June 13–19

This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.

 

Lesson 12: “Dealing With Difficult Passages”

This week’s lesson is a pleasant surprise. It is very straight forward and contains some very good advice on the quarter’s main idea of correctly interpreting, or understanding, the Bible. In fact, the title of each day’s lesson led the way through a good study of how to do just that.

Sunday, Possible Reasons for Apparent Contradictions, gives a pretty good discussion of the inspiration of the Bible and how God will hold us and what we commit to Him, even though we don’t always understand things we read. (2 Tim. 1:12)

Monday, Dealing With Difficult Passages, gives a good summary of the fact that there are some Biblical passages that can be difficult to understand and to integrate into the rest of our understanding of the Bible.

Tuesday, Deal With Difficulties Honestly and Carefully, is very good advice, and the author fills in the day’s study with thoughtful, Biblical advice on how to do that and also why it is important to do so.

Wednesday, Deal With Difficulties Humbly, is another Biblically sound title, followed by good writing from the author.

Thursday, Deal With Difficulties Scripturally and Prayerfully, is another well-written section with very good advice.

Friday, of course, is a study of what Ellen White wrote, but even she can’t overcome the good advice given the rest of the week—if that advice is actually followed.

So, overall, a good study with some very good advice. I see no problem with the claims of the lesson; the problems start when you look at how they are actually applied. Then, yes, there are some real problems.

Here are just a couple of examples from the lesson:

“It is better to say that you just don’t know how to answer the question or accurately explain the text, than to try to make it say what you want it to say when, perhaps, it really doesn’t.”

Sadly, Adventist theology is built on quite of bit of Scripture that is made to say what they want it to say. For instance, much of Hebrews is reinterpreted or ignored altogether in an effort to avoid the clear statements about the change of the law that accompanied the change of the priesthood. They prefer to keep Jesus in the priesthood of Aaron so that they can hold onto the whole sanctuary doctrine and the obsession with the 10 Commandments, meaning the fourth, of course. 

So that is one fail in the application of good advice. Or consider this from the lesson:

“How do you strike the right balance between humility and certainty? For example, how would you answer the charge, ‘How can you Seventh-day Adventists be so certain that you are right about the Sabbath and that almost everyone else is wrong?’”

They are “so certain” by starting with their conclusion—the Sabbath started at creation (while also claiming that the Law, meaning the 10 Commandments, is eternal), and using selected texts taken out of context so that they seem to support that conclusion.

This example is another fail in the real-life application of otherwise good advice.

Then, there is this warning against proof-texting:

“Bible problems are best dealt with when they are studied in the light of all Scripture instead of just dealing with a single text in isolation from others or from the whole of Scripture.”

As an example of how they fail this advice, the only way they can “prove” their idea of soul-sleep is by taking texts out of context, making them stand alone, and by using the “wisdom” literature like Ecclesiastes and treating it as if it were didactic, apostolic teaching for life. 

If the wisdom literature of the Old Testament is to be taken as objective advice for life rather than as a more poetic statement about the author’s discouraged view of life, then why not also adhere to his admonition: 

“So I commended pleasure, for there is nothing good for a man under the sun except to eat and to drink and to be merry, and this will stand by him in his toils throughout the days of his life which God has given him under the sun” (Ecc. 8:15). 

How do they determine which is direct truth and which is just hyperbole to describe the human condition? Adventists’ use of Ecclesiastes definitely does not follow this lesson’s good advice.

And here is one more:

“Rather than having extra-biblical sources or philosophy or science explain the meaning of the Bible, we should allow the text of Scripture itself to unfold its meaning to us.”

This week alone has 4-5 quotes from Ellen White to give it authority. Some weeks have had many, many more. Is there some exemption they give to her as an “extra-Biblical” source so that she can be given authority which, in practice, actually supercedes that of the Bible? 

In fact, just after that quote, the lesson adds to this idea by saying: 

“When God guides us through His Holy Spirit in response to our prayers, He does not contradict what He has revealed in the Bible.”

But Ellen White contradicts herself and the Bible multiple times, yet is considered reliable.

So, sadly, although the lesson is actually quite good in its objective advice, it is clearly just a bit of fluff made to sound good within a denomination that openly violates every one of the good suggestions in this lesson. †