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Message |
Melissa
Registered user
Username: Melissa
Post Number: 1243
Registered: 7-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 10:43 am: |     |
There is also a book about this topic of WWCG called "Out of the Shadows". I can't remember the author's name right now, but I heard him on Bible answer man one time. That was the first I realized how truly hard it would be for adventism to really change. I wondered how they compared in terms of numbers to adventism at their peak. B has always said adventisms quick growth proves God is working in them. I asked if he said the same of islam or mormonism, but he doesn't respond to those statements unless he's making a derogatory remark about my supposed sarcasm.
I enjoyed watching the movie. I'm equally impressed they put it on webcast. |
Melissa
Registered user
Username: Melissa
Post Number: 1244
Registered: 7-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 10:46 am: | |
Colleen mentioned the millerite movement....what is the truth about how big that was? I've heard it was world-wide (from B of course), but non-SDA sources seem to limit it primarily to the northeast. Does anyone "know" for sure? |
Lynne
Registered user
Username: Lynne
Post Number: 192
Registered: 10-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 12:31 pm: | |
Seventh-day Adventists I think have deeper roots in history than the WCG did.
The Adventist church is based more on deception now than WCG was.
The WCG had a vocal leader in front of the media and was openly against other churches.
The SDA church is against other churches in secret.
Like WCG that had a charasmatic leader, Ellen White was the charasmatic leader of the SDA church, but she died a long time ago. Much of her bad language doesn't reach church members or the media.
I think it would be difficult and nearly impossible to see the same result in the adventist church with how deeply they deceive people.
Much of the lie and deception is known by leadership. The only way the SDA church could be changed would be through the people, but like I said, the members are very deeply deceived. Adventism roots are as deep in the member as they are in history.
But as we saw in that video, with God, all things are possible.
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Flyinglady
Registered user
Username: Flyinglady
Post Number: 2181
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 1:05 pm: | |
Remember, if an SDA gives up the Sabbath, they give up salvation. If they do not eat as told by the Red Books, they give up salvation. There are too many things in the SDA doctrine that are salvation issues and people do not want to lose salvation. Yes, they are deceived and do not see it or do not want to see it. Only God can get through those barriers.
Diana |
Dd
Registered user
Username: Dd
Post Number: 612
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 4:29 pm: | |
Thank you, thank you, Goldenbear! Greg and I viewed the DVD this afternoon. WOW! I will share it with our mutual friend, Schasc (you'll see me soon, Schasc!). We want to have several copies. We want to share it with close family and friends and say, "Watch this to better understand why we have made hard choices that seperate us from those we love."
Questions:
What was the relationship between the WWCG and SDA church during Herbert Armstrong's day?
How could two different Sabbath keeping, law abiding denominations (both who claimed to be God's true church) keep themselves seperate? I don't ever remember even hearing about this "Sabbath" church growing up.
Did dear Herbert research EGW and use some of her ideas?
Were there words between the two organizations denouncing the others doctrines that differed?
Also...the Bible Answer man (Hank ???) is on this DVD...if he has never admitted Adventism as being cultish, how is it he can call the "old" WWCG a cult?
Just wondering about history...
Denise |
Colleentinker
Registered user
Username: Colleentinker
Post Number: 3189
Registered: 12-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 5:25 pm: | |
Good questions, Dd. I did hear of Armstrong growing up. In fact, I remember hearing him on the radio (I believe my folks listened to him now and then). As far as I understand things, the Adventists considered the WCG to be a false church and of no relationship to them. I think (although I cannnot prove) that Herbert W's wife, who first heard about the Sabbath and convinced him it was for Christians, heard about it from Adventists. Herbert ran with it from there.
My mother has a cousin (who actually spent many of her growing-up years in my mom's family--and they were Adventists) who, with her husband and six children, became WCG under Armstrong. For quite some time we actually received copies of the church's Plain Truth magazine--whether from the cousin or from elsewhere, I'm not sure. I was pre-teen at the time.
Yes, the WCG included Adventism in their "whore of Babylon" definition of "Christian churches falsely so-called". When I interviewed Joe Tkach for Adventist Today in the mid-90's, he told me that he and Albrecht and Feazel went to Silver Spring and apologized to the General Conference for having so designated them. They also went to the headquarters of the Seventh-day Baptist Church and apologized to them as well.
