Christ was a Seventh-day Adventist

[whatisthis]

Remember that Ranch on TV, the Ponderosa? There were all these people coming and going and they were all happily part of the Ponderosa. That name stood for the kind of country that the ranch was in. But the owner wasn't named Ponderosa. He wasn't "A Ponderosa" either. Jesus named this ranch, He owns it, we belong here, but He isn't the ranch. He even has children that are not of this ranch, er, "fold". At this ranch our whole goal and duty is to get ready for Jesus "Advent", His soon return, that's the kind of country we are in, here. Over the gate the owner's brand, or seal, is worked in wrought iron. Yep, Seventh Day! Well, it's just a parable, like the parable of the vineyard, but I'm happy to belong to this outfit. Jesus isn't a "was" to me, He's a very present King of Heaven, and he's given this church to us as a home to get ready to go Home in-- I don't know it all, it's a place for me to learn

[Ron Amnsn]

Jesus was speaking of the Moral Law not the ceremonial law which would end according to His own word given to Paul in Hebrews 10 "he takes AWAY the first in order to establish the second" - and Hebrews 7 "Where there is a CHANGE of priesthood there is a CHANGE of Law ALSO".

As Paul points out in 1Cor 7:19 comparing the ceremonial law to the moral law of God - Paul says that ceremonial laws such as circumcision do not matter "but what matters is KEEPING the Commandments of God" --

The same thing that the Christian Church approved of in Acts 15.

Bob, the terms "Moral law" and "Ceremonial law" are not found in Scripture. Nowhere does Scripture define something congruent to the concept of "Moral law" or the concept of "Ceremonial law". The man-made paradigm of "Moral" vs "Ceremonial" law was invented long after New Testament times. For those Christians who were raised in that paradigm it seems totally reasonable. It's almost a perfect deception created by theologians who did not value God's law as Jesus and his followers did.

The men who were inspired by God to write the Scriptures were not raised in the "Moral law" vs "Ceremonial law" paradigm, and would never have accepted it if someone had tried to teach it to them. It utterly fails the test used by the Bereans to determine whether Paul's teachings were true. The Scriptures consistently speak of God's law as a good thing that is a blessing. However, those who believe the Moral vs Ceremonial paradigm speak as if people are better off without large portions of God's law.

All of the passages that you refer to, Bob, can be better interpreted in their full context to be in agreement with the testimony of Paul when he stated, "I believe everything that agrees with the Law and that is written in the Prophets," (Acts 24:14 NIV) and "I stand to this day testifying both to small and great, stating nothing but what the Prophets and Moses said was going to take place;" (Acts 26:22 NASB) The Prophets and Moses said nothing about part of God's Word becoming obsolete when Messiah arrives.

To believe as you do requires that one believes that God reneges on his covenants-- for example the covenant given to Phinehas in Numbers 25. If you believe that God reneges on His covenants, how do you know that God hasn't already reneged on the "New Covenant"? It's not like Christians are any better behaved than the Israelites.

[BobRyan]

Jesus was speaking of the Moral Law not the ceremonial law which would end according to His own word given to Paul in Hebrews 10 "he takes AWAY the first in order to establish the second" - and Hebrews 7 "Where there is a CHANGE of priesthood there is a CHANGE of Law ALSO".

As Paul points out in 1Cor 7:19 comparing the ceremonial law to the moral law of God - Paul says that ceremonial laws such as circumcision do not matter "but what matters is KEEPING the Commandments of God" --

The same thing that the Christian Church approved of in Acts 15.

[BobRyan]

Originally Posted By: whatisthis

And a Baptist, because He was baptized, and a Lutheran because His salvation is by grace alone,

Correction - those are both Adventist, and He kept Sabbath - and He taught the correct view on the Second coming in Matt 24 as being "AFTER the tribulation" and he taught free will "whosoever will may come" AND he taught the correct view of the state of the dead in Matt 22 - AND he promoted the continued observance of Sabbath long after the cross in Matt 24 .. and He taught the importance of the prophetic book of Daniel.

Pure SDA.

[whatisthis]

Yes, I'm with you on this thought. Happy Sabbath btw, Bob!

