Colleen and Nikki share their bacon-wrapped turkey tradition and talk about the new dynamics in family gatherings after leaving Adventism. They also share how they have learned that God provides new family in Him. Podcast was published November 27, 2019. Transcription by Gwen Billington.
Colleen: Happy Thanksgiving! Welcome to Former Adventist podcast. I’m Colleen Tinker.
Nikki: And I’m Nikki Stevenson.
Colleen: And before we talk about Thanksgiving, I just want to remind you all of a few details. If you have questions or comments that you’d like to ask us or make, you can email us at formeradventist@gmail.com. You can also support this podcast. We are grateful to you who are supporting us through your donations. You may donate online by going to proclamationmagazine.com, and there is a link there to donate. Also, we now have Facebook and Instagram pages, and you may follow us on both Facebook and Instagram. Don’t forget to subscribe to our podcast and write a review and like us. So, Nikki, here we are, another Thanksgiving. [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.] With wonderful holiday coffee!
Colleen: Yes. What flavor do you think we’re drinking today?
Nikki: Oh, let me see. Is this gingerbread?
Colleen: This is gingerbread.
Nikki: Oh, it’s good.
Colleen: Gingerbread coffee with vanilla creamer.
Nikki: This is good.
Colleen: So, just so you know, we are wearing our new podcast shirts from our friend Sharon Carey.
Nikki: Oh, yes.
Colleen: They’re green, and they say, “A day without coffee is like…”
Nikki: “…just kidding. I have no idea.”
Colleen: Exactly. [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: So we are facing another Thanksgiving, and we’ve developed a tradition, Nikki, that’s been a lot of fun.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: I have to give a shout-out to my daughter-in-law, who first told me about this idea, but I have started making sure that our Thanksgiving turkey is wrapped in bacon before it’s baked. Now, it’s been kind of a several-year tradition now, and you came into this tradition a few years ago. Tell me your reaction when you first helped me wrap that turkey.
Nikki: It felt a little bit like science class to me [laughter] –
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: – because I had not handled raw meat before.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: I’d always been a vegetarian, and a vegetarian that was quite grossed out by meat. So it was pretty fun going in there and feeling that turkey for the first time. It was exciting. I remember a lot of laughter.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And I still really – I enjoy it. It’s been a wonderful tradition. My kids love it.
Colleen: It’s so fun.
Nikki: Yeah, it really is.
Colleen: And to my delight, my formerly strict vegetarian husband has said Thanksgiving morning is his favorite morning of the year because he wakes up to the smell of the turkey, which has been slowly baking all night, wrapped in bacon, and he said that smell is his favorite thing, and it’s his favorite morning of the year because of that smell in the house.
Nikki: Explain to our listeners why that’s such a big deal.
Colleen: Richard not only didn’t eat meat, but he considered meat to be not food. He had been taught that it was like – it was like eating something that a dog would leave on the sidewalk on his walk.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: So for Richard to actually have come to the place where he can see meat as food is a very big deal, and then add to that the fact that for Adventists anything from the pig is unclean and not to be touched, much less eaten.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: So to have our Thanksgiving turkey wrapped in bacon is quite an accomplishment, and it does my heart so much good to see him sitting at our kitchen counter on Thanksgiving morning picking off the bacon and eating it.
Nikki: Yeah. [Laughter.]
Colleen: [Laughter.] We’ve had several different experiences with this turkey. A few years ago, maybe four, we fixed that turkey in our utility room. Do you remember that, Nikki?
Nikki: Oh, yes, I do remember that. Yes.
Colleen: We had a devastating flood in our kitchen, and we had all the counters and floors torn out. The oven alone remained intact, and we fixed that 20-pound turkey in the utility room and carried it into the kitchen to bake. And here, now, Nikki –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – how is history repeating itself?
Nikki: My kitchen has been flooded! [Laughter.]
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: And I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought about what I watched here. How long did you go without a kitchen? It seems like it was through Christmas too, wasn’t it?
Colleen: It was through Christmas. The flood was discovered in the middle of November just before Thanksgiving, and it wasn’t completed – the whole process of re-fixing it and completing it was not finished until the middle of March.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: So it was about a four-month process, and it expanded, as these things do, and it spanned the holidays.
