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I went thru a number of Adventist forums reading up on the Shelton affair (no, no, the whole mess!). It was a good example why you stay out of other peoples business and don't try to sort out their sins. You can listen to one side and then the other and you will see completely different stories. Talk shows such as Dr Laura who take calls from upset spouses and give out advice are not doing a responsible action as they never heard from the other side. (Dr Laura does seem to pick out the ones who are lying well.) But unless you are a trained counselor and have both parties in front of you, best stay out of it. This even includes politicians on the national stage. You cannot know the whole story. If you cannot know the whole story and pass on incomplete information you have, you seriously are guilty of a falsehood for passing along an incomplete truth. I can even tell you of a couple who went to an Adventist preacher for marital counseling, the couple divorced, and the wife married the pastor! Not touching that one either! Moral of the story is, for the majority of the church, it is little different from the world. People are largely SINO (SDAs In Name Only). The tongue gets very bad reviews in the scripture. It is even called "loshan hara" (bad tongue). https://torah.org/learning/halashon-review1/

I agree and the Bible makes it clear that THE HOLY SPIRIT will be doing the sealing of the 144,000 the remnant. The scene in Revelation start to shows the Time of Trouble, but in Chapter 7 an angel from the east swiftly flies and tells the four angels to not let the events begin until the remnant are seal first. So they are seal before the Time of Trouble. Dan 12:3; Matt 25:9; Eph 1:13; Rev 6:14-17; 7:1-3; 12:7; 14:4, 14, 15 (This Verse proves that YAHSHUA has not returned. All of HIS angels will return with HIM! This whole Chapter deals with the 144,000 receiving their reward for the work they've done.) These remnant during the Time of Trouble, having THE SPIRIT of Elijah; when he did YAHWEH'S warning of Wrath on IsraEL. The remnant will have power from on HIGH to do exactly the same thing and more. It is the Wrath of THE LAMB! Rev 6:16; 11:5, 6 THE WRATH of YAHWEH is the 7 last plagues and then during the sixth plagues YAHSHUA is coming by the 7th, the earth is in turmoil and YAHSHUA has come. Rev 11:13-15; 16:15, 17-21. Then for a thousand years the saints will be in the city to judge the wicked. 1Co 6:2; Rev 20:4 Finally, the 2nd time the saints will come back with YAHSHUA to execute judgment on the wicked after the thousands years! Jude 1:14; Rev 20:3, 5-7 When the 144,000 are sealed they would have stopped sinning to be sealed by THE HOLY SPIRIT! Their work is to reap the harvest of souls that will come out of the Time of Trouble. Dan 12:3; Rev 7:9-15; 9:4 They will do the final work that THE HOLY SPIRIT had Elijah to do! Praise FATHER, THE SON and THE HOLY SPIRIT FOREVER MORE! Blessings!

John 7:53–8:11 talks about the woman and though it does not provide the woman's name, I agree that it is Mary Magdalene. YAHSHUA was known to dined with common people that were known as sinners. Mark 2:15 Mary Magdalene was constantly known to be around YAHSHUA and it was she that anointed his feet at the supper of Simon. John 11:2 My belief and understanding the historical thought of the day is how men treated a known prostitute. The proof of that is also in the Bible. The men present at the dinner talked about her like she isn't even there. She was in spite of their action for one reason, to show her love for YAHSHUA with tears. Why would she do this because she was that unknown woman of ill repute. She had become a harlot, but YAHSHUA saved her. All evidence points to her as this woman. Now, you made not believe that it was her, but I do. That's my choice and I believe that she, Mary Magdalene left as her accusers were gone and she stopped prostituting and changed her life. I also believe that the Bible writers set it up to show the times but provided through the Scriptures and THE HOLY SPIRIT that it was her. Blessings!

