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Commentary on "The Priestly Garments of Grace"

RICHARD PEIFER

 

Day 2: Sunday, April 24, 2011 - Old Covenant Grace

 

Overview

“Jesus said it about as clearly as human language could express it: ‘From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked’ (Luke 12:48, NIV). It’s a powerful principle, one that we as Adventists, with all that we have been given (and we have been given so much!), would do well to take seriously.” [Teacher’s Quarterly, Page 54]

 

Problems

Oh, please! Adventists have been given nothing that hasn’t been given to everyone else. In fact, every Adventist “distinctive” is anathema to clear Biblical teaching.

Believe it or not, not every non-SDA believes in eternal torment (at least as defined by Medieval teaching), that the Sabbath has been changed to Sunday and that there will be a secret rapture. There are lively debates surrounding these and many other doctrines.

What true Christians believe, and Adventists do not believe, is that Jesus was completely victorious over sin on the cross and over death in His resurrection. True Christians accept this as the “gospel that saves” (see 1 Corinthians 15:1-5).

This very section (Page 54, prior to the “Read…” section), proves that Adventism is as guilty of idolatry as was Aaron and the Israelites. And Adventists are not alone. Every human being has this seed of idolatry within them. Every one of us, if left to our own devices, creates a god in our own image, and then bows down to that god.

Grace indeed! It simply is beyond me that God would become sin for us so that we could become righteous in Him (2 Corinthians 5:21).

All of humanity has lived in such grace, Israel included. How else do you explain God’s refusal to wipe us out in order to start over with fresh stock?

The second half of Page 54 is a reasonable, though incomplete, explanation of the workings of grace. It focuses on mercy and redemption, but fails to mention life. Forgiveness is not salvation! Eternal life, as defined by the indwelling Holy Spirit, is salvation, and this Life, promised to people under the Old Covenant who walked by faith in the coming Messiah, has been given fully to those of who walk by faith in the victorious Jesus within the New Covenant. (There is yet more life to come when we finally receive glorified bodies at Jesus’ return and our current flesh and blood is thrown away.)

 

Summary

  1. To smugly and arrogantly write off all non-Adventists as lesser mortals and to claim that the SDA church is uniquely God’s church, empowered with His very oracles, is the very height of idolatry. Such is the first half of Sunday’s lesson.
  2. Appealing to God’s grace in the face of such idolatry in the second half of Sunday’s lesson is wise. Would that the SDA church would apply this teaching to itself.

 

GO TO DAY 3

 

Copyright 2011 BibleStudiesForAdventists.com. All rights reserved. Revised April 20, 2011. This website is published by Life Assurance Ministries, Glendale, Arizona, USA, the publisher of Proclamation! Magazine. Contact email: BibleStudiesForAdventists@gmail.com.

The Sabbath School Bible Study Guide and the corresponding E.G. White Notes are published by Pacific Press Publishing Association, which is owned and operated by the Seventh-day Adventist church. The current quarter's editions are pictured above.

 

Official Adventist Resources

Standard Edition Study Guide Week 5

Teacher's Edition Study Guide Week 5

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