EXTREME ADVENTISM by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Sep 16, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 36.

EXTREME ADVENTISM.

By Editor

SOME one sends us a copy of the California Christian Advocate of February 17, 1897, containing as its leading article the above title, and requests us to notice it. But it really is not necessary. A student of God's Word will readily detect all its fallacies. It starts out with these words:—

“The ‘second coming’ doctrine is a serious stumbling-block. The underlying error is in the assumption that the whole plan of redemption is at present incomplete—Christ was a teacher and prophet while on earth; he is now a mediator in heaven, but that a second appearance is necessary in order to complete the idea of salvation. The essential transactions of the Christian religion are adjourned to some future time. Faith, according to this doctrine, does not grasp things, but the promise of things. The anxiety for the physical coming of the Lord arises from the craving of an incomplete faith.”

But the “second-coming” doctrine is a doctrine of the Word of God, taught by a multitude of such scriptures as Matt. 16:27; Luke 21:25–27; Matt. 25:31, 34; John 14:1–3; Acts 1:9–11; Heb. 9:28; 1 Thess. 4:13–17. The plan of redemption in its results is not complete till the last soul is redeemed and Christ the King comes. See Luke 21:28; Rom. 8:23. “Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me,” prayed Jesus, “be with me where I am.” John 17:24. That prayer will be fulfilled; but not until he comes, raises the dead, changes the living, “and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” 1 Thess. 4:17. Faith is based on God's Word. Rom. 10:17. It believes for now all that Word commands or promises for now. More than this is not faith, but presumption. It hopes in all that God has promised for the future. But it lays hold of Christ now, and all is in him. Faith brings love; and love is satisfied only in the personal presence of the One loved. Again the Advocate says:—

“There is another old error which lurks about the platform of Advent doctrines. This incomplete faith fails to grasp eternal life. It does not hold firmly to the continuity of life. Christ has simply promised—not bestowed—eternal life. The faith that feels itself bound to insist on a second appearance of Christ has an abnormal fear that at death the soul falls into unconsciousness, or at best wanders about like a shadow without a substance. ‘He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life,’ and kindred scriptures, are not taken in a literal sense. Eternal life means future life, according to their type of belief.”

Here again the Advocate is mistaken, in part at least. The “Adventism” for which this paper is an exponent believes in a present eternal life to the believer. “He that believeth on the Son hath eternal life” is a blessed, present, literal truth. But it does not confound, as does our neighbor, eternal life and immortality. The one is the life of God, given to every believing soul,—to every soul in harmony with God,—by his Spirit. We live his eternal righteousness only by the power of his endless life. But if the believer dies, the life is hid with Christ in God, to be given again when he comes the second time. Col. 3:3, 4. Then he will bestow immortality upon his people, the seal of the incorruptible character they have developed here. 1 Cor. 15:51–54. Here are two other excerpts:—

“The power of spiritual inspection has been lost. The mysteries of materialism are transformed into ‘Christian Science,’ Spiritualism, and all kinds of occultism. The only real help for this condition of things is the true, spiritual conception of Christianity.”

“It does not fully believe the Gospel. It takes naturally to all mechanical conceptions of the truth. Saturday is the only day to be observed as a day of worship. It clings to externalism and legalism.”

Of the first paragraph we simply note the fact that it is not from the ranks of Adventists that the hosts of Christian Scientists and Spiritualists are recruiting, but from those who are taught by just such teaching as this we are receiving, that the express promises and words of Holy Writ are “a serious stumbling-block.”

Of the last quotation suffice it to say that Seventh-day Adventists believe the whole Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, believe that it is “the power of God unto salvation,” that it is the creative power of God, of which his Sabbath is a sign and pledge (Eze. 20:12, 20); that that Sabbath is the seventh day, the day just before the first day of the week, the day observed by Jesus Christ; that God is able to care for that Sabbath by the power of his Gospel without appealing to civil law; and that all his laws and his Word and his ordinances to be effectual must be written, not on statute-books, but in the hearts of men, by the Spirit of the living God. Now, neighbor Advocate, is not all this in harmony with the Word of God? If not, where not?