Dwight Nelson and Allah

I often wonder when listening to some Adventist Pastors how totally out of touch with the world around them they are. This week brought several elements, together that really should focus us on some of these leadership problems in Adventism.

First a bit of sad news as reported on the First Things Website:

Shahbaz Bhatti was a Catholic and a Pakistani minister for the defense of minorities who dedicated his life to the “struggle for human equality, social justice, religious freedom, and to uplift and empower the religious minorities’ communities.” He was assasinated yesterday because of his opposition to the country’s blasphemy law:

Watch his testimony recorded before his death with the instruction to be published if he died: https://youtu.be/oBTBqUJomRE

Last week I received an email of a letter or article by someone who had a problem with the emerging church, it was not specific and was pretty much the usual they don't have the truth so they must be against us view. So I thought I would look up the author and see what else he wrote. He is pretty much a run of the mill Traditional SDA of dubious interpretation abilities but I did discover something interesting. On a website where he has some articles I found this article entitled “SDA Pastor Dwight Nelson says "Allah is GOD" and that "ALLAH IS THE GOD OF THE UNIVERSE”

The article by Phil Moore correctly points us to the following:

In a sermon on Sabbath Dec. 11, 2010, Dr. (Pastor) Dwight Nelson of Pioneer Memorial SDA Church told the world on air, 3ABN and via the Internet that: "Allah is the name of the LIVING GOD; ALLAH IS THE GOD OF THE UNIVERSE."

This sermon was titled "Star Still Rising Over Islam" ...

After listening to the suggested area I saw that Phil Moore had given an accurate description of what Pastor Nelson said. Moore's analysis I will leave to you to read if you are interested, it did not strike me as anything special so I will offer up my view on Nelson's statements. While you can download the file from the above link I will give you a transcript of the relevant statements.

Leading me to this question. (unintelligible) If God was able to shine the light of truth upon those children of the East [wise men at Jesus birth] Those sons of Ishmael 2000 years ago come folks think with me could he not would he not be doing the same today? Among the same people's of the East? By the millions are there not honest hearted seekers after truth in the Muslim faith too? Huh? And if the answer is yes and by the way I believe the answer is yes then does it not follow that Bethlehem not Rome ought to be our example today? And that instead of alienating the children of the East with our anti Islamic rhetoric we ought to be at the forefront of a movement that seeks to share with them the light that shines upon both of our communities of faith.

I recently listened to a series of CD lectures given by the late Dr. Robert Darnell a member of our community of faith, an expert on Islamic studies, he's an anthropologist. In which he carefully chronicled how that the Koran teaches the seeds of every divine truth that you and I embrace. The seeds are all there. It was Darnell's lifelong mission and conviction cultivate those seeds in dialog with the children of the East and in an hour of history when the West is turning against those children ought we not to be the first to raise up our voices in their behalf?

Think. Why shouldn't we? For what if, by the way that story of Christmas could hardly let us do otherwise could it? What if the spirit the mighty spirit of Allah by the way I got some letters from viewers after that last teaching, and one viewer said don't you know that the name Allah is a name for Lucifer? I hope you never never never never never embrace that. Allah listen carefully now Allah is closer to Elohim the Hebrew name for god then is our English word god. In fact hold on to your seats the English name for god is a Nordic pagan god. We have taken a pagan god's name and we've said that is the name of our God. And we all call him god. That's a pagan a Nordic pagan myth. So don't you ever get pushed into the corner where your saying Allah is a demonic name, Allah is the name of the living God. Allah is the creator of the Universe, Allah is the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ishmael Jethro, Job and even Baalim.

What if through dreams the mighty spirit of Allah is raising up a movement within Islam in preparation for the Messiah's return. Would we not want to partner with that mission? I want to end with a story...

The main thing we should deal with are as follows:

--the Koran teaches the seeds of every divine truth that Christians embrace.

--Allah is closer to Elohim the Hebrew name for god then is our English word god

--the English name for god is a Nordic pagan god.

--We have taken a pagan god's name

--Allah is the god of the Old Testament folks.

