How Can This Impasse Be Solved?

This book deals with the basic problem of heart-motivated, searching the recesses of the Adventist conscience. After 6000 years of waiting, the Saviour makes His last plea. But it has gone unheeded for well over a century.

How long can we continue with "business as usual"?

There are those in the church who say that persecution must solve our spiritual problem. But is persecution the cause or the effect of revival and reformation among God's people? How does persecution fit into the Day of Atonement that we have long believed is vital to the final ministry of the True Witness?

We are not the first people to have misunderstood a message God sent. The ancient Jews brought grief to the Messiah because they were certain they understood - but they didn't get it. His unheeded call to repent could hardly have brought more heartbreak to the Saviour than the lukewarm, unknowing response He has received from the last of the "seven churches" of history.

The Jews were expecting the Son of David to take the throne and rule in splendor. Their national rejection of Him parallels our letting Him remain outside our door, knocking for admission. So says Ellen White.[6]

How could the Lord of the universe do more than He has done to plead with His "angel of the church of the Laodiceans"?

May the Lord use the message of this book to clarify that call of the True Witness for the repentance of the ages. The great High Priest wants to proclaim, "It is done." The power of the gospel and the final atonement will be demonstrated to be complete.

Introduction

In the ancient kingdom of Israel and Judah, the Lord's almost constant problem was what to do with human leadership. King after king led the people into apostasy until the two nations were devastated and had to go into captivity under pagan rule.

But never has the Lord had a more difficult problem to solve than the lukewarmness of "the angel of the church of Laodiceas," the human leadership of His last-day remnant church. The solution Christ proposes is to "repent." Our "historic" understanding has been that such repentance is personal, or individual. This sounds simple enough, but after more than a century and a half that experience seems to have eluded us. We still need myriads of personal repentances, but could it be that He is addressing us as a corporate body, and therefore He is calling for corporate repentance?

The One who gave Himself on His cross to redeem us has every right to call us to repentance, for it was He who died our corporate second death in our stead. [10] But the vast proportion of the world still understands little or nothing of the love that prompted that divine sacrifice. We haven't yet told them clearly enough.

How can the Lord solve His problem? Will it help to let punitive judgments, disasters, and more terrorism come upon us? More terrible world wars? More lethal epidemics? More storms and earthquakes? Or could it be that understanding a still small voice calling us to denominational repentance will be effective?

Hopefully this modest contribution may help to demonstrate that such repentance makes very good sense, and is indeed a gift of God not to be refused.[16]

1. A FAX direct from Heaven

Does Jesus Christ call the Seventh-day Adventist Church to repentance? Or does He merely call for it from some individuals within the church?

A Fax direct from Heaven could not be more arresting than Christ's one command to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans: "Be zealous, therefore, and repent." To whom does He say this? What does He mean - "repent"?

"The angels of the seven churches" and "the churches" are not the same. They are distinct. "The seven candlesticks . . . are the seven churches." But "the seven stars" `you saw in my right hand,' He says, are "the angels" who symbolize the leadership (Rev. 1:20). Since He addresses the message to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans, it must be more than individual or personal repentance He calls for.

"God's ministers are symbolized by the seven stars, which He who is the first and the last has under His special care and protection. The sweet influences that are to be abundant in the church are bound up with these ministers of God, who are to represent the love of Christ. The stars of heaven are under God's control. He fills them with light. He guides and directs their movements. If He did not, they would become fallen stars. So with His ministers. They are but instruments in His hands, and all the good they accomplish is done through His power." {GW 13.3}

That "angel" of the Laodicean church must include Sabbath School leaders, academy, college, and university teachers; local elders; deacons; Pathfinder leaders; pastors; local and Union Conference leaders; and of course General Conference leadership - all who guide the church.

Therefore this total body of leadership is the focus of Christ's special attention in the Laodicean message.[30] It is not in any way disrespectful to the human leadership of the church to give attention to what the True Witness says.

Laodicea is the seventh church of history, the last one just before the second coming of Christ. It is parallel with the proclamation of the three angel's messages of Revelation 14. No eighth church can follow. The message cannot be bad news, for Laodicea is not a bad word. It simply means "vindicating the people".[50] Heeding the call to repent redeems Laodicea from failure and provides her with her only hope.

How Long Have We Known the Message?

In our denominational history the message was taken quite seriously. As far back as 1856, our pioneers expected that it would lead into the latter rain and the final loud cry within their generation. But with the lapse of well over a century of seeming indifference on the part of Heaven, we have thought the message is either not very urgent or perhaps has already done its work. For whatever reason, it has been relegated to the back burner. Our modern culture is deeply obsessed with the need for cultivating self-esteem, both personal and denominational, and this message appears to be not very good at doing that. Hence it has also become rather unpopular to talk about it.

Since we have assumed that the message is addressed only to individuals, its application has been so widely scattered that it has had no real focus. We have not known what to do about it. Everybody else's business is nobody's business. But the possibility that Christ's appeal is for corporate repentance casts the message in an entirely different focus. If He is calling for corporate repentance, it follows that He is also calling for denominational repentance.

Is He Serious?

