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 The Church Is Us by Guy Sciortino I came out of my cozy closet recently. No. I’m not gay. Nor am I hiding any unusual skeletons (unless you’re really interested in counting the private sins in my life that are known to no one but God). The closet I emerged from is simply a wall of protection that I’ve built around my faith over the years. Part of my defense is due to a busy work schedule that keeps me from exploring provocative material and, consequently, I like to think I have a limited exposure to detrimental influences. My spiritual environment is strong since I’m somewhat a respected Elder in a small church with a fairly established congregation, which, like many churches has survived periods without a pastor. It seems my Adventist beliefs have remained fortified week after week because the most significant challenges to them have been the doctrinally thematic questions that our Sabbath school generates. As for the work place, scientific affronts to my Creationist position have been the only other threats to my security, but I typically provide adequate responses that satisfy the doubting public in my little sphere that I’m not simply a faith-oriented fundamentalist.
Do I sound irritatingly familiar? Well, it’s true. Like so many other Christians, I feel in control and satisfied that I’ve found most of the solutions to my life in Jesus Christ and His church. And my Adventist beliefs have been substantially etched in Biblical study and the writings of E.G. White. So why step out of the closet?
Part of it has to do with the fact that not long ago our small church was looking for a new pastor. A fellow Elder and myself interviewed a man who seemed genuinely interested in coming to our little sphere and pastoring both our group and our sister church (which has about 150 members). Because our congregation is small, and because most of our members have full-time day jobs, I asked this minister if he would have a problem meeting occasionally with a plumber or electrician if the need arose. (You might think this a very unusual question to ask a prospective pastor, but over the years I’ve dealt with one or two ministers who apparently find it difficult to leave their computers or gardens unattended during the day. These particular gentlemen were often reluctant to lend any time to what they consider ‘the physical plant’ or anything unrelated to e-mail. This is an obvious job for deacons.) Imagine my dismay and sadness when this noted interview revealed a similar attitude. The pastor’s remark was “Yes. I do have a problem with that. I didn’t become a pastor to shovel your snow or turn on the heat for your guests.” Hmmm? It wasn’t really on my agenda, but there you have it.
I take a trip to Loma Linda almost every year. I typically visit my mom and brother in Riverside and it’s a quick trip over to the college campus (where I got my medical degree) to check out my old haunts. When I’m in the area I meet up with my classmate, Sam, and we have breakfast together. In the past, we’d stop in the college bookstore to pick up interesting literature. I hardly receive any Adventist publications anymore (except for the ATS journals and the Review). As a result, my closet has been hidden from so many of the controversies that have apparently invaded what I thought was our once and solid Adventist Church. Am I naïve? Surely, and maybe just too busy to have noticed. On the other hand, I’ve always warned myself that trouble is constantly brewing on the religious horizon. Perhaps I’ve decided to ignore the issues and just live out my cozy little life. But sooner or later, I knew this would come knocking at my closet door. That is, I suppose, why I have sprung out and decided it is time to take the offensive and actually write something.
In fact, had I not been so self-absorbed, I might have answered the knocking a little sooner (and this may be, in fact, Jesus knocking at the proverbial door for me). Decidedly, in addition to the aforementioned pastor’s remark, what originally pushed me to create this article was a call from the mother of an Adventist woman with whom I work. The mother is married to an elder of another local church. She was very concerned because their pastor, like many pastors that year, had introduced a plan to replace Sabbath school with the study of the ‘Purpose’ book by Rick Warren. You know: the Baptist minister who pastors the 14,000-member Saddleback Church in Orange County, California. Warren obviously has some tactics in attracting church members that others seem to think need examination. After all, it’s about evangelizing and bringing the masses to the Lord. Isn’t it?
I couldn’t tell you what the pastor of this other church is thinking. I could possibly suggest what his answer would be for introducing the idea, but I am a man of high suspicions. There would always be an inner voice whispering, “Guy, it’s about money, not souls.” And I come away feeling terribly guilty for the thoughts, but I can’t help but wonder who’d initiated the action; the pastor, or certain administrators who want more numbers? More numbers obviously mean more money for our economy-strapped church. And there has been no lack of literature passed out on the subject of tithing. Does it add up to a somewhat tainted motive? Lest I write too much and risk getting ugly feedback about this article, I will not throw many stones nor get up on the watchtower to blow a trumpet. But this is the problem when a traditional Adventist, like me, comes out of the closet; one starts sounding paranoid.