First, does the Koran teach the seeds of every divine truth that Christians embrace? Read John chapter One. The Word became flesh and lived among us. That Jesus Christ is God, does the Koran teach that Jesus was God incarnate or that Jesus was a great prophet who did not die on the cross and who never was resurrected from the dead? The central core of Christianity is who is Christ yet here we have an SDA pastor telling us that the seed of the central core of Christianity is found in the Koran which even though written 600 years after the time of the New Testament denies Christ to be God or to have died on the cross and the resurrection.

Which means either Pastor Nelson is willingly ignorant of the Koran or he is lying or what he means by seeds is something like a concept that is present in such a tiny way that it is infinitesimal. Now think about this, the Koran is written hundreds of years after the New Testament and thousands of years after the Old Testament, would you really expect a divine addendum of truth to discredit the previous inspiration or to offer only seeds of what was previously clearly expressed? See more in the article Revisiting the Quran’s gross errors concerning Christian theology

Allah and Elohim are related, but they are both words from paganism since paganism predates all monotheistic religions, even if one believes there was always one true religion they were it seems outnumbered by the surrounding cultures. In the article Is the Word Allah Similar to Elohim? by Penny Warren B.A., M.A., D.D we read the following:

The Hebrew title of God is "Elohim;" in Arabic it's "Allah." These two words for God have a common bond that most people don't understand. Both of these words have their origin in pagan deities of the ancient past...

Webster’s Dictionary gives the definition and etymology of Allah as follows. Allah is the Muslim name for "the God." Allah is derived from two words "al," which means "the" and "ilah," which is related to the feminine Hebrew word for God, "eloah."

Now the Hebrew title or name for God is 'Elohim' and it is the plural form of eloah. It is made plural by adding "im," which is masculine. This corresponds to adding "s" to make a word plural in English. So the commonality between Allah and Elohim is "eloah" and "ilah."

According the Huston Smith’s book The World’s Religions (p. 222), it states: "Allah is formed by joining the definite article al meaning ‘the’ with Ilah (God). Literally, Allah means ‘The God.’ … When the masculine plural ending im is dropped from the Hebrew word for God, Elohim, the two words sound much alike." Eloah (Hebrew feminine) is similar to Ilah (God). Both Elohim and Allah are titles and not names.

Most Christians should know by now how frequently the “El” term is used in the Old Testament for various gods and in peoples names honoring their god.

Elohim (אֱלהִים) is a plural formation of eloah, the latter being an expanded form of the Northwest Semitic noun il (אֱל, ʾēl [1]). It is the usual word for "God" in the Hebrew Bible, referring with singular verbs both to the one God of Israel, and also in a few examples to other singular pagan deities. With plural verbs the word is also used as a true plural with the meaning "gods".[2]

Is the god the name of a Nordic pagan deity? The short answer is no, in the following article

Etymology of the Name God :

 Oddly, the exact history of the word God is unknown. The word God is a relatively new European invention, which was never used in any of the ancient Judaeo-Christian scripture manuscripts that were written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek or Latin.

According to the best efforts of linguists and researchers, the root of the present word God  is the Sanskrit word hu which means to call upon, invoke, implore.
Nonetheless, it is also interesting to note the similarity to the ancient Persian word for God which is Khoda.

The following is a survey of some of the efforts of those who have been trying to decipher the ancient roots of the word God:

What is nice about this article is that it then quotes multiple reference works, you don't have to go all over the place, just scroll down the page. 

Of course the whole concept of god means that there will be overlap between any and every superhuman being in whatever country or culture. The obnoxious thing about Pastor Nelson is he ignores this simple fact so that he can denigrate god in English because we don't speak Aramaic or Hebrew and those two languages that we don't use, are closer being they were near to each other in origins.

It is hard to even formulate an argument against such foolish ideas as Pastor Nelson presents. It is as if he desires to ignore the hatred and cruelty through much of the Islamic world, he acts as if when we observe the cruelty and violence it is anti-Islamic rhetoric. Well, the fact is there is a lot of problems going on in the world of Islam and Pastors like Nelson do nothing to help the situation with fictional facts and intentional distortions of the truth. He should be ashamed of himself and if he wants to deal with something a little closer to the heart of Adventism's love of eschatology he might consider the Islamic tradition of the 12th Imam and it's possible connection to the Christian conception of the anti-Christ. 

