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XXI - 03(88)
"Watchman,
what of the night?"
"The hour has come, the hour is striking and striking at you,
the hour and the end!" Eze. 7:6 (Moffatt)
1888
CENTENNIAL
ISSUE OF
Review
EDITORS CONTINUE
TO RE-WRITE HISTORY
The first issue of the Adventist Review for 1988 was devoted to "Christ Our Righteousness" and called the Centennial Edition. Some of the articles were little more than a "social gospel" which could be found in any "Christian" activist journal. Another article sought to cover a projection of self behind a facade of grace. The first article written by the Editor himself admitted the truthfulness of the evaluation that the 1888 General Conference was "one of the saddest chapters in the history of the believers in present truth." He also confessed that "God brought a message to His people at Minneapolis" and that "most of the delegates rejected it." (Jan. 7, 1988, p. 2)
_________________________________________________________
Knight Descends on Jones - P.3
1888 Re-Examined - P.5
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Dr. Johnsson then proceeds to tell what. he perceives the 1888 message to be without once quoting the messengers through whom God gave the message. He does point out "two misunderstandings of the message of Christ's righteousness" with clarity and illustration from the history of the 1888 period. One is that some, like those who rejected the message in 1888, still teach and believe "that we can, or need to, add to Christ's merits." (p. 3) The second misunderstanding is "that the gospel leaves us the same as it found us." (Ibid.)
At the 1888 conference session, not only was there theological discussion, but also the issue of religious liberty was prominent. A. T. Jones gave "several lectures upon the relationship between religion and the civil power." (Civil Government and Religion, p. 3) Whether by design, or by mere coincidence, this Centennial Edition of the Review devotes the entire "Focus on North America" to articles on current religious liberty issues. (pp. 22-27)
The historical overview of the 1888 message was "excerpted and adapted" from the book by Knight - From 1888 to Apostasy. This adaptation began the attempt at re-writing history. It is considered to be "wrong-headed" to believe that the men through whom "God brought a message to His people" were "somehow inspired." Knight would have the reader believe that "the imprimatur" of Ellen G. White gave Jones and Waggoner their credentials. (p. 4) This downplay of Jones and Waggoner is continued through a series of blocks at the bottom of each page of the section devoted to the 1888 message. Jones and Waggoner are pictured with the notation that they were "eloquent proponents of righteousness by faith in Christ." (p. 5) The next page shows a picture of Martin Luther with the comment that he "rediscovered the good news of salvation by grace through faith." (p. 6) The implication is clear Jones and Waggoner were merely the proponents in 1888 of the message Luther rediscovered.
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There is also an attempt to build up W. C. White. A sample of "the notes" which he kept of the discussions over "the law in Galatians," and the "horns" of Daniel 7 is pictured. (p. 11) Then a picture is shown of W. C. White and his first wife - Mary Kelsey, who had been J. H. Kellogg's
fiance - with the observation that W. C. White "became acting president of the General Conference for about six months until 0. A. Olsen, whom the delegates had elected, could leave his work in Europe." (p. 15) This is the closest W. C. ever got to the presidency of the General Conference, and can shed some light on his 180 degree turn around between 1901 and 1903, and the influence he had on Daniells. If he couldn't be "king" he would be "king-maker" and influence his mother in her judgments toward men in developments after 1901. This "human" factor has not been considered in the re-write of history in the "interpretive" biography of Jones.
Did Jones and Waggoner merely operate under the "imprimatur" of Ellen G. White? Or did God give them a message? Was the message which Jones and Waggoner gave at the 1888 session and after, only a review of the rediscovery of Luther? Or was it '' present truth" for God's professed people in 1888.
First, the standing of Jones and Waggoner before God: Ellen G. White wrote in 1896 to the Battle Creek Church referring to
the work of Jones and Waggoner - "God gave to His messengers just what the people needed." Then she asked the question - "How long will you hate and despise the messengers of God's righteousness?" (See TM, pp. 95, 96) How did Ellen White understand the term, "messenger"? Here is her own testimony concerning her understanding of the work she was called to do. In a communication from St. Helena, California, dated Nov. 17, 1903, she wrote:
From the year 1846 until the present time, I have received messages from the Lord, and have communicated them to His people. This is my work - to give to the people the light that God gives me. I am commissioned to receive and communicate His messages. I am not to appear before the people as holding any other position than that of a messenger with a message." (Quoted in The Final Word and Confession, p. 10)
A "messenger" then is one commissioned with a message - light from God - to be given to His people. Understanding her role, she assigned to Jones and Waggoner the same role noting them as "the messengers of God's righteousness." Why then should we seek to re-write history, and present them as merely "eloquent proponents" of the message "rediscovered" by Martin Luther?
