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During an era in which race relations worsened to their lowest point in post-civil war American history, the first Adventist church planted in the nation’s capital was an interracial fellowship, described in 1899 as a “living miracle of the power of God” that surprised outside observers. The church was central to a saga played out on the stage of Washington, D.C., introduced in Part 1, that challenges us to re-think Adventism’s racial past and how it has shaped the present.

Despite her melancholy over the absence of the man who had captured her heart, Georgia Harper dutifully went about her work for the Lord—selling Adventist literature, giving Bible studies, and seeking to interest others in receiving them. Trudging street after street and climbing steep stairs to row house after row house added physical exhaustion to her heaviness of heart.

She and Will Spicer had talked about marriage. But in 1887 the future world church leader felt called to join a mission to England. Meanwhile, Georgia and five other young people joined the city mission that the Adventists had recently set up in Washington, D.C. It was one of about twenty-five missions the church had launched in urban America during the 1880s—a frontier that the movement had as yet barely touched.

The few who responded positively no doubt lifted Georgia’s spirits. Yet she could not have imagined the far-reaching consequences when an exceptionally genial, professionally attired young black man responded positively to the literature she offered.¹ When James H. Howard embraced the message of “present truth,” he opened a large portal to a population segment that the Adventist mission initiative had not particularly targeted—the growing black communities of urban America.

Though the “Great Migration”—the boom in black migration from the South to the cities of the North—lay nearly thirty years ahead, Washington, D.C. already had the largest black population of any city in the world, approaching 100,000 by 1900. It was in many respects a Southern city, with hardening lines of racial segregation in education, housing, restaurants, and theaters. Yet, strong black educational institutions and prestigious churches thrived along with the arts and entertainment, making Washington the cultural center of black America before Harlem came into vogue in the 1920s. Employment opportunities in government and education undergirded a strong black middle class, well-informed, culturally alive, and progressive in outlook.²

It is difficult to imagine Adventism finding a more winsome and well-positioned ambassador to black Washington than James H. Howard. He was born in 1861, during the Civil War, in an historic, free black community near Sandy Spring, Maryland, north of Washington, D.C. He graduated from Howard University in Washington as class valedictorian and did so at age 18, the youngest person to earn a bachelor’s degree from the university for many decades to come. He went on to earn an M.D. at Howard Medical School in 1883, again at the top of his class. Years later he would be father-figure and mentor to his better-known niece, Eva B. Dykes, who in 1921 became the first African American female to complete requirements for a PhD.³

Instead of practicing medicine, Dr. Howard entered the Pensions Office of the Department of War—a coveted “desk job” in the higher echelons of the federal government positions that were open to black Americans. At the point when young James Howard encountered Georgia Harper and Adventism in 1887, he had just stepped into a future bright with promise for success, financial comfort, and prestige among the black elite of Washington society.

His embrace of Adventism thus “created a sensation among the [Howard University] faculty, student body and alumni…Dr. Howard became a marked man among his erstwhile friends and admirers who shook their heads at what they regarded as the folly of so promising a young man needlessly throwing away his career.” But to Kelly Miller, the author of these words, it was to Dr. Howard’s credit that, Moses-like, he preferred this course to enjoying “the social frivolities of Washington for one season.” Miller, a long-time professor and dean at Howard University, was also a public intellectual of a stature roughly on par with that of a Cornel West or a Henry Louis Gates today.⁴

The Adventist mission in Washington gradually gained momentum and in 1888 began meeting for Sabbath and evangelistic services in space rented at Claybaugh Hall on 14th Street, Northwest. The new group of believers was interracial from the start. Alonzo T. Jones, who worshiped with the embryonic congregation when he came to Washington late in 1888 to advocate for religious liberty in congressional committee hearings, recalled that about half of the group was “colored.” He had been “pleased to see how freely and brotherly they met and conducted their services simply as Christian brethren.”⁵

Other evidence suggests the proportion of black members was not as high among the 26 charter members when the congregation was formally organized in March 1889. Still, the church grew to an estimated total membership of 150 by 1900, about 50 of whom were black people. James Howard led the way in fervent witness to the gospel message of “present truth” in Washington.⁶

In a tribute published decades later in his nationally-syndicated newspaper column, Kelly Miller wrote that Dr. Howard “carried the gospel with him wherever he went,” always armed with “circulars and literature.” In fact, said Miller, “I never met him on the street but that he essayed to persuade me to become an Adventist just as he was.” While, on the one hand, Dr. Howard indeed had “the enthusiasm of a religious zealot,” on the other hand, Miller observed, “he always maintained the approach of the scholar and the never failing courtesy of the true gentleman that he was.”⁷

With reference to his enthusiasm for sharing the Adventist message, Dr. Howard noted, “One of the first questions asked me when I try to tell of the truth and our denomination, is, ‘Are your people as hypocritical as the rest of the churches on the race question.’” And he reported that he had been able give an emphatic response to the negative because “I have had so much confidence in our church and their faithfulness to the principles of Christ.”⁸

One way the story of Dr. James H. Howard and the Washington church (to be continued!) can help heal our historical memory is by broadening our conception of how Adventism took hold among Americans of African descent. For several reasons, mostly good, that conception has been dominated by the courageous and innovative mission to the Deep South led by J. Edson White, utilizing the legendary steamship, “The Morning Star.” The importance of that mission, conducted against great odds posed by resistance both inside and outside of the church, in stimulating a long-delayed concentrated effort to reach the vast majority of the black population who still lived in the South, is unshakably established.⁹

Edson White and his Caucasian colleagues braved a violent backlash from white supremacists, then adapted in the interests of self-preservation, but did not run away. Between 1894 and 1909, the Southern Missionary Society spearheaded by White established churches, schools, and even some small clinics throughout the South, and saw the southern black Adventist membership grow from around 50 to nearly 1,000.

Yet this legacy of faith and courage can be distorted and demeaned if seen through the prism of the “white savior” motif. That is, if a selective account of this story so dominates our historical consciousness that we regard the transmission of Adventism to African Americans as handed down by benevolently superior whites to poor, ignorant, depraved, and virtually helpless blacks.

Alongside the grand story of “the southern work,” we need the stories of brilliant, progressive, competent, and determined black people who discovered Adventism for themselves through means not especially directed to a particular racial group. Some are relatively well-known: the former slave Charles Kinny wandered into an evangelistic tent in Reno, Nevada; a precocious Anna Knight requested Adventist literature because she wanted to read anything she could get her hands on. Others, like Dr. James H. Howard, remain virtually unknown.

When we pick up the story in Part 3, we will find Dr. Howard and his wife Belle sharing the good news of Adventism in the home of Rosetta Douglass Sprague, daughter of the great Frederick Douglass. But we will also see that within a few months of the organization of the Washington church in 1889, perplexities arose to cloud Dr. Howard’s enthusiasm for his new-found faith. He finds that now both his “heart and his lips hesitate” when he is asked if Adventists were consistent Christians when it came to race relations. He had hoped that Adventism might succeed where American Christendom had largely failed in bringing the gospel to bear on the nation’s original sin. But he will begin to wonder if he would have even joined the church in the first place had he known what was now becoming apparent.

Notes & References:

[1] Daniel A. Ochs and Grace Lillian Ochs, The Past and the Presidents: Biographies of the General Conference Presidents. Nashville: Southern Publishing Association, 1974), 132-133.

[2] Constance McLaughlin Green, The Secret City: A History of Race Relations in the Nation’s Capital (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967), 119-154; Jacqueline M.Moore, Leading the Race: The Transformation of the Black Elite in the Nation’s Capital, 1880-1920 (Charlottesville and London: The University Press of Virginia, 1999), 4-8.

[3] DeWitt S. Williams, She Fulfilled the Impossible Dream: The Story of Eva B. Dykes (Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1985).

[4] Kelly Miller, “Howard of Howard.” Atlanta Daily World, 27 Jan. 1936: 4. Also appears in variously edited forms in Miller’s column “Kelly Miller Says,” syndicated in black newspapers throughout the nation.

[5] A.T. Jones to unidentified General Conference official, 3 July 1907. A.G. Daniells presidential correspondence files, General Conference Archives.

[6] Douglas Morgan, Lewis C. Sheafe: Apostle to Black America (Hagerstown, MD: Review & Herald Publishing Association, 2010), 179-181.

[7] Miller, “Howard of Howard.”

[8] J.H. Howard to O.A. Olsen, 3 Nov. 1889, General Conference Archives.

[9] Ronald D. Graybill, Mission to Black America: The True Story of  J. Edson White and the Riverboat Morning Star, rev. ed. (Published by the author, 2013).

Douglas Morgan is a graduate of Union College in Lincoln, Nebraska, and the University of Chicago (PhD, History of Christianity with an emphasis in American religious and social movements). Since 1994 he has served on the faculty of Washington Adventist University in Takoma Park, Maryland. His publications include Adventism and the American Republic (University of Tennessee Press, 2001) and Lewis C. Sheafe: Apostle to Black America (Review and Herald, 2010).

This article was originally published on Against the Wall. It is reprinted here with permission.

Image: Dr. James H. Howard / blacksdahistory.org

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An Adventist brother is spreading the Good News of Christ’s love in the Middle East. Neither he, nor the location he’s working in, can be identified due to safety concerns, but he asked that I share the following story. Almost on a daily basis, he is experiencing God’s leading in reaching out to others. Here is a snapshot, in his own words:

DAY 1 (Tuesday, November 21, 2017)

Last night something odd happened: my Wi-Fi stopped working. I woke up at 6 a.m. I did my devotional and decided to go in to work early where I could get some Wi-Fi. I dillied and dallied, tidied up and put out the rubbish, which I don’t usually do on a work morning. I would still get to work about an hour early. 

I went out to flag down a local taxi, forgetting that I had a 50% promotional discount if I had booked an Uber instead. There was a taxi on the other side of the street. I put my hand out to him but he would have to do a U-turn farther up the road to get to me. I don't even know if he saw me. Out of the blue, however, from a corner behind me, another taxi turned up. The driver was a very smartly dressed young man with a tie. 

I jokingly asked, “Are you an ambassador’s personal driver looking for a bit more money?" He smiled, and invited me into his car even though he didn’t know the address where I was going. We proceeded to have the usual taxi-driver's banter (“nice day?” “how's work?” etc.).

Then bam! He enquired in a thick Ghanaian accent, "Ah you Avendist?” I replied with my thick East London accent, "Yu wha’?" thinking, did he say what I think he said? If so, what gave it away?

“I think I have seen you somewhere before,” he told me. “I attend the local Seventh-day Adventist Church" I replied. “That’s where I must have seen you then,” he continued, "I haven't been long in this country but I have attended that church. I struggle to get to church because I don't get the time off from work to attend regularly.” 

We talked about God. By the time we finished, he was resolute: he will make sure that he comes to church each week; he will tell his employer that he is entitled to one day off each week, and that Saturday is the day of rest; he will be parking his taxi on Sabbath mornings and will go to church instead, to be with the church family and worship God.

What are the chances of that happening? I’ll tell you. Here, in this Muslim country, it is about a one in 20,000 chance for me to randomly meet another Adventist. I’d be seven times more likely to be struck by lightning in the United States by comparison. Being struck by lightning twice could be a coincidence. God allowing our paths to cross was no mere coincidence. 

DAY 2 (Wednesday, November 22, 2017)

I went home late last night and gave the Lord thanks for a wonderful day and asked Him for my Wi-Fi back because wouldn't that be a lovely story to share. No answer. So, I went to bed listening to the audiobook of Mind, Character, and Personality by Ellen White.

When I woke up this morning I did the same as yesterday, except the rubbish was already done. I did some more dillying and dallying. I eventually went briskly down the steps of my apartment to catch a taxi to work — again, one hour earlier than my usual departure time — "Thank you, God, because there is still no Wi-Fi in my apartment!"

As soon as I stepped forward I saw a taxi in the distance, about 600 feet away. I was glad I would still arrive at work bright and early. 

As the taxi approached, another taxi came from behind, overtook the first one, and stopped for me. I had no reason not to get in. We laughed as I started the conversation with, "I saw what you did there!” I glanced at his name badge and his name intrigued me. “May I know your country of origin?” I asked. I silently wondered to myself, “is he a Christian or Muslim?” I thought him unlikely to be Jewish. 

“I am from Ghana, sir,” he told me. I was now beginning to wonder whether this was some kind of “Groundhog Day.” He continued saying, “my mother is Christian, and my father is Muslim, so I took the path of Islam.” That did not deter me, and I proceeded to share my testimony of the previous day. The young man was so impressed that he gave me his contact details and asked me for mine.

It turns out that, of the possibly 3,000 taxi drivers in this city, he happened to know the young man I met the day before. Along with the offer that he might get some specially made Jollof rice from his homeland, he accepted my invitation to church. I am now ensuring that I bring together the lives of two young men with three things in common: taxi drivers, from Ghana, with the exciting prospect of learning more about the love of God.

God’s guiding continued to be shown in many ways throughout these two days!

Last night, a Christmas tree planted in the lobby of the foyer of my apartment building led to my invitation of a Buddhist Security Guard to our Seventh-day Adventist Church in this Middle Eastern city.

This morning because I came into work earlier than I normally do, I had the opportunity to unexpectedly meet a distinguished fighter pilot, who is a highly placed individual in society.

I also received an invitation, (yes, today!) to speak to government officials regarding the subject of educating children and young people with additional/special educational needs. Lastly, I received an email a short while ago from the head of student services at a nearby university who expressed a desire to work with me. 

Before I knew any of this was going to happen, my devotional thought for Tuesday morning had been based on Romans 15:7 which, in the Easy English version, reads:

"Christ has accepted you, so you must accept each other. So then, as a result, people will say how great God is."

And Wednesday’s devotional, also from the Easy English version, was from Romans 14:18 which reads,

"Anyone who does these things is Christ's servant. And God will be happy with that person. Also, other people will say good things about that person.”

Please pray for the many people I am meeting, that they will deepen their relationships with God, and that God will continue to position me and enable me to continue to be a blessing to others here in the city He has sent me.

Claude Lombart writes from the village of Binfield, UK, where he is in active retirement. He holds emeritus credential from the BUC. Lombart has served in several countries in francophone West Africa, the Middle East, New Zealand, Scotland and England in leadership, departmental, teaching, pastoral, and counsellor roles. He is a regular contributor to several church papers and has recently published a book on successful relationships.

Image Credit: Photo by Peter Kasprzyk on Unsplash

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Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Samantha Nelson and her husband Steve started The Hope of Survivors in 2002 after suffering abuse at the hands of their Adventist pastor. The support ministry now helps about a hundred victims every year directly, and many other people through their website, training seminars and counseling.

Question: You run a ministry called The Hope of Survivors, for victims of abuse and misconduct at the hand of clergy. What is the main focus of The Hope of Survivors, and what are the main resources you provide?

Answer: The main focus of The Hope of Survivors is providing emotional and spiritual support to victims of clergy sexual abuse, as well as providing educational seminars for clergy and congregations.

The Hope of Survivors takes a faith-based, scriptural approach to helping victims understand the devastation of clergy sexual abuse and how they can receive healing and wholeness by God’s grace. It is our mission and prayer that, through our website, educational seminars, one-to-one communication (phone, email and in person), media, printed resources and in-house programs, victims will find answers and the truth about what’s happening to them. The Hope of Survivors seeks to: 

• Educate the victims, clergy, church body and the general public about clergy sexual abuse and misconduct, the frequency of occurrences, the moral and social implications involved and the devastating consequences through national media, by disseminating brochures and other related materials, conducting educational seminars, and by maintaining up-to-date websites; 
• Conduct retreats and seminars specifically for the victims of clergy sexual abuse and provide one-on-one support for the purpose of facilitating their healing and recovery, and helping them to gain a greater understanding of what has happened to them, giving them hope and encouragement, and restoring their faith in their Creator; 
• Work closely with churches that are dealing with the after-effects of an abuse situation for the purpose of helping them to understand the importance of providing a safe environment for all and for understanding the dynamics of clergy sexual abuse so that the church and the victim are not further damaged in the aftermath; 
• Provide training seminars for clergy and church administrators for the purpose of disseminating prevention information and encouragement, and to work closely with those who have violated their sacred trust. 

In short, the mission of The Hope of Survivors may be summed up in the motto: 

Reaching the Hurting: Ministering to those who have suffered abuse at the hands of clergy. 

Calling the Faithful: Providing resources and support to church leadership to help them remain true to their high calling. 

Bridging the Gap: Leading the hurting to hope through a healing relationship with Christ. 

How many people has your ministry helped so far? How many people do you calculate are victims of clergy abuse?

The website averages around 10,000 unique visitors per month. Many people never contact us directly since the website is so informational and helpful. We also average about 90-100 new clients (actual victims of clergy sexual abuse) who contact us directly for support each year, from all states, countries and denominations. There have been multiple occasions where someone contacts us and tells us they have been reading the website for a number of years and just finally got the courage to reach out. That’s how devastating clergy sexual abuse is!

How do you define abuse by clergy?

Clergy sexual abuse or misconduct is when anyone in the role of spiritual authority abuses their sacred and fiduciary trust to take advantage of someone under their care. It can be a paid position, such as a pastor, teacher, counselor or Bible worker; or it can be a lay position, such as an elder, deacon, Pathfinder leader, etc.

It is interesting to note that many church manuals (including that of the Seventh-day Adventist Church) have policies against clergy sexual misconduct. I believe the following excerpt is a good definition from the General Commission on the Status and Role of Women from The United Methodist Church’s website.

Sexual Misconduct is defined as “behavior of a sexualized nature that betrays sacred trust, violates the ministerial role, and exploits those who are vulnerable in that relationship.”

Sexual abuse occurs when a person within a ministerial role of leadership (lay or clergy, pastor, educator, counselor, youth leader, or other position of leadership), “engages in sexual contact or sexualized behavior with a congregant, client, employee, student, staff member, coworker, or volunteer.” (2004 Book of Resolutions, p. 150-51)

Sexualized behavior is that “which communicates sexual interest and/or content. Examples include, but are not limited to displaying sexually suggestive visual materials; making sexual comments or innuendo about one’s own or another person’s body; touching another person’s body; hair; or clothing; touching or rubbing oneself in the presence of another person; kissing; and sexual intercourse.” (2004 Book of Resolutions, p. 151)

Sexual harassment is defined as “a continuum of behaviors that intimidate, demean, humiliate, or coerce. These behaviors range from the subtle forms that can accumulate into a hostile working, learning, or worshipping environment to the most severe forms of stalking, assault, or rape.” (2004 Book of Resolutions, p. 151)

This topic has received a huge amount of attention as relates to priests of the Catholic church, with many people seeing it as a problem related to the required celibacy of Catholic priests. Is it really as much of a problem in non-Catholic churches? And is the problem actually widespread in the Adventist church? How do you know? 

It is a prevalent problem in everydenomination and faith community. The Catholic Church does not own the market on clergy sexual abuse, although they have had the most media exposure. 

It is widespread in the Adventist church, based on reports we hear as well as the statistics we track from victims who contact us. (You can see statistics for a one year period in our 2015 Annual Report.) I suspect that one day there will be widespread media coverage of all the abuses that have taken place in the Adventist church that have been hidden or covered up. That is one reason why I wrote the article #SDAChurchToo—We Are Not Immune and It’s Time to Come Clean.

Why did you start The Hope of Survivors? What is your story?

My husband Steve and I started The Hope of Survivors because we felt compelled to do something to help others who were in a similar situation of being abused by a spiritual leader. When it happened to us, we thought we must be the only ones because it seemed like such an awful thing that certainly no other pastor could be so horrible. But we quickly realized that we were not the only ones at all and that there are, sadly, many abusive spiritual leaders out there. It’s interesting to note that many victims who contact the organization also believe they are the only ones this has ever happened to until they find our website and start reading other victim’s testimonies. You can read my testimony about being abused by my pastor there as well.

When did The Hope of Survivors begin? What goals did you have in mind at the beginning? How have those changed?

The Hope of Survivors was born one evening in December 2002, as Steve and I were reflecting upon our own experience of clergy sexual abuse and the lack of resources that were available to help us understand and heal. 

We felt compelled to develop a website that would provide information and encouragement to anyone who may be searching for answers. Steve and I felt that if “just one person” could be helped by the website, then it would be worth the effort and pain we had gone through. 

While our vision was initially limited in thinking “just one,” the Lord knew how many hurting people there were — suffering all alone and living without hope. There are many “ones” out there who have been touched and blessed by the ministry of The Hope of Survivors. Truly, God does work all things together for good to those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. (Romans 8:28) 

While our initial goal was to help victims find information on the website, it quickly turned into a fulltime ministry as victims reached out for one-on-one support because they had nowhere else to turn. Additionally, it turned into a global ministry, which is something we never even imagined!

What plans do you have for The Hope of Survivors over the next five or 10 years?

In addition to increasing our staff and funding base here in the US, we would like to strengthen and expand our current divisions (Australia, Romania, the UK, the Philippines, Latino, Canada, South Africa, Pastors’ Wives, etc.), as well as establish new divisions and have our website and other resources published in more languages.   

You and your husband Steve are Seventh-day Adventists, and you suffered abuse in an Adventist church. Do you mainly focus on Adventist clergy and Adventist victims?

Yes, we suffered abuse by an Adventist pastor in our local Adventist church in California. However, The Hope of Survivors provides support to victims of clergy sexual abuse from all faith communities and denominations. We have worked with Adventists, Catholics, Buddhists, and every denomination in between, including an atheist! 

In your experience, is clergy abuse any more or less of a problem in the Adventist denomination than in others? Do you have any statistics?

Every denomination and faith community struggles with issues of clergy sexual abuse. No denomination is immune. It is a human sin problem, not a denominational problem. In many ways, Adventists (like other conservative groups such as Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses) are apt to have a greater problem because we tend to isolate ourselves and medicate ourselves from within, rather than seeking outside support and assistance. It actually breeds cover-up, collusion and further abuse. 

There are no accurate statistics, as most cases of clergy sexual abuse never get reported.

Is the problem of clergy abuse in the Adventist church a problem because of the church administration? Is there a lack of prevention? Lack of oversight? Poor structure for reporting and responding to allegations of abuse? Does the church hierarchy not respond appropriately or forcefully enough? Is there a pattern of covering up and moving pastors on, as Catholic church higher-ups did?

Yes, to all those scenarios! It’s not any one thing but, rather a combination of things that makes it difficult to eradicate clergy sexual abuse within our denomination. There’s a good ol’ boys club, sad to say, that covers for its own. We see that in administration, in local congregations and in the self-supporting ministries as well. There are times when The Hope of Survivors will advocate directly with a Conference on behalf of a victim and sometimes it goes very well and the Conference follows proper procedures and the offending pastor is removed from his position and the victim is provided counseling. 

There are other times, however, when  things are handled so poorly by leadership that it creates much more devastation in the victim’s life and provides little or no consequences to the offending party. 

There is a poor structure for reporting and that is an area where great improvement is needed. We have often wished that conferences would notify The Hope of Survivors immediately when they learn of an abusive situation because that way the victim could be assured of support while the investigation takes place and the outcome is awaited. It would go a long way toward preventing lawsuits against the Adventist church if they would utilize The Hope of Survivors, rather than cutting off communication with the victims after the initial disclosure (quite often at the church’s attorney’s request). 

We need to do what is morally right as a church and not base our decisions on how great we think the pastor or spiritual leader is or what wonderful things they have done. If they have abused, they need to step down or be removed.

What are the solutions? What can the Adventist church do better to ensure that there are no victims of Adventist clergy abuse?

While it would be wonderful to be able to ensure there would never be another victim of clergy sexual abuse, it is undoubtedly a goal we will not be able to reach this side of heaven. However, we can certainly do much more to prevent clergy sexual abuse and, when it does occur, to prevent the re-victimization of the victims and to hold the abuser accountable.

We have conducted seminars for pastors and church leaders during worker’s meetings in several conferences in multiple states and countries. It is something that should be done everywhere and very often. It’s a topic that needs to be continually addressed. We also need to raise more awareness among our lay people as to the definition and existence of clergy sexual abuse and the fact that The Hope of Survivors exists.

