My Struggles with Adventism’s “Non-Assurance”

By Dennis L. Palmer, PhD

In nearly every worship service, Dennis Hester, the Senior Pastor of a Texan Southern Baptist church, offers an invitation for those who are not sure of their salvation to come forward. At that appeal, there would be an uneasy feeling. Even though I was at that time finishing my PhD and previously I was the pastor of a Sabbatarian church, I was struggling over the issue of assurance.

I read articles on Christian assurance, but found myself less secure in my faith, and the uneasy feeling in my heart would become louder. I rededicated my life to Christ, but the rededication did not bring about assurance. I finally saw the pastor in his office. I poured my heart out to Pastor Dennis concerning my lack of assurance. Despite the cordial visit and our discussion on some of the top commentaries on 2 Corinthians, I left with little assurance of my salvation. 

Perhaps this is you. In Adventism and decades beyond I lacked assurance of my salvation. Biblical assurance is not presumptuous, but is a quiet confidence brought about by the inner witness of the Spirit with the believer’s spirit (Rom 8:16) that he or she has entered into a saving relationship with Christ in which sins are forgiven due to Christ’s death and resurrection. In this scenario, the genuine believer knows that he or she has been justified and is a child of God who will never stand condemned before Him. Although a true believer remains part of the eternal family of God, this inner witness by the Spirit in a Christian can diminish or cease when a believer is unresponsive to God’s call or when there is ongoing or unrepentant sin in the believer’s life.

Although there is a paucity of documentation, I think there is overwhelming evidence that the lack of assurance is disproportionately high among Adventists. Philip W. Dunham laments that within his fifty-five years as an Adventist pastor that “there are far more Seventh-day Adventists who know who they are than who know where they are going.” ¹  

Herbert E. Douglass received a letter from an Adventist “friend” and “distinguished scholar” who acknowledged that he/she lacked assurance.² Douglass’s book, Should We Ever Say, “I Am Saved,” is partially a reply to that letter as well as a guide to help Adventists who lack assurance. However, as I read Douglass’s book, the book seems like another letter, albeit lengthy, of Douglass’s lack of assurance. At least Douglass freely admits his lack of assurance and the lack of assurance within the Adventist community of faith:

I am a seasoned Adventist. . . . But there have been times, in spite of my joy of salvation, when certain questions would haunt me: If probation closed today, would I be saved? . . . If I should die tonight, would I be in the first resurrection? . . . I discovered that many others were having the same uncertainty.³

Douglass’s book never ends with a note on how he personally came into full assurance. I do not know if he ever did nor do I know if his close friend found assurance. Due to the lack of assurance in the Adventist community, my aim is to inquire if there are faulty elements in the Adventist structure of soteriology that are causing a lack of assurance among Adventists. Having identified problem areas, I pray that you or anyone who lacks assurance will lay the problem at the feet of Jesus and be led by the Spirit to take the appropriate steps to remedy the situation. Let me begin with a brief sketch of the Adventist doctrine of assurance followed by a critique that outlines weaknesses in the Adventist doctrine on assurance.

 

The Adventist Doctrine of Assurance

Herbert E. Douglass refers to the Adventist-assurance doctrine as “present salvation,” “assurance now,” and “present assurance.”⁴ These are not just “buzzwords”. Philip W. Dunham, who wrote one of the better Adventist books on assurance, clarifies the Adventist doctrine of assurance by explaining that Christian assurance is “now, today, at this moment in time” and “says nothing about tomorrow” or sometime later.⁵ Assurance for Dunham is limited to the “present state” of a person’s “salvation.” ⁶ Dunham explains that assurance arising from faith in Christ does not mean “eternal salvation from now on” or “assurance forever.”⁷ The bottom line is that Adventism has consistently incorporated into the doctrine of assurance that a person can lose their salvation. Hence, Adventist assurance is for the present time only and thus has no future point of reference. At the drop of the hat, theoretically, one could move from eternity to total damnation. Consequently, due to the uncertainty of the final outcome of salvation, it is logical within the framework of Adventism that Ellen White warns her followers that one should never say, “I am saved.”⁸

 

A Critique of the Adventist Doctrine of Assurance

Two different portraits emerge when the biblical doctrine of assurance is seen alongside of the Adventist doctrine. The latter clashes with the Bible. This section enumerates four weaknesses of Adventist assurance that form a rationale why many Adventists lack assurance.

