7th Day Adventist Church / What Do They Believe?

I used to watch on Sunday mornings, Charles Stanley was on at 7 or 7 .30,

and then on 8 o 'clock, this is before I canceled cable, but at 8 o 'clock, there was a show called

Amazing Facts with Doug Batchelor. Who's ever seen that show? He has a

Bible and he's preaching, and I watched it several weeks, and it sounded pretty good for the most part, but there's just something about it,

I don't know, I couldn't quite put my finger on it. And then one time, I remember they showed some artwork, and I'm like, okay, it looked like the painter, whoever paints the stuff for the

Jehovah's Witnesses, it looks like they paint the stuff for the Seventh -day Adventist. But it turned out he's a

Seventh -day Adventist. So a lot of people just listening to their preaching and some of their doctrine, a lot of it, they believe like us, but there's some of it that's way off in left field.

So it's easy to get sucked into it, I think. This evening, we're gonna be looking at the, as you can see, the

Seventh -day Adventist Church. So because they are the best group that we've seen so far, which really isn't saying a whole lot, but they are the best group we've looked at so far.

Many would question whether or not they should be labeled a cult. So I'll address that.

But first, what's the name all about? Think of it, Seventh -day Adventist.

So the term Adventist refers to their belief in the imminent return of Christ.

So we would agree with that, that they are Adventist, we are Adventist in the sense that we believe that Jesus, any generation could be the generation that sees the return of Christ.

They're looking for Christ's second advent. So that's not so bad.

And then the Seventh -day, Seventh -day Adventist, the Seventh -day refers to their teaching that New Testament Christians are to observe the

Seventh -day Jewish Sabbath. So we worship on Sunday, they worship on Saturday.

Now, that may not seem like a big deal, but it's part of their whole system of keeping the

Mosaic law. Obviously they don't keep all the law, but they are big on the commandments and keeping the law.

They also don't believe in eating pork, they don't eat shellfish. And while these might not seem like the biggest issues and they're not, the

Sunday worship thing, that really is a problem because they view Sunday worship as the mark of the beast, or they view

Sunday worship, that Sunday worship will be at some point, the mark of the beast. So how many of you knew that?

So that is a big deal, but we'll talk about their teachings on that a little later on.

Just some information about the Seventh -day Adventist. At the end of the year 2000, they had 11 .3

million followers in 192 countries. As of the end of 2021, they are now claiming over 21 million members.

So this is a large church of all the cults, this is the biggest.

So because of that, because they are growing in size and because of their friendly new tone towards other denominations and churches, they're really starting to become accepted as just another

Protestant denomination. However, I don't think that's the case. They were given the cult label back when they started in the 1800s, and I believe they still should retain that cult label with a caveat or two.

Why do I consider them a cult? Why do many people consider them a cult? Because it's Jesus plus how well you're keeping the law.

It's the Bible plus the teachings of their founder or one of their founders, a woman who knows her name.

Ellen G. White. Okay, so the church centers around the teachings and writings of a supposed prophetess named

Ellen G. White who claimed to receive private revelations and visions from God.

So a few things to know about Ellen G. White. She was born Ellen Gould Harmon.

She was born in Maine. So she grew up in New England, and it's interesting that all four of the major cults, they all started in either

New England or New York during the 1800s. Ellen G. White is one of the most, if not the most published woman in American history.

But many of her works later on, it was discovered that many of her works were plagiarized.

Her estate has acknowledged this, although they would say the plagiarism is not nearly as bad as the critics claim.

So there's some debate about how much she actually plagiarized. So how did they start out?

There was a man in the early 1800s named William Miller. He was the leader of the

Adventist movement, and he set a date for the return of Jesus, right?

They're big on the Jesus is coming back at any time. So he set a date in 1943.

And when that didn't happen, as of course it's not going to because no man knows the day or the hour.

So if somebody sets a date, you can just bank on the fact that, okay, Jesus is not coming on this date.

So when it didn't happen in 1843, you know what he did. He set another date in October 22nd, 1844.

Many of his followers, they sold their homes, gave away their possessions, and they went on top of the hill to wait for Jesus to come back.

When Jesus didn't come back, that event was known as the Great Disappointment, as you can imagine.

So naturally many of the followers after that, many people did, okay, forget this, and they left, as you would expect.

