A Review of "For the Sake of the Gospel" by Des Ford
Posted August 28th, 2008 by Greg Schneider
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For Des and Gill Ford, what is “the Baby?” It is the package of distinctive messages to the world for which, they believe, God raised up the Seventh-day Adventist church. The package includes:
- A premillennial reading of history that shakes humans out of self-satisfied self-righteousness and makes it clear humankind is not progressing but only getting worse.
- A doctrine of the advent that nevertheless gives eternal hope in the face of the despair of human history, a doctrine of the sabbath that mirrors the gospel rest of conscience that gospel believers have at all times.
- A doctrine of the non-immortality of the soul that points to life only in Christ rather than innate human nature and thus points us toward the hope of the Second Advent and Resurrection of the body and away from the spiritism of the New Age.
- The continuation of spiritual gifts in the church apparent in the prophetic ministry of Ellen White.
- A teaching about the body as the temple of God that restrains people with temperaments like his own (he likens himself to hyperthyroid squirrel) from courting premature death.
- A doctrine of stewardship that stands opposed to the growing gap in the world between haves and have-nots.
All these good Adventist distinctives can be grounded in the Gospel and thus help the Seventh-day Adventist church fulfill its God-given special mission to the whole world, or we can pervert them all. Indeed, we have (p. 18). Which brings us to “the Bathwater.” Chief soiler of the water is the Investigative Judgment with all its correlates, such as the year-day principle of interpreting time prophecies, the “historicist” insistence on aligning all time prophecies with specific historical events and institutions--chiefly pagan and Christian Rome, and the twisting of the book of Hebrews to support the rationalizations Adventists produced for the significance of 1844 after the Great Disappointment. Most the chapters of this book aim to dismantle the exegesis and argument that support the Investigative Judgment doctrine. The paramount reason why the church must confess the error of this doctrine and forsake it, says Des, is that it mutes the gospel and undermines assurance of salvation.
Another component of the dirt in the bathwater, however, is the institutional defensiveness and pride of power seen in SDA hierarchy and church committees as they dealt with Des and Gill and with so many other church workers and lay members before, during, and after the “lynching” at Glacier View. Lynching is my word, but it is an idea that Des clearly implies by likening Glacier View to trials of black men in the South (p. 39). Some of the most arresting material in this book is in the essays by Gill that chronicle and analyze the Glacier View conference and the events surrounding it.
Indeed the stormiest emotional moment this reviewer had was while reading Gill’s mention of the insinuation and slander against her and her marriage to Des that were contained in the rumors charging her with being a willing go-between in a nefarious collusion between Des and Robert Brinsmead. The story made me furious. My reaction requires a bit of autobiographical unpacking in the interests of honest disclosure.
Des and I arrived at Pacific Union College the same year, 1977, and I was witness to the processes that led up to Glacier View. While my own theology differed, and differs still, from both Des and his perfectionist attackers, I have always believed Des more theologically right than his enemies, and far and away more ethical and charitable than they in the conduct of the controversies of those years. I also watched mentors and friends in the PUC faculty lose their careers, and in some instances their marriages, in the maelstrom that engulfed the PUC campus. I mourn the loss of these people not simply for reasons of personal friendship, but because of lost opportunities to pursue our callings jointly in conversations that might have built up the Seventh-day Adventist church and community.
Although I have not communicated with them for years, I count Des and Gill as friends in both the personal and professional sense and regret that we have not had opportunity to pursue our own conversations. It is as colleagues and friends that I use their first names in this review, and I would have all readers understand that this usage stems from friendly regard and affection and intends no disrespect. This point is all the more important to make because I am about to dwell on some disagreements I have with my friends.
When Des and Gill call repeatedly for the church to confess its sins against its members and to make things right with the families whose lives were disrupted by the persecutions of church administrators, I can only say “So be it.” I hold back my amens, however, when Des generalizes wildly about the consequences of church persecution: “college attendances in the West have been hard to sustain (particularly the ministerial trainees),” many of our colleges have tremendous financial difficulty with PUC in particular in such dire straits as to contemplate selling its land, the church mission program is in decline, church members in the West are declining in zeal. Des grants there may be many reasons for these things, but “it is correct from a biblical viewpoint to suggest that one of these reasons is unconfessed wrongs” (p. 122).
My response? The church should apologize for Glacier View and its aftermath because it defended false exegesis, pursued dishonest and arbitrary procedures, and unnecessarily harmed people’s careers and livelihoods. It did wrong, and therefore apology and restitution are the right things to do. To suggest that doing right will somehow ameliorate institutional problems that are at best distantly related to the wrongdoing clouds ethical vision and encourages superstitious thinking about cause and effect in human affairs.
As a side note, I feel compelled to say about PUC’s proposed land sale that this kind of stewardship of resources in order to build endowment is several generations overdue. Had PUC been building endowment in the decades prior to the 1970s, it would not have been in the politically vulnerable position that forced college administration to agree to the disastrous “study leave” for Des that led to Glacier View. We would have been much better equipped to protect academic integrity in general and Des’s rights to academic freedom in particular.
The kind of analytical overreaching to which I am reacting seems endemic to Des’s view of the world. The Lutheran reading of the Pauline gospel is the key to everything for Des. Failure to embrace and proclaim this gospel explains why the SDA church creeps along, moribund among the well-educated of the first world and winning souls primarily among the poorly educated in both first and third worlds (p. 3). Only by way of this forensic vision of justification can one be assured of God’s acceptance and thus accept both self and others. “Until I can accept myself, I am uneasy, and I am accident prone, and I’m nasty whenever it suits me” (p. 29) This theological riff on the popular psychology of self-acceptance also explains why Adventist legalism has produced a church full of people without assurance of salvation, hence without joy, and hence without real motivation to win souls for Christ (p. 34). And this failure of Adventism is just a special case of the failure of the whole of the Christian church for two millennia. Failure to preach this gospel clearly and consistently explains why humanity still waits for the establishment of the Kingdom so long after Christ’s humiliation on the cross (pp. 103-104). Failure to preach this gospel in foreign missions, furthermore, produces indoctrination rather than conversion, and failure truly to convert “the heathen” explains things like the complicity of Seventh-day Adventist Hutus in the Rwandan genocide against the Tutsis (pp. 131-36).
Like the proverbial hedgehog who knows one great thing, in contrast to the fox who knows many things, Des knows one great theological thing: the forensic, penal substitutionary metaphor for the atonement. He is as nimble and creative as he is dogged and single-minded in promoting this outlook. As one whose psychology works pretty much the way Des assumes everyone’s must, I have found his preaching and teaching inspiring and indispensable. I am aware of other friends, however, whose minds and hearts worked in ways that made Des’s outlook feel extremely threatening. Des himself notes in passing that when the SDA Bible Commentary adopted positions that aligned better with the theology he favors, the then-head of the Australasian Division cried, “‘They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him’” (p. 95). This seems like a sincere cry of the heart that might prompt us to see that the Lord’s presence and grace comes to people by many avenues, including routes that are incomprehensible, even repugnant, to us. (I have recently made my own effort to make sense of Adventist perfectionist hearts and minds in a lecture invited by the Loma Linda School of Religion.)
With regard to situations like Rwanda, furthermore, I doubt that very many African Adventists confront the same kinds of problems with guilt and self-acceptance that I do as an individualistic westerner and direct heir to the culture that Luther and Calvin were so pivotal in forming. I suspect that many Rwandan SDAs heard and understood, at some level, that “one does not have to be good to be saved, but that one must be saved to be good” (p. 134). However, suspended in webs of kinship and clan whose meanings are overlaid and twisted by generations of colonial European exploitation that sought to divide and conquer, it seems apparent that they did not hear that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, Hutu nor Tutsi. In short, I do not think that western individualistic models of the atonement, forensic or perfectionist, speak to the kinds of problems apparent in the Rwandan genocide. It is humbling to note, furthermore, that Muslim mosques were, on the whole, safer places for Tutsis to be during the genocide than Christian churches. It seems that in that time and place, Mohammed’s message of the Ummah, the House of Islam that transcends all tribal loyalties and brings peace by way of submission to Allah, was more effective in practice than any Christian message.
My point, not at all an original one, is that there are many ways to make sense of Christ, His life and teachings, His death and resurrection. Any of them can be a means of transforming grace, simply empty words, or worse. The absolute hegemony that Des claims for the Lutheran Pauline gospel will not, in my judgment, withstand scrutiny of scripture or history. I write these criticisms with reticence because I am loath to have Des and Gill disappointed in me and even more reluctant to cause them any pain. I write also with a rueful smile, knowing that if Des and Gill were once again my colleagues in a free atmosphere where we could carry on the conversations I have wished for, he would badger me relentlessly, with all the energy of that hyperthyroid squirrel whose temperament he says he shares, to change my mind and adopt his hedgehog’s vision of the faith. What a menagerie I’d have to cope with! Nevertheless, far better that lively, exasperating zoo than the lifeless, anxiety-filled void that haunted us for so many years in the aftermath of Glacier View.
I celebrate, therefore, the news I have learned from the Spectrum blog in the last couple of days as I have been writing this review: Des will be delivering a lecture on Saturday, September 6, at the Loma Linda Campus Hill church at 3:00 pm. You can read details as well as some “buzz” from the blogs here.
I celebrate also the fact that a group calling itself the “Good News Tour” will be at Loma Linda University Church that same week-end presenting messages based on alternative metaphors for the gospel. You can read more about it here.
Let there be civility, energy, more light than heat, and let everyone be persuaded in the integrity of their own minds.
You can purchase For the Sake of the Gospel, Throw out the Bathwater but keep the Baby here
Greg Schneider writes from Angwin, CA where he is a professor of religion and social science at Pacific Union College.