The NAD Working Policy D80 has a basic outline of procedures to follow, but we felt it lacked much when it came to how to help the victim in the situation, so we wrote a document suggesting how the church should respond.

Who else in the Adventist church is discussing this topic?

To my knowledge, there is no other organization with Adventist ties that specifically works with victims of clergy sexual abuse as their main focus. There are other individuals who occasionally speak on this topic, such as Jennifer Schwirzer, who served on our board of directors for a number of years and now has her own counseling practice, as well as Sarah McDugal who now assists in our Pastors’ Wives’ Division. Ardis Stenbakken, when she served as General Conference Women’s Ministries Director, referenced The Hope of Survivors in the Abuse Prevention Emphasis campaign materials many years ago, and Nancy Wilson also referred to The Hope of Survivors in last year’s enditnow campaign video. 

Do you run The Hope of Survivors full time? What do you spend most of your time doing? Are there others who work with you?

Yes, The Hope of Survivors is my full time job, although for most of the past 15+ years, it has been a full time unpaid position due to lack of funds. 

For the first seven to eight years of the ministry, I was the sole counselor/support person for 700-800 victims. Then, God blessed and brought a wonderful volunteer who took over the client care/support while I focused more on the administration of the global organization. 

The Hope of Survivors now has leaders in all of its overseas divisions and our Latino Division, which is based in Texas. We also have a great board of directors, advisory panel and roughly 20-30 volunteers on average. 

In 2016-2017, I was fortunate enough to have a paid executive assistant, but funds ran out and we had to lay her off. If I could change one thing about The Hope of Survivors, it would be to have a firm foundation of funding to hire the staff we need. The workload is constantly increasing and volunteers come and go, although we have been blessed to have several who have been working with us for a number of years. God always sees us through!

What do you like to spend your time doing when not working on The Hope of Survivors?

There isn’t much time left! However, my husband is a pastor and we believe it is very important to minister together, so I go with him whenever possible. He pastors four churches and a church school here in Wyoming and that keeps us very busy – and very blessed!

To donate to The Hope of Survivors visit www.thehopeofsurvivors.com

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Could Martin Luther King have been both a civil-rights activist and a Seventh-day Adventist? No. Here is why. The milieu of the black community, the black theology of the Baptist Church, and the liberal Protestantism of his seminary training all played a role in shaping this national leader. Of these three influences, black theology had the greatest impact on King's life. The very fibers of King's soul pulsated with the religion of his people. This is what King himself thought of his theological roots:

I am first and foremost a [black] minister. I love the church, and I feel that civil rights is a part of it. For me, at least, the basis of my struggle for integration—and I mean full integration of Negroes into every phase of American life—is something that began with a religious motivation…And I know that my religion has come to mean more to me than ever before. I have come to believe more and more in a personal God—not a process, but a person, a creative power with infinite love who answers prayers.¹

Notice that his religious experience began with a view of God. Not the God of the white man, whose God is mainly a God of the head and not the heart, whose God is colored by his privileged position, but the God of an oppressed people, who needed not only to know God but also to experience God. A God who could not only save their souls but also liberate their bodies from the shackles of white oppression. No black man (other than blacks rooted in the white religious experience) could escape this view of God.

The Black View of God

King was greatly influenced by his black view of God as the God of liberation. It was not uncommon for blacks to speak of God as promising to deliver them as he did Israel from Egypt. James Harris in his book, Pastoral Theology: A Black-Church Perspective, writes "black theology believes that liberation is the essence of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and any authentic Christian theology affirms that God is on the side of the oppressed."² Even though black theology as we know it today is relatively new, most black churchmen and leaders agree that it does reflect the roots of black religious thought. James Cone believes King's theology emerged from black faith.

King's faith was derived primarily from his people's suffering and struggling in a society where whites talked of freedom and justice, while blacks experienced slavery and segregation. A separate faith emerged among black Christians in the United States because they believed that the God of the Exodus, the prophets, and Jesus did not condone the mistreatment they received from whites…It was a black faith that emphasized God’s will to make right what white people made wrong, so that the rule of love would be established among all races of people. This was the hope that encouraged black Christians to bear witness, through public protest, to God's creation of human beings, just like white people, and not as slaves or as second-class citizens.³

This black view of God shaped Martin Luther King and the other black ministers' views about civil and political action against injustice. Since God was on the side of the oppressed and they were on God's side, they had no other choice. If they were to be on the side of God, they must protest against the oppressor. King's theology was in sharp contrast to that of Seventh-day Adventism and the theology of any other predominantly white religious organization. For the white Protestant American, God is indeed a transcendent, omnipotent God. During the civil-rights movement, whites magnified God's transcendence at the expense of His immanence. It seemed that white people viewed God as concerned about human beings' spiritual welfare, but could not see him as concerned about their everyday living. This is clearly seen by the actions of many of the church's pioneers. Many early Adventists, in response to their understanding of God, lifted prophetic voices against social ills like slavery and alcohol. Our theology hasn't changed, but our practice has.

I can remember my own father, now a retired Adventist pastor, leading the first "sit-in" protests in Savannah, Georgia. His actions were in defiance of official communiques from the General Conference warning against involvement in the civil-rights movement. Despite the church's official stand, many black preachers participated in the civil-rights movement, but seldom in a leadership role, for fear of reprisal from the leadership of the church. Their fears were not without basis, for Adventist history documents the treatment of men who sought to be leaders of social change in the black community. These men were banished from the church and left without any supporting organization. It appears that black theology forms a natural resistance to white theology and sets black preachers and leaders, of which Martin Luther King was a part, on a collision course with white Protestant Americans.

The Blackness of the Black Church

The black church played perhaps the most crucial role in liberating Martin Luther King to be the leader of the civil-rights movement. Unlike the development of new white churches, the black church was not born out of some new theological proposition, but solely on sociological grounds. The black church was a clear response to white oppression. Gayraud S. Wilmore, reflecting on the roots of the black church, writes about the Free African Society—the forerunner of the African Methodist Church:

Wherever the Societies were organized, they began as a protest against white prejudice and neglect and with the objective of providing not only for religious needs, but for social service, mutual aid and solidarity among people of African descent.⁴

Because the black church is centered in protest, this has given rise to protest leaders. In fact, simply by leading black churches, preachers get programmed to protest. Any preacher in the black tradition is expected to be involved in social change. In black theology, the church and community are tied together in single garment of destiny. In fact, in a 1968 Gallup Poll, 75.6 percent of the black community expected the church to be involved in the civil-rights movement. It is no small wonder, then, that Martin Luther King surfaced as both a Baptist preacher and a civil rights leader.

Black ecclesiology sets the preacher as the center of church life. He is the leader, the general, and in many situations, the ultimate authority among the people. He is the Moses come to liberate his people. W. E. B. Du Bois expresses the position of the black preacher in these terms: "The preacher is the most unique personality developed by the Negro on American soil. A leader, a politician, an orator, a boss, an intriguer, an idealist—all these he is, and ever too, the center of a group of men."⁵ Peter J. Paris correctly states:

The experience of self-governance provided blacks with the opportunity to practice the basic rights of citizenship long before the basic rights became constitutionally guaranteed and politically enacted for them. Ironically, it became the destiny of the black preachers to emerge as the freest of all persons, black and white alike, because they embodied the condition of independence and freedom more than any other. In their pulpits they could condemn virtually any social evil in either the white or the black community without fearing the possibility of censorship.⁶

The black preacher of bygone days entered the ministry, built up a sizable church and personal following, and then combined parish work with political work. Even today, many black politicians are a senior or associate pastor of a church. In a 1965 Gallup survey, 88.3 percent of the blacks polled favored the involvement of the preacher in political matters. It was therefore easier for Martin Luther King than for a white preacher to become involved in the civil-rights movement.

Adventist views of the church place the movement ahead of the preacher. This view becomes detrimental to the production of great leaders. Adventist ecclesiology has no room for men who overshadow the organization. Martin Luther King towered over his local congregation, which he eventually gave up, and even over the organization he founded, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The black tradition gave its churches and its ministers almost full autonomy, something the Adventist Church could not afford to do.

In order to keep its centralized government, the Adventist denomination can never have any superstars. Leaders such as Martin Luther King must have their independence. Adventism as we know it today could not survive the growth of ecclesiastical giants. A centralized government demands control. Clearly, Martin Luther King would have had a difficult, if not impossible, time working within the Adventist Church.

The Mission of the Black Church

Unlike the Adventist Church, which sees its primary mission as preaching the third angel's message to the world in preparation for the second coming of Christ, black missiology has more of a "this-world concern."

The mission of the black churches has always transcended their own constituency by aiming at the reform of the larger white society, that is, causing the latter to practice racial justice as an expression of genuine Christian understanding and devotion. Their mission, therefore, has had both internal and an external dimension in that they have sought religious, moral, and political reform in both the black and the white community, though not in the same respect.⁷

With a mission that has as one of its major concerns social justice, it would logically provide encouragement for preachers to become involved in social concerns. In fact, in the black community the church has always been the largest institution. It must take on a large social role if social change is to occur. This broad mission of the black church allowed King to preach in a sermon at Ebenezer, his father's church:

There's something wrong with any church that limits the gospel to talkin' about heaven over yonder. There is something wrong with any minister…who becomes so otherworldly in his orientation that he forgets about what is happening now. There is something wrong with any church that is [so] absorbed in the hereafter that it forgets the here. Here where men are trampled over by the iron feet of oppression. Here where thousands of God's children are caught in an airtight cage [of poverty]. Here where thousands of men and women are depressed and in agony because of their earthly filth…, where the darkness of life surrounds so many of God's children. I say to you that religion must be concerned not merely about the streets flowing with milk and honey, but about the millions of God's children in Asia, Africa, and South America and in our nation who go to bed hungry at night. It will be concerned [not only] about a long white robe over yonder, but about [people] having some clothes down here. It will be concerned not merely about silver slippers in heaven, but about men and women having some shoes to wear on earth.⁸

The social conditions of black people foreordained that the mission of black churches would encompass the whole life of the black community. Indeed, concerns for the plight of black Americans brought the black church into existence. Martin's missiology also took shape around Walter Rauschenbusch's social gospel. King studied the writings of Rauschenbusch and reflected his thinking in most of his writings. Rauschenbusch believed that personal existence is basically social, and that a relevant Christianity would "bring men under repentance for their collective sins" and would proclaim a corresponding social salvation. He contended that the church should be at the forefront of social change through a program for more revolutionary social action. The social gospel movement was characterized by a sharp criticism of social injustices, especially economic injustices. A cursory reading of King's writing and his sermons, reveals strains of the social gospel woven throughout. Of course, two major problems of the social gospel was its utopian elements and strained view of the nature of humanity.

Black Views of Humanity and Salvation

King's understanding of salvation (soteriology) was also affected by the social gospel. To understand his soteriology, we must first investigate his view of humanity. King, like the liberal Protestants of his time, believed that humanity is basically good—that the reason humans do evil things is because of their lack of knowledge. This philosophy is seen in King's optimistic view of white preachers during the civil-rights movement. He believed that by educating them about the injustice done to black people in this country and appealing to their goodwill, they would respond positively. A new age would begin.

Had King been an Adventist, his theology would have checked any overly optimistic view of human nature. He would have believed that human beings are basically evil—that social changes do not change the human heart. Adventism teaches the need to work for the betterment of society, but does not see social cures as the answer to the moral condition of humanity. Only a renewed heart can really change the human heart and thus society.

King's liberal anthropology and his black theology gave rise to a soteriology that tended to be "this worldly." In his famous "I Have a Dream" speech, King implied that the salvation of humanity will come from overturning oppressive systems. Little in his soteriology called for deliverance from sinful human nature.

Black Eschatology

Martin Luther King's theology shaped his views on the end of time. King's ultimate goal was a new world order on the earth. Again, in his famous "I Have a Dream" speech, we catch a glimpse of this eschatology.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed,…I have a dream that one day…sons of former slaves and sons of former slave owners will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, knowing that we will be free one day…This will be the day when all God's children will be able to sing with new meaning, "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing."⁹

This optimistic view of the future was born out of an eschatology that saw God as ushering in a new age on this earth. Had King been an Adventist, his optimistic dream for America would have been shattered. Our eschatology proclaims "that when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them." Investigating Martin Luther King's thought allows us to understand how he could become the great leader of America's civil-rights movement. It also becomes clear that Adventist theology and practice would have hampered his becoming one of our nation's greatest leaders.

Notes & References:
1. James Cone, Martin & Malcolm & America: A Dream or Nightmare? (New York: Orbis Books, 1992), p. 122, 123.
2. Peter J. Paris, The Social Teaching of the Black Churches (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985), p. 60.
3. Cone, p. 120.
4. Gayraud S. Wilmore, Black Religion and Black Radicalism (New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1972), p. 113.
5. James H. Harris, Pastoral Theology: A Black-Church Perspective (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1991), p. 77.
6. Paris, p. 109.
7. Ibid., p. 111.
8. Martin Luther King, Jr., "Remember Who You Are," sermon given July 7, 1963 at Ebenezer Baptist Church.
9. Martin Luther King, Jr., March on Washington, Washington, D.C., 1963.

This article first appeared in Spectrum, Vol. 24, No. 2 (October 1994). It was written by Pastor Roland J. Hill who received his B.A. from Oakwood College, an M.Div. from Andrews University, and a D.Min. from the Reformed Theological Seminary, Jackson, Mississippi.

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Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Pastor Matthew Lucio is telling the story of the Adventist church in monthly podcast episodes, beginning with William Miller and going up until Ellen White's death. Forty episodes in, there have been more than 40,000 downloads.

Question: You research, write and produce The Adventist History Podcast. Can you tell us a little bit about the podcast and what your goals are in producing it? Why should we listen to it?

Answer: First of all, I should say that the podcast isn't designed to be evangelistic. It's not Adventist hagiography. (Or hagiopodcastrophe? Whichever.) Sometimes I get comments from people who wish I would treat Ellen White more deferentially.

The main goal is for Adventists to know their own tribal history. But the other goal is for non-Adventists to learn our tribal history. And I know if I wanted to learn about Mormon history, a podcast that's all "Wondrous Joseph Smith, blessed be thy beard" is just going to turn me off. 

Back to the main goal: most Adventists don't even know their own story, and I think that causes identity issues. And some who do know their own history tend to romanticize it out of reality. God didn't just decide everything for us and our job is just to carry out orders. Our church founders wrestled with stuff. They didn't always agree. Yet somehow they stuck together. Maybe there's something to learn from that?

You began the podcast in 2014, and release a new episode every month. (Your website promises a new episode on the 22nd of every month, and you don’t seem to ever miss a deadline, even three days before Christmas!) You have created 40 episodes of The Adventist History Podcast so far. You began with William Miller and the context of the Adventist church’s beginnings in the 1840s. Now you have just covered Ellen G. White’s time in Australia in the 1890s. How do you decide what to include in each episode? Will you continue up until the present day?

I just pick story lines that seem interesting to me. Managing the pace is often a mess. I often discover things I wish I would have known 20 episodes ago.  

As for the scope, I think story-based podcasts need limited lifespans. JRR Tolkien called mortality a "gift" in the sense that it forces us to focus on what matters. 

From the beginning, I knew this was going to end with Ellen White's death in 1915. I may do a few "epilogue" episodes that take us to the 1919 Bible Conference, but, right now, I have no desire to take us into the 21st century. Mainly because the number of sources one has to deal with just explode in the 20th century. I study, write, and record each episode in five days each month, and I just don't have the time to do it justice. I'm also a little hesitant because recent history tends to be hotly contested history.

But maybe we can do a second series in the future.  

How do you research each episode? Where do you get your main material?

I read a few primary sources, but mostly I use the work of Adventist historians. Five days a month isn’t enough time to do a lot of original research. 

Your style is chatty and humorous, but yet you are organized and professional, with each episode smoothly paced. Does the writing come naturally to you?

Writing comes naturally to me. That doesn't mean it's easy. It's tortuous, frustrating, and exasperating. (According to my wife, those qualities also come naturally to me.)

What do you most enjoy about making a podcast? What gave you the idea in the first place?

Like many podcasters out there, I cut my teeth listening to Mike Duncan's The History of Rome podcast. People tuned in because they liked history. They stayed because Mike is a fantastic storyteller. I did want to do the Adventist History Podcast probably as early as 2011. I even wrote the first episode. But I chickened out. I had (have) imposter syndrome. 

I think what changed was that I started pastoring another district and I had an elder who I shared the idea with and he opened up his studio for me to record in. It was the push I needed.

How many listeners do you have? What feedback have you received since you started?

There have been over 40,000 downloads, but I don’t know how many listeners I have. Maybe it’s one guy just re-downloading all of the episodes? 

The feedback has been wonderful. Adventists are entrepreneurial, and people have approached me about translating it into Russian, Portuguese, and Spanish. 

The Adventist History Podcast also runs on some internet radio stations. 

One guy wrote to tell me it’s helped him leave his denomination. Now he’s started attending an Adventist church. Cool stuff.

Do you have support from the General Conference, or official church support? Your logo seems to be the official Adventist church logo.

Ha. No, but I'm a pastor so I can use it, right? If the church prefers, I can use the old three angels' logo. . . ?

You are a pastor in your day job, so of course there is some crossover in the skills needed to be a podcaster and a pastor, and the research must come in handy in both roles. But how do you find time to do the podcast and also pastor three churches? Do you have help making the podcast?

Finding those areas of overlap is key to efficiency. I joke that Nicholas Miller at the Seminary can write about 9.5 books based in some way on his dissertation research. He can teach and hit the speaking circuit with it, too. That's the dream: research that you can use in a variety of projects for years to come. 

We're just finishing up going through Adventist history at one of my churches, and I preached a series on 1888 last year. In March, I'm going to be speaking in Minnesota at a Youth Rally on Adventist history. So the podcast material gets used. 

I believe that you were raised as a Catholic. What made you change your faith? Do you think your upbringing outside the Adventist faith gives you a unique insight in your work as a pastor, and in your podcast?

It's a long story. My dad took me to a prophecy seminar put on by the only pastor or priest I had ever known who drove a pickup truck. That really impressed me. I got a Mark Finley book, called The Almost Forgotten Day, and read it in my closet when my mom thought I was sleeping. 

When I decided to be baptized, my mom and I had an argument and we haven't spoken since, sadly. 

I do think being a "convert" helps as a pastor, sure. But I think that "convert" experience can and should be had even by those born and raised in the church. I mean, Ellen White wanted Adventists to bust out of Battle Creek in part because people could grow up in the bubble and never have to do real spiritual work for others. So when you spend time loving on people who have different views, you can get some of that "convert" experience.

What made you want to become a pastor? 

The church I was baptized into invited me to preach shortly after I was baptized. I have no idea why. I agreed because I thought that's just what Adventists do. After that, they couldn't get me to stop. I just felt a calm call in it. 

I believe you studied at Southern and Andrews. Did these Adventist “ghettos” seem strange to you? Was your wife raised in the Adventist church?

I have to admit that I love Adventist neighborhoods. I mean, have you been to Baguette de France in Berrien? Life is so much simpler in Adventist neighborhoods. If you hear a lawnmower on Sabbath, you just disfellowship them in order to preserve your zen. Yet, I believe in Ariel's mantra: "I want to be where the people are." That is, non-Adventist people. I want to be with them wrestling with life. My wife, Laura, was born in the church — in Romania. All the best pastors get Romanian wives. It's why they're the best pastors. 

Did you study history in an academic setting? Where did your interest in the history of the Adventist church come from?

No, but I've presented a few papers for scholarly conferences since I started the podcast. I just like history. I read Gibbons'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire before I was 20. I mention this because I feel like the universe owes me something for that.

I understand you travelled to see members of Congress in Washington DC last autumn to defend Dreamers [the undocumented immigrants brought to the US as children] and advocate for the vulnerable. Do you feel the trip made any difference? 

Did it make a difference? Maybe not for Congress, but it did for me. We had a Dreamer in one of my churches. I did it for him, too.

You seem to be involved in a lot of things! I know you’ve also written at least one book, about the book of Revelation. What other projects are you working on?

I wrote a couple of books before the book about Revelation, which was called End. I wrote one on faith and doubt under a pseudonym so I wouldn't be fired, and a children's book with a church member about a cat who goes back to ancient Egypt. It's based on a real cat, which makes the story entirely believable. 

Next up are a couple of entries in the exciting new Adventist Encyclopedia and a book on Adventist history for small group discussion or prayer meeting or whatever. Yay, more overlap!

What are your favorite podcasts?

This is my favorite question. Let me check my phone. Okay, in no particular order: NPR's Planet Money, The Axe Files, BBC's In Our Time, Doctrine and Devotion, Intelligence Squared Debates, Revisionist History (in small doses), Unbelievable, Bad Christians (in smaller doses), and the Tolkien Professor (I need more doses). Oh, and The Adventist History Podcast! 

Let me also give a quick shout out to the "Stuff Adventists Should Know" podcast which is just getting off the ground. 2018 is going to be an exciting year for Adventist podcasting. Stay tuned!

Matthew Lucio is pastor of a three-church district in the Iowa-Missouri Conference.

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Official instincts about prop­er Bible reading continue to be partly right yet crucially wrong. One problem is that, for lack of willingness to converse—to speak and to listen, we continue to talk past one an­other. This lack baffles me. It hurts everyone and everything, not least discipleship itself.

In the “Week of Prayer” issue of Adventist World, NAD Edition, dated November 2017, General Conference President Ted Wilson lauds those daring Reformers who took the risk of trans­lating Scripture into the languages of ordi­nary people. In several cases, they gave their lives for doing so, such was the fury of the church authorities, who distrusted the mem­bership at large and thought access to the Bi­ble would make them wander into heresy.

The instinct behind such praise is right, incontestably; so is the instinct behind quot­ing, as the president does, Ellen White’s dec­laration that Christians should not “depend on the minister” to read the Bible for them. Formal authority gives no certain advantage in interpretation. Every voice counts. No single voice or group of voices can have the last word.

Trouble comes, however, when the idea of the “plain reading of the text” joins itself, as in the article, to the implication that our “critical” capacities give no help in the inter­pretation of Scripture. Here I insert the word “implication” because in official theology the word “critical” is never (at least to my knowl­edge) straightforwardly anathematized. It’s just that the conventional invective against the “historical-critical” method, here trotted out as usual, creates misgivings about it. The “historical-critical” approach to the Bible is associated (plausibly, I might add) with skep­tical assumptions about the reality of God. But a good bit of it is useful even when, as with every community of Adventist Bible read­ers that I know, such skeptical assumptions are themselves called into question.

“Plain reading” without “critical” assess­ment is verifiably disastrous, principally because it prompts fixation on fragments of Scripture that, taken apart from their im­mediate or overall context, offer seeming support to one or another of our prejudices. This way of reading, let’s remember, gave us Bible-backed anti-Semitism and genocide in Europe, Bible-backed apartheid in South Africa, Bible-backed slavery in the American South. It’s tiresome to have to constantly repeat the point that these doctrines de­pended on the “plain reading” of small bits of the Bible, just as it is tiresome to have to bring up, again and again to plain readers, such a passage as Psalm 137:7, 8, where the beleaguered poet screams revenge against Israel’s “devastator” Babylon. For this poet, payback, even against children, brings hap­piness. “Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rock!” Would a “plain reading” of these words, without help from our “critical” capacities, be at all edifying? If my finger fell by chance on these verses, would they be directly in­structive for what I think of God or how I live my life?

I believe, with the author of 2 Timothy, that all scripture is “useful for teaching, for reproof, for cor­rection, and for training in righteousness” (3:16). But that can be so only if we also confront another of the official instincts about Bible reading that turns out, in fact, to be true, again incontestably. The Bible is “vital­ly important,” says the General Conference president, “because it brings us face to face with Jesus Christ.” Yes. But his remarks, as is undeniably conventional in Adventism, and also undeniably misleading, fail to pay serious attention, or any attention, to Hebrews 1:1–3. In these verses the Good Book declares that God spoke in the past “through the prophets,” but has now spoken “by a Son” who is “the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being” (italics mine). And if words so crucial for biblical hermeneu­tics go unnoticed, so do equally crucial words from Jesus’ Gospel Commission in Matthew: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me” (28:18). The same perspective on Christ’s authority, Zane Yi shows in the latest issue of Spectrum, comes through in the story of the Transfiguration. Again, however, it doesn’t register.