But around that time, there was a man named Hiram Edson that claimed to receive a vision from God that the 1844 date was actually correct, they just got the details wrong.

So it wasn't that Jesus was gonna come back on that date. Something really did happen, he said, it was just invisible, so nobody could see it.

And that's the same thing the Jehovah's Witnesses did. They predicted the return of Christ, when it didn't happen, they went back and revised it.

No, something did happen, it was just invisible. So the Adventists claimed that in 1844, they say what happened is that Jesus entered into the heavenly sanctuary to begin what they call the investigative judgment.

Now, how do they know that? Again, this was given to this man in a vision, and then that teaching was later picked up by L .N

.G. White. So after the failed prophecy of William Miller, the Adventist movement was splintered into three groups.

There was one that Edson led in New York, there was another one in New Hampshire, and then there was a

Adventist group in Maine, and the one in Maine, they believed that L .N. White was a prophet of God.

So eventually, the three groups came together. Now, there's one story about L .N.

White that really, it's a little strange. When she was 17 years old, reportedly, at her parents' house, she was in the living room, and there was the, you know, the old

Bibles, like the old family Bibles, they're huge. There was an old family Bible that weighed about 20 pounds.

Well, she picked it up, and she went into a trance, and she just stood there, like wide -eyed in a trance, just holding the 20 -pound

Bible, arm outstretched, and didn't move an inch for a half an hour, just staring off into space.

So those, and that's probably impossible. I mean, how many of you have ever tried to take something that's five pounds and hold it there for three minutes and see how your arm feels?

20 pounds for a 17 -year -old girl. So, I mean, if that's, it's probably not true, but if it is true, you know, that sort of makes you wonder, like, what's going on?

It's just odd, but it sort of added to her mystique. So by 1855, the three groups of Adventists merged, and Ellen G.

White became the main teaching authority in the church. Now, what's the problem with that?

Let's start comparing this to what the Bible teaches. Well, the

Apostle Paul, and I know we live in the year, I realize it's 2023, and a lot of people these days don't like this, but the

Apostle Paul did say in 1 Timothy 2 .12, "'I do not permit a woman to teach "'nor to have authority over a man.'"

So the idea that a woman is your main teaching authority in the church, so Ellen is the teacher, that clearly contradicts the teachings of the

Apostle Paul. So that's a problem for the Seventh -day Adventists. It's also a problem for the

Christian science people, and that's what we're gonna look at, Lord willing, next week. So two out of the four of the major cults were founded by women.

It was in 1860 that the name Seventh -day Adventists was officially adopted.

And in 1863, the General Conference, which is the ruling body of the church, was organized.

And here's the thing, they declared themselves to be the remnant church on earth.

You say, okay, so what does that mean? Well, by declaring themselves the remnant church, in other words, they believed they were the one true church left.

This is what all the cults did. We are the true church. We are restoring true Christianity.

So the Seventh -day Adventists believed that they are the remnant church.

Incidentally, Ellen G. White, around that time, and this is probably the worst thing she ever did, but around that time, she claimed to receive a word from God that after the 1844 date, she said the door of salvation is now closed.

So if you were not an Adventist by that 1844 date, you could not be saved.

But what's the problem? Well, you know, as time goes on, that teaching becomes problematic because how do you recruit new people into your church if no one can be saved?

And then what do you do with all the children that are being born to church members? So wouldn't you know that Ellen G.

White, she, I guess she received another revelation that, oh, okay, the door of salvation is, it's back open again, folks.

Cool. Which should make you ask yourself, who is

Ellen White to declare that no one can be saved or that salvation is closed or open?

But this is always how the cults operate. The leaders will claim to have a direct pipeline to God, so God is constantly talking to them.

Therefore, they can rule and declare things as if they are God, because God is always speaking.

So the cult leader can pretty much say whatever they want and they cannot be questioned.

So the cult's bottom line, and this is the biggest issue, they have a different source of authority.

You know, it's the Bible plus the teachings of the cult leader. You know, in a

Christian church, if a pastor preaches something that's not mentioned in the Bible anywhere, you can take it or leave it because his word is not authoritative like the

Bible is. But with the cults, they viewed her teachings as though they were inspired.

Maybe not, they wouldn't say at the same level of scripture, they wouldn't say that today, but back then that's kind of the way it worked out.

