0:01

Today, October 22

0:04

is a very

0:06

significant day in

0:09

the history of

0:11

our beginnings. Welcome

0:14

back to the

0:17

Aveness History Podcast.

0:19

This episode is

0:22

called Epilogue.

0:25

Last time we talked about

0:27

a Baptist farmer named William

0:30

Miller who experienced a revival,

0:32

studied the Bible, came to

0:34

the realization that Jesus would

0:37

return about 1843. Then we

0:39

have a young married couple, James

0:41

and Ellen White. Ellen claimed to

0:44

have her first vision. Washburn, what

0:46

the haystack are you talking about,

0:48

man? That is right

0:51

my friends. We've arrived at the epilogue

0:53

of season two, which continues the trajectory

0:55

of the season to show why the

0:58

Avenist Church is the way that it

1:00

is today. Now I want to warn

1:02

you ahead of time that this episode

1:05

is going to be unlike any other

1:07

episode that we've had so far. We

1:09

kind of did a little bit of

1:12

a epilogue after season one, and because

1:14

I thought I was going

1:16

to stop there, and then...

1:18

It was a kind of

1:20

a transitional episode between the

1:22

seasons. But anyways, this one's

1:24

gonna be a little bit different.

1:27

A little bit less complete. Because

1:29

I'm telling you the goal is

1:31

to trace the trajectory of

1:34

the season to just kind

1:36

of bring us from 1980

1:38

to roughly the present. The

1:40

problem with that is it's

1:42

kind of hard to do

1:44

because we have no perspective

1:46

on. on things that happened in

1:48

the last 30 or 40 years. I

1:51

mean, I shouldn't say no perspective. I

1:53

should say perspective is really hard. It's

1:55

hard to say, what is the significance

1:57

of this event that happened in 2005?

2:00

that happened in 1995. We don't

2:02

know all of the implications of that

2:04

event because we haven't really had enough

2:06

time to see how it's going to

2:08

play out. Now, there may be some

2:10

issues where, you know, we can look

2:13

at some smaller issues and say, all

2:15

right, we've seen that one played out,

2:17

we know what the significance of that

2:19

issue is, but, you know, the degree

2:21

of confidence that we can make conclusions

2:23

about these significance of

2:25

certain things in Avenue history in

2:28

the last 40 years. is lower

2:30

than it usually is. So that's

2:32

one reason why this episode is

2:34

going to feel incomplete. We don't

2:36

have good enough perspective on the

2:38

things that we're going to be

2:41

talking about. The second thing is,

2:43

our sources are more limited. Okay,

2:45

I could only do those Des

2:47

Ford and Glacier View episodes because

2:49

I had access to a ton of

2:51

letters that people wrote back and forth

2:54

to each other. If I only had to

2:56

rely on what was written in ministry

2:58

or the review or what was otherwise

3:00

published, it would have been a

3:03

very different set of episodes, much

3:05

shorter and less insightful, I would

3:07

say. When we talk about the last

3:09

30 or 40 years, many of

3:11

these records are not accessible yet.

3:13

They're still sealed. And there are some

3:15

reasons why this is. This is

3:17

not an Avenus policy. Okay, don't

3:19

blame the general conference for this.

3:21

This is just... This is

3:24

just a standard operating procedure

3:26

with some of these archival

3:28

records. Time needs to pass

3:30

before researchers are able to have access

3:32

to them. So we don't have some of

3:34

the same sources that we would have if

3:36

we were dealing with things further in

3:38

the past. We also have to grapple

3:41

with a lot more rumor. There's a lot

3:43

of people who say, I heard this happened.

3:45

Or somebody told me that that

3:47

happened. And without access to

3:49

those deeper records, it's hard to

3:52

evaluate. how true some of those

3:54

statements are. We also have a

3:56

unique problem in that unlike

3:59

letters that were mailed back

4:01

and forth to each other, which,

4:03

you know, is a large base

4:05

of the materials we have for

4:07

stuff all throughout Avenue history.

4:10

Unlike those private letters,

4:12

we, to my knowledge, don't have

4:15

a policy regarding emails.

4:17

Are people, is there

4:19

a requirement that G.C.

4:21

Presidents, Union Presidents have

4:24

to keep their emails

4:26

for the public record?

4:28

Yeah, I'm going to guess no. And so

4:30

it really begs the question of

4:32

what is research going to look like in

4:34

the future, maybe in 30 years, when I

4:36

retire, if I look back on the time

4:39

that I'm living in right now, that

4:41

you and I are both living in right

4:43

now, what sources am I going to

4:45

draw from? Am I going to

4:47

go try to hunt down someone's

4:50

Facebook profile? Will Facebook even be

4:52

alive then? Who's keeping track of

4:54

President so-and-so's Facebook post, Twitter? Post,

4:57

it's X, whatever, it's Twitter, okay,

4:59

don't, don't correctly, and we all

5:01

know it's Twitter. They're Instagram photos

5:04

that they're uploading. Is someone saving

5:06

all of these things? Now there are

5:08

some leaders who have, I know, printed

5:10

off some of their emails that

5:12

they think are historically valuable, I

5:15

appreciate that. But yeah, we don't

5:17

have the same records we had when

5:19

dealing with stuff that we've dealt with

5:21

in past episodes. So for those reasons,

5:23

this is gonna feel a little bit

5:26

different. If there's one episode

5:28

that is more likely to change

5:30

over time, it'll be this one. It'll

5:32

be this one. So this isn't to

5:34

say I'm intentionally trying to

5:36

withhold information or be wrong

5:38

about anything. I'm still endeavoring

5:40

to get the story right,

5:42

but the sources that I

5:44

have to rely on to get the

5:47

story right are very different than

5:49

the sources that I've used in the

5:51

past. That doesn't mean they're

5:53

less reliable. It means I

5:55

have less confidence in their

5:57

reliability. Or I should say I have less

5:59

confidence. in my ability to

6:01

tell as complete a story

6:03

based on a variety of

6:05

sources than what I've had in

6:08

the past. Okay? Hope that

6:10

makes sense. It's kind of

6:12

boring stuff to get out of

6:14

the way at the beginning. Let

6:16

me just kind of get made

6:18

up for a second here and

6:21

say, this epilogue feels like the

6:23

end of something. I have gone

6:25

through this with my wife. It

6:27

feels like... I'm kind of going

6:29

through a grieving process. And

6:32

maybe that doesn't make sense to

6:34

you, but because nobody died,

6:36

right? It's a good thing. The

6:38

podcast has gone on for 10

6:40

and a half years. It's amazing

6:43

that I've been able to do

6:45

something consistently for so long. But there

6:47

is a little bit of grieving that

6:50

this routine, this rhythm that

6:52

has been a part of my life

6:54

for so long is not ending,

6:56

but it's changing. I'm no longer

6:58

looking at the 22nd of every

7:00

month as like, oh, this is

7:02

release day. It's just, I'm no

7:04

longer, you know, cramming at the

7:06

third week of the month, every

7:09

single month. So it's very different.

7:11

But, you know, we've also run

7:13

out of story to tell. It's like,

7:15

where do we go from here after

7:18

this episode? And I'll answer that,

7:20

I'll answer that, especially as we get

7:22

to the end. Look, I've said over

7:24

and over again that these episodes are

7:26

just my first draft. The beauty of

7:28

a podcast over and against a book

7:30

or any other kind of printed material

7:32

is that I can keep updating these

7:34

episodes as I learn and grow. You don't

7:36

have to go buy the second edition of the

7:39

book, third edition of the book, and so forth,

7:41

just to get my little updates. They're just

7:43

given to you right here in this

7:45

podcast. So, the podcast is never finished.

7:48

As soon as this episode is done, I'm

7:50

going to go back and revise season one,

7:52

and it's going to be my second draft.

7:54

Okay, I'll just call them 2.0. But it's

7:56

my second draft of that period

7:58

of Adventist history. Future seasons,

8:01

seasons three, four, five, six,

8:03

whatever, are gonna do deeper

8:05

dives into different topics in

8:08

Adventist history that I can't do

8:10

when I'm trying to move along with

8:12

this chronological story. I

8:14

would like to do seasons on

8:17

theological controversies, on topics

8:19

that maybe, I felt like, oh, we

8:21

could have spent a lot more time

8:23

on that, like, like the health. effort,

8:26

you know, all the sanitariums that were built,

8:28

you know, like just around the world. I

8:30

feel like more there can be said. I'd

8:32

like to do, maybe a season on Avinous

8:34

missions to a certain country. Okay,

8:36

there's so many things that we

8:38

can talk about in future season, and

8:40

we will, and I'm excited about that.

8:43

I'm excited about that. So, again, I'm

8:45

going to talk more about these future

8:47

plans here at the end of the

8:49

end of the episode. So, bucklele in.

8:51

It's a long journey. Just have

8:53

a little bit more housekeeping to get

8:55

out of the way here before we

8:57

dive in Big question getting into this

8:59

was what do we talk about? Not that

9:02

we can't find something to talk about

9:04

but that there's too much to talk

9:06

about I asked the patrons what I

9:08

should talk about I received Dozens of

9:10

options So I can't cover them all.

9:13

It's not that they were bad suggestions.

9:15

It's just it's just too much and

9:17

it just feels I don't want this

9:19

episode to feel like It's just like

9:21

a bag of popcorn, is this really

9:24

the metaphor I want to use? Maybe

9:26

I'll just do jelly beans, where

9:28

everyone is a different flavor and

9:30

they don't always work well together.

9:32

I don't want it to be

9:34

a bunch of randomness, where it's

9:36

like, here's a fact, and here's

9:38

a fact, and here's a fact,

9:41

because if you're going to have an

9:43

over an hour long episode of

9:45

randomness, it's a bit much. So I'm

9:47

looking for stories to tell that bring

9:49

us up to date, That that tie

9:51

into the stuff that we've talked

9:53

about before as well. So in order

9:55

to do that There's some facts or

9:58

some stories. I'm just gonna I'm

10:00

just going to leave out not

10:02

because they're not important just because

10:04

of I can't I can't I connect it

10:06

to things that we've already done or

10:08

Just run out of time guys just

10:10

run out of time. I should spend

10:13

three months just preparing for this one

10:15

episode, but I can't You get into

10:17

a little bit of a rhythm here

10:19

when you're doing like glacier view because

10:21

you can go scan a bunch of

10:23

stuff and then you know for the

10:25

next few episodes, you know, I'm just

10:27

going to be drawing from these sources.

10:29

Then you get to an episode like

10:31

this and it's like everything. Go read

10:33

all the reviews and go read ministry

10:35

magazine and go read, you know, all

10:37

these blog posts because the internet starts

10:39

to play a role in having a

10:41

history here. It's like drinking through a

10:43

fire hose to risk over using that

10:46

cliche. So what does this mean? It

10:48

means I'm going to talk a lot

10:50

about Glacier View, a post- Glacier

10:52

View Adventist world, rather. But there

10:54

isn't a lot of time to

10:56

mention the genocide in Rwanda. I

10:58

mean, the genocide in Rwanda

11:01

was newsworthy, tragic, certainly

11:03

deeply significant in the

11:05

history of Adventism in Rwanda,

11:08

in Africa. But it's too much

11:10

of a deep dive to try

11:12

to connect that to the global

11:14

church. into the story that we've

11:16

been telling thus far. So I

11:18

say global church, but obviously you

11:20

know, this podcast has a bit

11:23

of an anglosphere bent, not out

11:25

of prejudice towards the rest of

11:27

the world, but largely out

11:29

of ignorance, because I don't know

11:31

the local histories, the local avenues

11:33

of all the countries around the

11:35

world, and sometimes to pause and say,

11:38

let's go spend the next year. jumping

11:40

around the different countries it feels like

11:42

it's too much with interruption. So this

11:44

is another thing that I hope to

11:47

address in future seasons of this podcast

11:49

to make it more expressive of

11:51

global Adventism, more representative of

11:53

global Adventism rather than just

11:55

kind of the European American

11:58

and Australian Adventism. that

12:00

where most of the stories I've told

12:02

take place. So, all right, one last

12:04

reminder before we dive in, the goal

12:06

of the Avinous History Project, which

12:08

this podcast is a part of,

12:10

along with our friends Michael Campbell

12:12

and Greg Howell over at Avinous

12:14

Pilgrimage. They're a part of this

12:16

too, and also the yellow white

12:18

podcast, Avinous History Extra, those four

12:20

podcasts, and all of our future

12:22

endeavors. The goal of the Avinous

12:24

History Project is to give a

12:26

working knowledge of Avinous history. to you,

12:28

my friends. So if you listen all

12:30

the episodes, I hope it has given

12:33

you a historical perspective that has helped

12:35

you navigate what it means to be

12:37

an Adventist in the 21st century. And

12:39

if by chance, you're here listening, you're

12:42

not in Adventist, but you're

12:44

just hoping to understand Adventism

12:46

welcome. I don't know if I've welcomed

12:48

you in a long time. I hope

12:51

this has improved your religious literacy and

12:53

awareness of a small significant group of

12:55

Christians. All right, let's go. Alright,

12:58

so we could spend two or

13:00

three more episodes talking about the

13:03

fallout from Glacier View. Let's just

13:05

get that out of the way right away.

