Royce's Story: Steps from Adventism to Christ

Be careful what you pray for!

Several years ago, my wife Karen and I started praying for God to show us the truth. We realized it was time to start teaching our children what we believed, so we began a journey to know God. Although we took separate paths on our quest, Karen and I wound up in the same place.

I was a second-generation Adventist. Looking back, I am grateful to the Adventist religion because it brought my parents to the same place at the same time. My mother came to Emmanuel Missionary College (now Andrews University) from Puerto Rico, where she had been converted to Adventism by SDA missionaries as a teenager. My father had accepted the Advent message as a teenager, and he, too, headed to EMC in Berrien Springs, Michigan. My parents raised four children in a very loving home in which our religious life consisted of weekly church attendance and a daily devotional. We did not have Ellen White overtly pushed upon us. My parents created a loving, safe home environment for my three siblings and me. Daily devotions, absent from overt E. G. White indoctrination, and weekly church attendance were the norm.

I graduated from Chisholm Trail Academy in Keene, Texas, and from Southern Adventist University in 1984. The round of religious activities was in place in my life, but spiritually, I was dead. It was not until it came time to educate my two children that I began to question my beliefs. It was my privilege to homeschool them. Naturally, I turned to the Adventist Home Study International curriculum as my guide. It wasn’t long before I saw that it contained heavy indoctrination into the writings of Ellen G. White (EGW).

The Question

Since I had not had much direct teaching regarding the “prophet” of Seventh-day Adventism, I set out to learn more about her. I read some of the books she had authored, including The Great Controversy and Steps to Christ. At lunch one day, I was telling my father about my EGW questions when he asked me, “Where was Adam when Eve took and ate the fruit?” I knew the answer Ellen White and the Adventists proclaim, but I realized I didn’t know what the Bible said, so I looked it up. Gen. 3:6 says, “…She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.” 

So Adam was with Eve? Ellen White said Eve had wandered away from Adam and had thus been vulnerable to the serpent. I was taught that God had inspired her writings, but Genesis 3:6 contradicted what she said. It was enough of a discrepancy to make me want to delve deeper into other questionable areas in her writing.

The books I started with were White Washed by Sydney Cleveland, White Out by Dirk Anderson, Dale Ratzlaff’s books Sabbath in Christ and Cultic Doctrine of Seventh-day Adventists, and A Theologian’s Journey: from Seventh-day Adventism to Mainstream Christianity by Dr. Jerry Gladson. I came to the conclusion that a thoughtful and open-minded person who is intellectually honest must reject Ellen White as a messenger of God.

During this time of study and investigation, God sent a number of different people into my life to teach me about the New Covenant. What took place over the next few months was a simple process of God’s teaching and my learning. I had been praying for an open heart and mind so that whatever God showed me, I would be ready and willing to accept. He came and answered my prayers.

The Teachers

Now that the student was ready to listen, God sent the teachers. I had a close non-Adventist friend, Mike, who had recently become a Christ-follower, and he began to teach me about life apart from the law. Interestingly, our first discussions revolved around my attempt to share with him the significance of the seventh-day Sabbath. I taught him everything I knew about the Sabbath using all of the traditional Adventist proof-texts. He patiently kept pointing me back to Jesus by showing me that the issue is not about a day of worship but about a relationship with God. I finally quit my quest to make a Sabbath-keeper out of him, but I still didn’t grasp the truth of what he was saying. Mike’s perspective marked a turning point in my life. It was my first intimation that Christians do not live by the Ten Commandments but rather by the influence and fruit of the Holy Spirit.

God had His own curriculum lined up for me. My next teacher was a lifelong family friend, Uncle Ed. He had been a devout “Ellen White Adventist,” who, in his sixties, could no longer accept the teachings of EGW and Seventh-day Adventism. He turned away from it all and became a New Covenant Christian. His bold decision had a powerful impact on my thinking. He was very matter-of-fact as he taught me about the New Covenant. He used Paul’s writings as his textbook. Much of what he said made sense, but I was still confused about which “law” Paul was referring to in his epistles. By the time God led me to Sam Pestes’ CDs (The Stone Cutter’s Bride), the picture of the New Covenant was finally beginning to come into focus.