And this has happened with Catholicism, right? It's Jesus plus you have to be in subjection to the

Pope. Jehovah's Witnesses, you need to believe in Jesus plus follow the dictates of the

Watchtower Organization. So it's kind of always the same type of thing. With biblical Christianity, it's just Jesus and it's just the

Bible. So I said, some people don't believe that the

Seventh -day Adventist should be considered a cult. I would say, as long as they view

Ellen G. White as a prophet of God and follow her teachings, they're a cult. If they move away from Ellen G.

White, which some, I have to admit, some Seventh -day Adventists today are starting to move away from Ellen White.

If they do that, I think it's possible that some churches could be considered within the realm of orthodoxy, that they're just another

Protestant denomination, but not as long as they hold to the teachings of Ellen G. White. Any questions so far?

Mark. The Quakers, are they part of the Seventh -day Adventist? Or is someone altogether different?

The Quakers are not part of this, no. Neither are the

Shakers, right? There's the Quakers and the Shakers. Ann Lee, I think, was the founder of the

Shakers. And she was similar. She claimed to receive all sorts of visions from God, but God is

Heavenly Father or maybe Heavenly Mother. And they just kind of redefined everything.

But all of these different groups, but no, there's no direct connection with the Quakers that I know of.

Any other questions or clarifications up until this point? Okay.

So, like I said, if a Seventh -day Adventist moves away from Ellen G. White, I think you can, okay, now we can talk.

But as long as they hold to her teachings, we can't be naive.

You have to understand how the cults work. The Seventh -day Adventists, along with the

Mormons, they're trying to get mainstream acceptance right now. So they're naturally gonna put their best face forward.

They're not gonna tell you some of the stranger doctrines up front. But really, while there has been some reform in these churches, it doesn't go far enough.

And they really hold onto the core beliefs that they did back then. So we can't be fooled.

In the book, Cults and the Occult by Edmund Gruss, he writes of pastors who were placed on trial and dismissed from ministry.

You wanna know why? Because they preached that in Christ, we have the complete forgiveness of sin.

They said, no, we receive full forgiveness from Christ. And they were basically kicked out of the ministry by the church authorities, ultimately for preaching the gospel, because there's this investigative judgment.

Jesus has to look at how you're living. So really, that's what it boils down to. How are you living?

Are you following their teachings? Are you keeping the commandments? So in effect, they were disciplined for preaching the true gospel.

And all of the cults will do this. They'll give lip service to the Bible. No, no, no, we believe the

Bible. Yeah, they believe the Bible in light of how the cult leader interpreted the

Bible. Okay, so I wanna just look at some teachings straight from their doctrinal statement.

If any of you look them up during the week, they have two main statements.

There's the 27 fundamental beliefs and the 28 fundamental beliefs. So I have the 27. This is number 17 on the gift of prophecy.

So this is from their website, all right? Number 17 on the gift of prophecy.

It says, one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit is prophecy. So far, so good. We can agree with that.

They said, this gift is an identifying mark of the remnant church and was manifested in the ministry of Ellen G.

White. As the Lord's messenger, her writings are a continuing and authoritative source of truth, which provide for the church comfort, guidance, instruction, and correction.

So you see Ellen G. White's teachings are what? Authoritative.

So, well, that's the problem.

I mean, I think of Hebrews chapter one, where in these last days, God has spoken to us through his son.

But apparently, 1700 years later, Ellen G. White comes along. She has a whole new batch of revelations.

So that's a problem that they view her writings as an authoritative source of truth.

Also from their statement of faith concerning Christ in the heavenly sanctuary. Remember, this is how the whole church got started, this 1844 prediction.

You say, well, I don't, they probably don't even believe that anymore. Yes, they do. This is what they say about 1844.

Jesus was in 1844, at the end of the prophetic period of 2300 days,

Jesus entered the second and last phase of his atoning ministry. See, I thought he said it is finished on the cross.

But no, he's doing that right now still. It is a work, they say, of investigative judgment, which is part of the ultimate disposition of all sin.

And then it goes on to talk about how Jesus is investigating whether or not people have faith, whether or not they keep the commandments.

So it's hard for me to tell the difference between, what's the difference between this investigative judgment and a gospel of salvation by faith plus works?

