The Closing of a Texas Church

[GHansen]

"KJV only" and "last generation theology" are both toxic and destructive views. The KJV only teaching was promoted by Wilkinson in his book on the topic. At the time he wrote, his view was denounced by a GC committee. LGT is often identified with M.L. Andreasen but did not originate with him. His Hebrews commentary contains a chapter on complete or total sanctification which exposes a fatal flaw in his reasoning. i.e., he does not let the immediate context define perfection. There is some very good insights in his book but he is mistaken on this point, perhaps overwhelmed by the outsize influence of EGW

[B/W Photodude]

19 hours ago, Kevin H said:

B/W Photodude, I hope you are ok, have not seen your posts for a while and I again wrote about the difference between the last generation view that you find with say the Fulcrum7 in contrast to the view you find in Mrs. White. I've written a few times to answer the questions, you've asked me a few times, but then no comments from you on what I shared with you.  

Thanks for the post. Will get to it and check it out. Sorry I missed your post days ago.

[Kevin H]

13 hours ago, GHansen said:

"KJV only" and "last generation theology" are both toxic and destructive views. The KJV only teaching was promoted by Wilkinson in his book on the topic. At the time he wrote, his view was denounced by a GC committee. LGT is often identified with M.L. Andreasen but did not originate with him. His Hebrews commentary contains a chapter on complete or total sanctification which exposes a fatal flaw in his reasoning. i.e., he does not let the immediate context define perfection. There is some very good insights in his book but he is mistaken on this point, perhaps overwhelmed by the outsize influence of EGW

I almost gave your post a like, however the part "perhaps overwhelmed by the outsize influence of EGW" stopped me. Yes, Mrs. White does hold a version of LGT, but as I pointed out above, her view of LGT and the views of those like Andreasen are very different. Andreasen and others sees LGT as a difference of QUALITY from other generations. Mrs. White sees it as a difference in QUANTITY from other generations. Also, they both had different understandings of Perfection which is delineated in Bowman's fantastic book "Hebrew Thought Compared to Greek"https://www.amazon.com/Hebrew-Thought-Compared-Thorleif-Paperback/dp/B00GOHAN5K/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=YZXQM6NK4SNBFDG0AM83 with Mrs. White holding to the Hebrew view of perfection and Andreasen and the other LGT people holding the Greek view. And they ignore Mrs. White's comments that they do not agree with and have connected their view of perfection to a thought that John Wesley sadly entertained. The great man that Wesley was he was wrong on that speculated view.

Mrs. White's view of LGT is too different from Andreasen's and the others who have been pushing this view in the Adventist church. They are mistaken on this point, due to being overwhelmed by the outsize influence of Greek thinking and Wesley's incorrect speculation. 

[GHansen]

Andreasen does not quote Wesley in his chapter on Sanctification.  His problem is quite simple. He imposed a definition of perfection on the text of Hebrews 10 which is not derived from the context. Had he recognized the parallelism at the beginning of the chapter and the reference to the purging of the conscience in a previous chapter, he probably would have seen his way clear. One need not study Wesley or Greek and Hebrew thought to understand Hebrews 10 any more than one must study Ugaritic documents or Allbright to understand the OT.

I assume that most of the misunderstandings which plague SDA land are due to misunderstanding EGW but it's hard to be sure because many of the people are dishonest about the origins of their belief. We don't admit that our beliefs are based on EGW rather than Scripture. Probably Dr. Ford's wax nose comment shamed people into obfuscating their sources. Many people will say EGW wasn't infallible but ask them where or when she was mistaken. Ever seen a cow staring at a new gate?

 

[GHansen]

6 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

Is that so? How do you decide this?

 

EGW said her writings, in her lifetime, were often misunderstood and misapplied. Countless hours of online dialogue with numerous individuals indicate that their interpretation of the Bible has no basis in the context of the passage in question. A remarkable ignorance of the meaning of Scripture is often evinced, ignorance which could be abated by simply allowing the context to inform the understanding. What's lacking is basic reading comprehension i.e., inadequate skills of literary analysis,  which should be acquired with a basic education.