Comments
Thanks for this thoughtful review. I love this thought especially, "My point, not at all an original one, is that there are many ways to make sense of Christ, His life and teachings, His death and resurrection. Any of them can be a means of transforming grace, simply empty words, or worse."
I wish that you and Des Ford were still colleagues at Pacific Union College who could engage in regular, friendly debate about such topics. I was just a young child when Glacier View happened, but I still sense deep wounds from those who witnessed it and its ripple effects. I wonder what it would take for an official apology?
I hope Des Ford's talk next weekend gets posted for everyone to access online. Sounds like it's going to be a full weekend in Loma Linda!
I enjoyed attending Des Ford's Sabbath School class in the Science Complex at PUC. I also enjoyed taking classes from Erwin R. Gane. These two Australians did not see eye to eye on much of anything! I recall Dr. Gane laughing at Geoffery Paxton's 'Shaking of Adventism' reference to his view of justification as being 'Roman Catholic'. I attended the infamous Oct. 27, 1979 Forum lecture in Irwin Hall titled 'Investigative Judgment: Theological Milestone or Historical Necessity?'
What impressed me about Ford was how much he could remember and how fast he could think and speak. He could make people look and sound like idiots...even when they were right! But then he had a doctorate in rhetoric(in the writings of Paul)! He articulated the problems quite well...but I mostly disagreed with his proposed 'solutions'. I think Ford meant well...but if someone was trying to throw a monkey-wrench into the Adventist machine...I don't think they could have done it any better than Des. And the church did a hatchet-job on Des in a Kangaroo Court. Two wrongs did not make a right...it made a horrible mess.
Gill is quite a scholar. Has anyone read 'The Soteriological Implications of the Human Nature of Christ'? I wonder how much of Des's thinking can be traced to Gill? Did Des ever publish a book on the Teachings of Jesus? If such a book exists, I would imagine that he would use the grammatical-historical method...and that he would be careful to exegete...rather than just simply homelitically applying passages. Dr. Ford's mentor at the University of Manchester, F.F. Bruce, wrote an interesting book, 'The Hard Sayings of Jesus'.
In the final analysis, Ford proposed simplistic legalism as the remedy for complex legalism. It's sort of like proposing self-exaltation as the remedy for self-degradation. Neither one works. The 'Desire of Ages' read from cover to cover seems to be a good place to find the solution to the tussle over Eschatology, Christology and Soteriology in the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
I doubt that the most effective way to enable a group of Christians to improve their beliefs is to attack their convictions and demand that they apologize for holding them. I think that we can anticipate that this approach will prompt defensive reactions that will only make things worse. Far better to let outmoded ideas die from neglect and gradually replace them with better ones, so I think!
Dave
Firstly, it is interesting that the Fords still think that there is a baby worth not throwing out with the bath water when it comes to Adventism.
Secondly, I do not think that the lack of the assurance of salavation is quite so prevalent now... especially amongst the generations that have come to fruition post Glacier View. In fact having led out in youth Sabbath School classes the controversies that raged then are not even on their mind map, being virtually irrelevant(admittedly this is a Northern European perspective.)....this does however back up David's outmoded/let them die/be replaced modus operandi.
Well Done. Tom
I read Greg's review to Des, and we both enjoyed it very much because clearly written with love. The Baby in the title is Jesus, not a package of SDA views, but I can see why Greg thinks this. Jesus is the heart of prophetic intent, and he remains when views about interpretation inevitably change. The book is not an attack and a demand from our viewpoint, but once it's out there it will no doubt bring comments like David Larson's. Readers should remember that it is nearly 30 years since Des was defrocked and we have only now written such a book. We have always understood that the church has the right to hire and fire whoever it chooses, and that administrators were in a hard place at Glacier View. They had our sympathy then and now. We are not desiring, courting or expecting an apology to us personally, but for others who were treated worse than us. We do have the right to explain our viewpoint. We have received a tide of love and goodwill from many in the SDA church and it is reciprocated from us. We have also had a barrage of slurs, misrepresentations and lies from some. I urge readers to love your enemies as Jesus asked us to and as Des has consistently tried to do. These blogs could be sometimes be more Christian and not a medium for people to express thinly veiled hostility (not speaking specifically of this particular blog). To orthodoxymoron, I occasionally dip my foot into the sea of theology and write something, maybe once a decade. But I was Des's student and he hasn't learned a thing from me. I knew Des's first wife and the two of them were/are two of the most innocent, Christ-centered and dedicated people on this earth. Many people know this to be true. Des is 80 next year and you'll be glad to know he intentionally speaks slower. This will probably be his last visit to the USA. He will be speaking about the very objections Greg raises.
"Far better to let outmoded ideas die from neglect and gradually replace them with better ones, so I think!"
I agree - however people who want to hang onto these outmoded ideas keep getting space in the Review and in the Lesson Pamphlet and in the evangelistic presentations.
So there are three choices
(a) ignore them - but the ignorant masses of new members don't, and are swayed, and so perpertuate the ideas
(b) tell them to stop pushing these outmoded ideas - but then it looks (to the swayed masses) like the evil trying to suppress the righteous
(c) tell them why they are wrong - which hardly corresponds to "neglect"
In short, neglecting weeds won't result in a weed-free garden
/Bevin
Hi Gill,
We met years ago around 1986 when I visited you and Des at your home in Auburn, Calif. Thanks for your comments.
My wife and I plan to fly from Florida to the "promise land" of LLU to hear Des.My wife has not been there and we will also visit my dad's grave in Brea, Calif. I haven't seen Des since 2000. I would like to see him as he is approaching 80 and as you said may not return to the US.
I love and respect Des and his integrity and his classical Protestant message on the atonement and RBF/JBF...an outmoded idea if and only when the church apostatizes...when it says "peace and safety" without the foundation of the cross of Christ.
Would you ask him if he has this book? I would like to bring it to him as a gift.
"The Glory of the Atonement", Hill and James,IVP, 495pp.2004.
Blessings to Both of you!
pat travis
It's great to see you as part of this conversation, Gill! You know, last weekend I had a group of friends over for lunch. We are all early 30s-ish and have/are going through big questions about Adventism. The topic of Glacier View and Des Ford came up (along with Ron Numbers and the whole tumultuous 70s/early 80s).
I found it telling that several of them--lifelong Adventists--had no idea what the sanctuary doctrine was and how it was unique to Adventists (or why other Christians take issue with it). These were very well-educated people. I've actually noticed this trend in conversation with many other Adventists as well. I find it striking that so much was made of this 30 years ago, yet, in essence, I think a "bad" idea really has started to just die out.
I'll look forward to checking out this book!
I had intended to leave this forum alone but I find myself getting sucked back in by topics that are too personal for me to simply walk away from. This is one of them.
I was among those who left the SDA church in disgust over the way it chose to deal with Des Ford and the issues he raised. Today I would agree more with Dr Schneider than Doctor Ford, but to me it was and is about more than theology.
To me Glacier View was the loss of innocence. As a convert to Adventism I had bought into the idea of Adventist exeptionalism and I really believed that this church was a movement whose loadstone was "the truth." What shocked me was seeing my church just as committed to its traditions as any other denomination, and then some. When push came to shove, exegesis meant nothing. Administrators of no particular virtue (Victor, I know...)destroyed the careers of dedicated saints without compunction.
And worst of all was the betrayal by the mainstream academics within in the church, exemplary scholars who knew that Des Ford was arguing from an unassailable position exegetically when he took on the dogmas of 1844. Instead of saying so, they took Des to task (mostly correctly, if my memory serves me well) for views of his that strayed into more speculative arenas, and created thereby the impression that they supported the orthodox position on 1844, when they did no such thing.
Having sold out, they pleaded later that they had no idea the church leaders would act the way they did. They were not the first ones to wash their hands of dishonorable deeds.
Maybe this is the way churches operate. Maybe the Christian faith can justify such behavior but I decided I wanted no part of it. I left the SDA church and I left the world of faith.
I did not even back then insist that the church officially endorse Des Ford's views, even on such patently unbiblical doctrines as the 1844 dogmas, but I did expect it to remain open-minded and respectful in situations where tradtion and exegesis butted heads.
The problem at Glacier View was not Neal Wilson nor Des Ford.
It was all those not so innocent by-standers who just held the coats. Then they tried to make up by Consultation I and II. Now more than ever theology is decided by administrators not Scholars. Spectrum is a voice but not a power or a change agent.
Mainly the "lunatic fringe" read and posts according to the G.C. even Cliff has bowed out.
There is no future in rocking the boat. Edward Heppenstall was recruited as a big gun to fight for the right! He ended up by being marginalized primarily by the Review staff.
So we spend hours on "self abuse" and other fringe issues--the core of salvation seems to be off limits. Tom
My wife and some friends heard Des Ford the last time he shared the podium with Ray Cottrell in Loma Linda. I was away on a mission, to Africa, then. I'll be in Campus Hill next Sabbath.
Gillian,
I remember translating your Pilgrim's Progess spoof back in the day, and how I admired your facility with words. In the early 1980s we also met once in Norway when I translated for Des, overlooking the Tyrifjord lake. When Adventism comes up with a hall of fame, celebrating people of inegrity, I would like to see the two of you inducted.
I'd be interested if you could get Des' reaction to my main concern with his insistence on the be-all of the forensic view of the atonement. My concern is that it comes close to theological perfectionism, the idea that salvation is a function of theological perspicacity. I can see that the various views of the atonement can affect how people sleep at night, but does it go beyond that?
Secondly, about the forensic view itself: Can it be called forgiveness of sins if restitution or sacrifice is required to affect reconciliation? Isn't that a quid pro quo concept of forgiveness?
Like Aage, I and many others left the Adventist church when we realized there was no future for honest exegesis and integrity. "Saving" the institutional church was the most important and administrators, barely able to even discuss theological issues, were the ones who made all decisions. "Staying by" would be an admission that integrity is no longer important for both myself and an institution to which I belonged. I have never regretted that decision: Truthfully, on occasions such as this it reminds me even more that the right decision was made.