Why is He so concerned? He cannot forget that He gave His blood for the world. "The angel of the church of Laodicea" is represented in Revelation as standing between heaven's light and a dark world, intercepting it. The outcome of the issue in Revelation chapter 3 determines the outcome of the entire Book of Revelation. Defeat in chapter 3 will hold up or even prevent the victory of chapter 19. We, the "angel", or leadership, have delayed for a century the final purpose of God to lighten the world with the glory of the "everlasting gospel" in its end-time setting. The ultimate success of the great plan of redemption thus requires that the "angel" heed Christ's message and overcome. If Laodicea should fail, that entire plan would suffer a disastrous final defeat.

The entire reason is obvious. Seventh-day Adventists do not hold the doctrine of the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches that saved people go to heaven immediately at death. We believe that all the righteous dead must remain in their graves until a corporate resurrection. But this "first resurrection" depends on the personal return of Jesus, which in turn depends on a group of living saints getting ready for His coming. The reason for this is that "our God is a consuming fire" to sin, Hebr. 12:29. Christ dares not return until He has a people in whose hearts all sin has been blotted out. Otherwise, His coming would consume them, and He loves them too much to do that to them. Thus it is His love that requires Him to wait until He has such a people ready. It follows that, until then, all the righteous dead are doomed to remain prisoners in their graves.

Can we begin to see how an enemy has been infiltrating this church with the "new theology" lie that it is impossible for a people to overcome sin perse? Since the success of the entire plan of salvation depends on its final hour, Satan is fighting his last-ditch stand at this point.

For sure, Heaven is not concerned about our perpetuating an organizational machine for the sake of denominational pride, like General Motors struggling to maintain its image in the face of foreign competition. Heaven is concerned about the tragic need of the world for that pure gospel message which alone can bring deliverance from sin to all who call upon the same of the Lord. Suffering humanity weighs on the heart of God more than our concern for our denominational image. If "the angel of the church of the Laodiceans" is standing in Heaven's way, the Lord's message to that angel" must get through. Heaven's seeming indifference is deceptive; the Lord is moving the very stones themselves to cry out:

"All heaven is in activity, and the angels of God are waiting to co-operate with all who will devise plans whereby souls for whom Christ died may hear the glad tidings of salvation. Angels who minister to those that shall be heirs of salvation, are saying to every true saint: "There is work for you to do." "Go, stand and speak . . . to the people all the words of this life." Acts 5:20. If those addressed would obey this injunction, the Lord would prepare the way before them, putting them in possession of means wherewith to go. {6T 433.5}
Arouse the Idlers: Souls are perishing out of Christ, and those who profess to be Christ's disciples are letting them die. Our brethren have talents entrusted to them for the very work of saving souls, but some have bound these up in a napkin and buried them in the earth. How much do such idlers resemble the angel who is represented as flying in the midst of heaven, proclaiming the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus? What manner of entreaty can be brought to bear upon the idlers that will arouse them to go to work for the Master? What can we say to the slothful church member to make him realize the necessity of unearthing his talent and putting it out to the exchangers? There will be no idler, no slothful one, found inside the kingdom of heaven. Oh, that God would set this matter in all its importance before the sleeping churches! Oh, that Zion would arise and put on her beautiful garments! Oh, that she would shine! {6T 434.1}

The True Head Of the Seventh-day Adventist Church

Jesus introduces Himself as "the Amen, the faithful and true witness." Why is He the true Head of the Seventh-day Adventist Church? - He gave His blood for His church. He alone can convey truth to her. No committee or institution can control Him or forever suppress His message. The word "Amen" indicates that He is still in business as the living witness to the church. Above the conflicting din of present-day voices, we are told that He will see to it that His message gets through loud and clear:

"Message Prepares for Translation.-- Amid the confusing cries, "Lo, here is Christ! Lo, there is Christ!" will be borne a special testimony, a special message of truth appropriate for this time, which message is to be received, believed, and acted upon. It is the truth, not fanciful ideas, that is efficacious. The eternal truth of the Word will stand forth free from all seductive errors and spiritualistic interpretations, free from all fancifully drawn, alluring pictures. Falsehoods will be urged upon the attention of God's people, but the truth is to stand clothed in its beautiful, pure garments. The Word, precious in its holy, uplifting influence, is not to be degraded to a level with common, ordinary matters. It is always to remain uncontaminated by the fallacies by which Satan seeks to deceive, if possible, the very elect. {7BC 984.2}
The proclamation of the gospel is the only means in which God can employ human beings as His instrumentalities for the salvation of souls. As men, women, and children proclaim the gospel, the Lord will open the eyes of the blind to see His statutes, and will write upon the hearts of the truly penitent His law. The animating Spirit of God, working through human agencies, leads the believers to be of one mind, one soul, unitedly loving God and keeping His commandments--preparing here below for translation. {RH Oct. 13, 1904}{7BC 984.3}

Ellen White has bemoaned our constant tendency to put fallible human beings between Christ and ourselves. Note how in one short paragraph she mentions this idolatry no less than five times:

"Unless he makes it his life business to behold the uplifted Saviour, and by faith to accept the merits which it is his privilege to claim, the sinner can no more be saved than Peter could walk upon the water unless he kept his eyes fixed steadily upon Jesus. Now, it has been Satan's determined purpose to eclipse the view of Jesus and lead men to look to man, and trust to man, and be educated to expect help from man. For years the church has been looking to man and expecting much from man, but not looking to Jesus, in whom our hopes of eternal life are centered. Therefore God gave to His servants a testimony that presented the truth as it is in Jesus, which is the third angel's message, in clear, distinct lines. John's words are to be sounded by God's people, that all may discern the light and walk in the light: "He that cometh from above is above all: he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth: He that cometh from heaven is above all. And what He hath seen and heard, that He testifieth; and no man receiveth His testimony. He that hath received His testimony hath set to his seal that God is true. For He whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God: for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him. The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into His hand. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." {TM 93.1}

Imagine Jesus Christ as Guest Speaker!

