Inspecting Adventism's Beliefs—Unity in the Body of Christ | 113
Colleen and Nikki discuss Adventism's doctrine "Unity In the Body of Christ". The Bible teaches that the church has unity because the Holy Spirit is given to each believer—learn how Adventism distorts this Biblical truth. Transcription by Gwen Billington.
Colleen: Welcome to Former Adventist podcast. I'm Colleen Tinker.
Nikki: And I'm Nikki Stevenson.
Colleen: Last week we looked at Adventism's Fundamental Belief #13, "The Remnant and Its Mission." Today we're going to look at #14, "Unity in the Church." Now, in this belief statement and its explanatory comments in the book Seventh-day Adventists Believe, we realize that Adventism has completely appropriated common Christian language to actually create an inside marketing strategy for Adventist evangelism by using multiple proof-texts and taking phrases out of context. They have compiled a directive for Adventists explaining how they are expected to work together in agreement in order to spread the Adventist message around the world. And we learned last week that that message is the three angels' messages, which is code for having the faith of Jesus, having the commandments of God, which is the Ten Commandments, keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, and having Ellen White's testimonies. While Christians understand that the Body of Christ is unified by the Holy Spirit as He teaches the church biblical doctrines through the gifts of pastors, teachers, evangelists for the building up of the Body, Adventism uses those same texts and words to push its members into compliance with SDA beliefs. Before we look at the doctrine, though, we want to remind you that we love hearing from you. Please write to us at formeradventist@gmail.com. You can go to proclamationmagazine.com to sign up for our weekly email magazine and to find links to our FAF YouTube channel, our online magazines, and also this podcast. Please follow us on Facebook and Instagram, and we'd love it if you'd give us a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts, to help spread the podcast to new listeners. And now, Nikki, before we read this doctrine, I have a question.
Nikki: Okay.
Colleen: As an Adventist, what did you think it meant to be unified with the church?
Nikki: Walking in step with what they teach.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: That was my understanding of being unified with them.
Colleen: That was me too, and I believed the church was Adventism –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – even though I understood that there was a bigger church that started at Pentecost, but it was like the pre-church.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: It was like the lead-up to Adventism, and now we are the church and we have to be unified in our doctrines. Which was interesting because was your experience that the church, Adventism, was unified?
Nikki: Not my experience, no. No. When I was younger, I thought we all believed the same stuff, but as I got older I saw. Well, and especially as I traveled between New England and the West Coast –
Colleen: Interesting.
Nikki: – it was like, whoa, this is very different, depending on where you live, depending on how much money you make, what you do for a living –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – all of these factors change the way Adventism is expressed.
Colleen: True.
Nikki: But even still, if I had a question or if there was something I didn't understand, I would go to an Adventist who was older than me and I would say, "What do we believe about this?"
Colleen: Interesting.
Nikki: Or, "What did Ellen say about that?" So really, it was about learning what they teach –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – and then owning that and carrying it into the world.
Colleen: I had the same idea. And if I were pressed, I might have said, "Well, there are some specifics I'm not really sure about," but there were other things that I was really sure mattered, primarily the Sabbath.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: I felt like the health message also mattered, and I felt that Ellen White mattered in some way. I didn't know if I could call her a prophet all the time, but she still mattered. She was at least a godly leader that God had sent us. So there were essentials that I believed were always important and were part of what we had to carry to the world.
Nikki: Yeah, I had that same experience, and they seemed so obvious to me: Well, duh, don't eat animal flesh. That's not good.
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: And, Adam and Eve didn't do that, so why should we? Or, duh, the Sabbath is right there in the middle of the Decalogue –
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: – so these things are obviously right. So I just fell in line.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: I didn't know as much as really important people knew, and so my job was to do what they said and believe what they told me.
Colleen: Well, you certainly were doing what they wanted you to do.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: So why don't we read this doctrine, which I find to be a really interesting doctrine. When you think about churches having statements of faith, something like this would not show up.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: But go ahead and read it, and we'll do a little bit of an overview of this and then give our assessment.
Nikki: Okay. So this is Fundamental Belief #14, "Unity in the Body of Christ." "The church is one body with many members, called from every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. In Christ we are a new creation; distinctions of race, culture, learning, and nationality, and differences between high and low, rich and poor, male and female, must not be divisive among us. We are all equal in Christ, who by one Spirit has bonded us into one Fellowship with Him and with one another; we are to serve and be served without partiality or reservation. Through the revelation of Jesus Christ in the Scriptures we share the same faith and hope, and reach out in one witness to all. This unity has its source in the oneness of the triune God, who has adopted us as His children."
Colleen: So is there anything in the statement of this belief that raises a yellow flag for you?
Nikki: Well, you know, like you mentioned, this comes after the fundamental belief on The Remnant and Its Mission.
Colleen: [Laughter.] Yeah.
Nikki: And the remnant is Adventism –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – and the mission is to propagate their interpretation of the three angels' messages. And so here they talk about the Body of Christ as reaching out in one witness to all. This witness can only mean the three angels' messages –
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: – that they just taught.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: So by logical conclusion, the Body of Christ is made up of those who are Adventist.
Colleen: That's right.
Nikki: And it makes sense, when you know that they teach that the remnant 144,000 are Seventh-day Adventists.
Colleen: Yes. Related to that, near the end of this doctrine, it says, "Through the revelation of Jesus Christ in the Scriptures we share the same faith and hope, and reach out in one witness to all." Well, the revelation of Jesus Christ in the Scriptures, according to Adventism, is that three angels' messages. But the interesting thing is that the unity of the church, of the true church described in Scripture, is the unity of the Spirit who indwells all the believers and who raises up pastors, teachers, evangelists to strengthen the Body so it has unity in doctrine.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: This is code for people are being united in the understanding that Adventism has. It's not being united the way Scripture describes it, but it's very cleverly worded, so it would be hard to tear that apart if you hadn't looked in detail at the previous fundamental belief.
Nikki: Right. This has no relationship to the unity we see in Ephesians 2 –
Colleen: No.
Nikki: – where believers are raised from death and created new in Christ.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: That Christ has broken down the barrier between Jew and Gentile and created in Himself one new man. That's our unity.
Colleen: Yeah, that is.
Nikki: And Colossians says to keep that unity that is a monergistic work of God –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – to keep that in the bonds of peace. It doesn't say create that unity.
Colleen: Right. No.
Nikki: It talks about how to treat it.
Colleen: That's a really great point. The unity is given to us when we believe. Haven't you noticed that, Nikki? That since being born again you sense the Holy Spirit in other believers, and there is an instant bond.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: Even if you don't agree in every little detail of life and how to live and getting along, you have a bond with believers. You know your sisters and brothers.
