Where Adventist Monte Sahlin on 25 Years A Charismatic in Today Came From of Seventh-day Adventism Search of a Message ••II a yen 1 $5.00 novemberSPRING | december 2018 2006 • WWW.ATODAY.ORG adventist today volume 14 issue 6 Perspectives on 1844: Putting the Pieces Together Today / /' Adventist / T I S T N T E O D V A D Y A LOOKING BACK AT GLACIER VIEW: : 08 1844, A PERSONAL JOURNEY: : 18 25 1993 • YEARS • 2018 / /' • ANALYSIS • OPINION JULY - AUGUST 1994 Volume 2 Number 4 $3.75 NEWS • ANALYSIS • OPINION Volume 1 Number 1 RELIGION AND THE WACO CULT • Ex-Adventists at Mount Carmel • History and Fatal Theology of Branch Davidians Today INSIDEVOL. 26 NO. 2 Adventist Executive Editor Loren Seibold Copy Editor Debra J. Hicks Contributing Editors James Walters, John McLarty, Jeff Boyd, J. David Newman Art Director Chris Komisar Digital Media News Editor, Bjorn Karlman; Editorial Associates, Mark Gutman, Carmen Seibold; Weekly Email Edition Editor, Lindsey Painter; Monthly Edition Editor, Heather Gutman; Correspondents, Alethia Nkosi, Tyson Jacob Executive Director Monte Sahlin Chief Operating Officer features Paul Richardson 4 From the Archives DEPARTMENTS Chief Technology Strategist By Raymond Cottrell Warren Nelson 3 Editorial Membership Secretary 5 Ex-Adventists at Mt. Carmel: Apologetics and Apologies Jaimie Derting PR Problem or Learning By Loren Seibold FOUNDATION BOARD Nate Schilt (chair), Jim Walters, (vice chair) Monte Opportunity? Sahlin (secretary), Andrew Clark, Keith Colburn, Chris By the Editors in May 1993 22 Heritage Daley, Larry Downing, Elwin Dunn, Bill Garber, John A Charismatic in Search of a Message Hoehn, Bjorn Karlman, Mailen Kootsey, Alvin Masarira, Keisha McKenzie, Chuck Mitchell, Jim Nelson, Nathan 6 The Birth of Adventist Today By Aage Rendalen Nelson, Warren Nelson, Lindsey Painter, Gene Platt, By Jim Walters E. Gary Raines, Paul Richardson, Sasha Ross, Timothy Ruybalid, Ed Sammons, Dan Savino, Carmen & Loren 26 Heritage Seibold, J. Gordon Short, James Stirling, Ervin Taylor, 6 Adventist Today Highlights Ellen White’s Ingratiating David Van Putten, John Vogt By Jim Walters Amalgamation Statements SENIOR LIFETIME ADVISORS ($25,000+) 7 Where Are We After a By T. Joe Willey Tim & Lois Blackwelder, Patricia & Douglas Ewing, Quarter-Century? Kathi & Richard Guth, John Hoehn, Judy & John 32 Story Jacobson, Al Koppel, Joan Ogden, Thaine Price, Judy By Monte Sahlin & Gordon Rick, Mike Scofield, Lovina & J. Gordon Church People Short, Marilynn & Ervin Taylor, Nancy & John Vogt, Priscilla & James Walters 12 A Profile ofAdventist Today’s By John McLarty LIFETIME ADVISORS ($10,000+) First Editor, Raymond F. Cottrell Jane Bainum, Susan & Hernan Barros, Diana & Ken 34 Adventist Today Bauer, Kelli & Robert Black, Ginny & Todd Burley, By Richard W. Coffen Tierrasanta Church, Pat & Ron Cople, Kathryn & Fascinating Facts! James Dexter, Rosemary & Merlyn Duerksen, Dan 14 An Interview with Adventist Engeberg, Sandra & Sam Geli, Patricia Hare, Jackie & Victorian illustrations captioned Jim Henneberg, Mariellyn & Edwin Hill, Carmen & Clive Today Columnist Alden by Maylan Schurch Holland, Erika & Brian Johnson, Carmen & Yung Lau, David T. Person II, Patricia Phillips, R. 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Ruth & Beryl Rivers, Gretchen & Monte Sahlin, Beverly & David Sandquist, Carolyn & Robert Tandy, Gary & Diane Russell, Jackie & Hal Williams 2 ADVENTIST TODAY T I S T N T E O D V A D Y EDITORIAL A 25 1993 • YEARS • 2018 Apologetics and Apologies By Loren Seibold If you have followed the online versions of Adventist quite-different purposes of organized religion. Today and its cousin publication, Spectrum, you Because Seventh-day Adventists have officially have likely noticed comments such as these: “I can’t had nothing but a century of apologetics, writing believe you people are really Seventh-day Adventists.” that questions old positions seems dangerous, Or “What kind of Adventists would raise questions destabilizing. It frightens people—and I understand like this?” Or “How dare you criticize the church that. One of the faults of the alternative Adventist [doctrine, leader, policy, or decision]?” press is that we haven’t always been as sensitive as we There are many variations, but the essence is should be. that good Seventh-day Adventists applaud only the So here’s an honest and heartfelt apology. You traditional version of our shared faith, and every part might find something in our magazines and websites of the organization that professes it; that even the (I have surely been guilty) that takes on a bitter most thoughtful critique, or the most undeniable but tone. I can make the excuse that this is because a unwelcome fact, should never be voiced, much less generation of us felt deceived, ill-used. We grew written. That we should engage in nothing but the most up on certainties that turned out to be not at all banal and harmless apologetics characterizes modern certain, on threats and fears that made the blessed Seventh-day Adventism across most of its range. hope into a carnival freak show of beasts and popes One of the and persecution, that made salvation in Christ into faults of the Beyond Apologetics a discouraging perfectionism, that exalted Ellen The use of this word root is different from its use when White above Jesus and the church bureaucracy over alternative congregations and communities. telling someone you’re sorry. Apology is admitting you Adventist were wrong, while apologetics is insisting you were Too often, in our disappointment with and anger right all along, even if on fairly thin evidence. Religious at the church, we did our therapy in print. We might press is that groups are more enthusiastic for the latter than the first, have tried harder to shape our faith in solid, defensible, though both should be a part of our repertoire. meaningful ways, taking advantage of our shared we haven’t Of course, all of us rely upon apologetic culture and history to build a stronger faith community. always been as arguments. When I preach to my congregations, I argue in every sermon that Jesus’ exemplary life, Questioners Needed sensitive as we atoning death, and triumphant resurrection give us Yet it remains that if the early Adventists hadn’t asked should be. reason for hope. any questions, we wouldn’t be Seventh-day Adventists What some don’t understand about publications today. William Miller wondered what the prophecies of such as these (by which I mean both Adventist Today Daniel 2, 8, and 9 meant. Ellen and James White asked and Spectrum—you may prefer one to the other, but why the churches around them didn’t take the second we’re all friends and do similar work) is that our coming of Jesus seriously. Joseph Bates asked why so business isn’t confined to apologetics. Apologetics few were honoring the Saturday Sabbath. For a while we is ably attended to by the Review, Signs of the Times, were at the leading edge of questioning and challenging. and the Sabbath School Quarterly. By contrast, we’re Once we got an organization and a name, our addressing what those organs cannot, or will not. focus seems to have shifted to apologetics. And Here we’re opening windows and