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Well, that's not at all how most would consider liberal vs. conservative, as most don't have any idea what investigative judgement is, but I assume you mean most adventists.
I WILL point out that your list of examples includes a mixture of clear if literal examples from the bible ("homosexuals can be accepted"), inferences from the bible (Paul didn't forbid ordination of women, he forbade them to speak in church, if we take him literally), and things that the bible is completely silent about (the bible itself forbids no style of music, and the biblical dress code, again, if taken literally, is "modesty" and women having their heads covered).
So, it's really not a question of which side follows the bible and which discards it, but of what things each side focuses on and is literal about, and what new inventions each side has created.
Many of the "conservative" Adventist positions are complete neologisms in the biblical context- there's no evidence that the wine Jesus created was grape juice, and nearly all biblical characters ate meat, to use two very obvious examples. The prohibition of drums and bass guitars is also completely an invention that has no relation to the bible. The prohibition on motion picture viewing is also nowhere to be found or even inferred from the bible. Indeed, much of what, in day to day terms, denotes conservative from other Adventists are completely a-biblical ideas.
I fully agree that several "liberal" positions are also contradicted by the Bible, especially if taken literally.
So, perhaps a useful summary is that liberals invent "freedoms" that can't be found in the Bible, and conservatives invent "laws" that can't be found in the Bible.
I'll also point out, of course, that "tradition" isn't given an especailly positive endorsement in the Bible.
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Many positions Adventists have taught are straight from EGW: prohibitions against dancing, card playing (Rook excepted ?), theater, opera, jewelry, corffee, and many other "no-nos" are non biblical and straight from the "authoritative prophet" who had much to say about Adventist practices, a great many could not be directly from the Bible but were instituted by many churches during that period.
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When I was growing up, in the church, the "vegetarian" card game of choice was Uno. I may be dating myself a bit.
Yes, Elaine, I agree that many of these are straight out of EGW (although in some cases, individuals would carry things much further than she herself ever did). Of course, however inspiritational (or even prophetical) EGW may be, she is not the Bible. And my point of course is that we adventists have "found" a host of restrictions that appear no where in the Bible, and indeed, in some cases (prohibiting alcohol is the most striking example) directly contradict an honest reading of the Bible.
Adventists of course aren't alone in this. Many "conservative" (both politically and according to the brother's definition of biblical literalism) also create out of whole clothe positions that are to be found no where in the Bible and get quite extreme about them.
As much as I see the wringing of hands about the mainline churches and their liberalism and flexibility and universalist traits, there's as much danger and (to my eyes) distance from God on the other side. No one can honestly read any one of the gospels, for example, and come away with any acceptance whatsoever with the abomination that is the socalled prosperity gospel.
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I never learned any card games as a SDA growing up.
Once, at the Tenn. boarding school in the 30s (now, I'm really dating myself), some of us girls found some old '20s phonograph records and there was an old phonograph player in our "living room," a wind-up one!
We played some of those old songs and were "dancing" none of us really knew how) and the matron came in, scolded us, took the records and smashed them an removed the phonograph!
The records and dancing were certainly of the devil and he had no place on that campus! Some of the other rules were just as strict--straight out of EGW.ll
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Elaine, takes her negative experience as license to attack everything the SDA church stands for, especially EGW. Of course, she is not alone, and the "liberal" element in Adventism loves to cite examples of extreme applications that may or may not reflect a true biblical view.
Forums like A-tomorrow, A-today, Spectrum....etc, gather these types of "believers" and you huddle together giving each other massive doses of affirmation of the "evils" of Adventism. Various levels of "unbelief" gather and some are so intense they challenge and attack the bible as well.
In the end, all who attack EGW end up attacking the bible. This simply affirms the spiritual unity of her ministry and testimonies and the bible. Elaine's attacks on the Sabbath are pretty typical of the fruit of this spirituality.
Still and all, Elaine's basic spirituality is embraced by much of the mainline church to hold as many as possible in its membership, regardless of biblical doctrine and exhortations by EGW.