Christ has "eyes like a flame of fire" (Rev. 2:18). His message is no band-aid solution to our problems, not strategy that a committee can devise. It is a solemn and holy message; we will bring upon ourselves the judgment of the ages if we disregard it. If Christ were invited to be guest speaker to the human leadership of the SdA Church, His message would be that of Revelation 3:14-21. He would stir our souls to their depths. And He has the utmost right to speak thus to us!

This topic of corporate repentance has been sharply contested for a century. [100] General Conference opposition has been intense and pervasive. But two prominent General Conference authors rescued the topic from disrepute and made it eligible for serious discussion [110], and the Senior Sabbath School Quarterly for early 1992 openly discussed the need for it. Could it be that the Lord's providence has opened the way for us to inquire further into what He means? His call to "repent" must somehow make sense to us today, and to our youth as well. We can only seek humbly to understand it. In this modest volume we search for its meaning.

When Will We Respond to the Lord?

Repentance is not something that we do. It is never accomplished by voting on a committee. It is a gift from the Lord that has to be humbly and thankfully received (Acts 5:31).[120] But how can we ever find the time to receive such a gift? There is always the eternal pressure to "do" hanging over us all. And when will we find the will to receive? The book co-authored by two General Conference leaders plaintively asks,

"Will we do the work of spiritual preparation that God calls for, and allow Him to use us to finish His work on earth? Or are we going to let another opportunity slip through our fingers and find ourselves and our children in this sinful world for another 50 or 60 years? {Neal C. Wilson and George E. Rice, The Power of the Spirit, p. 53.}

Can you imagine the disappointment ancient Israel would have felt if Joshua had told them at the River Jordan after already wandering for 40 years, "Sorry, folks, we must go back to the wilderness to wander for another generation"? But such a delay has already happened repeatedly in our denominational history, and the greatest disappointment has been felt by the Lord Himself.

As we near the end we are seeing centrifugal forces at work within the church trying to force dissension and disunion. Some may conclude that these unprecedented buffetings mean that Jesus Christ has abandoned the church. But His appeal to "the angel of the church" proves that He has not done so. His greatest concern, Heaven's highest priority, is to effect revival, reformation, and repentance within this church. He does care.

What does He say to us?

2. Not a Word of Praise from Jesus!

It appears that we are better pleased with ourselves than Christ is with us. But if His truth hurts, it also heals.

"Unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write . . ." (Rev. 3:14, KJV). For many decades we have assumed that the message is addressed to the church at large. But surprisingly, the message is addressed to its leadership. We leaders have often erred in passing the message on to the laity, berating them, and blaming them for holding up the finishing of God's work.

If the message is addressed primarily to individuals in the church, we have some serious problems. SdAs have been dying for nearly 150 years (now 170 yrs). In practically all these funerals, we have expressed the confident hope that the deceased will arise in the first resurrection, something impossible without their personal, individual repentance.

Therefore, if Christ's call to repent has been addressed primarily to individuals, it has already been largely heeded, for we must assume that many of these faithful saints did repent in preparation for death. In that case, the Laodicean message becomes virtually a dead letter. We can expect little if any further result except continued personal repentance as has prevailed for well over a century. This is how the great bulk of our people, especially youth, now view the message.

Although each of us must apply individually and personally any counsel in the messages to the seven churches, this call to "repent" is specifically addressed to more than individuals. And when we begin to understand to whom it is addressed, the content of the message itself also takes on a more arresting significance.

The appeal in Revelation 3:20, "if any man hear my voice", contains a significant Greek word, tis, which primarily means "a certain one," not just "any one." For example, it was not just "any man" who "fled away . . . naked" at the betrayal of Jesus as told in Mark 14:51,52. The word tis is used and is translated as "a certain young man." In the Laodicean message, it would obviously refer to the "angel" as the certain one to whom the message is addressed. Unquestionably, Jesus quotes the Song of Solomon in His appeal,

"Behold, I stand at the door and knock." {Song of Songs, 5:2; Septuagint}[250]

"I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot . . . So then, because you are lukewarm . . . I will spew you out of My mouth" (Rev. 3:15,16). We could superficially conclude that because the "angel" is undeniably "lukewarm," automatically Christ has kept His promise and has rejected us. This assumption is based on the KJV and some other translations. It has posed a serious problem to some sincere church members and caused them to despair of the organized church ever becoming truly reconciled to Christ.

But the original language includes a key word, mello, that means, "I am about to spit you out" (NIV). It becomes clear in Revelation 10:4, where John says he was "about to write" what "the seven thunders had uttered", but he did not write, for "a voice from heaven" forbade him. Jesus stands poised, on the brink of vomiting us out. What He actually says in vivid modern language is, "You make Me so sick to My stomach that I feel like throwing up!"

This is a normal human phenomenon in extreme emotional disgust. A wife in East Germany read her newly released STASI file (the communist Secret Police). She found to her horror that during years of pretended fidelity her husband had been secretly informing on her to the dreaded police. Her involuntary reaction: She went to the bathroom and vomitted. Unpleasant as it may appear to us, Jesus tells us that this is how He feels, not about us, but about our cherished lukewarmness. This does not mean that He does not love us, or that He is not faithful to us. (The German lady also loved her husband.)