13:07

I decided instead to just

13:09

treated this one segment among

13:11

many in this epilogue episode.

13:13

This wasn't an easy decision because

13:16

the story doesn't feel like it's

13:18

complete, right? Like what happened? Ford

13:20

was fired, then what? It must

13:22

feel a bit like seeing Frodo. throw

13:25

the one ring into the fires of

13:27

Mount Doom and Lord of the Rings

13:29

and then walking away. What happened

13:31

next? Was Middle Earth saved?

13:33

What about Gondor? What is Peter

13:35

Jackson's return of the king? Without

13:38

27 minutes of endings. You can't

13:40

just turn it off when the

13:42

ring falls into the crack of

13:44

doom, Matthew. Wait, what were we

13:46

talking about again? Anyways, for

13:48

those who need some kind of ending.

13:50

All I can say is head over

13:53

to the website subscribe to Avonus

13:55

History Extra. I have an hour

13:57

long aftermath episode for you. It's an

13:59

hour long. and it just covers things

14:01

that happened post-glacier view from August

14:03

to December 1980. Now I may

14:06

add to this at time, and

14:08

so having a history extra,

14:10

maybe the place you wanna go if

14:12

you wanna get more episodes post-glacier

14:14

view, and you wanna kind of

14:16

just chase the tal of that

14:18

Des Ford saga. But there's several

14:20

reasons why I didn't want to

14:22

do two or three more episodes

14:25

here on the main podcast. First,

14:27

I don't think knowing every detail

14:29

helps us any more than knowing

14:31

some of the details. There's some

14:33

diminishing returns. The more time you

14:35

want to spend with this story,

14:37

it's still a lot of work to do

14:39

it. And I think everyone gets the

14:42

point. But the second reason is

14:44

that 12 episodes is enough on

14:46

Desmond and Glacier View. It's enough

14:48

to help you reason and make

14:50

conclusions and decide how this helps

14:53

you live Adventistly today. Okay? Twelve

14:55

episodes. It's a whole year focused

14:57

on one person, one saga. That's

14:59

more episodes than I have spent

15:01

on any other event in Adventist

15:04

history. So to go on and on

15:06

about him risks sending the message. that

15:08

Dezford is more important than Jones and

15:10

Wagner, the 19-19 Bible Conference, race relations

15:12

in the church, and other subjects that

15:14

I just don't spend as much time

15:17

on. It's certainly a significant event in

15:19

shaping the church that we have today,

15:21

but again, I can end up sending

15:23

a message based on how much time

15:25

I spend on any one subject, and

15:27

I think, like I said, I think

15:30

that you get the point. So

15:32

you can you can head over

15:34

to Avenue history extra and listen

15:36

to the aftermath episode and maybe

15:38

some future episodes I may do

15:41

Covering the the talent of the Desmond

15:43

Ford saga there as well. Now I

15:45

will say we do have to talk about

15:47

Some of the talent of Desmond Ford

15:49

because we're trying to trace our story

15:51

from basically from 1980 to the present

15:54

so we have to talk about a

15:56

little bit, but it's just not going

15:58

to be two to three episodes worth.

16:00

Now I will say this,

16:02

if you're wondering what's the

16:04

difference between epilogue and aftermath

16:06

in terms of Desmond Ford, two

16:09

different stories. Two different stories.

16:11

I'm going to share stories here.

16:13

I didn't share an aftermath. An

16:15

aftermath is full of information

16:18

that I'm not sharing here. So if

16:20

you want to listen to both, you'll

16:22

get a more complete picture. So

16:24

all right, back to that student

16:26

at Southern Missionary College. He wrote

16:28

quote, quote, quote, How does all

16:31

of this affect us who

16:33

are quietly and perhaps ignorantly

16:35

plowing along here at SMC?

16:37

Another student trying to survive

16:39

college asked, quote, who is Desmond

16:42

Ford and why is there so

16:44

much controversy? end quote.

16:46

I think both of these

16:48

statements by these students remind us that

16:51

while I may do 12 episodes on

16:53

Desmond Ford and Glacier View, and while

16:55

those who are kind of in the

16:57

know may want to argue about these

17:00

things, many avenues are just trying

17:02

to live their lives, man. They

17:04

don't really care. They don't really

17:06

see the relevance for what's happening

17:08

in Colorado, you know, or

17:11

the controversy surrounding Walter Ray. Not

17:13

everybody cares about these things. And

17:15

I think I bring these two students

17:18

up just as a way of

17:20

reminding ourselves that sometimes the I

17:22

guess the machinations, the drama

17:24

that happens at the top

17:26

of the church, we can

17:28

assume that everyone is always

17:31

absorbed by it. Everyone

17:33

is captivated by it.

17:35

And they're not. I would say

17:38

relatively few people care

17:40

enough to be following every

17:42

pitch that happens in that

17:44

game. Should be noted, of course,

17:46

it was still a significant event in

17:48

the student newspaper there at Southern Missionary

17:50

College, the Southern Accent, acknowledged that some

17:52

people might be disturbed by the rumors

17:54

and news reaching them about Glacier View.

17:56

You have to appreciate that in the

17:58

immediate aftermath of Glacier, review, few people

18:01

knew exactly what had happened. The

18:03

accent recommended that students just

18:05

keep their eyes on Jesus and

18:07

not, quote, label with criticism one

18:10

of the two participants in the

18:12

discussion, end quote. It also warned

18:14

that while being quick to judge,

18:16

you know, just based on incomplete

18:18

information, so-and-so is a heretic or the

18:20

church is wrong, while being quick to

18:22

judge might provide quote short periods

18:25

of inner satisfaction, they quickly gave

18:27

way to despair, end quote. It's kind

18:29

of a weird. a weird comment to throw

18:31

out there. But the idea is there's no

18:33

virtue in being quick to judge without

18:35

having all the information. Just keep your

18:38

eyes on Jesus and go back to

18:40

class, right? Of course, Pacific Union

18:42

College's student paper, the campus

18:44

Chronicle, put a photo of

18:46

Desmond Ford on its front

18:48

page with the headline, Ford,

18:50

Defrocked. Eric Anderson, fresh off his

18:53

PhD at the University of Chicago,

18:55

beginning his teaching career at PUC,

18:57

I believe, wrote a letter to

19:00

the editor, quote, the campus chronicles,

19:02

thorough reporting puts to shame the

19:05

Adventist review Pacific Union recorder and

19:07

other publications, end quote.

19:09

That's high praise for student paper,

19:11

but Kevin Paulson, a student at

19:14

PUC, was utterly unimpressed with

19:16

the paper's coverage right next

19:18

to Anderson's. letter to the

19:20

editor he writes quote it appears

19:22

to me that the Chronicle staff

19:25

is determined to convince our student

19:27

community of the utter unimportance of

19:29

these critical issues end quote

19:31

Paulson believed the student body

19:33

should celebrate Desa's firing writing

19:36

quote the Advent truth victorious

19:38

once more over its opponents

19:40

is destined to triumph gloriously

19:42

end quote another student who

19:45

worked as a groundskeeper on campus

19:47

recalled feeling discouraged being so

19:49

far from his home country at one

19:51

point. Then one day a professor

19:53

came racing by walking fast and

19:56

with a few kind words transform

19:58

the students perspective about where he

20:00

was in life at that moment. Quote,

20:03

his name, Desmond Ford,

20:05

and now he's been defrapped.

20:07

Father forgive them, for they

20:09

do not know what they did, end

20:11

quote. Among the faculty at

20:13

PUC were those who

20:15

personally respected Dez, but

20:18

didn't necessarily buy all

20:20

of his conclusions. Among

20:22

those were someone we met

20:24

before, Wayne Judd, an assistant

20:26

professor of religion. And after

20:28

Dez moved nearby to begin

20:30

his new ministry, Good News

20:33

Unlimited, Wayne Judd, Adrian Zikovsky,

20:35

Eric Anderson, and Bill Price decided to

20:37

go cheer Dez up. He had moved

20:39

not too far away from them. They

20:41

may not have agreed with all of

20:44

Dez's theology, but they liked Dez personally,

20:46

and they all did agree that

20:48

he had been treated shabbily by

20:50

the church. So they piled into

20:52

Adrienne's new Volkswagen jetta. And Wayne

20:54

grabbed a hymnal to take on

20:57

the way. Now flipping through the

20:59

hymnal during the hour and a

21:01

half drive, the group wrote parodies

21:03

of well-known hymns to poke fun

21:05

at the church in light of

21:07

the Desmond Ford situation.

21:09

Unfortunately for you, I am not a

21:12

great singer, but I will risk

21:14

infinite and everlasting shame to give

21:16

you a sample of one of

21:18

these songs anyway. This one is

21:20

called Rust and Obay. Obviously

21:23

adapted. from trust and

21:25

obey. And it goes something

21:27

like this. When we work

21:29

for the church, we'll be

21:31

left in the lurch if

21:34

we choose Wilson's creed not

21:36

to sign. While we do

21:38

Wilson's will, work abides with

21:40

us still and with all

21:42

who will Rostand obey. Rostand

21:44

obey, for there's no

21:46

other way to avoid

21:49

unemployment than to Rostand

21:51

obey. I'll see you guys

21:53

at the Grammys, my friends. I'll

21:55

be outside. Uninvited. Dez

21:57

was amused by the parodies.

22:00

was PUC's newest quartet. When

22:02

they got home, they recorded

22:04

their parodies under the label

22:06

of the sudden sound singers

22:09

from Keen Texas, chivalrously, selflessly

22:11

trying to cast off suspicion

22:13

by placing it on Southwestern

22:15

Avenue University instead. I mean,

22:18

you guys could have been

22:20

from anywhere. Attempts at avoiding

22:22

detection were futile because the

22:25

group, it seems to me, was

22:27

so enamored with themselves. When they

22:29

got back, they went house to

22:31

house around the campus of PUC,

22:33

to the faculty housing around, singing

22:35

their songs to cheer up like-minded

22:37

faculty. They sang for Walter Ut

22:39

and for Fred Veltman and for

22:41

others. But at one house, the

22:43

windows were open and the conservative

22:45

college registrar heard the music carrying

22:47

on the autumn air, hiding in

22:50

the bushes to watch Wayne and

22:52

his friends leave. The registrar was

22:54

able to report them to the

22:56

president. Jack Castle. who, shall we

22:58

say, was less than pleased at

23:00

what he called their sophomoric parodies.

23:02

Kessel had a good reason to

23:04

be frustrated. He said, quote, this

23:06

Ford business has already given the college

23:09

a bad name, end quote. In Wayne

23:11

Judd later wrote, quote, if the administration

23:13

and board had found out the real

23:16

purpose of our parodies, we would all

23:18

have been fired on the spot, end

23:20

quote. the real purpose of the parodies of

23:22

course was to go cheer Desmond Ford up

23:25

in person right if that had gotten out

23:27

when Judd is saying we would all been

23:29

fired on the spot and all of their

23:31

careers may have had a different trajectory

23:33

all because they and it was not

23:36

so much because they went to go

23:38

cheer Desmond Ford up they could have

23:40

done that quietly and returned but it

23:43

the fact that they went from house

23:45

to house afterwards the fact that they

23:47

sang in a house where the windows

23:50

were open, apparently oblivious to the potential

23:52

danger there, and the fact that they

23:55

decided to record an album of them

23:57

singing these parodies all just flirts with

23:59

this. And Castle certainly had cause

24:01

for concern when he's like, look,

24:04

we've already got a black eye

24:06

from this Ford situation. If it

24:08

gets out that four of our

24:10

faculty went to go visit Desmond

24:13

Ford in person and sang songs

24:15

mocking Neil Wilson in the church,

24:17

like that is something that's

24:19

a crisis for Pacific

24:21

Union College. That's, maybe they

24:24

were already in a crisis.

24:26

That's a greater crisis. That's

24:28

a whole different level. And

24:30

who knows where it would have

24:32

gone, but it could have spelled

24:34

the doom for the school, certainly

24:36

for Jack Castle and for those

24:38

faculty. Now, if you think that

24:41

this experience of nearly being fired

24:43

might teach the group something about,

24:45

you know, not wanting to be professionally

24:48

decapitated, you would apparently

24:51

be wrong, because they not only

24:53

did all of these things, but

24:55

they sent their recording and lyrics

24:57

to Friends at Andrews. and one

24:59

of the professor's wives there made

25:02

copies of the lyrics and Wayne

25:04

apparently was later shocked to find

25:06

that the words circulated by Wayne

25:08

Judd had apparently been written at

25:10

the top. Now this was especially

25:12

distressing because one of the songs

25:14

referred to the new seminary dean

25:16

with an extremely offensive epitaph.