If "the church" was on any level "hyper-conservative" in application of law and gospel, and some left the faith on this account, it is nothing compared to the now "hyper-liberal" stance that allows any and all evil in the name of the gospel.
The church's role is like a city set on a hill. Like the ten commandment law, it must be unyielding in demanding the very highest level of spirituality as a fitness for heaven. It must present and hold a standard of holiness that transcends the individual members who attend.
When the church lowers the standard for the sake of patronzing the world and to seek and obtain more members, it has betrayed its trust and mission as God's instrumentality in the world.
Many want to lower the standard to keep their children in the church. What a terrible mistake. All they do is prepare their children for Satan's impersonation of Christ and negate what they had hoped was a good tactic to help their children know the true God.
The true spirituality of the bible Sabbath is the spirituality of the bible itself. Undermine this spirituality, and instead of preparing the children to be loyal to the bible Sabbath, you are simply preparing them to abandon the Sabbath.
This is what much of the SDA church is doing today, and the harvest will be more and more evident in the future when the testing time really comes.
Even now we see the result of it on a smaller scale. And to dumb down the law is also to dumb down the gospel. Each derives its meaning and strength from the other. The atonement is foolishness if sin is superficially interpreted and made less than the bible teaches.
Only when the law is placed in its highest level of application and authority will the gospel have any value or meaning. Apparently, the devil knows this far better than we do, and we allow his influence and false teachings come into the church.
The SDA church is incredibly ignorant of this reality today, and if people really knew what was happening, they would be screaming to the high heavens about the apostacy our leaders are embracing and endorsing.
But, if you can sell "unity" and "you can't judge", as the church is doing today, the devil is winning and will continue to do so, until it is so obvious, some will eventually demand accountability.
Until then, if you are a true believer, all you can do is wait, and protest, and hope and pray more people will "wake up" before it is too late. Sad to say, for many, it will be too late. Freedom means if we reject our accountability, we must and will suffer the consequences. And God will not take away this freedom, even though the results will be devastating to many who fail to understand the implications of this valuable gift.
With freedom comes the highest level of accountability and demands decisions in harmony with the gift. But since it requires a cross, many will abandon the gift for an easy sell religion the patronizes sin and lets people sleep the sleep of death.
Bill Sorensen
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Sorry, Bill, there are some mainstream adventist beliefs that simply cannot be supported by the Bible. I don't think the church is evil or awful, in fact, it's better than most.
And you really are making very massive generalizations about people, based on nothing more than their disagreement with you about this or that particular doctrine. You know nothing about the crosses that Elaine bears, or that I do, or that Old Abe does, or whomever. (I similarly know nothing about yours, but I am not making any claims about them).
As for me, I am critical of what seem to be pretty clearly artificial and extra-biblical standards. The completely false claims that alcohol was not commonly used in the bible, or that vegetarianism is required by the bible. The host of things the bible is completely silent about, and yet become tests of faith for many: much of the "lifestyle" issues that are so often the focus: whether wading vs. swimming is to be allowed on the sabbath, whether one can engage in athletics of any kind, whether one can watch movies, whether one can use drums, whether (and which type of) card games are to be allowed. These are the motes we as a church strain at.
Often EGW is the vehicle for this kind of thinking, but it's hard to blame her. If we had a recording of every shopping list Paul made, and every casual or specific comment he made, there would probably be nearly as much problems arising from his writings as well.
For all of the talk about how being remotely liberal on any of the above points is some abdication of standards, in my experience, we'd be much better off with fewer standards, that are actually upheld. In real life, the people I know who want to recreate an adventist version of the 613 mitzvot would be much better off and much safer with regard to heaven, if they were sincerely trying to obey the ten commandments, or even two big supercommandments.