[Ron Amnsn]

Originally Posted By: FLO

Jesus celebrated Passover as well as the other Holy days of Lev. 23 and the SDA church does not. (www.EasterTruth.info)

That still puts Him square with those within the SDA Church who 1) don't celebrate the pagan holidays, and 2) do recognize and celebrate the Passover and other Holy days.

Not here in BC, Canada. My feast-keeping SDA friends tell me that those who keep God's Feasts are not allowed to hold offices in the local Adventist churches. So apparently Jesus was not qualified for church leadership here.

[Ron Amnsn]

Originally Posted By: Ron Amnsn

Bob, the terms "Moral law" and "Ceremonial law" are not found in Scripture.

And "yet" - in 1Cor 7:19 Paul says that circumcision does not matter (ceremonial though it may be) and that "KEEPING the Commandments of God" is "what matters" - moral law though they may be.

[cardw]

Although not Biblical, Christmas has never been a pagan holiday but was started by Christians.

You are absolutely wrong here. December 25th is the last day of celebration for many pagan religions because this ends the celebration around the winter solstice. This marked the death of the old sun and birth of the new sun.

You can read within the writings of the Christian church fathers on how they are amazed that the birth of Jesus so coincides with the birth of the sun, being ignorant of the fact that Jesus wasn't born any where near Dec 25th. This was a major tool to convert pagans to Christianity because many early Christians thought that Jesus was the Sun god. Early church fathers actually refer to Jesus as the Sun of god. He is the bright and morning star. Where do you think these sun references came from?

You will find parallel celebrations within Egyptian, Persian, Roman, Nordic, etc. It is because these changes were important in the economic and physical survival of the cultures that needed to mark the change in the seasons.

You will also find that it is difficult to find a god who is not a product of virgin birth. Most early deities were goddesses and for them to birth the world they had to be virgins because there was no god before them. The word Parthenon means virgin birth is a reference to Athena the virgin. And many pagan religions thought that the sun itself was the son of this goddess.

John the Baptist is born at the Summer Solstice and Jesus is born at the winter solstice. John precedes Jesus both chronologically and symbolically within the pagan system.

Christianity didn't all of sudden appear out of a vacuum. It is made up just as surely as paganism was made up.

[cardw]

Originally Posted By: cardw

I am quite familiar with Adventists. I grew up as one. And yes many Adventist eat meat, but Adventist are not known for teaching meat eating. They are known for teaching vegetarianism.

I have to say that I think you are wrong about SDA teaching vegetarianism because not once in the churches I have attended and so attend do they teach that. Yes, they do teach having a healthy lifestyle but they do not actually teach what you say. I must say that many of the SDAs in here are quite the fundamentialists.

That still ignores the fact that Ellen White believed that vegetarianism was a major principle of god's people. I don't care what any individual Adventist church teaches.

All this demonstrates is that so called prophets of god are cons.

[joeb]

Quote:

Where is this defined in Scripture? You (and your spiritual forefathers) have created this erroneous definition, but the Scriptures don't actually define a subset of the Law like your "moral law". The Scriptures also do not teach that the commands outside the so-called "moral law" are disposable or temporary.

Sure it does, but it doesn't say, there is a difference between the "moral law and the ceremonial law", but teaches it by example.

For instance, only the 10 commandments were stored under the mercy seat inside the ark. The rest of the laws given to/by Moses were stored beside the ark. This shows a clear deliniation between the sets of laws by none other than Moses himself. I believe you'll find this in Deuteronomy 31:26.

Also, we know the 10 commandments were considered to be in force for both Jews and Gentiles during the days of the NT, but that the vast majority of the ceremonial laws were not enforced upon the Gentiles. The fact that they weren't was a huge point of controversy in the early church.

[joeb]

That still ignores the fact that Ellen White believed that vegetarianism was a major principle of god's people. I don't care what any individual Adventist church teaches.

All this demonstrates is that so called prophets of god are cons.

cardw,

I believe you've been around some SDA's, but I don't believe you've ever really grasped the essence of the gospel or SDAism. All you've ever focused on was does and don'ts and, as a consequence of never understanding the why's, and disliking the "rules" have thrown out the baby with the bathwater.

