Responses from Church Entities to GC’s Compliance Attempts and Timeline of Key Events

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145

Eugen,
Generally, the community here does not appreciate being addressed in a condensing manner, such as by arguing points of grammar and the technical meanings of words, unless that is the topic at hand. Which does not appear to be the case here. But, since you started this…

I think I did.

I looked it up as what you suggest is not how I have heard the word used. It is defined as…

“contrary to or without regard for the law:”
“being without law; uncontrolled by a law; unbridled; unruly; unrestrained:”
“illegal”
(https://www.dictionary.com/browse/lawlessness)

…and, biblically:
“The law as such may be the criterion or standard for determining what constitutes lawlessness (as with sin in general), but at its root lawlessness is rebellion against God, whether viewed as the condition of one’s life or as specific Acts that demonstrate a determined refusal to acknowledge God.” (https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionaries/bakers-evangelical-dictionary/lawlessness.html)

And this is the way I understand it. One can be lawless at a point that they break a civil or moral law, or the law as found in the bible. When one is doing that, they are lawless, at least in regards to their current action. When one is not committing such acts, they are not in a state of lawlessness.

Lawlessness can be a state of existence as you suggest, but also the result of a temporal act that then passes. So, when you speed while driving, you are committing an illegal act, you are being lawless at the moment when regard to traffic law. When you stop speeding, you are no longer breaking the law.

That statement is amazingly condescending. You will eventually be censured here if you continue such blather.

How so? When you break a law, you are operating outside of the law -> seems like lawlessness to me.

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146

I’m suggesting that world fields are influenced by a number of factors that make it impossible to adhere to a “one size fit all”’approach. We need thinking leaders who can discern an agenda how to move a church with regions of different priorities. Otherwise a child with a third grade equivalent education armed with a paper and pencil and a checklist of priorities can do as much and as effective as what our current leaders are doing now.

I’m not pro WO per se. I am pro principle behind the WO, the belief that all are created in the image of God.

My dear mother did. In return, who taught you your world view, may I ask?

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147

Not wasting time on a worthless case of arrogance. Case closed! The court is dismissed…

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148

I predict it’s just a matter of time.

Remember when some time ago we had a “professor” here who wanted to teach everything to everyone? And were is he now? He left too soon, just when @elmer_cupino was about to get some lessons on Psychiatry from that prominent wizard… :roll_eyes:

This time it seems we got an “ethics professor.” Let’s see what his “ethics” will do for him… :wink:

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149

Dear @GeorgeTichy,
where was a case ever closed without a ruling that was pronounced?
Your Honor may dismiss the case, but then the defendant is not guilty.
If, however, Your Honor closed the case then at least the defendant may hear the ruling.
Or Your Honor pronounced the ruling en passant:

Arrogance to a degree so small that We found it not worthy of punishment?

I found the quizzes more fun than that.
But I am learning every day. Thanks @GeorgeTichy

150

I also think that “one size fits all” is mostly a bad approach.
The problem we both have is that 2015 GC Session voted pro “one size fits all”. What do we do now?
I have given testimony to the procedure I propose: Learn from your defeat and prepare a better motion for 2020 GC Session. You have my support.

Great! We have more in common than you might think.
I am also pro principle: Your principle AND one more, the belief that rules should not be broken but changed.
Sorry, I had to one-up you.

Surely, you may. @GeorgeTichy taught me that questions are always welcome here at spectrum, and I do not want to be an exception. But I digress.
Again we have more in common than you might think.
It was also my mother who got my feet wet in the Adventist world view.
Unfortunately she passed away in '88 and not only that but by lightning. That’s true - I am not making that up.
So there are three more Adventist mother figures in my life that completed the education. @GeorgeTichy knows two already through his clever quizzes:

  • Big Mama in the UK (originally from the West Indies as is Tall Dad)
  • Margaret Davis known by her book “What shall I do to inherit eternal life”
  • E. G. White, I only know her through her Estate but she is a wonderful teacher.

Happy to be answering your questions.
Take care and God bless.