The people who survive this period of extreme deception and confusion are certainly not babes in the truth. Rather, they are grown-up, adult believers. They are models of perfection and Christian maturity. They have had their faculties trained by practice to distinguish good from evil. Though their faith is severely tried, they do not let […] The post What God Is Waiting For (18:3) appeared first on Jon Paulien's Blog. View the full article

5 Things You Didn't Know About The Gettysburg Address_2 On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address at the dedication of a military cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Here are 5 surprising facts you probably didn’t know about the Gettysburg Address... Lincoln Did Not Make the Keynote Speech Edward Everett, a famous orator from Massachusetts, was the keynote speaker at the dedication ceremony for the cemetery. He spoke for two hours, talking about all the exploits of the Union Army at Gettysburg and alluding to Greek History. After he heard Lincoln’s speech, he wrote to the president afterward, saying that Lincoln had done more in two minutes than his own speech of two hours. Lincoln’s Speech Only Lasted About Two Minutes Lincoln’s speech was just 10 sentences long. In contrast to Everett’s hours-long address, Lincoln spoke for just two minutes. A popular myth tells of President Lincoln hastily jotting down his 270-word speech on the back of an envelope during the train ride from Washington to Gettysburg. In truth, Lincoln put a great deal of planning into his remarks. He began writing the speech the night before he left and completed it after his arrival in Pennsylvania. No one knew at the time that Lincoln’s short speech would go down in history as one of the most memorable speeches of all the presidents. Lincoln Wrote Every Word of The Gettysburg Address While subsequent presidents have all enjoyed significant assistance from speechwriters in crafting their messages, President Lincoln took a more hands-on approach and is one of the few presidents in U.S. history to have written the entirety of his speeches and remarks. No Photo Was Taken of Lincoln Addressing the Crowd Although a photo of Lincoln moving through the crowd exists, photographers did not capture his photo while he was speaking. This is because what became known as the Gettysburg Address was only about two minutes long. The amount of time photographers of the day needed to set up their cameras took longer than the speech itself. Only Five Copies of the Gettysburg Address Are Known to Exist Lincoln gave his two copies of the Gettysburg Address to his secretaries, John Hay and John Nicolay, and they are in the possession of the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. A third copy was given to Edward Everett and resides at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library. The fourth is in the Lincoln bedroom at the White House, and the fifth is at Cornell University.

Please show me the scripture where it says this woman sinned no more. Scripture is totally silent on this woman's subsequent life.

I still believe in no sin in God's people after the close of probation. God, in His word, has promised it and to me to deny it is to be in unbelief. Jesus said to be perfect like your Father in heaven. I do not believe He would waste words in telling us to do something we are not able to do. Perfection is not a demand, it is a promise! Trust God to deliver. So, the question is, what is that perfection and how does it work? I see the people of God living a life such as Jesus lived when He walked on the earth. He had the temptations of the flesh, but did not have a natural disposition to sin. I believe that when God declares the righteous to be righteous still that there will be brought about a change in them so that there is no longer a disposition to sin. This is part of the work of the Holy Spirit in the latter rain and also the beginning of "glorification." Notice Paul said that when Jesus comes, we will see Him as he is because we will be like Him. We will have the mind of Christ. Paul talks about waiting for Christ to be formed within His people. When Christ is fully formed within His people, they will no longer sin. One pastor thought of it like this, God will finally have a people who look like Jesus. Not just that person here and there who perfectly reflects Jesus but a large number of people. Those people will be the 144,000 who will be able to sing the Song of Moses and the Lamb. So, think on how people will be righteous still if they are able to continue sinning. I do not believe they will.

His downfall was that he lied; not that he held back. I imagine his gift would have been graciously accepted if he promised to turn over - say - half of the proceeds from his land sale.

Yes he comes at the 2nd coming and takes the saints that are in there graves and those that are alive and brings all to heaven and than 1000 years later raises the dead (lost) and them and Satan & his angels are all placed in the lake of fire!

sometimes I think the Adventist church couldn't survive without some sort of drama going on... We could have some sort of reality TV show, on the same level as "Keeping Up with the Kardashians" or "Dancing with the Stars." We could name it, "Rubbernecking with the Remnant" .....

