If you were to leave the Adventist church, where would you go?

[John317]

Your motivations are those of a mature husband who loves his wife. That's the best reason for being faithful and loving, but there are many people who are not mature or who don't love their wives as they should. The fact that they are immature or don't loves their wives doesn't mean it would be right for them to commit adultery. Doing so would still be a sin and wrong to do.

Don't you agree that parents must accept their small children's motivations when they're based on fear of punishment or of the terrible consequences? For instance, a parent sometimes must use fear to teach a child not to cross the street or not to touch the stove or stay away from a cliff, etc. It's hard to get all children to see the reasonableness of obeying the parent's instructions, so sometimes it becomes necessary to teach childeren that the parent is serious and that "no" means "no."

I believe this is similar to God's position in relationship with many people. He accepts fear of punishment as a beginning motive but He wants people to grow and mature so that their motives are more in line with the better ones that you speak of.

Do you think this makes sense?

[John317]

Good point, Shane.

The world is also full of men and women who think that they "love" their partner or companion or even their spouse, even though they have intimatte relations with other people. They see nothing wrong with it, but these relationships often end tragically and sadly, even as they both intend for their actiivies to bring them closer together. They don't consider the terrible consequenes of their behavior but think that morality is summed up in doing whatever makes them happy.

[Kevin H]

Good points Shane!

Cardw, don't forget that there are two different understandings of hell fire within the church. There is those who believe in literal fire, and those who believe that it is the glory and love of God that is the fire, and that the end of the wicked is not a barbecue. I dissagree with a comment posted above about heaven being so boring to the lost. No they are not bored, they find it exciting that is why they surround the city to attack it. They want heaven but are mixed towards Jesus. Jesus is their deepest desire, but they have developed a character of rejecting him.

[Guest]

Let me guess Kevin, you're in that camp right?

[Kevin H]

With Elder Fifield (who personally knew Ellen White and never received a testimony from her for his teachings about hell), and I honestly believe Ellen White, and serious study of the Bible text, and Elder Lynn Harper Wood (who wrote some of the SDABC and who got our church to hold to a high standard of Biblical study and who Lynn Wood Hall at Southern was named after) among others, maybe even including William Tyndale.

[Dr. Shane]

When people find out I am an Adventist they often make a comment to me about the Sabbath. I normally respond something like this:

Me: You know what I like so much about the Adventist faith?

Them: What?

Me: It is all about love. Adventist don't believe a God of love would torture sinners for endless eternity in hell. They believe the reason unrepentant sinners won't go to heaven is because they won't be happy there and it is a loving God that annihilates them. Their punishment is eternal in the aspect that the results are eternal but it isn't endless punishing.

Them: Wow!

It takes the wind out of their sails. Most are prepared to tell me why the Sabbath isn't that important but are speechless when I tell them a God of love wouldn't torture sinners for endless eternity.

[John317]

In the one view, God chooses to abandon those who hold onto their sins, so that they die and become as if they never existed; in the other, God sends fire down from heaven and burns them up so they become as if they never existed. Either way, God is the cause of the death of the wicked, and in either view, God is a loving, just God toward everyone, including those who are lost.

The "wicked" destroy themselves according to both viewpoints, just as the criminal destroys himself by his choices. It's true there's an individual who pulls the switch or puts the IV in the criminal's veins, but he is only carrying out the order of the court after the person has already destroyed himself.

[Guest]

That's pretty good Shane.

[Kevin H]

Good points John, but I would not call the one view God abandoning those who hold on to their sins. I strongly dissagree with that line. The reason why it is hell is because God does not give up on them. They get to see Jesus their deepest desire and the Holy Spirit is pleding on their hearts pulling them to Christ with irrisistable grace, It is characistic of God to keep trying and to do everything possible short of forcing the will, but they cannot conseve forgiveness and can not conseve God not getting them for their sins, and that they still want to commit their sins yet see how horrible those sins are when contrasted to the beauty of Jesus. They are in a horrible tug of war between the drawing power of Christ going as far as possible without forcing the will, and their will to reject and this wanting to come yet refusing to becomes so intence -- ever hear people say they are so split between two different decisions that they fell like they are being ripped appart? This lack of God giving up on them and the beauty of Jesus fighting against their characteristic habit of refusing to yield to God's love quite litterally rip them to pieces and disintergrates them.

[John317]

If someone were to ask you to give a Bible study on the destruction of the wicked, what are the first 10 or so texts that you would ask them to consider in support of your view?

Also, do you believe that one arrives at your viewpoint by studying everything Ellen White has written on the subject? For instance, have you studied Ellen White's comments found in the Exhaustive EGW Commentary on Revelation, which contains virtually everything she wrote on the destruction of the wicked?

[Jeannieb43]

Kevin, Where do you find Lynn Harper Wood's beliefs on this topic written? BTW, he was my mother's first cousin. He was an archeologist and Biblical scholar. We used to visit him frequently when he taught at the SDA Seminary when it was in Washington (in the 1940s). Later, when he and his wife Maude retired in Loma Linda we saw them frequently. They both lived to a ripe old age.

