Editorial – Living by Every Word, Part III

At the Council of Trent, convened to determine how to stop Protestantism (1545-1563), four propositions were made which have affected Bible translations ever since that time.  These four propositions were four condemnations that first condemned the Protestant doctrine that the Holy Scriptures contained all things necessary for salvation, and that it was impious to place apostolic tradition on a level with Scripture.

This condemnation is two-fold, first condemning the doctrine that the Bible contains all things necessary to salvation.  What do the Scriptures teach in regard to what is necessary for Salvation?  Is there any moral duty required of man that God somehow did not have put in His holy book so that the church had to develop it over the next few thousand years?  (Tradition is still developing, for instance look at the debate over the role of Mary, the mother of Jesus, in the plan of salvation.  Traditions which are totally absent from the New Testament, but have been developing for hundreds of years.  Does the Bible say anything specific in regard to this question?  Indeed it does: “Every Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for discipline [or could be translated “instruction” in the sense of instruction a child receives from his parents, or “upbringing.”] in order that the man of God might be complete, fully equipped for every good work.” II Timothy 3:16, 17.  The word translated “complete” is much more than “perfect.” A blade of wheat first coming up can be perfect, but it is not complete. To be complete means much more than to be perfect—it means to be lacking in nothing, which of course implies full maturity.  This is one of the strongest texts in the Bible teaching that the Protestant position is correct and the position of the Council of Trent is in error.  (For other texts teaching the same see Matthew 4:4; 15:1-9; Ecclesiates 12:13, 14; Matthew 28:19, 20, Deuteronomy 4:2 and Revelation 22:18, 19.)

Ellen White wrote, “The very beginning of the great apostasy was in seeking to supplement the authority of God by that of the church. Rome began by enjoining what God had not forbidden, and she ended by forbidding what He had explicitly enjoined.”  The Great Controversy, 289, 290.  This is always the end-result of any church adding any moral duty to what God has given.  So-called “apostolic tradition” has resulted in doctrines that are contradictions to what the apostles actually wrote.  It was for this reason that the Protestant reformers rejected “apostolic tradition,” and all other tradition, except that found in the inspired Word of God.

A second condemnation by the Council of Trent had to do with what writings should compose, or be a part of, the Bible.  This is a very important subject for any Protestant to understand.  Since the foundation of the Protestant faith is the Bible and the Bible alone, any change that is made, either in the translation of the Bible or in the text of the Bible or in what writings compose the Bible, becomes extremely important.  It was for this very reason that the Protestants had been studying Greek and Hebrew and were publishing the New Testament in Greek from the language in which it was originally written.  And it was for this very reason that the various editions of this Greek New Testament had been edited and corrected, over and over again, to obtain the most accurate New Testament possible.  It was for very similar reasons that the Protestant reformers rejected the apocrypha as being part of the Old Testament.  But the Council of Trent condemned the Protestant doctrine that certain books accepted as canonical (as part of the Scriptures) in the Latin Vulgate were apocryphal and not canonical.  One of the results of this was, and is, a difference in Bibles—before the Protestant Reformation there was only one Bible, but since the Protestant Reformation there have been “Catholic Bibles” and “Protestant Bibles.”  One of the principle differences between Catholic and Protestant Bibles is that Protestant Bibles do not contain the apocrypha in the Old Testament, but Catholic Bibles do.

to be continued . . .

Editorial – Living By Every Word, Part V

Among the Jews, in the time of Christ, a large tradition had been built up attempting to explain the Bible (Old Testament). There were laws explaining what it meant to keep the Sabbath—the fourth commandment. There were laws regarding every other aspect of the moral law. There were extensive laws explaining under what conditions a divorce could be procured. As you might expect, the Rabbis disagreed on some of these laws which were to explain the moral law of God and thus regulate human behavior.

One of the most radical of all the teachings brought to the world by Jesus, was that not only were these laws not necessary and not essential, but they actually caused people to break the law of God rather than keep it (see Matthew 15:1–9), and they made the law of God of none effect rather than protecting it.