25:19

Wayne got so many angry letters

25:21

over the next few years that

25:23

one day when no angry letters

25:25

arrived he and his wife celebrated.

25:27

He and his wife celebrated. and

25:30

impromptu holiday with some pizza. Now,

25:32

Dez's firing wasn't the end of

25:34

his relationship with denominational leaders. They

25:36

would meet several times in the

25:38

years following Glacier View, but these

25:41

meetings culminated in 1983 with the removal

25:43

of Dez's ministerial credentials. Neil Wilson told

25:45

Dez that after several meetings, the two

25:48

sides were, quote, further apart than was

25:50

the case at the time of

25:52

the Glacier View meeting, end quote. Neil

25:54

made it clear that the church

25:56

wasn't judging Dez's Christianity, only his

25:59

Adventist Orthodoxy. if that distinction made

26:01

any difference to him. Quote, we are

26:03

left with no alternative but to advise

26:06

the Australasian division to proceed to deal

26:08

with your case as a minister

26:10

of the church as seems best to

26:12

them. I repeat that I find no

26:14

pleasure in this. I feel nothing but

26:16

the deepest sorrow and regret and wish

26:18

with all my heart things could have been

26:20

otherwise. In doing what we feel bound

26:23

to do, we do not want to

26:25

cut off communication with you. You and

26:27

Jill are still persons, precious people. whom

26:30

I love in Jesus Christ." Ford responded

26:32

with a longer letter repeating many

26:34

of the claims he had

26:36

been making for several years

26:38

now. And his main point

26:40

is that if divergence from

26:42

prophetic interpretation, quote, is sufficient to

26:45

jeopardize one's position in the

26:47

evidence community, end quote, then

26:49

how do you explain Roy

26:51

Allen Anderson's book All Eyes

26:53

on Israel? Dez called Anderson,

26:55

quote, one of the greatest

26:57

men among us, end quote,

26:59

but noted that his book,

27:01

quote, takes a flagrantly different

27:04

position on prophecy from that of

27:06

the church in general, end quote.

27:08

And again, I think Dez's strategy

27:10

here, one of his strategies that

27:13

he employed for many years since,

27:15

he's doing it again here, which is,

27:17

you're charging me with this thing,

27:19

but why are you picking on me

27:22

and not this other person? who's doing

27:24

the exact same thing. So around in

27:26

1980, it would have been, you know,

27:28

why are you picking on me for

27:31

my Avonus Forum talk when Ray Cottrell's

27:33

Avonus Forum talk a

27:35

few months later was, I don't know,

27:38

how do I put it here?

27:40

It was more egregious in terms

27:42

of breaking with Avonus tradition. So

27:45

why is he not in trouble?

27:47

Why is he actually invited to

27:49

the sanctuary review committee to judge

27:52

me? When when he has said the same

27:54

things I've said and has gone even further

27:56

in some ways than I have gone And

27:58

so here's Des again in 19 1983

28:00

saying basically the same thing

28:02

if I'm in trouble for

28:04

divergence from prophetic interpretation Then

28:06

why is Roy Allen Anderson? Not in

28:09

trouble for the same thing. He

28:11

calls it a flagrantly different

28:13

position on prophecy Nevertheless, what

28:15

are you gonna do? Right? I mean, it's

28:17

not that those arguments had

28:20

never really gotten anywhere So

28:22

does accepted what he couldn't

28:24

control quote? I happily remain

28:26

a Seventh-day Avoness. Whatever happens

28:28

to my membership and my

28:30

love for the church, its

28:32

God-given truth, its people and

28:34

its leaders is not diminished."

28:36

On June 12th, 1981, 17

28:39

Avonus teachers from 7 Avonus

28:41

Colleges and Universities met in

28:43

Atlanta to discuss the implications

28:45

of Glacier View. for the

28:47

church's scholars. The group released

28:49

a statement affirming their belief

28:51

in the Seventh-day Adventist mission

28:54

and message, right? Don't worry,

28:56

we're still loyal, but they

28:58

worried about the post-glacier

29:00

view church. They feared that, quote, loyalty

29:02

to the church is now

29:04

often measured with references to

29:06

certain personalities or publications rather

29:08

than to scripture, end quote. They

29:11

also noted that confidence in

29:13

the seminary was being eroded,

29:15

that the review and ministry

29:17

were offering one-sided perspectives, and

29:19

that both critics and apologists for

29:21

the church are being divisive, and that

29:24

all of this is having an effect

29:26

on their students. So, you know, just

29:28

a couple of things to talk about. The

29:31

group recommended that Quote,

29:33

teachers, pastors, administrators, and other

29:35

members attempt now to stop

29:38

the polarizing process that threatens

29:40

our unity and future, end

29:42

quote. They lived in the time

29:45

of polarization. Totally can't relate to

29:47

that. The statement became known

29:49

as the Atlanta affirmation. Richard

29:51

Rice, one of the Sieners, said,

29:54

quote, we must pluralize and complicate

29:56

what Adventism is, end quote. He

29:58

was a quote. doing that single-handedly

30:01

at Loma Linda with his new

30:03

views on open theism. His book

30:05

had been printed by the Southern

30:07

Publishing Association and then it was

30:10

canned. Everyone, just calm down. That's

30:12

the message of the Atlanta affirmation.

30:14

It was signed by some

30:16

familiar suspects. Larry Garrity, Jerry

30:18

Gladson, Lorenzo Grant, Jack

30:20

Provancha, Richard Rice, Charles Griffin,

30:22

Fred Veltman, Ed Zagersonen, Ed

30:25

Zagerson, and Adrian Zaikoski. just

30:27

to name a few of the 16

30:29

who signed it. I say 16 and

30:31

not 17 because apparently Norman Gully signed

30:33

it, but then asked for his name

30:35

to be taken off. Why might Gully have

30:38

taken his name off while the

30:40

Atlanta affirmation was viewed by some

30:42

church leaders with suspicion? The issue

30:44

wasn't so much the content of

30:47

the declaration, but the idea that

30:49

scholars would gather without church approval

30:51

to address these problems on their

30:53

own. And so the Atlanta affirmation

30:56

further complicated the avenues

30:58

landscape in the post-glacier

31:00

view years, where it wasn't yet

31:02

clear what the implications of

31:04

Glacier view were going to be.

31:07

And so people were stepping out

31:09

making statements, taking action, trying to

31:11

establish a kind of a, whatever

31:13

they wanted to see is the

31:15

new normal. And so the 17

31:17

scholars gathered in Atlanta hoping to

31:20

just establish a new normal, basically

31:22

telling. Some of the church leaders, the

31:24

church's apologists especially, many of those could

31:26

be lay people who were trying to

31:28

attack Desmond Ford and defend the church

31:30

to just calm down, right? Everyone just calmed

31:33

down. And in the same thing to maybe

31:35

some of Ford's followers, everyone just calmed

31:37

down, everyone just calmed down, things

31:39

are getting too polarized. We all

31:41

just need to just settle down

31:43

here a little bit. Now Richard

31:45

Rice's call for a wider understanding

31:47

of what it meant to be

31:50

an avinous, received a response in

31:52

the review. Neil Wilson approved a

31:54

meeting called Consultation 2. Now the

31:56

first consultation, consultation 1, happened between

31:58

scholars and administrators immediately after. Glacier

32:00

View. We talked about that a little

32:02

bit in the final Glacier View

32:04

episode that it happened immediately, starting

32:06

Friday night after Ford and the

32:09

administrators had talked. And so that

32:11

was the first consultation. And now,

32:13

just over a year later, a

32:16

second meeting was to be held

32:18

between September 30th and October 3rd

32:21

in Washington DC. Neil posed

32:23

some questions in the review, which

32:25

he hoped the scholars could answer.

32:27

I'm going to give you three

32:29

of these questions that he posed. One,

32:31

quote, who decides what is proper to

32:33

be taught in evidence institutions

32:36

and what should be avoided? Two, are

32:38

some doctrines considered central

32:40

and some tentative or peripheral?

32:43

Three, is it healthy to have pluralistic

32:45

views expressed in college

32:47

Bible departments, end quote? Now

32:50

these were and are I think

32:52

important questions and the prize of

32:54

consultation too was that elusive healthy

32:56

relationship between administrators and scholars that

32:58

many on both sides deeply desired.

33:01

If you listen to the Avenus

33:03

History extra episode after math then

33:05

you heard one professor's comment after

33:07

Glacier View that he felt the

33:09

scholars have been prostituted that was his

33:11

word by the administration. They were brought

33:13

to Glacier View to give the appearance

33:15

of deep study and to reinforce a

33:17

narrative and then return to their box.

33:19

No longer useful. A year after Glacier

33:22

View, Desmond Ford was looking more and

33:24

more like a moderate, however. Robert Brinsmeade

33:26

and even some of Ford's followers have

33:28

been dismantling the Sabbath, Ellewhite,

33:30

other distinctive doctrines in a rush

33:32

towards evangelicalism. I know that's kind

33:34

of a big statement. This is

33:36

an era where we start seeing

33:38

some congregational Advent churches

33:40

disconnected from the church. They want

33:43

to be Adventist, more evangelical Adventist.

33:45

but they want a congregational model

33:47

of church governance. So they were

33:50

experimenting with this. Some of Brinsmee

33:52

people, some of Ford's people, were

33:55

experimenting with establishing some of these

33:57

congregational Adventist churches. And of course,

33:59

you know... the popular Avonus mind as we

34:01

all do as naturally as human beings

34:04

we tie forward to his followers we

34:06

tie brings me to his followers we

34:08

judge the leader based on what the

34:10

followers decide to do and Ford's off

34:13

repeated statement that Avonus scholars

34:15

all secretly supported him further

34:17

destroyed the confidence of many

34:20

in Avonus higher education particularly

34:22

departments of religion at

34:24

our school so there was a

34:26

great need for administrators and for

34:28

scholars for teachers to be meeting

34:30

and iron out some of this

34:33

stuff. Didn't help of course that

34:35

Ken Wood, editor of the review,

34:37

had published an infamous editorial

34:39

and I guess, you know, I don't

34:41

really have to say anything else

34:43

because we've seen already that

34:45

there's a delicate relational

34:48

problem in the church, Ken Wood is

34:50

going to publish an editorial

34:52

and make it more complicated.

34:54

So he stated, quote, we confess that

34:57

we are alarmed by the fact

34:59

that some of our colleges seem

35:01

to be drifting away from the

35:04

standards and objectives established

35:06

for them by their founders.

35:08

We are alarmed by the

35:10

secular climate that prevails on

35:12

some campuses. We are alarmed

35:14

by the strange winds of

35:16

doctrine that blow on some

35:18

campuses. Wood then quoted Elowite as

35:21

saying Avonus' parents shouldn't send

35:23

their kids to Battle Creek

35:26

College, implying that conscientious Avonus'

35:28

parents might do the same

35:30

today. The blowback on this editorial

35:32

was massive, and that's a story

35:34

for another time. It landed wood

35:37

into some serious hot water,

35:39

and of course, college university

35:41

presidents and their faculty were

35:43

not super psyched about it

35:45

either. And again, this just drove

35:47

that wedge between administrators and

35:50

in academics and people associated

35:52

with the higher educational side

35:54

of things in the church

35:56

because it didn't really offer

35:59

any exceptions. Woods editorial

36:01

didn't mention the good things

36:03

that were happening. It's just, you know,

36:05

we've heard rumors, we've heard reports that

36:08

all these things are happening, and it

36:10

alarms us. And so take and do

36:12

with that information as

36:14

you see fit. So it seemed

36:16

to many in higher education, this

36:19

was a very irresponsible editorial that

36:21

just stirred a bunch of people

36:23

up to further mistrust. and be

36:25

angry with Adventist colleges and

36:27

universities, even without any specific

36:30

charges being laid against anybody.

36:32

So again, this complicates the

36:34

relationship between these educators

36:36

and administrators in the

36:39

Seventh-day Adventist Church. Years later,

36:41

Wood, however, would defend his editorial saying,

36:43

quote, we shouldn't get to the place

36:45

where we feel threatened when somebody says,

36:47

are we doing everything in the best

36:50

way possible? That's really all that I

36:52

was saying, end quote. No.

36:55

That wasn't all that you were

36:57

saying, my friend. The problem wasn't

36:59

Wood's expectation that Advent schools

37:01

should be Adventist, but that it

37:04

offered a uniformly negative view of

37:06

Adventist colleges and universities

37:08

based purely on rumors and

37:11

reports. Being written when it

37:13

was written, it also exacerbated

37:15

the growing mistrust between scholars,

37:18

members, and administrators. If you just

37:20

wanted to write an article, buddy...

