Ellen White believed and taught Penal Substitution atonement

I often listen to some of the Sabbath School studies on the internet that are generally opposed to the Penal Substitutionary view of the Atonement (I also disagree with the substitutionary view of atonement.) There are three in particular that I listen to. ComeandReason.com usually led by Dr. Tim Jennings. Ken Hart and Friends TV and The lesson study offered by PineKnoll. 

All three of these groups use a lot of Ellen White quotes. All three seem to cherry pick Ellen White statements so that they downplay her Penal Substitutionary views. Today 10/28/2017 on the ComeandReason lesson study lead this week by Lori Atkins, noted and tried to explain away an Ellen White quote that was used in the lesson study guide. You can listen or view here. Here is the lesson study quote which caused her to email Tim Jennings for guidance on how to deal with it (starting at about minute 36):

“Righteousness is obedience to the law. The law demands righteousness, and this the sinner owes to the law; but he is incapable of rendering it. The only way in which he can attain to righteousness is through faith. By faith he can bring to God the merits of Christ, and the Lord places the obedience of His Son to the sinner’s account. Christ’s righteousness is accepted in place of man’s failure, and God receives, pardons, justifies, the repentant, believing soul, treats him as though he were righteous, and loves him as He loves His Son.” —Ellen G. White, Selected Messages, book 1, p. 367 lesson study guide for Oct 23

Their answer was to read some of the previous paragraphs and interpret them in the light of a more non-penal view. Apparently thinking that the Penal view theorists could not equally read those other paragraphs within the Penal view. In other words, she acted as if she had solved the problem but really did not even deal with the main paragraph problem. Their answer was to fall back to the levels of understanding and thinking that Ellen White was using the words of Penal Substitution to lead them out of Penal Substitution. Which might have some merit if after using the Penal terms than showing a different or better way of looking at things, which of course Ellen White does not do. It should be noted that most all Penal Substitution proponents incorporated the moral influence view with the penal view. Because when the Bible says it is His kindness that leads us to repentance it is pretty hard to ignore that so most all of the atonement views will include the moral influence view but it is not their major component as it is with moral influence theory.

It is to my reading very obvious that Ellen White was a Penal Theorists when it comes to the atonement. I always wonder how these groups can use her so much and not realize this. Several years ago I compiled Ellen White quotes where she states her substitutionary view. Ellen White's quotes on Substitution.

Today I came upon a good dissertation on the subject A Comparative Study of the Concept of Atonement in the Writings of John R. W. Stott and Ellen G. White Lawrence O. Oladini Andrews University The Dissertation I think is pretty clear as it compares the Penal Atonement views of Stott and White.

Summary of Images of Atonement
Though she employs different images to present her understanding of the atonement, nevertheless, it is the penal-substitution theory that seemed to predominate in the writings of White on atonement. In her thought, this view is closely related to the satisfaction theory. Christ is the sinner‘s substitute who bore the penalty in order to satisfy the holy requirements of God‘s justice. It is usually in the context of penal substitution that she discusses the theme of justification by faith. Essentially her position is that God can justify sinners because Jesus has satisfied God‘s just requirement by both His perfect obedience to the law and by bearing the penalty of the broken law as the sinner‘s substitute.395 In this regard, White has written:

 Christ bore the penalty that would have fallen upon the transgressor; and through faith the helpless, hopeless sinner becomes a partaker of the divine nature, escaping the corruption that is in the world through lust. . . . Christ rendered perfect obedience to the law, and man could not possibly obey the holy precepts had it not been for the provision that was made for the salvation of the fallen sons and daughters of Adam.396 

 Christ‘s substitutionary atonement originates in God‘s love for us. White argues that ―the atonement of Christ was not made in order to induce God to love those whom he otherwise hated; it was not made to produce a love that was not in existence; but it was made as a manifestation of the love that was already in God‘s heart.‖397 In her classic on the life of Christ, Desire of Ages, White has written on what Christ‘s substitutionary atonement involves. She writes, ―Christ was treated as we deserve, that we might be treated as He deserves. He was condemned for our sins, in which He had no share, that we might be justified by His righteousness, in which we had no share. He suffered the death which was ours, that we might receive the life which was His.‖398 Therefore, the atonement originates from the love of God; God does not love us because of the atonement provided on the cross. 