[John317]

I agree with you, Shane. That's great news-- to know that God is truly a God of love who won't torture people in an endless buring hell. The lost wouldn't be happy in heaven anyway, and God refuses to have a prison for them, so there's only one alternative.

[John317]

I'm interested also in what Lynn Harper Wood wrote in the SDA BC, as well as what Lynn Wood Hall wrote on this topic.

I know William Tynadale believed in the non-immortality of the soul, but what did he write which shows that he believes God doesn't destroy the wicked by literal fire? Do you know how Tynade believed the wicked will perish?

[Kevin H]

I have read many different comments both in collections such as Dr. Ken Hart's complation of Mrs. White quotes on the distruction of the wicked and in books and looking up from computer programs.

As for the Bible study, please give me a chance to come back with a more intense study, but for starters there is Deuteronomy 4:24 "For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God" Exodus 19:21 "and the Lord said to Moses 'Go down and warn the people, lest they break through to gaze at the Lord, and many of them perish'" and back up to Exodus 19:18 "Now Mt. Sinai was completely in smoke, because the Lord descnded upon it in fire. It's smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked greatly." Exodus 33:18- 34:10, such as Exodus 33:20 "But he said 'You cannot see my face;for no man can see Me and live.'" and move on to Exodus 34:29 where the glory of God was shining off of Moses' face and had to veil his face. Psalm 18: 6-17; I would also include for the beauty of Jesus Psalm 19:10. Psalm 21:9 (are they swallowed up by the Lord, or devoured by fire? This is a parrell cuplet, being devoured by the fire is being swallowed up by the Lord) There are other texts in the Pentituch and Psalms.

I would review my research, but of the terms "seraphim" and "cheribim" one of those mean "The burning ones" There is of course the classic Isaiah 33:14-15 where it is the righteous living with the eternal fire.

Like I said, I can do a more intense study, but this is a start.

[Kevin H]

I don't believe that [Wood] wrote about this topic specifically in the SDABC, but he taught it in his classes from the seminary. He wrote a beautiful passage (I believe it was a date in November) of the 1944 or 45 (it is copywrited 1944) morning watch book for the denomination "Mysteries unveiled"

Elder Wood was Paul Heubech's major professor and is where Paul Heubech got this view from. Neither Graham Maxwell nor Jack Provonsha remember Elder Wood presenting this view at a week of prayer he gave at PUC when they were students, but both found his week of prayer one of the most impressive ones they ever attended and told me that while they don't think his week of prayer influenced them for coming up with their views of hell, they could not say for sure that he did not mention it durring that week and that his mention may have influenced their later views, but getting to know him in his later years they learned that he held this view of hell fire.

As for Tyndale, I do not know for sure that he did not believe in the non-literal fire, but when the Tyndale Bible was in the Hunnington Libarary I came across some of his passages that sounded like he did not believe in a litteral fire, and of course Graham Maxwell is in that area and he and other members of his class pointed out other similar sounding passages that I did not see at the Huntington libarary. I've read and had read to me enough to be tempted to believe that he held this view, but also little enough to hold the final judgement on this until I verify that Abraham Lincon quote that Stan shared.

[John317]

OK, thanks.

Yes, it is interesting to study all the places in the Bible dealing with God's presence and to see the relationship between Him and "fire," "smoke," etc.

I know Maxwell well personally and spent many Sabbaths over about 15 years sitting in his Sabbath school classes. I also interviewed him for two issues of Insight magazine, which focussed on issues related to God's character and the way He deals with the problem of sin. At that time, Dr. Maxwell told me that he believed God destroyed the world with a flood.

I've lost communication with him since then, so I'm not sure whether his beliefs on it have changed. I don't necessarily agree with him on some of these things, but I like him and respect him very much.

[Kevin H]

I also sat in his class for about 10 years. I don't necessarly agree with him on every point, and there are some points where he showed that we need to question our conclusions but did not realy form (or at least clearly present) an alternative theory beyond the fact that the popular theories don't work. Sadly his critics have theorised what he should have offered as a solution and build their arguments on this supposed solution that they created for him.

I believe he could have done a better job in encouraging exogesis, and sadly some who have been listening to what he said, and what his critics say and side with him have ended up incorporating the false criticizisms into their thought which is leading them to disaster. However dispite questions over the method of presentation, I believe that he came to proper conclusions about hell fire itself. And I encourage the critics to look at more approaches to this than just the Maxwell-Provonsha approaches (as well as encourageing them to realize that while Maxwell and Provonsha are similar that they are not identical)

Most of what I got about Lynn Wood is what Dr. Maxwell and Paul Heubech told me and what I read in Mysteries Unvield, and a little bit from what Jack Provonsha told me and a little about what some of Lynn Wood's other former students told me. According to Dr. Maxwell, Lynn Wood came to this understanding of hell fire in the 1920s. and Paul Heubech does not hold Maxwells and Provonsha's thinking that while impressed by Wood at that week of prayer, but not beliveing that he refered to hell fire then but not positive that he didn't, Paul Heubech clearly remembers that when Lynn Wood was his major professor and taught him about hell fire. I've spoken to some other older ministers who taught the traditional view of hell who told me that they were convinced by Elder Wood about his view of hell, but when out in the work they were too busy to develop how to present it and the other sermons were there to use so they just preached the tradition but knowing that there was more than they were saying and wished they knew how to present Wood's view clearly.