Nikki: And you shared your life during that. You shared your life with a lot of people.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: And so now, as I stand in my kitchen and I speak to insurance adjusters and contractors –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – I think, “You know what? Colleen did this, and she shared her life, and she did not complain, and I can be grateful, and I can be thankful, and I can get through this too.” So you were a good example to me. I keep thinking about that, and you know, the Lord is providing through it.
Colleen: Yes, He is.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: He certainly did provide for us, because we were able to have some things done we could not have otherwise afforded to do, and thank God for good insurance. [Laughter.]
Nikki: Yes. [Laughter.]
Colleen: Well, it is interesting that four years later we are kind of standing in that same kitchen place, isn’t it? [Laughter.]
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: So, Nikki, as a former Adventist, what are you thankful for?
Nikki: Well, I am thankful for sonship, and what I mean by that is, I know, because Scripture tells me, that I have a new family in Him.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And that means a lot more than just a metaphor to me.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And I think to a lot of former Adventists. What I see from formers is that even if you maintain ongoing connections and relationships with your family, even if they seem healthy –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – when we gather, we often feel the division, the spiritual division. There are things that normally we once shared that we can’t even talk about –
Colleen: Exactly.
Nikki: – or if we do, it becomes hostile, and so we end up having to guard our speech. We maybe have to edit what we want to share about our life when they ask, “What have you been up to?” It just changes dynamics so much. And then there are those who don’t really engage with their families so much anymore.
Colleen: Exactly.
Nikki: And so there’s a lot of loss, whichever camp you find yourself in.
Colleen: That’s very true. I will never forget the first Thanksgiving when Richard and I were not officially out of Adventism yet, but we had been doing our weekly Bible studies with our neighbors, and we were convinced at this point that our understandings of things as Adventists was not Biblical, so there was a lot of change going on in our heads, and we had a Thanksgiving during that whole process when I said to my neighbors in a burst of, I don’t know, stupid bravery, “If you’d like to come for Thanksgiving, I’ll cook turkey.” Well, I don’t remember ever cooking turkey before that, so I went out and found a turkey breast and prepared it, and the other guests at our Thanksgiving dinner were my in-laws, who were very staunch Adventists, and because I was a novice, and because the turkey breast had been frozen, I had underestimated the cook time. So the turkey was not done when the meal was ready, and I had that turkey breast in the oven along with the mock turkey loaf.
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: So my in-laws came in, and I have an indelible memory in my head of them sitting on the couch in the living room, and I am not kidding when I say they were lined up in a row with their arms folded across their chests staring, and the resentment was palpable. And I realized later when Richard said to me, “You know, it wasn’t just that you were cooking turkey, and it wasn’t just that they had to wait for it. It was that the molecules of that turkey were mingling with the molecules of the fake meat in the oven, and that, in their minds, was contaminating their mock turkey.”
Nikki: I have to confess to kind of thinking like that as an Adventist. My husband will tell you he had separate dishes for his meat –
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: – and I didn’t wash them.
Colleen: I totally understand that. When Richard and I were first married, he didn’t like to kiss me if I’d had meat. That was a little upsetting! [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: He’s over that, believe me. [Laughter.]
Nikki: So isn’t it interesting that food is a division.
Colleen: Food is a big division. And it stands for something, and I don’t think even Adventists understand how much it stands for. It’s not just, “Oh, you like that and I don’t.” It’s like, you’ve rejected our tradition, and you’ve rejected being spiritual before the Lord, and you’ve rejected – it stands for so much assumption.
Nikki: And you know, I know that there are Adventist families that do eat meat.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: I know that there were times when we had meat at our gatherings.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: It wasn’t necessarily a big issue if you had the right company.
Colleen: Yeah, my family would do that too.
Nikki: But you know, Adventist potlucks absolutely do not have meat.
Colleen: No.
Nikki: So even if you have a progressive Adventist say, “No, no, we’re not that way” –
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: – those same Adventists will not bring turkey to a potluck.
Colleen: That’s very true. That’s very true.
Nikki: They know that it’s an issue.