Nikki: Yeah, all those differences go away when you talk about the Lord.
Colleen: Yeah, exactly. Well, there are a few key points in this chapter that we want to mention. We're not going to rehash everything they say in this chapter that's false or misleading because we spent a lot of time doing that on the previous fundamental belief. And basically, the underlying assumption is the same as the previous chapter.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: "The church" is Adventism. They must carry out their message of the three angels' messages. But there are some places where they make some really kind of significant and glaring assumptions or statements, and we're just going to touch on them. And the first one that I noticed was on the second page of this doctrine, where they're making a case that Jesus has this great concern for the unity of the church. And it says, "So even in the Garden of Gethsemane the main thing on Christ's mind was the unity of His church – those who had come 'out of the world,'" and they cite John 17:6. And they go on to say, "He pleaded with His Father for a unity in the church similar to that which the Godhead experienced. I pray 'that they all [His followers] may be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I in you; that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.'" And again, John 17:21. I did a double-take when I read that. And I went back and looked at John 17, and it's true. This did not happen in the Garden of Gethsemane. This was not what Jesus was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. John 17 is the last part of His upper room discourse, which began, actually, in chapter 14, where He's celebrated the Last Supper with them, He comforts His disciples, He explains that He's going to send the Holy Spirit, He tells them what the role of the Holy Spirit will be, He does the vine and the branches discourse, He talks about the disciples' relationship to each other and their relationships to the world. Then He talks to them about the Holy Spirit coming to convict the world of sin, of righteousness and judgment. He tells about His death and resurrection. He foretells that. And finally we come to chapter 17, where Jesus prays this really famous prayer, but this is what this book is saying happened in the Garden of Gethsemane. But look at the very first verse of chapter 17: "Jesus spoke these things," referring to all of these previous things He's said in chapters 14, 15, and 16. "Jesus spoke these things; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, 'Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son, that the Son may glorify you.'" And then He goes through the whole chapter, which is quoted here in the book, and at the first verse of chapter 18, this is what John says, "When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with His disciples over the ravine of the Kidron, where there was a garden, in which He entered with His disciples." This prayer for the unity of the church was not what Jesus was doing in Gethsemane. This was before He went to Gethsemane. What was He doing in Gethsemane?
Nikki: He was preparing to go to the cross.
Colleen: And He was struggling. That's where He prayed, "Father, if it's your will, let this cup pass from me." And you know, as an Adventist, I thought that just kind of was referring to the agony of being crucified, which undoubtedly was part of it. But what was Jesus really facing as He went to the cross.
Nikki: Separation from His Father.
Colleen: Yes. He was going to become sin for us. He took our sins in His body to the cross, and He experienced the wrath of God for the sins of humanity. That was the cup He was begging the Lord to take from Him, if it was the Father's will, but He submitted. It wasn't the prayer for unity. And I just want to point that out because that's kind of a glaring error that I think is kind of a common belief among Adventists.
Nikki: So, if they can be so careless with their use of Scripture and publish that in their fundamental doctrines, and no one in the organization has caught this –
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: – it gives us just a little picture of how insignificant Scripture is in the big scheme of holding together the whole worldview.
Colleen: Great point. Now, Nikki, you were talking to me about how distressed you were about the ways they misrepresented the Trinity in this chapter. Do you want to walk through a few of those?
Nikki: Yeah. You know, what I noticed in this chapter is they started pulling language from previous chapters. And in this chapter they don't explain it, they assume you know what they're talking about, so it's just kind of tucked in here, and you have to remember what they've already taught and put that in its place. And so when they talk about the Holy Spirit in earlier chapters, they refer to Him as the Spirit of Christ. And they do it again here.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: They say, "The Holy Spirit, the 'Spirit of Christ' in the midst of the Body of Christ, is the cohesive power and presence that keeps each segment unified. As the 'Spirit of Christ' and the 'Spirit of truth,' the Holy Spirit brings about unity." Well, remember earlier in this book, way back on page 74, they taught us that Jesus sent His Spirit to be in the world because God the Son cannot be omnipresent.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: They said, "Cumbered with humanity, the man Jesus was not omnipresent, which was why it was expedient that He depart. Through the Spirit He [Jesus] could be everywhere all the time." So we have that anti-Trinity, antitrinitarian idea –
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: – laced throughout this in different places without explanation.
Colleen: Yes, assuming that the members who read this will know what they mean, and indeed, they will.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: But outsiders who might stumble across this book would be deceived.
Nikki: And they also talk about the "the truth as it is in Jesus," and we've learned from previous chapters that that essentially means spiritual experiences apart from Scripture –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – that are given to you by God.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: And so, their language, that they don't flesh out now, because we've moved through enough, they assume you know what they're talking about, you just see that cultic language in there –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – that changes the meaning, if you don't remember what they were trying to say before.
Colleen: Plus it sounds so pious.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: You know, they threw another sentence in here too that I think is really important to mention because this is a point that Ellen White has made a big deal about. Adventists understand this, Ellen White taught it, but the Christian world doesn't really know that Adventism believes this. Now, this is found on page 211 of this particular fundamental belief, and here's the paragraph: "As this truth as it is in Jesus dwells in the heart" – and you've already talked about that "as it is in Jesus." That's an Adventist phrase meaning all these doctrines as it's exemplified in Jesus and as you are convicted of it by His extrabiblical experience in you. – "it will refine, elevate, and purify the life, eliminating all prejudice and friction." Well, first of all, let me just say this, we've already learned, as you said, in Ephesians 2 that we are made one new man, and Ephesians 4, one new man in Christ because of what Jesus did on the cross. He made one new man in Himself. We don't eliminate prejudice and friction. We submit to the Lord and allow His view of one another to become ours. They go on: "The believer may grow up into Christ, his living Head. It is not the work of a moment, but that of a lifetime." And here it comes, "By growing daily in the divine life, he will not attain to the full stature of a perfect man in Christ until his probation ceases. The growing is a continuous work. Men with fiery passions have a constant conflict of self, but the harder the battle, the more glorious will be the victory and the eternal reward." This is classic Ellen. That is a quote from Ellen, and she insists that everybody in Adventism is on probation, because the Investigative Judgment is not yet over. So once a person claims to believe in Jesus, accepts the tenets of Adventism, he is then being subjected to the ongoing investigation, supposedly, of Jesus in the heavenly sanctuary as they go through his works and see if he's confessed all his sins. This is probation, and she calls it probation. And all Adventists that I know believe they're on some kind of probation. They have no assurance that they can be saved.
