My Love for Adventists

It is frustrating year after year when people misunderstand your motives. I can clearly see how they would misunderstand, for I did the same when I was Adventist. They think I hate them or are bitter towards my former church. No such thing is true.

Rather, I see myself as someone who has escaped from a dark cave. I know Adventists will think comparing their faith with a cave is such an insult. I am not attempting to insult them, only tell the story of how I felt within Adventism's doctrine. The people were wonderful, but so much of the doctrine was dark, paranoid, confusing and unbiblical. Think about it. They think they will one day be the focus of a modern Catholic witch hunt and the entire globe will turn and hunt them down because they worship on Sabbath. Their whole world is defensive and irrational, seeing sinister conspiracies in every black helicopter and papal decree. Everyone is a potential enemy, even Christians!

So, I will characterize some SDA doctrine as cave-like in order to be experiential rather than insulting.

For years, I searched this theological scary, dank cave and its dark places with bats and spiders hoping for some light. In my quest, sometimes there was so little light I felt like giving up and remaining within the dark cave. Yet for me, I saw that I was so much closer to the entrance than most, that I had to keep looking. Most of these cave dwellers were farther, in little groups, much deeper in the cave complex than I had been raised.

Many people were hiding in the shadows, afraid. Too afraid and too proud to believe that there was something warmer, healthier, brighter and more wonderful out there towards the light.

Over time, I met up with a few others who were escaping and with their knowledge of things I didn't know and with my own studying of the cave, we finally got out.

Of those who escaped, some just kept going, so glad to be out that they walked on and now are happily dancing merrily in the light of the sun, singing like Maria von Trapp "The hills are alive with the sound of music!" But a few of us, thought about those back in the cave. Maybe some of them would like to know what it is like out here in the sun! Perhaps some would like to quit being scared and proud. There had to be many more like me. So, reluctantly, a few of us went back into the cave.

We knew the cave dwellers and their resistance. While a couple of those who had seen the light came in shouting that the cave dwellers were stupid, deceived and they better get out, I took a passive approach. I knew that many of them liked dwelling in the dark. They felt safe there and might need to watch a few people more go out and come back with good news before they would try and leave what they had always known--what they had grown up in. I was there only to help those like me who wanted light, no matter what.

I held up a sign with the words illuminated, "It's okay to leave the cave. It's good out there! Follow us and we will take you out." We didn't try and force people out, but many who read the sign panicked and tried to convince everyone out there that we were liars and deceivers. They told us that we hated the cave dwellers. That the cave is where God wants them and we are of the devil to say that there is something better outside the cave. They have all they need there, they are safe there. No place other than the cave gives them such sharp sight and white skin.

We showed a few people out and watched their eyes as they saw the green meadows and blue sky and felt the warmth of the sun. We cried as we saw their happiness. Then we thought we would love to show even more how wonderful it is outside. So, with reluctance and bolstering our courage, we went back into the cave. We thought it was the sacrifice God wanted of us--to do for others what we would have loved someone to have done for us.

Some of the cave dwellers, upon seeing us back, smirked and said that if we loved the light so much why would we be hanging around in the cave? We must really think the cave is better.

Some of those who came back to help got so sick of the abuse, they just left with a huge "good riddance." They are now all living with such happiness out in the light.

I know my time to help the cave dwellers is growing short. There are now others who have been in the light who wish to go back and help and I can rest, knowing I did my best. But I can't go quite yet, God says I still have a few trips left.

I wouldn't go back into the cave unless I loved the people I was rescuing. I hate the cave. It smells and I am no longer used to the cold, my eyes have adjusted for the sun and I can't see as well as I used to in there. So going in is hard on me, I do it only because of love.

End of allegory.

What I wish to tell everyone plainly is that my ministry to Adventists is about love.


I have never known an Adventist I didn't like. (There are some I dislike but I have never met them, like SDA abortionists. I am praying for, but I don't hate them.) To a SDA worldview, for me to forcefully disagree with some of the SDA doctrines is tantamount to hating Adventists or being very "disturbed". I have as much hope of disabusing them of that self-deception as of helping them to see the error of their doctrines. I will love them at a distance and hope that one day they will get to walk in the light and see the flowers and mountains and beauty of God, outside their cave of theology.

SDA pride will tell them I dislike them and that makes me so sad because they don't even know that they are fearful and prideful.

It's not about anything but love. I absolutely do love Adventists.

