The Nature of ChristApostasy
Yet it is a tragic fact that few of our people recognize this truth for
what it is a cornerstone, not only to the work of Christ to save us from
sin, but to the quality of our daily Christian experience. WHAT IS THIS TRUTH? This great truth, which is fully supported by the Bible and Spirit of
Prophecy, explains that Christ came from the highest heaven down to our
level in order to save us. Jacobs ladder reached all the way. Christ is the ladder that Jacob saw . . If that ladder had failed by a
single step of reaching the earth, we should have been lost. But Christ
reaches us where we are. He took our nature and overcame, that we through
taking His nature might overcome. Desire of Ages, 311-312. It took the divine and the human to bring into the world the salvation
that was needed by fallen man. Review, November 1, 1892. Christ had to become a human being like us, in order to save us. If He
had only become a man like unfallen Adam,He could only have saved
unfallen Adam. (Yet, ironically, Adam before his fall did not need saving;
he was sinless.) Christ took our nature in its deteriorated condition. Manuscript,
143, 1897. It was necessary for Christ to unite the fullness of divinity with the
fullness of our fallen nature, in order to reach man and lift him up. He took upon Him our nature that He might reach man in his fallen
condition. Signs, September 23, 1889. He assumed human nature, that He might elevate the human family. Review,
February 15, 1898. In order to successfully redeem us, Christ had to successfully resist the
temptations we must meet. He is the Forerunner. He has gone before us,
showing us the way. That way is obedience to the law of God, through faith
in divine power. He took our nature, and in it lived a life of perfect obedience. Signs,
January 25, 1899. Every temptation that could be brought against fallen humanity, He met
and overcame . . Had He not been fully human, He could not have been our
substitute. Bible Echo, August 2, 1897. Because Christ took the humanity we daily live with, He had to resist sin
just as we do. How then did He succeed? Did He rely on His divinity to
help Him? No, no. We are never told that in Scripture. Instead, we are
told that He trusted in a divine power outside of Himself. By faith, He
received power from God to help Him overcome. Through the life, death, and
mediation of Christ, that power is available to us also! Christ took upon Himself our infirmities, and in the weakness of
humanity He needed to seek strength from the Father. Review,
October 11, 1881. Here He lived as a man among men, meeting the temptations that we must
meet, and overcoming through strength from above. By His sinless life He
demonstrated that through the power of God it is possible for man to
withstand Satan's temptations. The Watchman, February 26, 1907. He came down fully to our level. The ladder reached all the way to the
ground where we stand; not the mountaintop up in the clouds where unfallen
Adam stood. He suffered every phase of trial and temptation with which humanity is
beset. Manuscript 35, 1895. He had all the strength of the passion of humanity. Signs,
November 21, 1892. He had the strength of the inherited tendencies to passion, but He did
not have the passion itself. For He never once chose to indulge in sin. He
never once yielded. In full reliance upon His Father for help, He stood
firm as a rock for the right. He was sinless. But many say that Jesus was not like us, that He was not as we are in
the world, that He was divine, and therefore we cannot overcome as He
overcame. But this is not true. For verily He took not on Him the
nature of angels, but He took on Him the seed of Abraham. (Hebrews
2:16) . . He took upon Himself our nature. Bible Echo, November 1,
1892. The plan of salvation required that Christ, who was fully God, become
fully man Many claim that it was impossible for Christ to be overcome by
temptation. Then He could not have been placed in Adams position; He
could not have gained the victory that Adam failed to gain. If we have in
any sense a more trying conflict than had Christ, then He would not be
able to succor us. But our Saviour took humanity, with all its
liabilities. He took the nature of man, with the possibility of yielding
to temptation. We have nothing to bear which He has not endured. Desire
of Ages, 117. As Jesus was in human nature, so God means His followers to be. Signs,
April 1, 1897. The Saviour took upon Himself the infirmities of humanity, and on this
earth lived a sinless life that men should have no fear that because of
the weakness of human nature they would not be able to overcome. Manuscript
51, 1903. So there is the glorious truth of the human nature of Christ! Can you now
see why it is a bedrock truth, IT IS A GREAT EVIL TO TRY TO DESTROY THIS TRUTH FROM
MEN'S MINDS But, unfortunately, men are trying to do just that. They are working at
cross-purposes with God. They are trying to convince men that it is not
necessary to obey Gods Holy Word. The excuse they give is that they fear perfectionism. What they
really fear is that they might have to put away their own sins and give up
their darling idols. What is more evil than inventing a religious teaching
which excuses sin, and then tries to deceive thousands into believing that
lie! These men assuage their sense of guilt, by finding comfort in the
number of people they can convert to their error. They draw assurance from
the many on their side Surely, theirs is an evil work, and, if those men do not repent, erelong
it will bring the wrath of God and a burning in hellfire. It is bad enough when Catholic priests and Protestant pastors convert
their flocks to the hideous teaching that it is safe to sin. But when men,
funded by the tithe in the Adventist denomination, use that support to
spread their deception that men can have salvation in sin, the sin becomes
profoundly great. Who can give an atonement for the souls of such men? He who has not sufficient faith in Christ to believe that He can keep
him from sinning, has not the faith that will give him an entrance into
the kingdom of God. Review, March 10, 1904. That which makes the evil even worse is that so many of these men have
had great light. They have had the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy. They
know that both teach that Christ took our fallen nature. The truth is so
obvious that only those believing the most carefully-crafted deception can
withstand it. Some of these men, such as Helmut Ott and Morris Venden, have declared
that those who try to obey Gods law, will be lost in perdition unless
they repent. It is claimed that man can only be saved by sitting back and
letting God do it for him. But Gods Word assures us that unless we do our part, we will not THE ROY ADAMS' BOOK A basic landmark in the ongoing apostasy of the leadership of our
denomination occurred this year, 1994. The Review and Herald Publishing
Association published the book, The Nature of Christ: Help for a Church
Divided Over Perfection, It is being advertised in denominational
journals and sold in our bookstores. The book purports to explain that Christ took the nature of unfallen
Adam, that our leaders and writers But such a contention is blatantly untrue! My thesis throughout is that the theology of these three men [A.T.
