On Biblical Authority

This is an adaptation of a response made on Spectrum Magazine's Blog on 'Vessels of Dine Love: Adventist and the Dalai Lama' about inspiration, the Bible, and biblical authority of Ellen White.

"It seems that there are still Christians who see all the world as either black or white: one is either of the Kingdom of God or the kingdom of Satan.” - Elain Nelson

She makes a great point. In Christian philosophy, just as in life, things are not as easily compartmentalized as we would like them to be. This notion of either with Satan or God is a product of the Church of the Dark Ages – an age stripped of Reason, Enlightenment, or an educated populace. Such proclamations as Luther’s ["...you are either with the Kingdom of Chirst of of Satan..."] seem to be based on a much too conservative, exclusionist theology. Lest one forget that Luther was not without his flaws as a human being, albeit inspired by the Spirit of the Lord, he was, just as Ellen White and Paul were . . . HUMAN.

Luther struggled with an understanding of how the Jews fit into the great scheme of Christian Community – he failed with that struggle, opting at times for stances that were blatantly anti-Semitic. While with respects to Ellen White, she lacked a full understanding of publishing regulations and did not have the foresight to guide and direct Adventists as to the purpose of her writings – writings of a human, led by God, but not dictated through verbal inspiration by God.

Ellen, as Luther, failed in respects to this matter as can best be attested to by the countless amounts of time, money, clarification, and, most sadly, the amount of former-Adventists who would be "fellowshipping" with us today had they been better educated on the role of Ellen White in the Adventist Church. Finally, Paul, too, is not without his faults. Paul struggled with woman’s issues in the church. He failed at understanding God’s full intent to include ALL of his blessed children into the call of ministry, women included.

Most Mainstream Protestant Churches have realized Paul’s shortcomings; Adventism, as we sadly know, has not. Additionally there is much scholarship by the Rev. John Shelby Spong and former Jesuit Priest John J. McNeill that Paul might have been struggling with a homosexual orientation himself, indicating only more so his humanity and maybe even shedding some greater light on such a volatile issue as Homosexuality and Christian Community. Fore more information please see, http://www.pactsnetwork.org/grace/docs/Spong%20-%20The%20Church's%20Dance%20in%20the%2021st%20Century%20-%20Part%203.htm

Understanding that Luther, White, and Paul were all human – faults emphatically included - and did, in fact, interject their own human understanding – whether or not they admit it – into their writings is precisely the reason why we are directed in Holy Scripture to test all things, even Scripture itself. Rev. John Shelby Spong wrote an incredibly important book for Christianity to consider The Sins of Scripture: Exposing the Bible’s Texts of Hate to Reveal the God of Love. In it Spong discusses this very issue of inspiration and the Bible.

While it is true that there are scant Ellen White quotes that mention “Oriental religions,” it is my belief that Sister White is, quite frankly, well above her perception level; having no recorded material chronicling that she had given serious study to what she dubs as “Oriental religions” she lacks any intellectual credibility on the issue and one need to take that into account before they marry themselves to her statements on such.

Whit respects to the Dalai Lama – the topic of this article – I cannot, for one second, submit to the idea that he is with the “Kingdom of Satan.” I join Elain in her proclamation that, “For one, I refuse to accept that limited concept. People are NOT either all good or all evil but a combination of both good and evil.” Like I stated in the article, such statements are the product of ignorance of the core philosophy of Buddhism and are neither productive in fostering a religious community of tolerance and understanding (I believe an inspired directive by God) nor exhibit manners in which Christ would have his followers interact with their fellow human.

Matters of spirituality, theology, tradition, religion, and culture are not as simplistic as some Christians would like to make them.

What worries me is that we have this notion that God is only working in Christianity. What of the Jews, then? I find myself immediately asking. Or for that matter, what of the billion of adherents to Islam?; both faiths – Islam and Judaism – which stem out of our common Abrahamic traditions have so much in common with each other and Christianity. Such a view, I believe, is ultimately fundamentally flawed. How can it be that we serve such an awesome and majestic Creator that is so dull when it comes to religious expression? Look outside your window at the environment you live in – take note of the difference in people, nature (the trees, flowers, grass, sand, oceans, lakes, streams), the clouds above. We serve an amazing God of creativity! Why then must he be so boring when it comes to religion?

I have long heard the argument that the plurality of our religious experience here on earth is due to the influence of the devil. God has no creative ability – Christianity, that’s all, folks. Satan has Buddhism, Taoism, Shintoism, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism, etc. God has Christianity. The comparison is quite sad if this is indeed the case that God only resides within Christianity.