The first weakness is that the Adventist doctrine of assurance is limited in scope. Assurance is limited to the present time without any reference point to an assurance of salvation in the future. Ellen White thus speaks with hesitancy concerning her future salvation when she writes: “If I am saved at last, it will be through the matchless love of my Redeemer. . . .”⁹ The conditional nature of her salvation leaves little or no genuine assurance because the outcome is left in the air. Furthermore, the outcome is precarious since Ellen White claims that her salvation is contingent on her sanctification: “If we [James and Ellen White] secure heaven, it will be because we are sanctified to God, . . . and have been fitted in this life for the holy society of the pure angels in the future life.”¹⁰ This type of assurance is very limited because one might quickly lose a certain level of fitness and become eternally lost. In this state one cannot have a deep sense of assurance. 

In contrast, Paul in Col 2:2 speaks of “full assurance” and 1 Thess 1:5 says the gospel came in “much assurance.”¹¹ Moreover, Christian assurance has a future reference point. Paul was confident of the outcome of true Christians for he promised them that “He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.” The ultimate verdict of the believer is not left to chance. What God has started in you and me God will complete. This is full assurance: an assurance that is deep and is better than the paper-thin assurance offered by Adventists. 

A second weakness is that Adventist assurance presupposes that genuine believers may lose their salvation. However, the sure foundation for the believer’s assurance rests on Christ’s death, His resurrection, and the work of the Triune God in salvation. In order to grasp the biblical doctrine of assurance, one needs to ask, “What is the nature of salvation that is freely given to those who believe in Christ?” Is salvation something that can be lost and hence assurance is thus for the moment? The Bible sketches a radically different picture of salvation. John 10:28-29 says:

And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.   

Douglass suggests that if we follow a “simple formula” of prayer, Bible study, and the exercising of faith, we will never be snatched from Christ’s hand.¹² However, in salvation, eternal life is given as a gift from Christ. John 10:28-29 is not a conditional statement, but a promise that the Giver of eternal life will not allow this gift to be taken from believers. The Apostle in John 10:28 uses the strongest negative in the Greek language, that is, a double negative, indicating the impossibility that true believers could ever perish. Furthermore, there is a double divine security. Christ keeps believers in His hand and the Father also keeps them safe in His hand. 

Some have speculated that believers could by free will jump out of Christ’s hand, but Christ and the Father holds them so they will not jump out. Metaphorically, if we assumed that a believer jumped out of Christ’s hand, the Christian would land in the Father’s hand (10:28-29). Thus, the Father and Son preserves true believers so that they will never fall away from God’s hand of mercy.

The nature of salvation, moreover, consists of the inner workings of God to bring to glory those who are predestined, called, and justified (Rom 8:29-30). Christ’s substitutionary atonement, His infinite righteousness, His gift of eternal life, and His promises are of such magnitude that to strip the believer of salvation would be to undo God’s promises and character of salvation as a gift of God based on His grace. In addition, the permanent sealing of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers (Eph 1:13-14; 4:30) and Christ’s unending intercession and advocacy in heaven (Rom 8:34; Heb 7:25) secures the salvation of every genuine believer. Hence, since it would be inconsistent with God’s character for Him not to keep His promises and to declare invalid His acquittal of repentant sinners, the saved will never fall away from salvation.¹³ 

Not only does God preserve His sheep, but God and the Spirit causes Christians to persevere in faith, love, and obedience. This is not a manufactured teaching to safeguard the doctrine of eternal security from the idea that people are free to live like the Devil after they are saved. Instead, only those who are the sons of the Devil can actually have the lifestyle of the Devil because the Spirit causes genuine believers to persevere in holiness.¹⁴ The Spirit produces the “fruit of the Spirit” in believers (Gal 5:22), but the unsaved lack the transforming work of the Spirit (5:16-25). 

