Since the year 2001 many Seventh-day Adventist pastors, teachers, and lay members throughout Australia have engaged in intense discussions about the need to resolve conflicts relating to church doctrine. Between the years 1950 and 1980 many Adventists in the United States, Australia and elsewhere became involved in sharp controversies regarding some of the church's core concepts, almost to the point of battle. But during the following twenty years, many believe, the heat of the arguments had subsided in the light of new understandings, so that the church might now facilitate reconciliation. To some observers, however, such a proposal seemed to suggest that the church might be tempted to give up some of its long-standing doctrinal positions, and they raised their voices in protest. Some of these people declared that "the pioneers" had formulated the distinctive doctrines under divine inspiration and that none of their ideas could be wrong.

Such critics may be unaware of the constructive doctrinal change that has occurred within the church during recent decades. For one to appreciate how this can be, it helps to understand the kind of dynamic changes that have characterized Sabbatarian Adventism since its birth. While all Christians may be concerned about the twin themes of doctrinal continuity and change, these possess particular relevance for Adventism, a movement with a mission for the entire world.

Typical Examples of Change

Francis Nichol published a landmark book in 1944, marking the centennial of Sabbatarian Adventism. Nichol affirmed that "Seventh-day Adventists, as a distinct religious body" began on the morning of October 23, 1844. We recall that the fledgling movement was named in 1860 and its basic organization was developed by 1863; therefore, the early period is fraught with particular significance. This article will cite brief examples of change relating mainly to Fundamental Beliefs 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 17, and 23, beginning with the formative early years but continuing into the present. (Clearly, similar observations could be made about the other twenty fundamentals.) Further, it will cite only authors or documents at the center of the movement, bearing in mind that any religious group may attract fringe dwellers who do not well represent its core beliefs.

A first example may be drawn from the earliest accounts of Ellen White's first vision, experienced during December 1844. This vision offered the disappointed Adventists a powerful new metaphor, that of a pilgrimage or a journey, "the travels of the Advent people to the Holy City" along a straight and narrow path, with the light of the Millerite movement behind them and Jesus in front of them. Denial of the light behind them, symbolic of divine illumination of the 1844 movement, was declared to bring dire consequences: "The light behind them went out leaving their feet in perfect darkness, and they stumbled and got their eyes off the mark and lost sight of Jesus, and fell off the path down in the dark and wicked world below." The next sentence reinforced and extended this warning: "It was just as impossible for them to get on the path again and go to the City, as all the wicked world which God had rejected."

Now, it may be debatable whether or not "fallen" Millerites could be restored to saving faith, but the idea that all the rest of the world was rejected of God is so clearly expressed and so pervasively reinforced by related statements that its meaning is beyond question. However, by 1851, this anti-mission stance of emergent Sabbatarian Adventism was radically reformulated; by 1874 the church sent its first official missionary overseas. In 1885 the "first fleet" of Adventist missionaries arrived in Australia, as another step in a process that established missions on every continent. Looking back, we notice that during the 1850s the key sentence indicating God had rejected the non-Millerite world was deleted from Ellen White's accounts of her first vision. In the 1870s she specifically acknowledged that she shared this erroneous belief that was pervasive amongst the pioneers of the early years. Here, then, is an example of change that occurred at the center of the church's belief system.

More evidence of change accumulates when the earliest accounts of Ellen White's first vision are considered carefully. For instance, on five occasions she reports that the Advent band "shouted Hallelujah" and on a sixth occasion they "cried out Hallelujah." More recent versions of this experience are apt to soften the charismatic "Hallelujah" to a more sedate "Allelujah." However, such revised reporting is only one tiny indication of pervasive change: the documents of early Adventist history demonstrate clearly an ethos of "enthusiastic religion," with manifest evidences of the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. More than that, our pioneers characteristically understood the Holy Spirit as an influence. Such experiences and perspectives are not at home in the church of 2003.