I pleasantly reject that notion of exclusionist theology and what I refer to as the kindergartenesque “my God is better than you god argument.” We must understand the immense influences that culture, geography, language, and history place on religious traditions. Christianity is quite diverse within its folds. There is not “one true church.” Many claim that there their tradition is the “One True Church,” even our own church, but history has shown us the bloodshed, depravity, and brokenness that such a proclamation begets. Rather within Christianity there are many denominations precisely because God meets people where they are at – this is axiomatic within the Scriptures and extra-Biblical references and accounts.

God works with us; the Bible is a blessed document not because EVERY word is divinely inspired or dictated by God, but rather because this document dramatically portrays a loving creator-God who earnestly struggles to be understood by His people and a rebellious, anxious people who earnestly struggle to understand God. That is what makes the Bible such a beautiful and cherished document. It is not the proclamations against this or that or the mythological stories, historic accounts, miraculous deeds, poetic prose of the Psalms, - these add to the biblical narrative, yes, indeed, but by no means are any of these in and of themselves reasons to cherish the Scriptures or to call them ‘holy.’

Coming back to the Dalai Lama and Adventism. There is much that can be learned from Buddhism and Christianity. Much scholarly work has been done by Dr. Marcus J. Borg (‘Jesus and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings’) and Thich Nhat Hanh (‘Going Home: Jesus and Buddha as Brothers’ and ‘Living Buddha, Living Christ’) that has shown the connections and parallels between Buddha and Christ. We must be able to separate (as the Dalai Lama told us on Monday) religious traditions and faith.

The Dalai Lama does not believe that Christ was God (in the Christian theological sense) he believes he was a great teacher and manifestation of the Divine, but God, no. My beliefs of the Buddha are that he was a great teacher and manifestation of the Divine, but God, no. So how can the Dalai Lama and I work together to bring our faith communities into kind-hearted fellowship? That is a key question you must ask yourselves.

I ultimately believe that God manifests himself in many faith traditions. Whether or not the Dalai Lama is going to “be saved” or what that concept even means, I care not for. God is awesome enough as a Creator, let us have faith that he is awesome enough as a Savior – and let us leave matters of salvation to Him. What I am concerned with is the brokenness of humanity. This is my primary and deepest concern.

I live today as a follower of Christ’s message; a message of hope, tolerance, compassion, and inclusion. My great question to myself and other is how can we be vessels of Divine Love and Compassion? I think to start to that effect we must put draconian, anachronistic ideas of theology and salvation aside – stop making idols of dogma and creeds. After doing this we need to come to a place within our spiritual experience to see the Divine expressed in all things. With these understandings, I believe, we can then begin to fellowship as Followers of Christ and not simply adherents to some 28 “Fundamental” Beliefs.

I see the Dalai Lama as a force of good in the world and for that He is to be commended and respected. What his afterlife is going to entail I cannot claim to fully know or even comprehend. I hope that he will be among those who say to Christ, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?' and what peace and joy will fill my heart as Christ responds to the Dalai Lama, “'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.”

Vessels of Divine Love and Compassion: Adventism & the Dalai Lama

"Let us cultivate love and compassion, both of which give true meaning to life. This is the religion I preach, more so than Buddhism itself. It is simple. Its temple is the heart. Its teaching is love and compassion. Its moral values are loving and respecting others, whoever they may be. Whether one is a layperson or a monastic, we have no other option if we wish to survive in this world" – His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama

On Monday, October 22, 2007 along with ten-thousand plus other people twenty students from Southern Adventist University (SAU) attended the “public talk” of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. These twenty students were members of SAU Amnesty International and College Democrats of Southern and I was their leader. It was my idea to attend the Emory University hosted event. I thought that Southern’s students might gain some insight from this humble Buddhist monk that has advocated so vehemently the causes of world peace and nonviolence resistance to the oppression of Communist China on the people of Tibet.

After all, the Dalai Lama is a Nobel Peace Laureate, recipient of the Congressional Gold Medal, and a Distinguished Presidential Professor at Emory University. I naïvely thought to myself that no one could possibly be against a message of tolerance, understanding, compassion, and peace. I knew from history that Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Theresa, and Jesus Christ of Nazareth all had their “protesters,” but this was the twenty-first century, an age that claims to understand the harvest of hate. Harvests chillingly exemplified in the horrors of the Holocaust, tragedy of the Armenian Genocide, terrors of Rwanda, tragic aftermath of the War in Iraq, and the current Genocide in Darfur.