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151

I have one of her original type written publications from 1982. She postulates that the only way into the kingdom is the total and complete transformation of character in thought, word, deed, cultural identity/persona i.e. baseline psychology of human behavior, during your lifetime. Basically in all aspects of thought process you must conform to the same level of thinking and conscious thought process of Adam before the fall and as acted out in the life of Christ. It is strongly self behavior examination and self transformation type of approach that uses the moral law and various cultural concepts of Adventism/American perfectionism. That through a vague/mystical and undefined methodology one can transform oneself to meet this criteria. If you don’t get it you are lost.

The message is simple that those who unfortunately those that fail in any aspect of this are not fit for heaven and rejected by God. Grace is relegated to be applied to your life at some yet again vaguely undefined point prior to recognizing that this is Gods will. It is sprinkled heavily with American cultural concepts and the LGT theology.

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152

Dear @timteichman & @GeorgeTichy,

I am sorry @timteichman that you found my statement that I am not teaching logic here condescending. I did not want to appear looking down on you when in fact I am looking up to you.
It still amazes me how we both can look up the same definition of lawlessness on dictionary.com and come up with two completely different understandings. It has taught me a lot about actual lawlessness.
But see: truth has it that I am definitely not a professor of philosophy or mathematics. So logic couldn’t possibly be any of my subjects… (continued after the quotation)

Well, unfortunately I am not an ethics professor either, not even a law professor as I would have guessed considering all the legalese I speak around here. (@GeorgeTichy, how could that escape your guessing skills?)

To come to terms with my profession:

  • I studied control engineering,
  • I write embedded software for that because bolting hardware together does not do the job since the steam engine is not around anymore,
  • I most frequently do software quality control, i.e. I find flaws in my peer’s software.

And guess what, they are actually thankful for it, indeed very thankful for it, and that each and every time I find a single flaw. Because they know it may cost people their lives if the flaw would make it into production of a car, bus or plane.

Now, those flaws are much harder to find than answers to your questions in particular if they are pushed under your nose with an attitude “You better answer these OR ELSE!”
You do not mind if I am reflecting on my perception of attitude around here, do you?
Sorry, I digress again.

Anyway, I thought I would apply my critical thinking skills to the current problem of our SDA church because just as you I did not like what I was hearing, seeing and reading.

It was indeed a hard problem. At first I thought my head would explode as I was thinking a full fortnight about it. With years of preparation as a faithful member of the church. But then light broke through and I wrote a couple of Mails and then I tried another full week hard to delete any redundant word so that only those would remain that were absolutely necessary which were 969.

And now you know the rest of the story.

Thanks to you guys I now know with certainty that I should stay clear of the word LAW because nobody would understand me even if I had angels’ tongues at my disposal.

There are 12 days left to discuss the topic - we used the first 18 wisely.
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

153

Dear @David1,
I have a facsimile copy as PDF of your edition which was type written as single pages bound in I think two large folders. If you let me know what the sections are that are of concern I can check whether she updated those in her later editions.

Anyway, I have had and still have the impression that she walked the fine line between all the heresies that she reported on without getting entangled in any of them. But that of course is my impression as I remember and still hold it.
The main point is probably that her book(s) were large thematic compilations of E. G. White quotes with very little material of her own. So any challenge against her must be along the line her quoting E. G. White out of context. Today her material is easily available through the search feature on the egwwritings.org website. But then Davis’ work was really marvelous.

But if you bring any such material I am willing to consider it and let you know my thoughts on it.

Take car and God bless.

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I am a big fan of being in harmony with God and wish my life was in all aspects in alignment. The biggest issue is that they were long on admonishment but stopped short of actually describing key elements as to achieving the end state.