Nikki: Well, and she says here basically that growing up into Christ is the work of a lifetime. Well, that's not what Scripture says.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: We are created new in Christ in a moment –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – and it's God's work.
Colleen: We don't grow up into Christ; we're placed in Christ as an act of God, and He completes what He begins in us.
Nikki: One of the things that stood out to me in this section, the section is called "The Achievement of Unity," and it has several subsections. But they have five areas where you have these steps to unity.
Colleen: Oh, sounds like Steps to Christ.
Nikki: Yes, it does. So the first one is "Unity in the home." The second they say, "Aim for unity." The third, "Work together toward a common goal." The fourth, "Develop a global perspective." And the fifth, "Avoid attitudes that divide." And it really did remind me of Steps to Christ.
Colleen: Oh, yes.
Nikki: It's something that we obtain through this specific method. We grow up into Christ, we work to achieve unity. But Scripture says we're unified in Christ by the Holy Spirit and then tells us how to treat that unity.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: We don't create it.
Colleen: And you know, I have to say, one of the things that they said in this list of five, that first one, unity in the home?
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And they actually said, "If we learn wise management, kindness, gentleness, patience and love with the cross as its center, at home, we will be able to carry these principles out in the church." And again, it reminds me of what I read from Ellen White long ago that caused me so much distress, that the wife and the mother in the home is supposed to be quiet and patient and a source of calm. And you know, I've always been a little bit emotional and reactive, and I felt like that was a role I could never achieve. Calm, patient, quiet; if the family unity depended on my being that kind of woman, well, there was no hope. [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: All to say, this is not biblical unity, and there are no steps to unity.
Nikki: But I have to say, Colleen, they've done a pretty good job learning how to counterfeit this.
Colleen: Yes, they have.
Nikki: And the steps that they provide and the ways that they play that out in their life really has deceived a lot of people.
Colleen: Yes, it has.
Nikki: This was interesting to me. Under one of these steps here, it's the third one, "Work toward a common goal," they say, "In His ministry Christ melded together the restoration of the soul and the restoration of the body. And when He sent His disciples on their mission He insisted on a similar emphasis: preaching and healing. So Christ's church must carry on both the work of preaching – the ministry of the word – and medical missionary work."
Colleen: And there you have it. And that's where Loma Linda gets its mission statement, which includes carrying on the preaching and healing ministry of Jesus. And the Bible never asked us to do that.
Nikki: Well, they say here, "Neither of these phases of God's work is to be carried out independently or become all-absorbing." So you cannot give the ministry of the word independent of medical missionary work.
Colleen: That explains a lot of self-styled self-supporting Adventists that I know, including institutions like Weimar –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – and Wildwood.
Nikki: And isn't it interesting that when you talk to Christians who don't really know Adventism very well, they'll say, "Oh, but they've got all those hospitals, and they do all that good." Or, "My doctor is an Adventist." It always goes back to the way that they live out their religion in the world –
Colleen: That's true.
Nikki: – serving other people by these means. I think of what you've shared with me. I don't think I heard Gary say this, but you've shared before on the podcast too that he said, "The most dangerous man is a highly moral man" –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – "who doesn't need Jesus."
Colleen: Yes. Yes. I'll never forget him saying that at one of the FAF retreats years ago. That is such a good description of the public face of Adventism. Now, behind the scenes, I have to differ. It is not a moral organization. There's so much deception and jockeying for position and misuse of funds and people even.
Nikki: And power.
Colleen: And power. But the fact is, they have presented that really clean-cut, humanitarian front to the world. They have ADRA, who goes throughout the world, who has contracts with governments to bring wells and food and medicines all over the world, where it's needed. So it has a really prevalent humanitarian front. But it is not a moral organization behind the scenes. But it's accomplishing its goal of pushing forward its agenda.
Nikki: Yeah, and we would never say that there's anything wrong with helping humanity.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: But that's not what's at stake here. God used Egypt to provide for His people. He used Egypt to protect and provide for His own Son –
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: – when He was just a child. He can use unfaithful, unbelieving people and things to provide for those who need His provision.
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: But they're peddling a false gospel.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And they're teaching a false unity, and it's all to carry this golden calf of the great controversy worldview.
Colleen: That's right, which has Sabbath at its core, a false symbol of salvation, a false symbol of loyalty to God. It isa false gospel, and I just want to say, this whole chapter dedicated to the unity of the church, that's another false statement. Adventism is not part of God's church. It is not part of the Body of Christ because it doesn't have the gospel of the Lord Jesus at its core. Its members are not, by and large, born-again believers. There may be some involved in it who are born-again, but God will bring His own people fully into the light.
Nikki: As they begin to conclude this chapter, they talk about having a global perspective. They say, "A church is not exhibiting true unity unless it is actively building up God's work in all parts of the earth." And they talk about how we achieve this unity. They say, "To achieve unity of judgment, purpose, and action believers of different nationalities must mingle and serve together." And as I read that, you know, we live here right next to Loma Linda.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: There are a lot of Adventist churches here.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And I decided I would just do a search for some of these churches because I know that they have churches that are just for specific nationalities.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: They have a Samoan group, two Spanish groups, an All Nations African group, an Indonesian group, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Romanian, Vietnamese. They have all these different groups that are segregated, doing their worship services in their own languages, with their own food and their own people, and they rarely mingle.
Colleen: That's true.
Nikki: And we've actually encountered some people who are leaving Adventism whose parents go to some of these churches, some of these groups.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And there's a language barrier.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: Even though they've lived here for a long time –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – there's a language barrier, and so they're insulated into these segregated groups where the only thing they understand is what their organization is teaching them.
Colleen: That's such a great point. And speaking of that, Adventism is characterized by its somewhat less well known but defining regional conferences in the United States, in North America.
Nikki: Can you talk about that because I didn't know what that was until I left.
Colleen: Regional conferences are like the shadow conferences. For example, we have the North Pacific Union Conference; we have the Pacific Union Conference; we have the Mid-America Conference. But then, especially in the South and in the East, we have things called regional conferences, such as the Allegheny Conference. These regional conferences originally were for Black Adventism. They had presidents, vice presidents, departmental secretaries, and they had organized Black Adventism into its own conferences, and those still exist today. In the West Coast – and you've read this list of churches, supposedly, this list of congregations in our area that are characterized by different ethnic groups – that's in the West, which has never had regional conferences. Adventism in the West has always been more integrated than Adventism in the South and in the East of the United States, but these things still exist. And we've talked about this before on this podcast, but if you haven't read it, on our blog if you go to proclamationmagazine.com and do a search for the article entitled "Adventism's Racist Leanings Ignored in Charlottesville," you will find an article in which we talked about the regional conferences and the historic segregation of Adventism between Black Adventism and White Adventism. Even today, Oakwood University in Alabama is considered the Black university. Now, they wouldn't deny access to White students, but it is primarily known as the center for Black Adventism to become educated, in Adventist secondary schools. So in spite of all this brave talk in this doctrine, they are not unified in the way Christians think of unity. They're segregated, and they are to this day.