You know, the Lord knows who believes because his spirit regenerated those who believe.

But the fact that he has to investigate people's lives, it's how are you living?

That's what matters of whether or not you're saved, according to them, how you're living. Now, obviously that does matter, but not as far as your salvation goes.

It's not a workspace system. Okay. So that's what it seems to come down to, is that Alan G.

White and the Seventh -day Adventist leaders were telling people that salvation depended on getting our teaching and how well you're living up.

That's works righteousness. How well are you living up? The whole point is, no matter how good you're doing, you're never doing good enough.

That's why we need to trust in God's grace through Christ and the gospel. But, you know, today

I'm sure they would have a whole new take, because remember, they're trying to get mainstream acceptance. So they will always have an answer.

If you find one of their apologists, they will always have an answer. Here's another thing that as far as following the church's rules, at one point in the church's history,

Ellen claimed that God showed her a specific style of dress.

Who's heard this story? Well, there was a particular dress that all

Seventh -day Adventist women had to wear. It was like this puffy dress with parachute pants underneath.

And, you know, when you wear something like, and it really stood out. So when women, Seventh -day Adventist women wore it in public, like, you know, everyone's looking at them and it really made life hard for many of the ladies.

So that turned out to be like a bad move, right? Because church members didn't like this very much.

So God told her, no, all the women need to wear the dress. And after a while, she realized how unpopular it was.

Guess what happened? Well, God spoke to her again. And well, you know, that, yeah, yeah, the dress thing quietly just went away.

But this is what the cults, another thing the cults do, they wanna control your behavior, even down to the little things of, you know, what you wear and the things you do.

And, you know, there is something about Christian conduct. You know, the Bible does teach us how to live, but here's the thing, they just kind of make stuff up and they go beyond their authority and they will threaten your salvation if you don't follow, if you step out of line.

So that's the problem. Okay, let's look at 1 Timothy chapter four. 1

Timothy four, another well -known view, a teaching of the

Seventh -day Adventists is they are vegetarians, or at least that's strongly encouraged.

See, for some people that just, okay, that rules it out. Like I will never become a

Seventh -day Adventist. No, and if someone's a vegetarian, hey, God bless you, that's up to you.

But the Bible never commands that anywhere. I mean, what a strange thing to pretend like that's a

Bible doctrine. In fact, the scripture says the opposite, doesn't it?

A matter of fact, it calls that doctrines of devils. So again, if you're a vegetarian, totally fine, totally up to you, but to tell someone that they have to be in order to be a good

Christian, you have to be a vegetarian. Look at what 1 Timothy four, one through five says.

Now the spirit expressly says that in latter times, the 1800s would qualify as latter times, that in latter times, some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and what?

Doctrines of demons. So this isn't something Pastor Grant says, this is something the Bible says.

Doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron.

So here are the doctrines of devils, right? Forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from foods, which

God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.

For every creature of God is what? Good, and nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.

I mentioned the shakers a moment ago, they were another cult that they would forbid their members from getting married.

So if you were a shaker, you had to be single and celibate the rest of your life. According to Paul, that's doctrines of demons.

Forbidding people to eat meat. The Bible doesn't teach that. What does the

Bible teach? Even in the Old Testament, the Jews had to eat the Passover, which included lamb.

Like where do they even come up with this? Then another occasion, the Lord gave them quail.

Remember, the Lord gave them quail to eat. So thing is Ellen G. White, what she was doing with the dress, with the eating meat, she's just making stuff up.

These are her preferences. This is what she thought, that's the way it should be.

And she's making this doctrine that maybe your salvation depends on it.

So this is cult -like behavior. She's basically, I don't think it's a stretch to call her this, she's a control freak.

She wanted to control people's lives. Another doctrinal distinctive of the

Adventists, they believe in soul sleep. Who knows what soul sleep is? So even if a believer dies who is saved, that you go out of existence.

Everyone who dies ceases to exist or their soul goes to sleep, basically.

So what does the Bible say about this? Paul says, and see, her doctrine really just flies in the face of Paul's teachings, just again and again.

Second Corinthians 5 .8 says, to be absent from the body is to be what? Present with the

Lord. What's absent from the body? When someone dies, what's absent? Their soul.