 In light of her argument presented above, it is clear that White employs the different images of atonement (theories) in mutually complementary, but not contradictory, ways. Nevertheless, one must point out that the heart of her atonement thought centers in the concepts of penalty, substitution, and satisfaction. For the believer, the concepts of penalty, substitution, and satisfaction become the foundation of all significant victory over sin and sinfulness.399 Whidden concludes that ―the heart of her atonement thought revolved around the dialectic of law and grace, justice and mercy and the demonstration of this right relationship in the life of Christ—and ultimately—in the believer.‖400 In this way, the death of Christ becomes the basis of a universal vindication of God. The dialectic of justice and mercy permeates all that God does in the process of atonement.

This Dissertation also contains a good listing of the various atonement theories Similar to my old article (why did Jesus have to die) but more detailed.

Temptation to believe lies

Today I was listening to a several of the current Sabbath School classes available at http://itsaboutgod.tv/hart_class.html

Now I can't say I was terribly impressed with any of the 3 I listened too. Unfortunately even Progressive Adventists seem to be firmly entranced with extra biblical mythology produced for the Adventist church by Ellen White. I still don't understand why they believe such things as Lucifer is Satan See Who is Lucifer (or Satan Misidentified) But the Pine Knoll Sabbath School even goes farther and the teacher Jon Paulien keeps saying that Lucifer and Christ were covering Cherubs. Surprisingly similar to the Lucifer and Christ being Spirit brothers of the Mormon Belief. Last week in his lesson he said there was good evidence for the two being covering cherubs. Of course he did not give that good evidence. But if you want to know it is not from the Bible it is from Ellen White. Probably a teaching from her Pre-Trinitarian days back when SDA's were substantially Semi-Arian.

Anyway once you get past all the mythology and assumptions about Satan the lessons get to the Temptation in the Wilderness of Jesus. One of the main points I felt it was important to point out because naturally none of the classes could manage to do that is as follows.

Luke 4:8 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

The Temptation of Jesus

4 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around ^[a]by the Spirit in the wilderness ² for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He became hungry. ³ And the devil said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” ⁴ And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone.’”

⁵ And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of ^[b]the world in a moment of time. ⁶ And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and ^[c]its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. ⁷ Therefore if You ^[d]worship before me, it shall all be Yours.” ⁸ Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.’”

What is so surprising to me is how none of the classes I listened to noticed that the devil claimed all the world was his and it had been given to him and he could give it to whom he choses. The catch being if only Jesus would worship him. Now Jesus could have said according to Scriptures that all the world is God's Psalm 24:1 "The earth is the LORD's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it;" Pointing out the lie in the Devils claim...which amazingly enough lots of people seem to believe and they point to this temptation text. But instead Jesus deals with the logical fallacy in the devils claim. If as the devil claimed the world had been given him, Who was it that gave it to him? The one that could give something to someone that they did not have before clearly has more power then the one given something. So the devil's next claim to be worthy of worship would be another lie. The one with the greater power to give the devil the world would be the one worthy of worship more so then the devil even if his claim had been true. Thus with brevity the soul of wit, Jesus destroys the devils entire argument with You shall worship only the Lord your God.

 

Upsetting the Apple Cart

A couple of things I have been reading have led me to wonder just how much the Adventist church cares about meeting people's spiritual needs vs. how much they want to dictate people's beliefs. Most of us by now have heard that about half of the Adventists in North America will leave the Adventist church, some come back most do not. Some estimates I have heard have former Adventists as numbering 3 million and current Adventists in North America at 1 million. Let's be more optimistic and only say the number of former to current Adventists is 2:1. Would not such numbers indicate that we are doing something wrong?

I have never been a big fan of sermons so the church service portion of the Adventist church never really appealed to me. I was usually able to find an interesting and challenging Sabbath School class however. At least until recently when my friend ceased his once a month facilitation of a class at the church I was attending. Though to be fair we were weaned off his class as the more traditional folks began leading more of the sessions until it was just down to once a month. Which is a good cautionary tale that the divided philosophy of a Sabbath School class is not likely to work. Theoretically it might still work if there were two leaders in attendance who agreed to disagree on things and lead together. But that is likely a hard thing to happen.

I think the reason for the demise of the more progressive or open Adventist Sabbath School classes has to do with the Adventist church desire to dictate beliefs vs. providing a place to meet spiritual needs. If you toe the more traditional Adventist line you rise in responsibilities and respect in the local church. If you don't you will become marginalized, and if you want to survive in the church as a progressive Adventist you often learn to sit down and shut up. You can only do that for a while usually and according to the statistics you then leave.