Glenn Beck The Twelfth Imam 2/4/2010 Part 1

Glenn Beck Part 2 The Twelfth Imam- 2-17-2011

Glenn Beck Part 3 The Twelfth Imam- 2-17-2011

Speaking of the news, only this last week Louis Farrakhan stated that the Great Mahdi is present in the world now.

This is a sign that The Great Mahdi that the Muslim world has been looking for is present in the world. That “The Christ” that you hoped for, “The Christ” that you longed for is present in the world. And all tyrants will be set down—God is stimulating the rise of the masses, and soon it will come to America's shores. Indeed it has already begun.

Lastly here is a good short article on Why Christians do not accept Muhammad as a prophet.

I would like to take a more conciliatory approach to answer this question by starting with some common grounds that Islam has with Christianity about Jesus:

1. That Jesus historically existed
2. That Jesus was a true prophet sent by God, the God of Abraham
3. That Jesus had the title "the anointed one" although understood differently in Islam as al-Masīḥ
4. That Jesus has the title the Word (Logos) although understood differently in Islam as kalimat Allāh
5. That Jesus was born without sin and remained without sin
6. That Jesus was born to Mary as a result of virginal conception
7. That Jesus performed miracles including raising people from the dead
8. That Jesus had foreknowledge of what was hidden to others
9. That Jesus is an important religious model, possessing the highest knowledge and intimacy with God
10. That Jesus was raised up to heaven (although this is not unanimous among Islam scholars)
11. That on the Day of Judgment (Yawm al-qiyāmah) Jesus will be witness against the wicked and destroy the anti-Christ (al-Masīḥ ad-Dajjāl)

But Islam denies the following Christian teachings about Jesus:

1. That the 4 canonical gospels faithfully recorded the teaching of Jesus and about Jesus. Instead, Muslim scholars consider the true gospel, Injīl, to be lost or hopelessly corrupted in the form of the NT gospels we have today, thus consider information about Jesus in the Quran as more authoritative.
2. That Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, with the full implications of what Jesus said to be understood in Christianity as,
   • being the second person of the Trinity and thus having pre-existence before conception
   • being fully divine yet fully human (i.e. Incarnation according to the Chalcedonian definition)
3. That Jesus was crucified until he was truly dead on the cross (see journal articles on medical evidence and a 2021 review of medical views). Instead, Muslim scholars's view is more similar to Gnosticism or Docetism (see the 2009 School of Oriental and African Studies journal article The Muslim Jesus: Dead or alive?).
4. That having truly died on the cross and buried in a cave tomb Jesus was raised from the dead on Resurrection Sunday. Muslim scholars believe that he was taken down from the cross alive (though unconscious) and later recuperated from his wounds.
5. That the Counselor/Advocate whom Jesus sent in John 14 and John 16 is the Holy Spirit. Instead Muslim scholars understand Jesus to mean Muhammad (pbuh) (see here, refuted here).
6. That Jesus is present in Spirit in the world today (see What is the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives today?). Instead Muslim scholars understand Quran references to "Holy Spirit" (Rūḥ al-qudus) to refer to the angel Jibrīl (Gabriel) (pbuh). The Quraanic Exegesis article Who Is the Holy Spirit? concludes:

   So it is clear that Ruh al-Qudus here refers to Jibril… No one suggests that Ruh al-Qudus means the life of Allah ; nor is this indicated by the wording and this phrase is never used in that sense.” (Daqaiq al-Tafsir, part 2, p. 92)

Although Islamic prophet Muhammad (pbuh) spoke highly of Jesus as possibly greater than the OT prophets before him, and spoke highly of his mother Mary as well, all branches of Christianity cannot accept Muhammad (pbuh) on the same level as all canonized OT prophets and as the prophet Jesus himself because Muhammad (pbuh) denied that Jesus claimed to be the Son of God. Instead, Muhammad (pbuh) believed that Jesus, as a holy prophet sent by the true God, would never have "blasphemed" God by claiming to be God himself.