Colleen: Yes. It’s a stigma almost, that they’re not going to take that, at least not publicly.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And how ironic that so many of them actually indulge in meat and pepperoni and even wine when they’re in private, but in public, no, we won’t do that.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: You know, this actually reminds me of somebody that asked me a question just this week. This person is attending a Baptist church, having been Adventist, and her husband is not yet fully out of Adventism. He is actually still Adventist. And the question was, “I’ve been asked to visit my Adventist family during Thanksgiving, my husband’s Adventist family. And they really want me to go to church with them over the weekend. I really don’t want to go. What should I do? What would you even suggest?” You know, we have worked through that very issue several times with the people in our local Former Adventist group.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: It’s hard to figure out sometimes.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: Where does your loyalty to your family end; where does your loyalty to Jesus end and begin; where does it overlap? And I tell you, I have finally come to the conclusion that because I know Adventism teaches a false gospel and has a false Jesus, I have to see it in the same category as I would see Mormonism or Jehovah’s Witnesses –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – and I want to say, “Would you go to a Mormon award service or to a Jehovah’s Witness Kingdom Hall or even to a Buddhist temple to pray with your family if they asked you to do it?” And if the answer no, I believe the answer has to be the same for Adventism. Once you figure out what it is, it’s not the same as the gospel.
Nikki: This makes me think – I had the exact same struggle, you know.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: I had young nieces and nephews. They were going to be facing baptism. There were a lot of church activities surrounding graduations, you know.
Colleen: Oh, yes.
Nikki: And Adventist academy graduations are not just a marching ceremony.
Colleen: Oh, no.
Nikki: They include all of the Sabbath hours. So this is something we had to work through, and I didn’t feel peace about it.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: And I remember praying during that time, and Psalm 26 was a help to me. David talks about how he has walked in his integrity and how he has trusted the Lord, and he asks the Lord to test his heart and his mind and help him to walk in faithfulness, and then he says in verse 4: “I do not sit with men of falsehood” –
Colleen: Oh!
Nikki: – “nor do I consort with hypocrites. I hate the assembly of evildoers and will not sit with the wicked.”
Colleen: Wow.
Nikki: “I wash my hands in innocence and go around Your altar, O Lord, proclaiming Thanksgiving aloud and telling all Your wondrous deeds.” He says he loves the inhabitation of God’s house, and he refuses to fellowship with sinners, liars, and –
Colleen: Wow.
Nikki: – and that to me felt like, “Okay, you know what? David was a man after God’s own heart.”
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And his integrity was important to him, and he couldn’t fellowship with liars, and you know, I know there are a lot of people in Adventism who are honestly deceived –
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: – but to go and give them the right hand of fellowship seems to give credibility to their message.
Colleen: I agree. I agree. Now, I want to make it clear that I would never condemn somebody for going to church with their Adventist family. This whole process of leaving is a process.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And the Lord can convict us. He is the guardian of our hearts, and He is the one to whom we ultimately answer.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: Nobody answers to me. I wouldn’t want anybody to answer to me.
Nikki: Right, yeah.
Colleen: But the fact is, we can trust the Lord in this, and if He is convicting us that the Adventist message is a false message – and by the way, Ellen White even said that heavenly messengers are present in the Adventist church services.
Nikki: Yes, she did. That’s in their church manual.
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: Page 117. [Laughter.]
Colleen: Thank you for reminding me of that, Nikki. Because when Ellen White, who we know had visions that were not from God, but that told us who she believed God was, and it’s not the God of the Bible, then for her to say heavenly messengers are present in the church service, I can’t believe that’s God’s angels.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: By the prophet’s own testimony, there are spiritual influences present in those Adventist church services because they are honoring the Adventist gospel, which is not the gospel of the Lord Jesus. I know that sounds strong, but if I didn’t believe that, I would not be doing this podcast.
Nikki: And I think it’s worth mentioning to our Christian listeners that the Adventist church, what we would usually call “worship center” or “worship room,” it’s the sanctuary –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – and they dedicate it. They have big services. They even dedicate the organ, the piano –
Colleen: Yes, they do!
Nikki: They dedicate all of this to their message, to their God, and so it really is set apart for the Adventist message.
Colleen: Absolutely true, absolutely true. As hard as it is, my advice to somebody like this lady who wrote is, if it were me, I would want to talk to my husband beforehand and make sure he understands my heart and my commitment to him and my commitment to the Lord, but make it clear, so that he’s not surprised when I get there, where I stand, and see if he can actually perhaps support me in that. If he doesn’t, I still have to answer to the Lord.
Nikki: And it’s worth saying that the Lord holds us and keeps us no matter where we are.
Colleen: Totally true!
Nikki: “He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.”
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And so if we find ourselves in the name of submitting to your husband –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – sitting side-by-side in an Adventist sanctuary –
Colleen: Absolutely, absolutely.
