| Author | Message | ||
| Sharon3
Registered user Username: Sharon3 Post Number: 123 Registered: 2-2010 |
Last week our youth pastor talked. He was using James text on how we are a mist in the scheme of things. He held up a l-o-n-g rope with a red jumprope handle on it. He refered to the handle as our mist like life here on earth. How it is over with in a short time. But then he looked out over the rope and said that represented eternity. I couldn't help but think that you could never use that example in an Adventist church. Their handle would be cut off from the rope and you couldn't find the rope for a long way away. This is because they think you die and know nothing and you don't exist until the second coming. This whole mist text used to feel scary to me before I learned about my spirit. I'm so glad my rope is connected to the handle. Praise God | ||
| River
Registered user Username: River Post Number: 7015 Registered: 9-2006  |
Not only that, many adventist think you will be re-produced, so in effect, you won't ever live again accept as some kind of clone. This one guy I know thinks maybe God has some kind of hard drive and all this other super science stuff, so he actually records you, guess his God don't have much of a memory. I guess if Gods hard drive goes bad you are just out of luck, or you end up with one leg and half a jaw maybe? Or if a hard drive goes completely wacko, I guess you just end up in the great bit bucket in the sky. You probably are going to tell me I'm full of crap. I ain't though, this guy is a retired college teacher who actually writes article about this stuff. I mean honey, he ain't even got a handle, much less any rope.  River | ||
| Helovesme2
Registered user Username: Helovesme2 Post Number: 2699 Registered: 8-2004  |
I've heard that idea elsewhere in Adventism too - that God keeps us somewhere in his memory, to be recreated at the resurrection. | ||
| Honestwitness
Registered user Username: Honestwitness Post Number: 1080 Registered: 7-2005  |
My SDA husband has actually stated to me that he believes that teaching, that God keeps us in his memory to be recreated at His resurrection. | ||
| Colleentinker
Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 12127 Registered: 12-2003  |
This believe, that we are retained in God's memory to be recreated, is Adventist teaching. Their book stating and explaining the 28 Fundamental Beliefs (Seventh-day Adventists Believe) actually says the dead are resurrected out of the divine memory. It also says the "life force" (breath) is like electricity; when it's there, the person is alive; when it ceases, the person is not and goes to the ground while God remembers the details. Colleen | ||
| Jeremy
Registered user Username: Jeremy Post Number: 3525 Registered: 10-2004  |
And the official Adult Sabbath School Bible Study Guide (2nd Quarter 2009) actually used the word "re-create" with the word "resurrection" even placed in quotation marks!!!:
Jeremy (Message edited by Jeremy on January 01, 2011) | ||
| Jim02
Registered user Username: Jim02 Post Number: 1055 Registered: 5-2007 |
I think the supposed mechanics of recreation of a soul is trying to work up a concept as to how to make the doctrine (SDA teaching) a practical matter. More of an after thought to tie up a loose end. I have softened my own position on soul sleep over these past few years, though I am still not really sure about our state of existance between our mortal departure and the general ressurection. We were always taught that the story of the rich man a Lazarus was a parable. Yet there are points about it that seem to indicate there was a truth involved literally. I have read about paradise as the intermediate place of righteous souls before the cross. There is a belief that Jesus went to Paradise and rescued those souls. Then there are other passages about souls crying out in Heaven. When people get dementia, brain injury etc,... Do their minds instantly become cured at death? Do their souls remain active but incorporeal? Do they have "anything" to do with us, under the sun? Do not have a familiar spirit. That means something. A warning. So I try to embrace the fragments from both sides of this. We will be getting a new perfect body. I prefer to call it new creation. Rather than re-creation. To me , it does make more sense that the soul must continue uninterupted even after death. The soul belongs to God who created it, and in that sense , the essence is continuous. What I do not know is the state of that existance, it's interaction in heaven, or whether it is a form of limbo. Possibly a suspended type of sleep, yet a continous soul existance. John 5:28 “Do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice" I know this sounds like a blending of SDA and Orthodox. I guess I am simply trying to encompass all the passages together, and not to entirely dismiss any part of scripture. I am still learning........ Jim02 | ||
| Honestwitness
Registered user Username: Honestwitness Post Number: 1081 Registered: 7-2005 |