Jones, E.J. Waggoner, and M.L. Andreason] has provided the spawning ground
for the position on righteousness by faith and perfection held by certain
Adventists today . . Without a doubt, the roots of the present agitation go all the way
back to Jones and Waggoner. Page 29. Yes, such a claim is blatantly untrue. A.T. Jones and E.J. Waggoner
primarily spoke and wrote on this
subject between 1891 and 1901. But
Ellen White and other of our pioneer leaders were writing on the
subject all the way back to the early 1850s. This is abundantly verified
by Ralph Larson's excellent book, The Word Was Made Flesh. Repeatedly, our early leaders taught the Bible truth that Jesus took our
human nature, not Adams unfallen nature. And they showed that this
great truth was a bedrock truth underlying the fact that, in Christ, we
too can resist and overcome sin The ten spies in the wilderness brought a lying report to the people,
which caused so many to miss out on Canaan. Men today are knowingly
bringing equally false reports. I say knowingly advisedly. There is
far too much detail referred to, in Adams book, for it to be the work
of individuals unacquainted with the writings of the Bible, the Spirit of
Prophecy, and our earlier leaders. In a recent study, Ralph Larson described the situation well: By the end of the year 1898, other church leaders had published their
own views on the nature of Christ, not different from hers, a total of 76
times. (See The Word Was Made Flesh.) This number does not include
statements from Jones and Waggoner. It does include statements from such
other church leaders as James White, Uriah Smith, Stephen Haskell, W.W.
Prescott, J.H. Waggoner, M.C. Wilcox, R.A. Underwood, Alton Farnsworth,
Elgin Farnsworth, W.H. Glenn, J.E. Evans, William Covert, J.H. Durland,
G.C. Tenny, G.E. Fifield, and others. These writers did not mute their
messages. The total includes nine editorials and five front page
editorials . . And let us not overlook the fact that while Jones and Waggoner were
co-editors of the Signs of the Times (1885-1891), they published,
in that journal, three statements by Ellen White that Christ had come to
earth in the human nature of fallen man. In the years 1890-1891, Waggoner,
as sole editor, published five more. Meanwhile, Jones, as editor of the Review
(1887-1891), published eleven such statements in that journal . . Jones and Waggoner, far from being innovators or teachers of the new
doctrines, were actually standing firmly in the mainstream of Seventh-day
Adventist theology, regarding the nature
of Christ and character perfection. Their teachings were emphatically not
the root of those doctrines; they were rather the fruit . . In our The Word Was Made Flesh, we document 1,200 statements on
the nature of Christ that were published by our church leaders between the
years 1852 and 1952, 400 of them by Ellen White. During that same period,
until her death in 1915, Ellen White published 4,500 statements regarding
character perfection. (See Tell of His Power.) Ralph
Larson, World-Class Straw Man, Landmarks, June 1994. Regarding the teaching that Christ took our nature, not of unfallen Adam,
Roy Adams declares that, among our people, only A.T. Jones and E.J.
Waggoner taught it in the nineteenth century. We have viewed the
inaccuracy of that idea. So in the construction of his world-class straw man, Adams has
apparently arbitrarily selected two persons, Jones and Waggoner, from
among a large group of Adventist thought leaders, including Ellen White,
and assigned to them the responsibility for creating doctrinal attitudes
that were actually shared by them all and had been witnessed to by some of
them before Jones and Waggoner came along. Ibid. What about Adams other charge that no leaders taught it in the
twentieth century until M.L. Andreasen did? The perfectionist agitation within the Seventh-day Adventist Church
today had its genesis in the post-1888 teachings of A.T. Jones and E.J.