Joselito,
Come by next weekend and say Hi and anyone else on this blog. It would be nice to associate a face with a name. Barring a huricaine that keeps us in Florida We'll be there.
I am an "ole white guy" with a goatee with a beautiful Filipino wife of 13 yrs...this description will likely cut down the search time!
regards,
pat
PS. Aage, thanks for your 8:08 first post...I feel you have correctly grasped the situation even if you now differ from Des. This is all the more why I respect Des' integrity!
Aage and Elaine,
I'm glad that you both stick around despite your distaste for a lot of the mud that clings to our Adventist roots. And as a pastor friend of mine put it so well, while mud definitely clings to our roots, upon examination we often discover things there that are also nourishing and life-giving.
But whatever the case, your contributions add a great deal to the conversations that happen here, and I hope you'll keep sticking around!
Pat - I had to read what you said twice! At first glance, I got the impression that you were married to a wife of thirteen years (that's really young!!). But on the second pass, I gathered that you've been married to your wife for 13 years (congratulations on that!)
Tom, I’ve always wanted to be a fringe element. Pat, I don’t believe Des has that book, thanks he’d be glad of it. Elaine, Des is going to speak on forensic justification when he comes, and there’ll be a DVD later if you can’t go; and an outline he’s prepared ahead for those who attend. Des knows there’s a variety of salvation metaphors, but justification is by far the most prominent. He’ll be speaking about the NPP, the moral influence theory and effective justification amongst other things. Someone else asked about had Des written a book on Jesus, yes: Jesus Only, came out just before the Baby book. Hi Auge, keep the faith. There was a lot to Glacier View; the scholars did object to Des’s being defrocked. Milton Hook’s bio of Des (sorry for the ad) is a reflection of what happened and matches our point of view.
Perhaps time to admit that there really is no baby in that dirty bathwater?
Jared,
My second marriage and we have been married 13 yrs. Glad you asked.
pat
After Dr. Ford's Investigative Judgment presentation, what if the bretheren had taken him out of the classroom and pulpit, without firing or defrocking him, and given him a two-year project to work with the religion department at PUC, to come up with a book similar to 'Questions On Doctrine' to deal constructively with the difficulties raised in his presentation? Des could have kept his office, salary, and home. I doubt that there would have been a media circus, or that so many people would have been fired or would have left the church. At the end of this two-year period, he could have resumed teaching and preaching...and promoting his new book. But wait...that would have made sense.
"Perhaps time to admit that there really is no baby in that dirty bathwater."
After so long a time, the water's been so muddied up, no one could find the baby if he looked!
Wow, it is indeed a pleasant reminisce to read the review and comments above. I am also a PUC alumnus and was at the infamous Oct. 27, 1979 Forum lecture in Irwin Hall on the Investigative Judgment. I can still hear the thunderous standing ovation Des was given at the end. I knew I had become part of something very significant in Adventism.
I can remember Wayne Jude giving a small talk before it started and remarking "how enough (cassette) tape would be produced from this meeting that would eventually strangle many of us". How ultimately prophetic he was.
I was also a theology major at the time and eventually changed my major due to how I was seeing Des treated.
On a humorous note - I took a class from Dr. Gane and during a lecture a loud car roared by, and Dr. Gane obviously annoyed, made the comment - "what was that?". A sharp witted Bill Truby came back with an immediate reply "I think it must have been a Ford" - from which the class burst into laughter.
Adventism was altered that day, whether it was for good or not, I guess depends on the individual. The fact that Adventism in North America has lost many of its educated class is unfortunate. Time will tell.
Don Barton: very good report of PUC back in 1979.
I am also an alumni (1982) of PUC and attended Dr. Ford's forum. An amazing thing happened immediately afterwards when Glen Mallory and I were casually talking about the forum. Kevin Paulsen came up to us and I thought "Oh, no, he is going to attack us and have one of his theological arguments over the issues raised in the forum." Instead he said, "Well, I guess the Lord expects me to love - even you guys!" This was the last thing we ever expected Kevin to say. I personally felt a subdued atmosphere over everyone after the forum, and I attribute that to the work of Spirit of God - when Jesus and the Bible were uplifted.
There were relatively few students that I could talk to about those themes. Most of them had a response like Ron Numbers: "I don't know, and I don't care."
To end on a joke like Don: Dr. Eric Syme, who gave "the rebuttal" of Des Ford's forum (or it turned out to be support) was a debater par excellence, and he did get a bit of a hard time with a theological major called Tom - who had gained the reputation as being the "class critic." So finally Syme had enough of it, and appeared one day to class in "cowboy" boots.
Of course, the first thing that happened was Tom put up his hand as usual, and asked Dr. Syme the question: "Dr. Syme, how come you came to class wearing those cowboy boots?" Syme replied: "They are for kicking critics!" The whole class roared in laughter.
Greg,
I agree with you! In our discussion, we must make sure we generate "more light than heat." We need to join Al Gore and do something about global warming!
Nic Samojluk, http://www.sdaforum.com
Aage,
Good question! After reading your comments posted on 29 August 2008 at 9:32, I decided to check my dictionary and discovered that it defines "forgiveness" as the willingness to forego the right to seek payment for a debt.
If you get a speeding ticket, and your friend pays for your fine. Would the judge have any right to say to you: "I decided to forgive you for your transgression"? If God demanded full payment for sin, then forgiveness makes no sense.
I wonder whether Des has considered the implications of the following explanation for the cross found in the book Education page 263:
*********
"Few give thought to the suffering that sin has caused our Creator. All heaven suffered in Christ's agony; but the suffering did not begin or end with His manifestation in humanity. The cross is a revelation do our dull senses of the pain that, from its very inception, sin has brought to the heart of God."
*********
It seems to me that this might be the clearest and most logical explanation ever written about the atonement. From this statement, we can deduct that God did not demand payment in terms of suffering required from the Son of God. God's suffering was the natural result of God's love for the people he had created.
When a parent is confronted with a rebellious child and offers his forgiveness, there is no legal requirement that the parent must suffer more than what he already suffered as the natural result of his/her love for the child.
Why did God allow the death of Jesus? In order to provide a window through wich we might understand the pain and suffering the Lord was subjected to as a result of sin and rebellion.
There is another statement by Ellen White I once read which went like this: "The cross was not a legal maneuver to balance the books of heaven." There was nothing to balance. Sin resulted in suffering both on earth and in heaven.
Before his death, Jesus said to his disciples: "You are clean by the words that I have spoken to you." He did not say, "You will be clean once I have paid the price for sin." Likewise, he told the paralitic, "Your sins are forgiven," and not "Your sins will be forgiven in the event I get killed."
This view of the cross agrees with what we find in the book of Revelation where there is a reference to the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." When did God suffer as a result of sin? From the beginning!
The Bible states that "In all their aflictions, he was aflicted." This means to me that by the time Jesus was born in Bethlehem, God had suffered more than enouth, not as a legalistic imposition, but as the natural result of his love.
Seen in this manner, the cross ceases to be an event in history, and becomes a process which started with Lucifer's rebellion in heaven, and will end when sin and rebellion is eradicated from the universe. What do we do then with the other theories of atonement? They simply become metaphors for a reality which surpassess those symbols.
When Jesus told his followers that they needed to eat his flesh and drink his blood, they were offended. The Lord then explained this symbol to them: "The flesh profiteth nothing, the words that I have spoken, they are spirit and they are life." [John 6:63] The power to save is not in the blood of Jesus, but rather in his words. His words created the universe and granted life to Lazarus. Anything else is mere symbols and metaphor.
Nic Samojluk, http://www.sdaforum.com
The pain I feel over Glacier View has not gone away and I fear it never will. The church I grew up in, had committed my life to and thought I knew vanished before my eyes.
I enjoyed this generous review of Des' latest book. There is little doubt in my own mind that Des was a prophetic voice sent to Adventism in the late twentieth century. We were so busy building memorials to an earlier prophet that we stoned this one.
One question I have on the review: Christ can be understood in many ways? What then of the Pauline insistence that there is only one gospel? Even if an angel from heaven preached another let him be accursed. Perhaps the real question is whether or not what Des teaches harmonizes with the biblical witness, and not whether or not it is one of any number of acceptable gospels in Adventism
Richard
As an “old timer,” a PUC alumni from the 1950’s, I appreciated this sensitive book review by Dr, Schneider and also the many good comments above. Having lived through and closely followed all the events since the 1950’s, I believe the present generation generally knows very little about the roots of the present SDA “Identity Crisis” --or even realizes that there is such a crisis! I sat in theology class at PUC and listened to R. A. Anderson defend his GC Committee’s book, Questions On Doctrine, during the time M. L. Andreasen was sending his Letters to the Churches opposing it. I personally talked with Al Hudson when he published Wieland and Short’s 1888 Re-Examined. I have never agreed with Wieland and Short’s continuing call for SDA corporate repentance for 1888 because I believe we can only repent for our own personal sins and errors. But I do believe that if we personally accept and perpetuate our father’s sins and errors, then we also personally share their guilt and need to repent of what we have made our own sins and errors.
I attended Des Ford’s climactic Fresno Debate with Dr. William Shea, and I talked with Des and Gillian Ford several times at GNU in Auburn. Gillian helped my late wife, Faith, and many other women suffering hormonal problems, and Des helped me get a copy of Dr. Kai Arasola’s book, The End of Historicism, from Europe, which was a great help to me in my long research project into SDA exegetical and theological roots which will soon be published in my book, "William Miller’s Enigmatic Time Setting Theory and the Seventh-day Adventist Identity Crisis."
I agree with the above comment of Aage Rendalen that “tradition and exegesis butted heads”. Tradition is a universal problem for all churches and religions. The “traditions of the elders” was at the heart of Christ’s conflicts with the Jewish leaders of His day.