The world today is in a similar condition, in regard to human traditions claiming to explain the meaning of the Word of God as it was in the days of Christ. This is true not only for Judaism, but also for the vast majority of Christian Churches. Almost every church has formulated at least a few traditions that are not from the Bible at all. Although the Roman Catholic Church probably has the largest stock in tradition, today many Protestant churches are also following traditions saying this is from early Christian times, etc.

A big part of tradition is the idea that the common man must have help in explaining or interpreting the Word of God. This help is supposed to be given him by the church, through tradition purporting to be from either the apostles or from ancient times. Also the church is supposed to approve explanations of scriptures. This was a teaching of the Jews in the time of Christ and also of the Roman Catholic Church through her official catechism today. A few inspired statements on this are as follows:

“And this is the religion which Protestants are beginning to look upon with so much favor, and which will eventually be united with Protestantism. This union will not, however, be effected by a change in Catholicism; for Rome never changes. She claims infallibility. It is Protestantism that will change. The adoption of liberal ideas on its part will bring it where it can clasp the hand of Catholicism.

“The Bible, the Bible, is the foundation of our faith,” was the cry of Protestants in Luther’s time, while the Catholics cried, “The Fathers, custom, tradition.” Now many Protestants find it difficult to prove their doctrines from the Bible, and yet they have not the moral courage to accept the truth which involves a cross; therefore they are fast coming to the ground of Catholics, and, using the best arguments they have to evade the truth, cite the testimony of the Fathers, and the customs and precepts of men. Yes, the Protestants of the nineteenth century are fast approaching the Catholics in their infidelity concerning the Scriptures. But there is just as wide a gulf today between Rome and the Protestantism of Luther, Cranmer, Ridley, Hooper, and the noble army of martyrs, as there was when these men made the protest which gave them the name of Protestants.” The Review and Herald, June 1, 1886.

“‘As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him; rooted and built up in Him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving. Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.’ For in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power…

“When enemies appealed to custom and tradition, or to the assertions and authority of the pope, Luther met them with the Bible and the Bible only.” The Great Controversy, 132.

“The last great conflict between truth and error is but the final struggle of the long-standing controversy concerning the law of God. Upon this battle we are now entering—a battle between the laws of men and the precepts of Jehovah, between the religion of the Bible and the religion of fable and tradition.” Ibid, 582

Four Old Things, Part I

This is a true story that happened to one of the most famous and out-standing sales trainers in the United States a few years ago. This man travels all over, teaching salesmen how to sell and how to be more successful. In a seminar on sales, the basic things of salesmanship are given, then some other things may be covered, but the basics are always provided first. Sometimes, after a person has been selling for a long time, they will say, “I don’t need to study that anymore. I know the basics already.”

In writing about his experience in one of the sales meetings, this trainer mentioned how people who are already in sales usually will not come to the seminar, but he noticed this one man who came to the seminar every year. He asked the man, “Can you tell me a little bit about yourself and what you do? I notice that you come to the seminar every year; are there any of your colleagues with you?”

“No,” the man replied, “I am here all by myself.” He explained that his colleagues could not be convinced that they needed to come to the seminar. The man who was speaking revealed that he was the top producer in his organization, and he felt the need to attend; the rest of the salesmen did not. He continued, “I feel the need at least every year to review the basics about salesmanship.” You know, people who forget the basics, even when they have a lot of experience, make a lot of crazy mistakes.

Jesus, speaking to His disciples, said, “Do you understand all of these things? They say to Him, Yes. And He says to them, On account of this, every scribe who has been instructed in the things of the kingdom of the heavens is like a man who is a householder which brings out of his treasure things new and old.” Matthew 13:51, 52. As human beings, we have a natural tendency to want to hear the new, and that is not wrong, but sometimes we need to hear the old. We need to be sure that we do not forget the old things.

Who are you?

Who are you? How do you define yourself? If you are a Christian, if you believe the Bible, when someone asks who you are, the first thing that might come to your mind is what Genesis says. God and the Son had a conversation, and they said, “Let us make man in our own image and in our own likeness: . . . and so they created both male and female; they created man in the image of God.” Genesis 1:26, 27. Does it make a difference in your whole view of the universe and of yourself whether or not you think you are the son of God or the son of a monkey? Yes, it makes all the difference in the world. You see, in our educational system today, the children are being taught that they descended from animals. No wonder, then, that they act like animals!