 

[GHansen]

On 4/30/2019 at 1:30 PM, Kevin H said:

Kevin H

"Anyway in a nutshell, the popular last generation movement is a mixture of some of what Mrs. White says (with a rejection of other things she said) and mixing that with something that John Wesley said. While John Wesley said a lot of good things and is light-years beyond Luther, not everything he said was perfect and this was probably one of the worst things he said. He speculated that there was a higher form of Sanctification than anything that he had written about or experienced, and he never knew of anyone who experienced it but he theorized that he was out there. "

 

Wesley's "A Plain Account of Christian Perfection" cites the example of a woman he believed had attained sinlessness. Wesley gave the world sinless perfectionism, a nonsense doctrine held in contempt by most most responsible students. Luther gave us justification by faith, still highly esteemed by those who understand Scripture.

 

[B/W Photodude]

On 4/30/2019 at 1:30 AM, Kevin H said:

mixture of some of what Mrs. White says  ...

something that John Wesley said.

is light-years beyond Luther, not everything he said was perfect

Another group are Seventh-day Adventists who are looking for the last generation of reaching that level, that it is a level that never existed before and that the last generation was to have a different QUALITY of perfection than anyone else in human history.

As I said they take part of what Mrs. White says and ignore other things she says about it.  Mrs. White differs in that she DOES NOT SEE THE LAST GENERATION AS HAVING A DIFFERENT QUALITY than ever before. She sees the perfection in the last generation as a different QUANTITY then ever before ... sees people from all ages as at different levels in their spiritual growth that runs the bell curve from those who have come to completely and totally trust in God that there is no way that their faith can be shaken and runs the gamete to the unpardonable sin where there is so complete rejection of God that nothing can shake their unbelief and rebellion with most of us someplace in between.

Mrs. White rejects the ridged Greek view of perfection and goes for the eastern and especially Hebrew view of Perfection

One of the problems I have with your posts is that they mention people who disagree with others without a clear statement of what their disagreement is. Sometimes you have "teams" of characters without a clear description of their differences. "Thumbnails sketches" of what you believe others to be saying would be helpful, however, I may not think they said it at all!

While I am reading thru many of these people as fast as I can, you may have had more access to material than I have and know what your thoughts are! Many more obscure to us today are writers that I have no idea of what they preached. 

I can only go from what I have read (Bible, EGW, Waggoner, Andreason, Douglass, and others) and find a great deal of similarity with not much difference other than terminology. Some may put down Last Generation Theology, but to me, that is just another name for the 144,000. 

[GHansen]

2 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

This actually makes no sense to me. You seem pretty confident that all or most Adventists are "dishonest" about the origins of their beliefs," as if  thats gonna make us all think you are the only "honest" one? Making a blanket-statement like this about a church or faith group has never worked out well. What makes you think its going to now? There are so many holes in what you post, its hard to know where to start.  Sometimes its just better to ignore the little green men in the room.

Makes sense to me. "Ignore" is a great feature on some websites. I use it a lot. Take care. 

[Kevin H]

2 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

This actually makes no sense to me. You seem pretty confident that all or most Adventists are "dishonest" about the origins of their beliefs," as if  thats gonna make us all think you are the only "honest" one? Making a blanket-statement like this about a church or faith group has never worked out well. What makes you think its going to now? There are so many holes in what you post, its hard to know where to start.  Sometimes its just better to ignore the little green men in the room.

 

First, GHansen, at last I was fully able to like a quote!

Wanderer; I found this quote making a lot of sense. Mrs. White had her understanding on how inspiration works, and what visions did and did not do for her. But most of the rest of the church hold what has been called (at least by some of my professors) "The myth of what a prophet should be." 