But here, surely, is the true heartbeat of the idea that the Bible brings us face to face with Jesus Christ: He is the one point, the only point, at which the will and way of God come into perfect focus. That makes Him the lens you look through for authentic Christian application of any biblical insight or story. Now, knowing Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, you can consider, for example, the revenge theme in Psalm 137 and say (as C. S. Lewis did) that if such revenge is the “natural re­sult” of suffering injury, it is nonetheless “profoundly wrong.” Its inclusion in Holy Writ may be God’s re­minder that of all “bad men,” those who are religious are “the worst.” In any case, this psalm, in most ways so beautiful and mesmerizing, actually is, in its en­tirety, “useful” for teaching, correction, and training in righteousness. We get a reminder of how piety can go wrong.

At the November annual meetings, in Boston, of two of the church’s theological associations—the Adventist Society for Religious Studies and the Adventist Theo­logical Society—speakers turned often to the theme of scriptural interpretation. At a Friday evening joint session, both presidents addressed the Bible, and one of them, Olive Hemmings, of ASRS and Washington Adventist University, made a point similar to the one I am making. The right understanding of the Reforma­tion sola scriptura principle, she said, upholds Christ as “the logos, the Truth, and the telos” of the written word. She was suggesting that Christ is the divine word, the divine reality, the divine purpose—made flesh. Christ alone, and no inanimate object, whether of wood or stone or paper, is God incarnate.

Again, and again, I tell myself: this should be the simplest of lesson in biblical hermeneutics. The Bible is a challenging book, encompassing different strands of thought and many kinds of stories. But the climax of its thought and stories is—Jesus, the “exact imprint” of divine being. Either this does not sink in, however, or conventional Adventist thinking simply doesn’t believe it, doesn’t believe that Jesus Christ, the Living Word of God, is the final criterion of Christian life and convic­tion. How can this be? How can it go on?

I myself wrote one of the papers presented in No­vember. Shortly afterwards it hit me that I would per­sonally speak to the need for more conversation about these matters. There is scholarly backing for a view similar to the one the General Conference president disseminates in his many articles and sermons. There is an official pronouncement, in the church’s State­ment of Fundamental Beliefs, on the authority of the Bible. And in too much of what is said, reference to Christ is either inadequate or, as in the official state­ment of belief, missing altogether. So, I hereby an­nounce that I am going to encourage representative people, along a wide range of opinion, into tangible, or public, conversation, either in print or in person, about these differences of hermeneutical outlook. I imagine something small, but I also imagine some­thing real: something truly honest and forthright and something fully and appropriately responsive to the wisdom Jesus set down in Matthew, Chapter 18. I will move forward in hope, and, in time, I will report on what happens.

At my age and in my station, I am fully aware that the effort may be feckless or quixotic. But why should that matter? We are not called to success, but to witness. Surely we can agree, all of us, on that.

Charles Scriven is Board Chair of Adventist Forum, the organization that publishes Spectrum.
Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

Further Reading:
Why Hermeneutics is Our Biggest Problem— a Spectrum interview with David Ripley, Ministerial Secretary for the Northern Asia-Pacific Division
Forgotten Homework: The 2020 Study in Hermeneutics— by Spectrum columnist Matthew Quartey

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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A Sanctuary for Conversation heads to Glendale, California, creating a safe space to ask difficult questions. Chris Blake, recently retired Union College English and communication professor, talks about the importance of precise language, how the workshop came to be, and why people should consider attending.

You are getting ready to take your workshop A Sanctuary for Conversation on the road to Glendale, California on February 3, where you will help Adventists trying to compassionately relate to LGBT+ church members and loved ones while remaining faithful to Scripture. Can you tell us a little more about what the workshop is, and maybe also what it is not?

“We aim to create safe spaces for positive, healing, informed, authentic conversation.” Our agenda is plainly stated on name cards and on the first page of the workbook, and anyone who is not interested in conversation of this sort should give this workshop a pass. Negative, debilitating, ignorant, inauthentic conversation can be found just about anywhere these days anyway.

Directly beneath the agenda on that first page you find: “This workshop faithfully follows the Holy Bible and honors the current position of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.” The workshop isn’t interested in promoting same-sex marriage or bashing Adventism. This is a space where people can grow in their understanding by listening to an Adventist mental health professional, two young adult LGBT+ people who are committed to the Seventh-day Adventist Church, Adventist parents of an LGBT+ child, and one another. We supply a safe space—a sanctuary—to ask questions and express thoughts and concerns in loving ways.

What are the major themes of the workshop?

We concentrate on employing precise language and practicing active listening skills. For example the term “homosexual lifestyle” is a misnomer. No such thing exists, just as there is no heterosexual lifestyle. LGBT+ people visit libraries, attend movies, feed pets, do crossword puzzles, and dine in restaurants. What people often mean by “lifestyle” is more accurately termed “same-sex sex.” If that’s what we mean, that’s what we should say. Sloppy language leads to sloppy thinking.

Another theme is the devastating effects wrought by so-called “change ministries.” For decades, ministries attempted to “change” or “repair” the sexual orientations of people who are LGBT+. In 2013, after existing for 37 years, Exodus International, the largest umbrella ministry for “reparative therapy,” shuttered its doors forever and issued an apology to the LGBT+ community. However well-intentioned we were, the Seventh-day Adventist Church has, tragically, promoted change therapy in the past. As the damage generated by this faulty approach has come to light, we must now admit our error, apologize, and refocus our efforts in realistic, healing directions.

Also, it’s not a sin to be LGBT+. This is the official Adventist Church stance; any other stance is outside official Adventist beliefs. If we believe one’s orientation is sinful, that people need to repent for who they are, then we are saying Jesus was sinful. Yet who would claim that Jesus was sinful and in need of repentance because He was tempted? Too often the unspoken message is, “Shame on you for being tempted!” Sins have to do with behaviors—not temptations, attractions, or orientation.

The target audience is the 96% of us who are not LGBT+. Normally whenever behavior changes are called for, they are aimed at “those other” 4%. Not in this workshop. We speak primarily to the majority and ask, “No matter what our stance is on same-sex marriage, how can our behaviors be more like Jesus?” It helps to place faces and names within the conversation. Otherwise we fall prey to stereotype, isolation, and rejection. One reason for our workshop is to close the fearsome distance to the unknown “they” until we’re saying “we” and “you.”

Can you give us examples of some of the exercises?

Active learning activities are sprinkled throughoutA Sanctuary for Conversation. Cross the Line, Central and Peripheral, introductions, Stand for Your Belief, role plays, discussions, and brainstorming solutions make time move quickly. Even introverts enjoy the interactions.

What responses have you received so far?

After our workshop for 80 leaders from Loma Linda University, one participant wrote, “I am moved in ways I didn’t realize I wanted to be on LGBT+. I hope to be a better friend, a safer place, an ally for my friends and others. I have a true flicker of hope that our church can love better. Thank you for the education. Listen, listen more, keep listening.”

During one workshop when I was interviewing the mother of a lesbian young adult I asked, “What gives you hope?”

“This workshop,” she replied, eyes glistening. That resonant hope makes all the work worthwhile.

Are your workshop attendees people who are genuinely struggling with this issue, or do you intend to attract "liberal" Adventists who already relate well to LGBT+ church members? How can you convince conservative church congregations to even begin talking about this issue?

Alita, one of the first things we talk about is how LGBT+ people are not merely an “issue” or a “problem.” (How would any of us like to be constantly referred to as an issue?) LGBT+ are people. Next, we move the conversation from “they” to “those of us who are.” This provides a sea-change in perspective—no more systemic othering.

Our LGBT+ friends are the canaries in the coal mine. How we treat those of us who are different—singles, immigrants, skeptics, chronically depressed, blurters, poor dressers—is how we deserve to be treated.

And oh, I’m so tired of hearing about conservatives and liberals. In Christ there are no conservatives and liberals. Jesus was both, as are His followers. Let’s give dismembering and alienating a rest. We are God’s family.

I will work on my language! What sparked your interest and research for this workshop?

Back in 1989, when I was editor of Insight magazine, I came across this quote from Tim Stafford: “Over 15 years ago I started a column on love and sex for Campus Life, a Christian youth magazine. Among the letters I received was a steady stream from young people who felt sexually attracted to their own gender. Nobody could express more fear and despair. They wanted to be Christians yet feared they were damned.”¹

In 1990, Insight published an issue titled, “What We Don’t Talk About.” It included articles about date rape, masturbation, and incest. We intended to include homosexuality also but found the topic as complex and layered as the other three topics combined. So on December 5, 1992, we published “What We Don’t Talk About II” exclusively on LGBT+ people (though that acronym didn’t then exist). I wrote a 7,700-word piece “Redeeming Our Sad Gay Situation,” the first in-depth article of its kind in the Seventh-day Adventist Church. In my research I read hundreds of pages, talked with dozens of people, and attended conferences.

The statistics are alarming. Suicide is the second-leading cause of death among young people ages 10-24. The Trevor Project found that LGBT+ youth are four times more likely to attempt suicide as their straight peers, and LGBT+ youth from highly rejecting families are 8.4 times as likely to have attempted suicide as LGBT+ peers who reported no or low levels of family rejection.

Recently, a survey of 310 Adventist LGBT+ millennials revealed only 11% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that they felt comfortable coming out to their parents, with 80.5% saying they were scared to come out because they knew their families would think they were sinful/disgusting. When they did come out, only 25.9% had parents who communicated they “loved me no matter what.” Moreover, nearly two-thirds (65.7%) disagreed with the statement, “My religious congregation is an important source of support to me.”² Yet, astoundingly, in a 2015 Pew Research Center report, 48% of LGBT+ Americans identify as Christians, up from 42% in 2013.

Within Adventist churches many people don’t talk to one another about things that really matter here and now—and they certainly don’t listen to one another. What sort of holy hell is this? It’s time for climate change in Adventism, one that creates renewable energy through love that listens and produces more light, less heat.

How much time have you put into developing and giving these workshops? How are they funded?

In the three years since we started in March, 2015, we have spent hundreds of hours listening to everyone from Kinship to Coming Out Ministries, from small church members to high-ranking administrators, from every conceivable tone and hue in the spiritual spectrum. And we’ve madelots of adjustments. We model the listening we’re promoting.

A Sanctuary for Conversation workshops are funded by the sponsoring/hosting organizations. Details are available at https://opendialogueresources.org/

What response have you received from the official Adventist church?

The workshop began at the behest of the official church. Our first presentation was to 100 youth workers at the North American Division (NAD) Youth Ministries Summit in Lincoln, Nebraska. That first workshop required a day-and-a-half. Then we presented for four hours to 140 pastors at the NAD Pastoral “Called” Convention in Austin, Texas, on June 30, 2015, a week before the General Conference session. Since then, we honed A Sanctuary for Conversation to a trim three hours, including a refreshment break.

What has been the most difficult thing about putting this workshop together?

Getting beyond pontificating to enacting practical individual and systemic changes. Ignorance is understandable; willful ignorance is unacceptable.

As always, the most difficult obstacle is fear. That’s why Jesus keeps repeating, again and again, “Don’t be afraid. Fear not.” The ultimate motivational choice is fear or love.

For Adventists, the five top conversational fears regarding LGBT+ people are:

1. “Am I going against Scripture and Jesus by opening this conversation?”
2. “If I talk with an LGBT+ person will I become one myself? Could others I care about ‘catch it’?”
3. “Will we have a gay pride parade in the lobby next week?”
4. “By engaging in this conversation, am I supporting behavior I don’t agree with?”
5. What will other people think?

We deal with each fear in the workshop. Actually some of these fears might even be reflected in the Spectrum comments below. (Laughs.)

How can people attend the Glendale workshop for the Southern California area?

A Sanctuary for Conversation is officially set for Saturday, February 3, 2:30-5:30 p.m. at Glendale Adventist Medical Center’s auditorium. Because space is limited participants must sign up through the following:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Sanctuary4ConversationLA/ 
EventBrite: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-sanctuary-for-conversation-tickets-40860297249

Notes & References:
1. Tim Stafford. “Coming Out.” Christianity Today, Aug. 18, 1989.
2. Curtis J. VanderWaal, David Sedlacek, and Lauren Lane. “The Impact of Family Rejection or Acceptance among LGBT+ Millennials in the Seventh-day Adventist Church.” Social Work & Christianity, Vol. 44, No. 1 & 2 (2017), pp. 72-95.

After 24 years as associate professor of English and communication at Union College, Chris Blake retired last May. He now writes full-time, pursues activist peacemaking, and plays riotously with his four grandchildren.

Alita Byrd is interviews editor for Spectrum Magazine.

Image courtesy of Chris Blake.

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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The tales of Harvey Weinstein and the #MeToo campaign may seem far removed from the debate over the ordination of women. But they are not. They are all expressions of widespread mistrust between all sorts of people – and, of course, particularly between men and women. Most significantly, they are symptoms of an unwillingness to recognize and talk about the exercise of power in relationships.

Notice I don’t say, “an unwillingness to discuss the power of men.” That’s because I don’t believe the problem is entirely with men. Of course, there are sexually predatory, bullying men. My work as a counselor leaves me in no doubt that there is no shortage of physical assaults on women and harassment of them by all kinds of men in many different contexts both inside and outside the church. But I have also come across plenty of evidence of manipulative, controlling women who dominate, undermine, and infantilize their men.

At one level of analysis, some responses to abuse are clearly sound. Assaulted or harassed women should report to police or workplace authorities. There are men who need to be “called out” and some who need to be behind bars.

In the church, there are some men who need to recognize that their readings of scripture are smoke screens for justifying domination and encouraging men to control women and others whom they see as needing their guidance.

But the belief that men are essentially lustful bullies who are “only after one thing” is a sexist slur. It’s as destructive as the idea that women are – or need to be – compliant manipulative victims who are “asking for it.” In the debate over women’s ordination, there are similar slurs by women and men on both genders. “Women with vocations are feminist harpies,” say some. “Women are prevented from serving God by selfish, power-hungry men,” say others.

What is needed both inside and outside the church is for women and men to engage in open public dialogue and private, honest two-way conversations about the intricacy of gender relations. There needs to be more awareness that verbal messages sent either via technology or in person depend so much on tone and timing. Eyes, voices, and other body language all have their impact. The skill of active listening should be taught in school and in churches.

In a nutshell, we need to recalibrate the power relationships between men and women. Powerful men will need to modify the way they exercise their power. Women will need to learn to take responsibility and exercise authority in ways they may have seen before as alien.

The basic process of honest and mutual listening is a demanding and time-consuming process! But there is a great deal at stake. If those of us who call ourselves Christians cannot learn to practice mutually honest relationships between men and women, we shall have stones, not bread, to offer to the wider world. What is involved here is not peripheral to preaching and teaching the gospel, it is the gospel. “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13.35

Helen Pearson is a counselor, psychotherapist, writer, and trainer from Wokingham in England and a longtime elder of Newbold Church. This article originally appeared on Helen and her husband, Michael’s, new website, Pearsons’ Perspectives. It is reprinted here with permission.

Photo by Jonatán Becerra on Unsplash

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Introduction

In his telling of the history of Adventism, George Knight divides the phases of Adventism’s development into three distinct stages, centering around three distinct questions. The pressing question for most of the pioneers of the de­nomination was “What is Adventist in Adventism?” The emphasis during the formative years of 1844–1885 was on the unique teachings that set Adventism apart from other denominations—the Sabbath, Sanctification, the Spirit of Prophecy, State of the Dead, and the Second Coming. This fifty-year focus on doctrinal distinctives, however, led to sectarian tendencies, and the following phase of development served as a corrective, centering around the question of “What is Christian in Adventism?” Adventists during this time, 1886–1919, (re-)discovered the significance of the apostle Paul and the doctrine of justification by faith. This was followed by a third phase of development, 1919–1950, centered around a third question—“What is fundamental in Adventism?” Here Adventists grappled (and continue to grapple) with a host of contemporary issues, as do other denominations trying to find their way in the modern world: issues regarding discoveries in science, the role of women, and sexuality. Today, since 1950, Knight writes, all three of these ques­tions are on the table for Adventists and there is confu­sion and disagreement about which of these questions is the most fundamental to Adventist identity—the beliefs that make them unique as a people, the beliefs they share with other Christians, or their beliefs about important is­sues being debated in society.¹

Knight’s analysis clarifies the central theological con­cerns that have shaped the way many Adventists study the Bible and illustrate the more fundamental hermeneu­tical insight that what an individual or community takes from the Bible to teach, what they derive from the Bible, is largely determined by the questions and concerns they bring to the text. In what follows, I will be suggesting an alternate path of inquiry, one I take to be a more fruitful and faithful one, guided by a different question.

Why the Conflict of Interpretations?

Why do conflicts of interpretation happen between well-meaning people looking at the same text? Simply put, as Hans-Georg Gadamer points out, all textual in­terpretation is shaped by the pre-judgements and expec­tations readers bring to a given text. And, because the meaning of a text is co-determined by the text and reader, a degree of plurality of legitimate meanings can­not be eliminated, even with careful attention and scholarship.

“Not just occasionally, but always,” Gadamer argues, “the meaning of a text goes beyond its author.”² Once it is “in the wild,” as they say, the meaning of a text is no longer under the control of the author, because readers are now involved. Because humans are finite and historical beings, living in various places and times, they will ap­proach texts with different prejudices which can be modified, but never entirely eliminated.³ Thus, while not every interpretation is a valid one, an irreducible plurality of possible mean­ings still remains; one can narrow, but never eliminate the hermeneutical circle.

But beyond the subjectivity of the reader, which forms both the condition and limit for any kind of intelligible experience, is the di­verse nature of Christian Scripture itself. The Bible is actually a collection of many texts, writ­ten and compiled over many years. This results in, as Paul Ricoeur puts it, “a polyphonic lan­guage sustained by [a] circularity of…forms.”⁴ The Bible speaks in many voices about God, ad­dressing different people in different contexts, and what these voices claim is often in tension, if not conflict, with each other, regarding the nature of God’s will. And this tension exists, not just between the two major divisions of the Bi­ble—the first and second testaments—but within them as well.

Take, for example, the shifting standards for membership into the community of God’s people. Walter Brueggemann draws our atten­tion to two texts: Deuteronomy 23:1–8 and Isaiah 56:3–8.

Deuteronomy 23:1–8
¹No one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the lord.
²No one born of a forbidden marriage nor any of their descendants may enter the assembly of the lord, not even in the tenth gen­eration.
³No Ammonite or Moabite or any of their descendants may enter the assembly of the lord, not even in the tenth gener­ation.
⁶ Do not seek a treaty of friendship with them as long as you live.

Isaiah 56:3–8
³ Let no foreigner who is bound to the lord say, “The lord will surely exclude me from his people.”
And let no eunuch complain, “I am only a dry tree.”
⁴ For this is what the lord says:
“To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose what pleases me and hold fast to my covenant—
⁵ to them I will give within my temple and its walls a memorial and a name bet­ter than sons and daughter.

Deuteronomy, the earlier text, sets out the standard for membership into the Israelite com­munity, and the liturgical acts central to the life of that community, along lines of reproductive capacity and proper bloodlines. Isaiah, how­ever, according to Brueggemann “sets out to contradict and overthrow the ancient rules of Moses . . . by asserting a principle of inclusive­ness against that of ancient exclusivism.”⁵ In Isaiah, God goes on to promise foreigners “joy in my house of prayer” (Isaiah 6:7). Their sacri­fices will be accepted in the temple. “My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations,” God declares.

“This is an ancient text that corrects an even more ancient text,” Brueggeman observes.⁶ The tension between these texts illustrate a wider, basic tension in the Old Testament, between the priestly and prophetic traditions. The priestly tradition conceives of holiness in terms of cultic purity. The prophetic tradition places the con­cern for justice, and more specifically protective justice for the most vulnerable of society, along­side that of purity.⁷ Some of the later prophets argue that justice supersedes purity. Micah, for example, insists that God does not want sacrifices at all, preferring acts of justice and mercy (Micah 6:6–8).

One could point out similar tensions in the New Testament. Again, one encounters a diver­sity of literary genres—parables, narratives, let­ters, visions, etc.—that seem to offer, at times, conflicting normative guidance. For example, Jesus, in the gospel of Luke, seems to recom­mend a renunciation of possession. “None of you can become my disciples if you do not give up all your possessions” (Luke 14:33). Com­pare this with what Paul says to the believers in Corinth (2 Corinthians 8:14), as he appeals for his collection for the church in Jerusalem. Here the recommendation is generosity, rather than renunciation.⁸ Another example is the believer’s relationship to the state. Romans 13—“They are God’s servants . . . Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities” (vs. 4–5) and Rev­elation 13—“And I saw a beast coming out of the sea . . .” (vs. 1)—do not say the same thing. These are, as Richard Hays points out, “radi­cally different assessments of the relation of the Christian community to the Roman Empire.”⁹

The diversity in the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Old Testament with the New Testament is a major source for the diversi­ty of interpretations about the Bible. Combined with the diversity of readers located in many times and places, conflicts of interpretations are inevitable. Diverse communities (and diverse individuals who comprise those communities) read diverse texts with a diversity of questions and expectations, facing diverse circumstances; hence, there is an inescapable diversity of inter­pretations about a single book.

Transfiguring the Conflict of Interpretations

What should one do in the face of this inev­itable conflict of interpretations? A story found in all three of the gospels and, arguably, allud­ed to in John—the Transfiguration—provides some suggestive hermeneutical insights.¹⁰ The Markean version, most likely the earliest ver­sion of the story, provides the relevant details with its typical concision.

The message of the story, found in Mark 9:2–8, is enigmatic. Jesus takes His inner cir­cle of students—Peter, James, and John—up onto a mountain top. There, Jesus’ appearance changes. “He was transfigured before them. His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them,” Mark recounts (vs. 2, 3). Two figures appear, identified as Elijah and Moses, and talk with Jesus. The disciples are terrified and one of them, Peter, proposes to build three shelters. Then a cloud appears and a voice speaks from the cloud identifying Jesus and issuing a com­mand—“This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him” (vs. 7). Suddenly, the disciples look around and they stand alone on the mountain with Jesus. “They no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus” (vs. 8).

The point of the passage emerges when read in light of the stories that immediately precede it and also the Old Testament passages it refer­ences and echoes. Two stories come before this one. The first is one of Jesus questioning His disciples in light of His spreading popularity. “Who do you say I am,” he asks (Mark 8:29). To which, Peter responds, evidently correct­ly, “You are the Messiah” (Mark 8:29). This is followed by a story of Peter’s response to Jesus as he begins to speak of His coming suffering and death. This, understandably, causes some consternation with the disciples. Peter takes Je­sus aside and rebukes him (Mark 8:32). Jesus in turn, rebukes Peter, calling him Satan and de­claring that His followers must deny themselves and take up their crosses (Mark 9:34). The wid­er narrative context for the Transfiguration sto­ry, in other words, is one where the disciples, with Peter representing them, are confused about Jesus’ identity and mission.

The story also alludes to numerous figures, passages, and images from the Old Testament. Moses and Elijah, the figures who speak with Jesus, simply put, are two of the greatest fig­ures in the Old Testament. Moses is the leader who led the nation of Israel out of slavery from Egypt. He is the giver of the Law and was re­garded as the author of the Pentateuch. Moses’ burial place was unknown (Deuteronomy 34:5–8) leading to the idea that he had been taken up by God.¹¹ Elijah was the greatest of the Old Testament prophets. At the end of his life, Eli­jah is taken up into heaven in a whirlwind (2 Kings 2:1–11).