Well, the phonecall about the Warren book did not take me completely by surprise. If you look at the Amazon.com sites, it’s is still very popular, and one wonders who is pushing the book so strongly. A personal perusal of the book did lead me to appreciate its religious practicality. However, I’m very disappointed. Am I the only who thinks that EGW’s writings are a lot more God-centered than Rick Warren’s purposes? What has she lacked in helping us truly develop our churches and ourselves? Why do we invite such liberal concepts into our Sabbath Schools when we already have the best spiritual library available for helping us win souls? And what could be more important than Bible study on Sabbath morning?
But it’s really more than just the book that has grabbed my attention. As I was saying, in the past I picked up some literature from the LLU Adventist magazine rack (I understand now defunct) and scanned the articles from some of the pages. These are not recent articles, so I can only imagine what is probably new, but From Adventist Today I noticed on a back page some fellow promoting a similar exchange in Sabbath School time as the Rick-Warren-endorsing pastor had introduced: i.e. replacing Bible study with ‘relevant’ literature. And some of his suggestions did cause me concern. For instance, are there really ‘myths’ and ‘legends’ in the Bible that warrant discussion? Have I been mislead about the Bible’s truth? Or perhaps I’m a total simpleton despite my undergraduate degrees in pre-med and education, my postgraduate work, and my private studies in theology and earth sciences. Maybe I should be branded as not intellectually curious because I think that trying to critically analyze the historical and social settings of the Bible seem only to lead people to discard the scriptures rather than increase their belief in the veracity of the Word.
Perhaps my attitude is just too judgmental, because I also reacted to another leading article in which someone stated, “Does God intend for me to be . . . so free that I can surprise God, that I can do something, create some thing, some idea, that God has neither thought of nor done?” Maybe I’m an uptight Christian, but is this guy getting a bit too romantic about being human? Perhaps I’m overcautious, but shouldn’t there be some limits in our lives to keep us from the old wish to be like God, or the original couple whom were seduced into believing that God has hidden some secret thing from us? Now why write an article like this instead of promoting deeper study of the scriptures? What’s this push to dissolve God’s Word in the solution of rationalism and relativism? You know our founders laid line upon line, precept upon precept with prayer and devotion. Now that’s worthy of an article, something you would find in the original Review and Herald papers, for instance.
Oh, and lest I forget, there was the Spectrum’s discussion of sports and Sabbath? I suspect this is probably a done deal, but I didn’t know we’d settled the issue of whether competitive sports even belonged in our church. I guess I’m really showing my age now. Not that I’ve never enjoyed a sporting event, but on Sabbath? While we’re discussing this particular old issue of “Adventist Forums” I unashamedly admit that I also reject the belief that Spinoza’s writings about miracles (or modern science’s explanations about ancient Hebrew concepts) exhibit valid truths by which we now evaluate our beliefs. Is it simply because they appeal to our educated minds, or have I missed something?
Of course I can’t ignore the fact that major Universities are influencing our own academia to accept that Creationist perspectives are either not allowed or at least highly suspect and there is educational insistence upon evolutionist sciences as the only serious theory to be published or preached. Rationalism has indeed pressed our sphere and it’s obviously governing the direction of our own publications under the guise of ‘intellectual investigation’. Semantics, I guess. Like hiding our true beliefs about Creation behind the ‘intelligent design’ logo. Are we that embarrassed by our God and His Word?
I was further surprised to find that even the Adventist Theological Society, perhaps needing to be appropriate, contemporary, and erudite, explores in a bygone issue the semantics of death in the scriptures and possibly in Heaven, offering more questions than answers on the Biblical descriptions of origins and sidestepping Jesus’ final act as described in 1Cor 15: 26. All these things are not shocking, considering that the world succeeds everyday in influencing our lives. There is likely not a home in American Adventism that is not overwhelmed by the images of TV, the onslaught of neighbors who follow the gods that control what facts are considered intelligent or relevant, and what magazines bombard us with advertisements finely tuned to elicit nothing but covetousness on a mass scale. Is it any wonder that we avoid revival?
