What Is the Destination of People Leaving Adventism?
I hope this email finds you well. I’ve been reflecting on our correspondence from last year and wanted to reach out to express my gratitude for the insights you shared. Our exchange was a significant part of my journey in examining the complexities of Adventism.
Your efforts to highlight the “cult maneuvers” and doctrinal errors within the system—ranging from its specific cosmology to its views on salvation—have been eye-opening. Seeing these claims of “exclusive light” dismantled has helped me, and even my wife, recognize many inconsistencies. While she remains within the church for now, she has shown a great deal of growth and is beginning to see the errors we’ve discussed.
However, as I follow your recent materials, I’ve found myself in a bit of a dilemma. I notice a transition where the focus moves from deconstructing Adventist doctrine to adopting Evangelical doctrine. This leaves me questioning if the search for “Truth” is simply a move between two different systems—a “two-way traffic” between Saturday and Sunday keepers.
I’ll admit I may have a bias, as I don’t consider myself a highly religious person, though I have a deep respect for the teachings and person of Jesus. From my perspective, I’m trying to understand if there is a path that exists outside of these doctrinal structures altogether, rather than just shifting from one set of religious requirements to another.
I would value your thoughts on this. How do you view the destination of this journey? Is the goal a different denomination, or is there a way to maintain a connection to Jesus without being bound by the specific frameworks of these organized doctrines?
Thank you again for the light you’ve shared so far. I look forward to hearing your perspective.
—VIA EMAIL, TANZANIA
Response: Thank you for writing. You raise an important question: what is reality? What is our purpose in our life on this earth? What is our goal?
The bottom line is understanding who we are and who God is. We have to ascertain what our authority is. In Adventism, our authority, at the bottom line, was Ellen White because the religion depended upon her interpretations of the Scripture—which makes the bold claim that it is God’s word (see Hebrews 4:12, 13, for example). If a human being reinterprets God’s word and manipulates it to say what it does not say, then that manipulator (if we believe her or him) becomes our real authority.
If, on the other hand, we dismiss any outside authority and make our own perception our foundation for understanding reality, then we become “god” in our own minds. We trust only what we understand and see. In a similar way, if we dismiss religion and spiritual reality and choose to make science our authority (or any other discipline), we are still dependent upon the people that we choose to believe. We make another person our authority for our understanding of truth and reality.
We have always, at Life Assurance Ministries, been committed to exposing the false teachings of Adventism but also to showing the biblical gospel. Leaving Adventism but not acknowledging the reality of truth and the one true God leaves people with a vacuum. We are created to be in relationship with the Creator, and false gospels bind people in spiritual and mental bondage because they fill people’s spiritual need with something that will ultimately destroy them, not redeem them.
The Lord Jesus is the One who said,
“When the unclean spirit goes out of a man, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, and not finding any, it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ “And when it comes, it finds it swept and put in order. “Then it goes and takes along seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they go in and live there, and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first.”—Luke 11:24–26 LSB
Adventism isn’t just wrong information. It is spiritually evil, deceptive. When we leave Adventism, we have to repent of it because we had replaced reality with a lie, even if inadvertently. Yet Scripture is very clear that there are two “places”: the domain of darkness into which every human is born (Ephesians 2:1–3), and the kingdom of the Beloved Son into which we are transferred when we trust and believe that Jesus completed the atonement that is sufficient to pay for human sin (Ephesians 2:4–10, Colossians 1:13).
Leaving Adventism isn’t just about figuring out that we were wrong; we are to understand that we need Truth. We are not created to be our own authority; we did not make ourselves. We are subject to the One who made us. When we leave Adventism and do not embrace truth, instead moving into agnosticism and unbelief, we are like that man in Jesus’ parable. We are not in a morally neutral cosmos. We are either in the domain of darkness or we are in the kingdom of the beloved son. When we leave Adventism and discard the belief that God Is and that His Word is His revelation of Himself, we are vulnerable to being in a worse condition even than we were as Adventists.
We are by nature spiritually dead, disconnected from the life of God (Ephesians 2:1–3; Romans 3:8-18). We are not merely bodies with air in our lungs; we are bodies with immaterial spirits that are our identities. Those spirits are born dead in sin. False religion does not give us spiritual life. Only our Creator can do that, and He is the One who took responsibility for us and paid for our sin on the cross, shattering our curse of death with His resurrection.
We are asked to believe Him. We are asked to acknowledge that we are not sovereign beings but are creations of the One Sovereign God. All creation is subject to Him, and He has given Himself to redeem us from our spiritual death.
The goal of leaving Adventism is not to wander endlessly in darkness but to realize that we had a false Jesus and a false gospel. We had a false view of ourselves and who we are. We have to be free to let go of our identities as Adventists and acknowledge that we are creatures who are unable to give ourselves meaning. We need our Creator, and He has revealed Himself in His word and in the incarnation and death and resurrection of His Son.
This is our goal: we need to be made spiritually alive. The issue is not joining an organization but literally passing from death to life. Once we trust Jesus and are made alive, we are placed into the body of Christ by the Holy Spirit. We are instructed to be in fellowship wit other believers, admonishing and supporting each other as we grow in Christ and carry out the work He prepared in advance for us to do (Eph 2:10).
I have a suggestion. Get a notebook and begin copying the gospel of John, a few verses as a time, and ask God to teach you what He wants you to know. He is faithful and will teach you.
Have you been listening to or watching our two podcasts, Former Adventist Podcast and Former Adventist Fact Check? I believe you would find them helpful if you listen over the “long haul”. Our Adventism skewed our worldview, and it takes time and immersion in reality to fix that and to be able to know what is real. The Bible is God’s own revelation of Himself and His will and purposes. These questions will resolve as you place God’s word into your mind.
Response to “Adventist: Ellen White Taught Us Wrong About Prayer”
You Can’t Leave Adventism…
How do you pray? You leave the church, but [it] seems to can’t leave at all.
—VIA YOUTUBE
Response from Jim Liley online moderator:
“Imagine loving the SDA people so much that you’re willing to take their anger in order to point out the gospel to them, so they won’t hear Jesus’ words; ‘I never knew you.’” —Quoted from R.L. FB post (emphasis mine)
“If you found out that the bridge into your town had been swept away, would you warn your friends and neighbors, or just walk away and let them die? Adventism has no bridge to heaven, so we are showing our love to Adventists by doing this work, and also facing the hate from Adventists who refuse to open their Bibles and see what it says. I encourage you to read Galatians several times… see what the Bible says about the beginning and the ending of the law. —Copied from FAF YouTube comment (emphasis mine)
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