A Christian’s life will be characterized by good works as a result of God’s grace (Rom 2:6-10). The promise in Philippians 4:7 is that “the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” God promises that He will guard the hearts of believers and so enable them to persevere in holiness. Hypothetical questions such as, “What if a Christian decides that he no longer wants to be saved and leaves the faith?” are counterproductive for they do not conform to reality. God has the power and will keep a genuine believer from ever taking a path that ends in permanent destruction (1 Pet 1:5). Thus, the nature of salvation is such that the keeping power of the Triune God prevents a true believer from ever forsaking faith in the Savior. God preserves believers and leads Christians to persevere in their faith to the end. Assurance that is rooted in a sound doctrine of salvation, rather than Adventist soteriology, provides confidence for believers to know that they will be among the saved when Christ comes.

A third weakness is of Adventist assurance is that some of Ellen White’s statements restricting the free expression that the believer is saved allows little or no room for genuine believers to say and rejoice that God saved them. For example, Ellen White writes: 

We are never to rest in a satisfied condition, and cease to make advancement, saying, “I am saved.” When this idea is entertained, the motives for watchfulness, for prayers, for earnest endeavor to press onward to higher attainments, cease to exist. No sanctified tongue will be found uttering these words till Christ shall come, and we enter in through the gates into the city of God. . . . As long as man is full of weakness—for of himself he cannot save his soul—he should never dare to say, “I am saved.”¹⁵ 

Douglass is correct that White is warning against “presumptuous assurance” and belief in the eternal security of the believer.¹⁶ However, White moves to the practical implications of assurance that grows out of the belief that a genuine Christian might lose his or her salvation. Due to the uncertain outcome of one’s salvation, an individual, according to Ellen White, should “never” say “I am saved” until a person meets Christ at His return.¹⁷ By claiming that “no sanctified tongue” will utter the words “I am saved,” White questions the moral character of those who make such remarks.¹⁸ White’s statement that no one should ever “dare to say, ‘I am saved,” denotes that nobody under any circumstances should express the view that he or she is saved or is a child of God. If Adventists heeded these remarks of their prophetess, an Adventist would not even proclaim that they are a child of God redeemed by the Lamb’s blood.  

Ellen White also warns against teaching believers “to say or to feel they are saved.”¹⁹ However, the Apostle John wants genuine Christians to feel that they are saved. Hence, he wrote: “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 John 5:13). Paul’s personal testimony is that he was lost, but is now saved (Gal 1:13-17; Phil 3:3-11, 20; cf. Acts 9:4-5, 17-18)! The avoidance of saying “I am saved” clashes not only with the personal testimonies of believers throughout history, but also with the practice of the early church in calling believers “Christians” (Acts 11:26). 

A fourth weakness is that in Adventism spiritual growth and ministry does not normally operate on the footing of personal assurance. Instead, Adventist assurance often operates on the fear that one might become careless in their life and fall from a saving relationship with Christ. Ellen White says that when one entertains the idea that “I am saved,” the “motives for watchfulness, for prayers, for earnest endeavor to press onward to higher attainments, cease to exist.”²⁰ From White’s perspective, any type of security of salvation would close the door to spiritual watchfulness. 

In reality, the reverse occurs. If we know we are saved, there is a more earnest desire to be who we are in Christ. Knowing Christ, our prayers overflow with thanksgiving for the joy of God’s salvation. The mission work is increased for there is an innate desire to evangelize the lost saved and to bring them to the assurance of their salvation. However, a person lacking salvation “will not feel constrained to give thanks to God” for what he possibly does not have.²¹ Whenever a genuine Christian lacks assurance, the person’s “gait is halting and uncertain.”²² Consequently, if the person is “lacking in confidence, he will not be able to do his best for the Captain of his salvation.”²³

In summation, there are four primary weaknesses with the Adventist doctrine of assurance: (1) the scope of assurance is limited to a present assurance, (2) the eternal keeping power of the Triune God is so ineffective that genuine believers may forever lose their salvation, (3) believers are forbidden to claim that they are truly saved, and (4) spiritual maturity grows out of an uncertain future which strikes fear in the heart and allegedly compels the person to become more disciplined and watchful. These four problem areas with Adventist assurance stem from a faulty understanding of the nature of salvation. The outcome is a lack of assurance among Adventists.

