Out of the Shadows: Finding God's Truth in a World of Deception

By J. Thomas Lapacka

The autobiographical story of one mans involvement with the Worldwide Church of God (WCG). The book chronicles his slide into the abyss of the WCGs deceptions, including false prophecy, spiritual... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0570052467
• ISBN13: 9780570052463
• Release Date: November 2001
• Publisher: Concordia Pub House
• Length: 317 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 0.8" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

An insider...with insight!

Tom Lapacka's book is a fascinating, can't-put-it-down look inside one of the most incredible American religious/entreprenurial stories in the last 150 years. Lapacka's spiritual leader (and mine, from 1972-1979) was Herbert W. Armstrong, a failed advertising man who "discovered" substantial "new truth" that he marketed, effectively, to millions of people. Of those millions, some 150,000, at Armstrong's peak, were hardcore followers and/or members of the Worldwide Church of God. I was utterly impressed with Lapacka's honesty, candor and perspectives. While he and I might disagree on some points, this is a valuable, insightful and informative book that desreves serious reading by those interested in modern American religion, the question of "marketing God," and the dynamics of a personality-led church. It is also a cautionary tale for members of many different denominations, about what can happen when power is too concentrated, and about how people who may have some good ideas can get far off track. (I'm not necessarily putting Herbert Armstrong in the "good ideas" category, inasmuch as I see him more as a creative re-packager and marketer, but I digress.)

A Fascinating Book From First Page to the Last

Young Tom Lapacka began as a casual Christian member of a church and member of a home where there was little peace and harmony. His grandfather influenced him to turn to Herbert W. Armstrong's World Wide Church of God. The radio programs attracted him as a high school student. The account of the author's acceptance of the teachings along with his eager search for the best makes absorbing reading. He rose to positions of trust and leadership in the group but somehow there was always a sense of dissatisfaction and longing for something more. This is a thrilling document about one individual's search for and finding the God of the gospels. The book challenges all Christians to be able to defend the faith to those who are seeking.

The penetrating testimony of one man's journey

Out Of The Shadows: Finding God's Truth In A World Of Deception by J. Thomas Lapacka (Executive Director, The Lutheran Church/Missouri Synod Board for Communication Services, St. Louis, Missouri) is the personal and penetrating testimony of one man's journey through the tight clutches of a cult to embracing faith and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. A powerful, moving account of the depths of the human and divine spirit, Out Of The Shadows is highly recommended reading for any member of the Christian community having to deal with the insidious deceptions of religious cults.

A Tranparent and Personal Healing Document

I found Tom Lapacka's "Out of the Shadows: Finding God's Truth in a World of Deception" fascinating and very helpful. What Lapacka primarily has to offer the reader is his own personal experience and his perspective on the Worldwide Church of God.(However, it's really not fair to expect him to write authoritatively beyond what he saw and experieced or to expect him to be a historian about those parts of the WCG story that he didn't see or experience.)Lapacka really did not set out to write a history of Armstrongism, so his book shouldn't be judged on that basis. Footnotes, indexes and more full names might have been helpful, but their omission doesn't really detract from what Lapacka has accomplished in this very personal document.What he set out to do was to tell his own story: Tom Lapacka's personal history inside Armstrongism, his struggles and his exit into a more orthodox Christianity.I also was a member of the Worldwide Church of God from 1969 to 1997. I was briefly the lay pastor of a WCG congregation that I was asked to plant in Geneva, Ohio, in 1995. I and the congregation exited the WCG and joined the mainline Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) denomination. The congregation has since disbanded and most members have joined orthodox churches in their own communities. I'm currently an ordained Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) minister with an M.Div. from Ashland Theological Seminary.I have two other perspectives as well on Lapacka's book: I've over two decades' experience as a newspaper copy editor and have to judge the honesty and accuracy of narratives everyday. I'm also just finishing an internship in counseling, have an M.A. in Clinical Pastoral Counseling and do about 12 hours of community mental health counseling a week. So I'm very interested in the psychological issues faced by cult exiters like myself and Lapacka. My sense is that Lapacka's book is an honest personal document. He does not shy away from either his personal humiliations or his current ambiguity about certain issues and experiences. In other words, Lapacka's account rings true. (Yes, his chronology at one or two points may be off a month or two, but that's not the central issue.)The central issues are why he got into the cult, what he experienced there, how he got out and how he and his family are getting on with their lives today in a constructive and God-centered way.Several of the books I've read recently written by WCG higher-ups and hierarchs, which talk about the same period of WCG reform, lack Lapacka's candor and transparency. Lapacka's book doesn't seem to have the self-serving quality of some of the other books. They often have a fairly obvious triumphalistic spin. And they are muddled a bit by their authors' need to vindicate their continuing to maintain autocratic leadership and power roles in the house that Herbert built.The other authors also don't let the reader peer as deeply into their souls as Lapacka does. That's what I really want to k