He told them they made the Law of God of “none effect” by their traditions. But they stubbornly clung to them rather than accepting Him as their Messiah and Savior.
The Word of God vs. tradition was also a core issue in the Reformation. And SDA false traditions are also at the heart of the current SDA “Identity Crisis.” Adventism largely took over and rehashed Miller’s chronology and exegesis of Daniel 8:14, and then, after the Great Disappointment, through the Edson-Crosier-White-Bates nexus, reinterpreted the Disappointment as a spritualized "heavenly" "coming of Christ to His Father" rather than a literal earthly coming as Miller predicted. Their spiritualized reinterpretation soon developed into the Investigative Judgment doctrine in the late 1850’s. But what is not well known (or admitted by those who know) is that Miller himself assumed as his exegetical “keys” two contemporary Christian traditions of his era: (1) the so-called “day=year principle” that had come down from the Catholic exegete Joachim of Flores in the Middle Ages, and (2) the idea that the 70 Weeks and the 2300 “days” began at the same time around 457 BC. Thus, through “Father Miller,” these two “key” false “traditions of the elders” were carried over into SDA 1844 theology and are still being perpetuated today in the SDA 1980 “Dallas Creed” of 27 (now 28) Points of Fundamental Belief which was largely a corporate reaction to counteract Des Ford’s PUC challenge to the SDA traditional 1844 theology. But how can Adventism effectively fulfill Christ’s Gospel Commission and preach the “everlasting Gospel” of Rev. 14:6-12 when it stubbornly clings like the Jews to its traditional unbiblical “unique” 1844 theology as its chief “identity factor” --rather than obeying Christ’s parable and digging down to Christ the “solid Rock” and making Him our sole foundation? The answer is --when Adventism practices these words we have long sung in our churches, “On Christ the solid Rock I stand, all else is sinking sand”?
We can’t repent for “Father Miller,” or even for our early SDA pioneers. But if we personally accept and continue to perpetuate (actively or passively) their erroneous traditions we essentially repeat the errors of the Jews in Christ’s day and the basic Catholic error of the Council of Trent in their Counter Reformation, and share their guilt and need for repentance and reformation. It is a very rare thing to see a corporate church body repent and reform itself, but the Worldwide Church of God recently did it after Armstrong’s death, and Adventism can learn many lessons from them, and the Mormon’s can also. See my Book Review at http://www.amazon.com/review/product/0758605277/ref=cm_cr_pr_link_2?%5Fe...
about the parallels between Adventism and Mormonism. But as I said, tradition is a universal problem for all churches and religions, and each individual must face up to this problem individually before they can effectively do it in a corporate way.
---Arlin Baldwin
Arlin,
Thanks for your timely comments. Tradition seems more powerfull than biblical truth. Ellen White told us that age will not transform error into truth, but we think it will. I read Ford's book about Daniel 8:14 several times, and it seems to me that it is crystal clear that the way we have been teaching the Investigative Judgment doctrine has no solid biblical basis, but we persist in holding to this tradition.
I used to give Bible studies, and it seemed to me that I was teaching in harmony with the clear understanding of biblical prophecy, until I read Des' book. It opened my eyes to the undeniable fact that I was mistaken and was equating my church's tradition with biblical revelation. I was convinced that the belief in the sacredness of tradition was the exclusive prerogative of Catholics, until Des opened my eyes to my deception.
Des and Gill,
I have a question for you. I believe in what you describe as the apotelesmatic principle in the interpretation of biblical predictions. I believe that Daniel 8 was given for Daniel's people, and that any ulterior application of said prophecies had a secondary character. This means that the focus of said prophecy should have always been the Jewish race. It also means that our traditional arguments that Daniel 8 had nothing to do with the actions of Antiochus Epiphanes misses the main objective of said prediction.
You argued quite effectively in your book that, if Jesus' predictions in Matthew 24 had a double application--first to the fate of Jerusalem, and eventually to the end of the world--then it follows that other prophetical revelations might have likewise multiple applications.
Now my question to you: Have you ever considered the tollowing interesting interpretation of Daniel 8? The action in said chapter starts with the he-goat, which points to Alexander the Great, who in 334 B.C. defeated the persians. Why not use said historical date as a starting point for the 2300 days prophecy? Applying the year-day principle, if we allow for the lack of a zero year between B.C. and D.D., we arrive at 1967.
Did anything significant take place for Daniel's race in said year? Of course, the Six-Day Arab-Jewish War, which resulted in the access to the sacred wall of the Jerusalen Temple, and to the city of Jerusalem. Could it be that this is one of the multiple applications of this prophetical period? Could it also be that in the future there might be another partial fulfillment of this prophecy?
By the way, I am indebted for this theory to Dr. Dick Koobs of Loma Linda, who was in turn indebted for the same to John Newton the theologian, the brother of Isaac Newton, who made this prediction three centuries ago.
Nic Samojluk, http://www.sdaforum.com
Who has asked for the date of the Book of Daniel?
Most scholars agree that it was not written until ca 160 B.C. If that is so, then it was NOT a prophetic book, but a narrative of past events. Writing about events that have already occurred, yet positing them as future is an entire world of difference.
Some of the reasons given for a later date:
1. In 3:5 the name of one of the musical instruments is not only Greek but found with this meaning nowhere in Greek literature before the 2nd cent. B.C.
2. A large section of the book (2:4b-7:28) has come down, not in Hebrew, but in Aramaic, which the exiles learned to speak in Babylon and then became the people's tongue in the postexilic period, continuing through NT times.
3. The name "Chaldeans" is also used in a special sense it did not acquire till long after the Exile (1:3-5).
4. The fact that the book in the Hebrew Bible is placed among the Writings rather than the Prophets indicates a late date; if it had been in existence before ca. 200 B.C. it probably would have been included rather among the Prophets.
5. Writing ca. 180 Jeshua ben Sira lists the heroes of the faith from Enoch, Noah, and Abraham through Nehemiah (Ecclus. 44-49) but makes no mention of Daniel, evidently because he does not know of the book about him. OTOH, Daniel and his 3 companions are mentioned in 1 Macc. 2:59-60, probably composed late in the 2nd cent and fragments of the book apparently produced ca. the same time have been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls.
All this supporting evidence in the visions pointing to almost the precise year in which the book was composed: It was most likely on Dec 6, 167 B.C. that the temple was desecrated by the erection of an altar to Zeus (1 Macc. 1:54; 11 Macc. 6:2-5). In Daniel this event is referred to specifically as the "abomination that makes desolate" and is alluded to a number of times. Although the early reconsecration of the temple and resumption of worship is foretold, the prediction is too vague to have been written after the actual rededication under Judas Maccabeus, which occurred 3 years later (1 Macc. 4:36-58). Thus the book must have been written within this 3-year period, probably near the end of it.
What evidence is given for the earlier dating of Daniel that must be used for it to be prophetic?
Elaine
Of course your right on the date of the writing of Daniel.
Des was trying to throw the brethern a life preserved. The
brethern knew it wouldn't hold even the baby up let alone the Church. So the issue was the Church or Des. The end was no surprise. The details make a good story. I imagine a few are left out.
Institutionalism is a crazy quilt.
Now a story: A dental researcher friend of mine, contacted the senior researcher at a major gum manufacturer to suggest added floride ion to gum to inhibit dental caries. The researcher replied. You don't understand my job. My job is trying to find ways to take things out of gum, not put more in!
Neal understood his job too well!
We all learned a lot, dispite the pain. Tom
"Chief soiler of the water is the Investigative Judgment with all its correlates, such as the year-day principle of interpreting time prophecies, the “historicist” insistence on aligning all time prophecies with specific historical events and institutions--chiefly pagan and Christian Rome, and the twisting of the book of Hebrews to support the rationalizations Adventists produced for the significance of 1844 after the Great Disappointment."
How can anyone serve as a religion professor and conscientiously accept his pay while railing against fundamental SDA teachings? I have nothing against the man -- it's the principle of the situation.
Your Friend
You must not have read or heard anything Des wrote or said.
There was no railing about it. It was an alternative understanding of the passage--in keeping with the literal translation. An understanding the Church found unacceptable regardless of its accuracy and softness. The Church did the only thing it could do. It "killed" the messenger. Tom
I lived through the time of Glacier-View as a SDA and I felt that Des got off too light. His exegesis, if you can dare call it, that was deeply flawed. The Investigative Judgment is an absolutely essential part of the SDA theology and his attack struck at the very heart of Adventism and especially the Gospel of Jesus. If you don't like the Investigative Judgment, fine. Have the guts to go start you own church and leave the SDA church alone. SDA's believe in the Investigative Judgment. If you don't believe in it, you are not an SDA. Get out. Get over it. Your divisiveness is not wanted.
I don't know if others treated Him as well as they should have. But that is irrelevant to the truth or error of his teaching. And only children run around crying that Bobby hit them. Grow up.
allenroyboy
Certainly a forthright Christian Viewpoint: Next time write it in capital letters--so us blinded ones can really see it.
Tom
"Allenroyboy" sounds like the name is a perfect fit: Your viewpoint is as childish as any seen here.
Fortunately, it is not left to you to decide who should "get over it" or decide what is "divisive." Has someone in the G.C. given you the authority to speak for the official church of what should and should not be spoken about?
Please qualify your statements with relevant credentials; otherwise, you have no more nor less authority to speak than anyone here. Your "Christian Love" is most apparent.
I appreciate the chance to hear the perspectives of people who were close to this matter, their perspectives and how their lives were changed. I was two years old in 1979 and am now contemplating church employment and have some interest in what lessons may be learned. Arlin's point that we cannot apologize for others, but can avoid repeating the same mistakes is well-taken.
I hope the recent command to "Get out." will not attract undue attention and drown out an otherwise constructive conversation.