As for Hank Hanegraaf (sp?), the mystery remains. Late in the 90's he actually had Mark Martin on his show and announced that he would be having a five-day series on Adventism early in 1999 (I believe it was). The series never materialized, and subsequent inquiries to him from former Adventists (including Richard who emailed him) had a completely different tone. He backed right down from his exposing them as he had been doing and began calling them a "heterodox" Christian church who should be included in the brotherhood of evangelical churches. He referred to his organization's interveiws with hundreds of Adventist leaders and educators as his validating "proof" that they were OK.
We have wondered if in some way Hank was hushed--money, who know? We have no idea and can simply not say what happened. We just know that, in spite of being personally given many publications, both current Adventist ones and material from Dale Ratzlaff and Mark Martin, Hank suddenly and without explanation changed his tune.
Colleen |
Goldenbear
Registered user
Username: Goldenbear
Post Number: 134
Registered: 12-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 6:01 pm: | |
Just a side note. We did a little study on the origins of the WWCG. Their basic founder was a man name Gilbert Cranmer. Cranmer was a young preacher that started working in Michigan. From what I read, it was during the hey day of the EGW Closed Door belief. Cranmer was challenged by some of the believers as to whether he believed it or not. He said he didnt. Another man did and when Cranmer challenged him as to where he got his source, he quoted the visions and testimony of Ellen. Cranmer then said essentially that he didn't accept that as proof.
Not long after that when Cranmer asked for preaching credentials from the Whites, it was denied. (Shock)He then left the church and started his own. I found out that he labored over 40 years and died with almost nothing to his name. The whites on the other hand...
He called his new church the Church of God. So WWCG began as a splinter of the millerite movement in direct defiance of the Whites. |
Gmatt
Registered user
Username: Gmatt
Post Number: 20
Registered: 3-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 8:10 pm: | |
I watched Amazing Facts last weekend and heard Doug B. state that he had recently listened to a radio program featuring a man who answers Bible questions on the air. Doug B. said that he didn't want to use the man's name, but from the way he worded it, anyone listening would assume he was speaking of Hank Hanegraaff. Anyway, according to Doug, someone called in and asked about whether or not SDA's were a cult and "Hank" insinuated that they were because Adventists believe that 'Sunday-keeping' churches have the mark of the beast. At that point, Doug said to his congregation, "Do we believe that Sunday-keeping Christians have the mark of the beast"? And the congregation replied in unison, "Noooooooo".
From what I have read on this forum, it is unlikely that Hanegraaff would have made such a statement, so I don't know what to think of what I heard. Anyone else out there who heard this Amazing Facts sermon? Don't know the title of the sermon but he was speaking about anger. Just curious. |
Colleentinker
Registered user
Username: Colleentinker
Post Number: 3194
Registered: 12-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 10:25 pm: | |
How interesting, Gmatt. No, I didn't hear either Batchelor or Hank on this subject. It is possible that Hank mentioned something about some Adventists believing Sunday-keeping is the mark of the beast. If I remember rightly, he does hold that there are different "brands" of Adventism. He sees the modern, evangelical Adventists as different from the historic ones, and he doesn't believe, as I understand it, that the main church leaders teach that old historic version anymore.
I suspect that Batchelor probably took Hank out of context, and I suspect that Hank probably (although I'm totally speculating here) did not think he was indicting the whole Adventist church.
As for the question and congregational answer that they don't believe "Sunday-keeping" Christians have the mark the of beast, what a deception. Now, if he had asked if they believe "Sunday-keepers" will eventually receive the mark of the beast, that congregation would likely have said "Yeeees!"
Sigh.
Colleen |
Melissa
Registered user
Username: Melissa
Post Number: 1247
Registered: 7-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 9:32 am: | |
To Dd's question, I had heard that Armstrong had studied EGWs books. If you noticed in the video, it mentions he studied some other materials, and I wondered if they were referring to adventist stuff. I think I heard that from the book I referred to (Out of the Shadows), but it may have been elsewhere....you know, after a while, things just get jumbled up in my head....  |
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