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Ecumenism or Distinctiveness? Seventh-Day Adventist Attitudes to the World Missionary Conference of 1910

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Keith A. Francis
Keith A. Francis*
Affiliation:
Pacific Union College
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Extract

For the Seventh-day Adventist Church, whose doctrines are rooted in eschatological and apocalyptic theology, ecumenism is problematic. While the Church sees itself as one heir of the historic tradition of Christianity and so welcomes recognition as part of the mainstream, it also claims to be the organization through which God proclaims a special message to the modern age. Put simply, sometimes Seventh-day Adventists are happy to be part of the universal Church and at other times they claim to be members of the only true Church. Obviously, the latter, exclusivist attitude is in contradiction to the ethos of the ecumenical movement.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 32: Unity and Diversity in the Church , 1996 , pp. 477 - 487
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1996

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References

1 See Ball, Bryan W., The English Connection: The Puritan Roots of Seventh-day Adventist Belief (Cam bridge, 1981)Google Scholar, for an example of a book which argues that Seventh-day Adventist doctrine has antecedents in earlier Christianity.

2 The willingness of Seventh-day Adventists to work with other Christians in collecting money for charities such as Christian Aid, for example, has aided the perception of the Seventh-day Adventist Church as ‘mainstream’.

3 A simple introduction to the modern ecumenical movement from a Seventh-day Adventist perspective is Beach’s, Bert Beverly Ecumenism: Boon or Bane? (Washington, DC, 1974)Google Scholar.

4 Gonzalez, Justo L., The Reformation to the Present Day, vol. 2 of The Story of Christianity (San Francisco, 1984), pp. 388–92 Google Scholar; Scott Latourette, Kenneth, ‘Ecumenical bearings of the missionary movement and the International Missionary Council’, in Rouse, Ruth and Charles Neill, Stephen, eds, A History of the Ecumenical Movement, 1517-1948, 2nd edn (London, 1967), pp. 355–63 Google Scholar; Neill, Stephen, A History of Christian Missions (London, 1965), p. 393 Google Scholar; Vidler, Alec R., The Church in an Age of Revolution (1789 to the Present Day) (Harmondsworth, 1971), pp. 257–65 Google Scholar.

5 For a general introduction to the history of Seventh-day Adventism see: Schwarz, Richard W., Light Bearers to the Remnant (Boise, Idaho, 1979)Google Scholar and Gary Land, ed., Adventism in America (Grand Rapids, Mich., 1986). More apologetic histories include: Edwin Froom, Le Roy, Movement of Destiny (Washington DC, 1971)Google Scholar and Spalding, Arthur Whitefield, Origin and History of Seventh-day Adventists, 4 vols (Washington DC, 1962)Google Scholar.

6 ‘The Great Disappointment’ was a term used by Millerites — and later by Seventh-day Adventists -to describe the failure of Christ to appear in 1844. See Numbers, Ronald L. and Butler, Jonathan M., eds, The Disappointed: Millerism and Milknarianism in the Nineteenth Century (Bloomington, lnd., 1987)Google Scholar for a good introduction to the Millerite movement.

7 ‘And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of jesus Christ.’

8 This belief in the special mission of Seventh-day Adventists is highlighted by the title of one of the histories of the Church: Mervyn Maxwell’s, C., Tell It to the World: The Story of Seventh-day Adventists (Mountain View, Cal., 1977)Google Scholar.

9 The best study of the development of Seventh-day Adventist doctrinal ideas is Gerard Damsteegt’s, P. Foundations of the Seventh-day Adventist Message and Mission (Grand Rapids, Mich., 1977)Google Scholar.

10 Ibid., pp. 179-81.

11 Ibid., pp. 208-20.

12 Land, Adventism in America, pp. 252-3.

13 The definitive history of the Conference, including reports of the various preparatory commissions and the text of some of the major speeches, is in The World Missionary Conference, 1910, 9 vols (Edinburgh, 1910).