Goes to be with the Lord, but according to Ellen G. White, the soul, you basically cease to exist.

And because of that, that's also tied in with their teaching of hell, that there is no hell or basically people are cast into the lake of fire, they're burnt up.

So when people die, they cease to exist. They'll get raised. At the last day, the lost are annihilated.

So they don't believe in hell. They teach annihilation. Ray. In the Old Testament, Moses was taught by God.

Both him and Aaron were gonna go be with their people. Yeah. They didn't have their soul going with these and other people to go with.

Yeah, I mean, there's really, even back then from the start, soul sleep was never true.

It's not like it was true in the Old Testament. They went to Sheol. So anyone who died in the

Old Testament went to Sheol. Yes, it can be interpreted as the grave, but clearly there are plenty of passages we could look at that it was actually a place of conscious bliss or conscious torment.

I mean, that's the teaching of the Bible, but the Seventh -day Adventists, just like all four of the major cults,

Jehovah's Witnesses, Christian science, pretty much the Mormons, for the most part, they all deny hell.

But the doctoral distinctive that the Seventh -day Adventists are known for, like the main teaching, it's in the name, what is it?

Yeah, the Seventh -day. It's all about the Sabbath. So the

Sabbath, according to the book of Genesis, and then the book, it's based on the book of Genesis, but it's first given to the children of Israel in Exodus that in six days you shall labor, but the seventh day is the

Lord's Sabbath. Now, that is an Old Testament doctrine. That's true. The children of Israel were commanded to keep the

Sabbath, absolutely. But the Sabbath was part of the Old Covenant. And in the

New Testament, nowhere are Christians commanded to keep the Jewish Sabbath.

And you know what, if somebody wanted to keep the Sabbath on Saturday, I don't know that I would fight with them about it, fine.

But Christians, for 2 ,000 years, we've recognized the Lord's Day. But here's why it's a real issue.

In a letter in 1847, Ellen G. White taught that the Mark of the

Beast was worshiping on Sunday. So you can say, well, you're attacking the

Seventh -day. No, all of the cults attacked the Christian churches. That's what you need to realize.

Someone will watch this video online and think that I'm just some big meanie and I'm attacking other.

No, I think I'm being very polite right now. They all, when they started out, they all claimed to be the true

Christians and they attacked us. They all said they're the true church. And especially some of these were, yeah, that we're all lost, we're all damned.

So that's what Ellen G. White taught, that the Mark of the Beast was worshiping on Sunday. You realize what that means for us, if that's true.

Because according to her, the true church, the remnant church, worships on Saturday.

She said that the act of giving up the true Sabbath for what she called the

Pope's Sabbath is the Mark of the Beast. Why does she call it the

Pope's Sabbath? Well, okay, the Catholic Church does claim to have the authority, I think. If you look back in their writings, they did claim to change and have the authority to change the

Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday. I don't think that's why we worship on Sunday.

It has nothing to do with the Pope. In the Bible, Acts 20, verse seven, 1

Corinthians 16, verse two, the disciples of Christ, they worship, they gather together on the first day of the week.

It's in the Bible. Revelation one, John said he was in the spirit on the

Lord's day. So Christians has nothing to do with the Pope. We worship on Sunday in honor of Christ and the resurrection.

Again, Acts 20, verse seven, 1 Corinthians 16, two said, the disciples gathered on the first day of the week.

So here's what the Seventh -day Adventists do today.

They try to distance themselves from this teaching because they know if they hold onto this and say that, okay, if you worship on Sunday, that's the

Mark of the Beast. What are they doing? They're condemning 99 % of Christians all over the world and they want acceptance.

So here's what they're saying now. They're saying, no, it's not the Mark of the Beast right now.

It will be in the end times. So they believe that the

Catholic church, there's a lot of stuff with Catholicism in the end times with the Seventh -day Adventists.

They believe that, and some of this, you might find some agreement on, depending on your view of the end times, but they believe that the

Catholic church is the harlot of Babylon that's mentioned in Revelation 17.

Their belief that in the end times, the Catholic church will basically take over the world.

The Pope will be the Antichrist and he will make a law that everyone must worship on Sunday and those who do not worship on Sunday.

So that's the Mark of the Beast, the Pope's the Antichrist. According to them, that if you don't worship on Sunday, you will be beheaded.

