I don’t know how it is with this generation where anyone who wants to enroll
in community college [at least] has the opportunity.
But back when I was growing up the Adults [pre-Depression and Depression
age] looked on College persons as authorities. [My own father was only allowed
to go through 10th grade, then had to go to work at 16. My mother did graduate
from high school]
But I noticed Adults in my parent’s ages looked up to anyone who had gone
beyond high school. And I think that was big even into the 70’s and 80’s. And
so a LOT of those persons, although white headed, are still around and are
on church boards and church nominating committees.
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That must be frustrating and sad to watch. I feel so bad for people stuck in such an abusive spiritual mind-set. As far as overcoming sins, if it’s a checklist, white-knuckling situation, not sure I would call that overcoming in the way of the Spirit. The fruit of condemnation, judgementalism, and a negative mind-set is not the fruit of the Spirit, as I know you are aware. We know what fruit the Holy Spirit produces in the believers life and LGT produces the opposite. Tragic.
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Please vote:
I get the highest euphoria picking on
- W.O. opponents
- LGT proponents
- Ted Wilson
- EG White/SOP
Incomplete survey.
Glaringly absent is “inept SDA teachers” and “biblically illiterate laity”.
But I really ought not feed the bears.
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this would have been the charge levelled against paul in his startling teaching that old covenant rituals held no more value…nowhere in the OT is this clearly taught…in fact circumcision, the big thing with apostolic jews, was originally presented in terms of an explicitly everlasting covenant, with no hint of any kind of abrogation down the line…it is telling that the other biblical apostles, all avid jews, steered clear of this line of teaching, even while they acknowledged that christ was and is our sacrifice…
the fact is that the NT is a presentation of the visions of apostles that don’t necessarily hinge on the visions of the OT prophets…even the NT’s method of OT interpretation must be considered suspect…for instance, matthew’s assertion that hosea 11:1 proves christ’s divinity because joseph took him into egypt as a child to escape herod would never have occurred to anyone…we only believe it does because matthew says it does, and because we believe, without any possible proof, that matthew was inspired…
my own view is that god is free to reveal anything to his church at any time…he isn’t bound by what he was able to teach within the constraints of the mindset of previous eras…christ himself told his disciples that he had many things to say to them but that they couldn’t bear it…that is, their cultural sensibilities prevented any receptivity to truth outside of those sensibilities…are we to be limited by christ’s disciples’ limitations…i don’t think so…
egw extra-biblical truth can readily be squared with what is in the bible…it can only be held to be anti-biblical if certain assumptions are accepted, and held to be non-negotiable…but none of these assumptions are taught in the bible itself…even the principle of sola scripture is decidedly anti-biblical…and most of these assumptions are academically wrought, which in my view makes them less than useless…after-all, at no time in the history of israel, or even the patriarchs, was academia on the right side of history…why would it be now…
egw’s non-academic background, her physical frailty, her homeliness, her lack of what generally attracts, not to mention her gender, at the time of her ministry, is just the assortment of dubious qualities christ himself exhibited, and one big reason he was essentially rejected…it seems to be god’s purpose and method to associate truth bearers with veritable stumbling blocks in order to give doubters ammunition for their doubts…believers are rewarded only when they make the decision to look beyond what they see with their eyes…
romans 6 is an example of the effective use of pauline metaphor…paul isn’t asserting that we literally die during baptism (i think we can readily prove that no-one literally dies and is raised to life during this ritual, which is symbolic in its own right)…paul is simply helping his readers to adopt a mindset for effective choices after conversion and the decision to live for christ…that is, he is helping them in their quest for effective sanctification…he even uses the word “reckon”, in the context of being dead, so-called, to sin, v.11, which is essentially saying to them to think of themselves as being dead to sin even though they know they aren’t…and if this isn’t enough, he goes on to counsel them to not let sin reign in their mortal bodies, to obey any of its lusts, v.12, which he would not have needed to do if the sinful nature, let alone the physical body, were really dead at conversion…