It's a pity that he probably got the wrong idea of the Trinity, thinking that Christians taught what we now call Tritheism (see Islamic view of the Trinity). Naturally, as Christians today ALSO denounce Tritheism as a denial of monotheism, this distorted view of the Trinity led him to exhort Christians to repent, such as in Quran Surah 5:116-118:

And [beware the Day] when Allah will say, "O Jesus, Son of Mary, did you say to the people, 'Take me and my mother as deities besides Allah ?'" He will say, "Exalted are You! It was not for me to say that to which I have no right. If I had said it, You would have known it. You know what is within myself, and I do not know what is within Yourself. Indeed, it is You who is Knower of the unseen. I said not to them except what You commanded me - to worship Allah, my Lord and your Lord. And I was a witness over them as long as I was among them; but when You took me up, You were the Observer over them, and You are, over all things, Witness. If You should punish them - indeed they are Your servants; but if You forgive them - indeed it is You who is the Exalted in Might, the Wise.

CONCLUSION: Since Jesus's being the Son of God whose true death on the cross and who is present in spirit in our lives today are both so central to salvation, and since true faith has to be based on agreeing with this, there is no way that any Christian can accept Muhammad (pbuh) as a true prophet despite many things he taught in common.

Christians trust that the 4 canonized gospels are the only authentic ones, that the other NT letters and books give us trustworthy accounts of what Jesus taught, trustworthy understanding of who Jesus is, and trustworthy interpretation of the OT. No true prophet would teach truths contrary to the truths presented in the Christian Bible.

Sources

1. University of Alberta Muslim Students' Association pamphlet Jesus: a Prophet of Islam
2. Vox 2019 article Muslims love Jesus, too: 6 things you didn't know about Jesus in Islam
3. U.S. Catholic magazine 2016 article What do Muslims think of Jesus?
4. Christianity Today 2002 article Is the God of Muhammad the Father of Jesus
5. Wikipedia article Jesus in Islam
6. Wikipedia article Names and titles of Jesus in the Quran
7. Wikipedia article Islamic views on Jesus' death
8. Wikipedia article Second Coming - Islam
9. Wikipedia article Messiah - Islam

 https://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/89037/why-don-t-christians-accept-muhammad-as-the-true-prophet

The Bible misused as a dictionary, Faith still needs evidence

Today let us explore some more of the irrationality that propagates itself contentedly in the Adventist church. Keeping with last weeks article let us again examine a statement made by Preston Foster on Adventist Today website:

What I am positing is that 1) spirituality is, by nature, irrational as it is based on faith which is, by definition, "the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (that definition, alone, would repel the traditional rational thinker) and, 2) based on our limited ability to comprehend God, whose thoughts and ways, by His own admission, are different than ours is.

How many times have we heard this statement, as if the author of the book of Hebrews was actually trying to define the meaning of faith, as if his intent was to give us the once and for all time meaning of faith even though he had used it before and it had been used many times in the Old Testament and the Jewish religion. After all those using this statement will say that they are only letting the Bible define itself as if the simple common words needed to be defined by the Bible as if it was not only a compilation of books but also a dictionary. Think about that for a moment should I use that technique if I said to someone “I love you” and I used the Bible as a dictionary I could quote “God is love” (1 John 4:8) therefore my statement is now “I God you”. Oh we can work it out in a round about way, we can say God loves and because God loves we are able to love. But still the definition of love is not found in the word God, even less so if I don't capitalize god and I realize that there are many different beliefs about god and gods, after all, not all gods are that terribly loving are they? We can't just substitute one word for another because some place it was equated in a statement where “is” is used. “God God's you” it may be true but what does it mean. So are we really being wise to use Hebrews statement as the definition of faith. Let us look at the text in question with the surrounding context, because after all context gives meaning because we are rational:

^{HEB 10:37} For in just a very little while, "He who is coming will come and will not delay.

^{HEB 10:38} But my righteous one ⁿ will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him." ⁿ

^{HEB 10:39} But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who believe and are saved.

^{HEB 11:1} Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

^{HEB 11:2} This is what the ancients were commended for.

^{HEB 11:3} By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

^{HEB 11:4} By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead.