So they believe as the Seventh -day Adventist, they believe in the end times, they will be persecuted for worshiping on Saturday.

They will be beheaded by the Catholic authorities. So that, if you know any

Seventh -day Adventists, there's a lot of teach. Actually that program that I watched,

Amazing Facts with Doug Batchelor, he sort of made a joke about, everyone knows two things about us.

Everyone knows two things about the Seventh -day Adventist. We worship on Saturday and we hate Catholics. Now he was kidding, like he was saying, we don't really hate

Catholics, but that's the perception because there's all this stuff. And I'm not saying that, right?

You heard me say, that's not what I'm saying, but that's what the Seventh -day Adventists. Believe they're gonna be persecuted by the

Catholic church. They believe that the woman, you know, in Revelation 12, the woman clothed with the sun, the moon at her feet.

Who do we believe that's a picture of? Yeah, well, the woman in Revelation 12, the harlot of Babylon is

Revelation 17, but the woman clothed in the sun, we typically believe that symbolic for the nation of Israel.

But they believe it refers to them, the true church. So Satan and the antichrist will persecute the

Seventh -day Adventist. So the mark of the beast is all they say now for end times in eschatology.

Any comments on that? Let me just say, there's nothing in the

Bible at all that would even hint at Sunday worship being the mark of the beast.

Again, it's totally made up. Just like the dress, just like being a vegetarian, the

Bible doesn't teach that anywhere. And because the Seventh -day Adventists hold to a historicist view of the book of Revelation, meaning they view

Revelation as sort of like a timeline of historical events, events throughout church history.

That's how Revelation is laid out. But that view is actually held by many of the

Protestant reformers. So some of these viewpoints are not totally unique to the Seventh -day

Adventists. And to be fair, they're not wrong about everything. What are some things that we agree with the

Seventh -day Adventists about? As of right now, they do believe in the

Trinity. So Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Christian science, they deny the

Trinity. Seventh -day Adventists, give credit where credit's due, they do believe in the Trinity. They do seem to have a correct view of Christ.

They believe he died on the cross and rose bodily from the grave. They believe in observing the

Lord's Supper. They believe in baptism by immersion. They're also premillennialists.

So we would agree with that. Although they have a strange teaching on the millennium.

They say that during the millennium, the earth is empty and it's used as a prison house for Satan and the demons while the saints rule and reign in heaven.

So Revelation 20 says that Satan is chained where? How well do you know your

Bible? Where is Satan chained in Revelation 20? The abyss, the bottomless pit.

But according to them, Satan's chained on the earth becomes a wasteland.

And then at the very end of the millennium, they're like, the way it's described is the dead are sort of, they're alive, sort of like zombies.

And I wish I was making this up, but they all kind of revolt. So there's a lot of strange teaching.

Some of the things they believe are right, a lot of things are wrong. So a few final remarks.

As I indicated at the beginning, the Seventh -day Adventist Church is growing. Jehovah's Witnesses are in decline, but the

Seventh -day Adventist Church is growing. They want to be seen as just another Protestant denomination.

And a lot of people are willing to accept them as such. You know, the common attitude is, oh, well, they just worship on a different day of the week.

You know, what's the big deal? Well, if that was all it was, then yeah,

I don't know how big of a deal it would be. But as you can see, there's a lot of strange teachings.

And the biggest problem is, it all supposedly, or much of it comes from this woman who claimed to have private revelations from God.

Just imagine you're attending a church, and the pastor comes in with all these new teachings that aren't in the

Bible. And he said, well, God told me, God showed me, God talked to me, God told me this. I mean, either one or two things is true.

Either he's gone mad. I mean, that's one possibility. Or he's, you know, a cult maker in training.

That's, he's trying to form a cult. You know, the third possibility would be, and I don't accept this as a possibility, that they're telling the truth.

Is that a possibility? I don't think it's a possibility, because revelation says that you shall not add to the scripture.

This is the problem with accepting that new prophecy is being given. You've heard people talk about how

God, God spoke to me and he told me this. And what they're saying, they're not quoting the

Bible. I mean, the world is full of people who claim that God is speaking to them, and the messages that they're receiving are not in line with scripture.

So that's a very serious thing, because either they're telling the truth or something else is going on.

