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Our retired pastor and many of our leaders in our church have told us about these group of pastors and others who are pushing this 'One Project' which seems aimed at the young people. And they are not saying good things about it and those who have come across it don't find much in it that is positive as it appears to be part of the 'Emerging Church' movement and connected to Spiritual Formation somehow. Has anyone come across it or have something on what its purpose is, as I can barely find anything on it. Here is some links... http://atoday.org/one-project-christ-centered-unity-unexplained-questions-criticism.html http://thegreatcontroversy.info/the-one-project.html

someone ought to come up with an "Adventist Monopoly" game... "Go to Jail" could be "Go before the Church Board"... "Park Place and Boardwalk" could be the GC and NAD "Luxury Tax" could be "Tithe and Offerings" There could be Mission Trips and building churches and hospitals.. "Chance" could be "Church Potlucks"... "Community Chest" could be related to SDA education.. and more.....

An often debated subject. I have heard sermons and explanations on both sides of the subject. The side one comes down on depends on which interpretation of the limited texts in the Bible one chooses to believe. For me, the question as posted, is the real crux of the matter....original creation not perfect? To many interpreting convolutions are gone through for those who choose to believe in no 'humans' again, only some type of 'angel' species. Not enough data in the Bible on this subject. I choose to believe there will be continuing family structures, why reunite them and then wipe out those memories?

I would disagree that the emerging church has just 'come and gone', but as you say morphed, faded, and done most of its damage by now as it has injected its false message and spiritual formation into countless denominations including many Adventist churches through the Adventist pastors that went there. One of our pastors in our old church took all the young people up to Willow Creek and within months they were following its message and created a church that catered to "new members" but stripped of any of the truths of Adventism, I didn't catch it till they told me not to teach from Ellen White and to use others such as Max Lucado and we slowly drifted into what others came and said was 'church lite', all the form of a Adventist church, but light on any true substance, or nothing inside. It is like the old story of the frog in the pot of water, who like us sat there impervious to the changes the temperature till it reaches high heat and destroys your beliefs and spiritual nature, and it is replaced in worship with a false one.

From the Adventist Today article: I couldn't agree more. I find spiritualism easy to see, but difficult to describe in a way that couldn't possibly be misunderstood. Spiritualism wrapped in Adventism uses our words and cliches but applies worldly definitions and examples to them. I encountered TOP early on and almost went to one of their meetings. I see a message with a lack of flavor and substance that reminds me of the spiritualist churches I have encountered. However I still wanted to go to a TOP meeting with a friend from my church who was going, but when I looked at its Facebook page I came across a post by an Adventist pastor that was clearly breaking the 4th commandment by selling tour boat tickets. A concerned individual had commented and I could see that at first they were ignored, and then when that hadn't worked the person was mocked. I was incensed and contacted that concerned individual and they said a TOP official had just contacted him and said "you wouldn't enjoy it at the conference". So if you're someone who would reprove open sin by a fellow church member, then you wouldn't enjoy it at The One Project conference. I also have met a TOP speaker before they ever toured. Extremely charismatic and popular. I've watched a bunch of that person's evangelism videos. It was well produced and pleasing to the eye, but after awhile I noticed I never heard the entire 3 Angels Message like I would with other Adventist evangelists. The faith part was there in the sense that Jesus's name was mixed in with keywords like "trust", but the character of Jesus through His doctrines was left mostly untouched, and their was nothing about prophecy. The videos were energizing if I just emptied my mind and didn't think critically about what that person was necessarily saying. When I later came across the concept of spiritualism, my experience with that person immediately came to mind. I have watched some videos by Project Iceberg. I was uneasy about them naming individuals involved with TOP, but my recollection is that they spoke towards their actions rather than motivations. And from what I recall those actions entirely consisted of TOP officials writing books that contained teachings from those who are self confirmed spiritualists. I recollect that on a few occasions the Project Iceberg presenters said something to the effect that it's not about the motivations of members of TOP that is the issue, but the actions. I'm almost sure that some of the viewer of the Iceberg Projects presentations will apply motivations to those actions, but that isn't on Project Iceberg. That's maybe more of an issue of SDA churches not teaching critical thinking skills or teaching that actions and motivations are not necessarily the same thing.

That is the task God our Father took upon Himself when He offered up His Son for all of humankind and I'm satisfied that's the task He would have liked all to choose to accept when He gave this instruction to His followers. 15 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.....Mark 16 God is Love! Jesus saves!