Interestingly, both men had their own moun­taintop encounters with God—Sinai and Car­mel. Together, they represent the greatest leaders in the Old Testament. And this helps explain Peter’s confused suggestion (other than sheer fear, as Mark surmises). Peter wants to keep the conversation before him going as long as possible. He is amazed at the company Jesus keeps. As one commentator puts it, “The offer to build three tabernacles—one for Jesus, one for Moses, and one for Elijah—would pre­sumably encourage the stunning consultation to continue indefinitely.”¹²

Peter seems to either think that Jesus is as great as Moses and Elijah or that he derives His great­ness from His relationship with Moses and Eli­jah. This confusion is addressed by the descrip­tion of Jesus’ appearance and the voice from the cloud. When it comes to Jesus’ appearance, two passages from the Old Testament provide some relevant background. Exodus 34:30 describes Moses appearance after he had been with God on Mt. Sinai—“His face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him.” In another pas­sage, Daniel 7:9, Daniel describes a vision, writ­ing, “As I looked, thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. His clothing was as white as snow; the hair of his head was white like wool.” Jesus’ appearance, where His clothes become a “dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them,” echo these passages, indicating the presence of the divine. Somehow God is with and in Jesus.

The visual cues are accompanied by an audi­tory declaration and command. First, the text indicates that clouds appear. In the Old Testa­ment, clouds are an indication of God’s pres­ence and glory. For example, Exodus 19:16 tells us that a cloud covered the mountain where God gave the Ten Commandments—“On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning cloud over the mountain … Everyone in the camp trembled.” When it comes to the voice at His baptism, recounted at the very be­ginning of Mark’s gospel (1:11), only Jesus (and the readers) hear the voice declaring Jesus to be “My son.” Now, the three disciples also hear the heavenly voice attesting to this relationship.

This voice gives very concise instructions. There is only one command: “Listen to Him” (Mark 9:7). The verb ἀκούετε is a present im­perative, implying continuing action. “Keep on listening to Him” or “Continue to listen to Him,” the translation could go. (Interestingly, Mark’s ἀκούετε αὐτοῦ seems to echo Deuteron­omy 18:15, where Moses predicts the coming of another prophet like himself and instructs the Israelites to listen to Him—αὐτοῦ ἀκούσεσθε.¹³) What happens next makes the point clear. Mo­ses and Elijah disappear. The sudden disappear­ance of the cloud and Elijah and Moses underscores the point that the disciples are to look to Jesus to be their teacher. The heavenly voice implies that Peter’s request to build the taberna­cles was misguided, because he and his fellow disciples are to listen, ultimately, to God’s Son. To drive home the point, Mark adds a redun­dant point of emphasis: “they no longer saw anyone, but only Jesus with them” (Mark 9:8).

“Listen to Jesus. Keep listening to Him.” The same point communicated to Jesus’ original stu­dents applies to the early Christians hearing this story—Mark’s original audience. In a world of conflicting voices, and at times, when Jesus’ teachings seem confusing, and at times when the way looks dark, they, too, are to continue looking to and listening to Jesus, over every other voice. This same point applies to pro­fessed followers of Jesus in every succeeding generation, in all times and places, including to­day. Taking the message of the Transfiguration seriously would transform the way Christians in the twenty-first-century deal with the polyph­ony of voices within Scripture and conflicts of interpretation about Scripture.

Like Peter, many of Jesus’ students today face the temptation of a flat hermeneutic, where the voice of Jesus becomes one of the many voices of Scripture, rather than the authoritative voice of Scripture. Jesus’ teachings are lined up with all the teachings of the Bible, systematized, and His voice competes amongst many other voices for attention.

His voice, at times, is muffled and interpreted through other voices; perhaps, if not by Mo­ses and Elijah’s voices, by voices that follow Him. The apostle Paul, for example, might be­come the ultimate theological authority. “Many Christians in our day treat the gospels as the optional chips and dip at the beginning of the meal…” N. T. Wright observes, “there’s some nice stuff to crunch there, but then you go and sit at the table and have the red meat of Pauline theology. That’s where we’re all headed.”¹⁴ We could call this a reversed hermeneutic, where Jesus’ teachings are interpreted through some other lens.¹⁵ In contrast, with a transfigured hermeneutic, Jesus is the ultimate authority—Jesus’ voice, his teachings, take obvious and intentional priority over all other voices. Jesus receives hermeneuti­cal priority over the rest of Scripture.

The same point is made in the opening lines of the epistle to the Hebrews:

In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, ²but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the uni­verse. ³The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his pow­erful word (Hebrews 1:1–3).

The opening of the letter sets up a theme to be repeated throughout the rest of the letter—the superiority of Jesus to other revelations, powers, and ministrations. Addressing a community un­der severe persecution, the writer unleashes his rhetorical energies to persuade his audience to stay committed to their relatively new faith and not to return to former ways. This bold opening affirmation of who Jesus is, and His relation to other revelations, makes a clear point with pro­found hermeneutical implications—what Jesus reveals is superior and singular when compared to other previous revelations. All revelations may be inspired by God, but not all revelations are equal before God, including other revelations recorded in the Bible.¹⁶

Jesus and the Conflict of Interpretations

So how, exactly, does looking to Jesus help us deal with the conflict of interpretations within and about the Bible? We should remem­ber that Jesus was a teacher of Scripture, who, amongst other things, taught His students how to interpret Scripture. Christians, of course, af­firm Jesus as being more than a teacher, but He was at least that and anyone calling themselves his students should treat Him accordingly, as their rabbi.

This would entail, as it did in second-centu­ry Palestine in Jesus’ day, the serious attempt to learn their mentor’s teachings.¹⁷ Students would commit years to learning the teachings of their rabbi and committing them to memory. They endeavored to live out these teachings in their day-to-day lives. They would take notes as their rabbi debated other rabbis. By doing all this, they were learning a new skill—how to think like their rabbi and respond to new situations unaddressed by him in ways that were faithful to him. They would read sacred texts, new and old, like him.¹⁸ Jesus’ promise to His students, then and now, is that, once trained, they will be “like a householder who brings forth out of his storehouse treasure that is new and [treasure that is] old [the fresh as well as the familiar]” (Matthew 13:52).¹⁹

Glen Stassen and David Gushee, in their study of the Sermon on the Mount, provide an insightful summary of the interpretive princi­ples that Jesus used to interpret Torah.²⁰ First, they note, Jesus “understood the Law as an ex­pression of God’s grace, calling for a faithful re­sponse.” Jesus loved His Bible and had the high­est respect for it. (Jesus, I think, would respond as any teacher would today when students ask what part of a given reading assignment is real­ly important—“All of it.”) He clearly states that His teachings do not detract from anything the Torah teaches, but clarifies its true meaning (Matthew 5:17). Jesus, like the other rabbis of His day, viewed the Law as a gift from God. God had chosen to give it to them. This was abundant grace.

Secondly, with this said, certain teachings of the Bible were clearly more significant to Jesus than others. As Stassen and Gushee put it, Jesus “placed more emphasis on the moral than on the cultic aspects of the Law.”²¹ Take, for exam­ple, Jesus’ teaching about neighbor love, which is drawn from Leviticus 19:18. If you look it up, it is actually a secondary clause to a larger teaching prohibiting revenge—“Do not seek re­venge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.”

What is even more striking are the instruc­tions in the verse that immediately follows it: “Do not mate different kinds of animals. Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed. Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material.” The rationale or the significance for these latter teaching is unclear; perhaps they were self-evi­dent to those living in an ancient agrarian soci­ety. Commentators note that Leviticus 19 has, as a whole, no clear organizing thread. Rather it is a loose association of ideas. In many ways, it is a microcosm of the Bible, as a whole, or the way it seems to many people trying to make sense of it. The phrase “love your neighbor as yourself,” in other words, is one easy to over­look; it is surrounded by all kinds of other in­struction. Yet Jesus homes in on this one phrase and makes it central to His teaching. All laws are not created equal, it turns out.

Thirdly, and this relates to the second princi­ple, Jesus “had a prophetic rather than a legal­istic understanding of righteousness; true righ­teousness consisted of deeds of love, mercy and justice, especially to the most vulnerable.”²² This returns us to the tension between the priestly and prophetic traditions in the Old Testament. It would be inaccurate to say that priests did not care about justice and that prophets did not care about ritual; but they seemed to focus on or emphasize one as being important to ful­filling God’s will. How is one faithful to both these traditions when they come into conflict? Which should be prioritized over the other? Jesus clearly sides with the prophets. As Rich­ard Bauckman points out, “Jesus does not reject the rules for priestly purity, but he downgrades them. Weightier considerations take prece­dence.”²³ This is clear in Jesus’ commentary on the punctilious payment of tithe by religious leaders. Jesus admonishes them for neglecting “the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness” (Matthew 23:23). This is why Jesus stretched His reading of Scripture to include as many people as possible. One’s neighbors weren’t just faithful Jews; they in­cluded enemies, Samaritans, women, children, the demon-possessed, the imprisoned, tax-col­lectors, widows, and the poor.

Lastly, Jesus “placed emphasis on the root causes of behavior, i.e. the heart or character.”²⁴ Take His teaching on the proper washing of hands and the eating of food: “Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them” (Mark 7:15). He goes on to ex­plain to His students, who are just as mystified by His dismissive declaration as the religious leaders He is addressing, “‘Don’t you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? ¹⁹For it doesn’t go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.’ (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.)”²⁵ (How one interprets this paren­thetical comment says a lot about which of the three hermeneutics options that have been laid out—flat, reversed, or transfigured—they are opting for.)

Jesus continues, “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. ²¹For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, ²²adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. ²³All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” In this, and other, engagements with the scholars of His day, Je­sus had the ability to engage in sophisticated and legal moral casuistry. But that wasn’t His focus like other teachers. Rather than more head knowledge, His teachings were crafted to identify, challenge, and transform matters of the heart.

Adventism and the Conflict of Interpretations

Jesus appreciated all of Scripture, but read it pro­phetically, focusing on how people treat others, especially those on the margins of society, and seeking to transform the character of His listen­ers. Early on, at its inception, Christianity was clearly a movement based on the teachings of Jesus. The New Testament had not been canon­ized, so believers were reliant on the teaching of the apostles, who, as students of Jesus, in­terpreted the Scriptures they did have, the Old Testament, like Jesus—prophetically, ethically, and transformatively. But something shifted as the growing community of Jesus’ students encountered competing philosophical and re­ligious groups. Christianity became creedal, more and more about the beliefs one had about Jesus than living one’s life inspired by the teach­ings of Jesus.²⁶

The number of doctrines that defined what it meant to be a Christian grew like a patch of unruly weeds. In addition to beliefs about God and Jesus, were eventually added affirmations (and denials) about the precise meaning of Je­sus’ death, the appropriate mode of baptism, what happens when one takes communion, the best way to organize a church, what happens at the end of the world, the true day of wor­ship, etc. These are all, undoubtedly, important issues. Are they equally important? And how does this way of reading the Bible reflect or re­late to the way Jesus read Scripture?

The time has come to rediscover Jesus as a teacher of Scripture and to restore His teaching authority in the church that bears His name. Like most Christians, Adventists believe that God inspired those who wrote the Bible and, through it, has something to say to them. We have approached the Bible with important and interesting questions—returning to George Knight’s summary: “What is Adventist in Ad­ventism? What is Christian in Adventism? What is Fundamental in Adventism?” Such questions have led to the discovery of many new insights. It has also generated, as we are aware, many new controversies and debates.

Is it possible, to quote the great theologian Bono, who in “11 o’clock Tick Tock,” sings: “We thought that we had the answers, it was the questions we had wrong.” Is it possible there are better questions we could have been and could be asking? What if we seriously started asking a different question as individuals and a community—How did, and would, Jesus interpret the Bible?²⁷

References & Notes:
1. George Knight, A Search for Identity: The Development of Seventh-day Adventist Beliefs(Hagerstown: Review and Her­ald, 2000).
2. Hans-Georg Gadamer in Truth and Method, 2nd ed., trans. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G. Marshall (New York: Continuum, 2004), 269.
3. Gadamer argues that “[r]eason exists only in concrete, historical terms—i.e., it is not its own master but remains constantly dependent on the given circumstances in which it operates.” Ibid., 277.
4. Paul Ricoeur, ed. Mark I. Wallace, “Philosophy and Religious Language” in Figuring the Sacred: Religion, Narrative, and Imagination(Fortress Press, 1995), 41. Through legislation, wisdom literature, narrative, epistle, hymns, etc., Ricoeur notes, “God appears differently each time: sometimes as the hero of the saving act, sometimes as wrathful and compassionate, sometimes as the one to whom one can speak in a relation of an I-Thou type, and sometimes as the one whom I meet only in a cosmic order that ignores me.”
5. Walter Brueggemann, Sabbath as Resistance: Saying No to the Culture of Now(Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014), 53.
6. Ibid., 55.
7. Ibid., 49. See also Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1978).
8. Richard Hays, The Moral Vision of the New Testament: A Contemporary Introduction to New Testament Ethics(San Francisco, Harper Collins, 1996). Text as quoted by Hays.
9. Ibid., 190.
10. See John 1:14.
11. According to Origin (c.185–c.254), the dispute between the archangel Michael and the devil over Moses’ body in Jude 9 comes from a treatise entitled: “The Ascension of Moses.”
12. C. A. Evans, Mark 8:27–16:20, Vol. 34B, (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 2001), 37.
13. Ibid, 38.
14. N.T. Wright, “Look at Jesus.” Interview for The Work of the People. http://www.theworkofthepeople.com/look-at-jesus.
15. Paul, according to scholars, was technically the first interpreter of Jesus, as his letters form the earliest writings of the New Testament. Chronology in writing, I am arguing, does not supersede the weight of content, nor does it discount the weight of earlier circulating oral traditions that inform the Gospels.
16. See also, John 1:16, 17: “Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”
17. This, of course, would be done with an awareness that we each approach the Gospel texts with our own expectations and interests. Our understandings of Jesus, mediated through the Gospel writers, are interpretations of interpretations. Acknowledging this, and the possible plurality of interpretations that inevitably arise, does not mean that all interpretations are equally legitimate; interpretations of Jesus can still be evaluated on the parameters set by the text and, furthermore, compared with other interpretations. For a fascinating survey of the way Jesus has been interpreted in American history, see Stephen Prothero, American Jesus: How the Son of God Became a National Icon(New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003). See also Jaroslav Pelikan, Jesus Through the Centuries: His Place in the History of Culture(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999) for a wider historical survey.
18. See Brad H. Young, Meet the Rabbis: Rabbinic Thought and the Teachings of Jesus(Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 28–37. Jon Paulien and the late Hans LaRondelle write: “For a Christian believer, Christ is the true Interpreter of Scripture. His way of understanding the Old Testament, therefore, becomes the true standard for understanding Scripture. Followers of Jesus must be taught by Him, surprised by His personal knowledge of God, and ready to accept His interpretation of the Scriptures…” See Hans K. LaRondelle and Jon Paulien, The Bible Jesus Interpreted (Logos Bible Software: 2014), 29.
19. The Amplified Bible.
20. Glenn H. Stassen and David P. Gushee, Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context(Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic: 2003), 92–3. See also Richard Bauckham, Jesus: A Very Short Introduction(New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 68–75 for a very helpful overview of Jesus’ interpretive approach to Torah. Richard Hays also provides a summary in Chapter 7 of The Moral Vision of the New Testament, 163–167.
21. Stassen and Gushee, Kingdom Ethics, 92–3.
22. Ibid.
23. Bauckman, Jesus, 71. See 68–75 for another, similar overview of Jesus’ interpretive approach to Torah.
24. Stassen and Gushee, Kingdom Ethics, 92–3.
25. Paul, in Romans 14:14, prior to Mark, also quotes Jesus: “I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean.” See also Romans 14:17.
26. Justo Gonzalez summarizes the outcome of the first six major church councils: “In this process, the historical, loving Jesus of the New Testament was left aside, and the Savior had become an object of speculation and controversy; he was now described in terms totally alien to the vocabulary of the New Testament—‘hypostasis,’ ‘nature,’ ‘energy,’ etc.; he had become a static object of discussion rather than the Lord of believers and of history…” See A History of Christian Thought, Vol. 2, revised edition (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1987), 90.
27. An initial version of this essay was presented for the 2017 Adventist Forum Conference on Celebrating the Word and I am grateful to the organizers of the conference for the opportunity to share it and the lively conversation with attendees that ensued. Additionally, I am grateful to Dr. Norman Young, who read and offered constructive feedback on the manuscript of my presentation, helping me better understand the dating of and relationship between the Jesus and Pauline traditions of the New Testament (See notes 15 & 25).

Zane Yi, PhD, is an assistant professor of religion at Loma Linda University’s School of Religion, where he teaches courses in philos­ophy and theology and directs the MA in Re­ligion & Society program. He serves as an of­ficer in the Society of Adventist Philosophers. This article first appeared in the latest print edition of Spectrum(vol. 45, no. 4). Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash.

Further Reading:
Why Hermeneutics is Our Biggest Problem — a Spectrum interview with David Ripley, Ministerial Secretary for the Northern Asia-Pacific Division
Forgotten Homework: The 2020 Study in Hermeneutics — by Spectrum columnist Matthew Quartey
Reading and Misreading the Bible— by Adventist Forum Board Chair Charles Scriven

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Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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During the Nixon era, under threat of losing her paper and going to jail, The Washington Post’s Katherine Graham published the Pentagon Papers. Why did she do it?

“Once she knew the truth, all else became secondary, including losing her paper, her freedom and all she most cared about.”

A similar conviction animates Dr. Jerry Gladson’s memoir Out of Adventism: A Theologian’s Journey. It is—at best—a sobering, and at worst, a demoralizing read. Count my reaction among the “worst.” It chronicles his tenure at Southern Adventist University (then Southern Missionary College) from 1972-1984 and his life afterward. He writes with a fierce honesty about his personal and professional anguish, his disappointment with specific persons, and the horror of watching his family unravel. An earlier effort felt incomplete to Gladson;¹ he now feels he has said it all. A number of current and former Seventh-day Adventist scholars who read this volume will respond sympathetically.

He describes the book’s controversial agenda:

As a cautionary tale, my story is a plea for Seventh-day Adventism and denominations like it to be more open and transparent in their internal political and theological difficulties. It is a plea for denominational openness to change, even when it involves critical, theological matters. No doctrine or belief should be held to be beyond revision, especially when new discoveries in theology or biblical studies plead for it. Even though I have been out of Adventism for more than two decades, I still hold out the hope—albeit slender—that it might eventually change in these respects.²

Gladson began his early life in the church as a deeply conservative believer who immediately felt a call to pastoral ministry. Deep joy filled him during his years as a church pastor. Eager for more learning, he enrolled at Vanderbilt University for an MA in Old Testament, never expecting to be invited to join Southern’s Religion Department. He accepted and was provided financial support to complete his PhD at Vanderbilt in the same area. As one should expect, this experience forced him to ask questions about well-established Adventist doctrine based on Scripture.

Church leaders and laypeople cannot easily imagine what the process of graduate work in the Bible really entails. If you have read the Bible for its spiritual help and clearly articulated theological teachings (this should not be interpreted as intellectual arrogance), such study—while important—offers only a surface awareness at best. Knowing the original languages and how to use them, understanding the history of the transmission of the biblical manuscripts and their cognates, is humbling and surprising. Only then can you appreciate the “shock and awe” felt by a young Adventist scholar who encounters, for the first time, what appear to be significant challenges to even a few of his beliefs. He instinctively seeks out other scholars grappling with the same issues, confident that there must be some way to deal with them.

Platitudes, simplistic explanations, and dismissive comments about being corrupted by “worldly schools” do not suffice. Gladson writes gratefully of faculty colleagues at Southern and elsewhere who, while not threatened by his concerns, nevertheless felt compelled to address them in surreptitious conversations. To his further surprise, he was appointed to the Biblical Research Committee of the General Conference (BRICOM), the group of scholars tasked with reviewing any and all questions about Adventist theology. “At last,” he thought to himself, the group working with or writing Adventist scholarly papers, would address his nagging questions. To his dismay, it was not to be.

The more deeply I became involved in the work of BRICOM, however, the more disappointed I was. When the really difficult, intractable questions about Adventist doctrine arose, the committee turned to scholars who would defend—usually without flinching—the denomination’s traditional teaching…When someone dared to present a paper at variance with the church’s teaching, it was quickly tossed into a dead file at BRICOM office, never to resurface again.³

During his tenure at Southern, other Adventist scholars in biblical, historical and theological disciplines raised similar questions on their campuses. “Is our traditional approach to the Bible (as well as the writings of Ellen White⁴), a disservice to the church?” “What does the doctrine of ‘inspiration’ mean and how much (and what kind of) authority do these writings possess? The major controversy at that time centered on the translation of the phrase “and then shall the sanctuary be cleansed” in Daniel 8:14. Adventist understanding of the heavenly sanctuary depended on that phrase, one of the issues that gnawed at Gladson who had carefully studied the Hebrew text.

What came next fanned irksome questions into a firestorm. A relatively quiet distress limited to scholars (even some who edited the SDA Bible Commentary), became a deafening community argument.

Dr. Desmond Ford, a professor at Pacific Union College, raised the sanctuary issue at a meeting sponsored by the local Adventist Forum on campus. His theme: the difficulties with the traditional Adventist interpretation of Daniel 8:14 and the “cleansing of the sanctuary” must be confronted, notwithstanding Ellen White’s interpretation of this passage. When a recording arrived at General Conference headquarters in Takoma Park, Maryland, alarms were sounded. For those exposed to the sanctuary class taught by Dr. Edward Heppenstall at the Seminary, this was not news, though Dr. Ford melded that passage with other equally charged issues.

As expected, questions about the meaning of “inspiration” surfaced right away, threatening the accepted views of inspiration and prophetic authority. Spectrum published evidence pointing to Ellen White’s borrowing material for a number of her books; Adventist pastor Walter Rae published a controversial book with the inflammatory title The White Lie. The English-speaking Adventist world was caught off-guard and the pressure mounted for church leaders to do something. Theology professors on many campuses began to feel their support evaporate from church leaders, selected college officials and students, and even community members who once praised them. Gladson and others at Southern had reason to worry.

At this point, the narrative shifts from his theological questions to his very survival as a theology professor at Southern. I found it painful to read, partly because others I knew well also endured a similar torment during that time. A parenthetical observation: as long as theological controversies that might erupt into loss of confidence in some traditional doctrines are kept in-house, informed leaders have more room to pace a response that will help the church grow more deliberately towards a new understanding. Ford’s public presentation took that option away, if it was ever a viable one.

Church administrators at the highest level decided to invest treasure and time to give Ford and the issues a fair hearing; hence, the expensive and infamous Glacier View Conference.⁵ The hopes that preceded the conference approached euphoria. Scholars believed that leadership would now allow time to resolve the issues theologically, rather than administratively.

While Gladson was not present the first week of Glacier View to hear Ford, he was there for the second week of theological consultation which included many of the earlier participants. When he arrived, he reports, a significant contingent of scholars voiced betrayal. They charged church leadership with abandoning their promises to allow more study and conversation about Ford’s issues. However, at the conclusion of the conference, an unannounced meeting of a select group voted to discipline Ford. When that became known, Glacier View morphed from a step toward theological maturity to a Pearl Harbor that elicited an angry response.

In the wake of that decision, administrators and lay people created litmus tests to evaluate the orthodoxy of theology professors and pastors. Once supportive of their religion faculties earning terminal degrees at non-SDA universities, leaders turned toward the doctoral programs newly developed at Andrews University. Future hires to teach religion would largely come from that program. Current scholars who kept raising questions were mortal threats to church harmony and unity. Why they were regarded that way, as discussed earlier, portends increasing strife for the denomination as we go forward. In Gladson’s case, as in most of the others, school and union leaders not trained as well as their newly minted scholars perceived danger everywhere. Their suspicions that he would “corrupt” his students ultimately made his situation at Southern untenable. Rumors of heterodoxy, fed by respected scholars leadership trusted, persuaded administrators that such professors were a danger to the community.