Nikki: Now, if you walk into an Adventist group meeting you're going to see different ethnicities there most of the time.
Colleen: Oh, sure, um-hmm.
Nikki: But the fact is, is that the organization promotes this segregation by funding and creating these segregated groups.
Colleen: Yeah. Not everybody wants to worship in a segregated congregation in Adventism, but it exists, and it's accepted. And I was never able to explain that except in a cultural way. But in terms of Scripture, it's not defensible.
Nikki: You know, it seemed very normal to me as an Adventist, "Well, hey, if they want to hang out with their people, that's fine." But you get out of Adventism and you see, in the Body of Christ that's not the norm.
Colleen: That's correct; it's not. Now, one other thing near the end of this chapter that they said that I just had to mention, because it is really quite subtle but profoundly egregious, they end this chapter by saying, "Just as our Lord, the Son of Man, became a brother to every son and daughter of Adam, so we His followers, are called to reach out in unity of mind and mission in a redemptive way to our brothers and sisters from 'every nation, tribe, tongue, and people.'" And I want to say this, Jesus our Lord did not become a brother to every son and daughter of Adam. Scripture teaches something completely different. Hebrews 2:11, where it's explaining why Jesus had to become human, says, "Both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are from one Father; therefore, He is not ashamed to call us His brothers." Now, the point here is we who are sanctified are those who have trusted Jesus and have been born again, "born of God" as John says in John 1:12. Jesus is the brother of those who are born again, who are born of God. He does not call Himself a brother to those who are still in the domain of darkness, who are still in Adam. In fact, both 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5 explain that we are in Adam when we are born, but when we trust Christ we are placed in Christ, we are no longer in Adam. So Jesus is not the brother of every human. He is the Creator, He is the Lord, He is the Savior, but He is not the brother. He is only the brother of those who have been born of God and have the same Father, and Hebrews 2:11 makes that really clear. That's one more way we can see that Adventism does not understand what it's talking about when it tries to claim to be "the church." Now, Nikki, because we've gone through "The Remnant and Its Mission" and because this chapter is really kind of a rehash of Adventist peculiarity, this chapter is more like an inside motivational talk to an organization on how to market itself and sell its product than it is a statement of theology. And because of that, and because of the misrepresentation of itself as the church, we wanted to focus a little bit on what the Bible says about the church and about what you do with groups that are false. You were talking to me before about how struck you were by Jesus' letter to the Laodicean church. Do you want to talk about that a bit?
Nikki: Sure. When I was an Adventist I understood that Ellen White said we were the church at Laodicea. And so I would often visit that portion of Revelation. I would read through it, and it struck me that in this church Jesus is on the outside.
Colleen: Interesting.
Nikki: He's not in the church, He's outside knocking on the door. And He accuses them of not being hot or cold, wishing they would pick a side –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – and saying that He's going to spit them out of His mouth, He's going to reject them. And He says that they claim to be rich, that they're wealthy, they have need of nothing, and they don't know that they're wretched, miserable, poor, blind, naked. This is not a description of a believer.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: A believer's eyes have been opened. They can see. They are not wretched; they are redeemed. They are clothed with the righteousness of Christ. This isn't describing what we would expect of a born-again believer. And He advises them to buy from Him so that they can have all these things that they need, they can have the white garments, and they can be able to see, you know?
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: And He says, beginning in verse 19, "Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with me. He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with me on my throne." So we have this picture of Jesus on the outside of this lukewarm, indifferent church who believes they have no need of anything and they're on track.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: He's calling on them to receive Him. And I remember thinking, How can we be the remnant church and the Laodicean church? [Laughter.]
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: How can we be the ones who are the faithful of the ages, as they call them in this book, and also be the ones who don't have any need of God?
Colleen: I used to wonder that too. And Adventism did identify itself as Laodicea.
Nikki: Yeah, yeah. So it didn't make sense to me. I couldn't put the two together. I remember going to the Former Adventist Conference in 2010 and listening to the gospel for the first time, which is crazy. I was 30. I thought I'd been a Christian my whole life.
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: I'd even read the Bible, but I heard the gospel for the first time that weekend, and like a song that is stuck in your head, I didn't go seeking for it, I hadn't recently read it, but the words "Come out of her my people" were going over and over in my mind as I was watching these faithful teachers take down the façade of Adventism and replace it with truth, and it was overwhelming to me. I knew God was calling me out of a false religion.
Colleen: I remember, as we were leaving, realizing with a shock – I'd always been told that we were being called out of the world to follow God, and I realized with a shock that the world I was called out of was Adventism. It wasn't the truth; it was a dressed up form of the world, and it was overwhelming to me when I realized that. There is a passage in 2 Corinthians that really sums this up, and it was interesting to me that this was part of my older son, Roy's, realization about Adventism. I'm going to read it. It's from 2 Corinthians 6:14-18, and I know it's familiar, but think of this in terms of being a person who has clearly heard the gospel, has seen who Jesus is, and being confronted with what to do with the reality of Jesus compared to staying in Adventism. "Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God has said, 'I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,' says the Lord. 'And do not touch what is unclean; and I will welcome you. And I will be a Father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me,' says the Lord Almighty." And I look at this chapter, "Unity in the Body of Christ," and this entirechapter dedicated to teaching Adventists how to act to imitate the church, how to act to sell their Adventist doctrines to the world, and I think, this is such a deception. It's blasphemous. The reality is that Jesus has finished His work. He came, He became sin for us, He took our sins in His body to the cross, and He died for our sins, He paid the price, He satisfied the wrath of God. He was buried, He was raised on the third day according to Scripture, and He asks us only to believe. And then He asks us to have integrity. "Follow me." "Don't touch what is unclean." "Come out of her." "What fellowship does light have with darkness?" What is darker than using Scripture to pretend that a doctrine of demons is actually God's Word? There's nothing darker than that. God is calling us to have integrity and to follow Him. And if you haven't, if you've heard the gospel and you've seen what Adventism is and you're stuck, look at this passage and follow Jesus.
Nikki: If you have questions or comments for us, write to us at formeradventist@gmail.com. You can visit proclamationmagazine.com to sign up for our weekly emails, and please like us and follow us on Facebook and Instagram, and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts. Join us next week as we look at Fundamental Belief #15 on Baptism.
Colleen: And we'll see you then.