In other words it was clear on when shouldn’t be done, which is indisputable, but then would skip to isn’t it wonderful that we are in complete harmony with God in all aspects of life. The key theme is to recognize that you have a form of Godliness but deny the power therein. She has various examples of selfish behaviors she observed in her life, husbands, and children which she found troubling and out of harmony with God. She then observes that at one point as both she and her husband studied they both “discovered how to surrender our hearts to God daily, our lives changed”. This discovery is basic Christian principles and coming to know Jesus who will reveal himself to you if you do not resist him. Various EGW quotations and Biblical themes are also presented to support what we all know and understand of the Salvation process however in the end you are left wondering “what part did I miss where we went from recognizing our sin, confessing it and being open to the Spirit to suddenly I am in perfect harmony with God”.

It really reads like a get rich book which says you have to have the right attitude and the right product for the right buyer and ta-da you are rich. It really lacks any substantive or practical issues and is highly generalized and stops short of what was the actual step that lead you to suddenly being in perfect in obedience to God.

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155

You have very good points but seems to be offset by your overall attitude of “one-upmanship.” The Bible never teaches “one-upmanship.” I’m sure your dear mother would be heartbroken to learn of your behavior, or wouldn’t she?

I do not disagree that we need management. What I disagree with are poor leaders who intentionally include divisive and polarizing issues into their agenda, then dig in instead of undoing mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes, including you and I, but few have the courage to undo their mistakes. (You find mistakes in software as a quality control engineer, I help people undo their mistakes as a psychiatrist.) This is where I fault TW and his associates. There has got to be a way out short of forming 5 GC Revew Committees meant to shame and humiliate. No need to wait for 2020. Surely as a quality control engineer you would agree. You would not want to let a “system error” go uncorrected until the budget is approved by stockholders meeting every 5 years, would you? Otherwise as our dear and honorable POTUS Trump would say “you ought to be ashamed of yoursel” and be fired from your job.

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156

That book sounds absolutely horrible! May be good for ripping up and being used for kindling. :innocent::wink::blush:

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157

Who said anything about acting as the Holy Spirit for anyone? I think someone is conflating their own issues with my words.

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158

Dear @David1,
there are three things I can help you with.

First, the last, most condensed version of her book is online at whatshallido.org.

Second, in chapter 7 you will find a chart that outlines how we come to and stay with God/Christ.

WhatShallIDo-Steps
WhatShallIDo-Steps.png663×542 65.1 KB

Third, at step 6 (Take God’s Way of Escape) I found her counsel most helpful to consider yourself quite literally dead.
If somebody does bad things to you then that will hurt. But if you consider yourself dead you will realize that the dead do not feel anything and - even more importantly - they will not react to anything.
Giving up your right to react autonomously and immediately will give you that split second, but all important advantage to ask God: What shall I do? and then take His Way of Escape.
If you practice that regularly you will find that it is not that impossible to be a victorious Christian as it used to seem previously.

It is that split second where you hand over control to your Lord and Master that makes all the difference.

Take care and God bless.

159

Dear @elmer_cupino,

there was one reason and one reason only for the one-up remark that I made.
I wanted you (and - by the power of the forum - others) to realize that, although it seemed most of the near past as if we were hugely different, that - indeed - it might be quite possible that we are almost identical except for that one (one-up) point. That one little insight that I am just barely ahead.

You are free to reject that idea and say that Eugen is just nuts - you do not care for any insight he might have.

That brings us to how the church should respond to the challenge that is in front of her.

Well,

  • if you are not willing to accept the decision that the 2015 GC Session has taken but blame the current crisis just on the leaders whom you do not like (because there are others that you do like)
  • if you do not respect the church’s 5-year policy making cycle, but want to go ahead with implementing your policy right now even without the approval from all your brethren around the world

then by quite simple extension

  • you will not heed any decision any GC Session has ever taken (whose record - by the way - has been compiled in the documents that we call Church Manual, Working Policy and others)
  • you will make your own policy regardless of others

Well, what shall we say then?

You have created your own church. You took the SDA church as a template and moved ahead with shaping it your particular way. Now it is your own unique church. You have got your own set of documents, your own set of policies, and perhaps quite soon your own set of fundamental beliefs.

Now, it is important to realize that that has already happened, that it IS the current situation.
To invoke our metaphor again: Because one size did not fit all we have created different sizes.

