absolutely” and pointed to 1 Corinthians 5:7-8 as proof.

Is the apostle Paul here advising the church in Corinth to keep the Passover in this verse, or could it mean something else?

Paul Uses a Metaphor

If we read from the beginning of 1 Corinthians 5, we see that Paul is discussing sexual immorality and incest among the people in the church (v1).  In verse 7, Paul tells the Corinthians to “get rid of the old yeast, so you may be a new unleavened batch”.  Yeast is symbolic of sin in the Bible (Matthew 16:11, Mark 8:15, Luke 12:1).  In Old Testament times, the family was to rid their homes of yeast during the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Exodus 12:19).  Taking into consideration that Paul was a teacher of the law prior to his conversion, and that his audience was certainly comprised of former Jews, we see how fitting it is for Paul to draw out this analogy, commanding the Corinthians to rid the church (house) of all yeast (sin) so that they “may be a new unleavened batch…For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed”, as Jesus was the fulfillment of the Passover because he was “lamb without spot or blemish” (1 Peter 1:19, Leviticus 9:3) and therefore “unleavened bread” (John 6:51).

This also helps explain why Paul clearly uses “heortazo” instead of “heorte”.  The entire series of verses is a metaphor, including verses 7-8.  Since Paul uses the abstract “heaortazo”, verse 8 is part of the metaphor, and does not indicate some sort of literal observance of the Law.

In conclusion, 1 Corinthians 5:7-8 is not of any evidentiary value concerning the Passover, and does not support the WMSCOG member’s claims that Christians of the early church observed or were required to ceremonially observe the Passover.  This is just further proof of the WMSCOG’s consistent misinterpretation of Bible.

The United States Constitution affords all citizens the freedom to exercise the religion of their choosing.  But when does a controversial religious organization such as the World Mission Society Church of God, cross the line from exercising the freedom of religion to committing religious fraud?  Do potential members of the WMSCOG have enough information about the WMSCOG when they decide to join?  Are potential members truly making an informed decision to join the World Mission Society Church of God?  The World Mission Society Church of God’s recruitment efforts seem to raise some red flags.

What WMSCOG Recruiters Do Not Tell You

• WMSCOG recruiters often represent themselves as a group of students from the “Elohim Academy“ (WMSCOG Bible study program) instead of disclosing that they are members of the World Mission Society Church of God when approaching potential recruits in shopping malls, on college campuses, and in other heavily populated areas like midtown Manhattan.  When questioned as to why WMSCOG members do not mention the name of their church when recruiting, a current WMSCOG member explained to me “We don’t want to turn the person off right away if they have already heard negative things about the church because they just won’t listen.”  Is it acceptable for  WMSCOG members to misrepresent themselves like this in an effort to deceive people into listening to them?
• WMSCOG recruiters will not disclose how much time is required of its members.  Members are slowly pressured to spend more of their free time studying the Bible, recruiting new members, or working on various projects for the organization.  Recruiters also fail to mention that members are required to spend their entire Saturday observing the Sabbath, and that numerous other “feast days” will be celebrated when members are required to take off from work and attend 5 am and 7:30 pm prayer services.  I once asked a WMSCOG member why they do not explain this to new members and the response I got was, “If we told new brothers and sisters how much time they should spend in the church they wouldn’t agree to join… they are too spiritually immature to understand… they need to be fed spiritual milk before solid food because as babies they will choke.”  Should WMSCOG members decide what information should be disclosed to a potential or new member based on the concern that the person may not join?  If information is withheld in this manner, the person is not making an informed decision as to whether or not to join the WMSCOG.
• WMSCOG recruiters do not admit to the monetary requirements for membership in their organization.  WMSCOG members are required to give 10% of their gross income for their “tithe” in addition to other “freewill offerings”. New members study a number of lessons when they join.  The “tithes and offerings” lesson is one of the last lessons they will be taught.  Why is this requirement kept a secret until the member has spent a considerable amount of time studying approximately 10 other topics?  Where does all of the money go? Why doesn’t the WMSCOG distribute financial statements to its members like mainstream churches?

What do these WMSCOG members gain by purposely withholding information in order to recruit?  From the answers I received from WMSCOG members, I would say new recruits!