37:22

that said, are we doing everything

37:25

in the best way possible? Like

37:27

no one in the entire history

37:29

of the Adventist educational system is

37:31

going to say there's ever been

37:33

a point where we're doing everything in

37:35

the best way possible. That's never

37:38

been the case. You know, if

37:40

you send out a survey to

37:42

every single Adventist member and said,

37:44

are we doing everything we possibly

37:46

can to bring the gospel to

37:48

the world, everyone's going to

37:50

say no. If you say, are our schools. doing

37:52

everything they can to offer the

37:55

best possible education. Everyone's gonna say

37:57

no, because the standard then is

37:59

everything. the best and it's never going

38:01

to be the best. So his later

38:03

comments just strikes me as

38:06

entirely disingenuous. He moved the

38:08

goal post. That wasn't what

38:10

that article was about at all. And

38:12

yeah, I'm not gonna buy it. This is

38:15

the context within which 200

38:17

administrators and scholars gathered for

38:19

consultation to. And Neil, just

38:21

as he did a glacier

38:23

view, informed everyone that people

38:25

wondered why the church even

38:27

spent this money. gathering with

38:29

these scholars. It should be spent

38:31

on evangelism instead. By the way,

38:33

those people are still with us.

38:36

I think those people have been

38:38

with us since the beginning. It's like,

38:40

why do you need a phone? Spend

38:42

that money on evangelism

38:44

as well? You know, look, I appreciate

38:46

where they're coming from, but

38:48

Neil wanted the people at

38:51

consultation to understand that he

38:53

didn't have to have this meeting, that...

38:55

There are a lot of people who didn't

38:57

want him to have this meeting and the

38:59

reason why I say this is familiar if

39:01

you don't remember was that the same thing happened

39:03

at Glacier View where he said that

39:06

he had traveled to Eastern Europe and

39:08

people there were saying basically just to

39:10

clear Ford guilty there's there's no reason

39:12

to have a meeting and spend all that money

39:14

right so just like a glacier view Neil here

39:17

is saying We need to have the meeting

39:19

anyway. He saw it as vital and

39:21

then he said, quote, all of us

39:24

know that the church cannot go forward

39:26

where feelings of misunderstanding, suspicion, doubt, and

39:28

distrust exist. The Lord cannot

39:30

bless us when we begin to

39:32

argue among ourselves and to distrust

39:35

one another, end quote. Well, how

39:37

did the church get into such a state?

39:39

I wonder. Neil lamed the blame at

39:41

the feet of scholars saying

39:43

that their intellectual conditioning, that's

39:45

his phrase. leads them to

39:48

say and write things that distress church

39:50

members at times. They ask questions, but

39:52

they don't always provide their own convictions.

39:54

And so when rumors of questions being

39:57

asked in the classroom gets out, it

39:59

upsets people. It undermines confidence in

40:01

what's being taught at these schools.

40:03

But Neil also laid some of

40:05

the blame at the feet of

40:07

administrators as well. He says sometimes

40:09

they had arrived, quote, at hasty

40:11

conclusions about the loyalty and commitment

40:13

of teachers without even talking personally

40:15

with the individuals concerned, end quote.

40:18

In his opening remarks, Neil acknowledged that he

40:20

hadn't communicated well about the agenda at

40:22

the meeting, papers weren't sent out ahead

40:24

of time, the agenda wasn't sent out

40:26

ahead of time, people didn't know what

40:28

to expect, and that led to some

40:30

of the anxiety of like, oh boy, what are

40:32

we in for when we show up? But he says,

40:34

quote, you can blame me. I did not seek

40:36

a lot of counsel, but I have become aware

40:38

of a number of key questions from my own

40:40

observations in my own observations in the

40:43

last couple of years. Unless we face

40:45

them honestly and openly, we

40:47

will have continual difficulties." End

40:49

quote. Neil said that he had

40:51

three objectives for consultation to.

40:53

First, to figure out what

40:55

academic freedom means. Second, to

40:57

determine what method of Bible study

41:00

Avenist Scholars should use. Can they

41:02

borrow from the principles the

41:04

evangelicals were using? What about

41:07

those principles being used in

41:09

secular institutions? Especially this

41:11

historical critical method? Third,

41:14

what is the best way of firing

41:16

teachers and preachers? Now I wasn't present

41:18

for that question, but I would have

41:20

voted for defenestration. I think that's the

41:22

best way to fire somebody. The schedule was

41:25

much like Glacier View. The delegates gathered

41:27

for a plenary session in the morning.

41:29

They joined one of the 10 study

41:31

groups or discussion groups until about 3

41:34

p.m. when the groups would then report.

41:36

There were no evening meetings. It was

41:38

definitely a lot more low-key, less tense

41:40

than than Glacier View. And at one

41:42

point, Jack Bravancia, who had attended

41:44

the meeting, which produced the Atlanta

41:47

affirmation, expressed his frustration. Quote,

41:49

I was amazed and saddened to

41:51

see such an event interpreted almost

41:53

instantly as hostile in intent without

41:55

any recognition of the sincere motivation

41:58

of the participants, end quote. But

42:00

an hour and a half later, Neil

42:02

responded to Jack Bravantia with real

42:04

emotion. Quote, if the scholars wanted

42:06

to bring healing, they did not

42:09

set a very good example, end

42:11

quote. Indicating the copy

42:13

of the Atlanta affirmation next

42:15

to him, Neil continued, quote,

42:17

no one contacted me personally

42:19

about this document, end quote. And

42:21

it seems that it was there that

42:24

it became clear to scholars that Neil

42:26

was personally hurt. especially by minutes

42:28

of the meeting which had been stolen

42:30

and leaked by a so-called loyal Adventist

42:33

trying to defend the church. Alden Thompson

42:35

captured the moment well when he

42:37

wrote, quote, One thing was painfully

42:39

clear, however, the Advent's underground press

42:42

was working incredible mischief. regardless of

42:44

whether it was attacking the administration

42:46

or academia, it was blurring the

42:48

distinction between the public and the

42:51

private. It was robbing us of

42:53

the privilege of praying out our

42:55

bitterness, of tearing up our tainted

42:57

notes, and speaking peace." The next

42:59

day Wilson said the Avenist Church

43:02

stood the crossroads. He believed

43:04

the church was largely conservative,

43:06

but not extremely conservative. He

43:08

opened his heart that he was concerned

43:10

about where the church would go. Would

43:13

Adventism join mainstream Christianity in

43:15

adopting the historical critical

43:17

method of interpreting the Bible?

43:20

Wilson noted a number of position

43:22

scholars had taken. One had told

43:24

him that without the historical critical

43:26

method, Ellen White could only be understood

43:29

as a liar. Others told Wilson

43:31

that if our pioneers used the

43:33

historical critical method, we never would

43:35

have the message that we have. So which way

43:37

do we go? Wilson also said that

43:39

the church had rejected inerancy. even

43:41

if some Avenist still believed it.

43:44

Avenist didn't fit into any

43:46

herminutical camp because there was

43:48

no coherent Avenist herminutic.

43:50

So which way will we go? Don McAdam's

43:53

president of Southwestern Avenist College,

43:55

now a university, stood to his feet

43:57

and said, now I know why we're

44:00

here. Some felt that this is where Ellen

44:02

White could help. Surely there was

44:04

no clearer example of the human

44:06

and the divine working together than

44:08

an Ellen White. Clear example because, well, we

44:10

know a lot about Ellen White in

44:12

her life and we don't know as

44:14

much about Isaiah in the Bible

44:17

or Moses in the Bible. Studying

44:19

how Ellen White was inspired could

44:21

help us understand how biblical authors

44:23

were inspired. So a consensus began

44:26

emerging that rejected both verbal in

44:28

the historical critical method. Wilson

44:30

seemed to favor calling an

44:32

Adventist hermeneutic historical analysis.

44:34

And this is a question that would

44:36

be studied and lead to the 1986

44:38

Methods of Bible Study document and beyond.

44:41

That's a whole storyline we're not going

44:43

to be able to trace. The final

44:45

question that they discussed, of course, was

44:47

on what ground someone should be fired?

44:49

Did they vote for defenestration? Sadly,

44:51

no. What if a teacher or

44:53

preacher believes in liberation theology? Theistic

44:56

evolution. denial of Noah's flood.

44:58

This was discussed, but not in

45:00

the same detail, it seems to

45:02

me, as other questions. At least

45:04

I don't have as much reporting

45:07

on how that conversation went. But

45:09

I think, again, it's a good

45:11

question to ask, right? Like, what

45:13

constitutes a red line where a teacher

45:15

has gone from, I don't know, kind

45:17

of an accepted variance on a, you

45:20

know, in theology, like, oh, he's a

45:22

little bit different in interpreting the seven.

45:24

seals than somebody else is, but he's

45:26

still a good Adventist. So at what

45:29

point do you cross the line in

45:31

your presence in the classroom is no

45:33

longer affirming the Adventist faith in

45:35

a way that the body of Adventist

45:37

can approve of? Well, recognizing

45:40

the hurt between himself and Jack Pravantia,

45:42

Neil Wilson asked Jack to close the

45:44

Thursday meeting with prayer. It was a

45:46

small moment. I mean, just asking someone

45:49

to pray doesn't seem like that big

45:51

of a deal, but you have to

45:53

understand. when you get to this

45:55

level of things, all of these

45:57

little things are significant.

46:00

Everyone there understood it as

46:02

an olive branch towards reconciliation.

46:04

Jack Bravanch was hurt that

46:06

the blowback against the Atlanta

46:08

affirmation was so fierce that

46:10

nobody seemed to appreciate what

46:12

the scholars were trying to do

46:14

there. Neil Wilson was hurt that as,

46:16

you know, the patriarch of the church, no

46:18

one bothered to, can I give him

46:21

a heads up that, hey, the scholars

46:23

are going to be meeting and we're

46:25

trying to... you know, would it be

46:27

helpful if we issued this kind of

46:29

statement, would this help bring healing and

46:31

so forth? Lowell Bach, a general

46:33

conference vice president, said a bridge

46:36

had been built at consultation

46:38

too. He said that it was a quote,

46:41

good walking bridge, even if it

46:43

probably wouldn't take a 10 ton

46:45

truck, end quote. At consultation to

46:47

some scholars complained to

46:49

Neil, or at a book that had come

46:52

out a few months before. Neil, if

46:54

you want to put away divisive

46:56

tendencies in the church, if you

46:58

really want church unity, the last

47:01

thing you want to do is endorse

47:03

that book. The book was called

47:05

Omega, and it was written by

47:07

an Adventist lawyer named

47:09

Lewis Walton. I remember seeing

47:11

this book in a number

47:13

of churches when I became

47:16

an Adventist. Omega was... deeply

47:18

controversial from the moment that

47:20

it appeared. Rather than seeking

47:22

to pacify the growing conflict

47:24

between Adventist in the wake

47:26

of Ford Davenport and Ray,

47:28

just as the Atlanta Affirmation

47:30

had tried to do, you

47:33

know, everyone settled down. Instead,

47:35

Walton saw the fulfillment of

47:37

prophecy in the conflict, in

47:39

the polarization. Omega focused on the

47:41

early 1900s and some comments Ellen

47:44

White made. During the heyday

47:46

of the church's conflict

47:48

with John Harvey Kellogg,

47:50

that this constituted the

47:52

alpha of heresies and

47:54

an Omega would soon

47:56

follow. As Walton characterized

47:59

it, had predicted that, quote,

48:01

under the banner of new light,

48:03

powerful forces would seek to bend

48:05

the Church of God into some

48:07

unrecognizable new shape, end quote. Case

48:10

you thought Walton was being a

48:12

little too vague here, he explained

48:14

what he meant. Confusion and hypocrisy

48:16

in the church were, quote, the

48:19

invariable result of an attack on

48:21

the sanctuary or the investigative judgment,

48:23

end quote. Now, Walton doesn't mention

48:25

any names, but then again he

48:27

doesn't have to. Omega reads like

48:30

a Dan Brown novel. At 100

48:32

pages, it is punchy. It is

48:34

forceful. It is a soul-sturring read.

48:36

I mean, you can't help but

48:39

kind of get worked up reading

48:41

this book. It reads like

48:43

a novel. You can't help

48:45

but feel the urgency of

48:47

Lewis Walton's words. He concludes,

48:49

rather grandiosely, rather dramatically, that

48:51

after the Alpha controversy had

48:53

settled down, then we had

48:55

the catastrophe of the First

48:57

World War. Walton says that

48:59

all of this happened because Adventist

49:01

had allowed the devil to trick

49:04

them back then and he asks

49:06

would we allow the devil to

49:08

win this time too? So I mean put

49:10

all this together guys. Lewis Walton

49:12

is arguing in Omega that

49:14

this alpha controversy was with John

49:17

Harvey Kellogg and that Ellen White

49:19

had prophesied that there would be

49:21

an Omega to come. And he

49:24

is suggesting that this Omega of

49:26

heresy is here. I mean, how

49:28

else do you explain Walter Ray

49:30

in his challenge to Ellen White?