Nikki: – no harm can come to you.
Colleen: That’s true. That’s very true. I agree, yeah. What has been the hardest thing for you when Thanksgiving starts looming on the horizon, Nikki, since leaving Adventism, for you personally?
Nikki: I’m not entirely sure how to articulate this, so I want to be careful, but I think one of the things that has been the hardest for me is, it seems that a lot of Christians, through their actions, not through what they teach or even what they believe, but through their actions, have treated the fact that we are family in Christ as if it’s a metaphor.
Colleen: Oh, my, yes.
Nikki: And so, for whatever reason, when people hear how I’m spending my holidays, there just seems to be that sense of being misunderstood by the Body of Christ.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: Because our life looks different.
Colleen: Yeah.
Nikki: And that’s not something that’s easy to explain to people –
Colleen: No.
Nikki: – if they have never walked what we’ve all walked; right?
Colleen: Exactly.
Nikki: And so probably one of the hardest things is that misunderstanding, and it can get inside of my own head and add to the temptation to believe it isn’t real that already exists –
Colleen: Yes, yes.
Nikki: – just because of, I don’t know, the lies are in our head when we are not rooted in Scripture.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: And so this time of year I end up spending a lot of time in God’s Word reminding myself of what He says is true, regardless of what believers and unbelievers alike might think.
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: I find a lot of hope in Ephesians.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: The prayer Paul prays of – this prayer of thanksgiving for the Body of Christ, and he prays that they would have the eyes of their hearts enlightened and that they would know the hope that God has called us to, and he says right in – it’s in verse 18, right in the middle of this prayer, that they would know what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints. The “His” there is Jesus.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And I remember the first time I saw that, I was like, “Whoa, wait a minute. The saints are Christ’s inheritance, and Romans 8 says we’re co-heirs.”
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: So that means that God’s people are my inheritance, that they belong to me and that I belong to them, and this is not a metaphor –
Colleen: No.
Nikki: – this is a real thing.
Colleen: No; this is real.
Nikki: This is a reality.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And somehow – by the way, that co-heirs with Christ in Romans 8 is right there with God sending His Spirit into our heart, the spirit of adoption –
Colleen: Yes, absolutely.
Nikki: – by which we cry “Abba, Father.”
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: So we have this understanding that we belong to God, that we are His.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And at the same time, we’re co-heirs with Christ, which means the saints are my siblings, and there’s this family-ness that happens –
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: – when we’re transferred into the Kingdom of the Beloved Son. And so when I really set my mind on that and I understand my position in Christ –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – I can look across the room at somebody who may not see me as family, and I can know, “That’s okay; I know you’re my family.”
Colleen: [Laughter.] Yes.
Nikki: You know?
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And so getting that identity from Christ rather than from what the people around me think –
Colleen: Wow. Yes.
Nikki: – when they look at me. And I know, Colleen, that you have had to work through some of these thoughts.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: Can you share that with us?
Colleen: Oh, yes. I know I’ve often said this to you, but I can’t imagine, you know, any little girl growing up and saying, “I know what I want to do with my life. I’m going to grow up and be a second wife and a stepmom!” [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: But that is my life! When I married Richard, I became a stepmother to a two-year-old and a six-year-old, and they were adorable, but it was very difficult. They were very traumatized, as many children of divorce are, and there were other issues as well, and I realized even then, the Lord was very clear with me. Even though I was still Adventist, it was very clear to me this was the Lord’s assignment. He was asking me to love these children for Him. He had brought them into my life to love.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: It was an amazing journey. The Lord knit those little boys into my heart, and they grew into men, and when they were 21 and 25, I adopted them. And, as Richard says, that was a golden day. It was by their desire and mine. It was a 3-way – 4-way, because Richard absolutely was part of the decision, but those young men wanted me to adopt them, and the most astonishing thing I realized, during the adoption ceremony in the judge’s chambers, was that as an adoptive parent, I cannot disinherit them, that they are forever mine, because they had to agree to give up their inheritance from their birth mom and accept me as their mom. I realized that parents can disinherit natural born children, but the law says I cannot disinherit my adopted children, and that was very moving to me because I realized that adoption metaphor in Romans and in Galatians, where when we trust Christ we’re adopted children of God, that was a very serious legal metaphor that Paul used to explain how seriously firm our belonging to God is.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: The other thing that I realized afterwards is that – and I know this probably sounds, you know, superlative or somehow excessive, but it was very true – I was aware that my sons were more my own than if they had merely been born to me. Now, I don’t mean to, you know, put down on natural born children, because that is something that is an amazing thing that God gives us, but these boys were legally mine, they have new birth certificates showing me as their mother, as if it were an infant adoption, and they’re also mine by blood, the blood of Christ.