Adventist Heritage

Michael Campbell 1919: The Untold Story of Adventism’s Struggle with Fundamentalism (Nampa, ID: Pacific Press, 2019). For the one hundredth anniversary of the 1919 Adventist Bible Conference, Pacific Press published a short volume written by Southwestern Adventist University professor Michael W. ...

To commemorate the five hundredth anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, the editors carefully chose a collection of essays that explore “the various facets and contours of Luther and compares them with Seventh-day Adventism.” The book is comprised of four parts: Historical F...

It is generally accepted that postmillennialism has reigned as the dominant eschatological view since the Reformation. In America most theologians from the Reformed and Puritan traditions encountered in postmillennialism the rationale to encourage Christian ethics and living, revival, and worldwide evangelism. They envisioned a millennial kingdom where the church and the state would create a political, social, and religious Christian order. Contrarily, premillennial views generally have a less positive assessment of humanity and its organizations, such as the church and society. Human sinfulness and general corruption in government and society seem to indicate that the church is incapable of transforming the present order. Consequently, premillennialists believe the necessity of the heavenly intervention of Christ in His second coming. Different from postmillennialists, premillennial thinkers expect deeper deterioration of the social and religious order. Although scholars commonly claim that William Miller was the first consistent premillennialist of his time, this presentation argues that Miller belonged to a religious milieu where theologians, especially within the Methodist tradition, refused to speculate about the future and defended a strong premillennial view. Without dismissing the value of revival and evangelism, they became convinced that both the biblical teaching and the evil of the present social order pointed to the second coming of Christ as the unique solution to human problems.

One of the most concerning prophecies to Adventists relates to religious persecution that will begin in the United Sates and spread throughout the world. Uneasy expectations regarding the American government can be traced even before the foundation of the Seventh day Adventist Church in 1863. In the early 1850s Hiram Edison, Joseph Bates, Otis Nichol, John Andrews, and John Loughborough had already expanded the future role of the United States as a persecuting power. This presentation reveals the situation that led Sabbatarian Adventists to question America’s role in religious liberty while the ideals of the founding fathers were still fresh.

The investigative judgment doctrine has always been an intrinsic part of Seventh-day Adventist soteriology. Throughout the history of Seventh-day Adventists, however, the investigative (or Pre-Advent) judgment has been one of the most controversial doctrines, challenged and questioned more than any other Adventist belief. For Adventists, however, the investigative judgment forms an essential part of their theology and cannot be abandoned. This is because their soteriology is locked within a meta-theological paradigm that necessitates the eschatological pre-Advent judgment. Understanding this paradigm may be helpful in explaining the beauty and uniqueness of Adventist soteriology.

This article will focus on the idea that, because the “Adventist” aspect sometimes separates the movement from this world, a mature Adventist missiology should be founded on a solid eschatological understanding not only about happenings of the future or the last days, but also the identity of the Adventist movement today. That will lead to the development of effective mission strategies for disciple-making (including its godliness, zeal, joy, and hope aspects), for new generations (including its understanding of the kingdom), and for world religions adherents (including its various eschatological views).

This presentation presents the historical development of Seventh-day Adventist theology up to about 1850 as it relates to the core doctrinal distinctive that linked the Sabbath to the heavenly sanctuary ministry of Jesus in the Most Holy Place. This linkage gave the Sabbath eschatological importance and called Adventists to world evangelism in light of the gospel and the soon coming of Jesus. Sabbatarian Adventists who understood the historical progression of prophecies in Daniel and Revelation identified the period after 1844 as the time of the end. They connected an end-time investigative judgment and the sanctuary ministry of Jesus to the Sabbath in the three angels’ message. This made the three angels’ message the foundational basis for Seventh-day Adventist gospel evangelism.

The notion that Seventh-day Adventists are the remnant church of Bible prophecy has played a central role in the church’s consciousness from its earliest years. It entails the notion that Adventists are a special people, with a special message for the end of history, distinct from all other forms of Christianity. There are diverse opinions among Adventists today as to just what it means to be the remnant church. For some it lies in the fact that the Advent movement exhibits definite prophetic earmarks, including the specific time of its origin and the manifestation of the gift of prophecy within its ranks. For others, the dramatic differences between Adventism today and Adventism in its earliest years call for another look at the remnant. As they see it, remnant identity involves engaging the world in healing and redemptive activities, much as Adventists did in the nineteenth century, along with the recognition that God’s final remnant will include people from various religious groups.

World War I was a defining moment in world history. It had profound implications for religion, particularly among evangelical Christians. At the same time, it also had profound implications for Seventh-day Adventism. This presentation examines its impact for Seventh-day Adventist theology, particularly in a renewed emphasis upon Adventist eschatology. During World War I the rising fundamentalist movement held a series of prophecy conferences that captured the attention of Adventist church leaders. By the end of the conflict this sense of militarism had pervaded Protestant Christianity with various reactions to the war. This presentation surveys some of those reactions within Adventism, including how this impacted eschatological debates with Adventism and fundamentalism. The focus of this presentation is to survey Adventist eschatology and theological debates from World War I through World War II, leading up to the pivotal 1952 Bible Conference that finally culminated in continued eschatological discussions. This presentation argues that both twentieth-century world wars had a profound impact upon Seventh-day Adventist theology.

Sabbatarian Adventists called their theological package “Present Truth.” They believed the doctrines in the Present Truth to be “essential truths.” They also mentioned the Present Truth as “meat in due season” since the message met the need of the end-time world. They considered the doctrines in the Present Truth to be interrelated to one another. During this period, doctrines of the second coming, sanctuary, Sabbath, third angel’s message, commandments of God and faith of Jesus, message to the Laodicean church, last-day events, and state of the dead were all called Present Truth. This presentation argues that all these doctrines relate to eschatological significance. Thus, it is important to see that the Seventh-day Adventist Church, believing Adventists to be the end-time remnant, is based on a biblical-theological package the pioneers had at the outset of the church.