If I had a dollar for every elder or local saint who railed against the evils of hamburgers or bass guitars or the occasional glass of riesling, who all the while was beating his spouse, or simply cheating on her with some barely adult member of the congregation, I'd be a very wealthy man. The problem is not simply that they fall short, of course they did. The problem is they were convinced that their adherence to the made-up rules somehow gave them some leeway from the Godgiven ones. The proliferation of such homemade rules don't draw us closer to God, they distract from Him and give us a sense of our own holiness.
There. Probably much too long, but I have tried to be specific, or at least give examples of what I see as problems with the ultra-"conservative" (and I don't like this terminology, as I don't see anything conservative about manmade traditions). You have made a lot of general statements about relaxing standards and the like. Do you have particular standards in mind that you feel the church has abandoned, or that "liberal" critics of the church are pushing for abandoning? Do you have disagreement with my characterization of the rules I have described?
I find discussion usually goes better if we are clear about what we are talking about, apologies in advance if any of the above isn't clear.
Anyway.
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Bill
I assume when you say church you really mean denomination and specifically the SDA denomination.They are not one and the same even if one pretends to think so.
Nor am I too cocerned about what any one particular denomination holds as truth. I am however concerned anout denominational doctrines that portray God as an unreasonable tyrant looking for any excuse to doom us all to hell or whatever the perversion is called.
A&E like ourselves had no say in the decision whether or not they would be created, what they would look like( where they really Caucasians 18 feet tall) or their mental capacity.All those decisions were made by a God with complete foreknowledge(so we are told)who knew exactly what would happen.
So where was the sin involved.A&E were placed in a situation where it was only a matter of when not if they would fail the test would be ongoing forever and God already knew the end from the beginning .In other words the pair were preprogrammed to fail.
What I am trying to say is; the fable, myth , story whatever, recorded in the book of Genesis cannot be the real story.It just doesn't stand up to analysis if we assume a loving God with complete foreknowledge.
Life as we know it today is unbelievably cruel.Some say it is the work of the Devil some say not but then again the devil is a creation of God.
I must admit I do not understand it all.But for myself I would rather worship a lesser God one powerlss to do very much about the situation then to worship one that won't. If indeed God has the power to correct the situation here but chooses not to then Kind and loving He aint.
There is a law in nature that says for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.So maybe that is the answer to have existance is to know up and down right and left over and under life and death good and evil.
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Abe said.......
"So where was the sin involved.A&E were placed in a situation where it was only a matter of when not if they would fail the test would be ongoing forever and God already knew the end from the beginning .In other words the pair were preprogrammed to fail.
What I am trying to say is; the fable, myth , story whatever, recorded in the book of Genesis cannot be the real story.It just doesn't stand up to analysis if we assume a loving God with complete foreknowledge."
Abe, you are so typical of the types of people who patronize liberal forums. You have no clue of what the bible teaches in doctrine or application. And I don't chide you for this, only to point out you represent the types who come on A-tomorrow and other forums and moan and complain about basic bible Christanity and attack historic Adventism because we represent the bible.
If you people think EGW was strict in what God requires for salvation, you apparently haven't read the sermon on the Mt., or, you don't have a clue of what Jesus is saying.
He concludes, unless you righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and pharisees, you shall in no way enter heaven.
Now we all recognize the strigent laws and applications the Jews made up. But Jesus points out that God's law transcends these laws in intensity and application and goes far beyond their "civil law" religion that they felt was more than adequate for salvation.
Yet you attack EGW as too strict. Give me a break! I preceive again, you don't read the bible and if you do, you certainly don't understand it. EGW is a "pussy cat" compared to Jesus.
But you want to justify your sinful and world loving ways in the name of the gospel, and hope somehow by affirming each other in your rebellion, you can find peace from an afflicted conscience.
In the end, all you will do is "find yourself on the outside looking in" and admitting to God and everyone else you lied to no one but yourself.
"Be not deceived, God is not mocked."
Bill Sorensen
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Bill
I do not moan about basic Christianity but I do see a irreconcilable difference about Jesus and his life and teaching and that of much of the OT and even Paul.