The purpose here is not to define faith as some kind of irrational thought that just gets into our head and we believe it even though we don't see any evidence of it. Faith is not even meant here to mean just because a person is sure of something and hope that their certainty is true that it is in fact true in all things one maybe sure of, rather that faith in Christ is something He is sure of and encourages other to be sure of. As the Expositor's Bible Commentary says:

The chapter begins with some general observations on the nature of faith. They do not constitute a formal definition; rather, the writer is calling attention to some significant features of faith. Then he proceeds to show how faith works out in practice.

1 In the Greek the verb "is" (estin) is the first word. Faith is a present and continuing reality. It is not simply a virtue sometimes practiced in antiquity. It is a living thing, a way of life the writer wishes to see continued in the practice of his readers. Faith, he tells us, is a hypostasis of things hoped for. The term has evoked lively discussion. Sometimes it has a subjective meaning, as in 3:14 where NIV translates it as "confidence." But it may also be used more objectively, and KJV understands it that way in this passage by translating it as "substance." This would mean that things that have no reality in themselves are made real (given "substance") by faith. But this does not seem to be what the writer is saying. Rather, his meaning is that there are realities for which we have no material evidence though they are not the less real for that. Faith enables us to know that they exist and, while we have no certainty apart from faith, faith does give us genuine certainty. "To have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for" (TEV). Faith is the basis, the substructure (hypostasis means lit. "that which stands under") of all that the Christian life means, all that the Christian hopes for.

Faith in the Bible is developed, it is practiced it is lived and thus Hebrews chapter 11 recounts several instances of faith. Not one of them simply based upon some irrational concept. God warns Noah and Noah builds and Ark, Abraham is called by God and goes to a foreign country, Abraham and Sarah have a child which they are promised by God. Now we may not know in all the cases how they received their messages from God but it does appear that it is not meant to convey the idea that their spirituality was based upon some form of irrationality. Instead they were trusting the one that communicated to them. The implication being that their lives included enough reason to come to the place where they could trust God rather then just following an irrational voice in their head. Think of the story of Israel's exodus from Egypt. Moses comes to Pharaoh and tells them what God wants. Pharaoh says who is this god and why should I do what he says and then evidence is provided. Pharaoh needed a rational reason to give up what was to him, his property.

We don't ever want to get to the position of faith without reason. There has to be a reason, there has to be some kind of evidence to create the faith. As Paul once wrote:

^{1CO 15:14} And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.

Faith that is not backed by evidence is usually useless. Irrational preaching and faith is useless if there is not reality to move the irrational into the realm of the rational. The problem is that today there are certain people of a fundamentalist perspective who despise logic and reason because reason dictates against certain of their beliefs. Their beliefs having become sacred truth because they hold them tight because they are traditions. When reality conflicts with their beliefs instead of re-evaluating their beliefs they reject reality in favor of their traditions and as in the above quote redefine Biblical material to support their traditional views. Growth however comes from changing, discarding things that don't fit reality and adapting to new systems of thought that function with reality. It is not perfect as you don't arrive at truth instantly it is a constant movement toward greater understanding. Not every theory will work out and when they don't they must be discarded, keeping the theory just because it has become your tradition insures that you won't ever change or grow. This failure to grow is so often the landmark of religion, it becomes why Fundamentalists whether Christian or Islamic fight against modernity. Because modernity and even post modernity refuse to simply accept tradition without evidence.

So we have to move past the irrational toward rational views in all things, and God is not irrational the very process of progressive revelation of the Bible indicates that God understands the need to grow and change and step by step lead people in a rational way while maintaining the necessary distinction between the natural and the supernatural. Which requires us to reason not only why miracles occur but why they don't occur. How best can we understand a God whose capabilities so outweigh our capabilities and the distinction between force and willing trust. It is unlikely that we can fully understand God but to end the rational pursuit of God is a fulfillment of the old commercial that said “a mind is a terribly thing to waste”. We can never get to the point as someone once claimed a church authority said regarding the Godhead and The Plan of Salvation :

“to wit: if we try to understand it, we will lose our minds; but if we don’t believe it, we will lose our souls.”

Adventist Mission Statement Gospel Restricted to SDA Doctrines

You have probably noticed that I am not putting up blog posts as often as I used to. Part of this is a reflection of the deep disappointment I feel in Adventism. See Addendum below for some examples.

