| Author | Message | ||
| Derrell (Derrell) |
Dear Former Adventists, Today I was watching the 700 Club with Pat Robertson, when I saw a segment regarding a fire in Colorado. A forest fire was moving toward a Pastor's house, and someone called a children's pastor who got the kids together and prayed. They showed footage of those kids praying. I have never seen little kids pray with the intensity, sincerity, and verbosity that I saw in those children. It was beautiful. Their communucation with God was something that I have never seen before. The fire went around the house burning within a few feet of it, but not leaving a single scorch mark. No suprise! I called CBN and was told that this had something to do with New Life Church in Colorado Springs. I am a current practicing Seventh-day Adventist, the son of missionaries, and working for an Adventist television network, yet I have never seen anything so inspiring... anything that created such a longing, as the connection that those children in Colorado have with God. I intend to go visit that church. I want to experience what I saw. Best wishes, Derrell | ||
| Dennis (Dennis) |
Adventists, as well as many others, do not want to take the risk of studying the Bible in depth. They are afraid that they may learn something radically new that will challenge their current understanding. People generally oppose views that they are unfamiliar or uncomfortable with--especially at first. It was truly a miracle of God's grace that we were called out of Adventism. Sylvia and I have greatly lamented the many SDA untruths we have repeatedly told people for more than forty years as devout members. Some of those SDA lies are most embarrassing to recount today (i.e., "Jesus is a Seventh-day Adventist," "Everyone in heaven will either be an Adventist upon arrival or be most willing or longing to become one immediately," ad infinitum). These thoughts, although not official GC dogma, were solidified by in-house conversations of the "faithful." Dennis J. Fischer | ||
| Terryk (Terryk) |
Derrell I have left the church and have been attending a Baptist church I was so shcoked at what I found . I found a church overflowing with teenagers who sit and listen to the sermon not reading guides. They arrive for the early sermon and sit and listen. I was also excited to see they had an abstance program and these kids got up and talked and they had a relationship with God that I wanted. It is so different with all christians who are taught to live and love Jesus and I can not explain it but you are so right it is just different then what I had seen in the SDA church. My 12 year old at the time said mom you know at church now it is just deeper then what I learned in the past at sabbath school. Well you are in my prayers that you too will be able to pray like those children. God Bless you in your journery | ||
| Colleentinker (Colleentinker) |
Derrell, I completely understand your reaction to those children's prayers. The first time we visited the church we now attend, we sat in the back during a high school praise service to which our son had been invited. Richard and I were completely astonished at what we saw. Those teenagers were PAISING GOD, singing, even kneeling down, raising their arms to God while they sang his praises. We were overwhelmed. This was not an act nor something they did to impress each other. Those kids were not there to "see and be seen" as was the case at the Adventist youth groups our sons had attended--or that we had attended, for that matter! Time has only confirmed the depth and sincerity of the teeangers who worship at our church. Even pre-teenagers speak of their love for Jesus and their desires to serve him. In real Christianity, even young people who accept Jesus are truly changed and born again. Accepting Jesus is not just a decision and a joining of an organization. They love Jesus, and even after five years, I never get over the awe and amazement at watching them (as well as the older church members) praise God and honor him. I'm praying for you, too, that you will know God's will for you and also for your and your family's healing after the death of your brother-in-law. Colleen | ||
| Madelia (Madelia) |
Dennis, your comment about "everyone in heaven will be an Adventist.." reminds me of a joke I heard. I don't have it word for word but it goes something like this: At the Second Coming, as the Lutherans, Baptists, Methodists, etc. are being ushered into heaven, they are warned to be silent as they go by door #8. When someone asked why, they were told "Because that's where the Adventists are and they think they're the only ones here!" As I sat through a Sabbath school lesson last weekend, I was impressed that I saw no one with an open Bible, only an open quarterly. I've decided, based on my experiences with my husband and "Bible studies" is that SDAs don't really study the Bible, they just know how to lecture | ||
| Colleentinker (Colleentinker) |