49:33

How else do you explain? Desmond

49:35

Ford, how else do you explain

49:37

the embarrassment of the Davenport

49:40

scandal? It... provided an

49:42

answer to those members who were

49:44

frustrated and confused by this explosion

49:46

of conflicts and controversies which were

49:49

shaking the church in the early

49:51

1980s. It seemed to offer a

49:53

reason why things were happening, the

49:56

way that they were happening, and

49:58

of course the channel... was are

50:00

you going to allow it to happen

50:02

or are you going to fight so

50:04

rather than like I said like the

50:06

Atlanta statement saying everyone calmed down Lewis

50:09

Walton is saying no we need to

50:11

be up in arms we need to be

50:13

angry about this and this was

50:15

the explanation that a lot of

50:18

people accepted in the first six

50:20

months of printing Omega went through

50:22

six editions and sold 66,800 copies

50:25

which you know may not put a huge

50:27

dent in the New York Times bestseller

50:29

list But via Avonest Standards, that is

50:31

a lot of copies of a book.

50:33

Kenwood, naturally, wrote the introduction

50:35

to Omega, and the review in

50:38

Harold published it. Harold Otis, Tom

50:40

Davis, Richard Lesher, Ron Wisbee, Ray

50:42

Wolsey, Arthur White, and Mervyn Maxwell

50:44

were the ones who agreed to

50:47

read the book before publication and

50:49

provide some feedback. Whatever their feedback

50:51

was, they failed to prevent the

50:53

book from flying off the press

50:55

like a missile. Omega was

50:58

mailed to all the pastors in

51:00

North America and then to Union

51:02

and Division Presidents overseas.

51:05

Walton was also given space to

51:07

make his case in Wood's Avoness

51:10

Review, which he used to

51:12

warn about how the old

51:14

Battle Creek Sanitarium had been,

51:16

quote, infiltrated with brilliant charismatic

51:18

persons who beneath a veneer

51:20

of profess loyalty actually had

51:22

little use for Ellen White,

51:24

end quote. Again, he's warning

51:27

of infiltration in the church,

51:29

just as it happened back in

51:31

the Alpha of heresies, where

51:33

there were brilliant charismatic people

51:35

who pretended to be loyal to

51:37

the church. And so here at the Omega,

51:39

at the end of time, don't trust everybody

51:41

who says that they are loyal to

51:44

the church. Behind the scenes,

51:46

Donald Yost, director of the

51:48

G.C. Archives, objected to the book

51:50

on September 19, 1981. He was

51:52

joined by fellow archivist Bert

51:54

Heloviac. Bob Spangler met with Heloviac

51:57

in Yost three days later to

51:59

talk about... their concerns. Jost

52:01

said that, quote, the style of

52:03

writing is unique in our denomination,

52:05

end quote. And Spangler asked what

52:07

Jost thought of the style of

52:09

writing. What do you mean by

52:11

it's unique? You know, what do

52:13

you mean by that? And Jost

52:15

was blunt. He said, quote, I

52:17

think it's dishonest, end quote. Another

52:20

person there wasn't convinced. Are

52:22

we quibbling over writing style?

52:24

And this guy said, quote, it's written

52:26

like a novel. doesn't he have

52:28

a license to write a novel?" Yo

52:30

scoffed at one line Lewis had written

52:33

in particular where he called Kellogg,

52:35

quote, an intense little man in

52:37

a white suit, end quote. Surely,

52:39

surely this sensational way of

52:42

writing is unbecoming for a

52:44

Seventh-day Adventist author. Writing style

52:46

aside, Heloviac attacked the central

52:49

thesis of the book that Ellenwhite

52:51

had predicted in Omega heresy to

52:53

happen towards the end of time.

52:55

Quote, Mrs. White doesn't see the

52:57

Alpha and Omega as an end-time

52:59

thing, end quote. Haloviac and Jost

53:01

reunited that Elowite's few comments on

53:03

the Alpha and Omega don't apply

53:05

to the present. That she doesn't

53:07

fully explain what she meant and

53:09

that Walton was inserting out-of-contact statements

53:11

to develop this Omega concept into

53:13

something much bigger than Elowite ever

53:16

made it. Jost lamented that, quote,

53:18

quote, at the present there is

53:20

a minute gap between scholars and

53:22

administrators and administrators. This book has

53:24

the potential. of widening the gap."

53:26

When Lewis Walton arrived in Washington,

53:28

D.C., some weeks later, he was

53:30

met by reports that Donald Jost

53:32

and Bert Heloviac were about to

53:35

discredit his book at a colloquium

53:37

that weekend. Walton brushed it

53:39

aside, quote, I encounter challenges like

53:41

that, five days every week, end

53:44

quote. Responding to Jost's critique that

53:46

Walton hadn't formed an accurate picture of...

53:48

the avenues history from which he drew

53:50

his conclusions. Walton scoffed, quote, neither you

53:53

nor the others who are attempting to

53:55

criticize the book's accuracy have any idea

53:57

of the extent of my personal library.

54:00

And quote, Walton couldn't understand why

54:02

Jost was so deeply opposed to

54:04

his book. Quote, why do you

54:06

seem to be trying so hard

54:08

to discredit a book that merely

54:10

reasserts God's evident supernatural guidance of

54:12

his church? End quote. This reminded

54:14

me of what Kenwood said about

54:17

his article on Avonus Colleges, right?

54:19

Like I was only trying to

54:21

say that we're not trying our

54:23

best. Don't you think we should

54:25

be trying our best? And here's

54:27

Walton characterizing his book. I'm only

54:29

saying that God is still guiding

54:32

his church. Like nobody would disagree

54:34

with that man. Nobody would disagree

54:36

with that God is still guiding his

54:38

church. This is not a summary of

54:40

what your book is about. Your book

54:42

is about that the fact that Elowite

54:44

had predicted an omega of apostasy in

54:47

that there in the early 1980s we

54:49

are living through it. This is the

54:51

last days and we need to fight.

54:53

to make sure we don't succumb to

54:55

this heresy. Like your book is not

54:58

just about God superintending his church. And

55:00

reducing it to that one line

55:02

that nobody could possibly argue with

55:04

is exactly the same thing Ken

55:07

Wood did. So let's just call

55:09

the thing what it is. Okay?

55:11

Seminary professor split on the issue

55:13

too. Perhaps the strongest voice objecting

55:15

to Walton's book was Robert Johnston,

55:18

who had a verbal joust with

55:20

Mervyn Maxwell on the subject. Maxwell

55:22

conceded that Walton's book wasn't always

55:24

historically accurate, but said the history

55:27

was, as he put it, adequate

55:29

for his purpose, for Walton's purpose,

55:31

and he called the book a tract

55:33

for our times. In other words, look,

55:35

let's not quibble over every detail. The

55:37

point is, is his message accurate, or

55:39

not. Is it something we need to hear

55:41

right now, or not? Both Johnston and

55:44

Walter Utt reviewed Omega for Spectrum.

55:46

Johnston focused on theological claims

55:48

of the book and especially

55:50

its target, which he identified as

55:52

Desmond Ford. Specifically, I guess, I

55:54

quote Johnston directly here, and he

55:56

said, quote, the target is not

55:58

only Desmond Ford. to his disciples,

56:01

but everyone else not in sympathy

56:03

with the perfectionistic wing of Adventism,

56:05

as well as most reflective thinkers

56:08

and scholars within Adventism." Johnston noted

56:10

how Ella White's pair of cryptic

56:12

statements about a coming Omega had

56:14

been the source of speculation ever

56:17

since she made them. Judson Washburn

56:19

attacked Daniels in a tract he

56:21

had entitled the startling Omega, right?

56:24

Remember that? Good old times with Washburn.

56:26

Man, I missed that guy. Washburn later

56:28

saw the fulfillment of the Omega in

56:30

another event that I probably didn't mention

56:32

in the podcast, and perhaps he had

56:35

other interpretations of the Omega as well,

56:37

which led Willie White to remark that,

56:39

quote, I think there are not less

56:41

than 12 different things that have been

56:43

urged by good-hearted brethren as the Omega,

56:46

end quote. Johnston urged that Ellen White

56:48

used some form of this Alpha Omega

56:50

concept to indicate cause and effect. When

56:52

she wrote her Alpha statement in 1904,

56:55

the church had not yet seen

56:57

the full effect of Kellogg's departure,

56:59

which ultimately drew him, his brother

57:01

Will, E.J. Wagner, A.T. Jones, and

57:03

many others out of the church.

57:05

This, Johnson argues, is all in the

57:07

white meant, that during the controversy,

57:09

she shuddered at the thought of how this

57:12

was going to end. She knew it was

57:14

going to be painful. She knew it was

57:16

going to take a number of people outside

57:18

the church, and this was going to

57:20

hurt. And so her Alpha Omega statement

57:22

is simply her kind of trying to

57:24

brace the church for impact. Johnston

57:26

indites Walton for mismatching

57:29

Elowite quotations and shaping them for

57:31

whatever point he wants to make.

57:33

And ultimately, however, Johnston blames Adventist

57:35

readers. Quote, the sad truth is

57:37

that there is something in the

57:39

psyche of many Adventists that craves

57:42

this kind of thing. Not too long

57:44

ago, the sensation was John Todd

57:46

and the sinister Illuminati. And Omega

57:48

is simply another reincarnation of the

57:50

same archetypal mythos. It is difficult

57:52

to deal with someone who has

57:55

a conspiracy mentality, for when you

57:57

try to disabuse him of it,

57:59

you own... succeed in convincing him

58:01

that you are a part of

58:03

the conspiracy." Johnston closed by

58:06

calling Omega a mischievous little

58:08

book that has set church

58:10

members against each other and

58:12

deepened suspicions of one another.

58:14

With a garnish of irony he

58:16

concluded quote it is hard to

58:18

imagine anything better to calculate it

58:20

to tear the church apart end

58:23

quote. In other words he may

58:25

be implying there that Omega is

58:27

warning of Satan trying to tear

58:30

the church apart by the introduction

58:32

of Desmond Ford's ideas and other

58:34

people's ideas, but in reality, what

58:37

if what if the devil is using

58:39

Omega to rip the church apart?

58:41

Walter Ott reviewing Omega's use

58:43

of history first commented on

58:45

a style again, which at

58:47

called breathless and spooky. Quote,

58:49

the style leaves the reader with

58:51

a delicious feeling of danger and

58:54

devil tree, end quote. After Utt

58:56

gives us some examples of how

58:58

Walton compresses and expands and glosses

59:00

over swaths of Adventist history, he

59:03

writes, quote, the author scarcely hints

59:05

at the complexity of the issues

59:07

in Adventist history. It is simply

59:09

a story of good guys versus

59:11

bad guys, end quote. Utt was

59:13

proficient at the zingers, and another

59:16

place he writes, quote, if Walton

59:18

had not furnished Adventist with an

59:20

Omega, we would have had to invent

59:22

one, end quote. Like Johnston, Ut

59:24

signed off in style. It is a

59:26

sad commentary on the state of

59:28

Adventism that a work of this

59:30

low caliber has been raised to

59:32

such prominence and authority. If historical

59:34

fiction is an unreliable but gripping

59:36

mixture of fact and fiction, one

59:38

of our denominational publishers has produced

59:40

in Omega a work of historical

59:43

fiction." Our spectrum did their own

59:45

interview with Walton, asking him to

59:47

respond to some of these. Criticisms,

59:49

these reviews of his book,

59:51

and Walton promptly made himself

59:53

as difficult as possible from

59:56

the very start. Spectrum asks,

59:58

why did you write Omega? Walton

1:00:00

responds, quote, my answer to that

1:00:03

question starts with a question to

1:00:05

you. Why did neither of your book

1:00:07

reviewers bother to ask that question or

1:00:09

to contact me in any way, end quote.

1:00:11

Does anyone else get the feeling

1:00:14

that Lewis Walton would have been at

1:00:16

home on a cable news channel today?

1:00:18

I don't know which way his politics

1:00:20

go, that's not what I mean, but

1:00:22

I mean, just the like the punditry

1:00:24

kind of doing this verbal jousting on

1:00:26

on CNN or Fox or whatever.

1:00:28

Right? In American news channels. It

1:00:30

feels like he was, he's born

1:00:33

for that role. Right? Just, just

1:00:35

answer the question, man. Why did

1:00:37

you write Omega? Just answer the

1:00:39

question. Instead of taking swipes immediately

1:00:42

at the two reviewers. The controversy

1:00:44

naturally caused conference leaders some

1:00:46

confusion, right? Do you invite him to

1:00:49

come speak at camp meeting or

1:00:51

not? Was he a heretic? Was he

1:00:53

right? The president of Northern New

1:00:55

England in the letter to Bob

1:00:57

Spangler of course editor of ministry

1:01:00

said that he greatly appreciated Omega

1:01:02

He asked Spangler what what Spangler

1:01:04

thought of the book and more importantly

1:01:06

What did Neil Wilson think

1:01:09

of the book? Ah, so this brings us

1:01:11

back to Neil Wilson You see in an

1:01:13

article in the review new well Neil

1:01:15

Wilson asked our leaders to patient.