To the generations that shared your experience, thank you.
Blake Laing
For a bit of lengthy lightheartedness, let me quote a Baptist minister by the name of John Dowling, commenting in 1840 on William Miller's use of 457 BC as the starting point for the 1844 Dan 8:14 prophecy. (Cliff note version: Essentially he argues that in 457 BC there was no Roman empire, whether secular or sacred to kick off the 'little horn' prophecy, and he argues that the 70 weeks and the 2300 can't possible start at the same time).
"The reader is already aware that I do not regard the 'two thousand three hundred evenings and mornings' as prophetical days or years. As however, some of my readers may suppose that years are possibly intended by the 2300 days, I shall proceed to show that even upon the supposition that this is the case, Mr. Miller is still egregiously in error, in the date of their commencement, and consequently, in that of their termination...."
"Now let the reader observe..., Mr. M. places the commencement of these 2300 days (years) in the year B.C. 457, that is, more than a century before the he-goat or the four notable horns or the little horn had any existence! Is it not the very height of absurdity, to fix the date of the beginning of these calamities, (which the prophecy says were to occur in the latter time of the four kingdoms which sprung from Alexander's) more than a century before Alexander was born, and 126 years before the establishment of Alexander's Grecian empire?
To express this in the symbolical language of the prophecy, Is it not somewhat extraordinary, that this 'little horn' (whatever was meant by it) should spring out of one of the four horns upon the head of the goat, more than a century before the goat had any existence?
And yet this is the absurdity upon which Mr.M. builds his whole theory of the coming of Christ in 1843...
If I were to bring forward any other argument to refute this absurd idea, I fear my readers would think me like the lawyer, who, in undertaking to prove that a certain deed had not been signed by a designated individual, began by stating that he had fifteen reasons to allege why the man in question had not signed the deed, and promising to state them in order, began by saying, "My first reason is the unquestionable fact, that the man was dead before the deed was written; my second--" "Stop," said the judge, "if you can prove that, you may spare yourself the trouble of ennumerating your remaining fourteen reasons."
.....
On the 70 weeks of Dan 9:
"Before passing to Mr. Miller's next position, I would remark, that the commencement of the 70 weeks, and that of the 2300 days, cannot be identical, because the former commences at an event among the most joyful in the history of the Jewish nation, viz.: 'the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem,' after their long and weary captivity in Babylon should have ended; and the latter commences at an event among the most painful and calamitious in their history, viz.: 'the taking away of the daily sacrifice, setting up the abomination of desolation, and giving the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot.'"
It was there in plain sight to anybody who care to look--in 1840. It just illustrates how difficult it is for truth to pass through a self-imposed ideological filter.
John Dowling, An Exposition of the Prophecies Supposed by William Miller to Predict the Second Coming of Christ, in 1843. Providence, R.I.: Geo. P. Daniels, 1840, pp. 84-86.
"Because conversation is our mission, we publish all comments immediately. We simply request that you focus on the posted topic, and not attack anyone or use profanity."
allenroyboy said his piece without attacking anyone personally. According to the guidelines here, he is allowed his viewpoint. He spoke on topic.
I would hope some of spectrums long term participants could help set a better example if conversation is truely the mission.
Nic Samojluk, Editor, 3o Aug.6:36
Thank you for your kind response to my earlier comments about
tradition, etc.
Your questions about John Newton's theory are addressed to Des and Gill so I am perhaps presumptuous to comment. But I believe Dan. 8:9 and 23 clearly lays out the perameters for the rise and desolating trespass of the "little horn" in the "latter time" of the Greek Period's four horns, long AFTER Alexander. Since Dan. 8:14 is talking about the TERMINUS of the "little horn's" desolating trespass after 2300 tamid sacrifices have been "taken away,"it makes no sense to start the 2300 count long BEFORE the "little horn" arose and committed his "desolating trespass" as this theory seems to do. The 1967 six-day war may have prophetic sigificance, but it would seem much more reasonable to connect it with Luke 21:24 as many do than with Daniel 8 and the "little horn" within the Greek Hellenistic Period.
Aage Rendalen, 30 Aug. 4:11.
Yes Aage, John Dowling was one of Miller's most astute and able critics who thorougly refuted his unbiblical time-setting theory and eisegesis of Dan. 8.
"It was there in plain sight to anybody who care to look--in 1840. It just illustrates how difficult it is for truth to pass through a self-imposed ideological filter." Well-said.
But we all are prone to have such "filters." No "fact" is "value-neutral." Historians have long since learned this, but theologians are beginning to see their feet of clay also.
Our finite limitations keeps us all humble.Even Miller tried to put aside his preconceived opinions and asked his followers to do likewise. But alas, they all failed to meet their highest goals, and we probably do no better. Thankfully hindsight is much clearer than foresight or sight in the midst of the "fog of battle" so hopefully we can learn from our forefather's errors. Miller said,"“We have been disappointed, but disappointments will work for our good, if we make right use of them.” Have we made "right use" of 1844?
Arlin Baldwin
Thank you, Greg, for your refreshing and encouraging review of Des’ and Gill’s book. I enjoyed your thoughts. While I have not yet read the book, I affirm many of the comments above, especially Gill’s and Richard’s. And I'm sorrry I'll miss Des' visits to the US.
As one of the folks who invited Dr. Ford to preach in Toledo five times after the Glacier View fiasco, I am deeply grateful to him for introducing Christ and his gospel to me, and many others. Des made the gospel credible and accessible, and consistently demonstrated its grace and love, especially when referring to Glacier View events.
No doubt, I was attracted to Dr. Ford’s understanding of the Bible, as well as his written and oral eloquence. He is brilliant and compelling.
But what will stay with me forever is Dr. Ford’s laser-focus on lifting up Christ and proclaiming the gospel with love, authenticity, and compassion. Truly, Des is a man of God.
Allenroyboy wrote: "His exegesis, if you can dare call it, that was deeply flawed."
Posted by: allenroyboy | 30 August 2008 at 1:32
Allenroyboy: Have you read Dr. Raymond Cottrell's exegesis of Daniel 8:14? He was a most respected missionary and scholar, and received a very high honorary award for his life of faithful ministry. (Dr. Cottrell's exegesis of Daniel 8:14 is all over the internet and can be easily found with a Google search.) In what ways is Cottrell’s exegesis the same as Des Ford’s and also in what ways is it different?
Spectrum magazine also published Dr. Cottrell's short hand transcriptions of what actually happened at Glacier view. We see some recommendations made by Elder Jan Paulsen in Cottrell's notes as well.
Pay special attention to the survey that Dr. Cottrell did in which he showed that "In the closing poll, on the basis of Hebrews 9, 28 percent still opted with Ford that Christ began His second apartment ministry in the heavenly sanctuary at His ascension rather than in 1844. 35 percent agreed that each of the prophecies of Daniel has more than one fulfilment, and were thus in basic agreement with Ford's apotelesmatic solution to the problem.
34 percent dissented from Article 23 of the Dallas Statement of Fundamental Beliefs."
Allenroyboy, I have a question about the above statistics that may be you or any one else could answer for me: what I am not sure about is whether those percentages of Dr. Cottrell's survey were just of the scholars or of all of those present at Glacier View? If it was all of those present at Glacier view, that would mean that the 30 plus percentages could jump to over at least 60 percent (or more) of the scholars present at Glacier view, since I understand that many more administrators were present than scholars.
The following points are both from Greg Schneider's review of Ford's book:
A) Part of 'the baby' according to Des and Gil is "The continuation of spiritual gifts in the church, apparent in the prophetic ministry of Ellen White"
B) "Chief soiler of the water is the Investigative Judgment with all its correlates,. . . and the twisting of the book of Hebrews to support the rationalizations Adventists produced for the significance of 1844 after the Great Disappointment."
My Question: How can I believe in Ellen White if the Adventist doctrine of the 2300 years is faulty, (which I believe it is)? I believe that the prophetic gift of EGW and the Adventist doctrine of the 2300 years and 1844 stand or fall together. Ellen White highly endorsed the day/year principle and the 1844 ending date. She was among those who not only "packed their bags" on Oct. 22, 1844, but continued to endorse the reinterpretation, saying that GOD SHEWED HER that Crosier had "the true light on the sanctuary"---shut door and all. To deny the Adventist interpretation of the 2300 days is to deny EGW's inspiration.
If Oct. 22, 1844 is part of the muddy water, then so is Ellen White. I think this is part of the dilemma the denomination faces. If you knock down the 1844 "pillar", then the EGW "pillar" is next to go, because it seriously erodes her credibility and inspiration.
Ellen White was very unyielding in her position on the investigative judgment and 1844 until her death. So, the denominational leaders generally have to be supportive of the traditional position (whether they truly believe it or not). Scholars, such as Ford, who have challenged the church's position down through the years are considered heretics because they are taking a sledge hammer to the very foundation of the church's teachings. It does not matter that the scholars are accurate, articulate, logical, or reasonable. If this singular doctrine crumbles, the whole structure collapses from its own weight. If the church admits that this one doctrine is wrong, they must also give up their stated belief in the inspiration of EGW. Adventists are in a tough position, because they can't live with the prophet, and they can't live without her.
The time has come for amends....
It was an incredibly shameful day for the Seventh-day Adventist Church when our top administrative leadership made the fateful decision to defrock Dr. Desmond Ford.
Sadly, ecclesiastical religious tradition prevailed over sanity and progressive spiritual truth.
We truly did stone our own prophet; we attempted to kill the messenger.
To our very great loss we took our best and brightest gospel preacher and officially rejected and shunned him.
The archaic, cultic doctrine of the Investigative Judgment, created as a face-saving, psychological defense mechanism after the embarassing theological fiasco of the "Great Disappointment" of 1844 has been nothing but a terriffic distraction that has kept so many away from what should always have been the simple, sound, transforming, core belief of our Church: JESUS SAVES. NOW. BY FAITH ALONE.