[cardw]

Shane,

I guess I don't feel any fear in regards to my compassion. I simply imagine the pain it would cause my wife. That's not fear, but sadness. I think it's the Bible that contains the ideas that love casts out fear.

So I'm not interested in the promotion of fear for any reason. About the only use I have for fear is if it gets me running faster when being chased by a bear. In most cases fear is a distraction and causes me to act as a reaction, rather than from wisdom.

This goes back to the statement of a great sword fighter as to why he was a great sword fighter. He said the key to his skill and focus was that he wasn't afraid to die.

[cardw]

John,

I don't think it makes sense to transfer early experiences with pain and fear as something a god would use with adults. Plus, since I don't believe in the biblical god, the only fear being spread is by the believers in this god.

I certainly no longer have to use fear with my sons. They may disagree, but I reason with them and explore what ifs. The motivation is to live life to its fullest and to know what to avoid. This isn't fear, but wisdom.

The feeling of fear paralyzes people and creates trauma. Even with small children reason often accomplishes much more than the creation of fear. My wife and I used a lot of redirection rather than condemnation and fear. If what my sons were doing wasn't fatal, I would often let them experience the consequences and this gave me an opportunity to engage with them in a non-theoretical way. I often simply had to ask them how they would do things differently and the pain of the situation shifted their view.

This is not what I see happening in the Bible. You may be using your own ability to have common sense in choosing a similar approach, but this is not in the Bible. The Bible basically offers the death penalty for almost everything. That just seems petty and immature to me. I certainly wouldn't use that as a guideline of how to raise my children.

[Aliensanctuary]

Has anyone thought about the pillar of cloud and fire rising above the desert wilderness in the days of Moses whenever they see the space shuttle riding on a swift cloud by day and a column of fire by night? To keep a large craft hovering several hundred feet above the surface of the Earth for forty years would require tremendous amounts of energy. That would be a possible explanation of the fire, smoke, roar, and shaking earth so often observed in the presence of the LORD.

I believe the experience of a close encounter with the LORD's pyrotechnics would tend to create fear in a few.

In the end, we will have a choice of either of two Masters (gods). We should all hope to choose the God who is on the winning side. This God may not be the God our religions have created out of myths and superstitions, but we can be sure that fiery, cataclysmic events will occur before the End of Time.

[cardw]

In this discussion of fear I would like to note that in most cases Christians place their energy into defending fear. I often find myself on the side of compassion and my efforts are certainly on solutions that use compassion.

This is further evidence that the core teachings require fear to validate a belief in Christianity. And this is because the use of fear is essential to retaining the Bible as authoritative.

This is why I left Adventism and ultimately Christianity.

[John317]

God begins with people wherever they are spiritually and mentally. I suppose it could be likened to a situation where you adopt a child and it turns out to be different from what you expected. Maybe he doesn't respond to you like you thought he would. So you have to try different things to really communicate with him. This is similar to God's situation. Therefore, if that means they need to be afraid of punishment in order for God to get their attention, and bring them along to greater maturity, he will do that. There are all kinds of people in this world, all at different levels of spiritual maturity and with different mental and psychological capacities.

If you had a child whose life was threatened in some way, and the only way to save him was to use a threat, or make him fear some kind of punishment, wouldn't you be willing to use it in order to save his life? That is sometimes a bit similar to God's position. He won't force anyone to believe in Him but He will warn them of the realities. And the reality is that people will die eternally if they don't allow God to save them.

It might be compared to a man swimming down a river and nearing a dangerous water-fall. A man on shore yells a warning about the water-fall but the man drawing steadily closer to certain death ignores him. He throws a rope out to the swimmer but he still refuses to grab it and instead simply laughs at the desperate attempts of the man on the shore to get his attention. A lot of people go over that water-fall, convinced that there's no danger and that the man on the shore with the rope is yelling about nothing. The swimmer refuses to base his actions on fear or on the desire to avoid terrible consequences.

Your thoughts?

[Dr. Shane]

[Running from a bear...] Another good example of a healthy fear. Indeed, most fears are destructive to our mental health and much of Christianity focuses way too much on fear. Adventistism's focus on love is one of the biggest reasons I am an Adventist. The Advent movement is not a fear-based movement.

[Guest]

.

[olger]

The church could use a healthy dose of "fear of the Lord" about now. Those who discard it also discarded wisdom (Proverbs 9:10).

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