Has the Adventist church experienced the Shaking?

[hobie]

The first big shaking was definitely felt when 'Questions on Doctrines' came out. We find a good description of the division it caused in many articles withing the church and caused many to leave at that time.

"Perhaps no other book has aroused so much controversy in the history of  the Seventh-day Adventist Church as the 1957 publication of Seventh-day Adventists Answer Questions on Doctrine.1 The book was published as both a direct result of and a representative response to the Seventh-day Adventist Evangelical Conferences of 1955-1956, involving Walter Martin and Donald Grey Barnhouse2 on the evangelical side and a number of General Conference leaders on the Adventist side. Questions on Doctrine was to be the apology par excellence of Adventism.

However, when the book came out, it created a great uproar within and without the church. Evangelical Protestants found themselves divided on the issue of the acceptability of Seventh-day Adventists as Christians. Adventists, on the other hand, saw within their ranks an even greater division. Although the book received a de facto imprimatur from the General Conference, it generated a passionate dissent concerning the book’s treatment of Christ’s human nature and the atonement. Single-handedly spearheading this protest was M. L. Andreasen, a retired theologian. Determined to have Questions on Doctrine censured and withdrawn, Andreasen campaigned against it, denounced it as “the most subtle and dangerous error”3 and “a most dangerous heresy.”4... https://www.andrews.edu/library/car/cardigital/Periodicals/AUSS/2008/2008-2/2008-2-05.pdf

Many Adventist left the church saying it had departed from its belief in what human nature Christ came with, which had been that of after the Fall as we see in SOP.

"Whatever Jesus took was not His intrinsically or innately. His taking the burden of our inherited weakness and failings, even after four thousand years of accumulated infirmities and degeneracy" (The Desire of Ages, pp. 49, 117)

'It would have been an almost infinite humiliation for the Son of God to take man's nature, even when Adam stood in his innocence in Eden. But Jesus accepted humanity when the race had been weakened by four thousand years of sin. Like every child of Adam He accepted the results of the working of the great law of heredity. What these results were is shown in the history of His earthly ancestors. He came with such a heredity to share our sorrows and temptations, and to give us the example of a sinless life..... Yet into the world where Satan claimed dominion God permitted His Son to come, a helpless babe, subject to the weakness of hu[bless and do not curse]manity. He permitted Him to meet life's peril in common with every human soul, to fight the battle as every child of humanity must fight it, at the risk of failure and eternal loss." The Desire of Ages, p. 49.

"He took upon His sinless nature our sinful nature, that He might know how to succor those that are tempted. ["Medical Ministry, p. 181]

But what many Adventists did not understand which they would have with deeper study,, is that Jesus took on Adams "spiritual nature" before the fall with no taint of sin, which is also clear Adventist doctrine. Which we also find in SOP...

"In treating upon the humanity of Christ, you need to guard strenuously every assertion, lest your words be taken to mean more than they imply, and thus you lose or dim the clear perceptions of His humanity as combined with divinity. His birth was a miracle of God, . . . "That holy thing which shall be born of thee [Mary] shall be called the Son of God." . . . Never, in any way, leave the slightest impression upon human minds that a taint of, or inclination to, corruption rested upon Christ, or that He in any way yielded to corruption. He was tempted in all points like as man is tempted, yet He is called "that holy thing." It is a mystery that is left unexplained to mortals that Christ could be tempted in all points like as we are, and yet he without sin. The incarnation of Christ has ever been, and will ever remain, a mystery. That which is revealed, is for us and for our children, but let every human being be warned from the ground of making Christ altogether human, such an one as ourselves; for it cannot be." [The SDA Bible Commentary, vol.5, pp. 1128, 1129.]

"We should have no misgivings in regard to the perfect sinlessness of the human nature of Christ. " [The SDA Bible Commentary, vol. 5, p. 113]

"I perceive that there is danger in approaching subjects which dwell on the humanity of the Son of the infinite God. He did humble Himself when He saw He was in fashion as a man, that He might understand the force of all temptations wherewith man is beset. . . . On not one occasion was there a response to his manifold temptations. Not once did Christ step on Satan's ground, to give him any advantage. Satan found nothing in Him to encourage his advances." [The SDA Bible Commentary, vol. 5, p. 1129.]

