Zealand, to those here in the US including David Hubbard, George Ladd, Colin Brown, Richard Mouw of
Fuller, Nicholas Wolterstorff of Yale, Alvin Plantinga of Calvin College and George Marsden of Notre
Dame, Walter Elwell, Mark Noll of Wheaton, Gleason Archer, Kenneth Kantzer, Don Carson, and John
Feinberg of Trinity Evangelical, Millard Erickson, Billy Graham, Carl Henry, Bill Bright, Robert Gundry,
Pat Robinson, and the list goes on.
In general, Evangelicalism subscribes to the theology of the Trinitarian nature of God--Father, Son and
Holy Spirit, the authority of the Bible, the Word of God written to be the normative rule of Christian belief
and practice. Evangelicals also believe in the sinful nature of humans, the Divinity and redemptive role of
Christ, His Resurrection and Second Coming, and salvation by grace alone through faith in Christ. They hold
that the Church is the Body of Christ--a community of corporate spiritual life, with emphasis on renewal.
They desire "a constructive, aggressive, dynamic, and unified program of evangelical action in the fields of
evangelism, missions, Christian education and every other sphere of Christian faith." 3
Some common emphases of evangelicals are, according to historian Bebbington: personal conversion
(born-again experience), social and evangelistic activism, Biblical authority and centrality of the Cross. 4
The passion of evangelicals is to know the living Lord God, the love of Christ, and the power of the Holy
Spirit and to share the good news of God's grace and love with every person everywhere on earth.
From a movement starting at the margins, the evangelicals are now in the mainstream of Christendom
with scholarly works and voices, proliferation of publications, institutions of higher learning, megachurches
and many parachurch ministries.
Brief Description of the Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) Church and its Contemporary Beliefs
The SDA Church has a membership of 12 millions with assets of over 13 billions, and annual tithes and
offerings amount to 1.6 billions. Next to the Catholic Church, the SDA Church is the second largest
Christian world-church with missionaries in most of the nations of the world. In 1999 alone, there were over
one million baptisms.
There are 9,699 ordained ministers, 5,210 licensed ministers. It operates 166 hospitals and sanitariums
worldwide and 371 health clinics, employing 77, 605 people.
It owns a major health sciences University--the Loma Linda University with medical school, dental
school, nursing school, School of Public Health, allied professional, graduate school, and others. There are
95 higher educational institutions worldwide with one major Theological Seminary in Andrews University,
Michigan, granting PhD, ThD, MDiv, and other Master degrees. The publishing arm of the SDA Church has
produced 281 periodicals with sales of 113 million in 1999 (137th Annual Statistical Report, 1999, General
Conference of SDA, Office of Archives and Statistics, Silver Springs, Maryland).
I shall discuss the SDA's doctrines and beliefs under two categories. Under the first group are those
beliefs which are shared with the traditional Christian confessions and creedal statements of the Western
churches. These include the authority and inspiration of the Bible, the Word of God as the source of faith
and normative rule of Chrisitan practice, the doctrine of God, the Trinity, the doctrine of man, creation, the
Fall, the sinful nature of humans and their need of redemption and justification by grace through faith, the
Divinity of Christ, His Virgin Birth, life, death and bodily resurrection and Second Coming, the two
sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper. For these doctrinal beliefs, there is no fundamental disparity
and irreconcilability between evangelicalism and Seventh-day Adventism. 5
Under the second group, our examination turns to some rather "unique" SDA beliefs other than the
commonly shared Christian doctrines, in contrast to evangelicalism's theology. They include E. G. White
and the Spirit of Prophecy, the soul, the state of the dead, destruction of the wicked, hell and punishment, the
Sabbath, the sanctuary, the investigative judgment, the law/ grace, and salvation, the unclean foods, the
Remnant Church. Which ones are considered evangelical and orthodox and which ones have been labeled as
heretical and cultic will be discussed. Here I want to call attention to Adventists' reluctance to formalize a
creed, because they believe in the progression of truth as revealed by God. In the preamble of the 27