Thought For Today 140722

[Gregory Matthews]

From: Nathan Brown, Alex Bryan & Japhet DeOliveira: FOR THE ONE: VOICES FROM THE ONE PROJECT.

As stated by: Mark Witas, "Jesus. Doctrine. Jesus and our beliefs."

Quote:

Anytime a group of people use doctrine to define themselves rather than establishing doctrine to explain and clarify God, they will yield to the real temptation of considering themselves separate from and better than the rest of the world. And this will ultimately do damage to God's character, no matter what truth they may possess. {page 62}

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The challenge for the Seventh-day adventist. Church in the 21st century is to avoid using doctrine to define and separate ourselves. Instead, we need to make it clear that our doctrine describes Jesus as the revealer of God's character. if our doctrine doesn't clarify a loving God as displayed by Jesus while He was on earth, we need to re-look at our doctrine. {page 66}

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I also believe that our church has sometimes yielded to the temptation to make our doctrines more about us than about our God. And I think that's one reason why there are more ex-Seventh-day Adventists than Seventh-day Adventists in the United States today. {page 67}