My very first article for the Proclamation! blog was entitled “On Leaving: Peeling Back the Layers,” and I wrote it from a place of both personal experience and anecdotal examples I have encountered while interacting with others who have left the Seventh-day Adventist Church. While I am able to empathize and sympathize with others’ stories, the process of peeling back the layers is far from over in my own life, that is certain!
Recently, I have felt myself moving closer to another layer that would need to be peeled back. I don’t really know how to describe it, but I just “knew” that there was something in my thinking and believing that was going to need to be addressed. I didn’t know what it was, but I could sense an increasing level of agitation and emotional discomfort. This is an interesting and new awareness for me. I feel like I have had amazing support and resources to help me work through the “big” theological problems with Adventism. I feel secure in my faith, in the soundness of my beliefs in regards to the nature of God, the Trinity, the gospel, completed atonement, assurance of salvation, eternal security, and others. My biggest struggles now seem to lie in the discovery of how my former beliefs and worldview, as an Adventist, colored the less overtly “spiritual” aspects of my life.
One day last week, I was getting ready for the day and still feeling an amount of inner turmoil that I couldn’t quite name. I began to pray that the Lord would keep me grounded in truth and reality (a frequent prayer of mine as I navigate these “layers”). I went about my business, still praying this in my mind as often as needed, when a thought came into my mind, as clear as could be. “I am not a robot.”
On the surface, it seems a little, well, obvious. As is often the case with things related to Adventism, however, the real issue is not usually what appears on the surface, but what is underneath, the underlying implications. That is where the real meaning is. Honestly, the significance of the statement was not immediately apparent, but I suspected it was significant because tears welled up in my eyes, unbidden.
I had little time to give it much further thought when another clear thought came. “I am a promise.” More emotions. This phrase brought up memories of a song I learned and performed as part of my voice lessons as a child, “I Am A Promise,” originally by the Gaither Vocal Band. I realized I learned it as a child who also happened to be a Seventh-day Adventist, so I thought about what that phrase meant to me now, as a New Covenant believer. As I thought, a Scripture passage came to mind, but I had to go and find it (memorizing Scripture references is not my strong point). My heart fairly sang as I read these words:
Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus, you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs ACCORDING TO THE PROMISE” (Gal. 3:23-29 emphasis mine).
I’ve spent time over the last several days trying to work through the significance of all of these thoughts. I’d like to share with you what I’ve discovered, realized (yes, they are different), and concluded.
I Am Not A Robot
I played that phrase over in my head for awhile, trying to understand the significance of it. I had some guesses. I’ve stated before that I am an oldest child—of an oldest child—of an oldest child. That right there is a recipe for some serious Type A traits (apologies to my firstborn who has a firstborn mother AND father).
Ever since I can remember, I’ve been drawn to routine and predictability. Repetition. “Just keep doing it the RIGHT way.” “Figure out the formula, master it and repeat it. THAT is the recipe for success.”
Remembering my habitual default to routine was an interesting thought for me as I began to try to flesh this idea out a bit more. Why would I think that? Where did it come from? While it’s not wrong to follow an established system for certain things in order to avoid reinventing the proverbial wheel, this mindset cannot work for everything, yet I realized my propensity to try to make it so. At the same time, I remember being endlessly drawn to trying to be creative in my childhood, yet always feeling like my efforts fell flat—failure which I promptly blamed on my lack of ability to follow the elusive formula.
As I’ve progressed, too rapidly for my liking, through my adult years, I often feel a yearning to express myself creatively, but I still end up in the same frustrated place. Sometimes I feel like I’m on the verge of some sort of breakthrough in creative freedom, but I just can’t quite get there. I envy my friends who just “go for it,” not because I feel like I could never do that, but because I feel like I COULD do that, only—I can’t. For some reason, I’ve been stuck.
After pondering this internal need to “Just keep doing it the RIGHT way,” I continued to wonder where it had come from. Certainly, my family upbringing played a role, but what about my religious upbringing (which influenced my parents, their parenting, and also my own formation of what I believed to be true about God and about myself).
I remembered various themes from my time in church school, in Sabbath School, and in church. The adults who guided me in these settings were very kind individuals, and I don’t remember being treated harshly by any of them, but the ideas of being “fit” for heaven, of being “good,” of being part of making it possible for Jesus to return (and conversely being part of making it Impossible for Him to return), and of having accomplished enough improvement to my character and behavior to stand out clearly—these ideas shaped my life.
Honestly, I don’t remember this idea scaring me—until I became a teenager. It made sense that it was a good idea to be good. Looking back on it, though, the “why” of the matter continued to become more twisted and distorted through my time of growing up in Adventism.