This is clear in your usage of words. For example, you say vegetarianism as if it's a pejorative, and completely miss the point. The SDA's advocate not eating meat, or at least eating very little of it, for health reasons. The SDA church was at least 100 years ahead of the secular world in teaching a healthy lifestyle. Millions of people, outside the SDA church, now follow the same principles of healthy living, yet all you can see is a pejorative.

[fccool]

Quote:

This is clear in your usage of words. For example, you say vegetarianism as if it's a pejorative, and completely miss the point. The SDA's advocate not eating meat, or at least eating very little of it, for health reasons. The SDA church was at least 100 years ahead of the secular world in teaching a healthy lifestyle. Millions of people, outside the SDA church, now follow the same principles of healthy living, yet all you can see is a pejorative.

That's actually not quite true. It's been demonstrated and documented fairly well that Ellen White got quite a bit of her opinion from health-related literature of the day. The literature that advocated vegetarianism and advised against smoking was available waaay before E.G. White could read.

There are instances where she actually copied error views along with the correct ones, for example, thinking that corsets can create deformity of lungs and body that can be passed on from one generation to another. Or that corsets can cause "lung protrusions" on the neck, which is fairly ridiculous as we know. She read those things directly from certain demonstrable publications. She would, of course, copy quite a bit of "God's advice" directly from other authors without giving them any credit. In SDA world that becomes the work of Holy Spirit .

There's nothing miraculous about what she did. She read a lot of literature, and she pieced together her theology and her health message from that existing literature. A lot of the literature was fairly consistent. Whenever dispute would arise, she would conveniently have a vision from God that would settle it by what she saw in vision.

It's pointless to claim that SDAs were ahead of the world on those issues, when in fact E.G. White would copy those things from the "worldly articles". It's an incredibly dishonest approach to take.

[fccool]

For example, it's utterly ridiculous to point out that the world was a 100 years behind on tabacco issue before E.G.White pointed it out. The negative effects of tabacco were very well-known in many medical circles at least a century before her:

1761 London physician, John Hill, performs possibly the first clinical study of tobacco effects. He warns snuff users that they are vulnerable to cancers of the nose.

1830s First organised anti-tobacco movement in the US begins as an adjunct to the temperance movement.

1836 Samuel Green of the New England Almanack writes that tobacco is an insecticide, a poison, a filthy habit, and can kill a man.

1856 A debate about the health effects of tobacco begins in the British medical journal, The Lancet.

It's quite obvious that the debate was heating up in the medical literature about the negative effects of tabacco. E.G. White simply would read the literature an put "approved by God" stamp on what she was doing.

[joeb]

Quote:

This is clear in your usage of words. For example, you say vegetarianism as if it's a pejorative, and completely miss the point. The SDA's advocate not eating meat, or at least eating very little of it, for health reasons. The SDA church was at least 100 years ahead of the secular world in teaching a healthy lifestyle. Millions of people, outside the SDA church, now follow the same principles of healthy living, yet all you can see is a pejorative.

That's actually not quite true. It's been demonstrated and documented fairly well that Ellen White got quite a bit of her opinion from health-related literature of the day. The literature that advocated vegetarianism and advised against smoking was available waaay before E.G. White could read.

There are instances where she actually copied error views along with the correct ones, for example, thinking that corsets can create deformity of lungs and body that can be passed on from one generation to another. Or that corsets can cause "lung protrusions" on the neck, which is fairly ridiculous as we know. She read those things directly from certain demonstrable publications. She would, of course, copy quite a bit of "God's advice" directly from other authors without giving them any credit. In SDA world that becomes the work of Holy Spirit .

There's nothing miraculous about what she did. She read a lot of literature, and she pieced together her theology and her health message from that existing literature. A lot of the literature was fairly consistent. Whenever dispute would arise, she would conveniently have a vision from God that would settle it by what she saw in vision.

It's pointless to claim that SDAs were ahead of the world on those issues, when in fact E.G. White would copy those things from the "worldly articles". It's an incredibly dishonest approach to take.

Well, fccool, we will agree to disagree. I've seen hundreds accusations against her. They've all been proven wrong. Your undocumented assertions go into the same round file.