"The human nature of Christ is likened to ours, and suffering was more keenly felt by Him; for His spiritual nature was free from every taint of sin. Therefore His desire for the removal of suffering was stronger than human beings can experience. . . . The Son of God endured the wrath of God against sin. All the accumulated sin of the world was laid upon the Sin-bearer, the One who was innocent, the One who alone could be the propitiation for sin, because He Himself was obedient. He was One with God. Not a taint of corruption was upon Him." [The Signs of the Times, Dec. 9, 1897.]

He took "the nature but not the sinfulness of man." [Signs of the Times, May 29, 1901.]

"He is a brother in our infirmities, but not in possessing like passions." [Testimonies, vol.2, p.202.]

The Son of God "became like one of us, except in sin." [The Youth's Instructor, Oct. 20, 1886.]

Now after Ellen White passed from the scene Adventist started to drift away from what she had written and was true Adventist belief that Christ had no taint of sin, and began to hold that "sinful flesh" meant Christ had desires of sin such as lust and covet. So lets start with a verse that speaks directly to that about the nature of Christ:

Romans 8:3 King James Version (KJV)
3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:

I was listening to a program with Adventist theologian Herbert Douglass, who knew many of those involved including M. L. Andersean, on Amazing Facts, and he in went in depth over the Adventist book Questions on Doctrine, but to my surprise did not make one quote from the book that he had a issue with. Instead he quoted others who said it had an effect on how Adventist looked at the nature of Christ and the Atonement. We all know how it shook the Adventist at the time, and the droves that left the church because of it. This was the first major shaking of the church even though there had been other issues such the one with Jones and Waggoner in 1888.

[hobie]

The next major shaking came with Desmond Ford and his personal view that the Seventh Day Adventist doctrine of the Investigative Judgement has no biblical basis. We all were witness to the end result of that as many brethren as well as pastors left the church, with some becoming the bitterest of enemies against the church or formenting a attack on its doctrines with every manner of weapon they could seize upon. We have yet to fully let go of the effects of what he caused as we find online and elsewhere...

The Investigative Judgment in Matthew - Advent Defense League

Desmond Ford & Walter Rea: 1844, Glacier View and Ellen G. White’s Plagiarism (1982) – Answering Adventism

Ministry Magazine | The shaking up of Adventism?

[hobie]

Then it seems that there came waves of shakings with issues of tithing and church finances being properly addressed, and church and others. Then we came upon giant ones that grew and separated church, family and friends, Politics and Women's Ordination. 

I didnt think Women's Ordination would grow to the battle royal it became till it cause even moderators and administrates on Adventist sites to begin to separate from each other and their forums to say nothing of the brethren and another major surge and shaking out the door of the Adventist church. Only the devil was pleased, but this was nothing to the next one, with the political apocalypse with the election of 2016. You could not even mention the names of the two candidates whether in church, at work, or even in public without a tremendous reaction or hardening of views, with no recourse for agreement. 

I remember I was greeting at the front door back during that time, and a group came up to the front to enter in. But first they asked, 'who do you support?' between the candidates. Despite my best effort to defuse the situation as not proper place or time for politics. They stopped and would not withdraw from the question before entering. They then turned around and left in disgust when I would not engage for one side or the other. Politics had become more important than the teachings of Jesus and His church..

[Asia Joe]

3 hours ago, hobie said:

with the political apocalypse with the election of 2016. You could not even mention the names of the two candidates whether in church, at work, or even in public without a tremendous reaction or hardening of views, with no recourse for agreement. 

Even more so now.  The division has never been greater in North America. 

We cannot forget the division of Vax vs Non-Vax

Now we have a divide about illegal immigrants and ICE.  In Lake Union this has become a problem. 

My friends tell me that church attendance is down in many white churches, and people are watching on the internet. I can see a correlation to the controversial issues. 

The next dividing topic will be the war in Iran. 

It seems like lots of shaking in North America. 

Let us not forget, the NAD makes up less than 10% of the Adventist Church. 