There are three great spiritual truths. 1. God is love 2. Jesus saves 3. The Holy Spirit want to fill you right now and draw you into an intimate moment by moment connection with the Father, like He had. As Dr. Ford teaches it,the gospel is after all, all about relationship, all about oneness, all about practicing the Presence.
Everything else is commentary. Helpful? Yes. Informing? Yes. But commentary.
But I digress.--
The solid research and Scriptural evidence presented by Dr. Ford at Glacier View that the doctrine of the Investigative Judment can not be supported by Scripture is unassailable.
We are just kidding ourselves if we think the shameful action was taken against Dr. Ford only for theological reasons.
It was actually all about power, prestige and as in 1844, still about face-saving.
The elephant in the room the day the vote was taken to relieve Des of his credentials was simply this...
the church could not accept the present-day truth that Dr. Ford presented without letting go of its unquestioning support of the theology of Ellen White. Des's posistion was a direct challenge to the innerancy of Ellen White's posistion on the Sanctuary doctrine. The cultic regard with which many of the brethern held Ellen White automatically precluded them from being able to even consider Dr. Ford's enlightened posistion.
But that was then. This is now.
For whatever reasons the unfortunate decision was made by our leaders,and we can now look back on it and see what a travesty it was.
Now is the time at last for official amends to be made.
Recently, in a very moving service, the President of Pacific Union College stood in front a campus-wide assembly and dared to make amends for the intolerant, bigoted, un-Christian official policies and behavior of the College and the Church toward African-American and other minority students at the school in the not-so distant past. It was a memorable and remarkable example of the power of making amends even years after the injustices have been done. It was a freeing and healing experience.
Dr. Ford is approaching his 80th. birthday. Time is running out for us to act.
The incredible grace and forgiveness and loyalty this man has consistently shown our church and those in it who so wronged him and judged him has been a touching and profound example of love and forgiveness to all of us.
Neither Dr. Ford nor his gracious wife (who we usually forget surely suffered her own pain and wounds from the experience) has ever asked for or expected an apology from the church. But truth has progressed! The time is here for the church to officially offer Dr. and Mrs. Ford 1. a heart-felt apology 2. The return of his credentials.
Perhaps Dr. Ford does not want his credentials back. That is up to him.
But...for the church to heal and regain some of its credibility and integrity with the thousands and thousands of members who were hurt and discouraged by what happend 30 years ago, we need to make amends and apologize to him and offer the credentials back.
So, let't make it happen.
I ask that Spectrum's board allow the editors to lay temporarily aside their journalistic obejectivity and perform an act of healing service to the church. I request that they quickly organize and preside over the writing of a petition to be signed electronically or physically by as many church members as possible a petition to our Church administrators. Such a petition to be presented at the coming Autumn Council. This petition would officially apologize to Dr. and Mrs. Ford for not allowing him to express his truth to the church in an open atmosphere free of fear and coercion and retribution and furthermore, ask the Council to restore his ministerials credentials to him without delay.
I and many others I know would be pleased to contribute to any expenses Spectrum might incur for such an important undertaking.
Respectfully,
Douglas Cooper, Ph.D. (Andrews University seminary graduate 1967)
Gill,
It is very good to hear from you, and especially good to read your appreciation of my review. I am grateful that you and Des received it in the spirit it was intended. I want to underline for other readers of this blog a couple of things you said in your first (29 August 2008 at 2:49) post. Your book, indeed, DOES NOT read as an attack and a demand, especially not for yourselves. Des claims that Glacier View was a blessing for him, setting him up for a million miles of travel in many countries preaching and writing the gospel, NOT, he is quite explicit, making polemics against the Investigative Judgment (p. 127). The call you and Des make for wrongs to be righted pertains to the damage done to people in and through faulty institutional processes. If I gave the impression in my review that you were asking people to repent their beliefs, I apologize to you and to all readers, especially to Dave Larsen, whose post (28 August 2008 at 11:09) you appear to read as rebuking the call to make things right. I find Dave’s remarks enigmatic, to put it gently, but I will deal with that below or in a seperate post.
To all readers,
I want to stress further that attacking the Investigative Judgment was not an axe Des was grinding during his years at PUC, either. There is an assumption underlying many of the blog posts here and in other conversations I have had or overheard that the animus against Des among a faction of SDA pastors, laity, and adminstrators had chiefly or even exclusively to do with what he said in the fateful October 27, 1979 address in Irwin Hall. Des’s detractors were mostly theological perfectionists who based their doctrines chiefly on Ellen White and her reading of Scripture. His pitting of the tradition of the Magisterial Reformation against their perfectionist traditions, and especially his facility at claiming Ellen White for the Lutheran tradition, was obnoxious to them. The October 27, 1979 address was something he produced at the urging of fellow professors at PUC who were trying, urged on by college adminstration, to build up the local chapter of the AAF. The title, “The Investigative Judgment: Theological Milestone or Historical Necessity,” was not Des’s coinage, but something given to him by local AAF co-chair, Adrian Zytkoskee, who was also, incidentally, my immediate boss as chair of the Behavioral Science department. The role of that address in the politics of theological controversy was to give Des’s enemies a weapon with which finally to bring him down, a task they had long been trying to accomplish.
Thus, to Orthodoxymoron (I love your online handle),
Your characterization of Des as throwing a monkey-wrench into the Adventist machine is, I think, apt only to the degree that the “Adventist machine” is inherently perfectionist and falls apart irreparably if one tries to introduce other ways of understanding humanity, Christ, and salvation. If Bull and Lockhart’s take in their 2nd edition, chapter 5 is right, then maybe the perfectionist machine metaphor is entirely apt. On the other hand, maybe Adventism, especially at the level of local churches and schools, is a more adaptable machine than that, as Adrian’s observations (29 August 2008 at 1:21) might suggest. Your own effort in your later post (29 August 2008 at 2:52) to imagine an alternative course of action for “the brethren” of the Glacier View era suggests that Des need not have been regarded as monkey wrench in a machine, but rather as an opportunity to build up the Body of Christ.
I am sorry I am not answering everyone's questions, but I am going to do just two posts. One a comment on Doug Cooper's posting and the other about the point of GV. I was thinking that maybe Spectrum should have posted this review next week when Des has finished his talk because maybe the powers that be will try to have the meeting stopped. Thank you Doug for your posting. It's a brave statement. But Des will always be a thorn in the flesh and a stumbling block to many SDAs, and the credentials idea is not likely to ever happen. The church took away Des's credentials in 1980 after Glacier View, but they met in 1983 and then took away Des and Smut's ordination. Des had told Elder Wilson that he couldn't take away his ordination, because it was 'the mighty ordination of the pierced hands', a phrase coined by Spurgeon, i.e., man does not ordain, God does it. But they took it away anyhow. The important thing and the purpose of the books we have just put out (Jesus Only and For the Sake of the Gospel: Throw Out the Bathwater but Keep the Baby) is to appeal to the church to preach the gospel and make Jesus central. Unfortunately, people being the way they are, it might end up in a bunfight if Des were taken back in.
At Glacier View, the president of the South Pacific Division took a similar stance to allanroyboy that if Des didn’t believe in the IJ, he should hand in his resignation. It suggests Des is sly and amoral, but we won’t go there. If things were simplistic, they might have a point. But Des is only one of a series of people who have loved the church, yet have questioned the Investigative Judgment down the years. Too easy to take a position like the young Mormons, who recently sat in our living room and said, ‘I have a witness that Joseph Smith is a prophet,’ and their minds are sealed to any other possibility. It certainly saves thinking. Des wrote his commentary on Revelation in the same year as the PUC forum, which led to GV, and the research for that book clarified his thinking on prophetic interpretation. Kathie says Ellen White supported the IJ and to deny the SDA interpretation of the 2300 days is to deny EGW’s inspiration. Des would say that in Great Controversy, EGW copied the views of particularly J.N. Andrews and Uriah Smith, and they were wrong on certain points. But she had less and less to say on the subject of the IJ as she aged. He has read all the Review and Herald articles she wrote and there is nothing in those books from EGW about the IJ. We get mud slung from every side, and many get angry with Des because he won’t damn the SDA church or Ellen White. But he has read voluminously in EGW and has retained a huge respect for her. There would be very few people who have read and studied Ellen White the way Des has. There are some things in Great Controversy, which in his opinion are more insightful than the best of modern scholarship. He said to me today that Ellen White in Desire of Ages has the exact view of the atonement given by the church down through the ages. Des has read widely in the classics, such as the works of Charles Haddon Spurgeon and such writers fostered his great love for the gospel of righteousness by faith. It seems to me that some don’t know what the protestant churches at large have taught down the ages on the atonement, and they go off on philosophical tangents, trying to mould God and his salvation the way they think it ought to be. Richard is right, Paul teaches there is a true and false gospel, and individuals need to work out what they are. So people can understand, there were a number of forces pressing Des at the time of Glacier View. There had been years of pressure by the conservatives in Australia on the Australasian president to get rid of Des. Prior to Keith Parmenter, the Division personnel in Australia defended Des, but Elder Parmenter gave in to pressure from the conservatives. Mind you, the previous administration would have had a problem with Des’s stance, but they would have treated him differently. Robert Brinsmead spoke out on righteousness by faith and then against the Investigative Judgment, and Des was asked about this in many public meetings in 1979. The South Pacific Division counselled with RDB’s brother and believed his assertion that Des was in collusion with Bob (which wasn’t true, but we weren’t asked). Then the Pacific Union College Forum asked Des to address this topic at PUC. The Australasian president had previously told Des that he would not go back into teaching when he returned to Australia. Des knew he would not survive in the field, and felt he had nothing to lose by speaking out. In earlier years, Des listened to Ellen White when she said in II Selected Messages, that ‘we have much to learn and much to unlearn’; ‘we only have the first gleamings of light . . .’, and that truth can afford to be fair.’ She loved Christ and the cross supremely and wished these were made the subject of every sermon; and also said our churches were as dry as the hills of Gilboa. Des took all of this very seriously. His scholastic studies were mainly done in the area of eschatology, the study of the last things and prophetic interpretation. In this specialty area, scholars began to talk about inaugurated and consummated eschatology. With Christ’s first coming came the kingdom of God on earth; the NT teaches that believers are living in the Last Days and the Time of the End, and that the Judgment came with the Cross. SDAs had interpreted Daniel 2, the stone hitting the mountain as being applied to the first Advent only and following the principles of historicism developed a timeline for God to follow until the Second Advent. But, in fact, the Bible doesn’t see a great gap between the First and Second Advents of Christ, and Daniel 2 applies to both Advents. The Cross event, the stone hitting the mountain, convulsed time and brought in eternity. Christ and his Cross were God’s last word. And this wipes out all date-setting, which Christ forbade, and also wipes out looking for events as guideposts to mark the way. Jesus tells us there’ll be wars and rumours of wars, nation against nation, famines. . . in essence nothing but trouble; but the only sign he gives of his coming is the preaching of the gospel. ‘This gospel of the kingdom will be preached to the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come’. If this is so, and the Bible says it, should not the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom be our main focus? Why then would people say that Des only has one string on his harp? The judgment? Yes, there’s a judgment of the believer at the end of time, but it’s a ratification of that judgment achieved when the sinner accepts Christ’s work for him on the cross. It is like the one in Zechariah 3. Satan accuses, Joshua the High Priest [representing us] is dressed in filthy rags, and the angel of the LORD is for the defense. ‘The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?’ And the angel calls for his helpers to take off his filthy clothes and put a rich garment and a clean turban on him. In the judgment, Jesus in at our side and on our side, and there is no fear in judgment for the believer. The bottom line is that the understanding of justification by faith changes the mode of interpreting prophecy. Jesus becomes the centre and focus of prophecy. The final events in Revelation are built on a paradigm of Christ’s suffering (the body will suffer like the head). It’s a very different way of seeing things, because the spotlight goes away from the Adventist church and us, us, us as the center of everything, and rather focuses on Christ. It means people have to give up old ways of thinking. Not all agree, and not all see any need to change. They like the old ways. And of course, that’s their right. Des is recovering from the flu at the moment, a very rare event for him and very inconvenient, which is why I have written this, but he did read it before I posted it. He is still coming.