Like Caesar’s crossing a river into Gaul precipitating the Roman Civil War, Glacier View became an Adventist Rubicon. Reliable estimates of the pastors and laypeople who simply left or were forced out numbers in the tens of thousands. In Gladson’s situation at Southern, a few students, caught up in the frenzy, secretly taped their efforts to bait Gladson into committing himself on “controversial” questions. Refusing to comment was itself “proof” of heresy. Gordon Hyde (not trained in theology) and Gerhard Hasel (himself an Old Testament PhD from Vanderbilt) are named as those most responsible for his eventual termination.

An exodus of religion scholars began in a number of our colleges. Those offered pastoral roles, like Dr. John Brunt,⁶ went on to become deeply appreciated preachers who could extract from the text “things new and old.” A few, before or in the midst of the uproar, went into college administration such as Drs. Niels-Erik Andreasen, James J.C. Cox, and Lawrence T. Geraty. No such options were offered to Gladson, which strikes me as a scorching ethical failure. Emotional, unfounded charges became “fact.” No reasoning, pleading or counter-arguments could alter what was about to occur. It was time to purge and “purify,” not get sentimental about termination procedures or the future of those being exiled.

In the end, like Katherine Graham, the moral dimension would not allow him to compromise by pretending all was well. “How could such an approach be a search for truth?” Gladson cried. “Wasn’t it a sham?”⁷ Unable to openly and honestly enter into conversation with other biblical scholars (which would unquestionably have been helpful if not dispositive of his concerns) and church leaders who would listen, Gladson had no choice: he felt compelled to legally challenge the termination, including the illegal practice of recording his conversations. Those who had done so were willing to do the immoral and illegal in order keep the church “purified” of these liberal scholars.

Shortly thereafter, Gladson was done. Alone and still passionate about finding truth, he found another community which embraced him and his quest enthusiastically. The rest of the book details his post-Southern life, with all its blessings and anguish. Still, he concludes his volume with sanguinity.

Will Gladson’s courageous book teach us anything? Will humility about what we assume is “settled” ever soften our approach to those who ask serious questions? Can we move from the certainty that besets us to truly hear these words of Jesus: “Judge not that you be not judged?”

One can only hope.

Notes & References:
1. A Theologian’s Journey from Seventh-day Adventist to Mainstream Christianity.
2. Loc. 142 of 6986, Kindle Edition.
3. Loc.  877 of 6986 Kindle Edition.
4. See the following for detailed information:  https://spectrummagazine.org/article/bonnie-dwyer/2009/05/10/most-significant-article-spectrum-has-published%E2%80%94so-far; Alden Thompson, Inspiration: Hard Questions, Honest Answers.
5. The Glacier View Conference was preceded by a committee which met with Ford for an extended period of time, reviewing his lengthy document written for the conference participants.
6. PhD in New Testament from Emory University, taught at Walla Walla College for many years, including a stint as Academic Dean.
7. Loc. 877, Ibid.

James Londis is a retired evangelist, pastor, professor, college president, and Ethics and Corporate Integrity officer.

Image: Wipf & Stock Publishing

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Larry Evans, Assistant to the General Conference President for the Deaf and Special Needs Ministries, talks about what has been accomplished and what is still left to do in reaching people around the world with a wide range of special needs.

Question: You were appointed as assistant to the world church president for Special Needs Ministries in September 2015, when this ministry was created. What has been your major focus over the last two-and-a-bit years?

Answer: The work for the Deaf and Special Needs Ministries has three major components. We refer to them as our “3-A Strategy:” Awareness, Acceptance, and Action.

1.Awareness– Precise numbers are difficult but the number of global deaf range from 75 to 350 million deaf, of which less than 2% are Christian of any kind. This is largely an unrecognized and unreached people group. (There are over 400 different sign languages which complicates the mission.)

2.Acceptance– Acceptance includes seeing those with special needs as individuals and second, the mission to reach them with the Adventist message of hope. My first concerns for the deaf developed while in the Oregon Conference. At that time there were about six or eight workers in the North American Division for the deaf, and all were paid differently. In that number, there was one full-time hearing pastor for the deaf. Today, that number has decreased to one denominationally employed pastor for the deaf (he is himself deaf). There is also one full time supporting minister for the deaf.

3.Action – The actions taken for the deaf and now for Special Needs Ministries is an educational approach — not a medical one. The majority of the deaf do not see themselves as being “disabled” but rather as being part of a unique culture with its own language. 

What major accomplishments can you point to so far?

Major accomplishments for the deaf include:

A sense of identity:

1. A name was created (Adventist Deaf Ministries International – ADMI) with input from the deaf community.
2. A logo was created with the input from the deaf community.
3. International networking – critical for a global identity
4. A website for the deaf combined with educational components for the hearing who want to learn more about the deaf:  www.AdventistDeaf.org

Organizational restructuring for mission to reach the deaf 

1. A division deaf coordinator was chosen by each of the 13 divisions to lead out in the development of the work for the division.
2. The second largest baptism of the deaf in the history of the denomination on a single Sabbath – 131 in Kenya.
3. The first denominationally-sponsored booth regarding deaf ministry at a General Conference Session (2010) plus the first “broadcast” of American Sign Language for the deaf at a General Conference Session via Hope Channel.
4. In November 2016 the launch of Hope Channel Deaf.
5. The first denominationally-sponsored school for the deaf on the continent of Africa was opened in Kenya. Two other schools exist — one in India and one in the Philippines.

Major events/accomplishments for Special Needs Ministries include:

I began working for the deaf at the General Conference in 2011 in addition to my full time position with Stewardship. Prior to the 2015 General Conference Session, the North American Division’s Deaf Committee petitioned President Ted Wilson to make me a full-time coordinator for the deaf. Instead, I was appointed as Assistant to the General Conference President for Special Needs Ministries. Personal Ministries and Sabbath School had begun Special Needs Ministries about a year or two before it was handed over to me.With the endorsement of this ministry by Elder Wilson, he and I discussed what it should encompass. I shared with him the following statement, which has proven to be a fulcrum point for the rapidly expanding “compassionate” ministry:

“I saw that it is in the providence of God that widows and orphans, the blind, the deaf, the lame, and persons afflicted in a variety of ways, have been placed in close Christian relationship to His church; it is to prove His people and develop their true character. Angels of God are watching to see how we treat these persons who need our sympathy, love, and disinterested benevolence. This is God’s test of our character. If we have the true religion of the Bible, we shall feel that a debt of love, kindness, and interest is due to Christ in behalf of His brethren; and we can do no less than to show our gratitude for His immeasurable love to us while we were sinners unworthy of His grace, by having a deep interest and unselfish love for those who are our brethren, and who are less fortunate than ourselves.”—Testimonies for the Church 3:511.

Special Needs Ministries has been defined to include: The deaf, blind, those with mobility issues, those with cognitive/developmental challenges, orphans/vulnerable children and caregivers (which now includes ministry for widows). We have created a special taskforce of experienced people for each of these six ministries.

This is not limited to the concept of “disability” though it is not denied. This ministry is not about what a person cannot do. 

This is a ministry about “possibilities,” about “inclusion” in every ministry of the church. It is about helping each person find a “vocational calling” in which they too can serve. 

It is a ministry helping local churches understand how to relate better to those who have special needs and a recognition that these individuals also educate us if we take seriously the statement above by Ellen White. It is about making every local church a “house of prayer” for all people—some can’t hear, some can’t walk and some may make “funny” noises. But we have to remember “all people.”

What other changes have been made in the way Special Needs Ministries has been organized? 

Each of the 13 Divisions has chosen a Special Needs Coordinator. Divisions are holding orientation and training sessions for Union leaders, who in turn provide training for conferences and local churches. 

At the General Conference, we have a Special Needs Committee made up of all General Conference department heads, plus lay leaders. 

As part of the reorganization, Christian Record Services for the Blind is now a North American Division entity, while the General Conference Special Needs Ministries for the blind now covers the world field outside of North America. The new arrangement is being reviewed, but we do plan to work as partners for the blind. 

We have instituted an annual Special Needs Sabbath with Sabbath School programs and sermons to increase awareness. This year it falls on April 21. 

We have created a new logo, new motto and new resource-rich website at www.specialneeds.adventist.org.

You have lots going on! Any other recent milestones you can point to?

We just facilitated (through donors) the purchase of a braille embosser to serve a thousand blind in Ghana! That embosser with shipping costs over $16,000 but will provide the only literature for these blind — both Adventist and non-Adventist. Imagine the mission opportunity this has.

What has been the most challenging or difficult thing in your role?

It varies from division to division but lack of awareness is a real challenge. We need leaders, pastors and church members to recognize the need to give priority to this ministry. Some don't understand the difference between a “disability” ministry and a “possibility” ministry.

We need more staff and volunteers for this expanding ministry. There is a desparate need for more interpretors and pastors for the deaf.

We also have financial pressures to deal with. We have had a large one-time gift by a gracious anonymous donor. But now that the ministry has expanded we hope funds will be allocated by the General Conference. The GC already pays my salary and travel expenses.

We are approaching this ministry as a “movement” – not a program! We seek to build understanding and enthusiasm that will spread globally and cross-culturally. This is a key concept behind all that we do. Therefore, we approach this wholistically, taking advantage of all the resources available through the General Conference departments.

I believe you have spent a great deal of time traveling to different divisions around the world promoting awareness and inclusion of people with physical and mental limitations. Where have you spent the most time? What differences in attitudes have you found toward special needs ministries in different countries and cultures?

I go where I am invited. Most invitations come from Africa, Inter-America, South America, Philippines and some in Europe. I visited 16 countries this year. 

We must educate the future generation regarding this compassionate and enabling/empowering ministry. I am scheduled to speak in four or five colleges outside North America this year, hopefully with a team, and making use of the educators at each institution. 

The attitude among most division leaders is amazing. Some division presidents have asked each of their unions to appoint a Special Needs Ministries coordinator. 

Kindness is contagious. A blind lady in Romania asked what she could do to help. She offered to translate an English book written about ministry for the deaf into Romanian, and she did!

In one way, serving in a new role is an easier experience because you have no previous procedures and conventions you are forced to follow. But it is also harder because you have to create and develop the job, informing stakeholders and creating awareness. How do you like being the first person in this role?

It’s like planting a new church (which I have done). It is exciting and exhausting at the same time. 

This ministry is not just a job for me. I firmly believe that caring for others is at the heart of “Revival and Reformation.” Serving in this role was never on my career radar but I feel it is a prophetic ministry.

As John the Baptist worked to prepare the way for Jesus’ own ministry so we too must rid the valleys of despair, flatten the mountains of impossibilities and exclusion, straighten the curves that often eliminate those with special needs and level the bumps that leave feelings of rejection.

Given the emphasis of Jesus to this very ministry, I can’t imagine Him leaving those with special needs behind and without hope or a future.  

I have been privileged to help get things started in a some new ways but I am very much aware that I’m standing on the shoulders of many who have gone before me.  

In general, how have we as a church done at including people with special needs in the past? How can we do better?

That all depends on one’s perspective. We all have “special needs.” We are all “broken” in some way. This ministry actually touches everyone in some way. 

But yes, there is much to do and to undo! Most have little idea of the prejudices that exist. People with special needs have not always been treated with respect. Some who may not appear or act in conventional ways have been marginalized. This must change if we are to be faithful to our gospel commission.  

Consider the following: The World Health Organization estimates that there are 1.1 billion people with some kind of discernible disability. There are between 70 and 350 million deaf people and 39 million who are blind. Today in the world there are approximately 240 million widows and 13 million children who have lost both parents. There is enough need in the world for us to get our minds off ourselves, stop being offended by whatever upsets us and reach out in compassion to those who need simple caring, gentle signs of acceptance or a warm meal from time to time. 

Yes, we can be that church. We have the talent, the financial strength to make a difference. We can be “the church of possibilities.”

While we may be doing some of these things already, we can always do better. Knowing what God has done for us, we will act out of a sense of grace rather than duty.

Despite our size as a world church, at the local level resources are of course often stretched. How can we realistically expect to offer a wide variety of services and forms of assistance to people with a wide variety of needs?

I learned a long time ago that the first question is not, “How much does it cost? But rather, what would God have me (us) do?” As one seminary professor once said, “You can’t give the right answer to the wrong question.” We start with what we have. 

This ministry had nothing to begin with. Elder Wilson caught the vision and has been very supportive. He called me to this position and put me on a number of key committees so that I would be able to get the word out to the church's world leaders. The biggest asset I had were the recognized needs — not money in the bank! I was given a small operating budget but it came with many doors of opportunity. From that small beginning, many are now leading out in compassionate ministries. 

We started by making it clear that we did care and then a few doors began to open. I would be less than honest if I didn’t say that at times I still feel overwhelmed when I see the global needs. I feel very inadequate. It is painful to see needs and not be able to help in tangible ways. Sometimes doors do open right away, but sometimes not until later.

Our Adventist schools have not traditionally been very good at catering to students with special needs. Is this likely to change?

I’ve served twice as a conference president and education was always a high priority on my agenda. I don’t have an answer except to say, there are times when we need to partner with the community.  However, if the child must go to the public to find special education, I personally believe the church can still play a part in the spiritual welfare of the special needs student. I firmly believe in the three-legged stool of influence: home, school, and church. 

But we must remember, and please don’t overlook this: parents and guardians of special needs children also need support! 

There are places where Adventists have done exceptional work for children with special needs. I wish there were more.  

What major roles have you served in within the Adventist church? Did you ask to work in the area of special needs? What experience do you have working in this area?

I've served in a number of roles, but whatever the role I have seen myself as a pastor.

The first time I was the assistant to a president (this is my third time) one of my roles was that of being the multicultural director. It was during that time that I learned that the deaf are part of a “culture” and that they did not consider themselves disabled. Learning the difference was a critical point though I did not know at the time how important that would be decades later. 

My initiation to the deaf ministry began when I was working in Oregon. A deaf pastor was sitting in a pastors’ meeting and obviously not getting anything out of it. Afterward I took him to my office and we began typing to each other on a TTY machine that had a very small LED screen. I did my best to review what we had discussed in the meeting. That was how it began. I went to campmeetings for the deaf and saw hearing parents taking care of their deaf children and I saw deaf children trying to relate to their deaf parents. I could not erase that from my mind.  

Years later when I was the Undersecretary of the General Conference those memories came back. The role of the Undersecretary is a heavy one with many organizational and policy details to attend to. I remember praying that the Lord would remove those concerns because I had some important work to get done. He changed the job but not the passion.

What has had the greatest impact on you during the last two years in this job? What is the biggest thing you have learned?

I think of the severely crippled man with cerebral palsy in Romania as an example of the the kind of impact this work has had on me. He can hardly speak. He drools and his body moves very awkwardly and in ways that frustrate him. Yet, I’ve learned he is a national chess champion and capable of playing multiple chess games at the same time.  

What have I learned? I’ve learned why Ellen White said, “It is in the providence of God that widows and orphans, the blind, the deaf, the lame, and persons afflicted in a variety of ways, have been placed in close Christian relationship to His church.” Last year I went back to Romania where I held some evangelistic meetings for those with special needs. The man with cerebral palsy made his decision to be baptized, but in reality he was one of many teachers who opened my eyes. 

When I look at my ministry, the church of today, and those with special needs, I’ve learned that we should never try to write the conclusion to a book (a life) when God is still adding chapters.

Many get frustrated with the slowness of the church to act in specific ways. I can get very impatient with the slowness of pastors and members for not recognizing the feelings of hurt and the sense of rejection by those with special needs. But I’ve also come to realize that I need to do what I can where I am at the moment. A new chapter will come. I must start where I am and where the church is. When that happens the Lord is able to bless our endeavors in ways we never thought possible.   

See www.SpecialNeeds.Adventist.org, www.AdventistDeaf.org, and www.HopeChannelDeaf.org for more information.

Larry Evans, Assistant to the General Conference President for the Deaf and Special Needs Ministries, has served in a number of capacities including church pastor, a church planter, a pastor for pastors, a multicultural director, a conference secretary and conference president. Prior to his current ministry in the General Conference he served as the Assistant to the President for the North America Division and then as General Conference Undersecretary and Associate Stewardship Director. He helped organize what is now known as Adventist Deaf Ministries International. He received his Doctor of Ministry from Andrews University.

He is married to Carolyn (Bigger) who works at the General Conference as an interdivision specialist in support of missionaries. They have two sons and five grandsons.

Alita Byrd is interviews editor for Spectrum Magazine.

Image courtesy of Larry Evans.

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Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Editor’s Note: This year marks the 25^th anniversary of the Waco Siege that occurred from February 28 to April 19, 1993. Throughout the coming weeks, we will be sharing on the website the articles that appeared in the May 1993 edition (vol. 23, no. 1) of Spectrum concerning this tragedy. What follows here is the editorial by Roy Branson, then editor of Spectrum:

Until their February shootout with law-enforcement officers, I had never heard of the Branch Davidians. Shepherd's Rods were familiar enough, but who were these people?

Despite the easy familiarity with which denominational spokespersons on network television referred to the church's long-standing problems with "Vernon," the world media has carefully disassociated the Branch Davidian Seventh-day Adventists from Seventh-day Adventists. That is still a relief. We are different. Seventh-day Adventists don't condone stockpiling weapons, drinking in the local bars, or carrying on polygamous marriages.

But then we began to learn more about the people who died at Ranch Apocalypse: sisters in their 20s from an Adventist family in California; a former student at Andrews University; young adults from Australia; several former ministerial students from Newbold College and their lifelong Adventist relatives; a younger brother of an active layman in Sligo church. These were not third-generation children of the Shepherd's Rods. Most estimates now say that 90 percent of those who died at Waco came directly from Seventh-day Adventist churches. This issue explores the extent to which they were us. Koresh set the flame, but we provided many of the materials.

The special section in this issue grapples with questions that will haunt Adventism for some time: How did Adventism contribute to this kind of tragedy, and what do we learn from the experience? Some Seventh-day Adventists no doubt blame immersion in the rock-and-roll culture, while others point to fundamentalist distortion of apocalyptic literature. Both are right.

What should give the greatest pause are the similarities between Koresh and Adventists—what both Koresh and Adventists feel in their bones: salvation arrives quickly, not slowly; God works most clearly in moments of crisis; the remnant's actions are the hinge of history; the majority of society will always remain hostile to the truth; loyalty to God may demand the ultimate sacrifice. Waco was the shadow side of this worldview. Other religious communities have their own darker side. Ours should not frighten us into rejecting everything we shared with Koresh. But it is our responsibility to learn also how not just our weaknesses but our strengths can be powerfully distorted. In this issue some have begun that task.

It will not be easy. During a recent visit to Battle Creek, I listened to a father talk of his son, a successful computer specialist, an active member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church until he joined Koresh in Waco, and a victim of the April 19 inferno. "If that is what religion does," the Adventist father told me, "I'm not sure I want to continue having any part of it."

Some Adventist congregations have already held memorial services; hopefully others will soon do so. Spectrum is not a congregation, but we dedicate this issue to all the families who lost relatives or friends in Waco, and to those whom they continue to remember with deep, unquenchable love.

Roy Branson was the founder of Spectrum and served as its editor for over 20 years. He passed away from complications of cardiovascular disease on July 7, 2015 at the age of 77.

Read more about Roy Branson’s legacy here:
Roy Branson (1937 - 2015) He Left Us With Hope
Roy Branson Memorial Service Saturday, August 8

Further reading on the Waco tragedy:
New TV Series Premieres for 25th Anniversary of the Waco Tragedy, January 24, 2018
Beware of Wolves Disguised as Sheep, June 8, 2017
Death of a Branch Davidian Friend and Other Memories, April 19, 2014
Branch Davidians (and Adventists) Revisited in The New Yorker, March 30, 2014
My Trip to Waco, December 27, 2017

Image: SpectrumMagazine.org

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Greetings from the Sundance Film Festival. I’m here with some friends—Spectrum found out and asked me to send over some dispatches. Given that it’s my inaugural time at this cold august assembly, I looked up the Latin origins of “festival” to make sure I knew what I was getting into. Festival comes from the word “festum” or “festa” meaning feast.

Now maybe there is serious dining happening at the fancy parties that I somehow didn’t receive invites to, but the only feasting I am doing at Sundance is with my eyes.

As soon as I arrived I met a friend at a lounge sponsored by a major bank credit card company and was handed (for free!) a small Dixie cup-sized sample of a wild mushroom soup. Feeling like an ingénue I made my first mistake as I should have risked social embarrassment and asked for a second thimble-full because it was the last warm food I had for several days.

But as the apostle Paul says, when in Rome...so while hanging out with the Hollywood crowd I’m trying to fit in while shaking off the lightheadedness and “hanger.”

Now I could have paused to enjoy an overpriced meal, but that would have meant losing the rhythm of Sundance, which means watching films in two-hour blocks until 1:30 a.m. and then leaving the condo by 7:30 a.m. in order to stand in line to get access to the 9 o’clock screening to which I forgot to buy an advance ticket.

Obviously sleep suffers, but true art takes sacrifice.

And my feasting eyes see incredible sights, perhaps most ironically in the film Blindspotting (2018) directed by the incredibly young and thoughtful Carlos López Estrada. If you liked Hamilton, you probably should see this Oakland story starring the town’s native sons: Rafael Casal and Daveed Diggs. Yes, that Mr. Diggs, the experimental hip-hop artist who originated the roles of Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson. Variety says it well:

In psychology, a black-and-white drawing known as Rubin’s vase poses a visual puzzle in which the brain perceives one of two images — either the outline of a vase or two faces posed in profile — but can’t see both at the same time. Take that phenomenon one step further and you get “Blindspotting,” not just a handy term for humans’ inability to look past stereotypes and appreciate the full complexity of others, but the most exciting cinematic take on contemporary race relations since “Do the Right Thing” nearly 30 years ago.

Smartly, some of the scenes are shot in profile giving the audience two-opposing faces staring at each other, contrasting their skin tones and their inability to see eye-to-eye. I don’t want to give anything away—there is violence and tough love—but I will say that if someone wants to have a multi-dimensional opinion on police violence or gentrification or life—seek out this masterpiece. And it is fun. Early in the film there was a reference to the British suspense master Alfred Hitchcock and I wondered why—and then I spent the last hour of the film on the edge of my seat.

Speaking of young directors, after I watched Minding the Gap (2018) and the director Bing Liu was introduced, I noted that this man probably cannot buy alcohol or rent a car in America. But he can talk about a film’s gestalt and knows how to train his camera on truth. This might seem like high praise for a documentary that starts out with teens skateboarding in Rockford, Illinois, but Liu, in his tight jeans and Vans Sk-8 high-top sneakers knows how to ask his poverty-stricken pals very mature questions. As the cinema verite-style shooting continues into the second act we suddenly see three different real stories of domestic violence among his street-riding crew—sons, a mother, and a young couple react physically and emotionally to an existence that offers very poor choices. But then this incredible portrait turns inward—as Liu turns the camera on himself and his mother in a brave artistic and ethical decision that promises tears and hope.

Well, the Sundance film feast continues and I can’t wait to see what’s next and grab some almonds. More to come.

Alexander Carpenter is a board member of Adventist Forum, the organization that publishes Spectrum. Photo courtesy of the author.

Further Reading:
The Sundance Film Festival: Faith in Film

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Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Since my first post from last week’s Sundance Film Festival I have found something besides almonds to eat. But man shall not live by bread alone so let me share some of the spiritual fare that I found in the cinemas around Park City.

One of the big stories circulating around the festival was the lack of film buying by the big streaming services: Netflix and Amazon. A theory is that they are reserving the tens of millions they’ve recently been spending on independent film to make their own productions. In fact, the last film I saw at Sundance is one that I recommend to the Spectrum audience. It was produced by Netflix and will be streaming beginning on April 13. You might have heard this story on the public radio program This American Life. The episode, called Heretics, first aired back in 2005. The film version, Come Sunday, is “based on true events, globally-renowned pastor Carlton Pearson risks everything when he questions church doctrine and is branded a modern-day heretic.” It stars Chiwetel Ejiofor, Danny Glover, Jason Segel, and a fantastic Martin Sheen as the very charismatic Oral Roberts. Actually, this could be played for a good Sabbath School discussion or a church youth group meeting as it includes tensions between keeping a church growing vs. following individual conscience, and touches on hot theological questions around universal salvation, LGBT inclusion, and what it means to witness.