Why Does Jesus Feel This Way?

Why doesn't He say something good about us? Is He too severe? Any president of a company, board chairman, or military officer, knows that he must praise his subordinates in order for them to do their best. The human leadership of the remnant church is surely the finest group of people in the world! Would it not be wise of Christ to say at least something nice about us, how diligent we are, how clever we are, what we have achieved after our 150 years of trying so hard? But He does not say that.

For sure, He is not trying to discourage us. He simply wants us to face reality, so that we can correct the problem and prepare to hear Him at last say "Well done!" when the commendation will mean something.

His answer, explaining why He feels like throwing up, helps us understand the reality of our situation. We have not realized it, but it is devastating. The next vision of Revelation introduces Him as a Lamb as though it had been slain" before whom the hosts of Heaven and the "twenty-four elders" bow in heartfelt worship singing an anthem of total devotion:

"You were slain, and have redeemed us to God by Your blood Out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, And have made us kings and priests to our God" Rev. 5:6,9.

All Heaven understands and appreciates what it cost Him to redeem us, how He went even to hell, how He tasted the equivalent of our second death, to save us. They sense the "width and length and depth and height" of that "love of Christ which passes knowledge." In contrast, "the angel" of the church of the Laodiceans, living in the concentrated light of six thousand years of Good News revelation is not deeply moved. When we should feel the same degree of appreciation, our little shriveled-up hearts are half-frozen. "You are lukewarm", Jesus says.

No wonder our superficial professions of love and devotion are nauseating to Him. He gave everything for us! When He compares the extent of His sacrificial devotion with the meagerness of our heart-response, He is acutely embarrassed before the watching universe. Is it hard for us to imagine how painful this is for Him?

Let Us See Reality as Heaven Sees It

Here we stand on the verge of the final crisis when our spiritual maturity should be so far greater than it is. Yet our childish indifference hurts Him. Peter's cowardly denial of Him at His trial was easier for Him to bear than our mild and calculating devotion in such a time as this. Arnold Wallenkampf comments incisively on the nauseating aspects of the "group-think" mentality that was so common among SdA leaders and ministers a century ago and still is so today:

1 "The main fault for the rejection of the 1888 message lay not with the people at large but with the ministers.

This startling disclosure must be seriously considered by each person in our church today who is an SdA minister or teacher or a leader in any capacity." {A. Wallenkampf, What Every Adventist Should Know About 1888, p. 90.}

"Many of the delegates to the Minneapolis conference became accomplices in the sin of rejecting the message of righteousness by faith, through action according to the laws of group dynamics. Since many of their respected and beloved leaders rejected the message at Minneapolis they followed these leaders in rejecting it . . . what we today call group-thinking. . . .
It is not a pleasant thought, but nevertheless it is true that at the Minneapolis Conference leaders of the SdA Church reenacted the role of the Jewish leaders in the day of Jesus. During Christ's ministry on earth the Jewish people were preponderantly favorable to Him. It was the Jewish leaders who later urged them to demand His crucifixion. At the Minneapolis conference in 1888 it was the leading brethren who spearheaded the opposition against the message." {Ibid., p. 45-47}

There Is Hope For Us

The Lord would not spend the remainder of the chapter (Rev. 3) telling us how to respond if He had already finally rejected us. We make Him sick at His stomach, but He pleads with us to relieve His pain. This message to Laodicea is the most critically sensitive and urgent in Scripture. The success of the entire plan of salvation depends upon its final hour; and Laodicean's problem is bound up with that crisis.

Jesus says, "I counsel you to buy of me gold tried in the fire" (Rev. 3:18) In addressing the SdA denomination and in particular its leadership, He tells us that the first thing we need is . . . not more works, more activity, more strategies and programs. He told us in verse 15, "I know your works." Our works are already feverishly intense. Peter identifies the "gold tried in the fire" as the essential ingredient in believing the gospel - the faith itself, which always precedes any works of genuine righteousness (1.Peter 1:7).

In other words, Jesus tells us that what we first need is what we have long confidently claimed that we already possess - the knowledge and experience of righteousness by faith. But what we have moves us only to lukewarmness. It is the true understanding that causes the hosts of heaven to serve so ardently "the Lamb who was slain." They are totally moved by the very heart of the message - "Christ and Him crucified," a motivation that shames us for our petty obsession with our own eternal security. Christ's diagnosis strikes at the root of our leadership pride.

The Subtlety of Our Spiritual Pride

Until the publication of Wallenkampf's book in 1988, our denominational press generally maintained that we were "enriched" at the time our leadership supposedly accepted the beginning loud cry message a century ago.[300] In recent years we have begun to take an abrupt about-face, and now the truth is openly recognized that "we" did not accept it.[310] This new candor is phenomenal and refreshing.

But surely Christ doesn't tell us now that we still need the "gold" of genuine faith? Yes, He says that in order for us to heal Him of his painful nausea we need the "gold" of genuine faith, and furthermore we need to buy it - that is, pay something in exchange for it.

But why does He not give it to us? He insists that we exchange it for the genuine, our helpless views of righteousness by faith, which have nurtured our lukewarmness. We are caught in an obvious contradiction, claiming that we adequately understand and preach righteousness by faith, when its proper fruits have been too sadly lacking. This is attested by the pervasive lukewarmness of the church. As lukewarmness is a mixture of cold and hot water, so our spiritual problem is a mixture of legalism and a poorly understood gospel.