And again, Hebrews 1 says that God, you know, in time past, he spoke various ways, but in these last days, he has spoken to us through who?

Christ, we need to look to Christ and to his word. So I'll just wrap this up by saying that Ellen G.

White, if I were to talk to a Seventh -day Adventist, here's what I would do. Let's turn to 1

John chapter four, we'll end there. If I were to talk to a Seventh -day Adventist, I would ask them,

I would start with the gospel, ask them, do you know that, you know, if you died today, do you know if you would go to heaven?

Try to figure out, do they believe that they're saved? And if they say yes, I would ask them, okay, on what basis, why are you saved?

How do you know you're saved? So try to figure out, do they have a true understanding of the gospel?

If they do, I would ask them about this 1844 investigative judgment thing and see if they're, okay, it's gonna depend on how well

I'm living up. Okay, because that's works. So I would ask about that. If all of the answers sounded good,

I would ask them about Ellen G. White. What do you believe about Ellen G.

White? With her writings or her teaching, do you believe that she is a true prophet of God?

So if they give all the right answers about the other stuff, ask them about Ellen White, because ultimately you're either following the

Bible, for them, you're either following the scriptures or you're following Ellen White.

The two do not line up. So that's where it really matters, because the scripture is the authority.

That's one of the fundamental beliefs of Christianity. The scripture is our authority, amen? You know, grace alone, faith alone, and Christ alone.

The scripture alone is our authority. If they believe it's the scripture plus the authority of Ellen G.

White, that's a deal breaker. Just like it would be a deal breaker if it's, you know, the

Bible plus Joseph Smith or the Bible plus the watchtower or the Bible plus anybody else.

It's not the Bible plus, it's not Jesus plus. So what do we need to do? First John four, verse one.

It says, beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

And I'm convinced through study and reading Ellen G. White and the things that she taught and the things she claimed to receive from God, I am very well convinced that Ellen G.

White is one of the false prophets that the scripture warned about. Any final questions or remarks?

Joyce. Do you know what the government is for the individual churches, how they're set up?

Yeah, they're set up with like a Presbyterian form of government. So yeah, there'd be a board or a

Presbytery off somewhere that would be making the decisions for each local church. Now, when she was alive, obviously she could kind of dictate things.

But after she passed away, and that's true with all the cults usually, after the leader passes away, then it's ruled by a committee, typically.

Any other questions? Linda. Isn't the Sabbath, the true

Sabbath in the Old Testament, isn't that a day of complete rest? Have they tweaked the...

Yeah, well, it was a day of rest, but if you look at, during the time of Jesus, the

Jews did assemble on Saturday. They assembled at the synagogue on the

Sabbath. So you couldn't do work, but you could worship. But yeah, it was a day of rest.

And I'm sure they, the way they do it, there's rules of things they can and can't do, right?

But they do go to church. So obviously driving to church, they wouldn't see that as work.

Do you read a Bible? Yeah, yep. They're probably the most biblical, like the

Christian science are not biblical at all. Like that's not even close.

The Mormons try to pretend to a degree to believe some parts of the Bible, but they're way, way off base.

Jehovah's Witnesses will tend to, you know, reference the Bible to a degree.

Seventh -day Adventists, they will turn to the scripture quite a bit. Like in James or in their own?

They do have their own version, right? Put out by, they own, the

Seventh -day Adventist church owns a publishing house and they have put out their own version of the

Bible. But to my knowledge, it hasn't been like obviously corrupted to the degree that the

Jehovah's Witnesses do. But they can sound biblical. Like I said, I watched that guy on TV for several weeks and it all sounded pretty good.

So it depends. I mean, you can walk into any church and hear a good message, but it's, you know, what are you gonna hear next time?

Or what are they not telling you? Sometimes it's not what is said, it's what's not said, right?

So, so there's enough truth there. It's like within the Catholic church, there is enough truth there where I think somebody could be saved.

But it's all this other stuff that's the problem. And then it just kind of gets mixed in.

Once you start mixing the gospel of faith and works, then that's a different gospel, so.

But, all right. Yes.

I often wonder if Ellen Jean, what she was saying was God's honest truth or she had some kind of mental health disease or.

Right. What is it that's far -fetched for anybody to have a brain?

Right, well, I mean, I mean, her and the founder of Christian Science both had a lot of health issues.