Reddogs: Let me commend you for asking an honest question and for including the two references that you have included. I understand your comment to be an honest question and an attempt on your part to be fair. I will respond to your questions in a following post. Let me give my qualifications to answer: 1) My wife and I attended the Gathering in San Diego. 2) I am currently a member of the congregation that has Japhet as the Sr. pastor. While I am in the process of moving to California, for a bit less than two years I attended his weekly services. So, I know what he preaches and the spiritual leadership that he has. 3) He is currently the Sr. pastor of the Boulder SDA Church in Colorado, Rocky Mountain Conference. 4) On the average, Japhet and I communicated, either by e-mail, or in person, two or more times a week. Those conversations were about equally divided between discussions of The One Project and local congregational matters. I have a very good understanding as to where Japhet is coming from as it relates to The One Project. 5) I have personally spoken to other leaders of The One Project as well as SDA administrators on Local, Union and General Conference level on issues related to The One Project. Much of this is covered by confidentiality and therefore I am often unable to name names and/or cite very specific statements. 6) Simply put: The goal of The One Project is to make Christ the center of belief and life practice of individual SDA members. There is no other purpose. 7) The Boulder congregation places its services on the Internet for all to view. You may access them at: https://new.livestream.com/bouldersdachurch 8) The password for the above is: SDA7sda 9) If you want to see what TOP says about itself, visit their website: www.the1projectorg 10) The leaders of TOP have written a book that tells of their founding of TOP and what it about. For some reason, few critics seem to have read that book. Going by memory, I think it is titled THE ONE. 11) The five major leaders of TOP are all SDA pastors. As such they are different individuals. Please distinguish between their individual spiritual leadership and TOP. 12) Japhet is probably the finest congregational administrator that I have ever experienced. The weekly sermons in the Boulder congregation are planed out more than one-year ahead with scriptural passage, title and the person who will preach that Sabbath. He typically preaches along with the other members of the pastoral staff who consist of two to three other people, along with a couple of congregational members. Those who preach will be asked to preach on the Biblical passage for that day. 13) Typically the Sabbath sermons come in a series. This may be a set of Biblical chapters from either the OT or the NT, such as lessons from the life of King David. They may be a series on a theme such as from the life of Christ. They do include sermons on beliefs dear to SDA members. 14) Japhet travels Internationally for TOP. So, he is very busy. While I could be wrong, I believe that Japhet has two International trips scheduled in the near future. 15) One interesting comment: Japhet has organized the Boulder congregation in a manner that is quite different from the typical SDA congregation. In his organization, the members take the lead in every aspect of the congregational life. They have the power and the pastoral staff is there to support them. In addition, there is a place for every member to take leadership in the congregational life. I will give you two examples: a) The Boulder congregation is reaching out to families with young children. The mothers found it hard to keep their children quiet during the preaching service. So, that now comes first when they are best able to keep them quiet. Sabbath School comes after the preaching service when the young children can be more active. 'b) The Sabbath Service has a person who is a "Producer." That person is totally responsible for seeing that the services take place as planned. [NOTE: It is not an Elder.} One Sabbath I discovered several of the Sabbath School class rooms did not have chairs set up for people to sit in. I informed the Producer for that day. It was immediately resolved. c) An extra item of interest: During the sermon, the congregation is invited to send a text message to the person preaching. That message is immediately responded to by the preacher during the sermon. [NOTE: People on their cell phones may be participating in the sermon.] 16)Japhet and other leaders have personally met with people who sincerely wanted to know what TOP was all about. As Japhet travels Internationally he has offered to meet with a major critic located in another country. That offer has not been accepted. All to many of the critics have made no attempt to personally interact and dialogue with the leadership of TOP. Yes, I know of exceptions. But, most have not been interested in interacting with TOP leadership. I will call it quits for now. Reddog, thank you for asking.