Waggoner . . The linkage of sanctification, perfection, and Christ's
nature that has become dominant among certain groups is a direct legacy of
M.L. Andreasons theology. Page 37. Ralph Larson, who spent months preparing an in-depth book on the subject,
replies to Adams second
charge: This leads us directly to the other proposition in the structure of
straw erected by Adams. Was M.L. Andreason a person who accepted strange
and new doctrines from Jones and Waggoner and urged them upon the church,
or was he only one among a host of witnesses to generally accept these
truths? . . In regard to the nature of Christ, we have documented statements by
General Conference presidents such as Daniells, Watson, Branson, and
McElhany; vice presidents such as Prescott, Thompson, Haynes, Fulton,
Olsen, Christian, Rudy, and Hackman; union presidents such as Underwood,
Farnsworth, Slade, and Turner; local conference presidents such as
Farnsworth and Evans; Signs and Review editors and associate
editors such as M.C. Wilcox, G.C. Tenney, W.H. Glenn, Uriah Smith, F.D.
Nichol, Oscar Tait, Alonzo Baker, C.M. Snow, and F.M. Wilcox; the first
president of our theological seminary, M.E. Kern; seminary teacher, L.E.
Froom; college president, W.E. Howell; other teachers and leaders
including T.M. French, Merlin Neff, L.C. Wilcox, Meade Macquire, C.L.
Bond, and J.E. Fulton; and many, many others . . We did not find a single evidence that any of our leaders or believers
held a different view from the mainstream on either the nature of Christ
or character perfection until the mid 1900snot one. And let it
be remembered that we made it our goal to examine every article or book
that had been published in the English language during the period of
1852-1952Ibid. Well, now we have a far better understanding of Roy Adams book,a
book which is being highly recommended by many of our denominational
leaders. It is of the highest significance that the liberals in our church are
praising Adams book the most. Those who are weakest on reproving sin,
upholding standards, or urging men and women to obey the law of
God; these are the ones who are especially urging our people to read and
believe Roy Adams book. But, of them all, the highest praises have been sung by none other than
Desmond Ford! He simply raves about Adams book. Desmond Ford, the most active breakaway liberal among us in the past
several decades, lauds the book At last! After a century and a half,
the Seventh-day Adventist Church has published a book devoted
entirely to the vital subject of the sinless nature of Christ, our Lord
and Saviour. For nearly fifty years, the denomination has been rent by divisions
over this issue [37 years: 1957, when Questions on Doctrine was
printed, on down to the present time]. The denominations major university, Andrews University, has for
nearly half a century clearly taught that our Lords spiritual nature
was like that of Adam For the record, Andrews was not teaching the unfallen nature between 1955
and 1958. But, three months after the present writer graduated from that
institution, Desmond Ford arrived and, I have been told, urged Edward
Heppenstall to come out in the open with his beliefs. Ford can hardly lavish enough praise for Adams book. I recommend Roy Adams book wholeheartedly. It reminds me of Perfect
in Christ, by Helmut Ott,
which was published in 1987 by the same publishers. Otts book, which I
also heartily recommend, is of the same genre. However, as mentioned at
the beginning of this review, Roy Adams The Nature of Christ is
(as far as I know) a first in Adventist publications. It is the first
official S.D.A. book to affirm the sinless nature of Christ, our Lord and
Saviour. We salute the author and the publishers. Ibid. Intriguingly enough, Ford, in his book review, differs with Adams on two
points: (1) Ford says he takes a more open stand on the error of St.
Augustine, that we are locked into sin, by means of original sin
from Adam. First, as with many modern theologians, Roy does not like to speak of
mankind inheriting guilt from Adam. Ibid. (2) Ford maintains that it was not possible for Christ not to succeed. It
was an easy victory, since He could not really sin anyway (since He
supposedly had Adams unfallen nature). So there was little sacrifice in
coming to earth, living here for a time and then dying on the cross. Second, Dr. Adams takes the popular Adventist view (found in Ellen
Whites writings) that the destiny of the human race hung in the balance
when Christ came to earth. There was no
absolute certainty that Christ would overcome and conquer and
successfully complete the Atonement. In other words, Christ could have
sinned . . The salvation of the human race did not hang in the balance when
Christ came. Success was absolutely certain. Success had been predicted
with full assurance Christ's provision of salvation would, indeed,
eventuate on behalf of the whole human race. Ibid. CONCLUSION It was stated, at the beginning of this article, that there can be few
evils more terrible for one who knows the Spirit of Prophecy writings, to
attempt to lead everyone in the church into the belief that they no longer
need to obey Gods Inspired Writings or His laws. Let us say it again: Why is it such a terrible evil? Because the God of
heaven committed the special message of Revelation 14:6-12the Third
Angels Message A correct understanding of the nature of Christ is part of the Third
Angels Message! As we clearly saw from Ralph Larson's comments, Roy
Adams book is founded on a terrible untruth. Read what the Bible says about the matter: God, sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin,
condemned sin in the flesh. Romans 8:3. Concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed
of David according to the flesh. Romans 1:3. For both He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of
one: For which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren. Hebrews
2:11. Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He
also Himself likewise took part of the same. Hebrews 2:14. For verily He took not on Him the nature of angels; but He took on Him
the seed of Abraham. Hebrews 2:16. Wherefore in all things it behoved Him to be made like unto His
brethren. Hebrews 2:17. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. John 1:14. May God have mercy on His people! There is so little time left, and there
are so many false teachers! Vance Ferrell |