Trying to find the source of these ideas, I did a quick search for Ellen White’s writings on character and perfection of character. I’ve heard her quoted many times on these topics, but as is the case with my memory for specific Bible references, I never seem to remember where the quotes came from. Thanks to Google and the EGW Estate’s full online access to EGW’s writings, I was able to find several quotes that rang very familiar in their tone and content, yet at the same time clashed heavily with what I have come to know to be true in light of Scripture and the New Covenant.
I will share some of them. Importantly, these are not short phrases or broken up paragraphs ripped out of their context, but lengthy passages that show the clear intent of her words.
The Lord has a great work to be done, and He will bequeath the most in the future life to those who do the most faithful, willing service in the present life. The Lord chooses His own agents, and each day under different circumstances He gives them a trial in His plan of operation. In each true-hearted endeavor to work out His plan, He chooses His agents not because they are perfect but because, through a connection with Him, they may gain perfection.
God will accept only those who are determined to aim high. He places every human agent under obligation to do his best. Moral perfection is required of all. Never should we lower the standard of righteousness in order to accommodate inherited or cultivated tendencies to wrong-doing. We need to understand that imperfection of character is sin. All righteous attributes of character dwell in God as a perfect, harmonious whole, and every one who receives Christ as a personal Saviour is privileged to possess these attributes.
And those who would be workers together with God must strive for perfection of every organ of the body and quality of the mind. True education is the preparation of the physical, mental, and moral powers for the performance of every duty; it is the training of body, mind, and soul for divine service. This is the education that will endure unto eternal life.
Of every Christian the Lord requires growth in efficiency and capability in every line. Christ has paid us our wages, even His own blood and suffering, to secure our willing service. He came to our world to give us an example of how we should work, and what spirit we should bring into our labor. He desires us to study how we can best advance His work and glorify His name in the world, crowning with honor, with the greatest love and devotion, the Father who “so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
But Christ has given us no assurance that to attain perfection of character is an easy matter. A noble, all-round character is not inherited. It does not come to us by accident. A noble character is earned by individual effort through the merits and grace of Christ. God gives the talents, the powers of the mind; we form the character. It is formed by hard, stern battles with self. Conflict after conflict must be waged against hereditary tendencies. We shall have to criticize ourselves closely, and allow not one unfavorable trait to remain uncorrected.
Let no one say, I cannot remedy my defects of character. If you come to this decision, you will certainly fail of obtaining everlasting life. The impossibility lies in your own will. If you will not, then you can not overcome. The real difficulty arises from the corruption of an unsanctified heart, and an unwillingness to submit to the control of God….
Remember that you will never reach a higher standard than you yourself set. Then set your mark high, and step by step, even though it be by painful effort, by self-denial and sacrifice, ascend the whole length of the ladder of progress. Let nothing hinder you….
Be ambitious, for the Master’s glory, to cultivate every grace of character. In every phase of your character building you are to please God. This you may do; for Enoch pleased Him though living in a degenerate age. And there are Enochs in this our day (Christ’s Object Lessons, pages 331-332 [emphasis mine]).
I found this particular passage quoted in several locations, and its clear promotion of perfection for salvation was staggering. I would also like to point out the use of the word “grace” in the fifth paragraph. As I was reading through multiple quotes and passages on this topic, it became apparent to me that Ellen White meant something completely different when she used that word than a believer would. As you will also see in further quotes, the meaning she is applying to the word is one of enabling power. Of course, this definition is not the true meaning of the grace that Christ gives us, which is primarily the unmerited favor of God that leads us to salvation and extends into a constant working in our lives—but never in a militant power to perfect our characters on this earth.
Two other quotes from Ellen White’s writings that stood out to me were these:
We can never see our Lord in peace, unless our souls are spotless. We must bear the perfect image of Christ. Every thought must be brought into subjection to the will of Christ. As expressed by the great apostle, we must come into “the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” [Ephesians 4:13] We shall never attain to this condition without earnest effort. We must strive daily against outward evil and inward sin if we would reach the perfection of Christian character.
Those who engage in this work will see so much to correct in themselves, and will devote so much time to prayer and to comparing their characters with God’s great standard, the divine law, that they will have no time to comment and gossip over the faults or dissect the characters of others. A sense of our own imperfections should lead us to humility and earnest solicitude lest we fail of everlasting life. The words of inspiration should come home to every soul: “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?”
If the professed people of God would divest themselves of their self-complacency and their false ideas of what constitutes a Christian, many who now think they are in the path to heaven would find themselves in the way of perdition. Many proud-hearted professors [of religion] would tremble like an aspen leaf in the tempest could their eyes be opened to see what spiritual life really is. Would that those now reposing in false security could be aroused to see the contradiction between their profession of faith and their everyday demeanor.