WATCH the Come Sunday Trailer:

Another film that connects directly to faith that I didn’t get to see, but that got a lot of attention is the documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor about Fred Rogers. My friend Ryan Parker over at Pop Theology saw it and describes it here:

Using home videos, clips from and behind-the-scenes footage of the show, and interviews with Rogers, his family, and colleagues, Academy Award-winning director Morgan Neville paints a portrait of a Protestant saint (if that part of the Christian church ever decides to have them, Rogers should be our first). A deeply religious and spiritual man, Rogers had no difficulty integrating his personal faith with his professional life and work. As it should always be, his faith was the heartbeat of his public persona, not its skin. An ordained Presbyterian minister, Rogers’ Christianity was motivated by Jesus’ central teaching to love your neighbor as yourself. Beyond this, his own life overflowed with the fruits of the spirit along with a deep love of, respect for, and passion to protect children. It is difficult to listen to Rogers’ speak about children and not hear echoes of Matthew 19:14.

I did see one film I barely want to think about, a horror called Hereditary that was horribly boring. The decapitation of the sister suffering from peanut allergies could be called a highlight, but actually Toni Collette was the brightest bulb in this dismally overwrought story about family pain. Vanity Fair called it “emotionally and intellectually terrifying” and for different reasons I agree. I mention it because it did have a strange faith focus that never really made sense—but it does end with everyone laying prostrate and worshipping something beastly.

★ movie poster, photo courtesy of the author.

Finally, although it had no overt religious subject matter, the most sublime film I watched did not even have a word title. It was part of the avant-garde New Frontiers section of Sundance and played late one night in a mostly empty theater far from the main drag. The title of this film is just the generic symbol of a star. It was ninety-nine minutes of only the clips of the starry heavens in movies from the beginning of cinema to now. The filmmaker, Johann Lurf, personally watched over 1,000 films and his research assistants screened another 3,000 to find and extract only the moments in any film from around the world that the stars—but no other heavenly bodies—are shown. The first few minutes were silent for obvious reasons and then the only audio was whatever was part of the original star shot so it was disjunctive, but combined with the chronological rhythm of heavenly shots changing every couple seconds on average, I found it transcendent. The Sundance description does a good job:

Lurf playfully shows how cinema turned the stars into endless metaphors, dreams, and warm blankets. There is no story or characters — only movie scenes worked together outside of their contexts. We put our own thoughts into the stunning scenes while each clip’s sound design presents us with ambience, brief dialogue, or loud music. The editing enthralls us as space is not depicted the same in every clip. If you have a love affair with movies and the sky, ★ is the ultimate romantic art film.

WATCH the ★ Trailer:

Johann Lurf ★Trailer from Johann Lurf on Vimeo.

I did get outside myself. I took advantage of the Park City resort location of the festival and snowboarded for several mornings. It was a little icy the first time, but then we got about six inches of snow mid-week and I could not resist the powder pull to the mountains. It was beautiful. With the Sundance crowds in town, the slopes were empty and meditative. Carving down those almost empty runs and cutting through the trees was a refreshing, even uplifting break from the art films and the festival artifice.

Alexander Carpenter is a board member of Adventist Forum, the organization that publishes Spectrum.

Photo by Jeremy Thomas on Unsplash.

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John Milton, in the opening stanza of Paradise Lost, presents his readers with a lofty goal—his desire to try and “justify the ways of God to men.” In the limited series Waco, premiering this month on the Paramount Channel, the task becomes even more difficult, given that the central character in this drama, David Koresh, is a deeply flawed, self-appointed demigod in cowboy boots, and the battle is joined not in some starry nebula in Orion’s sword but on a dusty plain in Texas.

At the time, the true shock for many of us was the realization that the spiritual DNA for the Branch Davidians mutated from as unlikely a source as our own brand of evangelical Protestantism. We had been taught that Seventh-day Adventists were intended to be a peculiar people. But not that peculiar.

I remember vividly sitting in the youth chapel at my home church in Long Beach, my first weekend home from college. The worship leader, having spotted a distinguished gentleman camped near the back, started to introduce him but before he could, the man, with booming radio voice, announced he was simply visiting from the local chapter of the Shepherd’s Rod. As it turned out, the visitor was none other than H.M.S. Richards, Jr., the beloved speaker of The Voice of Prophecy, who enjoyed joking about such things.  

I remember being struck at the time by the notion that within my church there apparently existed a kind of Adventist “deep state,” with certain shadowy groups like the Shepherd’s Rod, groups whose ideology, fueled by the prophetic visions of men like Victor Houteff,sowed the seeds for what would become the Branch Davidians.

Historically, depictions of Seventh-day Adventists in the mainstream media have been rare and generally unflattering. Sybil, a 1976 two-part movie for television starring Joanne Woodward and Sally Field, chronicled the story of Shirley Ardel Mason who was afflicted with multiple personality disorder, thought to be a coping mechanism for her bizarre and cruel upbringing at the hands of her Adventist mother. Although revisionists have tended to throw a little shade on some of Mason’s claims, the theme of fanatical Adventist parents (or grandparents) doing emotional and psychological damage to their children, as in the case of celebrated African American writer Richard Wright, has stubbornly persisted.

In recent years, others have fared much better, with Dr. Ben Carson and Desmond T. Doss each receiving heroic treatment in high profile films, which brings us back around to the tragedy that was Waco.

To many, the very name evokes memories of the standoff between government FBI and ATF agents and self-proclaimed messiah David Koresh and his followers at their Mount Carmel compound. As one might expect, the storyline of Waco, which is based on written accounts and interviews with survivors, gets most of its traction from civil and constitutional issues. In the first two episodes, Adventism is barely mentioned, and when it is, it is used for its “mainstream-ness,” to argue that Koresh and some of his followers had traditional evangelical roots, an irony that shouldn’t be lost. How can these people be dangerous cultists, when they started out as Seventh-day Adventists?

Waco early on establishes the battle lines between the government agents, fresh off the botched operation at Ruby Ridge and the Branch Dividians, living quietly below the radar and supporting themselves with firearm and camo vest sales at gun shows, not to mention honky-tonk gigs by a Koresh-fronted local cover band. But, within these groups, there are also subgroups, each with their own story arcs.

The FBI and ATF, more than eager to assign blame for Ruby Ridge, vie for redemption and seize on the compound at Mount Carmel as a fortuitous venue. Koresh, while trying to hold together his flock, faces his own fractious elements, especially among the women, several of whom he has taken as wives.

One of the ground rules for membership in the family is that the men take a vow of celibacy, while Koresh, as the self-proclaimed anointed one, asserts his right to be sole progenitor for the group. This, he tells the others, came to him in a vision. It would seem the ability to receive visions, however self-serving, is sine qua non for effective leadership, and what separates true leaders from the hoi polloi. Here’s Koresh, receiving a vision from the Almighty instructing him to claim the young women as sexual acolytes, while my recurring visions of grandeur usually involved playing short stop behind Sandy Koufax as he pitched his perfect game against the Cubs.

As Koresh, Taylor Kitsch (Friday Night Lights) bears a reasonable resemblance to the real person, even down to his Barney Fife kind of delivery, molasses-thick with a Texas drawl. Unlike George C. Scott’s portrayal of Patton with a gruff bark, markedly dissimilar from the real General’s somewhat pitched voice, Kitsch sounds remarkably like Koresh. Even so, it’s the ambiguous shaping of Koresh’s character, not the delivery, which seems most problematic in Waco, at least through episode two.

Cult leaders throughout history have succeeded in bending others to their will with an uncanny ability to null out the logical resistance of their would-be followers by a Pied Piper kind of charisma. That charisma can take many forms, from the far-flung fantasies of L. Ron Hubbard’s thetans and SPs to the paranoid victim bonding of Jim Jones to the crack-pot gleam in Charles Manson’s eyes; what develops is near-mystical and pathologically co-dependent relationship between leader and supplicant. By contrast, David Koresh, at least as portrayed, is someone who seems, for lack of a better description, just cloyingly earnest. A kind of Ned Flanders with a mullet.

It falls to those players around him to fill the narrative real estate with superheated arguments about freedom and tyranny, and, as a result, the writing often staggers under the weight of its own didacticism. Take Steve Schneider (Paul Sparks), who when his wife announces she is pregnant with Koresh’s child, responds with a kind of philosophical 12-step response: “If your wife had a chance to marry the Lamb of God,” he wonders aloud, “who am I to hold her back?” Later, when one of the members cautions Koresh about cozying up to Jacob, the ATF agent spying on the compound from across the road, his warning seems oddly prosaic: “David, your heart is in the right place, but you’re opening us up to a whole lot of trouble.” Nuanced foreshadowing it is not.

It’s Koresh, himself, who offers up his own succinct take on Jacob’s genuine question about human suffering. When Jacob questions the reason for his mother’s dementia, Koresh looks deeply into his eyes, searching for just the right pearl of truth to justify the ways of God to man. “It’s a toughie,” he finally offers, as if describing the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle.

On its production merits, Waco is beautifully shot, with impressive production values, made possible in this era of versatile camera platforms and drones. The casting is generally adequate, given what often seems like surprisingly shallow characters. The Feds are angry and aggressive and stubborn. Even Gary Noesmer (Michael Shannon), the FBI negotiator who serves as kind of a moral compass for the government, can only respond with stilted speeches about government overreach when he’s not grinding off the sharp edges of his conscience with Jack Daniels.

Those few moments in the first two episodes that actually manage to gain some sort of emotional footing occur when dialogue mercifully gives way to poignant silence. When the young initiate David Thibodeau (Rory Culkin) is pressed into marrying one of Koresh’s wives to provide some legal cover and, on his wedding night, sees his new bride whisked away to Koresh’s bed with what amounts to a “thank you for your service” nod from the leader, the true nature of the enterprise is painfully laid bare. It has been said that there is no suitable language to express the deepest of human longings. The look on Thibodeau’s face, held in close-up, as yearning grudgingly gives way to realization, is truly heartbreaking.   

So, how does one attempt to justify the ways of God to man? Or, in the case of David Koresh, how does one begin to try and explain those forces necessary to empower a man to draw together a band of people, people willing to lay down their lives and the lives of their young children based solely on his private vision? Unfortunately, the first two episodes fail to shed much light. In the end, I suspect the answer lies less in the gifts of the anointed one and more in the needs of those willing to follow.

This review was written by Donald Davenport for Spectrum. He is a screenwriter, novelist, and La Sierra University graduate. 

Image: Paramount Network

Further Reading:
New TV Series Premieres for 25th Anniversary of the Waco Tragedy, January 24, 2018
We Didn't Start the Fire but the Tinder was Ours, January 31, 2018

If you respond to this article, please:

Make sure your comments are germane to the topic; be concise in your reply; demonstrate respect for people and ideas whether you agree or disagree with them; and limit yourself to one comment per article, unless the author of the article directly engages you in further conversation. Comments that meet these criteria are welcome on the Spectrum Website. Comments that fail to meet these criteria will be removed.

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Inspired by Carter G. Woodson, whose life goal was to make black history widely known, in the spring of 2010 I launched blacksdahistory.org, a website with the express aim of publicizing, promoting, and informing on black Seventh-day Adventist history by providing free information and materials. A complimentary YouTube channel was created shortly after.¹ Although blacksdahistory.org was founded while I was a doctoral student (that is to say, somewhat impoverished), I never asked or accepted any donations for it. This is not meritorious; it is just something that I strongly believe in and enjoy doing. The only website of its kind, both the main site and the YouTube channel have enjoyed a gratifying amount of success. Allow me to elaborate my reasons for the need for projects like this that are concerned with making black Adventist history known.

Prefatorily, I contend that Seventh-day Adventist history is as “inspired” for us as is the Jewish history of the Old Testament. The ubiquitous hortatory appeals to the Jewish past by Jesus and the apostles to their Jewish audiences underscore this contention, the idea being that God’s interaction with a people and their saga with divinity is spiritually essential for that people’s descendants to grapple with and understand. In this line of thought, Ellen White wrote, “In reviewing our past history, having traveled over every step of advance to our present standing, I can say, Praise God! As I see what the Lord has wrought, I am filled with astonishment, and with confidence in Christ as leader. We have nothing to fear for the future, except as we shall forget the way the Lord has led us, and His teaching in our past history.”²

In the first denominational history, Rise and Progress of the Seventh-day Adventists, author John Loughborough touched on the raison d'être of his effort: “Now, having completed the task…I commit the work to the readers, hoping that, with the blessing of God, the perusal of these pages may be a means of promoting the cause of Christ in many hearts…”³ I find this concept of historiography (doing history: researching, contemplating, writing, speaking it) to be existentially fulfilling in a way that only proximate things can be. Historiography becomes a spiritual act of discovering how Christ related to your spiritual forebears, and their responses to Christ. I might add that instead of decreasing scholarly rigor, history as a spiritual endeavor enhances it, and also that doing this type of history is open to everyone as God has related richly to every people.

Zeroing in now, I maintain in this Black History Month of February 2018, that knowing black Adventist history is important for all Adventists in the United States, not just black Adventists.⁴ Black Seventh-day Adventist history is so wound up with broader U.S. and Caribbean Adventism as to be inseparable, and indeed incomprehensible, if separation is attempted. Perhaps a forgivable fallacy inherent in Black History Month is that histories can be dichotomized or distinguished, when of course they cannot. How can the life of Martin Luther King, Jr., begin to be understood apart from the American “founding fathers,” British imperialism, the Transatlantic slave trade, American chattel slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, homegrown white terrorism, the U.S. government and politics, economics, gender dynamics, etc.? In the same way, black Adventist history is Adventist history in the profoundest sense.⁵

Unfortunately, black Adventist history—its presentation and historiography—has had to be largely presented in a milieu of race and racism. I’ve observed, especially in lecturing to millennials, that dwelling on this can be distasteful, and even disruptive, on a number of levels. There are the inevitable awkward responses ranging from “It wasn’t me but my ancestors,” “It wasn’t me or my ancestors,” “I’m sorry for what was done to your people.” During Black History Month there are the anachronistically passé images of slaves, blasting hoses and snarling dogs, and five or six black notables. To be sure, we should always find new and innovative ways to share the past that has present sensibilities and needs in mind; but people also need to continue to be made to squirm.

Below I’ll touch on how black Adventist history transcends racism, but here it should be averred that it takes two to tango in any racist dynamic. And so the play that is black Adventist history summons all of the actors to the main stage: none of the actors are necessarily typecast, but are at once base, noble, retrograding, maturing—the whole spectrum. I’ve found that certain types of other Adventist histories can manage to be monochromatic, but not so with black Adventist history. Paradoxically, in a history that often sees people segregated, the history itself pulls everyone in and brings them together.

In its way, black Adventist history is quintessentially Adventist because it is minority history. Seventh-day Adventists in the United States were not as educated, long-lived, and well-off as they are today. At the church’s incorporation at the General Conference of 1863 we were relatively poor, few in number, and politically unconnected. Our prominent doctrines of a seventh-day Sabbath and an investigative judgment, and with de facto leadership by a woman prophet, made us pariahs among the Protestant and evangelical set, so much so that we were largely considered a cult until, let’s say the late 1950s. In this way Adventists were the blacks of Christendom, never quite accepted, seen as less than Christian, ripe for job termination, the possibility of persecution always in play. In the 1850s and early ‘60s, Adventists lambasted the American system for the enslavement of blacks, and one senses that the Adventists were not only protesting in theory, but because they knew that the American system would one day be against them as it was against blacks.

Blacks in the nineteenth and much of the twentieth century who converted to Adventism were especially valorous in that to pursue truth they willingly opted for assuming an additional strike against them—this time religion—along with their color, and, for women, gender. In his current ongoing series, historian of black Adventism Douglas Morgan has provocatively wondered why an African American would join the Adventist church for these very reasons.⁶ This query is accentuated by the reality that blacks were treated as second class citizens within Adventism during those years. Even an administrator of the stature of George Edward Peters (1883-1965), while a field secretary of the General Conference, could not eat in the GC/Review and Herald cafeteria until March 1949.⁷ These faithful leaders were the epitome of Christlikeness in that for these and other slights, they dared not tell their black parishioners, lest those weaker in the faith defect because of such hideous treatment. Only a negligible number of blacks (although even one is too many) left the Adventist Church on account of racism; the vast majority stayed and made the church better. Again, black Adventist history is for all Adventists.

Black Adventist history is the clearest mirror that the Adventist Church has ever looked into. Those that speak of the “golden days of Adventism” or “the good old days” are ignorant of the virulent race-based discrimination alive in those very days (not to mention the testimonies of Ellen White, which constantly decry a lukewarm church from its pre-inception to shortly before her death). How do you judge the health, the Christlikeness, the goodness of a church? By how they treated the least of these, those who had no power, clout, or standing. How blacks were treated in our history cuts through the hagiography and triumphalist narratives to show us exactly where we were, what we were. One is forgiven for not being wowed by robust evangelistic numbers while a colored woman is being turned away from an Adventist sanitarium. To extrapolate on King’s dictum, injustice anywhere in Adventism, is a threat to justice everywhere in Adventism.

Adventist Christians propound that we are in the midst of a great controversy, that we are in a life and death struggle with the powers of darkness. Black Adventists have always realized this existentially, not just cerebrally or figuratively. Christ’s crux to the Laodiceans is overcoming, and this is the theme of the Civil Rights Movement in the nation, and the lesser known one in Adventism. We can truly understand the Lord of Laodicea only by way of suffering, struggle, and pain. Black Adventists proffer Adventists the fruits of suffering.

One thing that immersion in black Adventist history has impressed upon me is the diversity within this tradition. There have been black Adventists who: established the first free medical clinics in a city, which provided free education on STIs, diabetes, cancer prevention, and prenatal care; successfully argued before the United States Supreme Court; were the first among African Americans to earn terminal degrees; were mayors of the largest U.S. cities; have had buildings named in their honor; served as intrepid missionaries in unentered lands; were pivotal figures in the Civil Rights Movement; were astronauts who have travelled in space; were renowned musicians, performing on the world’s illustrious stages, and composing hundreds of original songs; were cutting-edge physicians who performed unheard of medical operations; rose to the upper echelons of political power; initiated city-wide health programs; functioned as presidents and chairs of august educational institutions; appeared in media and influenced the public mind; began humanitarian foundations that are globally renowned; ad infinitum. Besides this, the influence of black Adventists upon this nation and the world has been truly remarkable. While some Adventists may have been too heavenly minded to be no earthly good, black Adventists tended to multitask, engaged in their communities while looking for the better land.

This is to say that black Adventist history is not all a recitation of perpetration of injustice and racism, although the overcoming of that is almost always a subtext, a mercurial leitmotif. The history is exceedingly broad and rich, so much so that any talk I give, to whatever the audience’s mélange of ages, regions, backgrounds, professions, or genders, I can say something from the black Adventist past that is apposite to them.

In conclusion, the study of black Adventist history by all Adventists will move us toward a meaningful unity; enable us to identify with the sufferings of our brothers and sisters; give us a sophisticated understanding of God in our past; instill in us a humility that triumphalism simply cannot bring; inspire us to overcome the multifarious forces opposed to us; give us understanding of where we are today; and impart clarity for the future, which is fraught with the same challenges of the past. Perhaps the litmus test for a heart that has been transformed by the lessons of black Adventist history is for Adventists of any color to embrace it as their very own story. 

Notes & References:
1. https://www.youtube.com/user/Blacksdahistory
2. E.G. White, Life Sketches (1915), 196: https://egwwritings.org/?ref=en_LS.196.2&para=41.1083
3. J.N. Loughborough, Rise and Progress of the Seventh-day Adventists (1892), iv: http://documents.adventistarchives.org/Books/RP1892.pdf
4. “Black” here indicates African American, and Caribbean blacks who migrated to the United States.
5. The recent conference on situating Adventist History merits mention here. Most of the presentations of the January 2018 ASDAH conference can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/user/SDAArchives. Also see Spectrum’s reporting on Day 1 and Day 2 of the conference.
6. See “Adventism and America’s Original Sin” on this site.
7. See General Conference Committee Minutes, March 11, 1949, 1395 (28): http://documents.adventistarchives.org/Minutes/GCC/GCC1949-03.pdf

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If you read your Bible carefully and attend the right church for a few years, you just might be in danger of thinking you are right. If you attend Revelation Seminars and carefully consider all the hidden nuances of all those beasts, then you might be precipitously close to imagining yourself to be right. If you sit on a conference committee or you are a member of a local church board, then you might very well be flirting with the edges of claiming to be correct. If you have a large sum of money in the bank and have a membership to the right golf resort, then you might be dangerously close to perceiving yourself to be right.

Living the Christian faith while believing ourselves to be right is not as easy as it sounds. Implicit in the declaration of being right requires a necessity to conclude that other people are wrong. Thinking we are right is not always a happy place to be. Some of us take the building blocks of being right and construct an impenetrable wall of personal beliefs that completely isolate us from other people.

Imagine yourself riding in a bus with a group of tourists visiting some historic sites near your hometown. In this hypothetical situation the bus driver announces to everyone his intended destination. As the bus rolls to a stop you observe that the driver puts on the left blinker. “No," you think to yourself. “If the driver turns left, this bus and all the people in it will wind up on a dirt road that ends in a mud bog.” After warning the driver about the dead end road, you are completely surprised when he turns left anyway. And now you settle in for another conversation with your constant companion, Human Nature.

Human Nature leans in and whispers. “Hey, did you notice the bus driver is a Mexican? You know what they say about the Mexicans, right? Most of them are criminals. They come here with no money and no education and just expect us to take care of them. Somebody needs to just stop them at the border. Am I right? Oh, and did you get a look at some of the other people on this bus? What a collection of losers, do you know what I mean? Well, my whole afternoon is ruined. I had plans you know; well, technically I guess I’m with you no matter what, but I still had plans.”

You pretend not to be listening, but that doesn’t stop Human Nature. He leans in even closer. “You know what really gets me about this situation is that you ARE right. Did you hear that lady tell everyone how this road looks just fine? Well I’ve got news for her. I am working on my, ‘I told you so’ speech as we speak.”

You get out your iPhone and start scrolling through Facebook for the fifth time today. “You know something Mr. Human Nature? You are no fun to be around. You’re always negative; always criticizing everyone. I would be much happier if I didn’t have to deal with you all the time.”

Human Nature just laughs. “Yeah, but here’s the thing. You and I are inseparable and we better learn to make the best of it. Most of the time you agree with me, so we just have to muddle along together.”

Such is the plight of mere mortals struggling along in a world of sin. For those of us who always believe we are right, the pathway is even harder. Holding other travelers in contempt is a lonely, thankless job.

Can you imagine what it must have been like for Jesus to come into a world completely out of harmony with God? He was no doubt tempted to regard sinners with disdain. Satan was hard at work, but Jesus and His Heavenly Father were not going to be defeated. Jesus came to this earth to solve the sin problem once and for all. The Scriptures are almost completely silent on the childhood of our Savior, except to say, "He grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man." There is little question that Mary and Joseph taught Him from the traditions of Judaism, but that does not account for what Jesus knew about the writings of the ancient prophets. When Jesus taught in the temple at a very young age, the priests were astounded at His knowledge of the sacred texts. "How could this child know these things, for he has not been schooled?"

I think the answer becomes clear when Jesus steps onto the world stage down on the banks of the Jordan River. The voice of John the Baptist rings true when he declares to his followers, "Behold, the Lamb of God—". Jesus knew the Father. He did not walk into this world as other men. Slowly and certainly His Heavenly Father prepared Him for His mission. Jesus saw the devastation of sin and sorrow all around Him. Destined to suffer the consequences for every sin committed by the human race, the innocent Lamb of God set out to turn this world upside down.

