NICOLE STEVENSON | Co-Host, Former Adventist Podcast
After being born again my sense of identity and reality was permanently changed. I knew I had a new Father—a new God! I knew I had been placed in His family and that I’d been given work to do. What I didn’t know was how drastically this would change everything about my life and the future I had imagined.
To begin with, the work God gave me was to learn how to trust Him with whatever He placed in front of me. Day by day I was learning to walk in faith. What I didn’t realize then was how this walk of faith would lead my life down unexpected paths, that I would face challenges that threatened my ability to walk in integrity and experience temptations to suppress truth for the sake of peace. In the months and years that followed my new birth, I had to learn to trust God in vulnerable places—at the risk of great loss, and in the midst of great sorrow.
God began to prepare me for this trust in the midst of loss immediately after giving me new life. He gave me a profound desire to read His word and began teaching me there. Contextually reading Scripture (and believing it) instructed me in the will of God, and it was changing me. Each time I read I was amazed that I’d never before understood the truths or the commands to the church that were so clearly articulated by the Spirit. I loved learning about God, and with new consistency I studied the Scriptures, both alone and in Christian fellowship, to learn what it means to live faithfully and to serve Him.
Light Exposes Darkness & Idolatry
Soon enough trials and temptations targeted the most vulnerable parts of me. Life was beginning to feel like a spiritual boot camp, and all I could do was cling to the promises in Scripture. I trusted that God would keep me to the end, that He would wash me with the Word and teach me to walk in ways that pleased Him. I didn’t expect that being washed with the Word would expose sin and idolatry in me— though I’m not sure why not.
My earliest battles occurred where my new life intersected with the old. It was there that both the word of God and the temptations I faced revealed sins which on my own I never would have recognized as sin. God was showing me the truth about myself. The light of His word was exposing the darkness of my unexamined idols.
To begin with, I had to face my fear of losing relationships— my fear of man. Connected to that, I had to surrender to Him my people-pleasing and peace-keeping. They were idols I’d managed to “moralize” so that “in the name of love” I could participate in Adventist gatherings even when they burdened my conscience and grieved my spirit.
We make it our aim to please Him
When interacting in Adventist circles I felt like I was stepping through a kind of spiritual wormhole into a familiar universe; one in which I was no longer at home yet knew well what was expected of me. It was a “reality” where all social norms and expectations were wrapped in a facade of morality which now ran counter to my new nature. It was a “morality” that demanded my spiritual compromise.
If I didn’t capitulate to the system’s definitions of family loyalty and love (which included remaining silent about my new faith or attending Adventist services if invited), I would be perceived as unloving, judgmental, or even as bringing shame upon the family. This wasn’t unique to me. My husband was my dear companion on this journey, and together we sought the Scriptures and Biblical counsel to learn how to walk in ways that honored the Lord.
For my husband and me, learning to say no to the demands Adventism continued to make of us through our extended family systems, and to faithfully honor the Lord with all of our selves and our lives, meant giving up our picture of what our life would look like. We had to give up our need to be understood or approved and to accept temporary losses while praying for the Lord to redeem them in eternal ways.
God Defines Loyal Love
I once thought that loving well meant not causing discomfort for others, but Scripture had transformed my understanding of love. Contained in love is the act of speaking and living truthfully before God and man. While I once believed I needed to maintain peace at the expense of sharing truth, the Word taught me that I was redeemed so that I could share the Truth even at the expense of my personal peace. True love carries a cross on its back. Living to please the Lord means being willing to suffer with Him.
I had lived 30 years allowing Adventism to define what family loyalty, love, and righteous living looked like. I had already repented of the Adventist gospel, but I eventually realized I needed to repent of my submission to other aspects of the Adventist worldview.