"...a temporary sleep from which he or she will be raised and given eternal life." So, we're not given eternal life until after God re-creates us. Aren't there verses in the Bible that indicate we receive eternal life the moment we're born again? I guess Adventists would consider existence solely in God's memory as being equal to eternal life. I'm not saying I agree with Adventism on this, but if God should choose to reduce all the components of my existence to a mere memory in His Mind, then I would trust him enough that I would be satisfied with that for as long as He would choose to keep me in that state. So my question is this: Does this belief, in itself, diminish Christ in any way? I totally believe there are serious errors in Adventist doctrine that diminish Christ. But this one item - existing solely in God's memory and being re-created at a later time - I can't see that as diminishing Christ. I'm open to correction. What do you think? | ||
| Jeremy
Registered user Username: Jeremy Post Number: 3526 Registered: 10-2004 |
Honestwitness, If there is no actual continuous existence, then when we are "re-created," it would not be us. It would be clones of us who have the same personalities as us and are made to believe they are us--but it wouldn't be us. It would be entirely new creatures (clones). If I have ceased to exist, I have ceased to exist. A re-creation would not be me. There is no such thing as a "temporary annihilation" as Adventism tries to teach. It is thus a denial of resurrection. As far as whether the doctrine diminishes Christ, could you clarify what you meant by that? Jeremy P.S. Yes, there are verses that say we have eternal life now (1 John 5:13 being one example). (Message edited by Jeremy on January 02, 2011) | ||
| Skeeter
Registered user Username: Skeeter Post Number: 1192 Registered: 12-2007 |
Some of this is still confusing to me also. While I do now believe that we continue to consciously exist beyond the death of our earthly bodies.... I am not sure just where that existence will take place between that time and Christs return. I would like to believe that we go straight into His presence in "Heaven" (absent from the body, at home with the Lord) and I know some teach that the souls of those who died before the ressurrection went to a place called "Paradise" as kind of an in between place of safety and comfort, but not Heaven, and that after the ressurection we go straight to Heaven and bypass "Paradise" BUT... what about AFTER the Ressurection and Christ told the woman not to touch Him because He had not yet ascended to His Father ? Then I thought that the part about "Paradise" and the great gulf between there and those in torment was probably just a parable... BUT I dont remember the Bible in any other instance using a "parable" about anything where it wasnt specifically told that it WAS a parable and dont remember any where real people were actually named in a "Parable". IF there is a temporary place of waiting until Christ returns to earth that would be fine with me... but if not... where in the Bible is it told that we do NOT go to "Paradise" since Christ's ressurrection , but go straight to Heaven since that time ? Which ever way it will God has it planned I am confident it is be the best way,, but still curious. | ||
| Hec
Registered user Username: Hec Post Number: 1562 Registered: 3-2009 |
I know that the SDAs do not teach "soul sleep". For them, when a person dies, the "spirit" (breath) and the body separate and disintegrate. There is no more soul because soul is "body + breath." At resurrection, God will re-create the body and place the memories that are in God's memory in the psychic or the new person. Like Jeremy says, that would not be me. That would be someone else with my memory. Most people here would say that at death, the body and the spirit separate. The body goes to sleep in the grave and the spirit goes to continue an active live in heaven/paradise/where Jesus is. Could it be that at death, the body and the spirit separate and the body goes to sleep in the grave and the spirit goes to sleep in heaven/paradise/where Jesus is? Sleep is not the same as annihilation. In annihilation the spirit ceases to exist. In sleep the spirit is not active, as when we are asleep, but it is still alive and existent. Then at resurrection God will awake the body and the spirit and joint them again for the "new" person. ???? Hec | ||
| Asurprise
Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 1615 Registered: 7-2007 |
If the spirit "slept" then the apostle Paul wouldn't have been wishing SO bad that he could "depart and be with Christ which is far better." (Philippians 1:23) He went on to say that it was more needful for him to remain with the saints he was writing to - for THEIR good. (Philippians 1:25) Each of us is a soul and spirit that lives in a body, so when we die, our bodies rot in the ground - yuk!!! - but we ourselves go to Heaven to be with Jesus!!! | ||
| Honestwitness
Registered user Username: Honestwitness Post Number: 1082 Registered: 7-2005 |