There has been a great oversight to date in assessing the heritage of Des Ford’s life, a heritage which goes far beyond Glacier View and the matter of 1844. It is my profound privilege along with Lorraine my wife, and dozens of others, to make a fortnightly pilgrimage whenever possible to a farm at Peachester in Queensland where Des’s daughter Ellene has set up a meeting place for the express purpose of giving her father a continuing voice. We sit in constant awe at the wealth of information and inspiration delivered without the benefit of notes and on a great variety of topics, inevitably centering on the person and mission of Christ. The resource material produced by Des in constant untiring succession would not have its equal anywhere within our church, or elsewhere. One simply sits in amazement that we forced this great man out of our midst, and the continuing thought is, “what fools we are!” Providentially every lecture is recorded. A web site (www.desford.org.au) has material that would launch a thousand sermons the likes of which are rarely heard. And this, I believe, will be Des’s greatest long-term gift to the church he has always loved. There are those of us intent on finding the funds to set up a full web-based index of all the sayings, topics, expositions and textual commentary from all lectures, recordings, and printed materials emanating from this man. Regrettably the pulpits that then come alive will not always be our own. But then who do we blame but ourselves and what we allowed? For the rumbling heard on an August day in 1980 was not the sound of a restless glacier, but the unseemly thud of a baby being thrown out with the bathwater!
To all those with a passion to defend the doctrine of an end-time investigative judgment--why would a God who knows even the hairs on our head and sees even a sparrow as it falls, need consult archives to determine the sheep from the goats?
Sounds pretty much like the secular Christmas song: "He's making a list, checking it twice to see who's naughty or nice!" Seems to me that investigative judgment advocates would be very careful about the tone of their blog entries.
Just a slip of the pen and out you go into utter darkness!
Even with a pen name, God knows and is keeping score! Tom
Hi Greg!
Thanks for correcting my understanding of your review, which I read as a marvel of cordiality and criticism.
I did take from it that a large part of the book is devoted to a critique of the IJ and that this includes a call for some kind of theological corporate repentence. But perhaps not.
In any case, instead of peppering you with these questions, I can purchase the book myself and get my answers from it.
Turning to the other matter, I apologize for being "enigmatic, to put it gently." That was not my intent. I wanted to be concise but clear. So I'll try again.
In general I am an old fashion liberal who believes in evolutionary theological change because I think that more revolutionary approaches often destroy the possibity of cumulative and inclusive doctrinal development.
My application of this general point to the situation at PUC so long ago is that perhaps this is not what took place. But you know better than I.
At the time, from my perspective at Loma Linda, it seemed to me that my colleagues at PUC had come unhinged. I say this as a graduate of both Prep and the College who thought he knew something about the place and the people. I guess not!
Although I have been attending SDA worship services since I was born in 1946, to this very moment I cannot recall ever hearing a sermon about the IJ in church. Likewise, although I have been a SDA minister since 1970, to this very moment no one has ever asked me what I think about the IJ.
In view of this, I could not understand why anyone on "the Hill" would bring it up. I still don't know.
Your point that the tensions on the campus at that time were less about the IJ and more about perfectionism helps me. But then I wonder why my colleagues at PUC, by encouraging him to make the presentation, gave Doctor Ford the theological rope with which his critics on this other issue hung him?
Didn't anyone in Angwin at that time--conservative, moderate, liberal-- have the sense that God gives a goose?
Is that less enigmatic? I hope so!
I wish you could see me as I write these words because then you'd know that I'm not fuming but smiling.
As I've said before, my problem is that I just don't get it.
Many thanks, Greg!
Dave
As someone who wasn't old enough to remember these events, I find it fascinating to hear the memories of those of you who were not just old enough to remember, but part of the story.
As someone who has often stayed in the Adventist church with the express idea to change some of what I believe needs changing, I have to heartily but respectfully disagree with allenroyboy's suggestion that it is unethical to be paid by the church and yet be working for a change, even a change of doctrine. The church is made up by people--it doesn't exist without our involvement and endorsement. Even our fundamental beliefs, which has clearly become a creed even though the preamble states expressly that it should not be used that way, are open to change, to evolving understandings of truth. Clearly that is a goal more easily stated on paper than actually achieved, though.
Dr. Cooper--I think your idea is a great one, and I'll pass it on.
There’s little doubt that I’ll buy the book and read it with great interest, as anyone who lived through “that” experience would. There’s so much here to respond to that it’s hard to choose. So, I’ve decided to address what I see as the two extremes in these comments, that being allenroyboy and Dr. Cooper.
Allenroyboy’s approach to the Ford problem is straightforward:
1. SDA’s believe in the investigative judgment.
2. Ford does not believe in the investigative judgment.
3. Ford is not an SDA.
4. Ford needs to move on (and take his theology with him).
Cooper, on the other hand, wants the Church to officially apologize and reinstate Ford. It would be hard to find a better example of polar opposites on the same web page. I have a little advice for these two gentlemen. First, allenroyboy:
Our Church has 28 Fundamental Beliefs. The first one reads as follows:
“The Holy Scriptures, Old and New Testaments, are the written Word of God, given by divine inspiration through holy men of God who spoke and wrote as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. In this Word, God has committed to man the knowledge necessary for salvation. The Holy Scriptures are the infallible revelation of His will. They are the standard of character, the test of experience, the authoritative revealer of doctrines, and the trustworthy record of God's acts in history.”
In addition to this, at the conclusion of the “Second International Bible Conference for Bible Teachers and Theologians” the attendee’s produced six affirmations and invited all SDA’s to join with them in these affirmations. The first one reads as follows:
“We affirm, first and foremost, our commitment to Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, to the final authority of God's Word, the Holy Scriptures, and to the leading of the Holy Spirit.”
Therefore, based on these statements, we as SDA’s publicly state:
The Bible is the authoritative revealer of doctrines and it has final authority.
Ford’s problem, allenroyboy, is that he actually believes what we as a church publically state regarding the bible. He takes the bible, and the bible only, believing it has the final word on our teaching of the investigative judgment, and can’t find it in there. He finds no biblical basis for Jesus moving from the holy place to the most holy place in the heavenly sanctuary on October 22, 1844 (a.k.a. phase 1 and phase 2). He finds no biblical basis for Jesus and the Father getting together to investigate people who confess their sins. He finds no biblical basis to investigate people in heaven that have eternal life prior to 1844, such as the multitude that went to heaven with Jesus. Ford appears to be blind to this entire teaching. He thinks it’s not biblical.
So, he asked the church to show him where it was, using the criteria publically set forth -- bible only and final authority. Our administration responded by abandoning these standards and chose your line of reasoning:
1. SDA’s believe in the investigative judgment.
2. Ford does not believe in the investigative judgment.
3. Ford is not an SDA.
4. Ford needs to move on (and take his theology with him).
This approach is much easier than to exegetically demonstrate the biblical basis for investigative judgment. Ironically, what prevents them (church administrators) from proving this doctrine is what they wrote in Fundamental Belief No. 1 and the First Affirmation noted above. So, they moved Ford on.
Simply put: Ford wants our Church to eliminate the hypocrisy. We as SDA’s can’t state publically that the Bible is THE AUTHORITATIVE WORD OF GOD and IT HAS FINAL AUTHORITY, and at the same time teach that the investigative judgment is founded on scripture – and scripture alone. It’s not.