WHG
ANOTHER CENTENNIAL
The Adventist Community is not the only group celebrating a centennial in 1988. The Lord's Day Alliance of the United States is celebrating its 100th birthday this year. Organized in 1888 at the time some of the strongest agitation for a National Sunday Law faced Sabbath keepers, it is "still well and alive" and still promoting Sunday legislation.
In the latest issue of Sunday, the official magazine of the American Alliance, there is revealed how closely the leadership of the organization is associated with the leadership of the Roman Catholic Church. Thomas A. Donnellan, Archbishop of Atlanta, died in October. Sunday reprints an article from The Atlanta Constitution. Then the Editor, Dr. James P. Wesberry, who is also Executive Director of the Alliance adds this revealing note. It reads:
Archbishop Donnellan was a real friend of the Lord's Day Alliance of the United States. He extended royal hospitality to the entire board several times, addressed us and prayed for and with us. He supported The Alliance generously and graciously. His friendship was an inspiration to all of us. We count it a privilege to have knelt by his side, held his hand, and prayed for him while he was at St. Joseph's Hospital in Atlanta before his death. (Vol. LXXV, #4, p. 13)
It is the same Dr. Wesberry for whom Dr. Samuele Bacchiocchi made provision to speak at a forum in the Chapel of the Adventist Theological Seminary and to whom the students and faculty gave a standing ovation following his address. (The Sabbath Sentinel April, 1979, p. 19)
In Sunday (Vol. LXXIV, #4) an article lauded an audience with the Pope by Wesberry and several others of the Alliance. The Pope was presented with a citation which read:
The Lord's Day Alliance
of the United States
expresses appreciation to
His Holiness
Pope John Paul, II
for his outstanding service in preserving
The Lord's Day
throughout the world
He was also given a book - The Lord's Day which Wesberry had written. (p. 9)
In recent years not only have Adventists had contact with the Lord's Day Alliance through Bacchiocchi, but the Bible Sabbath Association through its officers have also been guests of the Alliance. It is a sad day when those who profess to uphold the Sabbath of the Lord God seek to fellowship with those who seek to legislate an institution of both paganism and the papacy. Did not Paul ask - What concord hath Christ with Belial? (II Cor. 6:15)
WHG
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KNIGHT
DESCENDS ON
JONES
(PART TWO)
One critique of the book - From 1888 to Apostasy accuses Knight of using a "cut and paste methodology " in arriving at his conclusions concerning Jones. (Laymen Ministry News, #134, p.13) This accusation more aptly applies to the new edition of 1888 Re-Examined with its deletions and out-of-context use of the Writings. Knight's use of references and conclusions drawn from them is much more elusive. A reader can, if he really wants to know the truth, check the "cut and paste" approach of Wieland and Short, but there is little, if any, opportunity to check the references used by Knight. Let us illustrate by an example. Knight wrote:
Mrs. White interwove her counsel to Jones regarding the 1899 General Conference Session with her critique of his exuberant and forceful tactics in reforming the Review office. She firmly rebuked him both for his extreme view on the royalties issue and for his pushy ways. 46 (P. 174)
There is not a single quotation mark in this whole paragraph, yet it is footnoted - "46". This footnote reads:
46 EGW to ATJ, April 28, May 1, Aug. 14, 1899; ATJ to EGW, July 6, 1899; W. C. Sisley to EGW, Apr. 13, 1899. (p. 273)
Very few readers have access to this series of correspondence which passed between A. T. Jones and Ellen G. White, and from Sisley to Ellen G. White. The question is simply, - If we had this correspondence to read, would we draw the same conclusion Knight drew? This method is used throughout the entire book. In some instances, a word, phrase, or even a whole paragraph is placed in quotes, but rarely in full context so that a student can check the conclusions drawn. This covert methodology lends itself well to the objective Knight had in writing the book. He "tried never to forget that [his] primary aim was to write an interpretive biography of" Jones. (p. 13) The reader is not given the tools to evaluate that interpretation; he is expected to accept it by faith in a man.