A good dinner of wholesome food is ruined by even a slight mixture of arsenic. We have reached the point in world history where even a little legalism mixed with our "gospel" has become lethal. The confusion of past ages is no longer good enough for today. Believing the pure unadulterated gospel (in the Biblical sense) is wholly incompatible with any lukewarmness. The presence of lukewarmness betrays an underlying or subliminal legalism, a recognition that we as leaders are embarrassed to acknowledge.

We have thought that we possess the essentials of that "most precious message." What we have done is to import Evangelical ideas from popular churches who have no understanding of the unique truth of the cleansing of the sanctuary:

"As the Jews crucified Jesus, so the nominal churches had crucified these messages, and therefore they have no knowledge of the way into the most holy [place], and they can not be benefited by the intercession of Jesus there. Like the Jews, who offered their useless sacrifices, they offer up their useless prayers to the apartment which Jesus has left; and Satan, pleased with the deception, assumes a religious character, and leads the minds of these professed Christians to himself, working with his power, his signs and lying wonders, to fasten them in his snare." {Early Writings, p. 261}

This gradual process of absorption has accelerated for decades. We can never obtain the genuine, says Jesus, until we are humble and honest enough to give up, to exchange, the counterfeit to "buy" the genuine.

It is at this point that Christ meets resistance from us. Almost invariably we pastors, evangelists, administrators, theologians, leaders, teachers and independent ministries, will protest that we have no lack of understanding. Conservative "historic Adventists" and arch-liberals alike make the same boast from their antithetical (?) positions. Group-think loyalty forces us to resist that we do understand, thus we "have need of nothing." Feeling competent, we cannot "hunger and thirst after righteousness [by faith]" because we are already full.[400] We need only a louder voice, more clever ways to "market" what we already understand.

The Heart of the Problem

The issue is not whether we understand and preach the popular version of righteousness by faith as do the Sunday-keeping Evangelical churches.[495] We can do that for a thousand years and still fail to give the unique message the Lord has "commanded" us to give.[500] God has not called us to ecumenism. Rather, what have we done with the advanced light that Ellen White said was "the beginning" of the loud cry and the latter rain? [510]

If it is true that we have powerfully proclaimed righteousness by faith for decades, why have we not turned the world upside down as the apostles did? If genuine righteousness by faith is the light that will lighten the earth with glory (Rev. 18:1-4), why have we not lightened the earth with it? And why are we losing so large a percentage of our own youth in North America?

Could it be that we are actually making the proud claim that Christ charges on us in His Laodicean message? His diagnosis is on target. The Lord's servant has often said that when we do "buy" the "gold-tried-in-the-fire" kind of righteousness by faith, the gospel commission will be speedily finished like fire going in the stubble.[530] That has not really happened yet - not with 900 million Muslims and nearly a billion Hindus still unreached, plus many millions more professed Christians and others.

Here we come to the great continental divide in Adventism. At this point we turn to one side or the other. Either Jesus is wrong when He says we are "poor" and "wretched" and we are "rich" as we claim; or we are indeed "poor" and He has put His finger on our most sensitive plague spot of leadership pride. His words were a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense to the leaders of the ancient Jews; are they that to us as well?

Something Else That's Not "Free"

Christ makes even clearer that we must give up something, pay something, when He specifies the second purchase that we must "buy" from Him - "white garments that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed" (Rev. 3:18). Addressing the angel of the church, He makes clear that it is as a denomination that we appear in this shameful condition. The remedy He urges upon us involves the basic principle of corporate guilt and repentance.

(a) We cannot "buy" this robe of Christ's righteousness to put on 99% or less; we need it 100%. Righteousness is never in any way innate; never our own. All that we have of ourselves is unrighteousness. In other words, except for the grace of Christ, we are no better than any other people. If we had no Saviour, we would be stark "naked." The sins of others would be our sins, but for His grace.

(b) The realization of this truth humbles our pride in the dust. There is no way for us to obtain that special robe of His righteousness unless we first become conscious of our spiritual nakedness and are willing to exchange our false ideas for the truth, which alone can cover our shame.

The impact of His call does seem extreme. Are we not a prosperous, well-respected denomination of some six million members with great institutions? Do we not claim to be one of the fastest-growing churches in the world? Why does Christ not appropriately praise us according to our achievements?

(c) He is not talking about achievements. The problem of "nakedness" is our lack of understanding the gospel itself. This is where the charge hits the raw nerve of denominational self-esteem and arouses our indignation. If we can deflect the point of Christ's words by insisting that He is speaking only to us as individuals, we can always duck out. We can assume that it is some other individual who is spiritually "naked" while corporately we are well-dressed, It is only when we understand "the angel" to be the corporate leadership of the church that we begin to squirm most uncomfortably. Our pleasant sense of being denominationally well-clothed is rudely dissipated.

(d) Consider for example the plight of another body of professed Christians - the Mormons. their theological "garments" have been their trust in the divine inspiration of Joseph Smith and his writing of the Book of Mormon. But plain evidence for all the world to see indicates that the foundation of their "faith" is a monstrous fraud. In proportion to their knowledge of those facts and their intellectual honesty, imagine their corporate shame!