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: Because both of them love the Lord and have trusted Him, and they’re not only my sons, but they are my true brothers in Christ, and I know I will spend eternity with them, and that is overwhelming to me, when I think about the double way the Lord has put those boys into my heart. But I have to say that over the years I really had to submit a lot of anxiety and internal uncertainty to the Lord, because I felt like in some way I was not a true mother when they were growing up, even though I was mothering.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: I finally had to realize that the Lord is the one who builds the family.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: He brought those children to me and me to them, and I had to believe that if I loved Him, He had my best interest at heart, and He had their best interest at heart, and this was His provision, and that has been the thing that has kind of changed the way I look at so much of my life. The Lord’s provision for me is absolute. He said that when we trust Him, we may lose family, friends, houses, and lands, but that we will receive a hundredfold what we lose for His sake. That hundredfold may not look exactly like what we lost –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – or what we think we deserve or what we think we should have, but He provides what He knows we need, and He provided me with two sons who are mine as surely as if I had given birth to them. But not only that, He has brought other people into my life who are my true children in the Lord. Since adopting my sons, I’ve seen Psalm 113:9 in a whole new way. “He gives the barren woman a home, making her the joyous mother of children. Praise the Lord!” And there’s another psalm as well that has come to mean something to me that is new: “God makes a home for the lonely. He leads out the prisoners into prosperity. Only the rebellious dwell in a parched land,” which is an amazing statement. And as I look at my life since having my sons come into it, I realize that the Lord has brought me other people as well. He’s brought my sons wives, and their children. He has brought us our Tracy, who entered our life 18 years ago when she was 20, and her husband and their kids, and He has brought me you and Carel and your kids. He’s brought me brothers and sisters in Jesus that I would never have known who are closer to me than mere blood could make them.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And when He rebuilds our lives, He does give us family.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And it is by His definition, and I will never get over my amazement when I saw that story of Jesus and His brothers through new eyes. He was preaching, and His mother and His brothers came to talk to Him –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – and He said, and I always thought it was so rude –
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: – “Who are my mother and my brothers,” and He threw His arms around His disciples and said, “My mother and my brothers and my sisters are those who do the will of my Father,” and I realized right there that the Lord Jesus Himself redefined family when we love Him.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And by His grace, He often does include our natural families in that circle of His family, but He’s in charge, and He gives us what we need.
Nikki: Um-hmm. As you were talking about how your boys, their birth certificate changed, and you’re their mother.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: I don’t know why it made me think about – I can’t remember where it is in Hebrews, but where it’s talking about Moses, and it says that he considered the reproach of Christ more important than being considered the son of Pharaoh’s daughter.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: Christ defines us.
Colleen: He does.
Nikki: And He becomes supreme in our life, and I know, and I hope our listeners know, we’re not advocating the abandonment of family.
Colleen: Absolutely not.
Nikki: That’s not what we’re talking about right now.
Colleen: Uh-uh.
Nikki: We’re talking about the inclusion of a whole new family.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And having a place in God’s family and that that is real, that is just as real as the table in front of us. It is a reality.
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: And I think sometimes it can be thought of as something that will happen one day –
Colleen: Oh, yes.
Nikki: – but it’s now, it’s right now, and that passage that talks about how, you know, we may lose all of those things, but we’ll get a hundredfold, it does say “with persecution.”
Colleen: It does say that. Another thing that comes to my mind with Thanksgiving is that, from our unique perspective, and I don’t want to say that we’re completely unique in the world, but having left an unbiblical religion and having lost our identities and our social contacts as we have done that, it has caused me to have to examine a lot of things I might not have wanted to look at –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – like about my own life, about my own past, about my experiences growing up and in school, Adventist schools and so forth, and I realize that I have had a lot of residual anxiety from a lot of those things that happened that I had no way to understand before I knew who Jesus was. I had no way to understand that some of what I experienced was actually wrong, you know.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: It was presented as, “Do this and be good,” but it was actually teaching me to do things that were wrong or to accept things that were wrong, and it caused a great deal of anxiety in me over the years. I’ve had to remember that Paul says in Philippians 4, and this is a hard thing to figure out how to live by, but when one can understand that we can trust God’s promises, it becomes such a liberating verse, “Rejoice in the Lord always; I’ll say it again, Rejoice! Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything,” and reading that, it’s like, really? You’re saying that to Colleen “Anxious” Tinker?