ANOTHER TECHNIQUE USED
When first reading the book, we discovered certain words and phrases which prefaced conclusions without sufficient documentation. We had promised that we would list these words and phrases as found in the book. We discovered them to be too numerous, and thus space consuming to justify such a listing. However, we will cite some specific examples. In the first chapter - "Young Man Jones" - Knight uses the word, "undoubtedly," four times. Now the word itself by dictionary definition means - "genuine, undisputed." Apart from one use of the word, the conclusions drawn are purely interpretive, and could be questioned. In the same chapter, Jones is accused as having "ulterior motives" (19); that his estimates of his own possibilities "appear to be quite inflated" (p. 20); and that a certain contact "seems to be more than coincidental" in its influence upon Jones' later experiences (p. 21).
In the chapter - "The Nature of Christ" this same type of approach is used. Knight even professes to be able to read the mind of the devil as he writes that "undoubtedly" the devil is thrilled over a certain state of affairs. (p. 113) In the heart of the chapter, he writes - "It is reasonable to believe" (p. 134); "it seems safer to infer" (p. 134); "That appears to be the position Ellen White held" (p. 143); A "typology certainly seems" to fit (p. 144); "It may well prove to be the answer" (p. 144); "it is quite probable" (p.144); "it is highly probable" (p. 146); and "It appears that" (p. 147). Such use of language in discussing a key subject such as the nature Christ assumed in the incarnation is not justifiable scholarship, but rather adds to the question mark on the whole book.
WAS JONES ALL BAD?
Jones is pictured as extreme, controversial, unbalanced, pompous, egotistical, harsh, confrontational, abrasive, excitable, sharp, combative, and pushy to use a few of the
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descriptive words found in this interpretive biography. However, Knight in reporting historical data undermines his own evaluation of Jones, and reveals the truth about "The Case of A. T. Jones."
Senator H. W. Blair of New Hampshire was chairman of the Senate Committee on Education and Labor during the years of 1888 and 1889. He introduced two National Sunday bills, and a Constitutional Amendment to "Christianize" the nation's public school system. The hearings on these bills were conducted before this committee with Blair in the chair. All were defeated and in this defeat, A. T. Jones played a major role. Yet Blair speaking in 1909 at the twenty-first celebration of the introduction of his Sunday bill could describe Jones as "a man whom I shall always respect on account of his great ability and evident sincerity with which he presented his views to the committee." (p. 76)
Another experience is recorded. The Church leaders thought Jones needed to broaden his world perspective, and so he was sent to Europe. During his tour of the area which took him even down into Turkey, he "spent three days with Count Pagengouth on the isle of Capri. Jones gave the Count Bible studies. Pagengouth, who had once traveled all the way to England just to hear D. L. Moody preach, stated that in 20 years he had 'never been so blessed in Bible study.'" (pp. 161-162) He made Jones a generous offer. Hosler, president of the Adventist work in Central Europe, had accompanied Jones, and wrote of this experience to the Foreign Mission Board of the General Conference. Who among the personnel at headquarters had the charisma or the ability to do what Jones had done either before the U.S. Senate Committee or in studying with a Count?
Part of the answer to "The Case of A. T. Jones" can be stated simply as professional jealousy on the part of his peers. Thus to denigrate Jones by using the language of his colleagues in the ministry, even including W. C. White, is to project questionable evaluation. Jealousy has been described in the Scriptures as "cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals o fire, which hath a most vehement flame." (Song of Solomon 8:6) To interpret a man - faulty, yes, as all humanity is and has been - by the evaluations of jealous contemporaries is to build a case on cruel prejudice. This is hardly worthy of scholarship one would expect from the Church History Department of the Theological Seminary, but rather the work of an hired assassin of the hierarchy.
WHG
******
G. Burnside
95 Browns Road
WAHROONGA
N.S.W 2076
2. 7. 87
In 1946, I was in the U.S.A. and the General Conference asked me to take meetings at various Camps. I roomed at two camps - New Jersey and East Pennsylvania - with Pastor Meade MacGuire and we chatted much about the old days. He had known A. T. Jones. Pastor MacGuire spoke highly of Jones, especially of his knowledge of Church history. His big concern was the trends in S. D. A. Organization. Jones opposed A. G. Daniells (the Gen. Conf. president) on church organization as Jones felt it was drifting Romeward. Finally Daniells broke Jones, with the result that Jones finally left the church.