Colleen and Nikki discuss Adventism's doctrine "Unity In the Body of Christ". The Bible teaches that the church has unity because the Holy Spirit is given to each believer—learn how Adventism distorts this Biblical truth. Transcription by Gwen Billington.
Colleen: Welcome to Former Adventist podcast. I'm Colleen Tinker.
Nikki: And I'm Nikki Stevenson.
Colleen: Last week we looked at Adventism's Fundamental Belief #13, "The Remnant and Its Mission." Today we're going to look at #14, "Unity in the Church." Now, in this belief statement and its explanatory comments in the book Seventh-day Adventists Believe, we realize that Adventism has completely appropriated common Christian language to actually create an inside marketing strategy for Adventist evangelism by using multiple proof-texts and taking phrases out of context. They have compiled a directive for Adventists explaining how they are expected to work together in agreement in order to spread the Adventist message around the world. And we learned last week that that message is the three angels' messages, which is code for having the faith of Jesus, having the commandments of God, which is the Ten Commandments, keeping the seventh-day Sabbath, and having Ellen White's testimonies. While Christians understand that the Body of Christ is unified by the Holy Spirit as He teaches the church biblical doctrines through the gifts of pastors, teachers, evangelists for the building up of the Body, Adventism uses those same texts and words to push its members into compliance with SDA beliefs. Before we look at the doctrine, though, we want to remind you that we love hearing from you. Please write to us at formeradventist@gmail.com. You can go to proclamationmagazine.com to sign up for our weekly email magazine and to find links to our FAF YouTube channel, our online magazines, and also this podcast. Please follow us on Facebook and Instagram, and we'd love it if you'd give us a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts, to help spread the podcast to new listeners. And now, Nikki, before we read this doctrine, I have a question.
Nikki: Okay.
Colleen: As an Adventist, what did you think it meant to be unified with the church?
Nikki: Walking in step with what they teach.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: That was my understanding of being unified with them.
Colleen: That was me too, and I believed the church was Adventism –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – even though I understood that there was a bigger church that started at Pentecost, but it was like the pre-church.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: It was like the lead-up to Adventism, and now we are the church and we have to be unified in our doctrines. Which was interesting because was your experience that the church, Adventism, was unified?
Nikki: Not my experience, no. No. When I was younger, I thought we all believed the same stuff, but as I got older I saw. Well, and especially as I traveled between New England and the West Coast –
Colleen: Interesting.
Nikki: – it was like, whoa, this is very different, depending on where you live, depending on how much money you make, what you do for a living –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – all of these factors change the way Adventism is expressed.
Colleen: True.
Nikki: But even still, if I had a question or if there was something I didn't understand, I would go to an Adventist who was older than me and I would say, "What do we believe about this?"
Colleen: Interesting.
Nikki: Or, "What did Ellen say about that?" So really, it was about learning what they teach –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – and then owning that and carrying it into the world.
Colleen: I had the same idea. And if I were pressed, I might have said, "Well, there are some specifics I'm not really sure about," but there were other things that I was really sure mattered, primarily the Sabbath.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: I felt like the health message also mattered, and I felt that Ellen White mattered in some way. I didn't know if I could call her a prophet all the time, but she still mattered. She was at least a godly leader that God had sent us. So there were essentials that I believed were always important and were part of what we had to carry to the world.
Nikki: Yeah, I had that same experience, and they seemed so obvious to me: Well, duh, don't eat animal flesh. That's not good.
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: And, Adam and Eve didn't do that, so why should we? Or, duh, the Sabbath is right there in the middle of the Decalogue –
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: – so these things are obviously right. So I just fell in line.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: I didn't know as much as really important people knew, and so my job was to do what they said and believe what they told me.
Colleen: Well, you certainly were doing what they wanted you to do.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: So why don't we read this doctrine, which I find to be a really interesting doctrine. When you think about churches having statements of faith, something like this would not show up.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: But go ahead and read it, and we'll do a little bit of an overview of this and then give our assessment.
Nikki: Okay. So this is Fundamental Belief #14, "Unity in the Body of Christ." "The church is one body with many members, called from every nation, kindred, tongue, and people. In Christ we are a new creation; distinctions of race, culture, learning, and nationality, and differences between high and low, rich and poor, male and female, must not be divisive among us. We are all equal in Christ, who by one Spirit has bonded us into one Fellowship with Him and with one another; we are to serve and be served without partiality or reservation. Through the revelation of Jesus Christ in the Scriptures we share the same faith and hope, and reach out in one witness to all. This unity has its source in the oneness of the triune God, who has adopted us as His children."
Colleen: So is there anything in the statement of this belief that raises a yellow flag for you?
Nikki: Well, you know, like you mentioned, this comes after the fundamental belief on The Remnant and Its Mission.
Colleen: [Laughter.] Yeah.
Nikki: And the remnant is Adventism –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – and the mission is to propagate their interpretation of the three angels' messages. And so here they talk about the Body of Christ as reaching out in one witness to all. This witness can only mean the three angels' messages –
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: – that they just taught.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: So by logical conclusion, the Body of Christ is made up of those who are Adventist.
Colleen: That's right.
Nikki: And it makes sense, when you know that they teach that the remnant 144,000 are Seventh-day Adventists.
Colleen: Yes. Related to that, near the end of this doctrine, it says, "Through the revelation of Jesus Christ in the Scriptures we share the same faith and hope, and reach out in one witness to all." Well, the revelation of Jesus Christ in the Scriptures, according to Adventism, is that three angels' messages. But the interesting thing is that the unity of the church, of the true church described in Scripture, is the unity of the Spirit who indwells all the believers and who raises up pastors, teachers, evangelists to strengthen the Body so it has unity in doctrine.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: This is code for people are being united in the understanding that Adventism has. It's not being united the way Scripture describes it, but it's very cleverly worded, so it would be hard to tear that apart if you hadn't looked in detail at the previous fundamental belief.
Nikki: Right. This has no relationship to the unity we see in Ephesians 2 –
Colleen: No.
Nikki: – where believers are raised from death and created new in Christ.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: That Christ has broken down the barrier between Jew and Gentile and created in Himself one new man. That's our unity.
Colleen: Yeah, that is.
Nikki: And Colossians says to keep that unity that is a monergistic work of God –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – to keep that in the bonds of peace. It doesn't say create that unity.
Colleen: Right. No.
Nikki: It talks about how to treat it.
Colleen: That's a really great point. The unity is given to us when we believe. Haven't you noticed that, Nikki? That since being born again you sense the Holy Spirit in other believers, and there is an instant bond.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: Even if you don't agree in every little detail of life and how to live and getting along, you have a bond with believers. You know your sisters and brothers.