The Adventist Today blog has an article entitled: One Step ahead of Personal and Spiritual Annihilation
By Harry Banks. In the article he writes of someone who started a Saturday, 11 O’clock bible study at the local telephone company education center. He writes:

What? Saturday church? At the phone company? With an IT geek for a leader? Oh, and who also happened to have previously been an atheist, and we are not done yet... The group is purposefully nondenominational to attract persons who feel alienated from religion or formalized religion for whatever reason.
Hmm...
The fist week, Larry, the programmer leader, opened by saying that he felt a need to reach out to the people around him and make a place to engage with them where they are. No pressure to come to a certain position or place of belief, but an exchange of personal spiritual journeys whether in a context of doubt or faith. With Larry's atheist background, the agnostic, Julian Barnes' line, "I don't believe in God, but I miss him," seems to point to a possible point of contact for us all. There is that empty spot in all of us that only God can fill. Regardless of our state of belief or unbelief there is still a place in us only God can fill.

What a concept. Could such a thing happen in an Adventist church? Or would those who were so sure they had the answers...that they were the remnant, end up looking down their noses at such spiritually questioning people. Would they be viewed as wolves in sheep's clothing out to infiltrate and bring uncertainty to the certain? Perhaps they would even think that evolution of life was possible and maybe even a method that God used to create...could that be allowed in the sacred walls of an Adventist church.

I don't know, I suspect the way to find out would be to actually try such an experiment with your local church. I am pretty sure it is not the kind of Revival and Reformation that Ted Wilson (Seventh-day Adventist General Conference President) has envisioned for the Adventist church but maybe it is the kind of Reformation that could lead to a Revival. A Reformation is really about change and perhaps we need a far more radical change then a return to what did not work a hundred years ago. Maybe Ted Wilson's plan to Go Forward by going backwards is not really the answer. The question is it worth upsetting the "frozen chosen". They feel they are spiritually well off...on the right track with the right answers. They don't really want to engage with the questions so that they can maintain their answers but even so that is going to be a comfort to them and they, like the spiritual questing, need comfort in their journey. So the question is can we add more fruit to the apple cart without tipping it over and spilling all the apples. Perhaps the status quo of losing 2 apples for every 1 apple in the cart is the best we can do. It probably is unless one decides to rebuild the cart, and if you do that then you have to transfer the apples from one cart to another.

It does sound like a lot of work!

The destruction of Adventist Sabbath Schools

Adventist Today alerted me to a recent survey which covers numerous areas dealing with Adventists. There is a convergence of thought in my mind concerning the recent topic of theistic evolution vs. 6 day literal creation and some of the information in this survey dealing with Sabbath School.

Here are a couple of Sabbath School survey results:

Sabbath School Compared to Sunday School

Adventist churches are nearly twice as likely as other faiths in America to have a regular Sabbath School or Sunday School or similar religious education program for children and adults. More than 99% of Adventist local churches have Sabbath School each week, while only 53% of the local congregations of all religions have Sunday School or a similar program each week.

This is a major strength of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America. Dr. Win Arn and other church growth researchers working across many denominations have shown that congregations that have regular religious education programs are more likely to have significant growth. The research shows that this is especially true for those congregations that have a regular adult religious education program.

Research also shows that the better the attendance at the religious education program, the more likely a congregation is to grow. This is one reason why it is important to have a strong, vibrant Sabbath School, perhaps making changes to increase attendance if it has fallen off because the program is boring and not meeting the needs.

Small Groups

This week a church member considered moving her membership because her Sabbath School class didn't have enough interaction among class members.

"Because I have a stressful job and my family lives in other parts of the country, I look forward to relating to other believers at church," she stated. "But most classes are very impersonal with the entire focus on the lesson. I would really like to find a class that includes both in-depth Bible study and social activities."

According to data from the "Faith Communities Today" (FACT) study, in more than 75% of local Adventist churches, only a few members participate in small groups.

Only about one in fifteen churches have strong small group ministries with many or most adults participating. Nine Facets of Small Groups book.