1:01:17

That's the headline quote How long

1:01:19

should conference union or

1:01:21

institutional leaders permit the

1:01:23

beguiling influence of gifted

1:01:25

people to unsettle a

1:01:27

church before taking some

1:01:29

corrective or remedial action?

1:01:31

Gee, I wonder what

1:01:33

hypothetical, purely imaginary situation,

1:01:36

this question might be coming

1:01:38

from. Of course, I joke, this is

1:01:40

a very valid question, right? How

1:01:43

long should you tolerate somebody who

1:01:45

may be going off track? before

1:01:47

the church administratively decides to

1:01:49

do something. It's a fair question.

1:01:51

Neil was no doubt dealing with those

1:01:54

who think the church waited too long

1:01:56

to fire Desmond Ford that they had

1:01:58

known he was a heretic. years, they

1:02:00

would have fired him way back

1:02:02

when. So it's perception that church

1:02:05

leaders were not diligent watchmen on

1:02:07

the walls might erode confidence in

1:02:09

their leadership. So Neil is trying to

1:02:11

deal with this in his article. He

1:02:14

urges his readers in the review

1:02:16

to read Lewis Walton's book, for

1:02:18

it reminded its readers that, quote,

1:02:20

rebellion and apostasy will be in

1:02:22

the very air we breathe, end

1:02:24

quote, which I think is Neil's way of

1:02:27

saying. We leaders may not be

1:02:29

perfect, but we will keep you safe.

1:02:31

He's wanting to remind his readers

1:02:33

of the danger that's out

1:02:35

there, and lest you be

1:02:37

tempted to think that your

1:02:39

administrators are asleep at the wheel, just

1:02:42

want you to know we're very aware that

1:02:44

there's all sorts of heresy and

1:02:46

bad ideas out there, and we

1:02:48

are trying to keep you safe. So

1:02:50

he kind of endorsed Lewis

1:02:53

Walton's book. which he must have

1:02:55

known was extremely popular among

1:02:57

the people that he was

1:02:59

trying to convince that the

1:03:01

G.C. is active and vigilant

1:03:03

and ready to protect the

1:03:05

church. So going back a few months here

1:03:07

to the consultation too,

1:03:10

where Neil had been asked about

1:03:12

rumors that he was planning to

1:03:14

endorse Omega. He said that he

1:03:16

read the book while traveling to

1:03:18

Russia and had been blessed

1:03:20

by it. But he declined to say whether

1:03:22

Walton was right in his history or

1:03:25

what exactly the Omega was like to

1:03:27

Neil that was not the takeaway of

1:03:29

the book for him personally He

1:03:31

suggested that he could have deleted

1:03:33

any mention of Omega from his

1:03:35

article and his point would not

1:03:37

have changed which is Definitely true.

1:03:39

You can just delete that paragraph.

1:03:41

It does not really add or

1:03:43

take away anything from the argument.

1:03:45

What it does as I suggested

1:03:47

a moment ago What it does

1:03:50

is signal to the conservative church

1:03:52

members that Neil is trying to

1:03:54

reassure that I know the book that you guys

1:03:56

are all reading right now and are excited

1:03:58

about. I've read it. I think it's a

1:04:01

great book. I'm with you. I'm on your

1:04:03

side. I think that's the only function of

1:04:05

that paragraph. I'm not trying to be uncharitable,

1:04:07

not trying to read between the lines. I

1:04:10

mean, I am reading between the lines. But

1:04:12

I'm not trying to intentionally color this a

1:04:14

certain way. I think that's the only explanation

1:04:16

for why that dimension of Omega is

1:04:18

in that article. It doesn't need to be

1:04:20

there. Like I said, you can just delete

1:04:23

the whole paragraph. It doesn't change anything. I

1:04:25

think it was designed to signal to signal

1:04:27

to the people. Neil was trying

1:04:29

to persuade the people who

1:04:31

would read Omega that I'm

1:04:33

on your side, the general

1:04:36

conference is standing vigilantly on

1:04:38

the walls, watching for all

1:04:41

sorts of threats, the kinds

1:04:43

of threats that Omega is

1:04:45

warning you about. However, Neil

1:04:47

in talking with the scholars,

1:04:49

realized that maybe I didn't

1:04:51

need to write that. And he told

1:04:53

them it was too late to prevent

1:04:55

it from being published. It had already

1:04:58

been sent off. This is in, you

1:05:00

know, at least a month before publication,

1:05:02

but just the way things worked, there

1:05:04

was no way for him to retract

1:05:06

it now. So did Neil Wilson endorse

1:05:08

Omega? Kind of, but knowing what

1:05:11

we know from his comments at

1:05:13

consultation to, it wasn't like a

1:05:15

hundred percent endorsement of Omega. It

1:05:17

was something that Neil admitted he could

1:05:20

have taken back. Maybe he would have

1:05:22

if he had had more time, but it

1:05:24

served the practical purpose, I think,

1:05:26

for which it was intended. So

1:05:28

how does learning about Lewis Walton's

1:05:30

Omega help us understand the church

1:05:32

today? It certainly wasn't the first

1:05:35

or last of its kind, but

1:05:37

it illustrates the post-glacure view

1:05:39

fragmentation of this Anglo-Avenus world.

1:05:41

Many members have been startled

1:05:44

by the succession of traumatic

1:05:46

events around 1980, FDR, for

1:05:48

Davenport Ray, being the major

1:05:50

three. Neil Wilson was clearly

1:05:53

concerned about loss of confidence

1:05:55

in church leaders and had an incentive

1:05:57

to position the church on the

1:05:59

side. of those disturbed members

1:06:01

to reassure them, to provide

1:06:03

answers, and to maintain their

1:06:05

loyalty during uncertain times. Lewis

1:06:07

Walton's Omega helped bring both of

1:06:10

those sides together by pointing the

1:06:12

finger at Desmond Ford and anyone

1:06:14

who would dare to question the

1:06:16

church again. Viewed with suspicion

1:06:18

under the Pearson administration, many

1:06:21

of the scholars at Glacier

1:06:23

View hoped the meeting would

1:06:25

bring a reproachment with administrators,

1:06:27

but Glacier View ended up

1:06:30

driving them further apart. And

1:06:32

with many scholars operating now

1:06:34

under a cloud of suspicion,

1:06:37

the most influential theologians in

1:06:39

the church were basically local

1:06:41

conference evangelists, media preachers, and

1:06:44

authors like Louis Walton. And if

1:06:46

that doesn't seem relevant to today, I

1:06:48

don't know what is. A pastor in

1:06:50

Watsonville, California, who had gotten a copy

1:06:52

of Dez's Glacier View manuscript, now believed

1:06:55

Dez was right, and he was soon

1:06:57

to be in trouble. Some of his

1:06:59

members were up in arms, especially after he

1:07:01

preached a sermon, which seemed to

1:07:03

question the traditional understanding of Ellen

1:07:06

White. And while he was away on

1:07:08

vacation, he was accused of embezzling

1:07:10

church funds. Yeah, that escalated quickly.

1:07:12

Meanwhile, someone preached a sermon

1:07:15

in his church from Lewis Walton's

1:07:17

Omega, and his members quickly deduced that

1:07:19

their pastor was part of the

1:07:21

Omega heresy. Okay? So I'm bringing

1:07:23

this up because I think people need

1:07:25

to understand the real world impact some

1:07:27

of these books and ideas have. Some

1:07:30

people are like, ah, you like the

1:07:32

book, you don't like the book, read

1:07:34

it, don't read it, who cares? But

1:07:36

it impacts people's lives, just like this

1:07:38

pastor. So his members thought he was

1:07:40

part of this Omega heresy, a suspicion

1:07:42

which seemed confirmed for them at camp

1:07:44

meeting when local church leaders in

1:07:47

the Pacific Union Conference announced that

1:07:49

if members only had enough money to

1:07:51

buy one book, if you could only afford

1:07:53

one book, it should be Omega. The camp meeting,

1:07:55

the pastor there, met with local conference

1:07:57

leaders and promised that he could stick

1:08:00

with the 27 fundamental beliefs in good

1:08:02

faith, and so therefore the pastor could

1:08:04

keep his job. But many in the

1:08:06

congregation still rejected him, refusing even

1:08:09

to shake his hand or allow

1:08:11

him to visit in their homes.

1:08:13

Members stopped paying tithe, but the

1:08:15

conference president said he would not

1:08:17

bow to this kind of tactic. Nevertheless,

1:08:20

the next day, the conference president

1:08:22

called again, saying that the union

1:08:25

president had instructed him to quote

1:08:27

unquote, take care of this situation,

1:08:29

like a mafia boss. So this

1:08:31

conference president met with the pastor

1:08:33

who admitted that he could not

1:08:36

teach the traditional view of 1844,

1:08:38

but that otherwise he was in

1:08:40

harmony with the 27 fundamental beliefs.

1:08:42

This wasn't good enough. Pastor said,

1:08:44

quote, I refused to resign, however, because

1:08:46

I felt that I was not leaving

1:08:48

the Advent church, but it was leaving

1:08:51

me. I had given the best of

1:08:53

my life to its ministry, and I was

1:08:55

not about to resign. end quote. The pastor

1:08:57

then penned an open letter that he had

1:08:59

to have known would seal his fate. Quote, I

1:09:02

have done the unforgettable thing in bringing

1:09:04

this problem out in the open,

1:09:06

end quote. The pastor then founded a

1:09:08

new congregation outside of the

1:09:10

Adventist structure called the biblical

1:09:12

Adventist Church. This is one

1:09:14

of those congregational churches. Had

1:09:16

about a hundred members. Sixty

1:09:18

of them were Adventists who

1:09:20

were likewise frustrated with the state

1:09:22

of things. Why am I sharing this

1:09:24

story of this one pastor with you?

1:09:27

partially to give you a little update

1:09:29

on what this post glitch review thing

1:09:31

looks like with some of Dez Ford's

1:09:33

followers. Here's a man who was convinced

1:09:36

by Dez Ford and ultimately pushed out

1:09:38

of the ministry. Here's a congregation that

1:09:40

was influenced by Omega and helped to

1:09:42

push him out of the ministry, but also

1:09:45

because his name was Dale Ratslaf. And

1:09:47

Ratslaf, if you don't know the name,

1:09:49

would spend the rest of his life

1:09:51

in a so-called ministry to convince Aven

1:09:53

that they don't have the gospel. This

1:09:55

too. is the fruit of Glacier View.

1:09:58

Another significant... happened in

1:10:00

1980 which we haven't talked about

1:10:03

and it possibly involves a

1:10:05

dingo, probably involves a dingo.

1:10:07

Michael and Lindy Chamberlain took

1:10:10

their newborn baby to visit

1:10:12

Ayers Rock now called Uluru

1:10:14

in central Australia. Michael

1:10:16

was an avenues pastor and this

1:10:18

was a camping vacation for the

1:10:20

family of five. To make a

1:10:22

long story shorter Lindy heard a

1:10:24

noise and famously cried out the

1:10:27

dingos got my baby. Dingo is

1:10:29

a kind of wild dog, if you don't

1:10:31

know. Hundreds of people began searching for the

1:10:33

Dingo and the baby to no avail. The

1:10:35

baby's clothes were eventually found, but no trace

1:10:37

of saliva or hair or anything else that

1:10:40

might indicate an animal had taken the

1:10:42

baby. The police thought that Lindy, as

1:10:44

one of these Adventists, was crazy and

1:10:46

probably offered the baby as a child

1:10:48

sacrifice. And so Lindy was given a life

1:10:51

sentence in prison. She had a baby

1:10:53

in prison, which was immediately taken from

1:10:55

her, and while she was pardoned a

1:10:57

few years later, it wasn't until

1:10:59

2012 that a coroner concluded that

1:11:02

a dingo had, in fact, taken

1:11:04

the chamberlain's baby. The story

1:11:06

highlights, again, among many other

1:11:08

things, the need for religious literacy,

1:11:10

the need to understand what

1:11:12

different religious people believe so that

1:11:15

misconceptions and prejudices don't lead, let's

1:11:17

say, people to be arrested

1:11:19

for murder. because of a

1:11:21

mistaken understanding of what they actually

1:11:23

believe. Not understanding who Avonus were

1:11:25

and what they believed made this

1:11:27

case so much worse than it

1:11:29

already was, just in a human

1:11:32

tragedy level. I'd love to talk

1:11:34

about the perception of Avonus

1:11:36

and Western society since 1980, but

1:11:38

for the sake of time, let's

1:11:41

confine it to the relationship between

1:11:43

Avonus and Evangelicals, shifting gears a

1:11:45

little bit here. There was a

1:11:48

lot of soul searching throughout

1:11:50

the 1980s, of course. A

1:11:52

piece in Christianity today in

1:11:54

1984 lamented, quote, the wall,

1:11:56

avenues have built around themselves,

1:11:58

end quote, to keep them safe. from

1:12:00

other Christians. Quote, for all

1:12:02

their talk about being evangelical

1:12:04

Christians, Avonist still considered themselves

1:12:06

superior to the others. End

1:12:08

quote. That's not true, right?

