Before I begin my presentation, I want to briefly address some common prejudices against Adventism within Evangelical circles. To do this, I first recommend the book The Mosaic of Christian Beliefs by Roger E. Olson. Olson develops an approach to theological diversity where he organizes beliefs into three categories: orthodox, acceptable variation, and heresy. He argues that significant variation can be allowed in Christian doctrine without damaging the fundamental essence of the Christian worldview, as long as clear boundaries are still drawn delineating when beliefs no longer qualify as ‘Christian.’ I believe all essential elements of Adventist theology fall within either the Orthodox or Acceptable Variation Categories set up by Olson. For critics of my project, I highly recommend reading his book first as an external point of reference, and, if still unsure about Olson’s thesis, to consult scholars in one’s own tradition regarding Olson’s approach.
For those who have read the book, two types of objections remain. First, someone might argue that Olson’s schema is too broad, allowing into Christian theology beliefs that should be categorized as heresy. If so, I would first ask: which alternative belief categorization schema proposed by a reputable scholar or academic body is suggested in its place? Chances are high that any schema much narrower than Olson’s will rule out a large number of other Christian groups besides Adventists, meaning that the critics are not really opposed to Adventism specifically, but to a significant portion of all Christians.
A second type of objection might be that someone accepts Olson’s categorization schema, but does not think Adventist beliefs can fall within either the ‘orthodox’ or the ‘acceptable variation’ categories. For the rest of this lesson and the next, I will address two Adventist doctrines that are commonly brought up in such a context: the Sanctuary Doctrine and Ellen White.
For the Ellen White objection, I have a very simple solution: the Adventist theological system I will be developing here will not involve Ellen White at all. I will demonstrate that a distinctly Adventist theological system exists completely independent of Ellen White. So even if critics of Adventism might oppose other presentations on this basis, they will not be able to use that objection against my approach. Since an Ellen White-independent version of Adventism exists, it needs to be evaluated on its own account.
I will briefly address the sanctuary doctrine in the next post.
Amazon affiliate link to Olson’s book, A Mosaic of Christian Beliefs