[Kevin H]

Not just in Adventism, but in the world as a whole, Satan is trying to get people to extremes. Often, it is one side for people who don't like something, and the other extreme that looks like it fully supports something. Both extremes tend to clutch on to parts of the truth and use that part of the truth against a better understanding of the truth.  Putting us into these two extremes makes it easier for him to give only a few last great deceptions where the two sides need to join together to face the final crisis, and where the refusal to look for other aspects of truth blinds us to balanced views that can see us though. 

Woman's Ordination has some people look at their "proof-texts" and think they are faithfully following the Bible. They look at the liberal churches who do not take the Bible seriously as ordaining women, and jump to the conclusion that those within Adventism who want to ordain women wants the church to just become one of these other liberal churches that do not take the Bible seriously. Thus they see themselves as faithfully clinging to the Bible, while those who want to ordain women are rejecting the Bible and we need to save the church from rejecting the Bible. 

While others studying the Bible sees that the literary and historical context of these "proof-texts" does not fit what tradition has read into those words. They find evidence of women's ordination in the Bible, and find that within Adventism there has been an openness to women's ordination, and having developed a "temporary" back door way of ordaining women without using the word "ordained" which was only to last until more of our members could understand that women's ordination was indeed Biblical. Thus this pro-WO group does not care about what those "liberal" Biblically Minimalist churches teach, and see the Anti-WO people as stuck on non-Adventist traditions, thus that if we are fair to the Bible and to Adventist History that we need to change our back door ordination of women to coming out and being honest that we do ordain women, and that we need to save the church from having tradition blind our Bible reading. 

[hobie]

On 3/14/2026 at 12:42 AM, Joe Knapp said:

Even more so now.  The division has never been greater in North America. 

We cannot forget the division of Vax vs Non-Vax

Now we have a divide about illegal immigrants and ICE.  In Lake Union this has become a problem. 

My friends tell me that church attendance is down in many white churches, and people are watching on the internet. I can see a correlation to the controversial issues. 

The next dividing topic will be the war in Iran. 

It seems like lots of shaking in North America. 

Let us not forget, the NAD makes up less than 10% of the Adventist Church. 

Well, the Latins in North America and in the Adventist church tend to have a more conservative and traditional view on society and church beliefs. Not so much worry of Vax or Non-Vax, and for most part feel all immigrants should obey the law but dont turn away from helping those who are illegal. We are getting a rise in all of demographics in our church, but we accept any of Gods children no matter where they come from or the shade of their tans if you get my meaning. Now as for the War on Iran, most Latins watch news from latin sources, not Fox News or CNN so dont get all the politics they spin.

Back in the day, the first words out of the mouth of members we use to hear was 'La Senora White dice'. And here is a eyeopener, in the AVANCE study into Latino Adventists in the North American Division, "There was a very high degree (95 percent) of fidelity to the orthodox teachings of the church' according to Edwin Hernández, the principal investigator.

[Asia Joe]

2 hours ago, hobie said:

Back in the day, the first words out of the mouth of members we use to hear was 'La Senora White dice'. And here is a eyeopener, in the AVANCE study into Latino Adventists in the North American Division, "There was a very high degree (95 percent) of fidelity to the orthodox teachings of the church' according to Edwin Hernández, the principal investigator.

Can you explain this more? 

[hobie]

1 hour ago, Joe Knapp said:

Can you explain this more? 

'La Senora White dice'. means 'Sister White says', when they went to tell you what are the traditional Adventist pillars.. As for the pillars they stand by as others drift, the Sabbath, the Investigative Judgement, the Mark of the Beast, and the Remnant, etc...

[Asia Joe]

TY.

[Hanseng]

The real shaking is going to be a lot more trouble than arguments framed in air-conditioned offices on word processors. People will be killed, probably tortured as well. As a group, SDA have not fared well in the face of real persecution, which will occur when the real shaking arrives. The church was shaken in Rwanda, when the grounds of an SDA hospital served as a killing field, led in part by prominent SDA church members. They should have been put to death for their crimes.