i just think we need to look at what is in the bible in terms of mature, settled realism balanced with intellectual precision and contextual sensibility…the bible is very far from being escapist in any way…to think that we’re going to discover a paradigm for christian living in the writings of the greatest of the apostles that obviates the bread and butter self-denial that christ himself taught and lived is fantasy tinged with the most childish naivety…paul was living and ministering during a time of great and relentless persecution, in which many believers were physically killed…it meant something to take on the name of christ at that time…any valid interpretation of counsel to early christians must factor in this jolting context…the apostolic church was looking for rubber meets the road reality on which they could depend…they weren’t open to the kind of fantasy that is common in our time, at all…
there can be no doubt that it is possible to be obsessed with behaviour to the exclusion of what god does for us without our input, which is of course the pitfall of LGTers…but the remedy for this massive system of error isn’t escapism and dereliction of christian duty which christ and all the apostles, and especially egw, taught…the remedy is a full, direct look at what the apostles taught, but especially what they lived…the blithe intimation that the notion that christ did it all - let go and let god, which was a common refrain when i was growing up, which i even then knew couldn’t be right - can possibly square with the heroic courage we read throughout the NT, during a time when people were thrown to lions, crucified, disinherited, and consigned to abject poverty and hardship, and that he endured unspeakable suffering so that we can be wafted into heaven on a magic carpet, is so incongruous, it’s difficult to imagine that grown adults can think of it, much less embrace it…
god help us as a church to adopt the mindset that can identify and appropriate real truth, and not some escapist fantasy that sounds good, but that cannot heal us, and that comes to us from egw haters everywhere we turn…
Wow. This rings true to me. And all of it revolting. If this is where the church is or is going, I’m out!
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Amen to that! While scripture is of course flawed - having been written, redacted, copied, and translated by men - the idea that anything Ellen wrote (or stole, or borrowed or had her editors heavily re-write for her) should be elevated above the Christian bible just takes my breath away. It’s literally heresy - even for the SDA church.
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Steve, would you be kind to post a link to DB’s sermon on the 28 DEFECTS in women? Thanks.
Should be a good case presentation to my next psychiatry grand rounds.
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I wish that we would find out that we’re being punked…but I’m afraid it’s all to real!
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I’m starting to get the hint that the church I grew up with, as critical as I am of how it was, is now going down a path that I couldn’t follow even as the naive young adult I was - who had for a time drunk the Kool-aid.
I’ve been waiting and hoping for progress for 25 years and I think that’s over.
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I understand, Tim.
We bailed about 15 years ago, but I’m still fascinated and interested in the group. It’s kind of like a religious soap opera…
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No wonder people are often obfuscated and end up seeing nothing … 
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Or a car crash-one you can’t look away from, despite the obvious carnage…
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On 2010/03/19, this was published here on Spectrum, of all places.
Also found the youtube link for the 61 minute sermon, originally on Amazing Facts (AmazingFriction?)
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I got to thinking about the Spirit of prophecy recently. I realized it didn’t stop with Ellen White. It is actually alive today, but not necessarily in any one specific person. Unfortunately, just as with the Biblical prophets, the message is resisted. Messages like men and women should be ordained equally. Instead a 19th century prophet is institutionalize and controlled to say what those in power want to hear.
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Well, not “Lucifer”. Lucifer is a combination of two Latin words. Even if Latin were the language of heaven (perish the thought!), it wouldn’t have been used before it existed.
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Latin is clearly not the mother tongue of heaven.
Jesus identified it in Jn 19:30, “it is Finnish…”
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Yep, as it has been said, it’s easier to leave Adventism that to have Adventism leave you.
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Jeremy,
One thing I ask myself is this: Is there any conceivable flaw that would convince a fervent believer in EGW that she was not what she claimed to be?
IOW: what would it take for someone like you to have to honestly admit that she failed the Biblical test of a prophet?
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Jeremy, I respect your opinion. I just can’t believe it. God loves us regardless. Let’s just leave it at that.
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