To paraphrase Elijah in the first chapter of 2 Kings. Is there no God in Adventism that we seek counsel from the academia of Babylon? Why are we going outside our beliefs to get suggestions for questions to which God has already provided answers? Someone help me understand. At this point I’m sure that ‘intellectuals’ in the church have had just about enough of my rantings and ravings; labeling me as legalistic or infantile. I’m sure some administrators would like to silence me for upsetting the applecart. I’m sure there are pastors who would call me uncredentialed, rebellious, and probably paint me as a troublemaker. I’m sure mainstream Adventist writers would accuse me of being outside their system. But I’m determined to have my voice heard. If we can entertain evolutionists, celebrities, sports figures, and controversial theologians, can’t I be allowed my fifteen minutes?
Many Adventists, like me, would say that a major part of the liberalism in our church has come from lack of both personal Bible study and a constant prayer life. In fact, I would say that we’ve gotten to the point where we’ve taken our doctrines for granted; so much so that many of us don’t appreciate how much time in study early Adventists spent before they came to the conclusions that they did. The sanctuary doctrine and 1844 being of paramount importance.
There is also the we-want-to-be-relevant-and-accepted-in-Christianity mentality. With the obvious push toward ecumenism and political correctness around us, we don’t want other Christians to think that we condemn their faith solely on Sabbath or other ‘nonessential-to-salvation’ issues. Particularly when their justification-by-faith-alone perspectives seem to be more attractive than the dietary habits some of our own brethren obsess about in our congregations. And, of course, there are the ever-plaguing questions about what’s going on in the real sanctuary and what can anyone say about a nineteenth century prophetess?
A few years ago, an Elder in my church once said, “I don’t need to study what the Bible teaches. The church has already outlined it for us.” Was I a bit taken back by this statement? You bet! And I hope you are, too! But apparently educated leaders have made sadder statements. Not long after this elder’s gaff, I was shown a tape of a well-known Adventist evangelist trying to put out a fire caused by an independent ministry in Florida. No doubt, the conference had asked this leading preacher to explain to a wondering TV audience how a billboard enhanced with the Pope’s face got to be associated with the anti-Christ, the US constitution, and the Adventist Church. Ironically, hadn’t this very minister taught a similar venue in his own Daniel-Revelation seminars? It would have seemed not, as the pastor balked and evaded the very core of why we as a church exist, missing an ideal opportunity to proclaim our unique message and passing us off as simply another Christian church that happens to worship on Saturday instead of Sunday. In his defense, I wonder what any of us might have said with public pressure being exerted from both sides of the issue?
Well, it seems it’s not just one or two individuals under pressure, there is caution everywhere. In our institutions of learning there are particularly unique attempts at intellectual stimulation. At Loma Linda, for example, I had a religion course taught by a curious gentleman who proclaimed himself an expert in theological issues, having studied under the county’s best teachers. In order to resolve the dinosaur debate, this professor claimed that Satan had created those creatures prior to the Genesis account. All this escaped the eyes of our theologians, likely because they were too busy burning Des Ford at the stake that year over more realistic Bible studies concerning the Sanctuary. The one fortunate outcome of that roast was the establishment of academic committees to substantiate with great investigation what early Adventists had already discovered under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Thank God our professors had come to the same conclusions! It seems the Holy Spirit is not threatened by all academics.
Despite the push for a better understanding of our doctrines, however, traditional Adventism (whatever that may be) seems to be fading into the distance along with some of E.G. White’s paragraphs that have been assigned to the ‘trash heap’. It worries me that a wonderful spirit-filled writer’s admonitions appear to be nothing more than an historical aberration to some circles in the church. And it worries me that in other circles we are indistinguishable from the world. What’s going on? I almost feel like going back into the closet and locking the door. This is not the church into which I was baptized some thirty-three years ago. Or is it? Doubt has always existed somewhere in our congregations. And for others, bible discussion has always bordered on discrediting verses that they find uncomfortable or difficult to understand or defend. This is nothing new. The church has always had to defend itself.