David Lin, the long time "Dean" of Chinese Adventism survived the shaking in China by compromising, i.e., going to work on Sabbath. I asked a pastor in Asia how the Christians survived a time of persecution. "Oh, there were no Christians at that time." The expression on his face said the rest. Everybody denied Christ in order to survive. The book Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust tells how Hasidim sang and danced their way to execution after being shorn by their tormentors. Jews celebrated their own murders, while many Christians, including SDA cozied, up to Hitler to preserve their standing and denomination. We will stand alone during the real shaking. No administrator or pastor is going to save you. It won't be about what Sr. White said. It will be about your faith in Christ. Death may be your only option. If you deny your Lord and Saviour, you could still be killed. The only way out will be by your living connection to the Lord of heaven and earth. You'll likely be wondering why He is letting this happen. Trusting Him is the only way out.

[hobie]

On 3/26/2026 at 1:33 AM, Hanseng said:

The real shaking is going to be a lot more trouble than arguments framed in air-conditioned offices on word processors. People will be killed, probably tortured as well. As a group, SDA have not fared well in the face of real persecution, which will occur when the real shaking arrives. The church was shaken in Rwanda, when the grounds of an SDA hospital served as a killing field, led in part by prominent SDA church members. They should have been put to death for their crimes.

David Lin, the long time "Dean" of Chinese Adventism survived the shaking in China by compromising, i.e., going to work on Sabbath. I asked a pastor in Asia how the Christians survived a time of persecution. "Oh, there were no Christians at that time." The expression on his face said the rest. Everybody denied Christ in order to survive. The book Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust tells how Hasidim sang and danced their way to execution after being shorn by their tormentors. Jews celebrated their own murders, while many Christians, including SDA cozied, up to Hitler to preserve their standing and denomination. We will stand alone during the real shaking. No administrator or pastor is going to save you. It won't be about what Sr. White said. It will be about your faith in Christ. Death may be your only option. If you deny your Lord and Saviour, you could still be killed. The only way out will be by your living connection to the Lord of heaven and earth. You'll likely be wondering why He is letting this happen. Trusting Him is the only way out.

My family was in Cuba when Castro took over, we know 'shaking'...

[Hanseng]

2 hours ago, hobie said:

My family was in Cuba when Castro took over, we know 'shaking'...

Tell us about it.

[Hanseng]

On 3/14/2026 at 9:32 AM, hobie said:

Politics had become more important than the teachings of Jesus and His church..

The most racist speech I have ever heard was delivered from the pulpit of an SDA church in Vallejo, California and I have worked in several correctional institutions--juvenile hall, county jail. and prisons.  Social engineers in the department of corrections decided to end racism in prisons by putting members of different races in cells together. Figured out it wouldn't work after word of the beatings and a murder or two got around. ~50 years in/ around the church of Adventism, I heard very little gospel, except from Dr. Ford.  Never heard much about politics from him or the church.

Racial issues can hardly be separated from politics, hence we have the politics of race.

[hobie]

On 4/18/2026 at 9:40 AM, Hanseng said:

Tell us about it.

It became about one man, what he said was all that mattered, if you did not agree with him you went to jail or faced the firing squad. Everyone followed just Castro, and if you didnt your children would report you, your neighbors would come for you with machetes, and the soldiers would arrest you, and they would take your house, car, land, and your friends would cease to know you. My family escaped with the clothes on their backs and my mothers iron, she said Castro would not get that and she meant it and she carried it out. 

That was before the horrors happening now, with the power and transportation cut off...

[hobie]

We are at the place we were warned would appear as those we thought were close as family, church brethren, and even close friends and even leaders in the church that SOP told us would come..

"The work which the church has failed to do in a time of peace and prosperity, she will have to do in a terrible crisis, under most discouraging, forbidding, circumstances. The warnings that worldly conformity has silenced or withheld, must be given under the fiercest opposition from enemies of the faith. And at that time the superficial, conservative class, whose influence has steadily retarded the progress of the work, will renounce the faith, and take their stand with its avowed enemies, toward whom their sympathies have long been tending. These apostates will then manifest the most bitter enmity, doing all in their power to oppress and malign their former brethren, and to excite indignation against them. This day is just before us. The members of the church will individually be tested and proved. They will be placed in circumstances where they will be forced to bear witness for the truth. Many will be called to speak before councils and in courts of justice, perhaps separately and alone. The experience which would have helped them in this emergency they have neglected to obtain, and their souls are burdened with remorse for wasted opportunities and neglected privileges."--Testimonies, vol. 5, p. 463.  {ChS 158.1}

[hobie]

Here is a good sermon on this from Mark Finley...