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: “But in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” And over the years, I have learned that when anxiety seems to overwhelm me, when my fear of something impending that I can’t control is right in front of me, I have to sometimes, maybe every five minutes, go to the Lord and say, “I believe that you tell the truth, I believe your promises, and I know you’re commanding me not to be anxious, not because I have to just control my emotions, which I can’t seem to do, but because your Word can’t fail” –
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: – “and you’ve promised always to be with me, so please hold my heart in peace.” And when I’m able to say, “Lord, I want to love you and honor you and trust you more than I want to indulge my anxiety,” He does meet me there. I remember reading a story once of a young woman who was going to do something she terribly feared doing, and she prayed this prayer, which I’ve often prayed myself: “Lord, please be more real to me than my fear.”
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And I find that that seems to be part of what we have to face sometimes at the holidays.
Nikki: Yeah. I like what you said there, when you talked about how you have to face all of these things that happened to you in all these various places –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – because, you know, Adventism touches every single area of life, every single one.
Colleen: Absolutely. That’s true.
Nikki: Childhood, dating, marriage –
Colleen: Absolutely true!
Nikki: – parenting, eating, sleeping, resting working, I mean, all of it. It affects everything.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And so, of course, as the holidays approach, these things come up in us –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – and that anxiety comes up, that old anxiety, and you know, I’ve learned so much from you about – like that particular prayer, you taught me that prayer, “Be more real to me than my fears.”
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: And I’ve also learned that gratitude, thanking Him right there in that text –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – thanking Him for His provision, all of the ways that He provides for us. In the middle of the anxiety, He does not take that away –
Colleen: No.
Nikki: – that provision in that text you read earlier, it’s, yes, we get a hundredfold with persecution –
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: – these things go hand in hand, they go together, and if we focus on the anxiety, if we focus on the persecution, we miss the provision, we miss the redemption.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: One of the things that I often am so grateful for around the holidays in particular, and especially Christmas [laughter] –
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: – is the Body of Christ. It’s the church.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And that is where so much of God’s redemption in my life has occurred. It’s been in the “one anothers.” It’s been in – honestly, after leaving Adventism, it’s been in taking risks –
Colleen: Absolutely.
Nikki: – to allow myself to have relationships with people.
Colleen: I know. That’s true.
Nikki: It would be far too easy to just say, like many do, “All I need is a relationship with Jesus. I don’t need to go to church, I don’t need to be a part of people in the church, they’re all sinners and I don’t need to go there.” Well, here’s what I want to say to them, “I understand. I totally understand.”
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: People are hard.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: People in the church, out of the church, people are just hard; I get it. But if you can find a healthy church where people are submitted to God’s Word –
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: – there is so much redemption waiting for you there, and I remember one of the things that you told me early on as I was kind of working through this life after –
Colleen: Right.
Nikki: – I remember you told me that I could trust God with the people He was putting in my life and the things He was asking me to do, I could trust Him with it –
Colleen: Yes. Um-hmm.
Nikki: – even if I couldn’t trust the people.
Colleen: Yes, exactly.
Nikki: And so that walking in obedience. We were not just rescued from the domain of darkness, we were not justgiven eternal life – as if those are “justs” – we were not – He is such a God of blessing and grace and mercy, He also gave us siblings –
Colleen: Yes, He did.
Nikki: – like it or not, and He tells us gather, and He tells us to love one another, forgive one another, bear with one another, carry each other’s burdens. You cannot believe the Bible and believe that it’s okay to just have a relationship with Jesus and reject the rest of His family.
Colleen: That’s so true, and it’s hard to get used to. Like I have said to you before, Nikki, we’re related to one another when we trust Jesus. We are related to one another by blood.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: As a mom who is an adoptive mom, I am sometimes annoyed when I hear people say, “Blood is thicker than water.”
Nikki: Oh, yes.
Colleen: No! Absolutely not.
Nikki: Um-hmm. Right.