For me, though, the church didn’t truly expose its emergency plan until the independent ministers launched their attacks in the nineties. Unfortunately or not, their attacks were about the things no one wanted to talk about. The filth swept under the rug, the worldliness creeping in, the liberal attitudes toward doctrine. Those were tremendously emotional times that revealed a partisan church. It was probably a time in which the hinges were coming off my closet door. The day I heard that Bob Trevz was disfellowshipped, I cried. But when the Conference found itself in a corner and placed a copyright on the SDA name, I wailed. It was like the Adventist version of Don Maclean’s song “The Day the Music Died.” Would hope ever return for our precious church, I wondered? I must say I was somewhat optimistic when John Osborne came back to the church, repenting of his bitterness. But the real bitterness was that it occurred only after we’d hung out everyone’s dirty laundry in our bookstores. What victories had the church scored in any of this? Can it simply be chalked up to growth, or do we need to seriously look at where we are going when as an institution we adopt the legal climate of the world? And perhaps we as a church have taken a serious look.
Sometimes, though, I feel we continue to sweep everything under the rug in the comfort of the Bible message that we are all sinners. That we are all in need of Jesus. That no one should judge another. At some point, however, doesn’t political correctness and all this sinful equality business make us impotent as a people? Have Biblical standards been denigrated now as the habitat of legalists and the weak? Are we converting souls only to Adventism; under the imprimatur of a church overly secure in its own sense of manifest destiny? And how about this ‘hot potato’: have we endorsed and adopted a ‘good-old-boy’ network that protects ‘ordained’ ministers, providing secure jobs and pensions for those in the system whether they affirm Adventism or not? Are we capitalizing sacred tithe money for redundant administration; money that should be going to ministers who are actually preaching and teaching the gospel full-time (and perhaps helping to physically maintenance their local church building, which duty the Levites were not ashamed to perform)?
I truly hate to ask this one, but I’m on a roll and I can’t help myself: Have we encouraged idolatry of a placard that reads, “The church is the only object upon earth upon which Christ bestows His supreme regard?” Do we accept that, as unquestioning sheep, to our demise fostering the worldly direction in which we are heading because we have to accept that tares exist? Someone once said (okay, it was me), at some point the tares become the obvious destruction of one’s garden and even the uneducated farmer recognizes that there is an appropriate time to deal with them.
So I’ve had my fifteen minutes and these are the questions that many people and I have asked over the years. These are questions that come out of my anxiety closet as I look at our church. Perhaps it’s not my place to say anything. Perhaps it’s a matter for the local conferences. Perhaps as a Head Elder, I should retreat and easily believe that God will take care of His church. Or that one should not be critical. Or that we should take care of our own relationship with Jesus first before pointing the speck in another’s eye. Or the more encouraging thought that everywhere there are still Spirit-filled men and women leading our institutions. We can also be reassured knowing that there are thousands in our church who are in tune with God. And that we are all God’s children by grace. However, does this evade the real question, “What does God want from His people?” I can’t help but reiterate that Sister White has outlined what God revealed to her fairly clear for us, hasn’t she?
Though I accept all this, and understand all this, I am left with an underlying uneasiness that someone has left the backdoor open and an enemy is in the house. In all of our houses. That someone is asleep at the wheel. That I’ve easily been in my closet so long that I hadn’t noticed what’s going on around me. Perhaps I’m just another Christian Don Quixote looking to attack spiritual windmills in order to impress the idol of my own worship. I hope not. But I worry about God’s church; about my own little congregation. And mostly about myself. I wonder, am I ready to meet Jesus?
Jesus talked about the ten virgins, sleeping, slumbering, tired, surrounded by the dark world, hopeful, long-awaiting their Master’s return. Is it His voice I hear? Is He the one knocking at my closet, awakening me, perhaps, from my own slumber? I’m no fool; like to Elijah, God whispers to me that there are thousands more besides. These faithful ones are God’s church. Not ministers, not administrators, not the payrolled, not the theologians, not the educators, but each dedicated member in whichever congregation they worship. Let’s come out of the closet; all of us. Time is short, God’s work needs to be finished, and His church is us. Home | About Us | Bible Study | Billerica Blog | Bible Commentary | Devotional | Online Giving | Ministries | Prayer | Media | Bookstore | News | Calendar | Contact Us | Sermons |
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