Some examples of the differences and why GHansen's post made sense to me:

1. James White would complain about how people were making them look like idiots. He said that there are people who are in a dangerous position where God has told Mrs. White to write strong words to them so she does. But others are reading the strong counsel she is giving them and they are saying that this is a message from the Lord for what he wants all of his people to do and are trying to implement her words on to everyone in the church. 

2. There was the vision of the reform dress. People became every exacting about the length of the dress even bringing rulers to church to make sure that the ladies were wearing the dresses were not a hair too long or too short. Things got so bad that the Whites had to give up trying to encourage the reform dress. 

3. There was the ill-fated Testimony number 11 where Kellogg and others asked Mrs. White to write out all she saw about our health work, especially a large building with towers. They then started to send out this vision to raise money to start building that building immediately. When James came home he realized that building it at this time would be a financial disaster and had the the work that was started be dismantled.  

3. Around 1888 there was a new understanding on how to interpret the daily. Many rejected this new interpretation because Mrs. White had written in support of the old understanding. They were pushing Mrs. White to set these people suggesting the new interpretation to silence. She refused to do this encouraging people to study for themselves saying that the old view might be right, the new view might be right, or both views might be wrong.This got a lot of people upset with her and they kept throwing into her fact the quote she wrote years ago supporting the old view. There were other questions about what Bible texts mean as well. She would say that her writings were not to be used to answer questions such as "What is the meaning of the daily" nor other questions of exegesis. She said that it is our job to study those questions out, that she had a different job. When ever anyone wrote or asked her questions about exegesis she would do one of two things: Tell them that it was their job to study out the answer, or simply ignore or shrug the question off with a joke . However today how many Sabbath School studies where a topic is being discussed is shut down when someone reads what Mrs. White says about the text. 

4. Mrs. White wrote some things about the novel and fiction as well as a comment about the circus. What Mrs. White had to say were things that many ministers were saying about both, but also several serious writers such as Nathaniel Hawthorn and Herman Melville were saying the same things about the novel and fiction. They were all talking about a particular style of writing. However we read her in a vacuum and use her quotes against reading Hawthorn and Melville (by the way Hawthorn and Melville were not saying "Don't buy our books"). The English departments at our academies and colleges keep getting a lot of criticism for the books they study in class. 

As for the circus, many circuses, and unfortunately all the ones in America at the time  were NOT family programs. They appealed to men to leave their wives and kids at home and they come and watch provocatively dressed women and to get drunk and the grounds were full of thieves and pickpockets. (Now there was one European circus that visited the USA in the late 1700s that did not fit this description, but after their tour they left.) Well P. T. Barnum got the idea to start a new type of circus. He worked with ministers who were preaching against the circus and made a circus for the family and had security to look out for the pickpockets. Others also followed Barnum's example. After Mrs. White's death Willie was planning to take his family to see the Barnum show. He got a lot of criticism and people sending him his mother's quote about the circus. He tried to tell people that she was writing about a different thing and that it did not apply to the Barnum show. But the education was ineffective, and everyone kept bringing up that quote so Willie decided not to make people stumble and did not take the family to see the show. (One interesting note, I have only read this in one paper at the White estate and it gave no footnote and I could not find any other place to confirm the statement, but I read a paper that said that Mrs. White and P. T. Barnum were causal friends and that he hired her occasionally to go out and speak on temperance.)

5. Higher education had been focused in reading Greek and Latin classics and knowing Greek myths backwards and forwards and to know everything about Shakespeare. Then a movement started saying that education should be practical and that this deep study of Greek and Latin myths and Shakespeare was not practical, so some new colleges formed called agricultural colleges, where the students did not spend all their time of the classics but training for careers.  When Battle Creek was formed there was big debate over whether it should be a classical education or an agricultural education. Of course Mrs. White sided with those who wanted it to be an agricultural school. She thus would make arguments about the superiority of an agricultural education over the pagan Greek myths and the focus on Shakespeare.  Part of the downfall of battle creek was how it ended up becoming something in the middle. More time on building a career than a classical school but more time in the Greek myths and Shakespeare than an agricultural school.  