In regards to Dr. Cooper’s extreme proposal to reinstate Ford, I have a suggestion for him to consider. First, your proposal has no teeth. It means nothing to gather a bunch of signatures and present them to the administration of our church. They may look at them, they may not. Either way, those signatures would be discarded and business would continue as usual. They only thing that gets their attention is a significant decrease in revenue. If something triggers this, they respond rather quickly. Therefore, if you could combine with your idea an action that would greatly reduce their source of revenue, until they did the right thing regarding Ford, then you will reap the fruits of your labor. I see this as the dog wagging the tail instead of the other way around. The tail has been in charge too long.
You, being a graduate of Andrews, can figure out rather quickly how to implement this action. Me, being a numskull from PUC, would suggest withholding tithe until Ford is reinstated. I can’t think of any bigger teeth than “tithe teeth” can you? I’ll be the first to sign your petition and start the withholding process. In the future, please consider refining your extreme proposals.
seekernotdefender
Hi!
Because of its close working relationship with Doctor Ford, as evidenced by the upcoming Loma Linda lecture it is sponsoring, as well as the biography of him it has recently published, I wonder if it might not be appropriate for "Adventist Today" to take the leadership on the petition drive that Doctor Cooper recommends.
At the very least, I doubt that AF should launch this effort without conferring with AT. Perhaps it could be a joint endeavor.
I am no longer on the Adventist Forum Board. If I were, I think I would vote against this well-meaning proposal because I do not think it will succeed.
If for any reason it fails, as I think likely, this outcome is almost certain to intensify and make more widespread the unhappy thoughts and feelings that still exist after all these years.
Here is an analogy: A man usually doesn't propose to a woman until he is pretty sure that she'll say "yes" because he knows that if she doesn't he is worse off than if he had never asked!
Thank you for considering my thoughts!
Dave
Seekernotdefender has the most logical solution and it deserves serious consideration. Words mean little or nothing; but money DOES talk! All those willing to sign Dr. Cooper's suggested statement should also be willing and ready to also sign an accompanying statement that all signators' tithes would be withheld from the official church (they could be put in an account set up for this purpose to show good faith and that merely withholding was not being done). This tithe could also go to the ADRA, an organization that is not controversial.
It is a well-known fact that it is the tail of third world countries that wags the NAD dog and that it is the first world countries the NAD supports and it is the greatest supporter of the world organization. Simple math would likely show that many Atoday and Spectrum supporters are better educated and probably more able to give larger tithe funds also. If it sounds perverse, one can only fight with what tools he has and in this case, the tithe is the most obvious tool that we, individually, are able to control as unlike governments that tax involutary, tithe is always a voluntary act.
There are many of us who tithe regularly, but only to our local church where we have a voice and can determine the needs. This is another alternative, as there is nothing other than G.C. "policy" that designates the "storehouse" and that is changes the distributed percent to various operations at will.
As an aside: Gillian mentioned Smuts, who was also defrocked with Des. By what method was he able to ingratiate himself and be "redeemed" as at last note, he was pastoring the Vallejo Drive Church in Glendale. What requirements did the church mandate in order for him to resume denominational employ?
Gillian, if Ellen White plagiarized her views of the Investigative Judgment from fallible men, (in the Great Controversy and other places) and pawned them off as Divine inspiration, that is still a problem to me. I am familiar with Ellen's own claims that all her writings are of Divine origin, rays of light direct from the throne of God. I am also familiar with the G.C. commissioned 8-year study of Dr. Fred Veltman done at PUC showing otherwise.
I believe that Ellen White did lift up the cross. She copied from her extensive library, and according to the Veltman study, the "Desire of Ages is for the most part derived". The fact that Desire of Ages is Christ-centered, does not erase the fact that her writings are greatly flawed in other places (historically, theologically and scientifically). The sooner the denomination clearly states that we are "Bible only" people instead of making Ellen White an "authoritative" source of truth, the better off we will be. Why should we consider Ellen White any more authoritative than the individuals from whom she copied? The reason we can't easily advance to better understandings of theological issues, is that a significant segment of Adventism is still tied to the inerrancy of Ellen White's writings, and this is the official position of the Fundamental Beliefs. If the church had been in the right position of "Bible Only" instead of "Bible plus Ellen White" 30 years ago, there would have been no reason to take away the credentials of a God-loving, God-fearing, Christ-centered, Cross-preaching scholar like Des. The church had to choose between great scholarship and Ellen White with her trail of errors. Unfortunately they chose the latter. So, we are still wallowing around in the muddy waters of traditionalism, when we should be drinking of the crystal clear water of life and lifting up Christ and Him crucified.
"Although I have been attending SDA worship services since I was born in 1946, to this very moment I cannot recall ever hearing a sermon about the IJ in church. Likewise, although I have been a SDA minister since 1970, to this very moment no one has ever asked me what I think about the IJ."
Dave,
Yours is a very interesting experience. Does this mean that you have never sat through a Daniel or Revelation seminar?
If you mean Sabbath morning service, then upon further reflection, I would think that many of us are close to your experience as well. And doesn't this present a curious and somewhat disturbing scenario?
Here is the one unique doctrine that separates SDA from all other Christian denominations. A doctrine that whenever challenged in our history has caused heads to roll. A doctrine that is constantly reiterated in our evangelism and SS quarterlies. A doctrine that must be assented to for baptism... and yet it is rarely to never preached from our pulpits from week to week?
That would be like Lutherans abandoning preaching JBF within the first 140-150 years of their history! Is their anything wrong with this picture??
Could this indicate an institutional cognitive dissonance between our officialy stated belief and our real life praxis? Could this not also indicate the need for a real review of a central belief that spells out what's going on up in heaven right now, but that ironically...at least according to the real life picture that you and others like Daneen have described on this thread... seems to have little practical impact on the lives of people down here on earth at the same time?
A troubling picture!
Thanks...
Frank
I was in Church School 1934 through 1939--The IJ was a constant. Only Edward Heppenstall and my folks saved my mind.
Dr. Heppenstall was MV Sec of the Michigan Conference and his wife to be was a student at E.M.C. so we got a lot of chapel talks from Edward--all upbeat!!!! Tom
Hi Frank!
You are right: I don't recall a sermon on this topic in any church service. Neither has anyone ever asked me about it since my Bible Doctrines Class at PUC, and even then I wasn't asked to sign on some dotted line. I have never sat through a Revelation Seminar so I have no idea what they are like.
I think this sort of thing is pretty typical in all denominations. I gather from Doctor Zwemer that the Presbyterian Church he attends does not demand that he assent to TULIP in all its severest respects. I doubt that his congregation has heard a sermon in its totoal defense in recent years. For most Calvinists in this country the harshest points of TULIP have long since been sanded smooth enough to be comfortable.
But the most effective way to resurrect TULIP in its worse expressions among Calvinists would be for someone openly and with great drama to denounce it, especially if along the way some participants get humiliated or have their motives questioned.
This is what happens with governmental laws too. There are a number of them in most states that are neither enforced nor removed from the books, though every so often there is a move to clean things up.
But this poses the big danger: Existing but unenforced rules and regulations can always be selectively administered against preceived "trouble makers."
This is why I was disappointed that my colleagues at PUC resurrected the IJ conflict three decades ago and this is why I hope we don't resurrect it again now.
I doubt that SDAism will ever formally repudiate IJ and I think it unrealistic to expect this. But I suspect that in most parts of the world it has long since ceased being a central feature of the day-to-day experience walk with God of SDAs. Unless we keep interfering, I expect this process to continue.
Meanwhile, I think we need to recall that the theme of "sanctuary" is one of the most pervasive and rich in the whole of Scripture. I believe that we do not have God's permission to withhold these treasures from other people just because we can't agree on some very technical aspects of the interpretation of a very few passages of Scripture.
The basic message of "sanctuary" is "God with Us." This is what is was in the Torah, Writings and Prophets. This is what it was in the Gospels, Epistles and Apocalypse, especially the last. This is what it was in 1844. And this is what it is now.
How dare we keep this good and much needed news to ourselves?
Thanks Frank! Welcome to "Church Leadership 101!!"
Dave
Drs. Cooper, Larson, seekernotdefender, Greg and everyone else who is interested: Last October there was the 50th anniversary conference of the book Questions on Doctrine at Andrews University. At these meetings the scholars demonstrated that they were capabable of managing controversial subjects with a wonderful demonstration of love amid the wide diversities of opinions.
I would like to propose a similar anniversary conference commemorating Glacier view. May be Adventist today could sponsor such a conference? Reports of the conference could appear in the Adventist Review and on the internet. I would suggest to do this first as a first step in bringing about the healing and reconciliation most of us in this blog so desire.
This could lay a foundation to show that the church's scholars can be trusted and respected. Once that is created, then the rest can follow.
(P.S.: David Larson and Greg: thank you for your constructive comments and suggestions.)
I'm looking forward to reading this book. I have the pleasure of attending both a local SDA Church, and, along with many other SDA Youth, I'm very blessed to hear Dr Ford speak every second Sabbath afternoon in Queensland, Australia. His talks are now available on YouTube, the latest being from last week. You can access them from this link:
http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=pangear
I find his talks extremely relevant and insightful.
He is, without doubt, the best preacher I have had the pleasure of listening to and learning from.
The Author of Hebrews has some odd theology at the end of his book for Jewish Christians. Evidently, he was never set free from his legalistic roots:
"Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral." Heb. 13:4.
Shame on you, writer of Hebrews! Who did you copy that judgment teaching from, some navel-gazing perfectionist?
John the apostle must have been unduly influenced by this Hebrews guy because he records more perfectionism heresy, allegedly the words of Jesus himself to active church members:
"If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place." Rev. 2:5.
"...I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God." Rev. 3:2
"So, because you are lukewarm--neither hot nor cold--I am about to spit you out of my mouth." Rev. 3:16.
O come on, John! Haven't you heard the gospel