If a WMSCOG recruiter approached you and asked, “Would you like to join my church?  As members we give up most of our free time, spend countless hours in the church and give the church 10% of our money”.  Would you join? If someone was informed of the WMSCOG’s requirements and decided to join, that person would be absolutely within his or her right to do so.  However, I personally witnessed WMSCOG members, with intent, withhold information in order to recruit new unsuspecting members by disallowing them to make a real informed decision.  A religious organization should not, and does not have the authority to decide when a person can handle and can not handle the truth about its requirements for membership.  This is deceptive recruiting, and religious fraud, period.

*The photo above is licensed under the Creative Commons license, available here.

In the “Truth of Life” section on the official WMSCOG website, the World Mission Society Church of God (WMSCOG) claims that the apostles of Jesus Christ observed the Sabbath on Saturday.  I always understood that after Jesus’s death, the day of worship was changed to Sunday not only because Jesus fulfilled the old Law (Luke24:44, Romans 3:21), but because Jesus Christ resurrected, appeared to his apostles and ascended on the first day of the week, Sunday, thus establishing a pattern of Sunday as a holy day.  The day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came upon the Apostles, was also on a Sunday.

Sunday Worship in Scripture?

The Bible clearly documents that Christians gathered on Sunday in the following verse:

A WMSCOG member tried to explain this Bible passage of the Apostles meeting on the first day of the week to me by saying they were keeping the Feast of Firstfruits (which occurs during the Festival of Unleavened Bread), by directing me to Acts 20:6:

When Does the Feast of Firstfruits Take Place?

In order to determine if the first day of the week in Acts 20:7 points to the Feast of Firstfruits, we should examine how the feast dates were calculated according to God’s Law for the Israelites in the Old Testament.  Leviticus 23 lays out each of the feasts for us and how they are to be kept:

Just to recap, the Feast of Unleavened Bread lasts for seven days and the Feast of Firstfruits is celebrated on the following Sunday (the day after the next Sabbath).  This is exactly how the WMSCOG calculates these two feasts as shown in the table below.  So, now that we know how to calculate the feasts, we can look again at Acts to see if the Apostles were really keeping the Feast of Firstfruits, or if they were worshiping on Sunday.  Will my friend’s argument hold up?

Where Was Paul?

As seen earlier, Acts 20:6 tells us that Paul sets sail after the Feast of Unleavened Bread and joins the others in Troas in five days.  Acts 20:6 also tells us that Paul and the others stayed in Troas for seven days.  Acts 20:7 tells us that Paul gathered with the people in Troas on the first day of the week, Sunday and intended to leave the next day, which would be Monday.  To illustrate that the first day of the week, or Sunday, that Paul gathered with the people in Troas could not have been the day of Firstfruits we can go ahead and add the days up:

In Acts 20:7 it clearly states that Paul planned to depart the next day and since they gathered on Sunday, we can simply count backwards from that point (Monday), and work our way up the table back to the Passover.  Now, not only were the Apostles not gathered on the Feast of Firstfruits which wasn’t until a week later, but also note that Paul did not observe the Sabbath.  According to the WMSCOG, Sabbath observance is required for salvation.  The Apostle Paul said, follow my example as I follow the example of Christ (1 Corinthians 11:1), and the Bible provides irrefutable proof that Paul was traveling by boat on the Sabbath.  Remember that the Apostle Paul was a Jew before he began believing in Jesus Christ, and therefore was very familiar with the Old Testament laws and regulations.  If Sabbath observance was required for salvation, surely the Apostle Paul would not have been traveling on that day. 

Are WMSCOG members allowed to travel on the Sabbath?  As any former member will tell you, the answer is no.  

The WMSCOG vs. Scripture

The WMSCOG however, states that “the apostles kept the Sabbath day by worshipping God in spirit and in truth, following Jesus Christ’s example”, citing Luke 4:16 where Jesus goes to the synagogue on the Sabbath and reads from the Bible.  Obviously Paul did not follow this example because he was out to sea on the Sabbath day and not in the synagogue.  The scriptures in Acts provide irrefutable proof that observance of the Sabbath on Saturday was not kept by the apostles after Jesus resurrected.

Will Those Who Do Not Keep Saturday Sabbath Observance Be Saved?

Not according to the WMSCOG:

If you believe the above statement that the WMSCOG makes on their official website, then you must believe that Paul, despite his fervent ministry for the gospel of Jesus Christ, will not be saved by God???  Either the Bible is right, or the WMSCOG is right.  Since we have just proved directly from Scripture that the Apostle Paul did not keep the Sabbath, what does that say about what the WMSCOG teaches?  The World Mission Society Church of God teaches a works based doctrine that is in complete opposition with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

Not only was my friend wrong in claiming that Acts 20:7 refers to the Feast of Firstfruits (it was a week later), but the Bible demonstrates that Paul did not observe the Sabbath.  Thus, Scripture stands in clear contradiction to this core belief of the WMSCOG.  The World Mission Society Church of God claims to be lead by “god”, but they misinterpret Scripture all the time.   If you are a current member, you owe it to yourself and to God, to leave this blasphemous and legalistic organization.