In our case, our problem is not our "27 doctrines" or our history. Their general validity is unquestioned. Our corporate nakedness is our want of the one truth that alone can make those "27" meaningful - "the message of Christ's righteousness" which the Lord tried to give us a century ago. That message would lighten the earth with glory if we "had" it:

"Justification by faith in Christ will be made manifest in transformation of character. This is the sign to the world of the truth of the doctrines we profess." {EGW, 1888 Materials, p. 1532.}

"One interest will prevail, one subject will swallow up every other, - Christ Our Righteousness." {R&H Extra, dec. 23, 1890.}

How long can we go on proudly insisting that we have the genuine article?

In the case of the Mormons, as a corporate body, they probably do not care about their theological and historical predicament because (and we speak kindly) they are not a people who were raised up by the truth of the third angel's message. They do not profess to stand before the world as those who "keep the commandments of God and have the faith of Jesus." Nor do they have a keen sense of spiritual conscience as Ellen White's writings have imbued in us. If the Mormons can sustain their community socially and economically, they will probably be content corporately to go on without that "white garment" of Christ's righteousness to cover their historical and theological shame.

(e) But we cannot do so, for we possess a corporate conscience devoted above else to truth. This church was raised up by sheer force of the word of truth. Praise the Lord; our conscience will inevitably be aroused by Christ's "straight testimony."[540] Especially in North America, the cradle of Adventism, where our "nakedness" is becoming increasingly apparent, we will sooner or later be forced by reality to face what Christ says.

(f) The realization of a shared corporate guilt saves us from the pitfall of a holier-than-thou fantasy. No one of us can criticize another; we partake together of the fault for which Jesus rebukes us.

When We Can "See" Our Nakedness We Will Naturally Have Discernment

The third item Jesus specifies is the "eyesalve, that you may see" (Rev. 3:18). The Lord tells us to anoint our eyes with the eyesalve He offers. Once we "buy" the "gold" and the "white garments," our vision will automatically be clarified. We will begin to see ourselves as the watching universe sees us and as thoughtful people see us (who we say are still in `Babylon'). The picture is clearly more than the need merely of individuals.

What is at stake is the image of the SdA Church at view in current world history. Our divine destiny requires us to make a far greater impact on world thinking. That impact of the future will not be our charitable "works," in which others will always far out-do us. It will be the Good News content of our message. It will be a distinct, unique presentation of righteousness by faith - in a message that goes far beyond the message by the same name of the popular churches! Once we learn to "see," we shall immediately discern the contrasts between what we have assumed is righteousness by faith and what is the genuine "third angel's message in verity" that Ellen White recognized is implicit in the actual concepts of the loud cry message.

Christ now gives us the only direct command in His message: "As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent" (Rev. 3:19). Our sinful nature instinctively recoils against this kind of love - the chastening kind. We must therefore not be surprised that Christ's serious call to repentance meets with resentment from those whom He loves and resistance from those who love not the truth.

But He assures us that He loves us with close, intimate family love (philo, He says) which justifies rebuke and chastening and makes it possible for us to endure. Ellen White's life-ministry is an example. The Spirit of Prophecy has never flattered us! Neither does "the testimony of Jesus," its Author.

There is ample reason to search further for the meaning of that all-important command of the True Witness, "Repent."

3. The Fundamental Truth: Christ's Church as His Corporate Body

Our laborious exhortations to become a `caring church' have wearied us. Endless commands to `do' something are transcended by a simple divine invitation to `see' something.

To understand what is involved in Christ's call to repentance we must consider Paul's brilliant metaphor of the church as a "body." We sustain a corporate relationship to one another and to Christ Himself as our Head. Although this idea is foreign to much of our Western thinking, it is essential to the Bible concepts.

In fact, the word "corporate" is a good Bible word, for Paul addresses his letters "to believers incorporate in Christ" (Eph. 1:1; Phil. 1:1; Col. 1:1, etc.; Rom. 6:5, NEB).

"As the body is one and has many members, . . . so also is Christ" (1.Cor. 12:12).

Paul goes on to illustrate his idea.

There is a corporate unity of the "one body" (1.Cor. 12:13), a corporate diversity of its various "members" (v. 15-18), a corporate need felt by all ("the eye cannot say to the hand, `I have no need of you,'" v. 21,22), a corporate "care" they feel for each other and for the head (v. 25), and corporate suffering and rejoicing which all the members share together (v. 26). If I stub my toe on a sharp rock, my whole body feels pain. If the leg could speak it would say, "I'm sorry; I projected the toe against the rock." The eye would say, "No, it's my fault; I should have seen the sharp rock."

The Meaning of the Word "Corporate"

The word "body" is a noun, and the word "bodily" is an adverb; but there is no meaningful English adjective that can describe the nature of this relationship within the "body" except the word "corporate" from the Latin word for body, corpus. The dictionary defines it as "relating to a whole composed of individuals." (The New English Bible makes good use of the word.)

Your own experience can make this plain. What happens when you stub your toe badly? At once you realize the corporate relationship of the limbs and organs of your body. You stop while your whole body cooperates by rubbing the hurting toe to lessen the pain. You may even hurt all over. Your organs and limbs feel a corporate concern for that wounded toe, as if each feels the pain. "If one organ suffers, they all suffer together." (1. Cor. 12:26 NEB)

Any amputation in the body becomes a "schism" to be avoided at almost any cost. Likewise, any measure of disunity or misunderstanding or lack of compassion in the church is foreign to Christ and His body. It is as alien as disease or accident is to our human body. Sin is such an accident to the "body of Christ," and guilt is its disease.