 

Conclusion

Like bowling pins that fall with the crash of a ball, so the doctrine of small assurance among the Adventists topples over when it smashes against the gospel. The gospel offers full assurance to those who receive it; traditional Adventism offers assurance only for a fleeting moment. The gospel, once received, is an everlasting anchor for the soul because the repentant sinner is justified on the basis of Christ’s blood and righteousness. For Adventists, there is much to fear because justification can be quickly undone when the believer fails to be in step with the Spirit. 

I do not know the impact that Adventism had on your life in regard to Christian assurance. There is the possibility that someone reading this article might have a false security. Often when a person lacks assurance, it is because the person is not saved. If you realized that Adventism was causing you to rest upon your good deeds for your salvation (e.g., Sabbath keeping, tithing), confess that your best efforts are not enough and rest on the finished work of Christ for your salvation. Receive the Lord Jesus Christ “by grace through faith” without the addition of any works whatsoever (Eph 2:8-9). If unbiblical elements in the Adventist doctrine of assurance are causing you to lack assurance, reject them and embrace Christian assurance as found in the Bible. If there is unconfessed sin in your life that is hindering you from full assurance, confess your sins to God. If you offended someone, perhaps you need to also confess your sins to the person you sinned against. Maybe you are hearing the call of God to leave Adventism and to connect with a Bible-believing fellowship. Whatever is your case, take the necessary steps to come to that full assurance. 

For me, that journey to full assurance was extremely painful. I will recount to you the rest of the story that I started in the introduction.

The day came when Pastor Dennis spoke on David’s prayer of repentance in Psalm 51. I found myself guilty before God: different sin, different situation, but similar in terms of the depth of my sin. The invitation went unheeded. I left with tears about to flood my eyes, but little assurance. 

I did not respond to the invitation the next Sunday, and the next Sunday, and the next, and on and on. I constantly left God’s house with little assurance of my salvation. The pounding on my heart became louder and louder as I resisted Pastor Dennis’s invitations.

The day came when I did not come to my church. I felt led by the Spirit to visit another church. I will call it the Beach Street Church. A shortened version of the pastor’s name is Nathan. With a big grin across his face, Nathan announced that he would preach three sermons on Psalm 51. My heart sank. Now I knew the Lord sent me there to listen to what I was trying to run away from. 

Like the prophet that confronted David, Nathan declared the Word of the Lord, “For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Your sight” (Ps 51:3-4). Like the prophet of old, Nathan drew to my attention that “you are the man” (2 Sam 12:7) that sinned! Like the man of God, Nathan demanded, “You must repent!” The Spirit pierced my heart. About half way through the message, I found myself weeping bitterly over my sin with my face buried in my hands. An invitation was given. With embarrassment and shame, I confessed my sin to Nathan and to another individual. Immediately, I received the inner witness of the Spirit with my spirit that I am a child of God (Rom 8:16). The problem was that my unconfessed sin was hindering me from having assurance of salvation. I later confessed my sin to the person I sinned against. I left the house of God humbled, but with a full assurance of salvation, the assurance in Christ that is deep and like a mighty river. I now have a peace with God that I never knew.   

For years I struggled with Christian assurance. I was taught that at the drop of a hat a person could lose their salvation. I knew that if this were true, there could be no assurance of salvation because assurance has as its reference point the final outcome of salvation: eternal life in Christ. When I was a Seventh-day Adventist, I started questioning the view that a genuine believer could lose their salvation. Today, I am “confident … that He who has begun a good work in” me “will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:6). God Almighty will complete what He started in you and me. Thank God that the one who wrote “if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins” (1 John 1:9), also wrote: “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 John 5:13)!