Assuming that Jesus was God or at least manifested God to mankind there is a serious disconnect between that God directing his people to slaughter man and beast in the OT and Jesus praying for those that crucified Him.
Which is the real God or have we/they only created god in our own image.The more depraved cruel or corrupt we are the more outrageous a god we imagine.
Bill, free will is only an illusion.We are limited in life by our genetic makeup and the environment in which we live.I think if God is how Jesus showed him to be then He will take those limitations into account.I think it is a lot harder to be lost then many of us think.
Fact is the only way one can be lost is by not forgiving others.As the Bible tells us the accuser of the brethern is cast down there is no one to bear witness against us in the judgement.If there is no witness for the prosecution then a case is dismissed.But if we hang onto hate then in the judgement we witness against ourselves.
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Abe, to quote any scriptural concept while denying you believe the bible makes your testimony worthless. Why would we take any scripture seriously unless we take it all seriously?
But like many, you take seriously what suits your fancy and abandon, ignore and/or deny whatever you don't like. This makes the biblical testimony worthless and anyone's opinion about anything is as good as anyone else. Meaning, there is simply no authority to determine truth from error.
Just a thought.
Bill Sorensen
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He concludes, unless you righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and pharisees, you shall in no way enter heaven.
Yes, what exactly is this 'righteousness' that the Pharisees indulged in? It was following the letter of the law while ignoring the LAW. The law of love. It was creating constant 'dos and don'ts' that needed to be followed to be a 'good child' of God. It was making religion a burden to see how good you could be. It was trying so hard to be doctrinally correct and defining sin as actions instead of a state of being that legalism, cold hearted backbiting, gossiping and judging became the norm.
Sounds like most of mainstream conservative SDA to me, Bill.
Now we all recognize the strigent laws and applications the Jews made up. But Jesus points out that God's law transcends these laws in intensity and application and goes far beyond their "civil law" religion that they felt was more than adequate for salvation.Bill Sorensen
That's right. Jesus wasn't about 'dos and don'ts' to make oneself 'righteous' or in the venacular of traditional SDAism, 'safe to save'. He was interested in relationships. He was interested in the love principle that guided all external laws. He was interested in the LAW of love. He was interested in saving us from SIN as opposed to make us strong enough to avoid our sins.
Instead of following these principles, instead of letting go and letting God, instead of surrendering as opposed to 'trying harder', we have made the religion of God just like that of the Pharisees.
And just like the Pharisees, we sit smugly, ignorant of this fact, while pointing fingers at others and wringing our hands at how 'worldly' our church is getting by letting our standards drop and scrutinizing doctrines.
Traditional, conservative Adventism has much more in common with the Pharisees and the midieval Catholic Church than it does with NT biblical Protestantism.
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Old Abe, as I am sure you know, reconciling a good God with much of what happens in this life is an age old problem. I am no wiser than anyone else in this regard, and I suspect no one else here is, either.
I will suggest a book that you might find useful, or at least interesting reading.
It is The Problem of Pain, by CS Lewis. he grapples pretty honestly with this issue, and I found it very helpful for myself.
Here is a brief overview, but it doesn't do the book justice:
http://catholiceducation.org/articles/a … p0032.html
(although it's a catholic site, Lewis wasn't a Catholic. He started out as an atheist converted in adulthood, and was a member of an episcopal church in his native England. But I think he belongs to all Christians).
I am pretty sure the book is widely available. Most libraries should carry it, and I think paperback copies are available at a pretty affordable price.
I found his thinking very helpful for myself, and also for talking to my wife about this issue. (her starting position, in our early years together, was quite similar to yours. Not at all suggesting there's anything wrong with your view, merely that it's possible to move from that view to other views that may be more comfortable/comforting, without giving up intellectual honesty or a realistic view of life).
There are of course a million ways of resolving this issue or leaving it unresolved- and, again, not at all criticising your view, which I am sympathetic with and share to some degree, but I think you might at least find Lewis interesting reading.