I have posted several links to articles regarding questionable practices occurring in the NAD, EUR, and SPD divisions of the church. These are not for voyeuristic perusal, but to note the decline of spirituality in the church. Morals seems to be in freefall in the in the Western World and probably in the whole world, and in the divisions listed morality would also match the world in freefall. When Children Dance Sensually in the Church for Jesus http://adventmessenger.org/when-children-dance-sensually-in-the-church-for-jesus/ Florida Hospital Adventist Church Makes a Mockery of the Bible During their Children’s Program http://adventmessenger.org/florida-adventist-hospital-church-makes-a-mockery-of-the-bible-during-their-childrens-program/ Here is one worldly example of the decline of religious influence in life. 80 per cent decline in religious funerals as mourners opt for golf courses and zoos over churches https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/08/28/80-per-cent-decline-religious-funerals-mourners-opt-golf-courses/ Eight-years-ago 67 per cent of people requested traditional religious services and just 12 per cent were non-religious. However by 2018, just 13 per cent wanted a religious funeral. So, with this condition existing in the church it has to be much worse than even when Sister Ellen penned the following words more than one hundred years ago: The facts are before us. The burden bearers among us are dropping off into the silent grave. The active members of the church, the true workers in all reforms, are mostly past the meridian of life, and are declining in physical and mental strength. We should anxiously contemplate who are to rise up and fill their places. To whom are to be committed the vital interests of the church? The question may be asked by us with the deepest concern, Who will bear the responsibilities of the cause of God when a few more standard-bearers fall? We can but look anxiously upon the youth of today as those who must take these burdens, and upon whom responsibilities must fall. They must take the work where others leave it; and their course will determine whether morality, religion, and vital godliness shall prevail, or whether immorality and infidelity shall corrupt and blight all that is valuable. It is the way the standard is carried now that will determine the future. 5T128 Given the vote at the General Conference which showed that in other divisions around the world, the church was largely against the ordination of women. This has infuriated many brighter and more progressive members of the NAD, EUR, and SPD divisions of the church. It has been my opinion that this is even an example of racism in the church where the NAD, EUR, and SPD divisions of the church are just not going to stand for anyone else telling them how to run the church, especially from third world countries. However, thru much of the rest of the world, church members seem to be living much like the early Adventist church lived. The way I see it, I have to agree that the defenders of our faith are not even from the NAD, EUR, and SPD divisions of the church. Seems like Africa is one place to look for those seriously looking to be ready for the coming of Jesus. Seventh-day Adventists in Third-world Countries are the New Defenders of the Faith http://adventmessenger.org/seventh-day-adventists-in-third-world-countries-are-the-new-defenders-of-the-faith/ Seventh-day Adventists in the United States, Canada, Europe and Australia, commonly known as “developed nations” are no longer carrying the torch – it has been passed on to what is commonly referred to as the “third world countries” or “developing nations.” This growth in the number of Christians has been noted throughout Christendom: Christianity Booming, Atheism Declining around the World, Report Says https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/michael-foust/christianity-booming-atheism-declining-around-the-world-report-says.html Much of Christianity’s growth is due to its surge in other continents. Africa (119 million) and Asia (160 million) each have more Christians than North America (100 million). Lessons We Must Learn from the Church in Africa http://adventmessenger.org/what-we-must-learn-from-the-church-in-africa/ It truly is a blessing to see these orphan kids reciting the Three Angels’ Message, the 10 Commandments, the 8 Laws of Heath, Biblical passages and singing sacred music all from memory. Pastor Benson and his wife are doing a wonderful job with these children! Those who live in the last days should be circumspect in words and acts. Sobriety is more in accordance with our faith than levity. Those who realize the solemnity of the times in which we live will be among the number who bear about with them a weight of solemn influence. MS11, 1868 Considering the Sister Ellen statement quoted (5T128), seems the young people who are ready to take up the burdens are from places like Africa. Too bad about the American kids who are being led down the wrong paths. This is concerning that this situation exists because to me it suggests that the close of probations is rapidly approaching and I believe the vast majority of the church in the NAD, EUR, and SPD divisions of the church are asleep and will wake up too late.

