Clarity and Understanding To Leave
I want to thank you for the Former Adventist Podcast.…In March of 2020 I received a transformed life through the true gospel preached…I went from death to life. I had a Holy Spirit experience that I call my Saul to Paul moment. Scripture was illuminated before my eyes; a veil totally lifted, and I couldn’t believe I had never understand books like Colossians, Ephesians, Galatians, and Romans before. I remember reading Ephesians 1 and 2 moments after and sobbing as I read it thinking, “How did I never see this before?”…
My husband had a similar transformed life story through hearing the gospel…In the last four years since then we have been on fire for the gospel! We have been sharing our testimonies, helping others see the true gospel and their identity, and we can’t stop talking about how good and SIMPLE He is. We like to say Truth is a person; his name is Jesus.
We have tried to reach our local church…We would go to Sabbath School, and my husband even preached a couple of times. But it falls on deaf ears.
We related so much to your sharing in the podcast about how you tried to have a Sabbath School and only speak from Scripture. We were doing the same. When lessons from the quarterly were lofty and intellectual, we would simply say, “Well, let’s see what the Bible says?” And when we would take them to Scripture. It’s as if we made them uncomfortable, and we noticed they wouldn’t look at us when we spoke.
Over the past year I’ve felt it in my heart that I was not identifying with Adventism anymore but with Christ and Christ alone. But I couldn’t put my finger on it. I couldn’t come up with a good enough reason to leave. We can still be free in Christ and go to the Adventist church, right? But I would sit in sermons searching for small glimpses of truth, hoping I would hear it, and it was never there.
Then, in the past six months, the Holy Spirit has been revealing more and more about Adventism that wasn’t adding up to me. We were so blessed when about a month ago a friend sent us your podcast!!! What a blessing!
You put understanding and stories to things I couldn’t understand. I never knew what a fraud EGW is. As Dale puts it, we were living as Evangelical Adventists, not thinking we needed to believe in EGW to be Adventist. However, we had no idea the foundation of false prophecy the organization stands on. I have been appalled and angry in moments, mind-blown by the brain washing—embarrassed almost—but with relief I have so much peace to know the truth and to have clarity and the understanding to leave.
Anyway, I could go on and on, but I just want to thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your endurance and confidence in your ministry. We are so grateful. People are waking up, and the veil is lifting.
Please be encouraged that people are out here receiving what you have to offer!
—VIA EMAIL
Response: The Lord is the One who has led you to see the depth of Adventist deception. The way you have described the Bible suddenly making sense, and your increasing feeling that you weren’t identifying with Adventism—these things really are demonstrations of the fact that the Lord has revealed Himself to you and made you His! As Nikki and I often say, God saves us in spite of Adventism, but once we are His, He doesn’t leave us embedded in that deception. He finishes what He begins in us. He leads us completely out and into freedom.
You have begun an exciting, transforming, shocking, but SO worth-it journey. Walking out of Adventism involves a spiritual battle, but the Lord is faithful. He keeps His promises, and the One who has given you eternal life is the One who will guide your steps, one at a time, and He will keep teaching you truth and anchoring you in reality. God’s word is inerrant and living, and the the Lord Himself will teach you, showing you how to submit to His word and how to apply it to your lives.
I am so happy for you and thankful to God!
Please Help!
At this time, it seems that the Adventism is the only real church in Ethiopia. We have underestimated the salvation found in Christ. Now we are living under the threat of persecution. I am thirty-two years old, and I still attend the Adventist Church. I have many questions because from my teen age up to now we have only the same thing.
My language is Amharic, so please understand my English even if it’s not grammatically correct. I am a music leader and a singer, but but there is something that I am missing. I hope you will help.
With respect,
—VIA EMAIL
Response: You are free to email me anytime.
I have a suggestion for you: get out your Bible, and read Galatians, the whole book, (six chapters) every day, all six chapters. Ask the Lord to teach you what He knows He wants you to learn, and ask Him to show you how the Lord Jesus brought in the new covenant in His blood and what that means.
If you can understand the English, I suggest that you watch the Former Adventist Fact Check videos covering The Great Controversy Sabbath School lessons. The link to the playlist is here:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLN9GSkxQf71ZbPFg4gYhVC811rx2nHJ69&si=IRL58jOXi8aPfqXm
Also, here is one podcast addressing the New Covenant and how Jesus fulfilled the law:
I pray the Lord will teach you and show you the amazing reality of the Lord Jesus’s finished atonement which was completed on the cross! When we come to Him in repentance, He forgives us and gives us eternal life at that moment (see John 5:24).
Thank you from Dallas!
Good morning! Just wanted to send an encouraging note with you. I love how sometimes God nudges us through others in a way that really feels like He’s talking to us directly.
The other day I was in my car driving home listening to your recent podcast on Romans (episode 275). I’m subscribed through Apple Podcasts, and it has a new feature that displays the transcript of the podcast, which is great for going back and taking notes! Anyway, I’m about 3/4 through the episode, and while Colleen is talking about how we have fellowship with God through Jesus Christ, she says, “God has become so respectable that He can be worshipped in Highland Park, in University Park, in Richardson…”
Now, I’m in Dallas, TX, driving home through the main freeway that runs through the city, at that exact moment I was in the Highland Park and University Park part of town and had just come out of Richardson. I know y’all are in southern California, and I don’t know if there are parts of town there with those names, but I loved the call outs! It made me wonder if y’all were in Dallas recently. I had to rewind to make sure I heard right! But then I felt the Spirit telling me that yes, God is with us everywhere and is worthy of praise wherever we are and whenever we are!
Thank you for all you do! Keep up the great work!
—VIA EMAIL
Response: I’m sorry that the attribution got a bit lost in the reading, but that reference to Highland Park, etc., was part of a quote from the late S. L. Johnson who was on the faculty at Dallas Theological Seminary. That was a quote from a sermon he gave in 1980. Imagine…so current and so long ago!
I’m sorry that the last sentence about God’s respectability somehow got lost from the attribution to the quote I was reading…but I can’t take credit for that line.
Thank you for letting us know that you subscribe and that you listen and that you encouraged us. It means a lot to us!
We thank God for every former Adventist He pulls out of darkness and transfers to the kingdom of His beloved Son!
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