IS
SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM REALLY
CHRISTIAN?
by Wallace and Carole
Slattery
Adventists believe
that they are the Only True Religion, the ultimate
Christianity After all, aren't they the people who
keep all Ten Commandments and have the "Testimony
of Jesus" [their prophet Ellen White]
After we first
discovered the sordid truth about Ellen White's
plagiarism in 1980, we started to research into
Adventism's relationship with Christianity. It took
years, but by the middle 1990's we felt we had
reached the core of this relationship. For
Adventist theology is very similar to an onion: it
may be shiny and attractive on the outside, but the
inner layers become progressively stronger and
ranker until they are simply
insufferable.
It all boils down
to this: What are the fundamental identifying
characteristics that distinguish Christianity from
all other religions; and how closely does Adventism
follow these characteristics? The basic
characteristics are:
1. A belief that
Jesus Christ died, was resurrected on the third day
after his death, and ascended to Heaven 40 days
later.
2. A belief in the
Holy Trinity; that although the Trinity comprises
three individuals, they are at one in purpose,
existing as complete, equal members of the Godhead.
**(see note below)
3. A belief that
the Bible is the only, ultimate source of doctrinal
instruction; the final word of authority regarding
principles or doctrine and belief.
4. A belief that
acceptance of what Jesus Christ did For us in his
Atonement is our only source of salvation.
(justification through faith) Our works are only
results of our conversion (sanctification), and
have nothing to do with our salvation.
Let us examine how
Adventism measures up to these fundamental
doctrinal points:
1. Christ's death,
resurrection, and ascention to Heaven.
Adventism has no
real problem with this doctrinal point. Adventists
are taught this doctrine in its
entirety.
2. A belief in the
Godhead of the Holy Trinity.
Adventists claim to
believe fully in the trinity but Adventists also
believe that Christ is Michael the Archangel. They
are greatly taken aback when they learn that
Christianity cannot accept this belier that in fact
it is anathema to Christianity.
3. A belief in the
final authority of the Bible as doctrinal
instructor.
"The Bible and the
Bible only". Adventists will readily assure the
inquiring Christian that their beliefs are based on
the Bible alone but the Adventist Church has gone
on official record a number of times to demonstrate
that Ellen White is the final arbiter, the
infallible interpreter of the Bible; and this has
commonly been taught from the pulpit to Adventist
believers.
To our knowledge,
not once has Adventism ever taken any position that
contradicts Ellen White's teachings. Adventism must
stand or fall on her word.
4. A belief in
Justification through Faith.
Here Adventism
vehemently proclaims that it believes in
justification through faith. This doctrine,
however, has caused and continues to cause more
confusion in the Adventist Church than any other
doctrine. The "Justification/sanctification"
interpretations from the pen of Ellen White not
only contradict the Bible but contradict each
other. This leaves the SDA reader who follows Mrs
White completely confused on the subject.
By far the most
appalling of Ellen White's "Justification through
Sanctification" heretical statements are these from
her most widely-circulated book, The Great
Controversy Between Christ and Satan:
"Those who are
living upon the earth when the intercession of
Christ shall cease in the sanctuary above, are to
stand in the sight of a holy God without a
mediator. Their robes must be spotless, their
characters must be purified from sin by the blood
of sprinkling. Through the grace of God and their
own diligent effort, they must be conquerors in the
battle with evil ". (p 425)
"In that fearful
time the righteousness must live in the sight of a
holy God without an intercessor" (p. 614)
In Summary, the
Seventh-day Adventist Church teaches heresy to its
members in three basic Christian beliefs:
1. It teaches that
Jesus Christ is also Michael the Archangel, thus
denigrating the doctrine of the Holy Trinity.
2. It teaches that
it's believers that Ellen White is the "final court
of appeals" and the "infallible interpreter"
(actual published quotes from Church papers) of
Bible doctrine, thus denying the belief that the
Scriptures possess these attributes
3. It leaches at
best a contradictory doctrine of Justification
through Faith, in which perfectionism is stressed
over faith.
We cannot accept
that Adventism is a Christian Church just because
it asserts that it teaches Christian dogma from the
Bible. Instead, we must compare Adventism's
fundamental doctrines with those long accepted by
Christianity When we do so, we are forced to
conclude that Adventism distorts the Bible to
perpetrate its own religion essentially denying the
true Good News of the Bible in order to focus upon
its own heretical theology.
**Note regarding the statement above on the Trinity
- although the members of the Trinity are indeed
one in purpose as the article says, this is not
what makes them one in the Trinity even though the
above article seems to imply that. The Trinity
doctrine properly defined is three divine persons
who are one in being, one in essence. Each person
in the Trinity shares the nature of the one true
God, yet each is a distinct person. There is only
one being who is God, yet that one being exists for
all of eternity in three persons. The article's
incomplete way of describing the Trinity seems to
imply a tri-theism, that of three Gods, but it is
our understanding that this is not what the author
intended, just an unfortunate way of describing the
Trinity.
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