I think hearing these stories did peek my interest as a child, it made it look like Jesus was really coming soon. But as I went more into my teens, academy and college I learned more about the Bible, Mrs. White, our sinful nature. Also, even as a child I noticed a difference between the Adventism of my grandma, and family that was in the church, and the Adventism of one of my aunts by marriage and an uncle by marriage. And at academy occasionally there was an alumni who would give a weekend service. His parents gave large contributions to the school. They had studied with Elder Wilkinson and the mom had been Elder Wilkinson's reader. In his sermons he just kept complaining of what the church was doing and what the school was doing and what we were learning in Bible class etc. At college there was someone who would hang around college who kept doing the same thing. But he was a odd person in other ways as well. We did not deal much in this since the Walter Rea issue and Desmond Ford issues were the major issues of the day and where our focus was on. Although we would deal some with what professors pointed out as the other side of the coin and we studied how Mrs. White was frustrated because church members tended to go to one extreme or the other. She would write things to one group and the other group would latch on those letters and instead of seeing how she was writing to the one extreme to encourage them to become more balanced, but the other extreme would take those letters as support for their view and push the message on to the church and Mrs. White had to try with them . In class both sides were seen as two sides of the same coin, only that they would take their understanding of truth and use it against the rest of the truth, and that the Desmond Ford and Walter Rea issues were again just a resurgence of the one side. At campmeeting between college a couple from Union College's religion department Ralph and Beatrice (Now I don't remember the correct spelling of their last name, at the time we had two or three Ralphs who had written books released around the same time with the same last name but each had a different spelling, but either Neil or Neal). They gave an excellent study on how Seventh-day Adventist truth has been split in half and how half the church is fighting the other half and that both sides were wrong, and the two sides were the Desmond Ford issue and the Historic Adventists on the other, and how the truth tends to be someplace between . When I was at Andrews, I was aware of the historic adventists, but church seemed to me (and it probably was) to be very much a bell curve with a few people being at the one extreme of Fordism, and few at the other extreme of historic adventism. And except for my one aunt and uncle by marriage, most who I saw in the historic adventist camp tended to be odd in other ways as well. So I passed them off and would focus on things such as the historical, cultural, copying and geographical background to the Bible and life and ministry of Mrs. White, and also on social interactions and these are what my papers would be on. Sometimes if I needed a break from my studies I'd just pick a file at random in the White estate at Andrews and just read through it. They included a lot of Mrs. White's correspondence. In file after file I kept coming upon a bunch of letters between Mrs. White and/or Willie, and others but at first I thought that it was between her and the same man. These letters kept saying the same things. The basic outline of each letter was Mrs. White or Willie would write telling someone that despite their massive quoting of Mrs. White's quotes, that they did not understand her message and thus they were misrepresenting her. If they wrote back to her they tended to be much more polite, and much more rude if they wrote to Willie (especially after Mrs. White's death). Their arguments were that they did indeed understand her message, that they were indeed careful students of her writing and that they do understand her message and that the reason why she was sending them sharp testimonies is because people were polluting her mind against them and that if she saw their work objectively and not through her friends who were polluting her mind against them that not only would she would not only have not written the letter to them but that she would fully support them. They would often share with her some of her quotes that sounded like she agreed with them and was critical and worried of the direction that the church had been going since 1888 full of apostasy and warn Mrs. White that these friends and her son were changing her writings to make it sound like she agrees with these apostasy and that her newer writings have been used to spread these apostasies. They would compare Willie to Nadab and Abihu and Samuel's sons*. Mrs. White and Willie would often write back about how she would write strong to one group but the other group would take these strong writings as a one size fits all that needed to be followed by the whole church, and would mention some about what inspiration did and did not do to her. They would write back that she was a prophet and what she wrote was the perfect, infallible message from God and that she was denying her prophetic ministry and in danger of being lost, but they will continue to faithfully deliver God's message that she wrote. And I noticed that the messages they were sharing was the same as the so-called historic adventists. As I said I first thought that they were all one person. The name started with "W" (sometimes they had the name, other times the full name was removed and only the first letter). But after a while I noticed that not all the letters were to an "Elder W" or if the name was there, there were at least two or three names that started with "W" and I'd be surprised because when I expected the letter W or the names of those two or three that started with "W" I would find other letters or names and was surprised that there were a number of pastors who were writing these letters since you probably