It had been my belief that this generation was going to hold themselves to the exclamation of the previous generation of “never again.” Never again will genocide go unchallenged - as can be seen in the support around the globe for the immediate deployment of a hybrid U.N. and African Union peace-keepers into Darfur, Sudan and northern Chad due to the efforts of student-lead movements and organizations; never again will war be a solution to our diplomatic problems - as can be seen in the unprecedented world-wide protests to the war in Iraq; never again will our society be complacent in the affairs of the world but become involved and concerned about the interconnectedness of the world around us. This was the zeitgeist of my generation and I believed of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Imagine then how surprised I was when members of my generation as well as professors told me that the Dalai Lama was an agent of the devil. I was completely shocked and almost baffled – I write almost, because after all this is a church that has yet to accept scientific research in the area of human sexuality or which openly refuses to fully value women by barring them from ordained ministry, but I digress. Still I had hoped that in the matter of world peace and nonviolence resistance that the Adventist Church might find a confidant in the Dalai Lama. That our church having advocated for healthy living practices of wholeness, open conscientious objection to war, having had prominent Adventists involved in the American antislavery movement, ect. logic would suggest that the ethos of Adventism was more in tune with my generation than other denominations. Instead I found that there was a majority at Southern who viewed the Dalai Lama as an agent of evil.

It has been my experience that when such convoluted statements as “he is an agent of the devil” or “one driven by evil forces” that these are the product of ignorance or intolerance. When pressed on their knowledge of Buddhism most of those who had stated the Dalai Lama’s allegiances to Satan were, indeed, ignorant of what Buddhism was and what it is not. This is not atypical of Adventists, but unfortunately the norm and sadly the mainstream for the church.

There is this fear in the Adventist Church that some of my friend’s expressed. They said that it is best typified as a strong caution and willful ignorance of other faith traditions other than our own. This worries me greatly as a growing church. The notion that at a colligate institution of “higher learning” that one would be dissuaded from attending a lecture on peace by someone no affiliated with the Adventist Church or of a different faith tradition is astounding. It is my sincere belief that this incident is indicative of a greater insecurity that Adventists have with respects to other faiths.

I cannot help but imagine what our church would look like would that our church members were those “peculiar people” written about in the Spirit of Prophecy; would that our membership was so filled with the love of God for man that we had such a Godly-insatiable desire for the nourishment of mankind through interpersonal relationships.

As for me, I can read the words of the Dalai Lama, "let us cultivate love and compassion,” - what I believe is the very essence of God - and connect instantly on a spiritual level. Those who attended the public talk expressed that, “It is such an awesome feeling to be able to put aside religious differences - labels, whether they be Christian, Buddhist - I like to put it this way when discussing my faith, "I'm a believer in a Higher Power - greater than my existence, yet interconnected with my being - and a follower of 'The Way,' manifested in many faith traditions.”

I fully understand that this comes off as "New Age" to some and I'm, quite frankly, openly and unabashedly alright with that. I believe that our understanding of God must grow and constantly evolve. Living life with a stagnant view of God only produces, at best, bitter Christians or, at worst, broken atheists. God inspired the biblical author to write, "My ways are not your ways." It is interesting to recall that Christ continually challenged the contemporary view of God and the "religious community" in his day.

With respects to the Adventist Church and the greater Christian Community, I have observed that, too often, it is unfortunately the so-called “religious” that typifies a faith tradition; this is an unfortunate axiom because it limits the expression of a particular faith to its most conservative and fundamentalist elements - our religious communities are much more diverse than that, Adventism emphatically included. I asked members of our Democrats and Amnesty group attending the Dalai Lama’s lecture to ask themselves, “What it means to be an Adventist?” It is important to have these questions in the back of our minds and to have an answer for them should a question arise within ourselves or provoked by others.

Yet the answer to that quest must be different for everyone. For me, it means "cultivating love and compassion." I let my temple be my heart - welcoming the Spirit of the Lord to dwell within me and God to work through me, i.e. having and upholding "morale values [of] loving and respecting others, whoever they may be." This includes the "outcasts" of society - homosexuals, women, nonbelievers, believers of other faiths, AIDS victims, the poor, those who have a different "non-orthodox theology" than ours, etc. When Jesus ministered to the people, he widened the inclusion of his ministry and outreach.

Christ included the outcasts of society - his moral values were centered on loving and respecting others. His life dramatically portrayed the Divine Love and Compassion that God has for humanity. May we as a church community learn to respect and love the "outcasts of Adventism." May we cherish the spiritual wisdom of other faith traditions and may we strive to be vessels that express the Divine Love and Compassion that our Lord has for all of humanity.