People who were upset at the amount of classical education at Battle Creek started a few reformed schools. One was Atlantic Union College, another was Pacific Union College. These were started by men who were friends of Mrs. White, AUC by Stephen Haskell. They would stay in contact with Mrs. White in how to have these schools run. I don't know about PUC and the others, but at AUC the myths were cut out, and Shakespeare was moved from the center of study to just being a part of the English department and the Saturday night programs were performing his plays. Mrs. White would have been aware of this and we do not have her saying that they were wrong to do this. However our English classes at our colleges and academies are constantly under attack for using a little bit of Shakespeare. 

6. When teaching at Battle Creek W. W. Prescott read a book on fundamentalism. He liked it and started to teach it at Battle Creek both in class and in church and in talking. One man who he shared this thought  with was Stephen Haskell. A couple of other young people, such as A. G. Daniels and D. M. Canright were also gaining interest in fundamentalism. When she learned about this she asked Prescott, Daniels and Canright to come help her with her work. She constantly gave them assignments that went against their fundamentalist beliefs. These three young men were faced with a crisis where they either had to give up fundamentalism or give up Mrs. White. Prescott and Daniels basically gave up fundamentalism. Canright joined the most extreme of the fundamentalist churches and gave up Mrs. White.  

Mrs White and Steven Haskell would go around and around on this issue. Haskell would tell these wonderful things that her visions and inspiration was doing for her  and how her words and the Bible are both infallible. Mrs. White telling him that no, inspiration does not work like that, her writings were not infallible. They would go around and around on this, both were frustrated that they could not get the other to change their views but they still stayed good friends Sadly after her death there was some friction between he and Willie because Willie sided with his mom's view of inspiration rather than Fundamentalism. Today a number of Adventists think like Haskell, they believe "Ok, this infallible prophet said that she is not infallible therefore she is not infallible, it's just that she never made a mistake."

7. There were less friendly correspondence between the Whites and pastors who sided on a school of thought that later would present themselves as the name of "Historic Adventists." These people use massive quotes from Mrs. White but she said that they don't understand her message and therefore were making wrong application of her words. This group is still very strong in the church. 

[GHansen]

4 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

4 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

Wanderer quoting BWP  ; I can only go from what I have read (Bible, EGW, Waggoner, Andreason, Douglass, and others) and find a great deal of similarity with not much difference other than terminology. Some may put down Last Generation Theology, but to me, that is just another name for the 144,000

BWP 

Waggoner, Andreason, and Douglass are unreliable sources of Biblical truth. EGW wrote extensively and much of what she said  is poorly understood; consequently, I would place her in the same camp, with certain reservations. That leaves us with the Bible,which is really the best source. Forget what Waggoner, EGW, Andreason and Douglass said. Read Scripture and look for explanations of difficulty within the context, both immediate and larger. Most people display very poor reading comprehension skills. That is the main problem. Outside influences obscure the plain meaning of the text.

There is a fake pastor running around the denomination right now. By fake, I mean no ordination or credential or church plant. His particular problem is that EGW  dominates his interpretation of Scripture to the point that he murders it to prove "LGT."