Years later, Daniells and Pastor MacGuire were attending Camps in California. They were returning to Washington D.C. by train. Pastor MacGuire said Pastor Daniells was sitting looking out of the carriage window thinking. He looked up and said, "You know, Meade, I believe Jones was right and I was wrong." He was dealing with the question of organization.
Pastor MacGuire said that Pastor Daniells did all he could to rectify things, but as he was then out of the presidency no one paid much attention to him.
This is the account as I recall it.
Signed,
(Received from Orion Publications, Australia)
******
"In Jesus Christ alone is the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man; and in Jesus Christ we find the brotherhood of man only when we find Christ the Brother of every man." A. T. Jones
[End of part 2 of 4]
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1888
RE-EXAMINED
EXAMINED
(PART FIVE)
It was not a mere afterthought which caused A. L. Hudson to caption the collection of documents which he presented to the Executive Committee of the North Pacific Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists - A Warning and Its Reception. This collection contained the original
edition of 1888 Re-Examined. This 1950 edition contained three chapters - 10, 11, 12 - which outlined and documented a warning to the leadership of the Seventh-day Adventist Church of the consequences which would result from a continued rejection of the 1888 Message, and a refusal to repent as called for by the messenger of the Lord.
In the new 1987 edition, these three chapters have been condensed into one. The predictions with the warning of the first edition have been advanced to the present - some thirty seven years - without a single paragraph considering the fulfillment of the predictions made in 1950 during these thirty seven years!
Chapter 11 of the 1950 edition - "Predictions of Infatuation with a False Christ" - begins with the objective clearly spelled out. It reads:
This chapter of this essay will investigate: (1) Mrs. White's predictions that the apostasy of the modern popular churches will lead to a confusion of a false Christ for the true; (2) the grave danger of our becoming involved ourselves in the prevailing general confusion through a failure to recognize our true Lord and Christ in the message of 1888. (p. 138)
In support of these propositions, Wieland and Short quote from Series B -
In his work on this earth, Christ saw how, by a disregard of the injunctions of God in regard to righteousness and true doctrines, evil would be almost indistinguishable from good. (#2, p. 7)
The conclusion was then drawn -
If it is true that the false Christ will appear through misrepresentation before he appears through impersonation, it follows that it will be through false doctrines that he will make his most subtle appeals. (1950 ed., p. 147)
This same concept is echoed in the 1987 edition:
In consequence of our 1888 misconception of the true Christ, this false Christ will find a way to worm himself in through misrepresentation by false doctrines and concepts long before he takes the final step of physical impersonation. (p. 151, emphasis mine)
Even though we are standing on the very borders of the "impersonation", the "false doctrines and concepts" which have taken place in the "long" time indicated, have been left undiscussed in the new edition. No assessment of the present status of the Church before God can be made without a complete evaluation of the SDA-Evangelical Conferences of 1955-56; and the events in our history from 1967-1980 including the Statement of Beliefs voted at Dallas, Texas, in 1980. A refusal to candidly face up to these events of what is now history makes sheer hypocrisy of their position that through "false doctrines and concepts" Satan enters the precincts of the "temple" of the true Christ.
We need not document the history in this brief analysis in detail. It is available in documents and facsimiles prepared by the Foundation. They are the manuscripts - SDA-Evangelical Conferences 1955-1956, Steps to Rome, History of Our Statements of Belief, and The Times of the Gentiles Fulfilled. For now well over twenty years - most of that long time - we have been calling the attention each month of those who have ears to hear, and eyes to read, to the conditions existing in the Church through the Thought Paper - "Watchman, What of the Night?"
One series of events which served as a prelude to the apostasy needs to be reiterated. In 1950, God called Wieland and Short and sent them to the Church leadership with a call to corporate repentance. That call was set aside, and in this Wieland and Short acquiesced. Two years later, Elder W. H. Branson, then General Conference president, called a Bible Conference at the close of which he averred that the message of 1888 had been preached with "greater power" than
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at any prior time. Yet within three years the hierarchy of the Church compromised the "sacred trust" committed to the Church during the SDA-Evangelical conferences.