Nikki: Yeah, all those differences go away when you talk about the Lord.
Colleen: Yeah, exactly. Well, there are a few key points in this chapter that we want to mention. We're not going to rehash everything they say in this chapter that's false or misleading because we spent a lot of time doing that on the previous fundamental belief. And basically, the underlying assumption is the same as the previous chapter.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: "The church" is Adventism. They must carry out their message of the three angels' messages. But there are some places where they make some really kind of significant and glaring assumptions or statements, and we're just going to touch on them. And the first one that I noticed was on the second page of this doctrine, where they're making a case that Jesus has this great concern for the unity of the church. And it says, "So even in the Garden of Gethsemane the main thing on Christ's mind was the unity of His church – those who had come 'out of the world,'" and they cite John 17:6. And they go on to say, "He pleaded with His Father for a unity in the church similar to that which the Godhead experienced. I pray 'that they all [His followers] may be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I in you; that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.'" And again, John 17:21. I did a double-take when I read that. And I went back and looked at John 17, and it's true. This did not happen in the Garden of Gethsemane. This was not what Jesus was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. John 17 is the last part of His upper room discourse, which began, actually, in chapter 14, where He's celebrated the Last Supper with them, He comforts His disciples, He explains that He's going to send the Holy Spirit, He tells them what the role of the Holy Spirit will be, He does the vine and the branches discourse, He talks about the disciples' relationship to each other and their relationships to the world. Then He talks to them about the Holy Spirit coming to convict the world of sin, of righteousness and judgment. He tells about His death and resurrection. He foretells that. And finally we come to chapter 17, where Jesus prays this really famous prayer, but this is what this book is saying happened in the Garden of Gethsemane. But look at the very first verse of chapter 17: "Jesus spoke these things," referring to all of these previous things He's said in chapters 14, 15, and 16. "Jesus spoke these things; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, 'Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son, that the Son may glorify you.'" And then He goes through the whole chapter, which is quoted here in the book, and at the first verse of chapter 18, this is what John says, "When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with His disciples over the ravine of the Kidron, where there was a garden, in which He entered with His disciples." This prayer for the unity of the church was not what Jesus was doing in Gethsemane. This was before He went to Gethsemane. What was He doing in Gethsemane?
Nikki: He was preparing to go to the cross.
Colleen: And He was struggling. That's where He prayed, "Father, if it's your will, let this cup pass from me." And you know, as an Adventist, I thought that just kind of was referring to the agony of being crucified, which undoubtedly was part of it. But what was Jesus really facing as He went to the cross.
Nikki: Separation from His Father.
Colleen: Yes. He was going to become sin for us. He took our sins in His body to the cross, and He experienced the wrath of God for the sins of humanity. That was the cup He was begging the Lord to take from Him, if it was the Father's will, but He submitted. It wasn't the prayer for unity. And I just want to point that out because that's kind of a glaring error that I think is kind of a common belief among Adventists.
Nikki: So, if they can be so careless with their use of Scripture and publish that in their fundamental doctrines, and no one in the organization has caught this –
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: – it gives us just a little picture of how insignificant Scripture is in the big scheme of holding together the whole worldview.
Colleen: Great point. Now, Nikki, you were talking to me about how distressed you were about the ways they misrepresented the Trinity in this chapter. Do you want to walk through a few of those?
Nikki: Yeah. You know, what I noticed in this chapter is they started pulling language from previous chapters. And in this chapter they don't explain it, they assume you know what they're talking about, so it's just kind of tucked in here, and you have to remember what they've already taught and put that in its place. And so when they talk about the Holy Spirit in earlier chapters, they refer to Him as the Spirit of Christ. And they do it again here.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: They say, "The Holy Spirit, the 'Spirit of Christ' in the midst of the Body of Christ, is the cohesive power and presence that keeps each segment unified. As the 'Spirit of Christ' and the 'Spirit of truth,' the Holy Spirit brings about unity." Well, remember earlier in this book, way back on page 74, they taught us that Jesus sent His Spirit to be in the world because God the Son cannot be omnipresent.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: They said, "Cumbered with humanity, the man Jesus was not omnipresent, which was why it was expedient that He depart. Through the Spirit He [Jesus] could be everywhere all the time." So we have that anti-Trinity, antitrinitarian idea –
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: – laced throughout this in different places without explanation.
Colleen: Yes, assuming that the members who read this will know what they mean, and indeed, they will.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: But outsiders who might stumble across this book would be deceived.
Nikki: And they also talk about the "the truth as it is in Jesus," and we've learned from previous chapters that that essentially means spiritual experiences apart from Scripture –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – that are given to you by God.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: And so, their language, that they don't flesh out now, because we've moved through enough, they assume you know what they're talking about, you just see that cultic language in there –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – that changes the meaning, if you don't remember what they were trying to say before.
Colleen: Plus it sounds so pious.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: You know, they threw another sentence in here too that I think is really important to mention because this is a point that Ellen White has made a big deal about. Adventists understand this, Ellen White taught it, but the Christian world doesn't really know that Adventism believes this. Now, this is found on page 211 of this particular fundamental belief, and here's the paragraph: "As this truth as it is in Jesus dwells in the heart" – and you've already talked about that "as it is in Jesus." That's an Adventist phrase meaning all these doctrines as it's exemplified in Jesus and as you are convicted of it by His extrabiblical experience in you. – "it will refine, elevate, and purify the life, eliminating all prejudice and friction." Well, first of all, let me just say this, we've already learned, as you said, in Ephesians 2 that we are made one new man, and Ephesians 4, one new man in Christ because of what Jesus did on the cross. He made one new man in Himself. We don't eliminate prejudice and friction. We submit to the Lord and allow His view of one another to become ours. They go on: "The believer may grow up into Christ, his living Head. It is not the work of a moment, but that of a lifetime." And here it comes, "By growing daily in the divine life, he will not attain to the full stature of a perfect man in Christ until his probation ceases. The growing is a continuous work. Men with fiery passions have a constant conflict of self, but the harder the battle, the more glorious will be the victory and the eternal reward." This is classic Ellen. That is a quote from Ellen, and she insists that everybody in Adventism is on probation, because the Investigative Judgment is not yet over. So once a person claims to believe in Jesus, accepts the tenets of Adventism, he is then being subjected to the ongoing investigation, supposedly, of Jesus in the heavenly sanctuary as they go through his works and see if he's confessed all his sins. This is probation, and she calls it probation. And all Adventists that I know believe they're on some kind of probation. They have no assurance that they can be saved.