More than this, it is not just that you have been created in the image of God, but if asked who you are, one of the answers that may come to mind is that you are a Christian. What is a Christian? A Christian is one who is Christ-like, who is following Jesus. Christians overcome the world. (See 1 John 5:4.) If you say that you are of Him, then you have to walk the way He walked, as John said. (See 1 John 2:6.)

In the Christian church, around the beginning of the fourth century, some people belonged to what they called the church universal—that is the Catholic Church. There arose a controversy between them and another group that were called the Donatists. The Donatists were a very interesting group of Christian people. The controversy with the Catholic Church centered on the point that the Donatists did not believe that the church should be associated with the state. They believed in separation of church and state, and they told the Catholic Church that they should not be using the Roman Government to try to get their way. The Catholic Church was in cahoots with the Roman Government of that day, and they actually arranged for the Roman Government to put pressure on the Donatists and to tell them that they could not call themselves Christians. You are Donatists, they said; you are not Christians. That has happened thousands of times since then, clear down to the present day.

Warning of Apostasy

As time went on, the early church fell away from the truth. This action was predicted in the New Testament. The New Testament writers repeatedly reminded the early church that the church was going to go into a terrible apostasy after the apostles’ death. Over and over again they repeated this warning. Peter told them point blank—all of 11 Peter is about the fact that apostasy was coming into the church after Peter died. In Acts 20, Paul told the elders from Ephesus the very same thing. After his departure, he said, grievous wolves are going to come in and not spare the flock.

Protestant Reformation

As time went on, people who were studying the Bible saw such a discrepancy between what the Bible said and what the church was doing that they said to the people in the church that they were not the church but were idolaters. The whole world became a spiritual battlefield for hundreds of years. Eventually, well over a thousand years later, we see the development of the Protestant Reformation, which took place over a 200-year period. When we study the Protestant Reformation, we usually start at the days of Martin Luther in the early sixteenth century, but Ellen White says that John Wycliffe was the morning star of the Reformation, and he lived in the fourteenth century. (See The Great Controversy, 80.)

I not only call myself a Christian, I call myself a Protestant. Are you a Protestant? What does a Protestant believe? A Protestant is someone who protests the apostasy. That is how they got the name Protestant—they protested the apostasy.

In the Protestant Reformation, there were three major beliefs that they could not harmonize with the Catholic Church.

Priesthood of Believers

The New Testament writer who explains most fully the concept of the priesthood of believers is Peter, the man whom Catholics say was the first pope. The priesthood of believers is the idea that Christ is our great High Priest, and we do not have to go through a human priest to talk with Him, because we are all priests. Peter distinctly taught that.

If that is the case, then when I have done something wrong, I do not have to practice auricular confession. Auricular confession is the idea that you must go to a human priest and confess your sins. The early Reformers said that did not have to be done. They taught that the people could go directly to the Lord and confess their sins.

You may not know this, but auricular confession is one of the great power structures on which the Roman Catholic Church is built. The Roman Catholic Church today has more and better intelligence as to what is going on in every country of the world than any secular government. How? Because of auricular confession.

Protestants do not believe in auricular confession. We believe in the priesthood of believers. We are all priests, and we go to Jesus directly as our great High Priest.

Sola Scriptura

Sola Scriptura is a Latin phrase that means Scripture alone; in other words, the Bible and the Bible only is our foundation of faith. The Protestant Reformation gave the Bible back to the common man. When people read the Bible before that time, they found so much that was different from what the Roman Catholic Church taught, that they accused the papacy, the church, of being an adulterer. The Catholic Church teaches that the Bible and tradition are the foundation of the Christian faith. But they essentially exalt tradition above the Bible. The church had to take the Bibles away from the people, or its foundation would have been destroyed.

When the Bible began to be printed, one of the vicars in London said, We will either have to destroy the printing press, or it will destroy us. But the Protestant Reformation gave the Bible back to the people in their own language. They determined that they would not have Bibles just in Latin, Greek, or Hebrew, but that they would have Bibles in English and in German, and they translated the Bible in all of the different languages.

