I was listening to Advent Media Connect where he went over an interesting case in Adventism. An employee of 3ABN was fired from his job, or as Ryan Day said in his update told it was time to "separate". Listening to Ryan Day was interesting as he described his doctrinal questions and his experience. It is about 2.5 hours but it is well said and not hard to listen to, even if a bit long. Then the following day, Advent Media Connect presented the sermon to Ryan Day's home church in the video titled: "Pr. John Lomacang Warns His Church on Ryan Day's Unbiblical Position." This is where things really get interesting for me.
Picture below Ryan Day
John Lomacang begins at 1:17 saying: "And not too long ago at 3ABN um a sad decision was made uh but not on the basis of anything incorrect but there was a decision made that was facilitated by a departure from the doctrinal integrities of our church and our dear brother uh Ryan Day decided that he no longer could be a part of 3ABN. Picture Below John Lomacang
He continues at 3:01
"And I've said it pains all of us to know that such a young man with grand potential would make a decision that he felt that our doctrines were so out of harmony with the Bible that he could no longer be a part of our church Well let me tell you he was an elder of our church also And nothing is further from the truth The seventh-day adventist church throughout its existence have maintained one standard and one continuous standard is that everything we teach must be based on the unerring word of God. If it is not we don't we don't embrace it "
Notice the cute little switch that makes it appear like Day left 3ABN rather than Day being fired (he did get severance pay). We have learned so far that a decision was made facilitated by a departure from the doctrinal integrities of our church, and that Day felt our doctrines were out of harmony with the Bible. Further that the SDA church is only based upon the Bible, and if not in the Bible, we don't embrace it.
So Ryan Day, by John Lomacang's own words, feels that there are some doctrines out of harmony with the Bible. So, apparently, if they can both agree that their doctrines should come from the Bible, why would 3ABN feel it necessary to fire a fellow Bible believer?
It must be something to do with something that is not really from the Bible. Lomacang's warning was that Day's departing from the "doctrinal integrities" of our church. That is interesting, as Lomacang has said that the SDA church only embraces things found in the Bible. But as we will see, that is not even true in Lomacang's own sermon.
At 7:25 Lomacang says: "Examine our doctrines You know many people just like the fall of Lucifer from heaven Lucifer's fall was not based on the fact that he proved God wrong He made many accusations but because he could not prove God wrong He was expelled And the Bible talks about the influence of anyone who goes and walks away from truth Revelation 12:4 When Lucifer fell his tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth One third of the angels rebelled with Lucifer And they did not rebel on the basis of the fact that Lucifer was right But they joined with Lucifer on the basis that they sympathized with him When you sympathize your reasoning capacities are shut down When you sympathize God's word is no longer your guide "
I will simply note here that there is no Bible teaching that lucifer is satan, that tradition that misidentifies lucifer as satan is not a biblical doctrine. But Lomacang goes much farther and says that the fallen angels sympathized with satan and their reasoning capacites were shut down. Where does anyone find that in the Bible? If you only embrace things found in the Bible, how can Lomacang make such a statement?
Lomacang continues: "Every point of rebellion seeks to create new victims on the following points: One; they lack experience on doctrinal points that are being used to deceive them. Two; they fall for the belief that somehow the accusations made have some credible merit without going and asking for counsel from those of experience. And thirdly; they sympathize with the accuser The servant of the Lord wrote in councils for the church He said "Satan hopes to involve the remnant people of God in the general ruin that is coming upon the earth As the coming of Christ draws nigh he will be more determined and decisive in his efforts to overthrow them." Listen to what she says, and by the way, Ellen White's going to be attacked tonight on their broadcast also..."
So we can finally see where the problem lies. It is not a problem of Bible doctrines; there is no Bible doctrine that angels sympathized with Satan, that is, from Ellen White's addition, known in Adventism as the Great Controversy theme. An entirely unbiblical exposition on the happenings in Heaven before the earth was even created. Questioning how Ellen White is a prophetic authority is the "doctrinal integrities of our church". Taking Ellen White as a prophet is not a Biblical doctrine either, so very clearly, Adventist doctrines are in fact not derived from the Bible. Lomacang has very well demonstrated that his presupposition about the Adventist church's doctrines coming from the Bible is not true!
Here is an example of Ryan Day's apparent attack that Lomacang expected, from Ryan Day's Update:
2:31:36 "Let's get back to the Bible Let's put Christ back in the church back in the center Make him the cornerstone of our existence Not a woman who contradicts scripture not a woman who plagiarizes and tells everyone she got it from Jesus We shouldn't have to say "Well, Ellen White says for every little thing that we we say but my goodness you go on these Adventist forums and I did one a few a few months back where I asked a question and and here we go Here I go." Very few Bible texts a plethora of Ellen White says "Have mercy Have mercy." We cannot call ourselves a people of the book if we're using Ellen White as a crutch to get us through. So that being said, my friends back to the Bible."
It is interesting that Ryan explains how he came to the view that we should go back to the Bible:
31:27 "so often early on in a and even as recent as when I was at 3ABN you hear this all the time and that is well there's nothing that the Adventist church teaches that cannot be rooted and grounded in scripture or found in scripture You'll hear people say "We don't need Ellen White to teach any of our doctrines All we need is the Bible." Uh the Bible and the Bible alone you can prove all of our doctrines and everything we believe from the Bible and the Bible alone And and that always stuck with me."
What Adventism claims and what it actually does are two very different things. That is something that a denomination that is proclaiming God to the world cannot do!