Nikki: Well, and she says here basically that growing up into Christ is the work of a lifetime. Well, that's not what Scripture says.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: We are created new in Christ in a moment –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – and it's God's work.
Colleen: We don't grow up into Christ; we're placed in Christ as an act of God, and He completes what He begins in us.
Nikki: One of the things that stood out to me in this section, the section is called "The Achievement of Unity," and it has several subsections. But they have five areas where you have these steps to unity.
Colleen: Oh, sounds like Steps to Christ.
Nikki: Yes, it does. So the first one is "Unity in the home." The second they say, "Aim for unity." The third, "Work together toward a common goal." The fourth, "Develop a global perspective." And the fifth, "Avoid attitudes that divide." And it really did remind me of Steps to Christ.
Colleen: Oh, yes.
Nikki: It's something that we obtain through this specific method. We grow up into Christ, we work to achieve unity. But Scripture says we're unified in Christ by the Holy Spirit and then tells us how to treat that unity.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: We don't create it.
Colleen: And you know, I have to say, one of the things that they said in this list of five, that first one, unity in the home?
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And they actually said, "If we learn wise management, kindness, gentleness, patience and love with the cross as its center, at home, we will be able to carry these principles out in the church." And again, it reminds me of what I read from Ellen White long ago that caused me so much distress, that the wife and the mother in the home is supposed to be quiet and patient and a source of calm. And you know, I've always been a little bit emotional and reactive, and I felt like that was a role I could never achieve. Calm, patient, quiet; if the family unity depended on my being that kind of woman, well, there was no hope. [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: All to say, this is not biblical unity, and there are no steps to unity.
Nikki: But I have to say, Colleen, they've done a pretty good job learning how to counterfeit this.
Colleen: Yes, they have.
Nikki: And the steps that they provide and the ways that they play that out in their life really has deceived a lot of people.
Colleen: Yes, it has.
Nikki: This was interesting to me. Under one of these steps here, it's the third one, "Work toward a common goal," they say, "In His ministry Christ melded together the restoration of the soul and the restoration of the body. And when He sent His disciples on their mission He insisted on a similar emphasis: preaching and healing. So Christ's church must carry on both the work of preaching – the ministry of the word – and medical missionary work."
Colleen: And there you have it. And that's where Loma Linda gets its mission statement, which includes carrying on the preaching and healing ministry of Jesus. And the Bible never asked us to do that.
Nikki: Well, they say here, "Neither of these phases of God's work is to be carried out independently or become all-absorbing." So you cannot give the ministry of the word independent of medical missionary work.
Colleen: That explains a lot of self-styled self-supporting Adventists that I know, including institutions like Weimar –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – and Wildwood.
Nikki: And isn't it interesting that when you talk to Christians who don't really know Adventism very well, they'll say, "Oh, but they've got all those hospitals, and they do all that good." Or, "My doctor is an Adventist." It always goes back to the way that they live out their religion in the world –
Colleen: That's true.
Nikki: – serving other people by these means. I think of what you've shared with me. I don't think I heard Gary say this, but you've shared before on the podcast too that he said, "The most dangerous man is a highly moral man" –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – "who doesn't need Jesus."
Colleen: Yes. Yes. I'll never forget him saying that at one of the FAF retreats years ago. That is such a good description of the public face of Adventism. Now, behind the scenes, I have to differ. It is not a moral organization. There's so much deception and jockeying for position and misuse of funds and people even.
Nikki: And power.
Colleen: And power. But the fact is, they have presented that really clean-cut, humanitarian front to the world. They have ADRA, who goes throughout the world, who has contracts with governments to bring wells and food and medicines all over the world, where it's needed. So it has a really prevalent humanitarian front. But it is not a moral organization behind the scenes. But it's accomplishing its goal of pushing forward its agenda.
Nikki: Yeah, and we would never say that there's anything wrong with helping humanity.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: But that's not what's at stake here. God used Egypt to provide for His people. He used Egypt to protect and provide for His own Son –
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: – when He was just a child. He can use unfaithful, unbelieving people and things to provide for those who need His provision.
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: But they're peddling a false gospel.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And they're teaching a false unity, and it's all to carry this golden calf of the great controversy worldview.
Colleen: That's right, which has Sabbath at its core, a false symbol of salvation, a false symbol of loyalty to God. It isa false gospel, and I just want to say, this whole chapter dedicated to the unity of the church, that's another false statement. Adventism is not part of God's church. It is not part of the Body of Christ because it doesn't have the gospel of the Lord Jesus at its core. Its members are not, by and large, born-again believers. There may be some involved in it who are born-again, but God will bring His own people fully into the light.
Nikki: As they begin to conclude this chapter, they talk about having a global perspective. They say, "A church is not exhibiting true unity unless it is actively building up God's work in all parts of the earth." And they talk about how we achieve this unity. They say, "To achieve unity of judgment, purpose, and action believers of different nationalities must mingle and serve together." And as I read that, you know, we live here right next to Loma Linda.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: There are a lot of Adventist churches here.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And I decided I would just do a search for some of these churches because I know that they have churches that are just for specific nationalities.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: They have a Samoan group, two Spanish groups, an All Nations African group, an Indonesian group, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Romanian, Vietnamese. They have all these different groups that are segregated, doing their worship services in their own languages, with their own food and their own people, and they rarely mingle.
Colleen: That's true.
Nikki: And we've actually encountered some people who are leaving Adventism whose parents go to some of these churches, some of these groups.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And there's a language barrier.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: Even though they've lived here for a long time –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – there's a language barrier, and so they're insulated into these segregated groups where the only thing they understand is what their organization is teaching them.
Colleen: That's such a great point. And speaking of that, Adventism is characterized by its somewhat less well known but defining regional conferences in the United States, in North America.
Nikki: Can you talk about that because I didn't know what that was until I left.
Colleen: Regional conferences are like the shadow conferences. For example, we have the North Pacific Union Conference; we have the Pacific Union Conference; we have the Mid-America Conference. But then, especially in the South and in the East, we have things called regional conferences, such as the Allegheny Conference. These regional conferences originally were for Black Adventism. They had presidents, vice presidents, departmental secretaries, and they had organized Black Adventism into its own conferences, and those still exist today. In the West Coast – and you've read this list of churches, supposedly, this list of congregations in our area that are characterized by different ethnic groups – that's in the West, which has never had regional conferences. Adventism in the West has always been more integrated than Adventism in the South and in the East of the United States, but these things still exist. And we've talked about this before on this podcast, but if you haven't read it, on our blog if you go to proclamationmagazine.com and do a search for the article entitled "Adventism's Racist Leanings Ignored in Charlottesville," you will find an article in which we talked about the regional conferences and the historic segregation of Adventism between Black Adventism and White Adventism. Even today, Oakwood University in Alabama is considered the Black university. Now, they wouldn't deny access to White students, but it is primarily known as the center for Black Adventism to become educated, in Adventist secondary schools. So in spite of all this brave talk in this doctrine, they are not unified in the way Christians think of unity. They're segregated, and they are to this day.