That's quite an accurate assesment, Madelia. While there are some individual exceptions, in general Bible study is memorizing proof texts and finding Biblical texts to bolster the doctrines. A very huge discovery I made after leaving was something called "inductive Bible study". Adventists do not teach their members to study inductively. In fact, I actually resisted the notion of looking up related texts in favor of just trying to analyze whatever passage I was reading as if it were an independent piece of literature. I took a class at church called, "How to Study the Bible," and the idea of inductive Bible study has changed the way I approach scripture. Elizabeth Inrig explained that each passage had a clear meaning to the audience who first received/heard it. Secondarily, there may be other places where the author of a passage wrote about the same thing in a different context. Those passages can shed light on the original passage. Third, other authors in both testaments might also have written about the subject. Finally, what the passage might mean to me is the last meaning we should wrest from the text. Before we think we really understand a passage, we need to examine what the rest of the Bible says IN CONTEXT about the same subject. Only then can we apply it to our own lives, and the meaning we get from a passage will not be wildly different from the meaning it had for the first audience. The depth and richness of the Bible is still an amazing thing to me. Adventists do not teach inductive Bible study, I'm sure, because to do so would show up the fallacies of their doctrines. They use a few proof texts which bolster their theories, then they dismiss other passages which contradict their theories by trying to make the words mean something other than they really say or by calling them "cultural" issues which don't apply today. Sometimes they dismiss passages in the epistles by saying, "Oh, Paul was hard to understand." Since I've been studying inductively, though, the Bible has come alive. More and more I see that it means exactly what it says, and it confirms itself throughout the different authors and time periods of its books. Adventists claim to be "the people of the book," yet they do not believe the Bible is inerrant. It's another of those subtle deceptions which confuse people about Adventism. They claim the Bible, they know a lot of memory texts, they insist all their doctrines are based on the Bible alone, they call the Bible "infallible" (not inerrant), yet their Bible study is merely a "smoke screen" to hide the fact that they really give their final authority to a false prophet. The Bible is God's living word to us. The Holy Spirit reveals truth and practice and reality through the Bible, and we are unbelievably blessed actually to have God's word preserved for us. Praise Him! Colleen | ||
| Madelia (Madelia) |
And I shouldn't generalize and say all Adventists don't study their Bibles. Another phenomenon I've noticed here in Minnesota is that some of the SDA churches are changing their names. There is now a Pathways Church and soon to come (I had to chuckle at this one!) The Edge! | ||
| Lydell (Lydell) |
Oh Madelia, now you went and stirred up a memory of what we experiences. On several occassions while we were SDA's a group of people would get together for what was announced to be a "Bible study". On every occassion.....every single one, the FIRST question that was raised was this: "So...which one of sister white's books should we study?" When we would respond, "well, um, how about we study the BIBLE?" We would be met with blank expressions and one of two responses, "oh, but I had a Bible study when I joined the church" or, "but I don't think the pastor can be there that night", or with a quizzical expression, "well how would we do that?" The most telling response tho came the time the pastor was present, "oh, but that would be too much work." Amazing...and oh so very sad! | ||
| Dennis (Dennis) |
Do Seventh-day Adventists really, really believe in their strange eschatological views? Being Adventists have prophetic timeline charts, Ellen White "insights," etc., they are actually quite unconcerned about last day events that will soon impact their lives. Recently, my wife was visiting with a retired SDA minister about last day events. He kept telling my wife that things won't be as bad or imminent as she indicated. With their prophetic timelines, they seem to be at ease for the present. Unlike orthodox Christianity, they "know" about all the things that must first transpire before Jesus returns. To many of them, it is slumbertime for now. They are so busily involved with their institutions that they have little time to worry about impending doom and gloom for this world. Furthermore, they seem to like this old world after all--despite their repeated cries for panic and calamity throughout their history. With everything neatly SCHEDULED for the distant future, our Lord's return as "a thief in the night" does not seem to alarm them today nor even in the immediate future. For them, the Holy Spirit has not even arrived in full power yet. Also, without their believing in a lost soul (inner man) to save, urgency is replaced with complacency. Without eternal security in Christ, they remain tentative in their walk with Christ and are continually assailed with crippling doubts. Dennis J. Fischer | ||
| Sabra (Sabra) |