One of the recent article on Adventist Today's website is entitled Have We Lost Sight of Our Mission? By Preston Foster. I will sum up the article by using some of the comments after the article. In response to a comment by John McClarty (in red) where he quotes Preston's original article (in bold) Preston explains his intent.

I'm not saying that our message isn't Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.  It is.  I'm not saying that the most important thing that anyone could ever discover isn't the love of Christ and the gift of salvation thru His sacrifice.  It is.

But those fundamental truths are not our mission."

Do you really mean to argue that our mission and message are separate from "the most important thing that anyone could ever discover"? Our mission is to help people discover the  second most important thing? The third most important thing?

Yes, that is exactly what I am positing.  The point is to differentiate between our message as Christians and our mission as a denomination.  Our message, like that of all Christian churches is Christ, and Him crucified.  That is the most important thing that any Christian can communicate to another human.  However, that is not the reason that this denomination exists.

(skip one paragraph)

As, perhaps, some of our brethren of other denominations were given light to see was was written about grace, we Adventists have been given a mission in regard to what has been written in Scripture about the Sabbath and its connection to identifying truth in the last days before the Second Advent.  Delivering that message is, in my view, the mission of this denomination, in the context of the body of Christ.

The problem here is not only with Preston's view of things. It is in fact the problem with the Adventist church that we create our doctrines as the official interpreter of the gospel. Let me explain the reason I say that lest I simply make unsupportable statements like the bloggers I have mentioned in the addendum. Adventists have a mission statement that is very peculiar. Until I was spurred by Preston's blog to examine our mission statement I did not realize the cryptic nature of our statement. The Adventist mission statement reads:

Our Mission

The mission of the Seventh-day Adventist Church is to make disciples of all people, communicating the everlasting gospel in the context of the three angels' messages of Revelation 14:6-12, leading them to accept Jesus as personal Savior and unite with His remnant Church, discipling them to serve Him as Lord and preparing them for His soon return. http://adventist.org/beliefs/statements/main-stat1.html

Our mission statement which is given by the leaders to inform the organization how to carry out their mission includes the code language of Adventism namely the three angels' messages. If you read Revelation 14 you will not understand how it explains the everlasting gospel. It does not provide the context of the everlasting gospel. For that you would be better off reading the context of the Gospels, or even Paul then Revelation 14. But the three angels messages is code language for the distinctive Adventist doctrines. Even Wikipedia understands the code method of using the three angels' message to mean the SDA church. As their article quotes the SDA church manual:

"In accordance with God’s uniform dealing with mankind, warning them of coming events that will vitally affect their destiny, He has sent forth a proclamation of the approaching return of Christ. This preparatory message is symbolized by the three angels’ messages of Revelation 14, and meets its fulfillment in the great Second Advent Movement today. This has brought forth the remnant, or Seventh-day Adventist Church, keeping the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." Seventh-day Adventist Church Manual[2]

In short The Adventist church is the Remnant and it is her doctrines that the remnant must proclaim, the Adventist church sees itself in the book of Revelation and in Revelation 14 as being those who keep the commandments of God and have the Faith of Jesus. As Hans K. LaRondelle states in his article The Remnant and the Three Angels’ Messages

Three key teachings, each developed independently, merged into one message that began to characterize the movement of the Sabbatarian Adventists: Christ’s final ministry in the sanctuary, the Sabbath as a sign of obedience to God’s commandments, and the application of the phrase “testimony of Jesus” to a new manifestation of the prophetic gift through Ellen G. White (1827– 1915) in the “remnant” church (Rev. 12:17; 14:12; 19:10). These distinctive concepts began to be integrated into a unified body of belief during six Bible conferences held in the northeastern United States in 1848. The participants held in common a belief that in the post-1844 period all biblical truth had to be restored among God’s remnant people before the Second Advent would take place. They agreed on seven principal points, which came to be called the “landmarks” or fundamentals. These formed the “firm platform” of present truth on which the emerging Seventhday Adventist Church was built. Specifically, they were (1) the imminent Second Advent, (2) the continuous historical interpretation of the major time prophecies of Daniel and Revelation, (3) the conditional immortality of human beings, (4) Christ’s beginning of His final ministry in the heavenly sanctuary in 1844, (5) the seventh-day Sabbath, (6) the renewed manifestation of the Spirit of Prophecy, and (7) the historical fulfillment of the three angels’ messages of Revelation.