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People are correct when they see that the NT is especially about motive to obey. But like all despensationalist, many assume the correct motive somehow does away with the OT form. And this is the heart and soul of despensationalism.
But true historic Protestantism holds no such idea or doctrine of law and gospel. They always claimed that spirit and form, gospel and law, were always in perfect harmony. So, the true biblical motive to obey the law, in no way changed or affected the law or its requirements.
Adventism, in harmony with this confession of faith, points out the form for Sabbath keeping is not Sunday. It remains the 7th day as clearly articulated in the moral law. And the spirit, or motive for obedience is love to God and love to man as any and all forms of law expressed in the OT scriptures.
The charge of legalism is based solely on ignorance of both the bible and the historic confessions of faith in all the Protestant writings.
The investigative judgment as a system of theology, is no more legalism than the exhortation "thou shalt not kill". No spiritual minded SDA thinks they can merit heaven by keeping the Sabbath according to the commandment, than to obey the injunction "Thou shalt not steal".
Now we must either impute ignorance to those who oppose EGW and the historic SDA faith, or blatant rebellion against God and His kingdom. It is far more Christian to impute ignorance than rebellion. And thus we assume all fair minded, truth seeking, bible believing Christians will eventually see their error and repent.
In the end, we understand the seventh day Sabbath and the bible itself are so closely tied together, those who abandon the bible Sabbath will necessarily finally confess they do not believe or follow the bible.
Just as Rome, in conflict with the reformation, eventually admitted they did not consider the bible the only rule of faith and practice, and claimed "the church" was enlightened above and beyond the bible and thus held supreme authority over and above the bible in the church community and in the world.
With this in mind, we can defend our biblical position and allow individuals to make decisions according their own understanding. Knowing they must eventually accept the bible Sabbath, or, abandon the bible.
Bill Sorensen
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Bill, read what Christ said Himself that He fulfilled, completed, and made obsolete:
Luke 24: 44He said to them, "This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms."
45Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. 46He told them, "This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 48You are witnesses of these things. 49I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high."
Tom, this sure looks like a change, certainly not business as usual!!!
Last edited by bob_2 (10-11-10 10:57 pm)
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"Bill, read what Christ said Himself that He fulfilled, completed, and made obsolete:"
Bob, biblical concepts are not written in a vacuum. You wrest this idea from its true biblical meaning and then apply a meaning totally foreign to the bible. Jesus contrasts the ceremonial law with His own intercession and ministry in heaven. But you try to use this passage as refering to the moral law. In this, "You greatly error" (Jesus).
There is no flowing continuity in your despensational theology. But many will agree with you, so you apparenty have little concern as to whether you are convoluting the bible or not. None the less, in the end, you will eventually see your mistake and repent,or, you will abandon the bible.
I know this for a fact, because history is an infallible teacher. Many today see they can not harmonize their views with the bible, and many begin to attack the bible instead of repent. I would hope better things for you.
Bill Sorensen
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Bill, sorry, but since when is quoting scripture abandoning Scrpture. Read Eph 2:11-22 and ask what were the differences between Jews and Gentiles that are broken down. Your catagorizing ceremonial, civic and moral is not Biblical. Just ask any Jew if you can or should break down it like that, or what they expected Gentiles to do that were not within their Jewish camp.
Bill, I appreciate your remarks but when you start talking judgementally, I take exception. Let's stick to explicit Biblical texts and not implicit concepts.
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Bob said.....
"Your catagorizing ceremonial, civic and moral is not Biblical."
This statement is a total novelty that came into Christanity the last few decades. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the clear distinction between these various aspects of "the law".
We have laws in American society that pretain to various functions of life and activities. They don't all function the same way. Some regulate traffic control, some pretain to the tax system, some are simply social. Some laws even govern the relationship between church and state, some define family government vs. civil government.
To claim there was no distinction in the various laws that governed Israel is almost childish. Like many other societies, they had health laws, civil laws, religious laws.....etc.