4 hours ago, The Wanderer said:

 

 

[GHansen]

41 minutes ago, The Wanderer said:

”I was talking about characterizing "most Adventists" as "dishonest," and I am not sure how either of you could justify that line of thinking. I am well aware of how EGW viewed her writings, but what I am reading here is a long ways from the truth. Truth doesnt just magically happen because we make everyone out to be "wrong" or "dishonest," it happens when people can simply discuss what their view is and why. GHansons posts make no sense to me because of their context and insinuations.“

Wanderer, The name is Hansen as in "10, 000  Swedes [Hanson] ran through the weeds, pursued by 1 Norwegian" [Hansen]. I don't know how I can be more plain spoken without using words that most would consider offensive. I don't mean to "insinuate" anything. Are you suggesting that  people come upon the IJ doctrine during  devotional reading or serious study of Scripture? The IJ just jumps out  while reading Hebrews8-10 or Matthew 22? EGW didn't invent the IJ doctrine. James White， J.N.Andrews， and U Smith all wrote about it years before EGW included the chapter in GC which addresses it. Both White's heard about it from a local minister named Elon Everts, when they were in Illinois. EJ Waggoner said he never believed it and he was an early advocate of sinless perfection; nevertheless, few people associate the IJ with Andrews, Smith, or J. White. It's EGW, baby, right down the line. 

 

[B/W Photodude]

20 hours ago, GHansen said:

   On 5/5/2019 at 9:48 PM, The Wanderer said: 

   On 5/5/2019 at 9:48 PM, The Wanderer said: 

Wanderer quoting BWP  ; I can only go from what I have read (Bible, EGW, Waggoner, Andreason, Douglass, and others) and find a great deal of similarity with not much difference other than terminology. Some may put down Last Generation Theology, but to me, that is just another name for the 144,000

BWP 

Waggoner, Andreason, and Douglass are unreliable sources of Biblical truth. EGW wrote extensively and much of what she said  is poorly understood; consequently, I would place her in the same camp, with certain reservations. That leaves us with the Bible,which is really the best source. Forget what Waggoner, EGW, Andreason and Douglass said. Read Scripture and look for explanations of difficulty within the context, both immediate and larger. Most people display very poor reading comprehension skills. That is the main problem. Outside influences obscure the plain meaning of the text.

There is a fake pastor running around the denomination right now. By fake, I mean no ordination or credential or church plant. His particular problem is that EGW  dominates his interpretation of Scripture to the point that he murders it to prove "LGT."

You sure messed up on quoting and are attributing things to people they did not say!

However, you can have your opinion on writers such as White, Waggoner, Andreason, and Douglass. All yours! However, I will read and find interesting and illuminating works were I wish. The fact that EGW is poorly understood is not her fault. The Bible is poorly understood by most of the world, but it is not thrown out. The fact that people study so little and understand so little is not the problem of the different writers. Also, don't really need pointers on how to study Scripture.

The fake pastor is not really helpful as we do not know who to compare to what we may already know. So, it is just thrown in someone is messing up out there. But we already knew people are doing that!

[GHansen]

1 hour ago, B/W Photodude said:

"You sure messed up on quoting and are attributing things to people they did not say!"

BWP,

To put it another way, someone took issue with my characterization of most SDA as dishonest since they deny they get their teachings from EGW instead of Scripture. The IJ is a central pillar of Adventism. We all learned it from EGW. We didn't come across it from our personal study. Did you ever read the articles Smith，Andrews， and J.White wrote on the IJ before EGW popularized the doctrine in GC?   Few people have; consequently, it is dishonest to say our beliefs are based on Scripture rather than  EGW. 

 

[B/W Photodude]

9 hours ago, GHansen said:

The IJ is a central pillar of Adventism. We all learned it from EGW. We didn't come across it from our personal study. Did you ever read the articles Smith，Andrews， and J.White wrote on the IJ before EGW popularized the doctrine in GC?   Few people have; consequently, it is dishonest to say our beliefs are based on Scripture rather than  EGW. 

Well, if you read your Bible you will find the IJ. Just because people can not see an event in the Bible that others can (i.e., EGW and others) does not mean they are wrong. I do believe that it has been well established that not all doctrines in the fundamental beliefs were all parsed out immediately after the Great Disappointment. The fact that there were some different ideas that were developed later seems to throw people into kiniptions all the time and they then try to discredit the early pioneers of the church.