Last week at the Sabbath School class I attend we were talking about how few people go to Sabbath school classes in our church, as we waited for more than the two of us to arrive. The largest class that week in the church had 9 people in attendance, yes I went out and counted them. This is a moderate sized church and I am pretty sure it is also representative of the majority of Adventist churches. Of course the numbers will vary with the size of the churches but I have noticed over the last 10 years that Sabbath School classes are very poorly attended. As the Center for Creative Ministries research shows the small groups and Sabbath Schools are important for the health of our churches. To be correlated to the small groups the Sabbath Schools must be the interactive variety rather then the sermon variety. The sermon variety is easily identified with the Sabbath School class that Doug Batchelor teaches.

But as we can see from the recent blog discussions here and elsewhere there are often people who don’t handle discussions very well. There seems to be a large segment in Adventism who are so certain, that they cannot even allow other ideas to be entertained. That is part of the problem when one assumes that their church is the remnant and that it holds the truth. The church then has the answers and no other ideas need apply. What do people like that do to a discussion group? Well they stifle it, they make it hurt for others to express their views if they are different from traditional church beliefs. If every one agrees with the traditional beliefs there is usually no discussion at all. No discussion leaves you with a Doug Batchelor style sermon class where half true amazing facts are inserted to add some interest to the topic. But the problem is that in a sermon class people don’t get to know other people. The problem with a class or small group that can’t allow other opinions is that people with other opinions do not feel accepted enough to care to go to the class. That can even be uncomfortable for people who may accept other ideas but don’t like to see any friction in a class.

It is very possible that we live in a time when people need to relearn how to talk to other people; how to discuss things without needing to become judgmental or overly protective of their traditions or orthodoxy. We will never connect with people until we can talk to them and if we don’t listen to other people we will not learn from them or about them. Thus there will really be no connection, no real church growth because as a church what do we really have to offer. If we can’t even accept the people in our churches who are we going to accept?

So tell your pastor to consider giving some sermons on how to accept people, how to listen to people and how to communicate what you believe and why you believe it without resorting to demanding that the other person leave their church. Sermons that address the need for small group community, because often sermons are the only thing people are coming to church for as they think that fulfills their worship requirements. So we have to depend on our pastors to communicate the need to form a community at an interpersonal level. Frankly I am constantly amazed at how irrelevant most sermons are today to the needs of modern people. Perhaps there is a class on irrelevance in seminary; I suppose if the sermon is so milquetoast it does not upset anyone that may be what some pastors are shooting for. But as it is now we are shooting ourselves constantly, driving out our own members and helping practically no one, within or without our churches. Many may want to stay doctrinally pure but that assumes that their doctrines were pure to begin with, that their doctrines were completely correct and without any need to ever be updated or rethought. Which strikes me as a very conceited point of few, and conceited points of view are poison to churches and community.

Sabbath School audio lessons

I was thinking recently that there really should be a Progressive Adventist Sabbath School lesson discussion pod cast. So I decided to search the internet and see what Sabbath School pod casts (mp3 or streamed) are available for people to download and listen to. There really don’t seem to be many, the closest I could find were those which are based upon Graham Maxwell’s Larger View, AKA Great Controversy Trust and Healing model. Listed as follows:

The Sabbath School Lesson page of Dr. Jonathan Gallagher http://www.sabbathschoolonthemove.org/lessons.html

Ken Hart's Sabbath School Class is recorded weekly on the campus of Loma Linda University in the Randall Visitor Center at 11080 Anderson Street (at the corner of Anderson Street and University Court) in Loma Linda, California. Recordings and Handouts are provided here in multiple formats for your personal and group study. https://www.theox.org/index.cfm/pageid/615/index.html

Dr Tim Jennings’ Bible Study Class

---

The following would consist of more traditional Adventist viewpoints:

Walla Walla University School of Theology present the Good Word hosted by Paul Dybdahl http://www.wallawalla.edu/academics/departments/theology/goodword/

Doug Batchelor’s ‘Central Study Hour’ Batchelor’s class is not a discussion at all more like a sermon, though he does have audience members read Bible verses.