Sola Scriptura is still one of the basic differences between Protestants and Catholics. I have a very interesting Roman Catholic book, printed in 1999, which lists 21 points against Sola Scriptura. Unfortunately, most Adventists, even historic Adventists, do not know how to refute this book. We need to know why we believe in the principle of Sola Scriptura, which is the principle that the Bible, all by itself, can bring us to spiritual perfection and prepare us for the kingdom of heaven. From 11 Timothy 3:15 we know that the Holy Scriptures “are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” The Roman Catholic book attempts to attack our position on this passage of Scripture, but the text still says the same thing. After being attacked, it is good to check to see if the Scriptures say exactly what we thought they said. This is how 11 Timothy continues: “Every Scripture is God-breathed [that is, given by inspiration of God] and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for discipline in righteousness, in order that the man of God might be complete, thoroughly furnished [or fully equipped] for every good work.” Verses 16, 17. So the Protestant Reformation gave the Bible back to the people. Without it we have no foundation.

Sola Fide

There is another principle in Latin, Sola Fide, which means by faith alone—we are saved by grace through faith alone. That was a major battlefield of the Protestant Reformation. The Reformers showed from Scripture that the seven sacraments and the various penances, fastings, pilgrimages, and other good works that the Catholic Church taught as necessary for salvation actually hold no merit with God. We are saved by faith in the blood of Christ, not by any good works we can do.

Sectarianism

I am still a Protestant. Not only a Christian, but also a Protestant. And I am not only a Protestant Christian; I am a Seventh-day Adventist Christian.

Have you ever heard anyone say to someone else, “You are not a Seventh-day Adventist”? That happened to one of my church members. An Adventist pastor said to her, “You are not a Seventh-day Adventist.”

She said to him, “Show me what there is in the doctrinal beliefs, in the baptismal vows, that I do not believe. I am a Seventh-day Adventist. I have been a Seventh-day Adventist since before you were born.”

The pastor said, “No, you’re not an Adventist.”

“Why then do you say that I am not an Adventist?” He reasoned that she did not belong to the same church organization to which he belonged.

Do you know, that is exactly the same thing that was going on in the early fourth century when the Catholic Church said to the Donatists, You do not have the right to call yourself a Christian. Why did they tell them that? Because the Donatists did not belong to their church organization. I do not know why it took me so long to get this figured out, but I was reading my Bible a few years ago and all of a sudden Mark 9:38 jumped out at me, and I said, Of course, why didn’t I know that all along! It says, “And John gave answer to Him, ‘Teacher, we saw a certain person casting out demons in your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow us.’ ”

There are some churches, including the Roman Catholic Church, that make a big thing about whether or not your church is apostolic. Was this church the apostolic church? Yes, this was the 12 apostles themselves. They saw this person casting out demons in Christ’s name and they told the man not to do it, that he was not part of them, that he did not have permission to work miracles because he did not belong to the right church! He was not part of the right organization. Jesus did not agree with them. “Jesus said, ‘Do not forbid him, for no one is able to do a miracle in my name and then is able quickly to speak against me or to speak evil of me. For the one who is not against us is on our side.’ ” Verses 39, 40.

That is what we call sectarianism—if you do not belong to our church organization then you are wrong; then you don’t have permission; you cannot call yourself a Christian; you cannot call yourself a Seventh-day Adventist; you cannot do this; and you cannot do that. The disciples had that problem, but the Lord corrected it. The Lord would still like to correct this problem.

What Name?

If you do not know who you are, the devil is going to blow you away with the storm that is coming. You need to know who and what a Seventh-day Adventist really is. You see, before the end, the devil might put all kinds of names on us, just like he put all kinds of names on Jesus. Jesus was called “that deceiver” (Matthew 27:63); they said “He is working miracles by Beelzebub” (Luke 11:15–19), and Jesus told His disciples, “If they call the Master of the house Beelzebub, what are they going to do to His followers?” (Matthew 10:25.) So they might call us all sorts of things. No matter what name they put on you, who you are is determined by what is inside.

Where are you from?