To meet the apostasy, God raised up a man - M. L. Andreasen. Others blended their voices with his. But God did not call Wieland and Short back from Africa to do it. To run now with a message without being called to do so, except by the agitation of human beings; and in so doing ignore all the evidences of God's voice in history between the time once called of God, and the self-instituted call is to place one's eternal interests in jeopardy and to become a decoy of the enemy to deceive others.
The problem in 1950 and the solution to the problem was clear, and Wieland and Short did perceive it. At the close of the original Chapter 11, they wrote:
Where is the Rock, that we may fall upon it, and be broken? Self will not find it until the offence of the Cross is restored to the third angel's message in verity." (p. 149, emphasis theirs)
It is the search for the Cross that is not only the problem with the individual church member as well as the hierarchy, but also Wieland's present problem in the presupposition maintained in the new edition. The need for the Cross as an answer to the problem is verbalized in the new edition, true; but the actual spelling of it out in the light of history, NO!
The Cross was never planted in old Jerusalem, but on a hill outside of the city. To Hebrew Christians of Paul's day who had difficulty with separating from the rites, ceremonies, and concepts of Judaism, the counsel was given - "Let us go out unto Him (Jesus) without the camp, bearing His reproach. For we have here no continuing city, but we seek one to come." (Heb. 13:13-14) This reproach, this offence of the Cross, neither Wieland nor Short are willing to accept. One cannot expect others to accept the "verity" of the Third Angel's Message until they see those who profess to preach it, doing it!
The Jewish Christians for whom the book of Hebrews was written refused to accept the facts as written in their Church history from 31 A.D. to 34 A.D., thus they could not comprehend the meaning of the Cross. The ignoring of history today leads to the same end - the rejection of the offence of the Cross. Would to God that all who are professing to be engaged in the final warning to God's people could comprehend in simple faith the following words -
But ye are come unto mount Sion, and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel. (Heb. 12:22-24)
The facts of history shout at us that the Jerusalem which now is, is in bondage with her children, but the Jerusalem which is above is free through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and has become the mother of us all. (See Gal. 4:25-26) The whole question - the whole issue between 1950 and 1987, between 1888 Re-Examined, first edition, and 1888 Re-Examined, revised edition, is, who is your mother? Which is of righteousness by faith, and which is of works, the old covenant, symbolized in Hagar?
WHG & AS
"Absolutely nothing which does not bear the test of truth will be triumphant in the Judgement."
(1888 Re-Examined, 1950 ed., p. 2; omitted in the 1987 ed)
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CHRIST OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS
Lesson # 13
Living by Faith
Question
Answer
1. How are the just to live? Romans 1:17
2. Has this been true in all ages? Hebrews 11
3. In whom only should we have faith? Acts 4:12
4. Should man put confidence in the flesh? Phil. 3:3-10
5. Where is our confidence and in whom can we rejoice? 1 John 5:14, Phil. 5:4
6 To whom are all the promises of final happiness given? Rev. 3: 21 (See note 1)
7. What will those who overcome inherit? Rev. 21:7, (See note 2)
8. How may we gain victories? 1 John 5: 4
9. Where was Paul's strength? Gal. 2:20
10. In whom may we make our boast? Psalm 34:2
11. In what only did Paul glory? Gal. 6:14
12. If Christ is living in the heart, is it proper to say that continual victories may be gained? 1 Cor. 15:57, Phil. 4:13 (See note 3)
13. "By___ the walls of Jericho fell down." Heb. 11:30
14. Why was the story of Jericho recorded? Rom. 15:4
15. Whom do we battle against? Eph. 6:12 (See note 4)
NOTES
1. See also Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12.
2. "The inheriting is not the overcoming; that is only the reward for overcoming. The overcoming is now; the victories to be gained are victories over the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eyes, and the pride of life, victories over self and selfish indulgences ... Some folks look with dread upon the thought of having to wage a continual warfare with self and worldly lusts. That is because they do not as yet know anything about the joy of victory; they have experienced only defeat. But it isn't so doleful a thing to battle constantly, when there is continual victory." (E. J. Waggoner - ST, March 25, 1889 - As quoted from Lessons on Faith)
3. "John says that he that is born of God overcomes the world, through faith. Faith lays hold of the arm of God, and his mighty power does the work." (Ibid.)
4. "Victories which have been gained by faith in God over visible foes in the flesh, are placed on record to show us what faith will accomplish in our conflict with the rulers of the darkness of this world." (Ibid.)
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