What this all allows is that our mission becomes less about the Gospel and more about Adventist Doctrinal interpretations, the gospel according to Adventist doctrines. We see how important this is in the mission statement if we omit the part about remnant and three angels. Removed the statement would look like this:

The mission of the Seventh-day Adventist Church is to make disciples of all people, communicating the everlasting gospel , leading them to accept Jesus as personal Savior and unite with His Church, discipling them to serve Him as Lord and preparing them for His soon return

That would be a pretty good mission statement. Who would have a problem with that? But of course that is not our mission statement. Remember the purpose of a mission statement is primarily internal, for the organization:

A Mission Statement defines the organization's purpose and primary objectives. Its prime function is internal – to define the key measure or measures of the organization's success – and its prime audience is the leadership team and stockholders.

This shows that the Adventist church goal is to define and spread a gospel of it's own particular formulation. Preston on February 17 commented the following on the blog:

The filter that separates those who, in the last days, are listening to (and obeying) the authentic voice of God are, per Revelation 14:12.  That is, those "keep the commandments of God" as given in Exodus 20, "and have the testimony of Jesus."  It seems many Christians, by definition, "have the testimony of Jesus."  The differentiator, for many, will be "keeping the commandments of God," as opposed to the traditions of men.  The seventh-day Sabbath is the point of differentiation between the two.

For now I will ignore the misuse of Exodus 20 as the meaning of commandments rather then the New Testament meaning of the instructions of God and the fact that really no one is keeping all the commandments of God individually or as a denomination. We see that Preston defines the gospel along narrow Adventist remnant theology. Which is what the mission statement requires.

It does make me wonder, with a mission statement so self centered how will the Adventist church ever actually present the gospel?


----
Addendum: Edited 9:21 Pacific Time
Adventism appears to very quickly be moving into such a narrow cult-like religion that it seems somewhat pointless to point out the foolishness that is afflicting the church from the top down. All one has to do is read the Adventist Today Blog and see they have installed various bloggers with so little sense that it is appalling. A couple of cases as examples. Originally I cited this section as a preamble to my above article, but they are really separate issues and the importance of the mission statement should be seen without the personally feeling I have regarding the quality of material from the Adventist Today bloggers.

Stephen Foster Adventist Today blogger in the comments section of Ervin Taylors Blog says:

However, regarding the Godhead and The Plan of Salvation, I will quote/paraphrase the great Dr. Calvin B. Rock,to wit: if we try to understand it,we will lose our minds; but if we don’t believe it,we will lose our souls.

Later he will say that “try to understand it” is the same as totally or fully comprehend it. It is the technique of arguing by changing the meaning of the words after he said them. You can read the conversation at the blog. It is considerably frustrating to deal with people that are that completely illogical. It is rather like the person who just peed on you leg telling you that the liquid is not from them and that it is good for you and the ground also but it was not pee and you simply cannot understand that they never peed at all. Most all of Stephen Foster's blogs are like that as well, another example is the first paragraph of his most recent blog:

Yes, it is the undeniable fact that the God of the Bible does set before us life and death, and never changes those options, that has forced those who don't like that type of God, or don't think that type of God is worthy of worship, to reinvent Him in their own image. This is what all the postmodern, emergent, cross-over-Christian psychobabble is largely about, no doubt.

As if that opening tells us anything of the kind; that if one does not accept that God sets before us life and death then everything from postmodern, emergent Christianity is reinventing God in people's image. You will not find him logically setting forth his reasoning in any of his blogs on the subject just his presuppositions as fact and they are not intelligent presuppositions or anything close to facts. But he is not alone in this type of writing style. In Cindy Tutch's article last month also supposedly on emergent churches her beginning sentence is as follows: 

In the Adventist sanctuary doctrine, which is unique to our movement, we find a visual merger of relationship (Christ our High Priest), ancient roots (the Judaic Sanctuary rituals) and a common history (unfolding dialogue between the people and God). Satan targets this highly symbolic yet relational motif because it is the very heart of God's will and instructions regarding redemption, mission, spirituality, and even worship.

