In this small volume of six chapters, George Knight in his usually straightforward and somewhat acerbic style takes the church to task for losing its apocalyptic vision, by which he means the proclamation of the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation. He believes that “we have lost the sanctified arrogance that made us believe that we have a message that the whole world must hear” (p. 15). By aiming to become politically correct the Adventist church has managed to neuter itself and, consequently, begun to shrink in some parts of the developed world.

The best example of religious neutering, according to Knight, is Protestant liberalism. Once it shed such basic Christian doctrines as the inspiration of the Bible, the virgin birth, and the substitutionary death of Jesus it lost its distinctive Christian message and, as a result, the mainline churches in America began to lose millions of members. For example, between 1965 and the early 1990s the Presbyterian church’s membership dropped 34% from 4.2 million to 2.8 million. Other liberal churches experienced similar or worse declines in membership. By seeking to be relevant to their culture they proved that “the shortest road to irrelevance is mere relevance” (p. 19).

While Knight decries “beastly” preaching, i.e., preaching that fails to put Christ at the center of the apocalyptic prophecies; he is also dead set against discarding our last-day-events messages in an attempt to be politically correct. “Apocalyptic rightly understood is the gospel” (p. 21), he says. He defends the historicist interpretation of the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation, yet he recognizes that we have not always presented the best interpretations of them. For example, in regard to Daniel 2 and 7 he correctly observes that to interpret the ten toes or ten horns only as European nations is too Eurocentric. The Eastern half of the Roman Empire should not be forgotten. He is also correct in pointing out that in Daniel 8 it is the little horn that is the focus of the judgment, but because of the parallelism of Daniel 8 with Daniel 7, where the focus is on the saints, the pre-advent judgment includes both—the saints and the little horn.

In the chapter entitled “The Fallacy of Straight-line Thinking and a Most Remarkable Prophecy” Knight reminds Adventists that the scoffers mentioned in 2 Peter 3:3 are increasingly found inside the church. Many Adventists are in danger of settling down to a comfortable earthly existence. Knight reminds them that the final events will be rapid ones, “in one hour your judgment has come” (Rev 18:10); and he recalls the rapid fall of communism in the late 1980s and the sudden changes in American society after 9/11 as historical examples of rapid change.

The book is easy to read and is a veritable goldmine of quotable quotes. However, Knight’s claim that there is a conflict between the baptismal vow and the fundamental belief concerning the remnant church is not really valid. He says, “The baptismal vow speaks of Seventh-day Adventism as being the ‘remnant church,’ whereas the fundamental beliefs place the emphasis on a remnant message to be proclaimed to the world by that part of the end-time remnant already in the church” (p. 78). The emphasis in the fundamental belief may be on the message of the remnant, but the fact that it says, “in a time of widespread apostasy, a remnant has been called out to keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus” clearly identifies the Seventh-day Adventist Church as this remnant.

Also questionable is Knight’s characterization of Daniel 2 as predicting “four and only four (rather than five or six) political systems binding together the old Roman Empire (the area centered in the Middle East and around the Mediterranean Sea)” (p. 60). In what sense did Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece bind together the old Roman Empire? Rome never conquered the area of Medo-Persia proper; and the land of Babylon was only occupied by Rome for about ten years.

The sentence, “The problem of who to worship. . .” (p. 65) must have escaped the editor’s notice. It should read “The problem of whom to worship. . .”

In his conclusion Knight writes, “The Apocalyptic Vision and the Neutering of Adventism is not a slow-paced ‘scholarly’ book. Rather it is a tract for the times and a wake-up call based on the gut-level feeling that Adventism is losing its way and the observation that many of its younger ministers and members have never heard the apocalyptic vision, while many of its older ones question whether they can any longer believe it or preach it” (p. 106). Unfortunately, there is no doubt that a loss of apocalyptic vision leads to a loss of missionary activity and as a result to a decrease of new members. According to the back cover of the book, the author considers this small volume to be the most important book of his career. It is certainly a volume that will challenge every minister and lay person who wants to take his calling and membership in the Seventh-day Adventist Church seriously. The Apocalyptic Vision and the Neutering of Adventism is a must-read book for every member concerned about the present state of the church.