Well, it wasn’t long after Jim mailed his letter that he got a response. Interestingly enough, he didn’t get one from his local conference, union or the North American Division, all of which also received a copy of his letter. However, he did get one from the Ministerial Association at the General Conference World Headquarters.
You can check out the scanned copy of pg 1 here, pg 2 here. Below is the letter in it’s entirety. Let me know what you think. In my next post, I will dissect the response, and give Jim’s response to this letter as well.
April 3, 2006
Dear Brother Keesler,
Greetings to you in the name of our Wonderful Saviour, Jesus Christ, in response to your letter February 25, 2006, but which was postmarked March 27, 2006, and which was forwarded to my attention for a response.
First, you have lodged some serious complaints against the church in general on a vast variety of topics. Some of these are, indeed, serious and should be carefully considered in that context. Others of these are frivolous or matters of personal opinion and do not merit consideration of the same level of importance as those which are of importance.
Permit me to address one such frivolous concern which you state as your # 1 concern - changes in our fundamental beliefs. First, the fundamental beliefs of the Seventh-day Adventist Church have never been either a static number, nor a closed document. The last time, prior to the 2005 General Conference Session in St. Louis, in which the fundamental beliefs were amended was in 1980 at the General Conference Session in Dallas. At that time the following preamble was voted by the session as part of the fundamental beliefs: “Seventh-day Adventists accept the Bible as their only creed and hold certain fundamental beliefs to be the teachings of the Holy Scriptures. These beliefs, as set apart here, constitute the church’s understanding and expression of the teachings of Scripture. Revisions to these statements may be expected at a General Conference session when the church is led by the Holy Spirit to a fuller understanding of Bible truth or finds better language to express the teachings of God’s Holy Word.”
At the 2005 General Conference session the church, led by the Holy Spirit, found better language to express the teaching of God’s Holy Word and added the following fundamental belief. Note: this is not new light, nor new doctrine. It is a better expression of that which we have always believed and taught. The new fundamental belief states: “By His death on the cross Jesus triumphed over the forces of evil. He who subjugated the demonic spirits during His earthly ministry has broken their power and made certain their ultimate doom. Jesus’ victory give us victory over the evil forces that still seek to control us, as we walk with Him in peace, joy, and assurance of His love. Now the Holy Spirit dwells within us and empowers us. Continually committed to Jesus as our Saviour and Lord, we are set free from the burden of our past deeds. No longer do we live in the darkness, fear of evil powers, ignorance, and meaninglessness of our former way of life. In this new freedom in Jesus, we are called to grow into the likeness of His character, communing with Him daily in prayer, feeding on His Word, meditating on it and on His providence, singing His praises, gathering together for worship, and participating in the mission of the Church. As we give ourselves in loving service to those around us and in witnessing to His salvation, His constant presence with us through the Spirit transforms every moment and every task into a spiritual experience.”
The reason I’ve taken time to provide you these two lengthy quotations is to point out the fallacy in your reasoning which suggests that you adhere to some earlier version of fundamental beliefs, and reject the current statement of these same fundamental beliefs and … then … also state that the church is in error for having a Church Manual. Your reasoning is circular at best and argumentative at worst because the original opponents of a church manual were concerned over the very thing a new fundamental belief statement accomplishes. These opponents were fearful that a church manual would set the positions of the church in some concrete, creed-like fashion which could be altered in the future. You simply cannot oppose both positions and maintain any logical integrity.
Now to your specific, handwritten request that your name be removed from membership in the Seventh-day Adventist Church, I am returning to you your request for the following reason. Such membership in the Seventh-day Adventist Church is a function only of the local congregation. No other organizational entity can act upon a person’s membership, or discipline by censure. Therefore, any requests that you would wish to make concerning your membership should be directed to the local congregation where your membership resides.
On a personal note, I sincerely hope that you will reconsider this action because both you and your local church family will best thrive spiritually as you join together to hasten Jesus coming.
On the other hand, if you determine that you must remove your membership, I recommend a simple request directed to the church clerk “please remove my name from membership” with the prior enumeration of issues of either importance or frivolous nature which will benefit neither your own spiritual journey nor those who may not be prepared to endure your lengthy recitation.
In the meantime, would you permit a personal recommendation that you carefully and prayerfully read and reflect upon Chapter # 35 in Patriarchs and Prophets prior to acting upon your request? I am praying for a softening of your judgmental accusations against your brethren as a result of you studying the important message of this chapter.
Yours in our Saviour’s service,
(signed)
James A. Cress
Ministerial Association Secretary
January 5th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
Well I must say that I tend to agree with Pastor Cress here. Jim simply placed a laundry list of things that concern a certain segment of the church without really seeming to have any conversation.
On another note, I would seriously reconsider your plan to “disect” Pastor Cress’ letter and your friend’s letter and response. If I were Pastor Cress I would think that your friend had bamboozled me just to give material to a website. It may not be true, but that is what it could look like to outside observers.