1:12:10

We don't think we're better than other

1:12:12

people, right? The article hits at the

1:12:15

weird reality that Avonus considered

1:12:17

themselves part of the larger Christian

1:12:19

community. We believe that anyone with

1:12:21

faith in Jesus will be saved.

1:12:23

You don't have to be Avonus.

1:12:26

but generally treats the Christian world

1:12:28

as if it's unclean in Adventism's

1:12:30

ecological worldview. Christianity is divided

1:12:32

into Adventists, beastly Catholics, and

1:12:34

apostate Protestants. It is one

1:12:37

of the dichotomies of Adventism

1:12:39

that we believe other Christians

1:12:41

are in fact our brothers

1:12:43

and sisters in Christ, but we

1:12:45

would also prefer to stay away from

1:12:47

them. Of course, this is not

1:12:50

individually true of every seven day

1:12:52

Adventist. Just speaking in generalities here.

1:12:54

C.T. reported that when an

1:12:56

Avonus University was given the option

1:12:59

to join an intervarsity Bible study

1:13:01

at a neighboring school, the Avonus

1:13:03

declined to participate. But it should

1:13:06

be noted that the wall was porous in

1:13:08

places. C.T. also reported

1:13:10

that Andrew's University bookstore

1:13:12

was one of Intervarsity

1:13:14

Press's top academic customers. Desmond

1:13:16

Ford appeared on the Baptist

1:13:18

John Anchorberg's show in 1982

1:13:20

with Walter Ray. There were five

1:13:23

Avonus Leaders. that Ankerberg invited, but

1:13:25

all of whom declined to go

1:13:27

on the show. And that left, basically,

1:13:29

one former Adventist in an

1:13:31

Avonist who had been fired

1:13:33

to explain Adventism to a largely

1:13:36

evangelical audience. Dez, as was

1:13:38

his way, began with charm,

1:13:40

telling Ankerberg, quote, you said

1:13:42

you were not a Seventh-day Avonist. I

1:13:44

accept that apology. I am one, and

1:13:46

I love the church, end quote. In

1:13:49

1985, Bill Johnson, then entered the

1:13:51

Avonus Review Review. did join John

1:13:53

Ankerberg show alongside Walter Martin who

1:13:55

had grown concerned that the Avenist

1:13:57

Church had repudiated questions on documents.

1:14:00

doctrine. 30 years after the

1:14:02

Adventist evangelical dialogues, here

1:14:04

was Walter Martin sitting down

1:14:07

with another Adventist leader wondering

1:14:09

if the deal they struck

1:14:11

in the mid-1950s still held true.

1:14:13

Martin had posed three questions

1:14:16

to Neil Wilson, but Neil

1:14:18

had apparently passed him off

1:14:20

to somebody else. Martin's first

1:14:22

question was, do you still

1:14:24

hold the questions on doctrine?

1:14:26

Second. Is Alan White an infallible

1:14:28

interpreter of the Bible? Third, why

1:14:31

did the church let questions on doctrine

1:14:33

go out of print? Bill Johnson,

1:14:35

suddenly on the hot seat, to

1:14:37

speak for the entire denomination, affirmed that

1:14:40

yes, the church still holds the QOD,

1:14:42

no, and the white is not an

1:14:44

infallible interpreter of the Bible. That's when

1:14:47

Martin pounced throwing quotes from the

1:14:49

review in the white estate that

1:14:51

seemed to suggest otherwise. Martin was

1:14:53

his usual pugnacious self. He was

1:14:56

worried that the hundreds of church

1:14:58

employees leaving the church in the

1:15:00

post-glacier view years were being kicked

1:15:03

out for being gospel-oriented Adventists. That's

1:15:05

the lens through which Walter Martin

1:15:07

saw the post-glacier view years in

1:15:09

Adventism. Johnson, who was clearly not

1:15:12

ready for a brawl, was on

1:15:14

defense the entire time. John

1:15:16

Ankerberg threw a curball in here and

1:15:18

there, and in one case he said, that

1:15:20

he had Johnson respond to some of Walter

1:15:23

Ray's and Desmond Ford's arguments as well. The

1:15:25

longer it went on, the more Ankerberg and

1:15:27

Martin just walked all over Bill Johnson, who

1:15:29

struggled to get more than a sentence out

1:15:32

at a time. Another curveball came when the

1:15:34

audience was invited to ask questions

1:15:36

of Bill Johnson. One audience member

1:15:38

declared that Avonus were afraid of

1:15:40

Ellen White. And Johnson responded, no,

1:15:42

sir, we are not afraid of

1:15:44

Ellen White. But the audience member

1:15:46

just kept going insisting that Avonus

1:15:48

were afraid of Ellen White. And

1:15:50

then Martin went back on the

1:15:52

war path. Now these are direct

1:15:54

quotes here, but I'm not going to

1:15:57

say quote unquote, okay. Martin. But are

1:15:59

you in Christ? Yes, Martin, are your

1:16:01

sins blotted out? Johnson, Jesus has

1:16:03

taken care of my sins. Martin,

1:16:05

are they blotted out? Come on.

1:16:07

Johnson, my sins are forgiven. Martin,

1:16:09

are they blotted out? Johnson, let

1:16:12

me finish my parable. Martin, the

1:16:14

defense rests. Now, of course, this

1:16:16

conversation is out of context, right?

1:16:18

I'm not explaining the parable that

1:16:20

Johnson was trying to draw from,

1:16:23

but it just gives you an

1:16:25

indication of this rapid fire interrogative

1:16:27

style. that Walter Martin had. And

1:16:29

of course he was now convinced

1:16:31

that legalists had taken over the

1:16:33

Adventist church and he said that

1:16:35

he longed for the days of

1:16:38

Leroy Froom and Roy Allen Anderson.

1:16:40

Bill Johnson's Anchorburg interview

1:16:42

wasn't Adventism at its ecumenical

1:16:44

best. I think it represents

1:16:47

the way Adventists have often done

1:16:49

some of these goodwill tours without

1:16:51

much goodwill, like kind of

1:16:53

reluctantly, kind of half-hearted, kind

1:16:56

of half-hearted lady. walking in

1:16:58

the situations not fully prepared for

1:17:00

them. And that was certainly true

1:17:02

of the Avonus Evangelical Conferences in

1:17:04

the 1950s, but they Avonus

1:17:06

quickly recovered and did what needed

1:17:09

to be done from their perspective

1:17:11

to have a good relationship with

1:17:13

Walter Martin and Donald Gray Barnhouse.

1:17:15

Now after Walter Martin's death, his colleague

1:17:17

Donald Gray Barnhouse had died back in

1:17:20

1960, you'd think the issue might die

1:17:22

down? But Ken samples, a colleague of

1:17:24

Walter Barnes, picked up the mantle

1:17:27

instead. And an article for Christianity

1:17:29

today in 1990, samples recognized that,

1:17:31

quote, a problem in the past,

1:17:34

in past evangelical evaluations of Adventism

1:17:36

has been the failure to recognize

1:17:39

its theological diversity, end quote.

1:17:41

That's 100% true. In a

1:17:43

particularly uncomfortable comparison, sample said

1:17:45

Adventism was as diverse as

1:17:47

American Catholicism. Sure, that makes

1:17:49

the Avonus happy. And the

1:17:51

open question was, which group

1:17:54

samples identified three? The

1:17:56

legalists, the evangelicals, and the

1:17:58

liberals would prevail in... the

1:18:00

evidence church. And we have to

1:18:02

remember where samples in Christianity today

1:18:04

are coming from. Both are evangelical

1:18:07

believing they have the gospel and

1:18:09

so Adventism's factions are evaluated based

1:18:11

on how evangelical they are. The

1:18:14

evangelical movement was predominantly and comfortably

1:18:16

white at that time. The same

1:18:18

issue of Christianity today that has

1:18:20

Ken samples his article also asked,

1:18:23

quote, do blacks want to be

1:18:25

evangelical, end quote. So, Adventism's

1:18:27

diversity may have, shall we say,

1:18:29

colored their assessment at times. What

1:18:31

I guess I'm saying is that we

1:18:34

shouldn't be too worried about one

1:18:36

group claiming Adventism doesn't have the

1:18:38

gospel if their gospel only seems

1:18:41

to reach one particular group of

1:18:43

people. Sambles is correct, however, that

1:18:45

Adventism in the late 1970s was

1:18:48

at a crossroads. The church could

1:18:50

have gone several ways, but choices

1:18:52

that church leaders made circular in

1:18:54

1980. and not just leaders, but

1:18:57

members as well, are still directing the

1:18:59

church today. I'll give you an

1:19:01

example before we move on. And

1:19:03

that's the emphasis on fundamental beliefs.

1:19:05

While these beliefs have existed in

1:19:07

list form... in some former fashion

1:19:09

for many many decades, they weren't

1:19:12

seen as the definitive test of

1:19:14

fellowship for employees and members. In

1:19:16

1920, R.A. Underwood proposed a list

1:19:18

of 11 questions to be asked

1:19:20

of someone wanting baptism. The first

1:19:22

question was, have you accepted Jesus

1:19:24

as your personal Savior in His

1:19:27

Word as your teacher? Underwood did

1:19:29

ask in question 11, the very

1:19:31

final question, if the candidate was

1:19:33

in harmony with the teaching of

1:19:35

Seventh Day Adventist, but this teaching

1:19:38

wasn't spelled out. Since 1980, we

1:19:40

have seen this expanded articulation

1:19:42

of fundamental evidence theology play

1:19:44

a greater role in the

1:19:46

life of the church as

1:19:49

a safeguard against future Desmond

1:19:51

Ford's. In other words, people

1:19:53

haven't talked about fundamental beliefs

1:19:55

more before 1980 than they

1:19:57

did after 1980. This is...

1:20:00

They've taken a much

1:20:02

more prominent authoritative place in

1:20:04

the life of the church since Desmond

1:20:06

Ford, since they were first passed as

1:20:08

a general conference session there in April

1:20:11

1980. In 2007, at a conference

1:20:13

commemorating the 50th anniversary of

1:20:15

questions on doctrine, I was

1:20:17

there. Kenneth Samples penned an

1:20:20

essay talking about his own

1:20:22

relationship with Walter Martin, the

1:20:24

1950s meetings, and Martin's concerns

1:20:26

about Seventh Day Adventism in the

1:20:28

1980s. Samples made it clear that

1:20:30

one of Walter Martin's last wishes

1:20:33

was to write another book on

1:20:35

Adventism, and that samples himself

1:20:37

planned to write that book. It's unclear

1:20:39

to me if he ever did. Should we be

1:20:42

happy that Walter Martin didn't write one

1:20:44

more version of a book on Adventist

1:20:46

before he died? If I'm honest, it's a

1:20:48

little relief. I don't know what he would

1:20:50

have said. It's hard to say where the

1:20:52

relationship between Adventist and evangelicals

1:20:54

are today. I believe the relationship...

1:20:57

that they have is much better

1:20:59

today despite the Ford affair and

1:21:01

Walter Martin's fear that Adventism had

1:21:04

taken a legalistic tone. Why do

1:21:06

I think it's better? Well, certainly the

1:21:08

culture of the Anglosphere has changed and

1:21:10

fewer Christians it seems are as pugnacious

1:21:12

about doctrine as they used to be.

1:21:14

That might be a double-edged sword. Perhaps

1:21:17

there is a growing awareness that

1:21:19

internees seen conflicts distract from the

1:21:21

greater threat that churches face in

1:21:24

secularism. But there are still plenty

1:21:26

of evangelicals willing to pick

1:21:28

up Walter Martin's mantle and

1:21:30

claim that Adventists are not Christians. With

1:21:32

the death of Dal Ratslaf, his work

1:21:34

has been continued by successors just as

1:21:37

samples tried to carry on Walter Martin's

1:21:39

legacy. But you'll note I think in

1:21:41

both cases that the fervor and the

1:21:44

fire and the popularity just isn't

1:21:46

what it used to be. Now we have people

1:21:48

on YouTube. At this moment in

1:21:50

American politics and culture. I don't

1:21:52

know that Avonus are as eager as they

1:21:54

once were to be seen as evangelicals. I

1:21:56

think it's always been appropriate to

1:21:58

check the assumption that evangelicals have

1:22:01

the gospel figured out and all that

1:22:03

remains is for Adventists to be like them

1:22:05

in some way. Nevertheless, you can still

1:22:07

find plenty of evangelicals, like I

1:22:10

said, getting clicks on YouTube for

1:22:12

saying that Adventists are an occult, despite

1:22:14

a recent embrace of Adventism as

1:22:16

a fruitful field of scholarly inquiry,

1:22:18

something I talked about in an

1:22:20

extra episode at the American Society

1:22:22

for Church History. you will find that,

1:22:24

I don't know, for most people I

1:22:26

think Adventism lurks just out of their

1:22:28

peripheral view. They've maybe heard of it,

1:22:31

but they don't really know an Adventist,

1:22:33

don't really know what they're all about.