By earthly standards it comes as a complete surprise how Jesus accomplishes His mission. Claiming to be the Deliverer, even more, the Messiah, Jesus presents Himself in the world with only a handful of men at his side. He has no army. He has no political clout. Instead, Jesus sets out to take on a planet bent on rebellion by offering healing, kindness, and compassion. Even His disciples must have been skeptical about Christ’s methods. How can you change the world by changing water into wine or restoring sight to a blind man? How can you take on the principalities of darkness by showing love and compassion to all of the wrong people?

I believe Christians today have lost touch with the very Man they claim to follow. The crowds clamor for raucous rhetoric designed to divide America. Christians seem to accept the hypocrisy of harsh, unseemly language designed to belittle and degrade those who come from disadvantaged circumstances, while at the same time claiming to follow Jesus. There are a few Christians who are quietly looking for ways to show love and compassion for fellow travelers, while the majority of Christians seem content to get on the bandwagons full of hate and intolerance.

As it turns out, being right in a world of sin is not the whole story. We can be right about a day of worship or what happens when you die, only to discover that we have completely lost touch with Jesus. We can be right about the mark of the beast, and at the same time completely turn our backs to the humble, gentle teachings of our Savior.

On January 20, 2018, Franklin Graham did an interview with MSNBC in which he stated that America has a sin problem. When Alex Witt pressed him on how he can decry the sins of America while at the same time making excuses for political leaders who are obviously out of harmony with biblical teachings, he was dismissive of those faults and cited the rise in the stock market and the defeat of ISIS as an offset for any wrongdoing by political leaders.

Many Christians seem to willingly rationalize almost ANY negative actions of politicians who align themselves with their righteous cause. I believe it is possible to be right about abortion and right about who gets a tax cut and still fall very short of following Jesus. Thinking ourselves to be right is often the very thing that stands in our way of fulfilling God’s purpose for us.

While riding the bus down that beautiful road headed for the mud, we have a choice to make. We can point our fellow travelers to the true character of our Savior or we can systematically alienate those who disagree with our opinions.

On that fateful Friday, oh so long ago, a thief hangs on a cross next to the King of kings. He sees the Majesty of heaven wearing a crown of derision placed there by a frenzied crowd of hate mongers. All of a sudden a surge of emotion wells up in his heart. He turns to Jesus and asks, “Lord, remember me—, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”   

Without hesitation our Savior answers, “I tell you this day, you will be with me in paradise.” There are no words to describe this kind of love. At the last hour, Jesus adds one more struggling traveler to His kingdom.

Suffering from the weight of sin, Jesus bows His head and declares once and for all, “It is finished!” On this day our Lord reconciles the whole world to Himself. Christ wins the battle with unmitigated love. He dies for the rich and the poor. He dies for people in every walk of life. He dies for all the wrong people; even for those we cannot seem to accept. 

Leroy Sykes lives and writes from Alabama.

Photo by Bailey Hall on Unsplash

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Editor’s Note: This year marks the 25^thanniversary of the Waco Siege that occurred from February 28 to April 19, 1993. Throughout the coming weeks, we will be sharing on the website the articles that appeared in the May 1993 edition (vol. 23, no. 1) of Spectrum concerning this tragedy.

The following article was written by William Claiborne and Jim McGee, who were staff writers for The Washington Post. Excerpts of their May 9, 1993, article "The Transformation of the Waco 'Messiah'," were reprinted by permission of The Washington Post. The Washington Post staff researcher Barbara J. Saffir contributed to the report:

In the beginning, the members of the Seventh-day Adventist congregation in Tyler, Texas were intrigued by the handsome young man who returned to the faith after years of straying wildly from its strict moral code.

His name was Vernon Howell, and when he first arrived in 1979, he seemed genuinely hungry for spiritual guidance. But soon he proved resentful of the church's authority. Demanding of attention, he used the Bible to justify his sexual appetite and he had a worrisome ability to hold the church members' children in thrall.

When Howell was 20, he tried to use the Bible to justify a romantic relationship with the 15-year-old daughter of a prominent church member. After Howell insisted that God had given him the girl, church deacon Hardy Tapp said he confronted him about the situation.

"His response to me was that she was already his wife in a biblical sense. I said you can call it anything you want, but what you are doing is wrong…."

The church grew increasingly wary of Howell, whose intensity was as unsettling as his hold over the young. He confronted church leaders again and again, arguing over everything from whether the church should buy a new organ to how Scripture should be interpreted.

One Sabbath, Howell forced a showdown, striding to the pulpit and launching a longwinded Scriptural harangue. When it happened again on the very next Sabbath, the deacons confronted Howell and told him, "We would like for you to leave, and if you're not willing to leave on your own, if we have to carry you out, we will," Tapp said.

Howell was formally "disfellowshipped" from the Tyler congregation in April 1983, a formal rejection by the church. The split would lead him eventually to a much larger destiny, in a compound just outside Waco that he called Ranch Apocalypse.

There, under his new name of David Koresh—an amalgamation of the names of two biblical kings—he found a role that fed his seemingly bottomless hunger to hold center stage and his lust for a rich and varied sex life. It was there, inside a ramshackle collection of wooden buildings over which his rule was supreme, that Vernon Howell—an abused child, itinerant carpenter, would-be rock star and self-styled prophet—would come to think of himself as Jesus Christ. And it was there, in an apparently self-set conflagration on April 19, that he would die, along with 71 of his followers.

A Disruptive Early Home Life

Vernon Wayne Howell was born in Houston on August 17, 1959, to Bonnie Clark, a 14-year-old, unmarried high-school dropout. His father, Bobby Wayne Howell, soon married another woman.

Shortly after Vernon's birth, Bonnie married a man who had just been released from prison, according to family members who remember him as an abusive man who beat both his wife and her infant son. Bonnie managed for nearly 18 months, then asked her mother, Erline Clark, for help.

Erline took her grandson, then quickly had two more children of her own—a daughter, Sharon, then a son, Kenneth. With Vernon technically their nephew—they became a noisy trio in the Clark home, almost siblings.

According to the Clarks, Vernon was a bright and precocious child who grew up calling his maternal grandmother "Momma." Once, trying to help out at the age of 4, he put a garden hose in the gas tank of the family car and filled it with water.

Her husband was never affectionate with Vernon, Erline Clark said in an interview, nor was he expected to be. He was a hard-drinking "macho man…country-type Texan," she said, of a generation that did not encourage men to show emotion toward children unless it was time for discipline.

When Vernon was 5, Bonnie, who had divorced her first husband, married Roy Haldeman, and they took her son back to live with them in Dallas. Haldeman, David Koresh later claimed, administered physical discipline. "When I used to act up? When I had a bad report card? Can you imagine? We got our tails whomped," Koresh told an Australian television crew last year.

In a recent interview, Haldeman denied that Vernon grew up in an abusive household. "We had our normal problems…We got along okay," Haldeman said.

Sharon, his mother's young sister, said there were many happy visits with the Haldemans, but they usually ended very sadly, with Vernon begging to come home with "Momma." Sharon said her most enduring memory of this time was looking out the car window as they drove away and seeing Vernon on his bicycle, peddling furiously after the Clarks, tears streaming down his face.

During his early years in Dallas, Vernon attended public school, but was plagued by what family sources said the school told them was a learning disability. He was held back to complete first grade twice, and in the third and fourth grades was put in a special class for learning disabled children.

When Vernon was 14, it was decided he would go back to live with his grandparents. By then the Clarks had moved to a one-story brick house on Ardmore Avenue, a lovely tree-lined street in Tyler.

There was a place for Vernon to sleep in Kenneth's room, but he was fascinated with a small shed in the backyard. It was a mess when he first arrived, but Vernon was handy with tools. He cleaned and hammered and transformed it into his own private place. "It wasn't for lack of a bedroom in the house," Sharon said. "He just liked the idea of fixing it up."

The backyard shed was a typical teenager's room, she said. He fashioned a bed, ran an extension cord for a black light, covered the walls with posters of 1970s rock star Ted Nugent and fluorescent designs. "It was like a clubhouse," said Kenneth, now 30. Vernon taught himself to play the guitar.

And always, Sharon said, there were girls. They came from around the neighborhood, ostensibly to visit her, she said, but really to meet this dreamy new guy with wavy blond hair who had his own place in the back and played rock-and-roll. "I don't think he really had to chase the girls," Sharon said. "Everybody that met Vernon liked him."

Sharon and the others remember this as a happy, stable time in Vernon's life. It ended, Erline Clark said, when her husband objected to Vernon's continued presence and he was sent back to his mother and Haldeman in Dallas.

Both his mother and grandmother were practicing Seventh-day Adventists, and Howell's early life was steeped in Bible study and governed by strict moral codes that applied the Ten Commandments literally and banned smoking, drinking, and fornication. But he had problems with formal instruction.

When he was 16, Vernon left public school and went to the church-run Dallas Junior Academy. He dropped out in the 10th grade. One family member said he became fascinated with the Bible during this period but had always listened to preachers on the radio.

The family is reluctant to discuss what happened at the school, but Erline Clark said she was told that Vernon got into a dispute with a teacher and was feuding with his parents. Sharon recalled that "he was having a lot of trouble at home with Bonnie and Roy," and "Bonnie had to take him out of school there." Back he came to the Clarks, who by now had moved to the picturesque rural town of Chandler.

Throughout the years of shuttling back and forth between his mother and his grandparents, Vernon was left to find his own way into manhood. "There was never a very really good male role model for him—someone who really took an interest in him and genuinely wanted to spend time with him and teach him something," Sharon said.

His sexual education began early, an example set by his mother and Sharon, his surrogate little sister, who married a soldier at 14. Years later, Vernon told women the story of an older girl who attempted to have sex with him when he was 6, and of the time when a group of older boys tried to rape him in a barn.

Erline Clark suggested that Howell's later sexual involvement with the young girls at the Waco compound whom he called "wives" ought to be viewed in the context of the prevailing sexual mores of rural East Texas. "The youngest girl that had a baby [at the Branch Davidian compound] was 14 years old," she said. "He never raped anybody in his life…They grow up faster."

In interviews, his relatives frequently returned to the rejection they said he encountered from older males and father figures, including his natural father, grandfather and stepfathers, to men who refused to let him marry their daughters. "Vernon seemed to be always wanting to be accepted and loved by the men in his life and it never seemed like he got what he was looking for," said one relative.

Rock-and-Roll Becomes 'Main Thing'

By 1978, Vernon was 18 and facing an uncertain future.

"In his younger years, he had a hard time," Kenneth said. "He was always looking for something. He had his rock-and-roll; he had his women. But it was never enough."

Howell did make enough money in construction to afford the down payment on a new Silverado pickup truck. It was black, with red velour interior, and he kept it full of rock tapes—Van Halen, Aerosmith, Eric Clapton and, of course, his idol—Nugent, a Detroit-based rock star whose videos featured violent hunting scenes. He was seriously into bodybuilding that year, pumping up his biceps to the point where they almost looked too big on his lean frame.

Debbie Owens, then 16 and working as a waitress at an all-you-can-eat catfish restaurant, counted herself lucky to be dating Vernon. "He was a typical teenager," she said in an interview, a "rocker" who carried his guitar wherever he went.

When Owens was not working, she hung out at a community pool in a mobile home subdivision. There was an open-air pavilion next to the pool with a roof and an electrical outlet and, during the summer, Vernon made it his own. He setup his amplifier, Owens said, and practiced for hours, usually drawing a crowd with hot riffs copied from Nugent and Clapton.

He would "zone out," Owens said. "It was like nothing else existed when he played, unless he messed up," and then he was super critical of himself, a real perfectionist about chord changes. "That was the main thing in his world. I was second. Music came first," she said.

Owens said the most striking thing about Vernon was the effect he had on younger boys, such as Kenneth, then in his early teens, and others who, she said, "idolized him." Guitarist Grant Cook, who sometimes practiced with Howell and later became a professional musician, said the same: Vernon always was hanging out with much younger boys.

"He really pumped them up, played with their self-esteem and they thought it was so neat that here this older guy would take the time to talk to these 14- to 16-year-olds," Owens said.

"It was real important to him that they thought highly of him, respected his music, his brain, his values," she said.

His younger uncle, Kenneth, said Vernon taught him to drive and counseled him on facing up to older bullies at his school. "I learned to stand up for myself," Kenneth said. "He taught me that."

Never, Owens said, not once in the seven months they dated, did she ever hear Vernon talk about the Bible or religion. What she did discover was that he was seeing another girl in Dallas, a girl whose family members said eventually became pregnant. Owens said they planned to have a meeting to talk things out, but Vernon never showed up.

In the months that followed, Howell headed into what family members and friends described as a pivotal emotional crisis. He had taught himself to be a capable carpenter, but held no steady job. He formed a band, but no one can remember a single paying gig. He was well read in the Bible, but apparently lacked a high school degree. And he still had no permanent residence, sometimes living in Dallas, sometimes in Chandler.

Although the date is unclear, this also was the period when he chose to confront one of the mysteries of his youth, the disappearance of his natural father, Bobby Wayne Howell. Vernon began a search that ultimately took him to the Houston living room of his paternal grandmother, Jean Holub, who said she arranged a meeting between father and son.

"When his dad pulled up," she said in an interview, "they grabbed each other and they hugged each other. And that was a wonderful thing." Vernon was delighted to find out that his father was both a carpenter and a skilled mechanic. "He started telling his dad…'I know how to do carpenter work. It was just natural. And I am a mechanic, and that came natural. Now I know that I got it from you."'

Whatever happiness Vernon found in this reunion, he was devastated by the breakup of his love affair in Dallas. When the girl's father refused to allow him to marry his pregnant lover, Howell returned to live in Chandler and, with Sharon [his younger aunt], began going to the Tyler Seventh-day Adventist Church.

"He was going through a chastising," Sharon said, seeking atonement for the guilt he felt over his sexual appetite. He told her, "'I am having a hard time keeping these thoughts out of my head,"' she said. "He prayed a lot and he lost a lot of weight."

A Return to the Adventist Church

From the first day he walked into a midweek prayer meeting, said Bob Bockmann, now an elder in the Tyler church, Howell commanded attention. If his discussions of Scripture were sometimes obscure, it was still nice to have a young man who was serious about the Bible.

The Tyler congregation was delighted to have a young, apparently fallen-away member return to the faith. When members learned that Howell was out of work, Harriet Phelps, an elderly woman whose sons were grown, offered him a room in exchange for work around her farm.

Bockmann and his wife, Maggie, befriended Howell, and Bockmann said the young man seemed to be burning with guilt over his past sex life and resentment that he had not been permitted to marry his ex-girlfriend. "The girl he was with in the Dallas area was about to have his baby," Bockmann said. "It was just killing him, because her parents didn't want him around anymore. He really missed the girl and felt terribly rejected that he wasn't able to be with her."

Bockmann said Howell also professed to have intense feelings of guilt over his lifelong devotion to playing rock-and-roll. "He would not even touch a guitar," Bockmann said. "They [the rock songs] implied very strongly to him that he was under a satanic influence, so he had washed all that away."

At first, Bockmann said, Howell seemed receptive to the church's teachings. "He said, 'I am just a newborn baby.' Here was a point where he was asking to be led, asking to be counseled. Sad to say, it was very short-lived."

In a church with strict moral values, the reformed Howell suddenly became everyone's judge, especially when it came to the conduct of women. He told at least one father that his daughter was "wearing what he thought was immodest dress," Bockmann said. "He became very strait-laced."

Adding to the tension was the fact that Howell seemed able to command the rapt attention of younger members. He would stand in a corner and "all-encompass them," said deacon Hardy Tapp's wife, Annette, "and just totally take over the conversation."

And whatever his feelings of sexual guilt, he used the church to develop relationships with women, both platonic and sexual. "He alluded that he was attracted to me," recalls Bockmann's wife, Maggie, who was much older than Vernon.

She said he would speak to her for hours about his childhood, often tearfully recounting physical abuse. Once, she said, he showed her a pattern of burn scars on one leg he said were caused when he was forced to kneel on a heat register.

His younger aunt, Sharon, said she believes that this period was the last, best chance for anyone to have interrupted Vernon Howell's transformation into David Koresh. His life might have turned out differently, she said, had Howell not been captivated by a powerful series of revival meetings sponsored by the church.

They were called Revelation Seminars and were conducted by evangelist Jim Gilley of Arlington, Texas. They featured dramatic, even frightening, images in a multimedia portrayal of Armageddon. Gilley, who still presents his "Prophesy Panorama" in the United States and abroad, is a rousing speaker and his video representations of the Apocalypse as foretold in the Book of Revelation—featuring earthquakes, pestilence and religious persecutions—was combined with a video of current events that seemed to point toward the imminent millennium.

"We went every night of the week," Sharon said. He couldn't stop talking about the details, which seemed to bring all his years of Bible study into focus. He felt he could expand on Gilley's teachings. Gilley said in an interview that Howell approached him one night and offered to reorganize the show and change its message. Gilley said he rejected the offer.

"That's when it took off," Sharon said. "That's when he really became serious.”

"Vernon said that even Mr. Gilley had a piece of the puzzle missing," she said. The missing piece, Howell told her in earnest, was the Seventh Seal, something that could be opened only by a new prophet. The Seven Seals, as described in the Book of Revelation, bind a scroll held in God's right hand that prophesies the calamities that precede the Apocalypse.

Sharon said Vernon was convinced that it was time "to have a new prophet and a new light" in the Seventh-day Adventist Church and that he was quite possibly that person.

Vernon tried hard to bring his message to the Tyler congregation, but by that point, they had had their fill of him. Following his formal rejection from the church, he took a high-speed turn into the insular world of the Branch Davidians, a group formed 60 years ago by a man named Victor Houteff, another disaffected Seventh-day Adventist who quit the church after becoming convinced that he was a prophet. Since then, the Branch Davidians always had had a prophet living in their midst, someone who could convey the "message."

The Waco section of the Branch Davidians was headed by Lois Roden, who assumed the role of chief prophet after the death of her husband, Ben. But she was in her sixties and everyone understood she would soon have a successor. Here Vernon found his niche, in an isolated and insular group that was willing, perhaps even anxious, to accept his claim of divine inspiration.

Howell recruited his uncle, Kenneth, to the sect. The two rented an apartment, working construction to pay expenses and spending their off hours recruiting on an Adventist campus or going door-to-door in the neighborhoods.

During this period, Howell developed a close relationship with Perry Jones, who ultimately gave Howell permission to marry his 14-year-old daughter, Rachel, Howell's first and only legal wife. A lifelong member of the Branch Davidians, Jones was convinced that the federal government posed an oppressive danger to devout Christians.

"He was real involved with our rights, freedom of religion, the right to bear arms," Kenneth said of Jones, who died from wounds inflicted in the February 28 shootout with federal agents at the Waco compound.

The three took long trips to revival meetings, carrying along Davidian tracts filled with elaborate diagrams of the faith. As they drove, the car was filled with talk of "God, government and religion," Kenneth said.

At the camp meetings, Howell's natural gift for empathy and public speaking served him well. "He would have a lot of people surrounding him," Kenneth said, so much so that the revival organizers sometimes had police ask him to leave.

His old friends back in Tyler and Chandler heard that Howell, now in his mid-twenties, had transformed from a rock-and-roll libertine into a sanctimonious, Bible-quoting martinet.

After not talking to Debbie Owens for many months, Vernon suddenly showed up and wanted to talk to her about Scripture. He had lost the Silverado pickup, she said, and was driving a beat-up Chevy Nova filled with religious tracts.

He told her he had really changed and wanted to lead her to a better life. "I told him, 'You are the last SOB to take me to God,"' Owens said.

Gaining Leadership of the Cult

According to a number of former disciples, the gun battle at the Branch Davidian compound on November 3, 1987—and the trial that followed—was the catalyst that rallied Howell's followers around the aspiring, 28-year-old evangelist and-perhaps more importantly demonstrated to him the extent to which he could control them.

The dispute began when Lois Roden, who died in 1986, skipped over her son, George, and anointed Howell to be the Waco cult's new prophet.

To settle the dispute, George Roden had disinterred the corpse of a long-deceased cult member named Anna Hughes, who died at the age of 85. Whoever could bring Anna Hughes back to life would be revealed as the Branch Davidians' true prophet, he said.

Shortly before dawn on that November day, Howell and seven of his supporters, dressed in camouflage fatigues and carrying assault rifles and a camera, slipped into Mount Carmel, as the compound was officially known, to take a photograph of the corpse.

Howell later claimed he was seeking photographic evidence of the disinterment to support a criminal charge against Roden.

They were met in the yard by Roden, armed with a submachine gun. In a brief shootout, Roden was slightly injured. Howell and his self-styled "commando" squad were brought to trial on charges of attempted murder. Roden, now 55, is in a Texas mental hospital, where he was committed after killing a man in Odessa, Texas in 1989.

Waco lawyers who were present at Howell's trial still recall the moment when he displayed his control over his followers.

As the Branch Davidians crowded into the spectators' gallery at the start of the trial, McLennan County Judge Herman Fitts declared that anyone in the courtroom who needed to be sworn as a witness should stand and identify themselves. When there was no response, Howell's lawyer, Gary Coker, turned to the Branch Davidians present and urged—also with no success—that the defense witnesses rise.

Then, in a moment of high drama, Howell stood, smiling benevolently. Raising a hand, he declared: "It's all right. You've done nothing wrong. Stand." At this command, the witnesses stood.

After the jury acquitted Howell's lieutenants and deadlocked on the charge against him, resulting in dismissal, he was given another moment with which to savor his growing power. The Branch Davidians backed a truck up to the county sheriff’s department and watched with satisfaction as deputies loaded it with dozens of weapons they had seized at Mount Carmel after the shootout.

"You don't have to stretch your imagination too far to appreciate how his followers must have interpreted that. He had won the verdict, the weapons and the compound. In his mind, and in those of his people, he must have felt that he was guided by the hand of God," former cult member Mark Bunds said.

A Name Change and 'New Light' Edict

During the five years of his leadership, Howell transformed the cluster of dilapidated bungalows at Mount Carmel into a fortress-like compound, greatly expanded its weapons arsenal and began training his followers in military tactics.

He also legally changed his name to David Koresh and declared himself a "sinful" incarnation of Jesus Christ. He issued his "New Light" declaration, proclaiming that, while his male followers would eventually find their perfect mates in heaven, their earthly wives and daughters were reserved exclusively for his sexual gratification and procreation.

"Only the Lamb is to be given the job to raise up the seed of the House of David, isn't he?" Howell asked rhetorically in a tape-recorded message he sent to Australia in 1989.

Further reading on the Waco tragedy:
Paradise Lost in Waco, February 5, 2018
We Didn't Start the Fire but the Tinder was Ours, January 31, 2018
New TV Series Premieres for 25th Anniversary of the Waco Tragedy, January 24, 2018
Beware of Wolves Disguised as Sheep, June 8, 2017
Death of a Branch Davidian Friend and Other Memories, April 19, 2014
Branch Davidians (and Adventists) Revisited in The New Yorker, March 30, 2014
My Trip to Waco, December 27, 2012

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From 1844 to the present, Adventist attitudes toward giving have been shaped by a plethora of articles, tracts, sermons, and Church Manuals, few of them in total agreement on the method of tithing. This body of literature, before 1880 largely apologetic and defensive, but since 1880 rather didactic, has itself been shaped by external events, chief among them the Panics of 1857 and 1873 and the Great Depression of the 1930s.

From 1844 to 1859, Sabbatarian Adventists had no plan for regular giving, but relied on freewill donations from interested hearers. For example, during three months of hard labor in Illinois in 1857, J.N. Loughborough received ten dollars in cash, a buffalo skin overcoat, and his board and room. During the winter of 1857-58, his listeners in Michigan gave him three ten-pound cakes of maple sugar, ten bushels of wheat, five bushels of apples, five bushels of potatoes, a peck of beans, one ham, half a hog, and $4.00 in cash. After spending the summer in Wisconsin, four months of preaching netted him only twenty dollars in cash plus board, room, and some traveling expenses. Another minister in 1859, after driving a team of horses on a 200-mile, three-week circuit, during which he preached fourteen times, returned home with only four dollars in his pocket. The inevitable result of this unsystematic giving was sporadic labor for the cause: have money, will preach; no money, must farm or do carpentry work.