God relentlessly pursued me. One day my wife, Karen, came home brimming over with a conversation she had at the YMCA while walking on a treadmill next to a preacher’s wife. Karen told her new friend her story of growing up in a legalistic religion. The preacher’s wife had grown up in a legalistic religion as well and had found the book of Galatians to be a major key in her understanding of grace. We read it over and over and wondered how we had missed its clear and straightforward message. Where had this book been all of my life?

Galatians

Galatians changed my life. As an Adventist, I had been led to believe that the Ten Commandments had been in place before the earth was made. They were said to be unchanging and unchangeable, so therefore still binding on us today. However, Paul very clearly states that the law was given 430 years after the promise given to Abraham (Gal. 3:17), and that the law was put into place until the seed (Jesus) had come (Gal. 3:19). In Gal. 3:19 he even says why the law was put into place; “It was added because of transgression.” If Paul were here today, he might say, “You foolish Adventists! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes, Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? …Does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law, or because you believe what you heard?” (Gal. 3:1-2)

Seventh-day Adventism teaches that the law is separated into ceremonial, civil, and moral laws, but this artificial division does not exist in scripture. This misinterpretation allows for separating out part of the law to keep while dismissing the rest. On the contrary, Paul states (Eph. 2:15) that the law is the commandments and regulations. (“…by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations.”) He does not separate the law into two divisions. He goes on to say, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.” Gal. 3:10. Why would anyone choose to be under the law?

What had been confusing and difficult to comprehend in Paul’s writings made sense for the first time in my life! Paul was not speaking of a ceremonial law in one place and a moral law in another. He was referring to the entire Law of Moses given to Israel on Mt. Sinai. God performed a miracle, and the scales dropped from my eyes.

New Church

So where did this realization leave me? I was a Seventh-day Adventist who embraced the New Covenant of faith in Jesus Christ and rejected the false teachings of Ellen White. Where did I belong? Karen and I decided to begin attending an atypical Adventist church—Franklin (Tennessee) SDA Church. Sadly, what distinguished it was the pastor’s focus on righteousness by faith. When he likened salvation to a free gift, it broke through the veils and revealed to me that I am not saved by Sabbath observance but by accepting the Gift. I finally got it!

God is patient and methodical in His leading. He knows that we learn to crawl well before we can run. Though I had experienced many breakthroughs, I had still been trying to make my new understanding fit an Adventist worldview. If you are trying to do the same thing, let me save you some time; it doesn’t work. We had to acknowledge that it was going to be necessary to leave Adventism and find a new church. Once again, Karen and I asked for guidance because we did not know where to start.

An Adventist friend of mine did some accounting work for the pastor of the local World Outreach Church. She actually suggested that we check it out. Since we don’t always catch on quickly, God also led a number of Karen’s co-workers to recommend the same church. “OK, God, we get it!” One memorable Sunday, we experienced our first service at a non-Adventist church. We were overwhelmed by the presence of the Holy Spirit there. God used this inter-denominational church to deepen our newfound love of Jesus and rejoice in His free gift of salvation by faith alone.

My journey to become a more devoted Christ-follower began with a desire to teach my children the truth and to better understand the religion that I had professed all of my life. When I took off my Seventh-day Adventist-colored glasses and took away the Ellen White filter, I found the message that had been there all along. It became clear and surprisingly simple. He is all we need.

It is such a blessing that Karen has been willing to share this journey of discovery and commitment to the Lord Jesus. She is a Godly woman who is not afraid to seek Christ wherever that leads. My journey happily continues today as I rest every day in the work of Christ.