The memories of some contemporary Adventists reach back a half-century or more to an era in which church publications usually protected Ellen White from suggestions of doctrinal change during her seventy-year ministry. It is fair to note that the church long lived in partial ignorance of her participation in such processes, because scholars lacked access to primary sources. As new evidence came to light, in particular from 1970 onwards, many people denied its actuality. The Shut Door issue was considerably resolved by 1982 when, at the first International Prophetic Guidance Workshop, Robert Olson tabled a 58-page document that included 84 pioneer statements on the topic. Since that time, respected authors such as George Knight have located the Shut Door doctrine and Ellen White's role in its development within a comprehensive understanding of early Adventism. In similar fashion, the church's understanding of the doctrine and work of the Holy Spirit has moved to include recognition of the "enthusiasm" so obvious in the early period, as well as the significant doctrinal change from a perception of the Holy Spirit as an influence to embracing him as a Divine Person.

The Adventist perception of the relationship between faith and science is now quite different from what it was in the nineteenth century. In the 1860s, Uriah Smith could claim, with James White's evident approval, that to observe the races of human beings then present on the earth was to find evidence of the interbreeding of humans and animals. The church was told in 1864 that "large quantities of coal and oil ignite and burn," heating rocks intensely and burning limestone. When fire and water meet under the earth, "the action of water upon limestone adds fury to the intense heat, and causes earthquakes, volcanoes and fiery issues." During the 1870s, it was acceptable to warn Adventists that to lace a woman's waist tightly might cause her offspring to inherit a wasp waist, and for anyone to wear a headpiece might heat their blood and result in immoral behavior. None of these concepts seem to be promulgated in Century 21. In the twentieth century, George McCready Price (1870-1963) spent decades, with the support of the church, proving in many volumes that there is no such thing as a geological column. Since Price's death the church has spent similar energy explaining the data derived from the geological evidence clearly present in the earth's crust.

During the 1870s and 1880s, within Adventism the doctrine of salvation underwent important change. This fact is illustrated graphically by the "Way of Life" illustrations that portray the central focus of the church as moving from the tree of life to the cross of Christ.

The doctrine of the Trinity was often berated in early Adventism, whereas by 1898 it was embraced in principle within Ellen White's classic volume, The Desire of Ages. In 1980 it was winsomely expressed in the first set of Fundamental Beliefs voted by a General Conference Session. In a similar way, Adventists changed from a "young" Christ to One in whom life is "original, unborrowed, underived."

When we compare Adventist expressions of belief written in the 1850s, 1870s, 1890s, and 1930s with the 1980 statement of Fundamental Beliefs, we can see that the doctrine of the sanctuary has experienced constant and constructive development since the early period.

Some Implications

In light of this discussion it is both responsible and imperative for us to note that Adventists now better understand the theme of Righteousness by Faith. They more faithfully interpret the writings of Ellen White in the light of crucial evidence almost unknown before the 1970s. Adventists now exegete Daniel 8:14 more cogently in linguistic terms (especially in view of the meaning of the word translated "cleansed" in the King James Version); they have looked more closely at the contextual issues; they have probed more thoroughly the thought of related biblical passages; they have pondered further the evidence from Scripture about the "true tabernacle" in heaven; and they have more carefully articulated their sanctuary teaching and their theology of judgment to better express the doctrine of Christian assurance.

We need to recognize publicly that the church in its growth and maturation has moved beyond the early formulations of the founders to more gospel-centered and biblically faithful understandings. It is time for all who have debated the "fundamentals" of our belief to accept the reality of this change and engage in more fruitful "dialogue and dialectic" of the community. The "war" must end if we are to be faithful representatives of the Prince of Peace

This article summarizes some of the data presented under the title "Continuity and Change in Seventh-day Adventist Doctrine and Practice" at the San Diego Chapter of the Association of Adventist Forums on July 12, 2003. The Forum distributed 1,600 copies of the script; it may also be consulted on sdanet.org in the At Issue section.

Arthur Patrick, Ph.D., is a faculty member at Avondale College, Australia. Email arthur.patrick@avondale.edu.au