January 6th, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Sherman,
As always, thank you for your comments! While I appreciate and understand what you are saying, I think that the fact that Jim sent his original letter to all levels of the church hierarchy indicates that on some level he was/is willing to have conversation. That being the case, I didn’t see much of an opening for conversation with James Cress after reviewing the response.
Although I certainly understand that some may feel this is simply “fodder” for the web, this is certainly not the case. Consider that the letter is almost a year old, and it is hard to imagine keeping such material private for so long if the intended purpose was to publish it online. In addition, while I have attempted to address some of these issues from a historical Adventist perspective here on the site, Jim’s letter struck me as being a pretty complete enumeration of the issues at stake, at least as perceived by the majority of the historic Adventist community. As a blogger representing the voice of this community, I thought it would help facilitate open discussion of the issues at hand to post the material to the web. It was I who requested it’s use from Jim, after he sent out the original letter a few weeks ago to some friends via e-mail.
I will look forward to more commentary and discussion as the issues are addressed in more detail going forward. I hope you will continue to share with the readers your thoughts as well.
In His Service,
Michael
January 6th, 2007 at 9:23 pm
I will post a link to the above response letter and make a few comments on my website. James Cress answer was very diplomatic and that is about all it was. But the fact is there is nothing he can do about the original letter writers complaints. Most of them simply reflected an unscientific and simplistic nineteenth century view. Such as his complaint against accreditation. We would have no doctors or dentists if we held to such a view and we would have precious little standing in the Academic world. It is a symptom of the mindset of so many Traditional SDA’s their idea of the church was the church of over a hundred years ago and it is to that time and the thoughts of those days that they hold as the summit of the SDA denomination. It is rather like the King James Only advocates who for no real reason hold to the scholarship of 400 years ago as the epitome of Biblical Scholarship.
January 7th, 2007 at 9:04 am
Ron,
Thanks for stopping by, as well as commenting on these letters on your blog. I do agree that Cress was diplomatic at best, sarcastic and condescending at worst. I’ll touch on the accreditation issue in a future post, but I think the real issue relates to what our perceived mission as a church truly is. I believe that our vision or mission has changed and that perhaps we have lost focus of the true meaning behind the Adventist movement.
However, I realize that there is a growing group within the church that espouses the virtues of higher criticism, rejecting the story of creation as literal, rejecting any inspiration from Ellen White, rejecting 1844 as of any significance, and rejecting the more difficult aspects of the gospel in favor of a ultra grace-laden feel-good message that tickles the ears of the hearers. After all, isn’t that what drives membership, which, in turn drives the dollars?
I’ll look forward to reading your post and commenting. Thanks again for stopping by … come back again. There’s sure to be more discussion on this one.
Michael
October 1st, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Hey again Michael!!..:)
As you can see I’ve landed on another one of your blog posts; and I wasn’t trying to…really.
Be encouraged! I say agin, BE ENCOURAGED!!
What you are seeing was prophesied about in the Spirit of Prophecy and has been; slowly over the last 50 or so years, summarily dismissed or re-written into some “gum-rubbing saccharin saturated” substance, i.e “no teeth no thinking required! Sad isn’t it? Kinda scary too.
MOST of the “General Conspiracy/Conference” leaders are in either willful collusion with The Beast, willful ignorance, indifference or spiritual apathy. I’d say MAYBE 2-4% of them are sincerely naive and will be un-blinded when the last stronger sounding call goes out to “come out from among them and be ye separate says the Lord”, that the LAST angel will sound even STRONGER! AMEN!
Not to fret, Michael; not that I believe that you do. The Lord Yeshua is truly waking up His “sleeping brides-maids”!
Now home-churchin’…..that’s the way to go, if you ask me….and if you don’t ask either….:) Gettin together with “those of LIKE FAITH” is what the Holy Spirit; not to be in any way confused with that “other spirit” (you know, the three frogs spirit and all), is saying to “he who has ears to hear”….get it? got it?….good..:)
I’m trying to get baptized and have been havin the darndest time. he “local church” that I’ve been fellowshipping at at first wanted me to go through about 12-16 “studies” BEFORE I could be baptized!! AND…they keep droppin comments about being baptized a “Seventh Day Adventist”. I don’t think that’s what the Ethiopian eunuch had to do. So I pressed the issue and just received word that I’ll be baptized not this Sabbath but the next. Hope they also don’t mind that I want a PUBLIC baptism in the ocean!…LOL….What? That’s what it’s supposed to be anyway right? Public confession of faith. Least that’s what I learned; over time. Public baptism is public confession. “In-house baptisms” are just that…SECRET….IN-HOUSE…..yet “whose house”?
Keep callin ‘em like you see ‘em!
PRAISE THE LORD AND PREACH THE TRUTH!…..:)