I know I have eternal life, and I am grateful that God restored to “me the joy of” His salvation (Ps 51:12). Salvation I did not lose, but part of the joy in salvation. The joy of salvation comes when Christ brings peace in the heart. This peace continues when we walk in faith knowing that we are completely forgiven and our salvation is forever secure in Christ. When this happens, we enter into a full assurance of salvation.²⁴ †

 

Dennis Palmer grew up in the Christian Church but converted to Adventism in his teens. He attended Union College, a Seventh-day Adventist school in Lincoln Nebraska, where he majored in theology. In 1978, just before he graduated from Union College, he became a Seventh Day Baptist and later pastored a Seventh Day Baptist Church in California. When Dennis discovered that Sabbath rest is found and fulfilled in Jesus, he left the denomination. Recently he graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary with a doctoral degree.

 

Endnotes

¹ Philip W. Dunham, Sure Salvation: You Can Know You Have Eternal Life (Nampa, ID: Pacific, 2007), 90.

² Herbert E. Douglass, Should We Ever Say, “I Am Saved:” What it Means to be Assured of Salvation (Nampa, ID: Pacific, 2003), 8.

³ Ibid., 7-8.

⁴ Ibid., 8, 40-41, 104, 107.

⁵ Sure Salvation, 91. 

⁶ Ibid., 94.

⁷ Ibid.

⁸ Selected Messages, bk 1, 314. 

⁹ Letter 22, April 16, 1880. E. J. Waggoner, General Conference Bulletin, vol. 2 (January 1, 1897), 8, notes that during the formative years of Adventism “perhaps nine-tenths of the prayers” ended with the request: “Save us at last.” Prior to the twentieth century, Ellen White and some of her contemporaries used of the phrase, “if I am saved,” intimating that the Adventist pioneers had serious doubts about their salvation. The phrase is sometimes used to refer to present salvation rather than a fear that later one might become eternally lost. For example, Waggoner expresses hope that he will be saved (“If the Lord saves me now, . . . . If the Lord saves us at the present time, . . . .” ) and uncertainty of his present salvation: “If I am saved now, I am satisfied” (ibid.). Dexter Daniels, Advent Review, and Sabbath Herald, vol. 2 (August 19, 1851), 15, wrote that “Brother Boutell is a good man, and if I am saved, he will be.” A. Lanphear, Advent Review, and Sabbath Herald, vol. 13 (February 17, 1859), 102, used the phrase, “if I am saved, . . . .” to refer to uncertainty of his salvation. 

¹⁰ Letter 22, April 16, 1880.

¹¹ Unless otherwise stated, all Bible quotes in this article are from the NKJV. 

¹² Douglass, Should We Ever Say, 40.

¹³ Space will not permit me to layout a full theology of the preservation and perseverance of the saints. See John 6:37-39; 13:1; Rom 3:24; 8:28-39; Eph 2:8; 4:30 Heb 6:17; 7:25; 9:12; 1 Peter 1:5; 1 John 2:1-2, 19; 5:13. Also, there are many more problems with the Adventist doctrine of salvation (e.g., the close of probation, the need to acquire a fitness for heaven, and the Adventist understanding of the relationship between character and salvation) that poses a stumbling block to genuine Christian assurance. I have started writing another article that addresses these issues that will not be covered in this article.

¹⁴ On presumptuous assurance, see Matt 7:21-23; 25:8-12; Luke 13:24-28; 2 Tim 3:1-7; Heb 6:4-8; 1 John 1:6, 8; 2:4.

¹⁵ Selected Messages, bk 1, 314. 

¹⁶ Should We Ever Say, 34.

¹⁷ Selected Messages, bk 1, 314.

¹⁸ Ibid.

¹⁹ Christ’s Object Lessons, 155. Later Ellen White, in the General Conference Bulletin, April 10, 1901, reverses her position declaring that a person “need not stand where you say, ‘I do not know whether I am saved.’ ”

²⁰ Selected Messages, bk. 1, 314.

²¹ Louis Berkhof, The Assurance of Faith: The Firm Foundation of Christian Hope (Birmingham, AL: Solid Ground Christian Books, 2004), 83.

²² Ibid.

²³ Ibid.

²⁴ Thanks to Kaspars Ozolins for proof reading this article. For a more comprehensive understanding of Christian assurance, see Robert A. Peterson, The Assurance of Salvation: Biblical Hope for our Struggles (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2019).