To be living Christians, we must have a vital connection with Christ…. When the affections are sanctified, our obligations to God are made primary, everything else secondary. To have a steady and ever-growing love for God, and a clear perception of His character and attributes, we must keep the eye of faith fixed constantly on Him. Christ is the life of the soul. We must be in Him and He in us, else we are sapless branches (The Review and Herald, May 30, 1882).
God’s ideal for his children is higher than the highest human thought can reach. The living God has given in his holy law a transcript of his character. The greatest teacher the world has ever known is Jesus Christ. And what is the standard he has given for all who believe in him, to reach?—“Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” As God is perfect in his high sphere of action, so man may be perfect in his human sphere. The ideal of Christian character is Christlikeness. There is opened before us a path of continual advancement. We have an object to reach, a standard to gain which includes everything good and pure and noble and elevated. There should be continual striving and constant progress onward and upward toward perfection of character (Special Testimony to Battle Creek Church, page 53).
I will be honest and say that some of these quotes sounded “good” in places, but as you read them in their entirety, you feel the weight and the burden of perfecting one’s character—of not making mistakes. Her words guilt one into constant self-scrutiny to ensure “continual striving and constant progress onward and upward.” Mistakes are a sign of backwards motion, a cause for dread that one might not “see our Lord in peace.”
These past days, I have realized that while I had shed my belief that my continual striving and constant progress were essential to any chance at salvation, I have not shed the belief that it is yet necessary for me to be ever-improving, never making the same mistake twice. It has been a heavy, heavy burden to carry, and one I am sure is not unfamiliar to many readers. I am also certain that it will not be easy to rid myself of this burden, because the messages from and to myself are filled with words such as, “you should have known better,” “why can’t you get this right?” and others. These reprimands are so deep that I often don’t even know that I am thinking them.
For example, during the writing of this piece, I found myself agitated with my kids and with myself. I was trying to focus on writing, yet at the same time I felt I was doing something wrong by not paying more attention to them. Even worse, I was not managing their behavior effectively. The internal conflict became so strong that I found it impossible to do either: write or parent well, and the evening quickly devolved into a frustrating and discouraging mess.
“Why can’t you get this parenting right? You should have known better than to try to write while they are entertaining themselves. When will you learn?” All of these messages, spoken to my heart over the last 40 years, have taught me to, in essence, be a robot. “Figure out the formula, master it and repeat it. THIS is the formula for success. Do not veer to the left or to the right. Follow the formula.”
I Am A Promise
The problem I am discovering with this approach is that LIFE does not follow a formula. Life on earth is messy. On the negative side, people mess up, they hurt us (and we hurt them); kids act up and break things; accidents happen. On the positive side, however, there is beauty. There is art, music, love, and laughter—and through it ALL, there is the Lord Jesus. He meets us in our messes and in our hurt.
When our kids throw a tantrum; when they break the TV remote for the fifth time this season (I’m not saying this has happened in our house, but my husband may have the receipts to prove it); when we love our friends and enemies; when we laugh cry together; when we paint, sculpt, or draw beautiful stick men (that’s me); when we sing, play, and yes—even dance—the Lord Jesus is with us.
It’s not like I never do these things I’ve listed on the “positive” side. Rather, the problem is that my “robot talk” is always there in the background, just under my conscious awareness. “You’d better get this piano piece right, or else.” (“Or else, what?” I’m never sure, but there’s a problem with not getting it right.) “You really could have been MORE present with your kids today.” “You could have done a BETTER job at bringing the gospel into that conversation. When will you ever get it right?”
I’ve realized these last few days that my desire—my BELIEF that I needed to be a robot is what keeps me from the freedom of expression that I long to have. I’m also realizing it may not be a creative breakthrough into stunning artistic abilities that I desire, but a freedom breakthrough where I’m more able to LIVE fully in the freedom that I have in Christ. Freedom in Christ is not a freedom to indulge in my own will, but a freedom to fully give and fully receive the love and the beauty that has been afforded to me in this life. In fact, my life is a mere shadow of what awaits me when I meet my Savior, and at times it is harder than hard. Nevertheless, I have to admit that what I have here is pretty beautiful.
As a woman belonging to Christ, Galatians 3 says that I AM Abraham’s offspring and an heir according to the promise. I am not chained to the Law of Moses. I am not chained to “earnest effort,” to “continual advancement,” “continual striving and constant progress onward and upward.” What a burden to bear! And what a realization that I have unknowingly kept myself under that burden! Although my chains of “striving” have not kept me from knowing I am saved, they have colored and distorted my ability to live in the freedom and joy in which Christ has called me to live.
For you were called to freedom, my brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, BUT through love, serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself….BUT the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control, against such things there is no law (Gal. 5:13, 22-24 [emphasis mine]).
Goodbye, robot! Hello, promise! †
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