That's it Dennis, I always thought Jesus wouldn't come before the "Sunday Law" so I had plenty of time to clean my act up. Colleen, do they actually say the bible isn't inerrant? Not the same as being inspired, hu? What's the difference? I can't wait until we get raptured, boy, won't that stir some people up, or will they think the aliens got us? And, I never took my bible to church when SDA, I didn't go to learn anything, I went because I had to, obligation, not desire, ever. I actually dreaded it. They (family) are so shocked that we go every Wed. now and Sunday night. Now we can't wait, even my 3 year old asks by Tuesday when we are going to church. Kids can't wait, all the teenagers sit on one side for service and they are worshippers, cryers, very involved and very touching. I love sitting in the choir and seeing the whole church in one accord praising God, it's awesome! | ||
| Madelia (Madelia) |
Yes, Lydell, I don't get how they can talk about a "Bible study" and then what they are actually reading is an EGW book!! And the Sunday Law business. A few weeks ago on our local Christian radio station, there was a news item about a Christian bookstore chain that decided they were now going to be open on Sundays because they felt it would be a great outreach. From that, it sounded to me like we're a long ways from a "Sunday law" | ||
| Dennis (Dennis) |
Sabra, In their book, QUESTIONS ON DOCTRINE (1957), Adventists declared the Scriptures to be "all-sufficient" and "unerring" (page 11). Of course, this statement was not approved by the General Conference in session. This book was primarily published due to an agreement with the late Dr. Walter Martin, an Evangelical cult watcher. In subsequent statements on the Holy Scriptures, Adventists deleted the words "all-sufficient" and "unerring" to accommodate the extrabiblical writings attributed to Ellen White. Adventist leaders deceived Dr. Martin into thinking that SDA theology was basically Evangelical (as noted above with their statement on the Bible). The SDA leaders knew what Dr. Martin wanted to hear. Consequently, the late Dr. Walter Martin was pivotal in helping Adventists overcome their cultic image and stigma. Inerrancy indicates that every word of Scripture was divinely constituted. With the SDA reliance on extrabiblical authority, biblical inerrancy did not equate with the "inspired" writings of their prophetess. That which is infallible is said to be unable to make mistakes or to err. Theoretically, something may be fallible and at the same time inerrant. That is, it would be possible for someone to err who in fact does not err. However, the reverse it not true. If someone is infallible, that means he cannot err; and if he cannot err, then he does not err. To assert that something is infallible yet at the same time errant is either to distort the meaning of "infallible" and/or "errant," or else to be in a state of confusion. Anything that is infallible, that is, incapable of erring, cannot at the same time err. For if it errs, it proves that it is capable of erring and therefore is not infallible. In situations, like with Seventh-day Adventists, where infallibility has been substituted for inerrancy, it has usually been designed to articulate a LOWER VIEW of Scripture than that indicated by the word "inerrant." Again, it is important to see that something which is fallible could theoretically be inerrant. But that which is infallible could not theoretically be at the same time errant. All in all, Ellen White's writings are responsible for the lower designation for the Bible. Being filled errors and contradictions, her writings are indeed far removed from inerrancy. Consequently, Adventists separate infallibility from inerrancy. Strictly speaking, biblical inerrancy applies only to the autographic text of Scripture, which in the providence of God can be ascertained from available manuscripts with great accuracy. The Old and New Testament Scriptures are probably the texts which have reached us with the most extensive and reliable attestation. This serious work is accomplished through the field of textual criticism. In more than ninety-nine percent of the cases, the original text can be reconstructed to a practical certainty. Even in the few cases where some perplexity remains, this does not impinge on the meaning of Scripture to the point of clouding a tenet of faith or a mandate of life. Thus, in the Bible as we have it (and as it is conveyed to us through faithful translations), we do have for practical purposes the very word of God, inasmuch as the manuscripts do convey to us the complete vital truth of the originals. Dennis J. Fischer | ||
| Freeatlast (Freeatlast) |
Dennis, have you been exposed to the SDA argument of "thought inspiration"? | ||
| Dennis (Dennis) |
Freeatlast, Yes, I am familiar with the White Estate alibi known as "thought inspiration." The SDA verbal vs. thought inspiration idea was solely created by the desperate apologists of Ellen White. Being God is the ultimate author of the Holy Scriptures, His book is truly inerrant. While we do not know everything about the mystery of inspiration, we can be assured that God directed the writers of the Bible to write the very words--not merely thoughts and/or commentaries conditioned by cultural, historical, and linguistic factors. God's penmen wrote the words of the Bible as directed by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit certainly was not limited in directing the biblical writer to use the exact words to best relate God's message for man. The SDA verbal vs. thought inspiration concept is a humanistic