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Incredibly, having seen the end result of Joe Tkach's doctrinal evolution, knowing its earlier phases originated with disfellowshipped men of a similar spirit in the seventies, rightly judging the end result anti-Christ, and even hearing Joe Tkach Jr. confess eventually that “doing away” with the Law naturally followed in doctrinal reasoning from the preceding changes, many of God's ministers and people today still agree with some or all of the pre-1993 doctrinal changes. Yet Christ commanded for this very spiritual test, in His day but primarily for future ages of the Church: “A tree is known by its fruit;” “a good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit;” “do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?” (Matt. 7:15-20; 12:33-34; Luke 6:43-44).
All the ministers and officials who left the WCG for the sake of Truth are a living testimonial that Mr. Armstrong was a “good tree”: he trained and appointed them all (directly or through surrogates), and the vast majority of what they still recognize as Truth was revealed to him uniquely before any of them knew it. Indisputably the Tkaches and Garner Ted etc. were “bad trees.” What is the inevitable conclusion under Christ's clear command?
The largest single body of God's people is “United” (chaos by any other name…). It generally accepts or condones virtually all the pre-1993 doctrinal changes, and adds to that false doctrine regarding God's government, including outright ministerial voting and elections—government Mr. Armstrong called demonic and even Garner Ted considered too “liberal.” United's doctrine also accepts or condones in principle virtually everything from the seventies Mr. Armstrong called “liberalism” and “watering down truth”—virtually everything Mr. Armstrong fought to put the Church “back on track” from in the eighties. The organization started out with about twenty thousand people fifteen years ago but it is smaller today. Despite potentially greater resources, it has done far less work in proclaiming the Gospel than the anemic accomplishment of some of its much smaller rivals. United's primary “work” has been to provide a paycheck to the many ministers and other Levitical workers who collaborated to form it.
A significant number of God's people in United disagree with much of the false doctrine, yet still attend. About a quarter of the organization's ministers even refused to vote in United's formational years. Yet, as discussed more fully later, even these who see the error also forget or reject Mr. Armstrong's doctrine in a vital regard: he often taught that all in the Church must speak the same thing, and it must be what Christ speaks. If parts of the Truth Christ set in the Church are rejected by a group's highest authority, God's people not only aren't required to attend for the sake of “assembling,” but they sin if they continue to do so knowingly: they would then be assembling under leadership Mr. Armstrong would have disfellowshipped for division and false doctrine (Rom. 16:17). On more than one occasion Mr. Armstrong stated that if he were the only one left who held fast to all God's revealed Truth, he would worship by himself. Many of God's people today condemn their brethren (of significant number) who still attend Tkach's “Sabbath congregations” despite absolutely rejecting the doctrine of lawlessness; yet those at United and other groups who so condemn make the same error by continuing to attend where they do.