Revelation Today--SDA Pastor John Bradshaw's Series

Ah, this ongoing series brings back so many childhood memories--as this is exactly the same Revelation Seminars the SDA church has always put on. I  thought something would be new, something other than the newest world tragedies. 

This is the exact same program format and topics, the same its-so-obvious-and-Biblical--no-question-about-it-delivery as has been done all over the SDA world for the last fifty years. Same world-toppling scare tactics, same bogey-man. The only thing missing is the Seventh-day Adventist name. But, interestingly, the name of the church sponsoring on the program has been missing for several of the last Revelation seminars. 

I will spare you all the observations I had about the down-undah enthusiastic Pastor John Bradshaw, (they were all good) and Yves Monnier the host at the Las Vegas Cashman Center (I’m sure he is a nice guy). 

Let’s be honest. The whole thing is about the Sabbath in these seminars, all else is just the golden halo around it. The Sabbath doctrine, if wrong, is where Adventism stands or falls. For them it is the cornerstone of their theology. Without it all their raison d’etre would be crying “Jesus is coming again, soon” along with every other denomination out there.

Why not just tackle that subject and be done with it.

You see, Adventists very subtly set up false premises then prove the false premises wrong and shout victory. For those not educated in scripture and who don’t ponder what is being taught, it is all shivers and good bumps awaiting the end of time when Adventists become top billing in the cosmic horror show, Armageddon.

Yet if we examine what is taught, seeing where a little is added here and there to scripture, a slight shift in the direction, a tiny misinterpretation--we will see how that shift can lead you completely off the road into a theological ditch. And a dark scary one too!

Watch how it is done:

1st wrong premise: The Church claim is that the “Everlasting gospel” of the Third Angel’s Message in Revelation is a different gospel, a different end time message than that of Christ and the Apostles.

Wrong: The Greek word agonies (everlasting) means “since the beginning, without beginning and end” so this is not something new. The word for gospel is eujaggevlion and is the exact same word used throughout the New Testament for the gospel proclaimed by Jesus Christ and the Apostles. This isn’t anything different. It means The Messiah is God and came as a human to suffer, die and be resurrected for our sins. Nothing anywhere at all about Sabbath in that. 

This new and everlasting gospel (different from what the Apostles passed on) was given to the Seventh-day Adventists alone. They claim that in the last days there will be a divide between those who worship God the Creator and those who worship the creation. Well enough, okay on the idea that Christians and non-Christians will divide on how creation occurred. But then they add something outside of anything in scripture. 

2nd wrong premise: Then the church links this true and false worship of the creation back to the story of Genesis claiming that on the seventh day God gave us a day rest as an eternal commandment. 

There is nothing in the Genesis story that says the 7th day was a literal day. Please go back and read a fascinating fact. All the other days had an evening and morning. Not so with the seventh day as it was supposed to be an eternal day of rest. The idea of the day being a weekly day of rest is an addition to the text. 

Little shifts, little shifts set them on a totally wrong course!

3rd wrong premise: Then Pastor Bradshaw jumps to the Ten Commandments. And claims that because they were written on stone means it is an eternal covenant for all time.

Another false assumption. If you do a word search you will find that throughout the Old Testament, many times, stone and rock symbolize God himself, not an eternal covenant. 

Also if they writing them on a stone was supposed to mean how eternal they were, why would Moses smash them after leaving the presence of God? God wasn't upset with him for doing it either. I would think if the stones had that kind of symbolism, God would have mentioned to Moses to care for them a little better.

4th wrong premise: The weekly Sabbath was an eternal sign. (Bradshaw uses Ezekiel 20: 12 for proof.)

Moreover also I gave them my sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the LORD that sanctify them.

But please note that the sabbaths are a sign--the high annuals sabbaths as well as the weekly sabbaths. (See Deu. 6: 1, 8; 11: 18; 28: 46)

These sabbath signs for Israel absolutely including Passover: 

Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread, and in the seventh day shall be a feast to Jehovah.... And it shall be for a sign unto thee upon thy hand, and for a memorial between thine eyes, that the law of Jehovah may be in thy mouth: for with a strong hand hath Jehovah brought thee out of Egypt. Thou shalt therefore keep this ordinance in its season from year to year. Ex. 13: 6-10

So if the sabbaths are a sign for everyone, then we should be keeping all the sabbaths, the annual, monthly and weekly. 

5th wrong premise: That the Sabbath was not just for Israel alone, but all of us, even today. Again, the Bible would disagree with the SDA church on this claim.

Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily ye shall keep my sabbaths: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am Jehovah who sanctifieth you. Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that profaneth it shall surely be put to death; for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a sabbath of solemn rest, holy to Jehovah: whosoever doeth any work on the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.  Ex. 31: 13-17

There are some important things to note about this. Though God reckons the Sabbath back to creation, He also does not include anyone else in the sabbath requirement making it between God and the children of Israel forever.

The fact that God sanctified a day at creation doesn’t mean it was meant to be universal. And keep in mind that anyone who profanes the day is to be put to death. If Adventists really believed that the sabbath requirement was for Christians today, they would then have to impose the death penalty. 

Bradshaw quipped that “they weren’t Ten suggestions.” Well Pastor Bradshaw, we have to be honest with the text, the commandment to put to death anyone who profanes the sabbath is not a suggestion. It is a direct command.

6th wrong premise: Then Pastor Bradshaw jumped to the New Testament and reminded us that Jesus didn’t come to destroy the law, but fulfill it.

And that is exactly what He did at the cross.

For the SDAs to teach that we are still required to keep Sabbath is saying that Jesus didn’t fulfill the law at the Cross. Hebrews tells us that the Sabbath was a shadow fulfilled in Christ. 

But, he asks, “Are we now allowed to kill? Steal?  Jesus didn’t do away with the Ten Commandment law.

Right, and wrong.

Jesus expanded the Old Covenant at the same time He fulfilled it. 

The Temple sacrifice--with all its rituals and ordinations--wasn't done away with, but replaced by a much better, in fact, perfect one-time sacrifice of God's only Son. God didn't get rid of them, He fulfilled them. The Ten Commandments were, like the sacrifices, pointing to a permanent, eternal Covenant with a new and better set of laws.

Look at Jesus’ words. “You have heard it said” These are not the words of someone reiterating the gravity of the law--Jesus didn’t even source it as God’s! He just spoke, “You have heard it said, ‘you shall not...’ But I SAY.” This is Jesus taking authority over His Ten Commandments and changing them, reforming them, making them into the more perfect law of the New Covenant. They are better--expanded. But different. 

How did Jesus expand the fourth? Adventist might claim that He didn’t say anything about that one. Yet he didn’t say anything about stealing either, but it was expanded. Now we are to give rather than receive. Now we are to give our cloak instead of our shirt when someone tried to rob us of what is rightfully ours. Later Jesus will say “come all ye who are weary and I will give you rest. 

Hebrews tells us that the sabbath shadow was fulfilled in Christ. Sabbath hasn’t disappeared but our Sabbath rest is Christ, the day has expanded to a forever day--an eternal day of rest from the Creation account itself. The curse has been lifted and the original creation plan of an eternal rest with a 7th day without an "evening and morning” has finally been fulfilled in Christ.

It isn’t wrong to keep a day that is a rest once a week. That is fine. In fact Paul says:

Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days. Col 2:16

One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day [alike]. Let each man be fully assured in his own mind. Rom. 14: 5

7th wrong premise: Then Pastor Bradshaw makes the false assumption that since the Apostles went to the synagogue, they were keeping sabbath. This is just full of erroneous assumptions. 

The Apostles worshipped everyday and preached daily. Being in a synagogue on Sabbath isn’t keeping the Sabbath commandment to rest. It is showing up where Jews will be. 

Adventists draw a direct line between a Sabbath rest and someone going to a synagogue on Sabbath (as if worshipping and resting are one in the same). This is a non-sequitor. 

There is not one shred of evidence in the Bible post resurrection that the Apostles rested on Sabbath or commanded anyone to rest on Sabbath. The 4th commandment is a requirement for Israel to rest.

8th wrong premise: The pastor claims that Jesus' warning to pray that the Hebrew’s flight out of Jerusalem in the last days not be in winter or the sabbath (Matt.24:20) is a slam dunk for proving sabbatarianism post-Cross. Yet, this is hardly proof. Christ knew that His followers would be preaching in the Temple every day (Acts 2:46). The slaughter the Romans could acheive would be most devastating on Sabbath because so many Jews would be there too. It is a prayer for Jews because it would be especially hard for them to flee if caught inside the Temple on Sabbath, in winter or if they were pregnant.

It isn’t calling on his disciples to keep the sabbath as a perpetual sign. We know the Apostles were in the temple daily! So the warning wasn’t pray to keep from being attacked on an obligatory sabbath service, but as intercession for their brother Israel. 

End of Part I-