rationalization that is alien to the inspired Word of God. God is fully capable of writing an inerrant book using human authors as their hearts and hands are "moved by the Holy Spirit." Adventists commonly inject human reasoning when differing with biblical teachings. They, in effect, create their own god. Not surprisingly, their god consistently contradicts the God of Scripture. Every WORD of Scripture is divinely constituted as I mentioned in my post above. Words constitute thoughts, so WORDS are the pivital issue here. As the accepted principles of hermeneutics verify, even ONE word in a passage is crucial in its interpretation and application. How can the Bible contain thoughts without words? How can any thought be wordless? It truly boggles my mind how Adventists can separate words from thoughts. Apparently, there is no limit to their mental gymnastics in trying to defend their false prophetess. Being Ellen White's books are full of errors and contradictions, Adventists claim that the Bible is in the same category. Their claim is not only false--it is dishonest. Indeed, we can trust the Bible with all its WORDS! | ||
| Melissa (Melissa) |
Two thoughts come to mind from these discussions: a few years ago, I commented to B that he was not looking for Christ, but for the Sunday law and until the Sunday law, he really didn't fear anything. He kindof hemmed and hawed and then said that he believed Christ could come at any time...and I was completely baffled how he could say that after all the smoke he blew at me about the "coming" Sunday law, which looked closer and closer all the time. I think in the year before that someone somewhere made some effort to have Sunday declared an official day off or some such fiddle-faddle and it seems the SDAs jumped on it as the sign they were looking for. B's grandfather in Canada even mentioned the closing of time in his Christmas card because "the pope was on the move". Here we sit 4 years later without any threat at all of any so-called "Sunday law". The second thought involves scripture. This fall, I have been doing a study with a women's group on the book "the shout of the bridegroom". (Not to be confused with anything SDA related!) It is a book purely designed to talk about how a jewish marriage came to be. How the parents negotiated, the betrothal period, the differing monies involved for dowry or bride-price. What struck me last week as we were on the last chapter was how consistent scripture is through the many writers, centuries and circumstances. It completely changed how I understood Matthew's description of the bridegroom. We lose so much by not understanding the culture of the people those original writings were written for, yet if we could understand their culture, we would be in such a better position to understand some of the word-pictures in scripture, and therefore make better applications for our lives. I continue to be awed and amazed at the book which reveals itself in a new way each time I open it. And no matter where I am in my life, God has something for me. I can't imagine not having that trust in the word of God or having to discount it because it didn't agree with something else I had been taught. B says I see in the Bible what I "want" to believe (like associating being absent from the body with going to heaven, when he's really just talking about being in vision ... whatever!) Do they even recognize what a treasure of hope is at their fingertips? I never get enough time to study the Bible. And I have been collecting commentaries in the past couple of years as I've grown in my need to understand the cultural aspects of the scripture (as in veils for women ... some might say that not wearing a wedding ring in our culture is the same as not wearing a veil in that culture....) HOW can someone NOT want to study the Bible? What nuggets of GOLD are awaiting the person willing to dig in! | ||
| Melissa (Melissa) |
I should mention that the book correlates the imagery of us as the bride of Christ and how the things he said could be related to this marriage-process. For example, after a woman accepted the arrangment of her parents, the man went back to prepare a 'home' or room on his parents house for the bride. When you think of Christ talking about going to prepare a place for us, it perfectly fits when you understand the jewish marriage customs. It also broadened the picture of Christ making the water into wine at the wedding ceremony. And if you want some really racey ideas, did you know that the bride's parents received the sheet or cloths the couple consumated their marriage on to have "proof" of the woman's purity upon her marriage? It was a sort of protection for them in case the groom decided to come back and say at some later point that she wasn't pure when they got married as grounds for divorce. The point is that understanding those cultural elements made the word-pictures of us as the bride of Christ in scripture far more vivid than thinking of an American traditional wedding process. | ||
| Loneviking (Loneviking) |
