Comment on What does it take to be a true Seventh-day Adventist? by Sean Pitman.
I have a suggestion for you, Dr. Pitman. The vast majority of SDAs disagree with your deeply cherished but heterodox views on faith and evidence. Some of your most ardent supporters have disagreed with you, including Shane Hilde and David Read.
I would say that the majority of SDAs, or members of any other church group for that matter, haven’t really considered why they believe what they believe or have faith in this or that. Most of the time it is simply a matter of how they were raised from childhood. They’ve never really been brought to the point of seriously questioning their faith. It’s been more a matter of culture rather than a real solid conviction that provides a rational assurance in times of intense stress or direct challenges to one’s faith.
Some, after thinking about it for the first time, change their minds and are no longer so fideistic in their views. This is true of Shane Hilde who started out arguing very much like you, but now sees the fundamental importance of the weight of evidence as a basis for true Biblical faith.
If you think your views are at all important, I suggest you create a movement to add a 29th SDA Fundamental Belief, one which clearly articulates your understanding of what faith is and is not.
I don’t think you’re up to the challenge, but I’d be curious to learn how theologians and other SDA leaders respond to your efforts–vanishingly few of whom either read your views here or care enough to defend them.
The current position of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, as an organization, is very much in line with what I’ve been presenting here in this forum. The church recognizes the need for the weight of evidence as a basis for Biblical faith – as did Mrs. White. This fact is so clear that you feel the need to argue that she and the Biblical authors weren’t really talking about real “faith” when they used the actual word “faith” (which is quite telling I might add). You say that they were really talking about “belief” when they use the word “faith” on occasion. I’m sorry, but your fideistic arguments and efforts to redefine what the Biblical authors and Mrs. White were actually trying to say are what are outside of the current perspective of the Adventist Church as an organization. The SDA Church simply does not support your fideistic or “faithism” views.
One of the empirical evidences to which Ellen White referred was Biblical prophecies as they compared to historical evidence outside of the Bible – i.e., the historical sciences.
Also, Ellen White presented numerous other forms of empirical evidence as a basis for faith in the Bible’s claims:
“Science is ever discovering new wonders; but she brings from her research nothing that, rightly understood, conflicts with divine revelation. The book of nature and the written word shed light upon each other…
Inferences erroneously drawn from facts observed in nature have, however, led to supposed conflict between science and revelation; and in the effort to restore harmony, interpretations of Scripture have been adopted that undermine and destroy the force of the word of God. Geology has been thought to contradict the literal interpretation of the Mosaic record of the creation. Millions of years, it is claimed, were required for the evolution of the earth from chaos; and in order to accommodate the Bible to this supposed revelation of science, the days of creation are assumed to have been vast, indefinite periods, covering thousands or even millions of years…
The vast forests buried in the earth at the time of the Flood, and since changed to coal, form the extensive coal fields, and yield the supplies of oil that minister to our comfort and convenience today. These things, as they are brought to light, are so many witnesses mutely testifying to the truth of the word of God.” – Ellen White, Education, p. 128
“God designed that the discovery of these things in the earth, should establish the faith of men in inspired history. But men, with their vain reasoning, make a wrong use of these things which GOD designed should lead them to exalt him. They fall into the same error as did the people before the flood—those things which GOD gave them as a benefit, they turned into a curse, by making a wrong use of them.” —Ellen G. White, Spiritual Gifts 3:90-96
So, there you have it. According to Ellen White, the discovery of empirical evidences, outside of the Bible itself, was designed, by God, to establish the faith of those considering these evidences in the credibility of the Scriptures…
I highly doubt that very many church leaders at the GC level would disagree with these statements of Ellen White. The only qualification, of course, is that the correct understanding of scientific evidence and passages in the Bible requires that one have a sincere desire to know the truth (i.e., a love of the truth). God has promised to guide the minds of those who are sincerely seeking to find Truth, to find Him.
Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com
Sean Pitman Also Commented
What does it take to be a true Seventh-day Adventist?
I guess someone who accepts neo-Darwinism must have some problems with the reality of Biblical prophecy…
What does it take to be a true Seventh-day Adventist?
You didn’t answer my question as to what you would do if you happened to have been in a place like Sandy Hook Elementary School when a shooter entered the building. Or, what you would do if someone threatened the lives of your own family. Also, don’t tell me that Australia has no police force or that the police there don’t carry guns…
What does it take to be a true Seventh-day Adventist?
The Bible and Ellen White are very clear that Satan and his angels were forced to leave heaven just as Adam and Eve were forced to leave Eden after they fell to Satan’s charms. They are also very clear that the wicked will one day be excluded, by force, from the New Jerusalem and will, eventually, be completely destroyed from existence. I don’t think that’s how it worked with you and your family…
Recent Comments by Sean Pitman
After the Flood
Thank you Ariel. Hope you are doing well these days. Miss seeing you down at Loma Linda. Hope you had a Great Thanksgiving!
The Flood
Thank you Colin. Just trying to save lives any way I can. Not everything that the government does or leaders do is “evil” BTW…
The Flood
Only someone who knows the future can make such decisions without being a monster…
Pacific Union College Encouraging Homosexual Marriage?
Where did I “gloss over it”?
Review of “The Naked Emperor” by Pastor Conrad Vine
I fail to see where you have convincingly supported your claim that the GC leadership contributed to the harm of anyone’s personal religious liberties? – given that the GC leadership does not and could not override personal religious liberties in this country, nor substantively change the outcome of those who lost their jobs over various vaccine mandates. That’s just not how it works here in this country. Religious liberties are personally derived. Again, they simply are not based on a corporate or church position, but rely solely upon individual convictions – regardless of what the church may or may not say or do.
Yet, you say, “Who cares if it is written into law”? You should care. Everyone should care. It’s a very important law in this country. The idea that the organized church could have changed vaccine mandates simply isn’t true – particularly given the nature of certain types of jobs dealing with the most vulnerable in society (such as health care workers for example).
Beyond this, the GC Leadership did, in fact, write in support of personal religious convictions on this topic – and there are GC lawyers who have and continue to write personal letters in support of personal religious convictions (even if these personal convictions are at odds with the position of the church on a given topic). Just because the GC leadership also supports the advances of modern medicine doesn’t mean that the GC leadership cannot support individual convictions at the same time. Both are possible. This is not an inconsistency.