Then came the Panic of 1857, the first worldwide economic crisis. Triggered by the fraudulent dealings in and the subsequent failure of the Ohio Life Insurance and Trust Company, this financial panic caused scores of businesses to fail; the railroad industry declined and hundreds of workers were fired. Railroad stocks had seen increasingly speculative buying, which only made things worse when the bubble burst in August of 1857. By the spring of 1858, commercial credit had dried up; American merchants experienced decreased sales and profits; scores of banks closed; numerous railroads declared bankruptcy; laborers took ten percent pay cuts; and many farmers lost their land to bank foreclosures. The nation did not pull out of this depression until the Civil War began in 1861. The hardest hit area of the U.S. was the Great Lakes region where Adventists had established their headquarters at Battle Creek in 1855.

In April of 1858, James White described the tiny pool of preaching brethren as “sunken down under poverty, broken-down health and discouragement.” Something must be done soon to sustain the cause financially or the Advent Movement would come to a screeching halt. In February of 1859, a committee of three men in Battle Creek proposed a Systematic Benevolence Plan based on 1 Corinthians 16:2 (Let every believer set aside funds on the first day of the week), 2 Corinthians 8:12-14 (emphasized the equality principle), and 2 Corinthians 9:5-7 (God loves cheerful givers). In practical terms, the committee urged males from 18 to 60 years of age to give 5-25 cents weekly; females to give 2-10 cents weekly; and both groups to add 1-5 cents more for every $100 worth of property owned. It should be noted, however, that the ill, aged, and those under 18 were not expected to participate in the Systematic Benevolence Plan.

It is also worth mentioning that at no time did any Adventist leader reference Malachi 3:8-10 (tithing one’s income); no one used the term “sacrifice” for this plan; nor did any writers initially emphasize the divine blessings to be gained by giving. Instead, articles in the Review stressed the great needs of the cause and the fairness, equality, and non-sacrificial nature of what was popularly called “the Sister Betsy (S.B.) Plan.” Every Sunday the local S.B. treasurer visited each member’s home, carrying a hand trunk or satchel, and a record book with receipts. “All expect him, and all get ready for him, and meet him with open hands and benevolent feelings.”

As it evolved during the 1860s and 1870s, the Systematic Benevolence Plan was based on the tithing principle: full-time workers were urged to give a tithe or ten percent of their annual increase to the cause. Since James White estimated that one’s increase represented about ten percent of the annual growth of one’s assets, in reality, the S.B. Plan amounted to only one percent of one’s total income for any given year. But in Ohio, members were expected to pay an “annual church tax” of two percent based on the treasurer’s assessment of their property.

While there were pockets of resistance to the “Sister Betsy Plan” and occasional misuse of the funds for building or maintenance of local meeting houses, by and large, the S.B. Plan put the Advent Movement back on track financially for the next twenty years. Loughborough stated in June of 1861 that it “has been the salvation of the cause of present truth from bankruptcy.” Between 1859 and 1879 a steady stream of S.B. funds and offerings enabled the fledgling denomination to build scores of meeting houses; form a dozen local conferences and a General Conference; found a publishing house, a sanitarium, and a college; and send a handful of missionaries to Europe. In a word, everything was hunky-dory until the Panic of 1873.

The Panic of 1873 was a financial crisis that brought a depression in Europe and North America that lasted until 1879 (even longer in France and Great Britain). It was caused by rampant speculative investments in railroads (the second largest employer after agriculture), shipping docks, and factories; the demonetization of silver in Germany and the U.S.; growing trade deficits; global ripples from the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71; and huge property losses from the 1871 fire in Chicago and the 1872 fire in Boston. Its immediate trigger, however, occurred thousands of miles away in Vienna, the capital of the vast Austro-Hungarian Empire, which in 1873 stopped minting silver coins. This dropped the bottom out of the Western silver mining industry, reduced the domestic money supply, and resulted in the U.S. abandoning its own silver currency. When President Ulysses Grant contracted the money supply, this raised interest rates, making matters worse for debtors. These cumulative factors soon triggered a chain reaction of bank failures, the closure of the NY Stock Market, the failure or bankruptcy of 110 American railroads, the closing of 18,000 businesses, and the firing of hundreds of workers. Again, the Panic of 1873 hit Michigan particularly hard when its lumbering companies went bankrupt.

Under these trying circumstances, the Sister Betsy Plan of giving ten percent of one’s annual increase no longer provided sufficient funds to keep the Gospel train moving forward. Paradoxically, although James White in April of 1861 had rejected “the Israelitish tithing system” as “God’s plan of the Levitical priesthood,” but not applicable to Adventists today, the Panic of 1873 forced him and other leaders to revisit the Old Testament. In a series of articles in the Review in the spring of 1876, Dudley M. Canright now called Malachi 3:8-11 “The Bible Plan of supporting the Ministry.” “God requires that a tithe, or one-tenth, of all the income of his people shall be given to support his servants in their labors,” he wrote. “Notice,” he added, “the Lord does not say you should give me a tenth, but he says one-tenth is the Lord’s.” Therefore, since the tithe already belonged to God, believers merely returned it to Him.

With the stroke of his pen, Canright thus reversed all previous Adventist thinking on tithing. Believers do not pay the tithe as a “church tax,” but return it to God as His own. Furthermore, they should not give one-tenth of their increase from one year to the next, but one-tenth of their total annual income. Moreover, Canright and Ellen White now changed the focus of tithing rhetoric in Church papers. They emphasized the divine blessings received by the generous giver. They highlighted items such as tea, coffee, tobacco, alcohol, dances, the theater, and jewelry which Adventists willingly avoided, thus saving thousands of dollars annually that could be donated to the cause of Present Truth. During the 1880s, Adventists everywhere adopted the full tithing plan (except for the saints in Arkansas, who were still following the Systematic Benevolence Plan in the late 1890s). But Ellen White repeatedly stated in her Testimonies that by whatever name it was called, “Systematic Benevolence [or Tithing] should not be made systematic compulsion.”

Then came the Great Depression of the 1930s. Sparked by the Wall Street Crash on “Black Tuesday” (October 29, 1929), this economic crisis was made far worse than any previous “panic” because of the drought conditions of the western Dust Bowl. The Crash triggered bank closures, mass unemployment, homelessness, hunger, despair, and dejection for tens of thousands of Americans and millions more abroad. It brought with it bread lines, soup kitchens, hunger marches, shantytowns (called “Hoovervilles”), and the violent Bonus Army March by WWI veterans chanting “Feed the hungry, tax the rich” as they occupied Washington, D.C. Between 1929 and 1931, over 20,000 companies and businesses closed; over 3,000 banks went bankrupt (10% of the nation’s total); and suicides skyrocketed to 18.9 per 1000. By 1932 construction projects had fallen by 80%; by 1933 over 12,000,000 Americans were unemployed (25% of the population) as 70,000 factories closed. International trade fell by 70 percent.

Since the U.S. had no welfare system, bread lines stretched for blocks in major cities and churches and charities established soup kitchens. Thousands of homeless men and women lived in hastily built shantytowns on public lands; 50% of all American children did not have adequate food, shelter, or medical care. Thousands of hobos rode freight trains across the country looking for any kind of work, especially those who had lived in the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico (the heart of the Dust Bowl that destroyed 100,000,000 acres of land and rendered 3,000,000 people homeless and impoverished).

During the Great Depression, as the Adventist Church experienced significant reductions in financial support, leaders’ rhetoric regarding tithes and offerings became ever more detailed and didactic. In 1932, the nadir of the Depression, the first Church Manual was published. It emphasized for the first time the duties of local church leaders to be tithe payers. “A man [sic] who fails to set an example in this matter should not be elected to the position of elder,” it stated, adding that “all church officers should be tithe payers.” While the Manual agreed that tithe paying “is not held as a test of fellowship,” those “conference workers and church elders and other officers and institutional leaders who failed to pay tithe, should not be continued in office.” In fact, in 1951 the Manual mandated that church leaders who failed to be faithful tithe payers must not only be expelled from the office of local elder, but also barred from any other church offices. Three years later, the Manual for Ministers tightened the noose around non-tithe-paying workers’ necks by stipulating that “no worker shall be continued in denominational employment who is found to be unfaithful in tithe paying, nor shall he [sic] be transferred to another conference unless he [sic] reforms.”

In 1932, for the first time, tithing entered the roster of “Fundamental Beliefs.” Number 18 stated:

That the divine principle of tithes and offerings for the support of the gospel is an acknowledgement of God’s ownership in our lives, and that we are stewards who must render account to Him of all that He has committed to our possession.

Likewise, tithing for the first time entered the list of baptismal vows in 1951 as Number 10 asked:

Do you believe in church organization, and is it your purpose to support the church by your tithes and offerings, your personal effort, and influence?”

But in 1985, when the Annual Council proposed several significant revisions in the area of tithing, offerings, and church employment, the wording of its proposals reveals that confusion still reigned in official circles. Their definition of “a faithful tithe” included the words “one tenth of their increase or personal income.” Yet as you know, the two terms are not the same.

The burgeoning number of appeals by local churches and independent Adventist institutions for a share of the member’s dollar also drastically reduced mission offerings from a high of 28.6% of the tithe dollar in 1934 to a low of 6.5% in 1985. Moreover, while 68% of church members in the 1980s figured their tithe on gross personal income, 29% based their tithe on net income after taxes, and about 3% figured it on the amount left after major living expenses had been deducted. Furthermore, it was not uncommon for some Adventist ministers to support tithing net income. Others zealously urged giving a double tithe, while some conferences in the 1980s trumpeted the 10+10+ plan of tithes and offerings. Thus, in a very real sense, the Adventist concept of tithing and systematic giving is still in a state of flux and may evolve for decades to come in response to external financial crises and Church officials’ recommendations.

Brian E. Strayer is Professor Emeritus of History at Andrews University. This article was originally presented at the Andrews University Campus Dialogue Sabbath School Class on February 10, 2018. It is reprinted here with permission.

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Like many other LGBT+ Christians, I lived my life trying to be heterosexual. It was a common teaching that being gay, or committing homosexual acts, was an abomination to God. No one wanted to be an abomination to God, of course. We were taught that if we had enough faith God would “cure” us of our “adverse” sexual orientation. We learned that our sexual orientation was a choice that we had made, even if we had no recollection of ever making that decision. Notwithstanding, we were expected to make the decision to be heterosexual every day of our lives, and oftentimes multiple times a day. Do straight people have to make the decision to stay straight every day, I would wonder to myself?

Being an avid Bible reader, I could not help but feel condemned by it. In my younger years, when my sexuality was but a whisper in the wind, the Bible was full of awesome stories and fantastical feats. It spoke of a man, named Jesus, who seemed really cool and very loving. However, as I progressed into my teen years, when my sexual orientation became more evident, reading the Bible was like stabbing myself in the heart with a rusty, dull dagger at each sitting. Reading about a “God of Love” didn’t ease the pain of knowing that just a few chapters away God was reminding me that He hated who I was. As a natural consequence to all of this negativity and condemnation, my teen and early adult years were eventually plunged into a dark pit of depression.

Just before I hit my lowest point, and ultimately an attempt at suicide, I did receive a small glimmer of hope. While I was learning to hate everything that I was and everything that I liked; when I began demanding that God explain to me why He would allow me to be born, He spoke to me. It was on a clear autumn morning, just as the sun peaked over the tree lined horizon. I was semi-conscious, that state between awake and sleep in which you are aware the world exists but your mind is still in dreamland. It was a voice speaking directly to me, as though someone was in my room. I lived alone—one of the perks of being a dorm floor Resident Adviser. Yet, there the voice was, clear as day, addressing me like a parent addresses their child. It said, very simply: “I love you just the way that you are.” Period. There was no interlude, there was no time for questions, there was no pause. In and out. The voice had come without warning, said what it had to say and left just as abruptly.

I was, in that moment, fully awake, wondering what in the world had just happened. Had God just spoken to me? That had never happened before, not like this anyway. I considered that perhaps I was hallucinating, but I remembered the story of the prophet Samuel, who, when he was but a child, had been called by God three times. He didn't know what to do until Eli told him, but, thanks to this story, I knew what to do. I knew I wasn't hallucinating; I had actually heard a voice, out loud, in my room, while I was alone! The message replayed in my head: “I love you just the way that you are.” So, like Eli counseled Samuel, I fell to my knees and spoke to God. I thanked Him for taking the time to actually speak to me and for the message. The meaning of the message was clear; it was as if the interpretation had been revealed to my brain as the voice spoke. The message was: God was not asking me to change who I was for something others thought I should strive to be. It was a pure, direct message of love, peace, and acceptance, and for that I promptly thanked God. The end. Except, plot twist: this was just the beginning. As it happened, I would have to learn the hard way what it meant to disbelieve God's promises.

What should have been the next few years of bliss and peace were, instead, transformed into the next few years of hell. These are the times that I rightly entitle my “dark ages.” My dark ages lasted almost nine years and were filled with the worst amount of emotional suffering that I have ever had to endure. All of it was unknowingly self-inflicted. Why self-inflicted, you may ask? Because, the worst decision that I have ever made in my entire life was to blatantly distrust God’s promise. In response to that wonderful gift God gave me, a gift of total acceptance and love, I got on my knees, thanked God for the message, and said, “I know that you love me just the way that I am, but I know there are some things you want me to change.” I had, quite literally, negated everything God had just told me and put my religious beliefs before God’s Word. I followed right in the footsteps of Adam and the Children of Israel. I simply did not believe God's promise. And thus began my crusade to double, even triple my efforts to be rid of the plague called homosexuality and all the while falling head first into a world of misery and pain. It was a crusade that nearly claimed my life multiple times.

Two years after having heard God's voice, I found myself in France. It’s true what they say about depression, because I was in a country that I had dreamed of visiting for years, and I could find no enjoyment in it. All of the pictures I had taken that year, which were already few in number, showed me without a smile. The world seemed against me; as if no one cared that I was slowly dying inside. How lucky my friends around me were, I kept telling myself, to not have to battle such a heavy demon. I was persuaded that they would never know the pain that I was going through, nor would they care to try. They were having fun, traveling here and there, planning parties, and going out meeting the locals. Meanwhile, I had confined myself to my room, partly because I simply had no money to partake in revelries, but, mostly because I saw no reason to go out and tempt myself or try and have fun. It all seemed futile. Instead I stayed in my room reading the Bible, praying, fasting, and cleaning like I had Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

It was about a year after my first suicide attempt when those same thoughts started resurfacing. To be honest, they never really disappeared during that time, it was just that some moments were more poignantly depressing than others. I had never known tears and sorrow as much as I did during that school year in France. And although I didn't know it, this was just the beginning. I still had almost seven more years filled with anguish and pain and suicidal thoughts. During that school year in France, however, I suffered the most. I cried myself to sleep more nights than I can count and certainly more than I care to remember. That school year is what I call the worst year of my life.

During this worst year, at the time when I was starting to seriously consider suicide again, the same voice that had spoken to me two years earlier spoke again. It was the second time I heard this voice. Again, it spoke to me in an empty bedroom. Again, it woke me from my sleep. Again, the message and meaning were impossibly clear. It said, “Go, sell all that you have, and follow me.” To the average Bible reader, one would recognize this as the command Jesus gave to the Rich Young Ruler. The Rich Young Ruler, according to the story, declined Jesus' invitation, telling himself that he had invested too much into his riches and status. I, unlike the Rich Young Ruler, had not a penny to my name. In fact, I was using school loans just to be in France, so not only did I have no money, or possessions for that matter, but I was already deeply in debt. The message did not want me to get rid of my money, however. It wanted me to let go of the beliefs and traditions that I had invested so much of myself into. I, like the Rich Young Ruler, had a difficult decision to make. Would I let go of everything I learned in my Christian community about life, God, and Christianity, or would I cling to it, like a lifeline and my only source of pride?

Like the last time I heard the voice, I got on my knees and prayed. This time I told God that what He was asking me to do was incredibly hard. Basically, He was asking me to trust that He would teach me. But, how could I trust that this was the voice of God? Even if it were His voice, I didn't really know God. How could I be sure that He would actually catch me once I let go of my religious lifeline? Like many other Christians, my faith was grounded in the Bible and our fundamental teachings. God was asking me to give up on those things, to learn at His hand; His invisible, unproven hand.

If I did choose to trust God, however, how could I convince others that it was actually Him who I was following and not my own hedonism? How would I protect myself from the enemy if I gave up on all these teachings? Certainly, my religious community would strongly disagree with me, and quite possibly reject me for not keeping their beliefs. As most people in my particular community, I was well integrated, and had no desire to find myself out in the world alone, following a “God” that I had only ever heard of but whom no one had ever seen or heard. The community was my home, a place where all my friends were and where I felt protected. It was a tall order to ask me to give all that up. Needless to say my hesitation was great and the decision frightening.

After telling God my mind, I paused for a good while, rethinking the consequences of either action. Finally, and still not completely sure of the outcome, I told God that if He helped me to sell all that I had, then I would indeed follow Him. The decision, though unsure, was based on the fact that I trusted God somewhat. If He could not keep me safe from deception, though I chose to walk with Him daily, then why follow Him? I had decided to step out in faith, as so many before me have done. I knew that it was God speaking to me. It certainly could have been the Great Deceiver, which is something I thought about while making this decision. Yet, somehow I knew that it was God. It was like when God told Abraham to get up and leave his country for a country that he had never seen. Abraham just somehow knew it was God and he obeyed.

So, there you have it. I decided to obey like Abraham. The next few years of my life were spent casting away every single belief I had learned in my religious community. One after another I shed the layers of dogma, like a butterfly breaking from its self-made cocoon. My community's teachings weren't all erroneous of course, but I had to question every teaching that came to mind and ask God for clarification. Nothing was left to my own wisdom and interpretation. I was beginning to have a reason, my own reason, for why I believed the way that I did. 

Finally, toward what would be, the end of my dark ages, I came upon a Bible chapter: Psalms 91. When I read the text I didn't feel any real connection but I also wasn't looking for anything in particular. I was just reading through the Bible, as I had taken to doing three times a day. Having finished with 91 I moved onto chapter 92. For some reason, however, something in the back of my mind provoked me to go back to chapter 91. So, I reread it, but still nothing really jumped out at me. There was no real reason that I felt I should stay fixed on this chapter. Again I moved onto chapter 92. Again, there was something in the back of my mind trying to convince me to reread chapter 91. I didn't know why I felt this nagging. Perhaps it was because when I read the chapter it felt as if the words were written in a foreign language. Yet, it also felt as if I understood the foreign language, and the words, but I simply could not grasp the meaning.

Succumbing to my self-imposed nagging, I re-reread chapter 91. This time I read the first verse and I stared at it: “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” It felt like I was reading through a medical tome. I understood the words and their individual meanings, but when they were combined in these sentences they just seemed to drone on with no real significance. What I needed was enlightenment, a spark of interest or just a hint of understanding.

Lacking any real connection to verse one, I continued on to verse two. I slowly read the chapter a third time, verse-by-verse, until I reached the end, yet still no closer to understanding. It felt like I was doing homework, looking for the solution of an assigned problem that the teacher had never taught. Determined to understand what I was reading, I reread the chapter for a fourth time, until I got to verse 15: “He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.” The part “and honour him” grabbed my attention. Asking myself what I must do to be honored by God, I decided to read backwards to find my answer.

Verse 14 said: “Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.” My body started to get warm and began shaking as though I was cold. It’s a reaction I normally get when I am on the verge of discovering the answer to an enigma I've been trying to solve for a while, or when I am in the zone while I'm gaming. When I am in this state, my senses become heightened. Every action I take is hyper-calculated, my peripheral vision seems to expand, and my brain begins to analyze, in rapid progression, all possible outcomes, as if I was a Game Theory genius. I continued, backwards, verse by verse: “Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation”(verse 9). I was beginning to get excited. It felt as if God was promising this directly to me! “Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day”(verse 4). “Wait, is He promising me protection from attacks?” I asked myself as the excitement mounted. “I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust” (verse 2) and finally verse 1!

The cloud had lifted! It was indeed a promise! A promise that God was making to me, to everyone who would decide to believe it! I read the chapter again, forward this time. I could not believe what I was reading. God was essentially telling me that if I decided to trust Him, He would be my place of refuge. He was saying that if I chose to call upon Him and find in Him my solace, no evil would come upon me! What a promise to be given!

Upon understanding what God was saying in His scriptures, I got on my knees and prayed: "If you are promising this to me, then I cannot accept it.” I told Him, “I have literally done nothing for you to do this for me!" I opened my eyes, thinking and hesitating. Was I really going to pass up a wonderful promise for an incredible future just because I don’t deserve it? God isn’t stupid, so He must know that I don’t deserve it, but He’s promising it anyway. I closed my eyes again and asked, "Why God? What did I do? I have done nothing to deserve this.” There was no rhyme or reason to this promise. I was gay although still desperately trying to fight it. I kept slipping up by looking at guys. I was constantly berating myself for my “wicked” thoughts that I tried continuously to cast out of my mind. No, there was no way that I was worthy of such a promise.

Then I remembered Esther 6:11—"Thus shall it be done unto the man whom the king delighteth to honour.” The account was settled. God wanted to bless me. Years ago He told me He loved me just the way that I am, no strings attached. Two years after that He showed His love to me by asking me to trust Him. Now, He was proving His love to me by asking me to let Him bless me and protect me. He promised all this, knowing full well that I was gay. He knew that if I ever came out of the closet I would have relationships with men and thereby commit homosexual acts. God knew all of this and more, and still He made these promises to me. I did, quite literally, nothing to deserve His blessings. Finally convinced, I happily conceded and thanked God for His promise. I told Him that I trusted that He would keep it and that He would show me His salvation. Not long after having accepted this promise, I came out of the closet, fully assured that not only did God love me but He had set His seal of protection upon me. I have never been back to the closet since.

God loves me and blesses me on a daily basis, of this I have no doubt. He also loves you, regardless of who you are and what sexual orientation you possess. It has never been God’s will to ostracize you for feeling different or request that you change. He loves you just the way that you are. In order to believe that, you are going to need to do what I did and “sell all that you have and follow [Him].” If you remain under the belief that He is forcing you to change or that He is forcing you to act like someone you aren’t, then you will never get to know the real God. You will never understand that He has unconditional love for you, despite what others say or think.

I know what you read in the Bible. I know that it seems crystal clear how God feels about homosexuality. Yet, I also know that our current interpretation of those texts has cast a dark cloud upon God and His love. There is a reason those texts exist, but they were never, ever meant to condemn anyone for being who they are. Remember what God told Peter: “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common” (Acts 10:15). The law has not condemned you and neither has God. God has not called unclean those who have been purified through their faith. So, don't let others fool you into believing so. Allow God to show you His law and love through His eyes. When you begin seeing life through your own loving relationship with God, the Bible will make much more sense. It will all come together like pieces to a puzzle.

If you never get to know the real God, then you will never be able to claim His promises to protect you and honor you, either in the Bible or elsewhere. You will be on your own, forging your own future according to what others have been telling you, and it is likely to be full of unnecessary burdens. Has He not told us that His yoke is easy and His burden light? (Matthew 11:30)

Do not do as I did and place upon yourself a burden that God has never acknowledged or ordained. Let Him free you of those self- and societal-made prejudices by calling upon Him and trusting in His love. He will indeed free you as He has freed me, and we all know, whom the Son has made free, is truly free indeed.

Nathaniel E. King has an extended career as a project manager in Europe and America and is a passionate writer. After studying law and obtaining an MBA in Switzerland, and, later, working in a renowned French business school, he decided to move back to California to pursue his career as a Business Consultant. Founder of KingDom Coaching, he blossoms, giving his heart every day as a life coach with an emphasis on marginalized sexuality, fortifying faith, and managerial coaching. 

Photo by Mantas Hesthaven from Pexels

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