By diminishing Christ, I mean something that makes Him less than fully God and fully man - the Creator, Redeemer, the Holy One, the Pre-Eminent One, the all-powerful One, the Lamb of God, the Perfect Sacrifice, etc. For example, a Christ who had to wait until 1844 to enter the Most Holy Place is a diminished Christ, because he wasn't "allowed" to be in the Most Holy Place for 1844 years. However, a Christ who causes a human to cease to exist and then re-created that person doesn't appear to me to be a diminished Christ. There is only One Pre-Eminent Being who could accomplish that. Besides, even if the re-created person is not the original me, it is the only me that exists, even if it is a clone. It's as good as it gets, because it's the only me and a better me, at that. Hence, I don't see this doctrine as diminishing Christ. | ||
| Jeremy
Registered user Username: Jeremy Post Number: 3527 Registered: 10-2004 |
Honestwitness, Well, the SDA teaching of no spirits/souls does impact the divinity and humanity of Christ in many ways. But just sticking with the specific teaching of cessation/re-creation, Adventism teaches that Jesus Christ ceased to exist on the Cross, and that He was "re-created" three days later by the Father. Not only does this destroy the incarnation and the eternal unity of His divinity and humanity, but it means that the Jesus who died on the Cross is not the "Jesus" who ascended to heaven that they worship today. He is an entirely new man, one who did not even exist before Resurrection Sunday (or more accurately, "Re-creation Sunday"!). But not only does it affect His humanity, but also, because of their state of the dead arguments and fear of consciousness in death, Adventism teaches that Christ's divinity was unconscious during death (and they even teach He had no divine consciousness in life!), thus destroying the doctrine of the Trinity and the deity of Christ. This makes Christ into a created being, who has only existed for nineteen-hundred and some years. Since He ceased to exist on the Cross, the "re-created" Christ is an entirely new being, a god created by the Father on that Sunday morning. Also, if Jesus did not exist for three days, that means that some other god was running the universe for those three days, thus introducing polytheism--one god ("the Father") who was running the universe and another god ("Christ") who ceased to exist on the Cross and was dead in the tomb, who would be "re-created" by "the Father" after three days. According to the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, if the Son were to cease to exist, then God would cease to exist because the Son is the one true God. You can't have a Father and Holy Spirit without the Son. But that is exactly what Adventism has happening for three days! Thus, when we look at how the doctrine affects their teachings about Jesus who came and died as a man, we see that that is where it turns into Christ-diminishing heresy. Jeremy (Message edited by Jeremy on January 02, 2011) | ||
| Colleentinker
Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 12133 Registered: 12-2003 |
Excellent post, Jeremy. HonestWitness, as Hec said above, Adventism does not really teach "soul sleep". That's a euphemism for "no soul". They believe that Jesus was exactly as we are. In Adventist thinking, Jesus the man ceased to exist at death. Additionally, human nature and salvation are skewed in the Adventist paradigm. Without a spirit, there's no new birth. Instead, being born again is a mental, cognitive recognition of SDA truth...the reality of receiving eternal life as a result of the Holy Spirit making our spirits alive is completely unseen. Adventist "soul sleep" is very, very dark. It skews the nature of reality. Colleen | ||
| Honestwitness
Registered user Username: Honestwitness Post Number: 1083 Registered: 7-2005 |
Oh, my! Thanks for explaining this, all of you. It's amazing to me that I was an active participant in Adventism for 16 years, and I never realized the full extent of what their doctrine really is. I never realized they taught that Jesus ceased to exist for 3 days. Whooiee! That's really, really bad! This needs to be posted in the discussion section for all the world to see. | ||
| Flyinglady
Registered user Username: Flyinglady Post Number: 8880 Registered: 3-2004  |
Jeremy, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR EXPLAINING WHAT I USED TO BELIEVE!!!!!! I did not realize it was so blasphemous. Jesus ceased to exist for 3 days!!! Then was recreated!!!! That is not the Jesus Christ I know now. Thank You awesome God for our spirits that can be born in you and we can be reborn. Thank you so much. Diana L | ||
| Heretic
Registered user Username: Heretic Post Number: 299 Registered: 2-2005 |
I believe this. But if I believed that all that comprises us is simply a mass of cells, an organic unit that decays away into nothingness then I guess I wouldn't and that wouldn't glorify Christ very much, either. | ||
| Colleentinker
Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 12134 Registered: 12-2003 |
Does anyone who has posted on this thread object if Richard moves it to the open section? If you could all post a response, we'll move it if the vote is unanimous. If there's anyone who objects, we'll leave it here. Colleen | ||
| Jeremy
Registered user Username: Jeremy Post Number: 3528 Registered: 10-2004 |
Moving it is fine with me. Jeremy (Message edited by Jeremy on January 02, 2011) |