1:22:35

Adventism is a little bit more mainstream

1:22:37

than it used to be, but still

1:22:39

kind of strange in some way

1:22:41

that many people cannot articulate. So long

1:22:44

as Adventism occupies that location at

1:22:46

the at the periphery, people will

1:22:48

be curious to understand that friend

1:22:50

of a friend who's an Adventist.

1:22:52

And so there will always be

1:22:55

those who show up offering to

1:22:57

explain that strangeness on YouTube in

1:22:59

exchange for some likes and some

1:23:01

clicks. But let's talk about this

1:23:04

again in 30 years when I retire

1:23:06

and I'm sure we'll understand

1:23:08

it much better. Let's shift gears,

1:23:10

talk about something a number of

1:23:12

you have asked me to talk about

1:23:15

in this episode. Women's Ordination.

1:23:17

Oh boy, I don't want to

1:23:19

get into this again. Oh. Women's

1:23:21

Ordination, as elders and pastors, could

1:23:24

be an entire season of this

1:23:26

podcast. Hint, hint. So let's keep it

1:23:28

simple for now. And by simple, I

1:23:30

mean, still pretty long. I avoided this

1:23:32

topic throughout both seasons of the

1:23:35

Avinous History podcast because the flow of

1:23:37

that story didn't really match the flow

1:23:39

of the story we're telling. What I

1:23:41

mean is that in order to tell

1:23:43

that story of women's ordination, you kind

1:23:46

of have to start the 1800. In

1:23:48

so far, you know, to be up to date,

1:23:50

you're going to finish in the 2000s. So when

1:23:52

you're telling a story that every episode

1:23:54

is just moving us forward year by

1:23:56

year, it's hard to stop and say,

1:23:58

now let's tell this story. spans 150

1:24:00

years. It kind of breaks you

1:24:02

out of the chronology. And plus, you

1:24:04

know, kicking it over to another season

1:24:07

all by itself enables us to spend

1:24:09

a lot more time on it as

1:24:11

well, because I think this is one

1:24:13

of those topics. The details kind

1:24:15

of matter. The first thing we

1:24:17

need to understand is that the

1:24:19

ordination of women as elders or

1:24:21

pastors is a different issue from

1:24:23

whether or not women should be

1:24:25

elders or pastors. Okay, I've noticed

1:24:28

this get conflated so many

1:24:30

times Where people say well the

1:24:32

church does not support women's ordination

1:24:34

therefore a woman should not

1:24:36

be an elder two separate

1:24:38

issues two separate issues We're

1:24:40

talking about ordination in

1:24:42

particular and Adventist history.

1:24:45

There are many many women who

1:24:47

have served in pastoral roles chaplancy

1:24:49

roles and other leadership roles in

1:24:52

the church while the ordination of

1:24:54

women was considered in the

1:24:56

1800s, especially at the 1881

1:24:59

General Conference session, I really

1:25:01

want to begin our story

1:25:03

in the early 1970s when

1:25:05

Josephine Benton was ordained as a

1:25:07

local church elder. Benton, who

1:25:10

only passed away in January

1:25:12

2025, had found 50 other women

1:25:14

who have been licensed ministers between

1:25:17

1870 and 1973. And after her

1:25:19

ordination, she asked to see your

1:25:21

pastor at Sligo church. Quote, if

1:25:24

you ever want a woman on

1:25:26

your pastoral staff, let me know, end

1:25:29

quote. She thought the pastor would laugh

1:25:31

at her, but he took her seriously,

1:25:33

and she joined the pastoral staff

1:25:35

at Sligo. As one person

1:25:37

had said, quote, in 1973, Josephine

1:25:39

was to SDA ministry what Jackie

1:25:42

Robinson was to all white baseball

1:25:44

in 1947, end quote. 1973 also

1:25:46

hosted one of the historic

1:25:48

conferences on women in the

1:25:51

Avinous Church. This is the role of

1:25:53

women in the church committee that met

1:25:55

at Camp Mohaven in Ohio. Established by

1:25:57

the General Conference, 10 men and 15...

1:26:00

women meant to present and discuss papers

1:26:02

because what else does the church do

1:26:04

to have a good time? So while

1:26:06

the meeting wasn't about ordination per se,

1:26:08

of course it was brought up, it was

1:26:10

talked about, you obviously can't

1:26:12

get to ordination without first

1:26:14

understanding the role of women and the

1:26:16

role that they should play in the

1:26:18

church, I should say. The owner running

1:26:20

and outspoken and charming professor who wrote

1:26:23

one of my favorite books, Annie Avana,

1:26:25

says ever written, just is a, from

1:26:27

a readership enjoyment perspective. She cut to

1:26:29

the heart of the discussion when

1:26:31

she quoted somebody as saying, quote,

1:26:33

we can produce no positive theological

1:26:36

case for ordaining Scotsmen by a clear

1:26:38

oversight in the part of God.

1:26:40

They were not represented among the

1:26:42

apostolic band. But the extension of

1:26:44

the church, the Gentiles, cleared the

1:26:46

way for the ordaining of people

1:26:48

of all nations. The same extension

1:26:50

of the church to total humanity

1:26:52

is, surely, the basis for opening

1:26:55

the possibility of ordination to total

1:26:57

humanity. end quote. Ralph Detteran found

1:26:59

no theological reason for women not

1:27:01

to be ordained, but he thought

1:27:03

the entire concept of ordination needed

1:27:06

to be reconsidered. He asked, why

1:27:08

are we ordained people to pastoral

1:27:10

ministry, but not to teaching ministry?

1:27:12

Why do we not ordain people who

1:27:14

use their other gifts for ministry?

1:27:16

To reduce this issue to whether

1:27:19

or not to ordain women risked

1:27:21

as he sought to perpetuate this

1:27:23

separation of pastoral ministry from all

1:27:25

other kinds of ministries. And thus

1:27:28

the separation from pastoral giftedness as

1:27:30

a spiritual gift from other kinds

1:27:32

of gifts that God gives. Not

1:27:34

everyone at Mohaven was convinced by

1:27:37

either argument, obviously men and women

1:27:39

alike, made the case that women

1:27:41

can minister just fine without seeking

1:27:44

ordination. So we had these three

1:27:46

groups emerge out of Mohaven. We

1:27:49

had the group that was pro-women's

1:27:51

ordination, a group that was against

1:27:53

women's ordination, and then a

1:27:55

group that was maybe hesitantly

1:27:58

or qualified pro-women's ordination. really

1:28:00

wanted us to send a

1:28:02

step back and just have a

1:28:04

conversation about ordination period before

1:28:06

we get into women's ordination. Maybe

1:28:08

we need to revisit what

1:28:10

ordination is, the role it

1:28:13

plays in the church, and whether we

1:28:15

should even ordain men, right? The

1:28:17

Mohaving Committee report asserted that,

1:28:19

quote, we see no significant

1:28:22

theological objection to the ordination

1:28:24

of women to church ministries,

1:28:26

end quote. The 1973 annual council

1:28:28

basically said, slow down. They sent

1:28:31

the Mohaven report to each division,

1:28:33

asked them to study it during the

1:28:35

next year, and come back with notes.

1:28:37

The same council also said that a

1:28:39

married woman's first ministry was to

1:28:42

her home and family, but

1:28:44

that women should be credentialed

1:28:46

when they do pastoral evangelistic

1:28:48

work. The next year, the 1974 annual

1:28:50

council tried to put a plug in

1:28:52

the discussion. Quote, because a survey of

1:28:55

its world divisions reveals that the time

1:28:57

is not ripe nor opportune, therefore in

1:28:59

the interest of the world unity of

1:29:02

the church, no move be made in

1:29:04

the direction of ordaining women to the

1:29:06

gospel ministry, end quote. Prexad, however,

1:29:09

was asked to study it further. The

1:29:11

1975 spring meeting decided that women

1:29:13

should be able to serve as

1:29:15

ordained deacons. Furthermore, they urge that,

1:29:17

quote, the greatest discretion and caution be

1:29:20

exercised in the ordaining of women to

1:29:22

the office of local elder, end quote.

1:29:24

Nevertheless, they stop short of supporting

1:29:26

ordaining women to the pastoral ministry because,

1:29:28

quote, we believe that the world church

1:29:30

is not yet ready to move forward.

1:29:33

Therefore, until this question becomes clearer, we

1:29:35

recommend that every endeavor be made to

1:29:37

use women in the numerous positions, many

1:29:40

of them are well qualified to fill,

1:29:42

end quote. So let's catch our breath here.

1:29:44

What you're seeing is two different things kind

1:29:46

of happening at the same time. One, we're

1:29:48

not ready to move forward on women's ordination

1:29:50

to pastoral ministry because the world church

1:29:52

is not ready for it. This is

1:29:55

the thing we're hearing year after year

1:29:57

throughout the 1970s. But at the same

1:29:59

time, it's not. like they're only

1:30:01

saying that and doing nothing

1:30:03

else. You also hear some of these

1:30:05

meetings say we need to find other

1:30:07

roles for women to occupy in the

1:30:10

church leadership positions and whatnot.

1:30:12

So we're kind of having both

1:30:14

things where we want to

1:30:16

encourage women to occupy prominent

1:30:18

leadership positions in a

1:30:21

church, but we're not ready to

1:30:23

talk about the ordination of past

1:30:25

12 ministry. They can be ordained

1:30:27

elders. They can be ordained deacons,

1:30:29

but let's hold off on the

1:30:31

pastor part of this. A complicating

1:30:34

factor was the IRS, which is

1:30:36

always a complicating factor. The IRS,

1:30:38

for those who don't know because

1:30:40

you're blessed, is the tax-collecting

1:30:42

entity in the United States.

1:30:45

Because these female pastors would not

1:30:47

be eligible. And I'm not

1:30:49

talking about ordained female pastors,

1:30:51

just female pastors, right? Ordination

1:30:53

is a separate issue from...

1:30:55

from being a pastor. Because

1:30:57

these female pastors would not

1:30:59

be eligible for parsonage exclusion,

1:31:02

among other tax benefits, because

1:31:04

they're not ordained clergy, and

1:31:06

the IRS seems to have defined

1:31:08

ordained clergy as those with

1:31:10

the authority to administer communion

1:31:13

and officiate at weddings, then

1:31:15

they're at a serious tax

1:31:17

disadvantage here compared to their

1:31:19

male colleagues. The IRS could not

1:31:21

navigate each church's theology of ordination,

1:31:23

right? So it settled on. an

1:31:26

ordained pastor having the authority to

1:31:28

do those two things. The pressure from

1:31:30

the IRS helped push the

1:31:33

1976 annual council to allow

1:31:35

licensed ministers in certain circumstances

1:31:37

to perform the functions of

1:31:39

the ordained minister. So

1:31:41

what we're seeing here is even

1:31:44

when we're not comfortable yet with

1:31:46

women being ordained as pastors, we

1:31:48

can't have a situation Tax-wise, it

1:31:50

would be unfair for them to

1:31:53

have to pay taxes their male

1:31:55

colleagues don't pay just simply because

1:31:57

of a We're not giving them the order

1:32:00

nation certificate. So there was a

1:32:02

move then to allow these women

1:32:04

to perform certain of these functions

1:32:06

and by that I think

1:32:08

we're talking about weddings in

1:32:10

particular perhaps baptisms. We're allowing

1:32:12

them to perform some of these functions

1:32:14

that otherwise only ordained ministers

1:32:17

could do for the for

1:32:19

tax purposes. Okay, we're letting

1:32:21

them have a little bit

1:32:23

more authority as non-ordained ministers

1:32:25

doing some ordained things. in order

1:32:27

to qualify for these tax privileges.

1:32:30

The 1975 spring meeting also made

1:32:32

a recommendation to stop giving ministerial

1:32:34

licenses to women, which they had

1:32:37

been receiving for more than 100

1:32:39

years, because as the 1977 annual

1:32:41

council explained, quote, when a conference

1:32:44

gives a young man a ministerial

1:32:46

license, it should be recognized as

1:32:48

a pledge on the part of

1:32:51

the conference leadership to foster that

1:32:53

worker's growth, end quote. The license

1:32:55

was an opportunity for the worker to

1:32:57

prove their calling With the implication

1:32:59

being that when there was when

1:33:02

that calling was satisfactorily Demonstrated the

1:33:04

worker would be ordained. There was

1:33:06

an expectation. You're not guaranteed that