Now with this sadness, today something happened that also brings great joy. In 1982 I worked in Israel with the Jerusalem Passion Play and Nativity Play of Bethlehem. In the Nativity play there were 4 girls who became super close friends. Two cousins, Gehan and Mai. And two girls who the older sister of the one was married to the brother of the other. We became like brother and sisters. Now the one girl was only 14 but you could tell that she was going to grow up to be a beauty. Anyway I also befriended 2 Israeli girls from the neighborhood where we were living. One I was starting to go out with. Then due to the drop in tourism because of the Lebanon war the play closed and I had to say good bye to my friends. Then in the spring when we were to return for the next season tourism was still down so the company went out of business. I had to write my friends letters saying I was not coming back and good bye. The next fall I went to Andrews, and on the bulletin board was a poster for a class in Biblical Geography being taught in Israel. It would be 14 months after I had left. I was able to take the class. Sadly the one girl who I was starting to go out with was 2 months into a new relationship. But it was fun to see two of the 4 girls from Bethlehem, and when I saw that second Israeli girl from the neighborhood told me that she wanted to be more than friends. So we considered ourselves boyfriend and girlfriend, but with in a few weeks the class was over and I was back at Andrews and the following October she met someone new. But we have still always stayed the best of friends. And I was also the best of friends of 2 of the 4 girls from Bethlehem. After Andrews I joined the Army. In army training in NJ and at church I met a girl who we went out once or twice then I went to my permanent duty station on the other side of the country. That lady would call me, write me, make food and send to me and her brother lived an hour away from the base so she decided to move out there. As her brother and his friends helped her move she became interested in one of her brother's friends. Instead of telling me she called my first sergeant to tell me. I did not know her that well so was much more embarrassed than hurt. Went to the mail room and there were two letters. One from my "girlfriend" from my second trip to Israel, and one from my Bethlehem friend who had grown from a 14 year old who you knew would be a beauty she grew into being an 19 year old beauty. I wrote both girls telling them what happened and thanking them for the perfect timing of their letters. The 19 year old wrote back "I'm sorry for what that lady did to you, but don't forget, she's a stranger and doesn't know you. But you have been my best friend for 5 years, come on over to Bethlehem and let's see what can happen with us!" Well, I went and had a wonderful time seeing my friends over there again. While it was good to be with her she was more casual friendly and she and her brother-in-law were not doing the arranging that I thought was going to happen. Her sister-in-law, one of the 4 friends from the play had married a couple years before and had a child was taking time talking about how she met her husband. He worked in the bank and she caught his eye so he arranged with her family to marry her, so they formally met and married. And she reminded me that is how her culture was and that I needed to know about that. If she did not really like the guy she could get out of it, otherwise no. But she was glad that she had gotten a kind man for her husband. Then it was explained to me that the father of the other girl did not know about me and the plans that we were making and one week before I got there her dad came home with a surprise for her, and arranged marriage to a distant cousin. When he was told about me he apologized, but he had made the arrangements and it was with in the family and was too embarrassing to cancel. After I got back to the USA she wrote me one last letter apologizing for how it turned out, but she was glad it was not like her sister-in-law who married a stranger, this was someone she grew up with. Now I had stayed in contact with this family through her sister's husband and we stayed friends for years through him. In 2001 when I moved from California to NY in my unpacking I could not find their address. Thus I lost some of my dearest friends. One Christmas, about 9 or 10 years ago I was watching CNN. They were talking about Bethlehem's poor economy and they had a guest a girl with the same name as my friend who looked like her, but they gave an age that was a few years different from what her's should be. I tried to get a copy but CNN did not save it to sell. Wednesday night after leaving my late cousin's I stopped at the mall. There was a man selling olive wood carvings from Bethlehem. I asked if he knew these families. He knew one of them and told me I can find him on Facebook. I had looked for them a few years ago but did not find them. Well I looked and found a name that was similar (turns out it was his daughter). And looking at her friends I looked at one of their friends and found a girl who looked like my long lost friend. I wrote asking if it was her, and today got confirmation that it is! She is currently in San Francisco. She is looking for churches to buy and sell olive wood carving from Bethlehem hoping to help their economy. It was her who I saw on CNN she said she had to give the wrong age and some other misinformation to keep terrorists from wanting to do something. And she has also been on 60 minutes talking about the issues in Bethlehem. She is a strong Christian wanting to follow her Lord by helping the poor. We talked to each other on the phone. On the one hand I am in strong pain with loosing my cousin. On the other hand my heart is full of gratitude with being reunited with these special friends. It is like loosing family and gaining family. A mixture of the sadness of hell and joy of heaven both with in a few hours.

Pr. Berry is referring to the 2 time prophecies of the 5th and 6th trumpets, and their application by Josiah Lich to the Ottoman Empire's affliction of the Fallen church beginning in 1299, to its ending that affliction and surrendering same by accepting the protection of Christian nations on August 11, 1840. It should be studied by every serious prophecy student, as God used this fulfillment to assure the 2700 day prophecy would end exactly as He said it would, 4 years later in 1844. The various Mohammedan peoples still chaff at this, and though their strength seems to be rising today, I notice that these Middle East nations are still under to protection of professed Christian nations - they appeal to Russia, Britain/America, Germany, and/or France for help and support for their regimes to fight against the surging Mohammedan uprisings...just like the Ottoman Empire did to protect itself from the same kind of uprising from its Egypt province in 1840. God is still ultimately in control. Blessings,