14 This objective was placed at the beginning of each report from the preparatory commissions. See History and Records of the Conference (Edinburgh, 1910), vol. 9 of The World Missionary Conference, 1910.

15 Gairdner, W. H. T., Edinburgh 1910, 2nd edn (Edinburgh, 1910), p. 48.Google Scholar

16 ‘The World Missionary Conference’, United Methodist, 23 June 1910, p. 478 and ‘The Mighty Missionary Conference’, Primitive Methodist Leader, 30 June 1910, p. 449

17 E. G. White—SDA Research Centre Europe, Newbold College, Bracknell, Berkshire, General Conference Committee Minutes [hereafter ‘Bracknell, GC Minutes’], 17 Jan. 1910. The ‘summer meetings in Europe’ were meetings of the executive committees responsible for running the Seventh- day Adventist Church in various European countries such as Denmark, Germany, France and England.

18 There is no mention of the World Missionary Conference in any other Seventh-day Adventist publications nor in any private correspondence. This seems to confirm the lack of importance Seventh-day Adventists attached to the Conference.

19 Adventist Review and Sabbath Herald, 87/14 (April 1910), p. 24. As well as the meetings for delegates, there were meetings held in the Tollbooth Parish Church, Edinburgh, and St George’s Church, Glasgow, which anyone could attend.

20 Bracknell, GC Minutes, 6 March 1910.

21 Ibid., 20 April 1910.

22 Tissington Tatlow, ‘The World Conference on Faith and Order’ in Rouse and Neill, History of the Ecumenical Movement, p. 406; and ‘The World Missionary Conference’, Church Times, 17 June 1910, p. 800.

23 Schantz, Borge, ‘The Development of Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Thought: A Contemporary Appraisal’ (Fuller Theological Seminary Ph.D. Thesis, 1983), p. 389 Google Scholar.

24 General Conference Statistical Report quoted in Schantz, ‘Development of Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Thought’, pp. 388-9. The Foreign Missions Board could have sent another twenty delegates.

25 Sec p. 481-3.

26 Spicer, ‘Notes from the World’s Missionary Conference’, Adventist Review and Sabbath Herald, 87/29 (July 1910), p. 9.

27 Spicer, ‘More Notes from the World’s Missionary Conference’, Adventist Review and Sabbath Herald, 87/32 (August 1910), pp. 11-12.

28 Bartlett, ‘The World Missionary Conference’, Signs of the Times, 37/29 (July 1910), pp. 10-11.

29 Liberty was a Seventh-day Adventist journal which focused on religious toleration; it particularly informed its readers about developments in church and state relations.

30 Latourette, ‘Ecumenical Bearings of the Missionary Movement’, pp. 361-2; and Co-operation and Unity, vol. 8 of The World Missionary Conference, 1910, pp. 220-3.

31 Liberty, 5 (Third Quarter, 1910), p. 27.

32 Ibid., p. 40.

33 Schwarz, Light Bearers, pp. 94-5.

34 Good discussions of Seventh-day Adventist mentality are found in Bull, Malcolm and Lockhart, Keith, Seeking a Sanctuary: Seventh-day Adventism and the American Dream (San Francisco, 1989), csp. pp. 95–175 Google Scholar, and Gaustad, Edwin S., ed., The Rise of Adventism (New York, 1974), esp. pp. 154–206 Google Scholar.

35 See, for example, Seventh-day Adventists Believe … (Hagerstown, Maryland, 1988), pp. 152-69.

36 The World Council of Churches meeting in Canberra, Australia, in 1991 was reported in some detail in the Church Journal Adventist Review (the renamed Adventist Review and Sabbath Herald). See 168, 11 April 1991, pp. 8-10; 18 April 1991, pp. 14-16; 2 May 1991, pp. 8-10.

37 See Vidler, Church in an Age of Revolution, pp. 267-8.

38 See Bull and Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary, pp. 1-15.

39 Matt. 22. 14.