I mean, there's, it's possible they did experience things that were more, you know, illness, mental illness.

I mean, that's possible, I guess. I mean, there's some stories about, you know, there's all these rules.

You can't eat shellfish. But then people said that, hey, I saw she loved oysters.

You know, when people weren't looking, she was kind of doing whatever she wanted, which doesn't prove anything except that she's inconsistent.

But it could have been a spirit telling her things.

She could have been making, we don't really know. Yeah, that's the thing I've often wondered about some of these guys, yeah.

Do they really believe it? Are they making it up? It's hard to say. Yeah. Where do they get all these followers from?

I don't know if you mentioned at the beginning, I was running late today. Yeah, yeah, well. I'm just a guy, right?

Right. I want to start some cult and I want to control people, right? I want to start my own little cult like this.

Yeah. Where do I start? Like, I've been eating your candy all day. Yeah. Very. Right.

Don't answer that. Yeah, yeah. But seriously, though. Right. Where did she get all these followers from?

Well, she got the, the movement already existed. So there was the Adventist movement that was started by William Miller.

And this guy was just a, you know, a silver -tongued preacher who just people just flocked to him.

And so he had 50 ,000 followers and he set a date for the return of Christ.

It didn't happen. A lot of people left, but there's still thousands, tens of thousands of people still clinging to something.

And, and she filled the void. So she didn't actually get all those followers herself.

She kind of, yeah, she inherited them. But as far as like Joseph Smith, he went from nobody to today, there's millions of Mormons.

You know, I always, I've said it before every, every false teacher. And, you know, there are churches all over Massachusetts that are being pastored by false teachers.

Then they're just preaching their own opinions. They're twisting the scripture. Every one of them is a potential cult leader.

It's just, does it ever get off the ground? You, so you think of the millions and millions of people throughout history that have tried this, it's going to be successful once in a while.

So I think it's just playing the numbers, really. You know, there's people that are charismatic, right moment in time.

It just strikes a chord with people. And then once you have a crowd, a crowd attracts a crowd.

So I think it's just a matter of, it's, it's got to happen somewhere. But in the old

Testament, the Lord tells the children of Israel that he allows false prophets to rise up in order to test his people.

So all the false teachers out there, one of the reasons they exist is to test us, to make sure we're going to be faithful in believing the scripture and not be carried off by, you know, what this guy is saying.

That's why I say, when somebody claims that, hey, God told me this, and let me tell you what God told me.

I mean, that, I know it happens all the time, but that's a very serious thing. And I know a lot of Christians say stuff like, well,

God told me that, and they don't actually mean that God told them, but some people do mean it.

And I would, I would run for your life because the odds that that person is a true prophet of God, you know, they better be able to part of the

Red Sea or prove it somehow, because I'm not just going to take them at their word. So, Lord, I just ask that you would help us to retain some of this information that if we do come across someone who is a

Seventh -day Adventist, that we will have a heart for them and be able to talk to them about the true and full forgiveness that is found in Christ and how clearly back then they didn't believe that as we saw there were many ministers who were disciplined in the denomination because they preached that Christ fully forgave and that it was not by works or how well you lived up to the commandments.

So, Lord, I realize that many of these churches over the decades, they've changed, and we're not standing in judgment over anyone's soul.

For all I know, there's millions of Seventh -day Adventists who really are putting their full trust in Christ.

But, Lord, if that's, and we know that's not the case, even in churches like ours, there's still people who will not believe or receive the true gospel.

So, we just ask that you give us a heart for people that when we do come into contact with them, that we'll be able to talk to them about what the scripture says, not what

Ellen White says, although that might be a beneficial conversation to have if they are following her.

But, Lord, we want people to be saved because that's your heart. For you say in your word that you desire all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.

So, if salvation came through the law, we know that Christ died in vain and Christ certainly did not die in vain.

So, we pray for all those who are trusting in their own works, trusting in their performance to keep the commandments when

Jesus was so very clear in the Sermon on the Mount that nobody is able to live up to that standard.

And because we recognize that, help us to cling so much more to the cross of Calvary.

And we thank you for the full forgiveness we have in Christ. And because of what he did for us, may we all live for him.

We ask that you'd give us a safe trip home and bring us again, Lord willing, this Sunday. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.