Free at Last, Thought inspiration is just an awful heresy. The idea is that, as the book 'Adventists Belive' puts it 'the thoughts are inspired but the words aren't.' So, the thoughts of the Biblical authors were inspired, and then they wrote in the vernacular of their day and culture. What this leads to is the admission that there are errors and contradictions in the Bible. Also, you can't always take the Bible at face value---so you go to an another authoritative source, vis a vis EGW. SDA apologists use thought inspiration to say that EGW's plagarism is nothing more than what the authors of the Bible did. EGW, lacking any real formal education, used the writings of others to explain her 'inspired thoughts'. This is why, as most of us formers have found out, you can have a Bible study with all sorts of Christians from various Evangelical/Fundamentalists churches and have so many points of agreement. You can't do that with the SDA's. Their understanding of Scripture, the Gospel, who Christ was, even their hermaneutic is so far off from the understanding of most Christians that you might as well be talking to a Mormon or J.W.! Bill | ||
| Freeatlast (Freeatlast) |
Dennis & Bill, I totally agree with you. My aforementioned SDA brother tried to blow that smoke up my proverbial skirt a couple of years ago, and I second what you say about having a theological discussion with an SDA. Every topic becomes peppered with SDA "flavor" in the way the Scriptures and theology are addressed (i.e., Creation is about the Sabbath, Abraham was a Seventh-day Adventist and tithed, Jesus was also (OF COURSE!) the ultimate Adventist, the apocalypse is all about the Sabbath. You name it, they claim it. I give up trying to convince them. I just pray for them anymore. I feel it truly is all I can do. Y'all please do the same. This web of lies has entangled nearly my entire family and separated us, probably for this lifetime. I hate these doctrines! | ||
| Dennis (Dennis) |
INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PRAYER FOR THE PERSECUTED CHURCH: Sunday, November 9, 2003 Have you realized that the entire Christian Church has been annihilated in the Sudan of Africa? Those not martyred were enslaved. It is estimated that one hundred million Christians suffered martyrdom in the twentieth century alone. These last century statistics reflect more killings than all the centuries of Christianity combined. As a Seventh-day Adventist, during the second half of the twentieth century, I never heard one prayer for the persecuted church nor even a single public comment of concern or compassion by anyone. Truly, this is the type of "annihilation" that Adventists should be greatly concerned about. Sadly, as we too well know, their compassion is virtually nonexistent for the persecuted church. After all, they reason, these martyrs are part of "babylon." Presumably, being they were not Adventists, these martyrs died in vain. Being they are already judged as being unworthy by official Adventism, the investigative judgment is not needed for these cases. Interestingly, God showed the Apostle John, on the Isle of Patmos, the many martyrs "under the altar" in heaven--many more were yet to join them. Let us continue to uphold in prayer, our brothers and sisters in Christ that are daily persecuted for their faith. Come Lord Jesus! Dennis J. Fischer | ||
| Colleentinker (Colleentinker) |
Dennis, thank you for that reminder. I have also marvelled at the total lack of concern or awareness in Adventism of the persecuted church. It it's not Adventist, it doesn't count. I want to revisit the inerrancy/infalliability discussion a bit. A few years ago (maybe three?) I heard part of a Sabbath School presentation on the radio from LLU Church. Whoever was speaking was actually stating that when we (they) read the Bible, they have to interpret the words and adjust apparent meanings so they make sense to us today. When we were leaving the church, we had a conversation with a faculty member from an SDA dept of religion who said to us, "You'll take many of your Adventist understandings with you, such as the non-inerrancy of the Bible." I remember just looking at this person and thinking, "He/She does not get it. He/She can't really know Jesus and talk like this." Some months later, Richard visited the web site of Riverside Community Church, an Adventist church which has deliberately marketed itself as Christian with no hint of its Adventism. (It's like those you mentioned in Minnesota, Melissa!) We knew who the pastor was, and Richard became concerned when he saw that the church's statement of beliefs included that the Bible was the inerrant word of God. He emailed the pastor and asked why she (yes, I said "she") had included that statement when the true Adventist position is that it is NOT inerrant. Her reply was a textbook example of relativistic confusion. She said that she does believe the Bible is inerrant. It contains many inconsistencies and outright mistakes, she claimed, which God wanted there. Therefore it IS inerrant. Its mistakes were given by God. (Does that sound faintly reminiscent of EGW? Remember--God held his hand over the error of the 1843 prophecy because he wanted his people to get ready before the REAL date in 1844?) Of course, this pastor doesn't state her understanding of inerrancy on her web site, merely the word "inerrant". It's so typical of the Adventist commitment to good PR and deception. As I said before, I'm more and more amazed at how consistent and reliable the Bible is the more I take it at its word and study it. Praise God for the Bible! Colleen |