Colleen: I do not share a genetic pool with my sons, but they could not be more my sons.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: But I want to say this: We’re connected by the blood of Jesus, and that is thicker than everything else. There’s nothing that can separate us from Him, and there’s nothing that can separate us from one another when we’re in Him. We are part of His Body, and that Body includes everybody who has believed since the Day of Pentecost onward. The Body of Christ is real. They have not disappeared just because they have died. They’re real, they’re still in Christ, and we’re in Christ with them, even though we can’t see them and talk to them at the moment.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: But they’re there, and we are His Body, and we are connected for eternity. It’s so exciting to me.
Nikki: I remember how amazing it was to realize that I have a new lineage.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: I have a new family tree.
Colleen: We have a new Father. We’re born of God, as John says in John 1:12. It’s very exciting.
Nikki: So if you’re a former Adventist and you find yourself sitting in some uncomfortable gatherings over the holidays, you need to know, you’re a part of a very large family.
Colleen: Yes.
Nikki: And even if we’re not sitting around the same table, we are your family, and we absolutely will be – I do pray for formers, for believers who have lost family, I pray for them –
Colleen: Yes, yes.
Nikki: – during these holidays in particular, because I know it’s hard.
Colleen: I agree. It’s very hard. All of these provisions are ours because Jesus did everything necessary to justify us before God. It’s so amazing. The words Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 15:56. He says, “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the Law.” Jesus fulfilled the Law, and He removed that sting of death from us when we trust Him. Because of Him, I have family in Him, and it’s worth saying, even the former Adventists who still have warm relationships with their Adventist families, when you get together, you can know that whatever you may feel that is somewhat disjunctive with them or whatever you may feel that is warm, like a gift from God, all these things are from Him, and in addition to that Adventist family that you’re still loving and praying for, you have a family in Christ that you’re already part of, and that doesn’t stop, whether you’re with them, whether you’re sitting through their family worship, or whether you’re just not even with them over the holidays. When we are in Christ, He doesn’t leave us; we don’t stop being His family, no matter where we actually are. So if you are experiencing Thanksgiving with your family this year, thank God that He has preserved those relationships with your Adventist family.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: And ask Him to make them receptive to truth, and use that opportunity to speak the gospel to them. You may be the people they can hear. You may be the closest ones to them who know the Lord, and ask Him to open up the opportunity for you to speak the gospel to them. And one last thing, this new family in Christ, this experience that we share when we leave Adventism, we have a great event every February, and we’re just inviting you to come and be part of it. Our annual Former Adventist Fellowship Conference –
Nikki: – which has always felt like a family reunion to me.
Colleen: Absolutely, to me too! [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: It’ll be February 14 through 16 in Loma Linda, and if you go to proclamationmagazine.com, you will find a link that will tell you more about the conference. This year our theme is Jesus, The New Covenant Lawgiver, so we just invite you to come and experience meeting some of your family in Christ.
Nikki: And I want to say too that at these conferences we have incredible teaching. We have wonderful people who come and bring the Word of God and bring clarity to it and definitely deal with false teachings in Adventism, but it’s more than the teaching, it’s a kind of fellowship that I don’t even – I’ve never experienced anywhere else.
Colleen: Yes, me too.
Nikki: When we gather, I don’t feel like the people that I’m sitting side-by-side with, who I’ve never met, I don’t feel like they’re strangers.
Colleen: That’s so true.
Nikki: There’s an immediate family connection.
Colleen: Um-hmm.
Nikki: You don’t have to worry about coming and feeling out of place.
Colleen: That’s true.
Nikki: If you don’t like hugs, you might feel a little uncomfortable. [Laughter.]
Colleen: [Laughter.]
Nikki: But this is a wonderful time of fellowship, and I hope you guys will join us, and you know, this Thanksgiving, I am so thankful for you guys. I’m thankful for all of you. I’m thankful for the formers, I’m thankful for the family that God has given me, and I’m looking forward to making turkey with you, Colleen. [Laughter.]
Colleen: I’m looking forward to it too, Nikki. The bacon will be in the fridge. [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, and I pray that the Lord will give you a sense of truly being His and of truly experiencing the connection of family in Jesus this Thanksgiving. We’re going to wrap this podcast with one of Paul’s prayers. This one is especially dear to me, and to be honest, I have actually prayed this prayer for my husband over the years, but here it is in Ephesians 3:14-21. “For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you according to the riches of His glory to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.”
Nikki: Amen. Happy Thanksgiving.
Colleen: Happy Thanksgiving. †
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