"We don't "ride" into God's kingdom on our church membership. Salvation isn't determined on the basis of names on the church books. And yet, it is important to know how God is going to use His church in the last days. We need to understand what is meant by that important expression, "the shaking." What events will constitute the shaking? How will the shaking affect each of us? Will God's believers be shaken out? Or will the unfaithful be shaken out? How will God purify His church? And how can we be confident that we are among those who, knowing Jesus, will receive God's seal, so that we may live forever? We want to face the future with a firm assurance in Jesus.

Throughout history, God's people have often drifted into apostasy. Periodically they have adopted the customs and practices of the people around them. Note some examples:

Old Testament

God called Abraham out from among the idolaters of his day because of his obedience. He was a "friend of God," a loyal, devoted follower of the true God. In subsequent generations, God called Abraham's descendants, the people of Israel, out of Egyptian bondage to maintain this obedient relationship with Him.

When Israel persisted in disobedience, God allowed them to face oppression, persecution and defeat at the hands of their enemies, and eventually to go into captivity, in order to teach them dependence upon Him. Then He called them out of Babylon's paganism to be His separated people once more. Through the prophets' warnings and appeals to repent, and through the scourge of persecution, He tried to purify them, pruning the unfruitful branches. Some responded, but most of Israel blatantly continued in rebellion.

New Testament

The Greek word for church in the New Testament is ekklesia, a gathering or assembly, especially one that had been "called out" of a larger community (in Greek, ek means "out" or "out of" and klesia is from the word that means "to call"). The New Testament church was a body of believers called out of the world to maintain faithful allegiance to God (see 1 Pet 2:9).

Church history reveals that the New Testament church drifted away from God. Pagan practices began to slip into the church. Images, Sunday worship, human ordinances, indulgences—all were signs of the growing apostasy.

Reformation

The Reformation was also about God calling out of God's people. First, God called the reformers out of the papacy, which had become Babylon. Then those reformers—Wycliffe, Huss, Jerome, Luther, Calvin, and others—called out other true believers from the main body. But when the Protestant churches failed to keep pace with the advancing light of God's Word, God again called Bible students out of Protestantism during the Advent movement.

Whenever the corporate body at large has drifted away from God, spurned the principles of the Scriptures for the practices of the world, and refused the advancing light of God's Word, God has called out a body of believers from the Babylonian confusion and rebellion.

Shaken Out or In?

Many Seventh-day Adventists today are deeply concerned as they see certain conditions within their church. They sincerely wonder whether God is about to call out a body of believers from the Seventh-day Adventist church in order to purify it. In fact, certain movements we often call "offshoots" base their entire philosophy on the idea that God is going to purify the church by calling out a faithful few.

But God's method is to call people out of paganism, out of Egypt and Babylon, not out of Israel. He works to purify His people, pruning some branches of the parent stock and grafting others in (see Rom 11, especially vv. 17-23). He removes the dead wood.

In Hebrews 12 Paul recounts Israel's experience at Mount Sinai when God delivered the Ten Commandments. He speaks of the darkness, the thundering, the great voice speaking, and the fear. Then He says:

"His voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, 'Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heaven.' This phrase, 'Yet once more,' indicates the removal of what is shaken, as of what has been made, in order that what cannot be shaken may remain" (vv. 26-27 RSV). Notice that the unshakable things are left, and the things that are shaken are removed.

Verse 28 continues, "Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe."

Remnant Remains

God purifies His church not by calling out the faithful, but by shaking out the unfaithful. Those who are loyal to the principles of God's Word and the teaching of Jesus remain. We call them "the remnant."

Isaiah used an agriculture illustration to describe the same concept when he said, "You shall winnow them and the wind shall carry them away" (Isa 41:16 RSV). John the Baptist echoed that symbol: "His shovel is ready in his hand and he will winnow his threshing-floor; the wheat he will gather into his granary, but he will burn the chaff on a fire that can never go out" (Matt 3:12 NEB)."... Shaken or Sealed? - Mark Finley — Adventists Affirm