Often we suffer disease without knowing which organ is ill, or even what causes it. We can also suffer from sin without knowing what it is. How can sin have both a personal and corporate nature?

In malarial areas, people are bitten by the anopheles mosquito, and infected with the disease. Some ten days after the bite, the parasites in the blood stream produce malarial fever. Not only is the one "member" such as the finger affected which received the mosquito bite, but the whole body partakes of the common fever. The blood stream has carried the parasites everywhere. This is a corporate disease.

When we receive an injection of an anti-malarial drug in one "member," the arm receiving it is not the only member to benefit. The medicine begins to course throughout the blood stream. Soon the entire body is healed of the disease, and the fever disappears over all the body, not just in the one "member." This is a corporate healing.

The 17th century poet John Donne grasped the idea:

"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death, diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee." {Donne, J., Devotions, XVII}

It would have been a short step more for Donne to have said, "Any man's sin diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know who crucified the Christ; it was you."

This solidarity of humanity can be illustrated by lions. A few lions in Africa become man-eaters, but most never get to taste of human beings. Does this mean that some lions are good and others are bad? There is no difference so far as lion character is concerned. Given the right circumstances, any hungry lion will be a man-eater.

Does Jesus say in His message to Laodicea that our pride, our blindness, our spiritual poverty, our wretchedness, are corporate? Do we partake of common spiritual disease that is like a fever to a body or a lion's nature - something pervading the whole? The Hebrew mind says yes.

The Bible Idea of "Adam"

The Bible writers perceived the whole of humanity as being one corporate man - the fallen "Adam." "In Adam all die" (1.Cor. 15:22). An outstanding example is found in Hebrews. Paul said that Levi paid "tithes in Abraham. For he was yet in the loins of his [great-grand] father, when Melchizedek met him." Abraham did not yet have even one son (Hebr. 7:9,10 KJV). Daniel asks forgiveness for the sins of "our fathers," saying, "We have not obeyed the voice of the fathers," although he himself had been obedient (Hebr. 9:8-11).[560]

Human sin is personal, but it is also corporate, for "all alike have sinned," and "all the world [has] become guilty before God" (Rom. 3:23, NEB; 3:19, KJV). Adam's real guilt was that of crucifying Christ, although his original sin was 4000 years removed; no one of us "in Adam" is even now excused. What is our basic human nature? The answer is unpalatable - we are by nature at enmity with God, and await only the proper circumstances to demonstrate it. A few people did demonstrate this for us by crucifying the Son of God. In them we see ourselves.

The original sin of the first pair was the acorn that grew into the oak of Calvary. Any sin that we today commit is another acorn that needs only time and circumstance to become the same oak, for "the carnal mind is at enmity against God", and murder is always involved in enmity for "whoseoever hateth his brother is a murderer" (Rom. 8:7; 1.John 3:15, KJV).

The sin that another human has committed I could commit if Christ had not saved me from it. The righteousness of Christ cannot be a mere adjunct to my own good works, a slight push to get me over the top. My righteousness is all of Him or it is nothing. "In me . . . nothing good dwells" (Rom. 7:18). If "nothing good" is there, as I am part of the corporate body of Adam, all evil could dwell there. Nobody else is intrinsically any worse than I am - apart from my Saviour. Oh, how it hurts us to begin to realize this!

Not until we can see the sin of someone else as our sin too can we learn to love him as Christ has loved us. The reason is that in loving us He took our sin upon Himself. When He died on His cross, we died with Him - in principle. For us, love is also to realize corporate identity. "Be tenderhearted, . . . just as God in Christ also forgave you" (Eph. 4:32). Paul prays for us, not that we might "do" more works, but that we might see or "comprehend" something - the dimensions of that love (Eph. 3:14-21).

The reality that Scripture would bring to our conscience is that we need the robe of Christ's righteousness imputed 100%. Those who crucified Christ 2000 years ago acted as our surrogates. Luther wisely says that we are all made of the same dough.

The Other Side of the Coin

If this seems to be bad news, there is also good news: Christ forgave His murderers (Lk. 23:34), and that means He also forgave us. Even the fallen Adam and Eve in the Garden were forgiven. But you and I can never know that forgiveness unless we "see" the sin that makes it necessary. Since God had promised them that "in the day that you eat" of the forbidden tree "you shall surely die" (Gen. 2:17), they would have died on that very day had there not been a Lamb slain for them "from the foundation of the world" (Rev. 13:8).

The guilt that Romans says rests upon "all the world" is "in Adam," and legal. The "trespasses" of all the world were imputed unto Christ as He died on His cross as the second or "last Adam" (2.Cor. 5:19). That means that all the "condemnation" that the first Adam brought on the world was reversed by the second Adam, by virtue of His sacrifice (Rom. 5:16-18).