The World Mission Society Church of God (WMSCOG) claims that keeping the Jewish feasts is necessary for salvation.  Do they keep them correctly though?  Read on to learn how to calculate for yourself, and see how they have kept the feasts of God incorrectly.

Feasts Required For Salvation?

The WMSCOG teaches that keeping the Jewish feasts (the feasts of God) is required for salvation:

The Days of the Feasts From Scripture

So if the feasts are that important, you’d expect the WMSCOG to get them right, especially since they claim that their leader Zahng Gil Jah (whom they call “Jerusalem Mother”) is divine. If she was divine, then would she let her her church celebrate the feasts on the wrong day? Let us look at two of the feasts recorded in Scripture so that we might calculate their dates ourselves. Don’t worry, it’s very easy:

Passover is on the 14th day of the first month.

The Feast of Trumpets is on the 1st day of the seventh month.  (The Day of Atonement and Feast of Tabernacles are also in the seventh month, so it’s important to begin correctly with the Feast of Trumpets.)

How Months are Counted in the Biblical Calendar

The Hebrew calendar is luni-solar, which means that the months follow the lunar cycle, with a leap month added every so often between the 11 and 12 months to keep the holy days in their proper seasons (see the Wikipedia article on Hebrew Calendar for more information). Each month starts with the new moon (according to Isaiah 66:23).

How to Calculate the Feasts

In order to correctly calculate the feasts, we first need to know when there is a New Moon.  For this, we’ll go to NASA’s lunar phase data.  We’ll record each New Moon as a new month.  It is also important to realize that the Biblical calendar begins around the Gregorian calendar months of March or April.  (The Gregorian calendar is the one the world uses today).   For the purpose of our analysis though, the differences between the Gregorian and Hebrew calendars will not have an impact because we can simply observe the number of months (or new moons) from Passover to the Feast of Trumpets.

It is important to note that the calendar of the WMSCOG does not exactly match any Hebrew calendar used by the Jewish people today.  Since it is slightly different, we’ll refer to it here as the “WMSCOG calendar.”  In any case, for the WMSCOG calendar to truly be “sacred” (or Biblical) as they say it is, it must begin its months with the new moons and have its feasts in the correct months. So grab your pencils and let’s start calculating!

They Get it Wrong in 2005

In 2005, the WMSCOG celebrated their Feast of Trumpets in the wrong month. Not the wrong day, but an entire month off. You can see on their website that in 2005 the WMSCOG held the Passover on March 14, 2005. We know from Lev 23:24 that the Feast of Trumpets for the Jewish people was to be on the “first day of the seventh month”, but the WMSCOG held their Feast of Trumpets on October 3, 2005, which is the eighth month in the WMSCOG calendar. The following table shows the error:

They claim that their leader is god. They also claim that there is no salvation unless the Feasts of God are held correctly, and then they lead all of their members to hold them incorrectly. By their own teaching, this doesn’t look good, but by common sense, if you claim to have God as your leader, but then do something so clearly contrary to the Bible, then what does that tell you?

They Get it Wrong Again in 2008

In 2008 the WMSCOG held the Passover on March 21st, and then, instead of holding the Feast of Trumpets on the “first day of the seventh month” as God commanded the Israelites in Lev 23:24, the WMSCOG incorrectly held it on September 30th in the eighth lunar month. It is not difficult to calculate at all:

And Again in 2010

In 2010 the WMSCOG held the Passover on March 29th, and then, instead of holding the Feast of Trumpets on the “first day of the seventh month” as God commanded the Israelites in Leviticus 23:24, the WMSCOG incorrectly held it on October 8th in the eighth lunar month:

Conclusion

If you claim to have God as your leader, and claim that the Feasts of God must be kept, and then keep them incorrectly not just days, but entire months out of cycle, and these errors are so egregious and so easy to calculate that anyone with a pencil and an Internet connection can find them, what does that tell you? It tells you that your leader, Zahng Gil Jah is not God. And if she is not God, then you are worshipping a false god and you owe it to God and to yourself, to leave the WMSCOG.