It is to my utter amazement that the very people that have created the different sizes, that have celebrated the “diversity” of the different sizes for years, that those very people are still suggesting that we would loose our unity NOW, when - in fact - we have lost it long ago. This is the most amazing intellectual dishonesty I have ever seen.

I am not saying that the other sizes are bad. I am not saying that they are not needed. All I am saying is that we HAVE different sizes.

And yes, I am also admitting, that the intention of the UOC proposal is to bring all those sizes back to one again - the size that the sequence of past GC Sessions has seen fit.

Well, were do we go from here?
Now, that we all share a new awareness of the current situation we can take a step back and ask ourselves:

  • How did all of this happen?
  • Did we really want that?
  • Is there a way out?
  • What are we willing to sacrifice to bring back unity?
  • If there will be no unity, how do we split?

Take care and God bless.

160

On a final note I would like to share the experience of one of the SDA ancestor churches: The United Methodist Church.

The UMC has church law called the “Book of Discipline” and they have a church court called “Judicial Council”. They also have Women Ordination, but what the Book of Discipline (despite multiple motions to change it through GC Sessions) has been explicitly ruling out was the ordination of openly homosexual clergy.

Up until in July 2016 the Western Jurisdiction appointed Karen Oliveto, an openly homosexual woman as a new bishop.
I cite from a statement dated April 28, 2017 of Bishop Bruce R. Ough, President Council of Bishops (equivalent to SDA GCC)

Today, the Judicial Council released its decision on a request for a declaratory decision from the South Central Jurisdiction (SCJ) in response to the Western Jurisdiction’s (WJ) nomination, election, consecration and assignment of Karen Oliveto as a Bishop of the United Methodist Church.
In its decision, the Judicial Council ruled that the consecration of a gay bishop violates church law but also said Bishop Oliveto “remains in good standing,” until an administrative or judicial process is completed.
This decision means Bishop Oliveto will continue as a Bishop of the church until such process is completed.
The Council of Bishops expresses our appreciation for the Judicial Council’s careful and deliberate consideration of this matter and for the thoughtful and considerate participation of all parties to the case. The Judicial Council has a distinct and critical role in the governance structure of the denomination. We recognize and respect the Judicial Council as the body responsible for deciding complex questions of church law, including the right to declare jurisdiction. We implore all within the United Methodist structure and family to honor the Judicial Council ruling.
Yet, we acknowledge that the decision does not help to ease the disagreements, impatience and anxiety that permeates The United Methodist Church over the matter of human sexuality, and particularly this case. Our compassion and prayers of intercession extend to all those who are hurt, relieved, confused or fearful.
The decision does not change the Book of Discipline. The Judicial Council’s actions are specific to the cases that they are requested or required to consider. Only the General Conference speaks for the church and has the authority to change the Book of Discipline. The Council of Bishops will continue to exercise temporal and spiritual oversight support of the church’s mission.
The Council of Bishops remains committed to the unity of the church and the flourishing of its mission. We are confident of the work that the Commission on a Way Forward has begun and we believe the Holy Spirit is working through the Commission and Council to accomplish God’s purposes.

The Commission on a Way Forward (the UMC UOC) has worked since then and it failed to re-unite the church. An UMC General conference is called for February 2019 which will - if no miracle happens - just decide on how the church will split.

You may join our fellow brethren from the UMC in their prayers for that miracle.
And while you are at it you may pray as well for a miracle to happen in our church.
Indeed, you are all an integral part of the process shaping our future.
I do not claim to be a prophet but I can clearly see what lies ahead of us.

Thank you all for your kind consideration.
Take care and God bless.

161

As if relationship with God can be reduced to a formula. How arrogant can humans get? Apparently, very!!!

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162

I’d like to believe you but in reviewing your posts, they prove otherwise and betray your words. Have you heard people say “ Actions speak louder than words?”

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163

"But I am learning every day."

What are you learning, Eugen?

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164

I am sure that he has heard the maxim before…but may not apply it personally. :wink:

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