To claim that the ceremonial law that typified the ministry of Christ, His death, and priestly intercession in heaven, can not be distinguished from the moral law of 10 commandments, and state they both had exactly the same function is clearly wrong.
Now it is true, that all laws and types of law have a unified function as a "schoolmaster" to lead us to Christ. But to take this singular and unified function on a given level, and then claim there is no other function for "law" than this is wrong.
The ceremonial law had this singular and given function that was terminated at the coming of Jesus. But the moral law and many other laws have an ongoing application and function that a despensationalist would like to deny. This error is the mother of many other errors that convolute and undermine the bible and God's kingdom.
In this, the ceremonial law was unique, for it had a singular purpose that terminiated with the Christ event. Some must so, that it was an unpardonable sin to blaspheme the temple service and attack this form of worship. To abandon it was idolatry.
In the new covenant age, it is an unpardonable sin to continue it and is equally equated with idolatry. See Heb. 10. Especially vs. 26-30.
We can study this issue as two laws that make up a complete whole. Or, we can call it one law divided into two parts. The important thing is the conclusion we come to as we consider the implications of our conclusions.
If we conclude the moral law of 10 commandments are no longer binding on the Christian community, we have come to a faulty conclusion that the bible will not support nor agree to. And this is the real issue in all the discussions of "the law".
Bill Sorensen
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Let me interject another thought:
. . I am a third generation SDA. We have started a new Sabbath School class in our Grand Junction church. I have for some time felt uncomfortable with the fact that we come to SS and Church, we discuss the lesson in SS, and we listen to the sermon in church. Then we go home and have a nice dinner. We might visit friends, attend a Bible study class, or go for a hike in nature.
THEN ..... we feel that we have done our "duty" and are good Adventists!!
Is this what it is all about? Will this hasten the coming of our Lord? Are we fulfilling Jesus' direct command to "go, teach, and baptize?" NO! NO! NO!
Well we can't continue to sit around, so we have started a new SS class that will emphasize witnessing. The first half hour is dedicated to the lesson. The next half hour is to discuss our experiences in witnessing, learn new ideas of how to witness, and to testify of what God has done for us personally.
This class is just starting. More news later. (This is from the "Adventist Online" forum)
I'll admit, discussing theology is fun, but in the end it will not get us where we want to go. I do believe that Christians must be knowledgeable about Bible Doctrine. Our mistake is that we think we have had a "religious experience" if we have talked about it. Using a medical analogy, we must complete the "neuro-muscular circuit" and go out and do something about it.
Hubert F. Sturges
www.theeverlastingcovenant.com
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Hubb,
We should be more creative with our Sabbath habits. In many areas, it would be better to have a crew of able-bodied individuals offering to help poor by preparing food in a community kitchen; painting the houses of those widows unable to do so; caring for children so a mother could have a few hours freedom from full-time work and mothering; tutor children who are not scholastically up to speed. Those are just a few ideas that would be much more helpful than "talking about our witnessing" and actually performing a public witness. We would not, nor should advertise our church unless asked.
There are endless ways of doing as Jesus did on Sabbath--helping those in need. Attending church is merely a spectator sport and no better than sitting for hours during a ball game. Yes, Jesus went into the synagogue on some sabbaths (we do not know if everyone) but many sabbaths he performed healing which was a way of showing how we should do the same. Endlessly discussing the fine points of Adventist doctrine has no benefit to anyone, if we all are in accord. It's simply the amen corner--useless. Active Christianity is what is needed, not simply head knowledge.
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Elaine
Your suggestions sound a lot like Tom Norris's reform NC sabbath
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I didn't realize that Tom Norris no longer believed in a sabbath for Christians.
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Bill, how do you read these texts:
Exodus 31:18 When the LORD finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the covenant law, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God.
Was the Covenant the whole of the first 5 books of the Bible, if so it can not be separated. Ask a conservative Jew, and find out if they have secitions of the law.
Also look at these:
Exodus 34
Lev 23
It looks to me that the Sabbath is part of the Covenant, not separate by being part of the Decalogue.
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