From where do you come? The people in the world say that we come from a church that started in 1863. “My church is 2,000 years old,” they say. Well, my church is 6,000 years old! Yes, we come from the Adventist movement; we still believe what the pioneer Adventist preachers taught and preached; we still believe what Ellen White wrote; but from where did they come? At that time, that was the extent of the development of the Protestant Reformation. You see, the Protestant Reformation kept going on after the sixteenth century reformers died. The Protestant Reformation eventually developed into the Second Advent Movement. We are the outgrowth of the Protestant Reformation, and the Protestant Reformation is the outgrowth of what the Waldenses taught and of what the people of God taught all the way back to the apostles. You see, the thing that determines whether or not you are apostolic is what you are teaching. It is not whether you can say you can trace the head of your church back so many years.

The Jews could trace their church all the way back to Abraham, and they told Jesus, “ ‘Abraham is our father.’ [We know where we come from.] Jesus said to them, ‘If you were the children of Abraham, you would do the works of Abraham, but now you seek to kill me, a man that has told you the truth, which I have heard from God. This Abraham did not do. You do the works of your father.’ Therefore they said to him, ‘We have not been born out of fornication; we have one father, even God.’ Jesus said to them, ‘If God was your father, you would love me, for I came out from God, neither did I come from myself, but he sent me. Why do you not know my speech? Because you are not able to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father you wish to do. That one was a murderer from the beginning and did not abide in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie he speaks of his own, because he is a liar and the father of it.’ ” John 8:39–44. Jesus was teaching that our character shows where we come from. They said that they came from Abraham, but Jesus said, No, you did not; you came from the devil because you have the same character as the devil.

It is your character that determines your lineage, where you are from. The apostle John expressed it this way: “He who sins is of the devil.” 1 John 3:8. If I am living in sin, where am I from? Who is my spiritual father? The devil! Where is your lineage? There will be a group of people in the last days whose lineage will go all the way back to the beginning of time, and they will be called the sons of God, the children of God, because they keep the commandments of God and they accept and follow the testimony of Jesus (Revelation 12:17). Friends, I want to be in that little group. Over and over again we are told that this will just be a little group. Jesus said it, and the apostles said it. Almost all of the world will be deceived, but there will be a little group who will be saved.

Where are you going?

What is your future? The Bible does not teach that we are all going to the same place. It does not even teach that all Christians are going to the same place. Are all Protestants going to the same place? No, they are not. Are all Seventh-day Adventists going to the same place? No, they are not. Ellen White says, “I was shown the startling fact that but a small portion of those who now profess the truth will be sanctified by it and be saved.” Testimonies, vol. 1, 608. Startling statement!

Where are you going? “Well,” someone says, “I go to the right church!” Does that make you go to the right place? No. “I belong to the right church organization!” Does that make you go to the right place? No. “Oh, but I believe the right doctrines.” Does that make you go to the right place? No. Well, where are you going, and how do you know you are going to get there? Ellen White said that she saw in vision that many of those who were on the broad road had written on their garments that they were dead to the world and that they were headed to the New Jerusalem, but they were on the broad road. Ibid., 128. Scripture says, “Enter in through the narrow gate, because wide is the gate and spacious [or broad] is the way that leads to destruction, and many there are which enter in through it. Because narrow is the gate and restricted is the way which leads to life, and few there are who find it.” Matthew 7:13, 14. “Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of the heavens; but the one who does the will of My Father who is in the heavens. Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name? And in Your name we cast out demons. And in Your name we did many powerful works [miracles]. Then I will confess to them, Never, at any time, did I know you: depart from Me, you who work lawlessness.” Verses 21–23. They thought they were going to heaven, but when they got to the end, they discovered that was not where they were going.

Do you know for sure where you are going? Are you praying to the Lord that you will not be deceived and have some kind of pretend religion? What determines where you are going? Your character determines your destiny. Jesus taught that over and over. The people who are not saved are the people who practice lawlessness.

[Bible texts quoted are literal translation.]

To be continued . . .

Pastor Grosboll is Director of Steps to Life Ministry and pastors the Prairie Meadows Church in Wichita, Kansas.