The Denomination sponsors a couple of downloadable Sabbath School related programs:

A reading of the quarterly: Sabbath School Bible Study a pod cast service is brought to you by the South Pacific Division SDA quarterly weekly reading pod cast (mp3) audio recordings, in MP3 file format, of the Seventh-day Adventist Adult Bible Study Guide - Sabbath School lesson. Each file plays for about 40 minutes and is around 10mb in size. http://sspodcast.adventistconnect.org/ Streamed version at http://record.net.au/sabbath-school-bible-study

Sabbath School U is a weekly program produced by the Sabbath School and Personal Ministries covering a quarterly topic or theme. It follows the studies found at www.cqbiblestudy.org or http://www.sabbathschoolu.org/podcastlist.php or http://gcyouthministries.org/Resources/SabbathSchoolLesson/SabbathSchoolUPodcast/tabid/195/Default.aspx

Sabbath School U Colligate: http://cqbiblestudy.org/article.php?id=3

Hope Sabbath School Study See HopeTV.org for a schedule of when the class is broadcast. You can also subscribe to a podcast of the class to automatically download the video or audio in your own podcast feed reader. Teacher: Dr. Derek Morris

http://media.forestlakechurch.org/content/hope-sabbath-school-study

This runs a week behind unlike many of the other downloads which record their discussions earlier so that people can listen to the discussions before their local class,

And finally at Sharon Seventh-Day Adventist Church in Omaha, Nebraska the Sabbath School Department has a weekly Sabbath School Teachers Meeting. (does not post in advance of actual date thus you hear the last weeks lesson) http://pkwsabbathschoolwrap.podbean.com/

Life Expectancy and the Attractive Church

In reference to my last post on a literary work of fiction here is excerpt from another literary work of fiction showing how some ideas interact with others.

In reference to her husbands loving yet unconventional family Laurie says:

You know, parents and children and love come in some strange combinations. I mean your parents can love you and you can know they love you and you can love them and still grow up so lonely that you feel hollow…

Love isn’t enough your parents have to know how to relate to you and to each other. They have to want to be with you more then with anyone else. They have to love being home more than anywhere in the world and they have to be more interested in you then in “snakes and tornadoes” I suggested…[speaking of her parents occupations]

God I love them, their nice Jimmy they really are and they mean well but they live inside themselves more then not and they keep their doors closed. You see them mostly through windows…

You grew up with everything I wanted so bad, everything that I dreamed of having your folks live for you and for each other for family…It’s bliss Jimmy and I am so damn grateful that you all let me in.

(Dean Koontz, Life Expectancy chapter 26)

What strikes me about the above excerpts is how attractive the family is. Others want to be part of that family and are thankful when they become a part of the family. How nice it would be if our church reflected that position. Sabbath school classes where people enjoy the communication, the opportunity to share ideas and listen to other ideas. That is the way I have felt about many of the Sabbath school classes I have attended. That is what I look for in the classes I choose to attend. I would hope for that experience in the other parts of our church experience as well.

Recently my daughter’s youth Sabbath School got involved with discussion of some challenging life situations. I was pleased to see that my daughter was excited about going to Sabbath school and she had prepared some notes to discuss her point of view. Then after our respective Sabbath school classes I found out that instead of the open communication and sharing ideas, ideas were stomped on by those who for some reason think that the miracles of mission stories are the answers to every Christians life. Simply put instead of being a welcoming family it became a fundamentalist dictatorship where the two adults present worked as a team to repress the thinking of the youth. No doubt with the best of intentions. They feel they are responsible to teach the youth what they think the SDA church believes. As with many fundamentalist views they have assumed that they know what the Adventist church believes and that the church is restricted to a certain way of belief.

The point here is not whether the adults in the youth class were right or wrong in their beliefs. The point is that they destroyed the opportunity to create a friendly challenging and stimulating family, which would make the youth glad they were there, and something that would interest others to be included.

Our traditions have in many ways limited us here. Many don’t even know how to discuss ideas without getting upset with someone who holds an opposing view. We have for so long thought that we had “the truth” that we assume anything different then our traditional “truth” is actually an enemy of both God and/or Adventism. We must change our philosophy to allow for discussion, to allow people to express themselves and create the impetus to research things further to either come up with an answer or at least communicate our position based upon reason and allow the others to express why they believe what they believe. Your philosophy and my philosophy may not agree but that does not need to separate Christian families whether physical family or spiritual family. We need to learn to relate to others in such a way that shows we are open and accepting just as our God is open and accepting. Jesus says come and lay your burden on Him we have no business adding more burden upon those coming to lay their upon Him. And of course if we do that we will never create the kind of family that someone would be so glad as to say, “I am so damn grateful that you all let me in.”