[cardw]

Well, fccool, we will agree to disagree. I've seen hundreds accusations against her. They've all been proven wrong. Your undocumented assertions go into the same round file.

His assertions appear to be quite well documented. Your tendency to throw things into the trash that disagree with your view of the world is no excuse for your ignorance.

[joeb]

His assertions appear to be quite well documented. Your tendency to throw things into the trash that disagree with your view of the world is no excuse for your ignorance.

LOL. The world is square. There's an assertion with just as much documentation as fccool's post so it must be true.

[cardw]

For example, it's utterly ridiculous to point out that the world was a 100 years behind on tabacco issue before E.G.White pointed it out. The negative effects of tabacco were very well-known in many medical circles at least a century before her:

1761 London physician, John Hill, performs possibly the first clinical study of tobacco effects. He warns snuff users that they are vulnerable to cancers of the nose.

1830s First organised anti-tobacco movement in the US begins as an adjunct to the temperance movement.

1836 Samuel Green of the New England Almanack writes that tobacco is an insecticide, a poison, a filthy habit, and can kill a man.

1856 A debate about the health effects of tobacco begins in the British medical journal, The Lancet.

It's quite obvious that the debate was heating up in the medical literature about the negative effects of tabacco. E.G. White simply would read the literature an put "approved by God" stamp on what she was doing.

[cardw]

Originally Posted By: cardw

His assertions appear to be quite well documented. Your tendency to throw things into the trash that disagree with your view of the world is no excuse for your ignorance.

LOL. The world is square. There's an assertion with just as much documentation as fccool's post so it must be true.

Well if you want to quote the Bible, the world is flat. LOL Christianity has always resisted knowledge with its assertions.

I would like to note that you have made no attempt at all in providing any documentation for your assertions. What a hypocrite.

[joeb]

Well if you want to quote the Bible, the world is flat. LOL Christianity has always resisted knowledge with its assertions.

I would like to note that you have made no attempt at all in providing any documentation for your assertions. What a hypocrite.

So giving an obviously foolish assertion with as much documentation as fccool supplied, as an allegory of his post, is hypocritical?

How about, let's remain civil....

[cardw]

So giving an obviously foolish assertion with as much documentation as fccool supplied, as an allegory of his post, is hypocritical?

How about, let's remain civil....

Where is your documentation? Oh, I'm sorry it's mean to ask for evidence.

[fccool]

I will provide documentation later tonight. I have a couple things to finish up.

[M. T. Cross]

I will provide documentation later tonight. I have a couple things to finish up.

Seems to me that should be unneeded as you provided dates and names. Documentation for those that require it are just a Google click away.

[fccool]

I'm not trying to be mean here, but I think it's worth pointing some truth to people who claim to value truth.

It's all about integrity. If a group of people collectively chooses to lie to themselves and other in order to preserve some sense of identity, that group of people will eventually be doomed for failure. Certain statements that Adventists make in light of the world of information that's accessible and available to anyone today make me feel embarrassed at times.

The issue of Adventist superiority of the health message being a 100 years ahead, because it was given to E.G. White by God is quite odd in light of the sources that pre-existed and that talk extensively about both benefits of vegetarian diet, exercise, abstaining from alcohol and tobacco... all of that was fairly contemporary.

What Adventists tend to do is to point out the other side with doctors who prescribed smoking and etc... making E.G.White look progressive. In reality, she was the follower of the progressive health message coming from a wide variety of sources. She was not the source of it.

[fccool]

Steering back into the topic, it's very easy for any religion to claim Christ. Just think about it... how easy would it to make Christ look:

1) Catholic

2) Presbyterian

3) Baptist

4) Greek Orthodox

5) Methodist

6) Republican

7) Democrat

You name it...

[Ron Amnsn]

Sure it does, but it doesn't say, there is a difference between the "moral law and the ceremonial law", but teaches it by example.

For instance, only the 10 commandments were stored under the mercy seat inside the ark. The rest of the laws given to/by Moses were stored beside the ark. This shows a clear deliniation between the sets of laws by none other than Moses himself. I believe you'll find this in Deuteronomy 31:26.