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 Can the Elect Become the Victims
of Deception?
by Nic Samojluk
The Question. After a long protracted debate with a young man I greatly admire for his keen intelligence and his unswerving loyalty to the Genesis account of Creation, I wondered: Can the elect become the victims of deception? You may wonder why would such a question pop into my mind when dealing with someone apparently so loyal to the Bible story of origins. The reason is rather simple. The topic we had debated was not the origin of heaven and earth and life on earth, but rather the origin of human life inside the womb. I held to the belief that human life is sacred from the moment of its inception, while he defended with deep conviction the notion that until the unborn baby--fetus if you prefer since fetus is the Latin word for baby--develops a cerebral cortex, you actually do not have a human being, but rather nothing that can be morally differentiated from a human appendix.
When pressed for a point in time when taking the life of the unborn would be morally wrong, he pointed to twenty weeks after conception, because that is the time science can verify the development of the human brain cortex, which will eventually distinguish the unborn as a member of the human race. It became a no win-situation, for which reason, since both of us are Seventh-day Adventists Christians who pride to be members of the elect of God, I wondered whether either I or him could be deceived into adopting an erroneous moral position regarding the sanctity of human life. So the question is: Can Christians who were referred by Jesus as the "elect" be candidates for deception? This question is especially important for Adventists, because we have been claiming to be the "Remnant of God" with the "last message for a perishing world." Jesus did state that before his Second Coming false prophets will deceive, "if possible" even the elect, but he did not say whether this is feasible or not. [Matthew 24:24]
Some Lessons from History. So let us try to examine some lessons from history. Is there any evidence of God's elect having succumbed to deception? The first example of God's elect having become the victims of deception is the Old Testament nation of Israel. Isaiah described said nation as God's elect, and we know quite well that Jesus, the most innocent being in the universe, died at their hands two millennia ago. How could the elect of God have been deceived into believing that it was better to sacrifice an innocent individual in order to preserve their nation? Well, the fact is that this did take place. God's chosen people were led to believe that it was expedient for them to take the life of the Son of god, which means that in fact God's elect are subject to deception if they do not keep their connection with the Lord alive.
Next I want to use an example that is rather closer for comfort: the Adventist church. Can we cite an example where a large number of Adventists were led to accept a moral error? I think we can. This took place in Germany seven decades ago. When Hitler came into power, most Christians in Germany were led to believe that supporting his program was a Christian duty, including remaining silent when the extermination of the Jews was operating at full speed. They were led to believe that sacrificing the lives of six million Jews was a small price to pay for the survival of the Master Race. Did Seventh-day Adventists refuse to be deceived by this morally atrocious Hitler's lie? No so! The Adventist leadership in Germany and Austria decided to cooperate with Hitler's program as revealed by a recent official acknowledgement of this error in judgment. Here is a link for you to verify this:
Church Leaders Say "We're Sorry"
http://www.adventistreview.org/article.php?id=92
German and Austrian SDA churches apologize for Holocaust
http://sdaforum.com/page47.html
And here is another example. This time an official statement by a former president of the General Conference of the Seventh-day Adventist church commenting about the morality of abortion. Notice the similarity between his argument and that of both those who crucified Jesus Christ, and those who went along with Hitler's program of extermination of a large segment of humanity. In each case the objective seemed to represent a noble cause: To save the Jewish nation in the first instance, to protect the Master Race in the second one, and to save human beings from overpopulation in the last one. Here is what Neal Wilson stated in 1970:
| Quote: |
| Though we walk the fence, Adventists lean towards abortion rather than against it. Because we realize we are confronted by big problems of hunger and overpopulation, we do not oppose family planning and appropriate endeavors to control population. [1] |
Two months later, the GC officers approved “suggestive guidelines for therapeutic abortions.” This action did not satisfy the SDA medical community because SDA hospitals had been providing therapeutic abortion for some time even before the State of Hawaii decided to legalize abortion. This quasi-official document was made available to SDA medical institutions under the name “Recommendations to SDA Medical Institutions,” which allowed Castle Memorial Hospital [CMH] to provide elective abortion on demand. Eventually, the church officially adopted the current version of the Guidelines on Abortion.
This is amazing; the president of the SDA church, the church claiming to be God’s “Remnant Church” keeping "God’s Commandments," declaring in the richest country of the world that killing the unborn is justified because there is hunger and overpopulation in the world! No wonder that two Adventist-owned hospitals have been providing elective abortions to the public. One of them was described by a high official of the General Conference as "an abortion mill."
Can the Elect Become the victims of Deception? We thus come back to the question I stated at the beginning: The answer is obviously "Yes, they can," as history has proved on repeated instances. Therefore, I want to end this posting with another question: Is it possible that the Adventist church has erred on the issue of abortion? I think that it did, but my friend thinks that I am the one in error. The debate we engaged in in this forum has highlighted this dilemma. We can't be both right on this moral issue. Either one of us is wrong, or else both of us are wrong. If this topic is of interest to you, take the time to read the lively exchange of ideas on this issue, and take the time to post your reaction to the arguments expressed there. The Internet link is:
Jumping Through the Loop in the Kingdom of the Blind
http://sdaforum.com/page94.html
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[1] George B. Gainer, “Abortion: History of Adventist guidelines” Ministry (Aug. 1991): 11-17. Accessed from http://www.adventistarchives.org/docs/MIN/MIN1991-08/index.djvu?djvuopts&page=11 on 25 Oct. 2006.
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