I had to refuse to accommodate Adventism’s internal definitions of loyal love— even if that meant being misunderstood by Adventist loved ones. God has spoken in His Word, and I had to trust that He is powerful enough to be eternally clear about what godly love looks like. Learning to apply His truth to the circumstances of my life took a great deal of faith. It was the call to walk with the Lord the same way in which we came to Him—by faith— that kept me taking the next steps (Col. 2:6).
Spiritual Warfare: Perseverance is Not Passive
The dynamics that invade relationships between Adventists and those who uncompromisingly and openly leave for Jesus are sudden and palpable. Our ability to communicate with Adventist loved ones seems to be invariably altered. It can feel as if we stand pleading the gospel while a distortion field hangs between us translating our efforts into something else entirely.
We know that “we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” (Eph 6:12). Even so, watching the spiritual battle occur in the context of relationships with flesh and blood is devastating and lonely. It can also cause us to wonder if we are living faithfully at all. Why is the fruit of our obedience to Christ producing dissension and heartache?
We have to remember that the spiritual authorities and cosmic powers over this present darkness have no problem with taking hostages. By invading the relationships most dear to us and creating divisions commensurate with our faithfulness to the Lord we can easily be brought to a place of confusion and temptation to capitulate.
We have to remember that the spiritual authorities and cosmic powers over this present darkness have no problem with taking hostages. By invading the relationships most dear to us and creating divisions commensurate with our faithfulness to the Lord we can easily be brought to a place of confusion and temptation to capitulate.
This is why Paul tells us in Ephesians 6 to put on the armor of God. Each piece gives us what we need to trust God and stand in the evil day, uncontrolled by the fiery arrows of the enemy, and masterfully equips us to wield the sword of truth, the Word of God. As we face the consequences within our relationships for the faith we now have, we cannot forget that Jesus told us these things would happen, and He told us that our loyalty to Him matters.
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” —Matthew 10:34-36
The Place Where His Glory Dwells
When I was in the thick of wrestling with the issue of whether or not to attend any kind of services held by the Seventh-day Adventists I came across Psalm 26. As I read David’s words through tears, I felt every word I read. I longed to feel the freedom that came from David’s commitment to refuse to even sit with men of falsehood. He declared that he would instead go around the Lord’s altar and that he loved the habitation of God’s house where His glory dwells. I felt David’s heart, and as I read his words, they became my prayer and my permission to abstain from attending a congregation of falsehood.
1 Vindicate me, O LORD,
for I have walked in my integrity,
and I have trusted in the LORD without wavering.
2 Prove me, O LORD, and try me;
test my heart and my mind.
3 For your steadfast love is before my eyes,
and I walk in your faithfulness.4 I do not sit with men of falsehood,
nor do I consort with hypocrites.
5 I hate the assembly of evildoers,
and I will not sit with the wicked.6 I wash my hands in innocence
and go around your altar, O LORD,
7 proclaiming thanksgiving aloud,
and telling all your wondrous deeds.8 O LORD, I love the habitation of your house
and the place where your glory dwells.
9 Do not sweep my soul away with sinners,
nor my life with bloodthirsty men,
10 in whose hands are evil devices,
and whose right hands are full of bribes.11 But as for me, I shall walk in my integrity;
redeem me, and be gracious to me.
12 My foot stands on level ground;
in the great assembly I will bless the LORD.—Psalm 26
David longed to be faithful to the Lord. He wanted the Lord to prove and try his heart and mind; he sought to conform to the will of God. He meditated upon the faithful love of God, confessing that it was God’s faithfulness in which he walked. He contrasted his disdain for false worship and false worshipers with his love for God’s altar, His house, and the place where His glory dwelled. He did not want his soul or his life to be united with sinners and bloodthirsty men. Instead, he strove to walk in integrity knowing his redemption came to him by God through His grace. David knew that with God he stood on level ground and that one day he would bless the Lord in His great assembly.
