Letters Remembering Dale Ratzlaff
Thank you so much for the notice. I wish I could attend, but distance and my circumstances will not allow me. I’ll definitely check it out on YouTube.
Our ministry will never forget Dale, and neither will the Lord!
—LARRY WESSELS, CAnswersTV
Dale was a gracious man and he loved Truth. He lived with much adversity for that love of truth, but now he is in the presence of the One of all righteousness and truth. He will be missed by many.
Till we meet again.
—VIA EMAIL
I love Dale’s work, and I will attend the memorial service virtually. Please accept my condolences.
—VIA EMAIL
it was watching his video about the Sabbath that made me finally understand that it wasn’t for new covenant Christians. His testimony has been an inspiration to me, and I know he has gone to be with the Lord.
—VIA EMAIL
Because of the distance (and travel cost) and my health, I will not be able to come to the memorial service, but my heart and memories will be there. Dale is one of the people who profoundly affected my life!
—VIA EMAIL
I am deeply saddened by the loss and glad that Pastor Dale is now with Jesus.
—VIA EMAIL
I won’t be able to attend, but I will always remember Dale’s amazing talks that I listened to online. We know he is with the Lord, and that is what we all look forward to. Peace and love to you all, and thank you for your ministry. And, thank you for all the caring and informative talks you had with me over the phone a few years ago.
—VIA EMAIL
Thank you for the invitation to Dale’s memorial service, but as I’m in the UK, I won’t be able to attend. I will be thinking of you all and give thanks to God for Dale’s life and for all he did to help those of us who were Adventists to understand the false teachings.
—VIA EMAIL
Much as l would love to be there, it is just not possible. Sending my love and condolences; may the blessed hope of Jesus’ soon return comfort and bless you.Dale has been such a blessing in my life and my walk with the Lord.
—VIA EMAIL–NEW ZEALAND
Requesting Membership Removal
My husband and I left the Adventist church in 2008. We have gone through many hurdles on our way to the true gospel. The result is so freeing, providing true peace and contentment. We thank our Savior for this wonderful, though challenging, change of our lives.
For several years now, I have felt the need to formally request the removal of our memberships from the Adventist membership rolls. My question is what should that letter look like?
Do you have a basic template that we can roughly follow to request removal of our official memberships? What should we put in the letter to clarify that we are not open to visits to discuss our changes from Adventism to true Biblical beliefs?
If we should try explaining, how do we do this in kindness but stressing we hold to only Biblical stances based on context and common idioms of the time of writing, cultural practices of the Biblical time of writing, and that we only follow Biblical study using the Berean study method?
Do we need to explain that we do not accept any of the Fundamental Adventist beliefs that come from taking verse(s) out of their contexts?
With that being said, do you have some type of form letter that explains, but not over-explains, our change in Biblical doctrines that require us to request Adventist membership removal?
Where do we send this request? The local conference? The church where our membership still resides? Is there a main conference department where the official memberships are kept that we need to send the letter to?
In your experience, do the Adventist leaders respond or just ignore these requests? How will we know if they have formally removed us from their membership lists?
We thank you in advance for responding to these questions.
—VIA EMAIL
Response: Thank you for writing!
Yes, it is a good thing to ask for one’s name to be removed from the Adventist membership rolls.
There is no specific template. Some people write the briefest of letters simply asking for their membership to be removed. Others state that they no longer believe the doctrines of Adventism and request removal. Still others take the opportunity to write out their convictions regarding the doctrines individually. Whichever format you prefer, there are some basics to consider.
First, Adventist membership is held at the local church level. Therefore, when requesting membership removal, the request must be made to the church board or the pastoral staff or both. Just for the sake of accountability, however, we suggest that you send the request to both groups and also send a CC to the secretary of the local conference office. That way the pastor knows that the conference is aware of the request, and vice versa. If you send the request only to the conference, they will not deal with it but will punt the request back to you to send to the local church. Email, incidentally, is considered a legal document and is a good way to do this request.
Second, ask for a response informing you that your request has been granted. Some churches ignore such requests, or perhaps may even remove your name but not contact you. Some people have to ask again—and it seems to help to request a response.
Third, on the other end of the spectrum, some churches ask to have a pastoral visit with you before removing your name. You do not need to engage in such a meeting unless you desire to because of a personal relationship or some other reason. In general, however, we recommend that you do not have such a meeting, and it is a good preemptive move to ask that they not contact you for a visit. Adventist pastors are trained to try to pull you back in, especially if they have a relationship with you. There is no need to engage in a conversation in which you will simply defend your decision against the carefully-crafted entrapment of Adventist dogma mixed with emotional entrapment.
In your case, you have been gone from the local congregation for many years; it seems unlikely that they would try to have a meeting with you—but if they do, there is no need at all to engage in such. Relationships are already severed to some extent at least. Furthermore, it sounds as if they haven’t been seeking you to find out why you are missing. Simply writing to ask to have your name removed with a request for a confirmation that they have removed it should be enough.
When we wrote, we sent our local church a very brief letter requesting that our names be removed and that we be notified when the removal had occurred. We did meet with our pastor because we had been working directly with him doing public relations for the church, but that meeting was our choice in order to be respectful of the relationship we had had with him.
There is no “formula” for how to write such a letter; nevertheless, I want to encourage you not to be more detailed than you personally wish to be. Be direct and clear about what you wish to receive from them. If you don’t hear back within a month or so, write another letter and repeat the request. †
- April 27–May 3, 2024 - April 25, 2024
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- April 20–26, 2024 - April 18, 2024
Just prior to Dale Ratzlaff’s death and reading some background to his founding of Proclamation and Life Assurance Ministries, I realized that I was probably one of the first people who received Proclamation in the mail. I had been a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church for almost ten years, and my husband was an Adventist from birth. Wow! What I read really spoke to me and some of the doubts that I had been having about the SDA Church. I continued to receive the magazine each month, and read it from cover to cover. I asked a friend if she had received the magazine and what she thought about it. She told me that she refused to read “those things” and advised me to toss them in the trash. I wasn’t about to do that, and kept reading each magazine as it came. I ordered some of Dale’s books and a few of the books that were recommended. All of this new information I pondered and prayed about, eventually leading me to leave the SDA Church. I had many discussions with my husband, someone who was a strong, practicing Adventist who had gone through the SDA educational system through college. Within a couple of years, he, too, left the SDA Church. We have been practicing Christians belonging to an active and nurturing church for almost 20 years. I thank God for all the work Dale was led to do and for his reaching out to an Adventist who, through his efforts, became a former Adventist. “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free!” -Joanne Claridge