could have removed the names and find the letters interchangeable. Now I did not find this in the correspondence, but in the files I also found copies of filers that were floating around the church in the early 1900s. These were vicious. They said that Mrs. White had apostatized, and no longer believed that she was a prophet because she believed and was teaching that her writings are not the inerrant infallible message from the almighty God, and that she is saying that some of her writings apply to some people and some to others and not necessary everyone, while God was using her to tell these messages because he did want everyone to live up to these. Some of these fliers suggested that maybe a Jesuit spy had gotten into her inner circle and was controlling her. Some suggested that the Jesuit spy might be any or all of (and the most common names were Willie, Prescott and/or Daniels). One or two even suggested that Mrs. White herself may have been converted to Catholicism and has become a Jesuit spy to destroy the good work that she used to do until she got involved with Jones and Wagner and how after compromising there the result was that she soon there after accepted and started to write and preach teaching the heresy of the trinity. These fliers suggested that members protect themselves by stopping the reading of Mrs. White directly, but to read her as quoted and then named the pastors who she had been writing those letters to. That these pastors were sharing the true message that God gave through Mrs. White and that the members were in danger of being lost if they did not turn to these pastors to share the truth with them. After Andrews, I joined the Army as a chaplain assistant. I was stationed at Ft. Lewis Washington. In visiting the churches there, several members would give me a journal "Our Firm Foundation" of which I read many copies of and believe I had a one year subscription to and read each issue. I noticed that this journal sounded like I had read it before, their message was VERY familiar. Sure enough as I read the references for the articles time after time they refer to the pastors who Mrs. White and Willie wrote those letters to and who the flyers warned people that they better turn to to understand true Adventism instead of the heresy that were creeping into the church. After the Army and then Air Force training, I started to work for Loma Linda Medical center. There I was able to get a book "With Cloak and Dagger" which was a repeat of the same issues as in the letters and flyers and "Our Firm Foundation" but blamed these problems not on the elderly Mrs. White, and her Nadab and Abihu son Willie, and other common targets from the early 1900s, such as Daniels and Pescott. This book pictures their views as being normative Adventism until the 1950s when our Adventist leaders of the 1950s. Reading "With Cloak and Dagger" had me loose respect for the book because I knew that the same things that book complained about was complained about 50 years before the time that the author saw as the origin of these ideas. Also, at Loma Linda I got a paper mailed out by the so called "Historic Adventists" all lamenting activities they saw in the church. In one part of the paper, there were two articles side by side. Now neither of these were lamenting anything, but one article was a long one on the importance of the color "red" in the Catholic church. The next article was just a straightforward announcement that Loma Linda University was going to be having activities and community education based on Red Ribbon week. I noticed with a number of people, a couple of my classmates, one in my class when I was student teaching, but they would keep doing a flip flop. At one time they would be highly religious, but focus on "Historic Adventism" and their comment after comment in class was constantly complaining about things that the school was doing and what the church was doing. Then they would become non-religious and one classmate would work on his car in front of the boys dorm smoking , or they would drink, go into drugs, live a very un-adventist lifestyle. Then have a religious conversion but again it is the very strict view and constantly pointing out problems that our schools and churches are doing. And they are living their life in these flip flops. When I run across them I never know which of these two sides they are on. I should apologize some to B/W photodude as I had seen scenes of the event on facebook, but it was edited in a way that really bothered me, but I thought "There must be more here than this is sounding" . I have to admit when I read and saw B/W's post and link, he did put it into perspective which was not given on facebook. The event made much more sense and was much more acceptable in what B/W posted, and much of my reaction comes from the background I wrote about above and the contrast between how the event in Florida was presented on Facebook and in B/W's post. But even in both posts I keep finding the same spirit that I saw in those letters to Mrs. White or Willie, in those flyers from the early 1900s, the book "With Cloak and Dagger" and these classmates and that student of mine and others that I have known in the church who keep living that flipped flop life. I think the worst part is seeing these people who live the flipped flop life. I pray for them and worry about them. And I am critical of this spirit. * Oh, just a theological note about Samuel's sons: There is Biblical evidence that the complaints of Samuel's sons were more politically motivated than their actual actions. Long before David there was a split between the northern and southern tribes. It looks like there were 7 years that David was King of Judah until becoming King of Israel. And that Saul and David were more kings over the two kingdoms rather than a united kingdom. And Samuel tended to be more popular in the north, his sons appear to have preferred the south, and his grandson worked for the Southern kingdom and temple. So Samuel's sons may not have been as bad as their critics made them sound.