We know from David’s life that this didn’t mean he hid away from the world. To be sure, we cannot remove ourselves from the world, nor am I suggesting that faithfulness to God means refusing to be in the presence of unbelievers or refusing to socialize with unbelieving family. But when relationships of any kind demand spiritual compromise from us, we cannot allow our love for others to dictate our faithfulness to God.
When we love the glory of God and the proclamation of His saving gospel more than we love being liked or accepted, we will know what it truly is to be undivided— to walk in integrity. We will know what integrity feels like, and we will know the comfort of the Lord as we suffer with Him.
Zeal for Your House
It may seem odd to some, but one of my favorite accounts of Jesus’ earthly life is found in John 2 when He cleanses the temple. I find it difficult to read the passage without crying. In this account we see how God feels about those who use what belongs to Him to place obstacles before those who long to know and serve Him.
The temple was everything to the Jewish people. It was where they went to atone for sin and to pray and seek the Lord. When the passover (which foreshadowed what Christ was here to do) was at hand Jesus went into the temple and saw that men had turned His Father’s house of prayer into a market place. There they sat turning a profit in the name of “meeting the religious needs of the people”, making the house of God a house of trade for personal gain.
“The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, ‘Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.’ His disciples remembered that it was written, ’Zeal for your house will consume me.’
“So the Jews said to him, ’What sign do you show us for doing these things?’ Jesus answered them, ’Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ The Jews then said, ’It has taken forty-six years to build this temple,and will you raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking about the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.” —John 2:13-22
Through His death and resurrection Jesus was going to open the way for all of us to access God freed from religious manipulations and obstacles! Through His death and resurrection, the Lord Jesus would make a way for you and me, and all of believing humanity, to bypass those who would “set up marketplace at the temple” (or in their publishing houses) so that we could worship Him in spirit and in truth wherever we are. Through His resurrection life He would cause us to be born again, and we would become the habitation of His house—place where His glory dwells!
What does this have to do with Adventism? The way I’ve come to understand it, choosing to tacitly affirm Seventh-day Adventist doctrines and practices with our attendance at their services (even if just to make loved ones comfortable) is akin to pulling up a chair at the tables of the money changers. It is choosing to sit on the wrong side of the whip of the wrath of God against those who defile the things of God for personal gain and who create obstacles before those who are seeking Him.
God hates idolatry and false teachers. How can we choose to sit with such men of falsehood— men who have ensnared our loved ones in their profiting? How can we allow our loved ones to feel comfortable lost in the marketplace when the gospel that saves them has gone outside the camp?
Follow Jesus
“So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood. Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come. Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.” —Hebrews 13:13-15
As a Christian, I’ve learned that what we believe about God is the most important thing about us. Jesus showed us that true love stands between people and hell to proclaim truth at any cost no matter the threat of personal loss. We are called to take up our cross, to find our life in Him and join Him outside the camp bearing the reproach He endured while offering up a sacrifice of praise to Him.
Scripture leaves no room for us to seek our own personal comfort above the proclamation of truth or the refusal to compromise. Extending the right hand of fellowship to those who are believing a distorted and cursed gospel is effectually cutting them off from the true gospel. It allows them to feel content and comfortable in a counterfeit faith for the sake of our own temporary social comfort. There is no Biblical permission for such a stance. That is not love!
The way I see it, choosing to participate in or abstain from false fellowship comes with a price one way or another another. Either the lost pay the price in not being told the truth so we can feel accepted, or we pay it through reproach so the line between false religion and Christianity remains fixed, and so the lost can be confronted with their need.
Rather than offering false fellowship, let’s instead stand for clear Biblical distinctions while loving the lost well with the pure truth and in integrity, praying always for their eyes to be opened. And may our greatest aim in all of life, whether here in the body or at home with the Lord always be to make it our aim to please God and God alone.
“Therefore do not become partners with them; for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.”— Ephesians 5:7-10
- No Compromise! - October 31, 2024
- Truth Triumphs Over Terror - September 5, 2024
- Where is the Comfort For My Grief? - July 11, 2024