You know doubt wonder how it is that Satan targets this highly symbolic yet relational motif? Well you can keep wondering because as with the old “Satan made me do it claim” the claim is all that is necessary because they can't show how Satan made them do it nor can Cindy say how Satan targets the Adventist sanctuary doctrine which is highly symbolic yet relational. If you are a critical thinking person you can probably see another problem there in something being called highly symbolic yet relational. You might like to see that little idea delved into a bit...well you will have to wait for that and I would not suggest you hold your breath to find out about that little theory.

Faith and Mystery vs. Certainity

I came upon the following quote from the speaker Brene Brown on her lecture “The power of vulnerability” at the TED website :

“The other thing we do is we make everything uncertain certain religion has gone from

faith and mystery to certainty, I'm right your wrong shut up that's it just certain...”

This is such an amazingly true statement yet so simply put that it becomes striking. This is so true of Fundamentalism and now becoming undeniable in Adventism. In a previous post I mentioned an Andrews Seminary student who I think is the perfect example of this. In Ervin Taylor's Blog entitled “Forward into the Past” we read this statement directed toward me:

“..It is also just funny how you and some others speak against the doctrines of the church and at the same time don't leave the church . People like you should be disfellowshiped , and given them a restraning order from our churches”... [please not I don't correct spelling or grammar when quoting blog comments]

I put that quote in because most who read the quote by Brene Brown will see the truth of the first part of the sentence but think that we don't actually have people saying shut up if you are not certain like them. Later on this seminary student who apparently is also already a Pastor from what he says, was more magnanimous, saying:

...”Ervin , Ron and Elaine , your problem is that you don't believe in the inspiration of scripture .As a Pastor , I wouldn't mind having you visit my church . I would just not baptize you or give you any privileges ( like preaching , or teaching a Sababth school class or leading in small groups ) So I believe there is place for everybody in the church , and I think that is what the church does to you , I don't think any of you teach or preach in the churches you attend but I am sure that people smile at you and invite you to stay after potluck . ELder Wilson say we should read more Ellen white , I thik she will answer your questions . read the chapter on creation and you will change your view .I am glad that God the remnant church the gift of prophecy and we have Ellen white who has been right on final events and every single area she wrote . Ellen is our modern day "Moses " who is going to take us to the promised land . If you don't want to be deceived by the Satan ,read her writings .”

Church is to be a place to be smiled at and maybe invited to a potluck just as long as you don't talk about what you think and are given no opportunity to express your beliefs or opinions or uncertainty. Shut up unless you believe like me seems to be the new Adventist Fundamentalism. Did you also notice that he would not even baptize those who don't believe like him. My statements here are not simply representative of this seminary student but upon the actual experiences I have in my local church and many churches I have visited. This seminary student is just a recent example who I have in writing so I don't have to rely on my memory of personal experiences.

Certainly about faith and ancient stories and ancient history is really not that wise. It leads to false acceptance of non facts to be facts. I have reason to believe the stories about Jesus Christ but that is based upon certain evidence but evidence is not completely solid which is why it has from the New Testament times been termed faith. But faith that becomes certainty is no longer faith and if that certainty is based upon the misuse of facts or the absence of facts then that certainty is hubris.

Religion as hubris is not attractive! Certainty becomes exclusiveness and rather then spreading the idea of love and acceptance with the humility to learn more, the “certain” church becomes accepting of those who believe like them, love is lost unless you believe as they do or at best a pipe dream talked about but not practices. Humility and learning become the qualities on the outside, they out there, study the natural world and they study mankind with it's many attributes, inside we have our beliefs and we are certain of them because Scriptures can only be interpreted as we on the inside interpret them. Those who are certain don't need to learn anything because it might go against their certainty, and humility becomes humility based upon the assumption that they have the truth, the certainty of their own view of the truth. As we look at history it is often those who are the most certain who are the most dangerous, you only have to look at certain segments of Islam to see that certainty in action and it deadly consequences.

A religion that has lost it's faith and mystery has lost it reason to exist.