Archive for the ‘Seventh-day Adventist Issues’ Category

Morality In Music

By admin On May 10, 2018 No Comments

Morality in Music

Recently my son said something about music that really got me to thinking:

I feel sorry for people who say that drums and guitars with full bodied choirs and orchestras—often music with much personality and deep emotion—is not acceptable. They are missing out on some of the most beautiful expressions of love and emotion that we has humans can bring to our maker. I firmly believe that music—all kinds of music—is the life blood of the universe and (along with mathematics) a universal language.

Music That Has Blessed Me

All of the genres of music that have blessed and taught me over the years came back to me as I thought about what my son had said. I knew what he was talking about. Many morally object to

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Catholic or Adventist: The Ongoing Struggle Over Authority + 9.5 Theses

By admin On July 8, 2017 No Comments

The Seventh-day Adventist church that is moving dangerously close to the kind of kingly power we have always spoke out against in the Holy Roman Catholic Church (with its Magisterium). Ellen White fought against this same thing (a hostile takeover by the GC) in the late 1800s.

I have been warning those in our church about these things for the last couple years. This same warning is now being lucidly articulated from one who, because of where he’s been, is in a better position than I am to really know the truth. The essay below should be read by everyone in the Seventh-day Adventist church. If our unions and conferences do not stand together and take decided against this power grab by the General Conference then we will fall one by one…

Just read

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Should Women Be Slaves?

By admin On October 8, 2016 1 Comment

“The laying on of hands is ordination to slavery.” – Dr. Darius Yankiewicz

womenShould women be slaves? Some of us think so…

A Misunderstanding of Authority

Jesus insists that the terms “slave” and “servant” are the terms through which His followers should view authority (Matthew 20:26). What kind of authority does a slave have? It is certainly not “power” as we understand it today. It is this issue that has sidetracked many Seventh-day Adventists when considering the ministry of women in the church.

In the 1890s-1920s Christian Fundamentalism crept into the Adventist church as a reaction to the excesses of liberal theology. Although this was not all bad, an unfortunate result of joining forces with fundamentalism was that we accepted a skewed idea of authority, gradually accepting fundamentalist ideas on authority and women in

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A God of Wrath?

By admin On September 21, 2016 No Comments

Does God Destroy?

God desires us to trust in Him, but how can one love and trust a god of wrath, a divine power that so many see as vengeful, exacting, and harsh? So often He has been portrayed as severe, vindictive, and hostile. Yet in my understanding, that is not what God is like. Here I want to paint the picture I see of Him.

Importance of God’s Character

In Behold Your God, FT Wright says, “The question of God’s character became the most critical element in the mission of Jesus and the fate of the Jews. They believed the Messiah would exalt them by use of the sword. They saw God as the vengeful, destroying One of the Old Testament. Their concept of that

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A Letter to the 2016 NPUC Constituents

By admin On September 20, 2016 No Comments

npuc

I’m sure you have heard the accusation of insubordination (or rebellion) that some have leveled at our conferences and unions. I believe this is because of a misunderstanding of church policy. The church has never made a gender qualification for ordination, and decades of church-sponsored research on the theology have found no prohibition. There is no policy against unions authorizing the ordination of women pastors. Neither is there any policy requiring unions to ordain anyone. It follows then, that Unions are free to consider women as well as men.

Those in doubt about Seventh-day Adventist gender policy need to take a closer look at Fundamental Belief #14, “Unity in the Body of Christ.” In part it says, “In Christ we are a new creation; distinctions of race, culture, learning, and

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15 Epic Mistakes of Headship Theology

By admin On July 16, 2016 2 Comments

I have recently talked with several 4th and 5th generation Seventh-day Adventists who grew up in our schools. Every one of them have expressed their dismay over a new theology in our church—Headship Theology—that is being touted by some as a traditional Adventist belief. If it is a traditional doctrine, then how could so many of us have spent decades in Adventist schools and not heard of it until recently? The only one I’ve talked with that did hear of it when she was in school, heard about it from Bill Gothard’s umbrella people in a homes-school group. At the time, she was grateful for the sane and balanced SDA theology that contrasted so strongly with, as she put it, “the Gothard cult.”

Being a 4th generation Adventist myself, I will have

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Giving In To Culture: The Adventist Gender Error

By admin On June 23, 2016 No Comments

Giving in to culture

Just Who Is Giving In To Culture?

Those Adventists who are against ordaining women have one argument totally wrong. It is their go-to argument when speaking out against those who seek to lift women up to their Godgiven stature.

What is this argument?

It is that supporting women’s ordination is giving in to culture, capitulating to cultural norms and pressures instead of abiding by a “plain thus saith the Lord.”

Yet long-held bias and entitlement have twisted the truth. Giving in to culture is the opposite of what some Adventists have believed and perhaps unknowingly they have co-opted an argument that doesn’t belong to them. The time has come to think again and turn this argument around and to set the gender record straight.

Pandering to the cultural norm is

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Doctrine: An Adventist Stumbling Block

By admin On May 21, 2016 1 Comment

doctrine stumbling block

There are many within the Seventh-day Adventist church who have made the same mistake as the Jews of Christ’s time in holding up doctrine—doctrine that is often hard for even career Christians to get their minds around—as essential to salvation.

Confusing the Facts with Doctrine

Though we should not undermine the importance of personal study and discussion on theological subjects like Last Generation Theology, the nature of sin and Christ, the ins and outs of justification and sanctification, and perfection, we have placed far too much emphasis on understanding them in order to be saved. Daily looking on Jesus is the only thing that can save us.

Many have been discouraged, overwhelmed, and driven away from Jesus by a focus on good

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