WHY I keep Mr. Rader on as my assistant, in spite of the biggest character assassination campaign in God’s Church
by Herbert W. Armstrong
WHY, I ask, WHY has Stanley R. Rader been persecuted, with a bitter campaign of character assassination against him as no other man in or associated with the Church?
Those who have HATED Mr. Rader could not tell you WHY. I think it’s time the Church membership and pastors come to grips with this question.
The fountain source that has spewed out this bitter hatred is my own son, Garner Ted Armstrong.
But if I ask this, that, or the other minister or church member, ”WHY?” They can’t answer! Much of this character assassination has taken place in the faculty locker room in Pasadena, guzzling beer. Little personal snide remarks have built up a giant wall against Stanley Rader.
I look at the “fruits” and they are virtually all VERY GOOD!
There’s an old saying to the effect that “He who steals my purse steals trash, but he who besmears my character steals the most precious and valuable thing I have.”
But, even though snide remarks and character assassination statements have been freely spued out, I still have to ask, ”WHY” HAVE SO MANY IN GOD’S CHURCH BEEN WILLING TO BELIEVE THE WORST against Stan Rader? I want to answer that, and once for all set the record straight.
I have to go back fifty years or more, to explain, because there is a resemblance to this unfortunate situation in my early experience with the Sardis people in Oregon.
Jesus Christ called His people “sheep” who seriously need leadership and protection from competent and honest shepherds.
Jesus said, “the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light” (Luke 16:8). Those of this world know better how to deal with others of this world than God’s sheep.
In the autumn of 1926, when my life-changing challenge came, I was one of the “wise of this world.” I had been in business. From age 18 to age 34 I had no interest in religion. I think I was upright and honest and sincere – yet very much a part of this world. I had not neglected education and did possess the equivalent of post graduate degrees.
The brethren in Oregon began immediately to look to me for leadership – especially in giving the Gospel Message to the world. The ministers worked against me every way they could. They were jealous. Wherever God used me in speaking, FRUIT WAS BORN – THERE WERE CONVERSIONS, newly baptized members brought in. Yet, of the Sardis ministers of that time there was not one single conversion brought about that I could find, and I specifically asked at least two of their oldest and most loyal members if they knew of any conversions brought about by their church ministers.
The brethren knew that I was newly converted out of the world. I KNEW THIS WORLD! I KNEW HOW TO APPROACH AND REACH THIS WORLD. The Sardis ministers did not. They appeared as just so much “ignoramus foolishness” to the world.
The church NEEDED the leadership of one who had the “know how” to reach the world.
When I was completely converted, spring of 1927, I did not try to change my personality. I, with my wife, ABHORED any “put on” mannerism that could have made me APPEAR “religious.”
I remember once when one or both of my sons brought to our house a neighbor boy. He later said to them, “Why your Dad does not seem like a preacher.” I seemed just like any business man. I did change my attitude and basic interests and concerns with values – I did eradicate all slang words such as “darn,” but I did not “PUT ON” any new sanctimonious appearance, I was just NATURAL – myself – although Jesus Christ was CHANGING that self.
Just as, in order to get God’s Work moving, in GOING TO THE WORLD, the work then needed one who could effectively reach the world, so in the early sixties, I came to realize God’s Work needed the services of one who had expertise in finance, banking, borrowing and legal matters. We had started using Mr. Rader to a limited extent, on a professional fee basis, in certain legal matters, and contacts with radio stations. He was distinctly the most brilliant of the men we had used in these areas. In due time, later, we discussed with Mr. Rader the matter of giving up his CPA and legal clients, and devoting full time to us. The Work needed him.
In 1972, when Garner Ted Armstrong was banished from the Church and College, and living in Colorado, all top-ranking ministers had turned against Ted – but Stanley Rader stood loyally with me as TED’S ONLY FRIEND, in working to bring Ted back into the Work.
But once back, Ted started a campaign of persecution and character assassination against Mr. Rader such as I have never witnessed, and have never found chronicled in Biblical history.
WHY, I ask again, WHY do some ministers and even some brethren lay members, think EVIL of Stanley Rader?
Could it be because he is “worldly-wise” and therefore able to give the Work a help none of us can give? Is it because he has not tried to “PUT ON” a religious or sanctimonious personality and appearance, and appears “more worldly” than we – even though I know for a fact some well recognized members or ministers are, in fact – especially Garner Ted – more “worldly” in ATTITUDE and WAYS than Mr. Rader.
I do not want Mr. Rader to “PUT ON” a sanctimonious or religious-type bearing.
To sum up briefly, when I look at the RECORD – at the FRUITS – I find them mostly GOOD – the GOOD far outweighing the bad. This Work could not have come to the state of success in God’s eyes that it has otherwise.
Mr. Rader is not perfect – nor am I – nor are YOU! But maybe now, all of you who have GOD’S HOLY SPIRIT will have a little more KINDLINESS in your attitude toward the one my son would paint as Satan incarnate. “Judge NOT that ye be not judged!”