Nikki: Now, if you walk into an Adventist group meeting you're going to see different ethnicities there most of the time.
Colleen: Oh, sure, um-hmm.
Nikki: But the fact is, is that the organization promotes this segregation by funding and creating these segregated groups.
Colleen: Yeah. Not everybody wants to worship in a segregated congregation in Adventism, but it exists, and it's accepted. And I was never able to explain that except in a cultural way. But in terms of Scripture, it's not defensible.
Nikki: You know, it seemed very normal to me as an Adventist, "Well, hey, if they want to hang out with their people, that's fine." But you get out of Adventism and you see, in the Body of Christ that's not the norm.
Colleen: That's correct; it's not. Now, one other thing near the end of this chapter that they said that I just had to mention, because it is really quite subtle but profoundly egregious, they end this chapter by saying, "Just as our Lord, the Son of Man, became a brother to every son and daughter of Adam, so we His followers, are called to reach out in unity of mind and mission in a redemptive way to our brothers and sisters from 'every nation, tribe, tongue, and people.'" And I want to say this, Jesus our Lord did not become a brother to every son and daughter of Adam. Scripture teaches something completely different. Hebrews 2:11, where it's explaining why Jesus had to become human, says, "Both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are from one Father; therefore, He is not ashamed to call us His brothers." Now, the point here is we who are sanctified are those who have trusted Jesus and have been born again, "born of God" as John says in John 1:12. Jesus is the brother of those who are born again, who are born of God. He does not call Himself a brother to those who are still in the domain of darkness, who are still in Adam. In fact, both 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5 explain that we are in Adam when we are born, but when we trust Christ we are placed in Christ, we are no longer in Adam. So Jesus is not the brother of every human. He is the Creator, He is the Lord, He is the Savior, but He is not the brother. He is only the brother of those who have been born of God and have the same Father, and Hebrews 2:11 makes that really clear. That's one more way we can see that Adventism does not understand what it's talking about when it tries to claim to be "the church." Now, Nikki, because we've gone through "The Remnant and Its Mission" and because this chapter is really kind of a rehash of Adventist peculiarity, this chapter is more like an inside motivational talk to an organization on how to market itself and sell its product than it is a statement of theology. And because of that, and because of the misrepresentation of itself as the church, we wanted to focus a little bit on what the Bible says about the church and about what you do with groups that are false. You were talking to me before about how struck you were by Jesus' letter to the Laodicean church. Do you want to talk about that a bit?
Nikki: Sure. When I was an Adventist I understood that Ellen White said we were the church at Laodicea. And so I would often visit that portion of Revelation. I would read through it, and it struck me that in this church Jesus is on the outside.
Colleen: Interesting.
Nikki: He's not in the church, He's outside knocking on the door. And He accuses them of not being hot or cold, wishing they would pick a side –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – and saying that He's going to spit them out of His mouth, He's going to reject them. And He says that they claim to be rich, that they're wealthy, they have need of nothing, and they don't know that they're wretched, miserable, poor, blind, naked. This is not a description of a believer.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: A believer's eyes have been opened. They can see. They are not wretched; they are redeemed. They are clothed with the righteousness of Christ. This isn't describing what we would expect of a born-again believer. And He advises them to buy from Him so that they can have all these things that they need, they can have the white garments, and they can be able to see, you know?
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: And He says, beginning in verse 19, "Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with me. He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with me on my throne." So we have this picture of Jesus on the outside of this lukewarm, indifferent church who believes they have no need of anything and they're on track.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: He's calling on them to receive Him. And I remember thinking, How can we be the remnant church and the Laodicean church? [Laughter.]
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: How can we be the ones who are the faithful of the ages, as they call them in this book, and also be the ones who don't have any need of God?
Colleen: I used to wonder that too. And Adventism did identify itself as Laodicea.
Nikki: Yeah, yeah. So it didn't make sense to me. I couldn't put the two together. I remember going to the Former Adventist Conference in 2010 and listening to the gospel for the first time, which is crazy. I was 30. I thought I'd been a Christian my whole life.
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: I'd even read the Bible, but I heard the gospel for the first time that weekend, and like a song that is stuck in your head, I didn't go seeking for it, I hadn't recently read it, but the words "Come out of her my people" were going over and over in my mind as I was watching these faithful teachers take down the façade of Adventism and replace it with truth, and it was overwhelming to me. I knew God was calling me out of a false religion.
Colleen: I remember, as we were leaving, realizing with a shock – I'd always been told that we were being called out of the world to follow God, and I realized with a shock that the world I was called out of was Adventism. It wasn't the truth; it was a dressed up form of the world, and it was overwhelming to me when I realized that. There is a passage in 2 Corinthians that really sums this up, and it was interesting to me that this was part of my older son, Roy's, realization about Adventism. I'm going to read it. It's from 2 Corinthians 6:14-18, and I know it's familiar, but think of this in terms of being a person who has clearly heard the gospel, has seen who Jesus is, and being confronted with what to do with the reality of Jesus compared to staying in Adventism. "Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God has said, 'I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,' says the Lord. 'And do not touch what is unclean; and I will welcome you. And I will be a Father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me,' says the Lord Almighty." And I look at this chapter, "Unity in the Body of Christ," and this entirechapter dedicated to teaching Adventists how to act to imitate the church, how to act to sell their Adventist doctrines to the world, and I think, this is such a deception. It's blasphemous. The reality is that Jesus has finished His work. He came, He became sin for us, He took our sins in His body to the cross, and He died for our sins, He paid the price, He satisfied the wrath of God. He was buried, He was raised on the third day according to Scripture, and He asks us only to believe. And then He asks us to have integrity. "Follow me." "Don't touch what is unclean." "Come out of her." "What fellowship does light have with darkness?" What is darker than using Scripture to pretend that a doctrine of demons is actually God's Word? There's nothing darker than that. God is calling us to have integrity and to follow Him. And if you haven't, if you've heard the gospel and you've seen what Adventism is and you're stuck, look at this passage and follow Jesus.
Nikki: If you have questions or comments for us, write to us at formeradventist@gmail.com. You can visit proclamationmagazine.com to sign up for our weekly emails, and please like us and follow us on Facebook and Instagram, and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts. Join us next week as we look at Fundamental Belief #15 on Baptism.
Colleen: And we'll see you then.