Consider the Jewish nation. Those who crucified Christ asked that "His blood be on us and on our children" (Mt. 27:25). This does not mean that every individual Jew is personally more guilty than people who are Gentiles. They were invoking a blood-responsibility upon their children in a national sense. This is the Jews' corporate guilt. But we are in reality no better than they are. Apart from specific repentance, we share the same involvement in the crucifixion of Christ:

"That prayer of Christ for His enemies embraced the world. It took in every sinner that had lived or should live, from the beginning of the world to the end of time. Upon all rests the guilt of crucifying the Son of God. To all, forgiveness is freely offered. "Whosoever will" may have peace with God, and inherit eternal life." {DA 745.1}

"Let us remember that we are still in a world where Jesus, the Son of God, was rejected and crucified, where the guilt of despising Christ and preferring a robber rather than the spotless Lamb of God still rests. Unless we individually repent toward God because of transgression of His law; and exercise faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ, whom the world has rejected, we shall lie under the full condemnation that the action of choosing Barabbas instead of Christ merited. The whole world stands charged today with the deliberate rejection and murder of the Son of God. . . . All classes and sects who reveal the same spirit of envy, hatred, prejudice, and unbelief manifested by those who put to death the Son of God - would act the same part, were the opportunity granted, as did the Jews and people of the time of Christ. They would be partakers of the same spirit that demanded the death of the Son of God." {TM, p. 38}

This is the world's corporate guilt. Note that no one bears the condemnation unless he repeats the sin "were the opportunity granted." But "unless we individually repent," we share corporate guilt that is involved "in Adam."

Our Special Involvement in Corporate Guilt

But as SdAs, we share another example of corporate guilt in a special way for a very special sin. Not that we are personally guilty, but we are the spiritual "children" of our forefathers who in a notable sense repeated the sin of the ancient Jews. This corporate guilt causes the latter rain to be withheld from us as surely as the Jews' impenitence(?) keeps the blessings of the Messiah's ministry from them. "We" rejected the "most precious message" that the Lord sent to us and which in a special way represented Him. What our forefathers really said was similar to what the ancient Jews said, "The responsibility for delaying the coming of the Lord be on us and on our children!" In fact, Ellen White has said that "we" did worse than the Jews, for "we" had far greater light than they had. The reality of this indictment is alarming:

"An unwillingness to yield up preconceived opinions, and to accept this truth, lay at the foundation of a large share of the opposition manifested at Minneapolis against the Lord's message through Brethren Waggoner and Jones. By exciting that opposition, Satan succeeded in shutting away from our people, in a great measure, the special power of the Holy Spirit that God longed to impart to them. The enemy prevented them from obtaining that efficiency which might have been theirs in carrying the truth to the world, as the apostles proclaimed it after the day of Pentecost. The light that is to lighten the whole earth with its glory was resisted, and by the action of our own brethren has been in a great degree kept away from the world." {EGW, 1888 Materials, p. 1575; 1MR 130.3.}

"The managers of the Pacific Press need to humble their hearts before God. They need to walk in all humility. The Lord will overturn until there is a reformation in our institutions. The men who ought to be filled with faith in this most sacred truth ever presented to mortals, the men who handle sacred trusts, are not all true watchmen. The Holy Spirit has often been in your midst, but these men, whose hearts should have been open to receive the heavenly messengers, were closed to its entreaties. They have ridiculed, mocked, and derided God's servants who have borne to them the message of mercy from heaven. Some have trifled with the precious things of God which are light and truth and grace. Had these men no fear that the sin of blasphemy might be committed by them.(?) They would certainly fear were they not blinded by the enemy. Poor foolish, deluded souls. They know not the things that make for their peace. God has said, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings." {M.V.H. (7) Jan. 27, '97./ {1888 1641.3}

"Time is passing, and God calls for every watchman to be in his place. He has been pleased to lead us to a crisis greater than any since our Saviour's first advent. What shall we do? God's Holy Spirit has told us what to do; but, as the Jews in Christ's day rejected light and chose darkness, so will the religious world reject the message for today. Men professing godliness have despised Christ in the person of his messengers. Like the Jews, they reject God's message. The Jews asked regarding Christ, "Who is this? Is not this Joseph's son?" He was not the Christ that the Jews had looked for. So today the agencies that God sends are not what men have looked for. But the Lord will not ask any man by whom to send. He will send by whom he will. Men may not be able to understand why God sends this one or that one. His work may be a matter of curiosity. God will not satisfy this curiosity; and his word will not return unto him void." {1888 1651.4}

"Under the gracious influence of God, you have often felt the moral obligations devolving upon you. But after the influence you received at the Minneapolis meeting, where it was popular to talk doubt, to question and resist the light God was sending, the sentiments there suggested one to another, acted upon your mind and heart like a poisonous malaria. Although every evidence that was essential was given in regard to the work which the Lord had begun in behalf of his people, although those present felt the convicting power of God upon heart and mind, they did not possess humility of heart to the acknowledging of the truth. They revealed that more evidence would accomplish nothing for them. It was not evidence that they needed, for this had been abundant. They needed meekness and lowliness of heart to confess. Had you yielded your pride and self-sufficiency then, you would have softened your heart, and been converted. But you kept your feet in the path of unbelief. You hated the messages sent from heaven. You manifested against Christ a prejudice of the very same character and more offensive to God than that of the Jewish nation. Nothing but spiritual blindness could so obscure your discernment that you would not see the working of the Spirit of God. You did see it, but you would not yield to it. You refused to admit the truth of the heaven-sent message. You, and all who like yourself, had sufficient evidence, yet refused the blessing of God, were persistent in refusing because at first you would not receive it. You did not search the Scriptures to obtain clearer light, but you obtained something with which to brace your mind to reject the Spirit of God, and strengthen your unbelief. This is your stumbling block, which no one but yourself can remove. Because of your false ideas, you cannot obtain a right understanding of what is truth and what constitutes the third angel's message. Had this blind obstinacy in you been yielded, you would have humbled your heart, and received the greatest blessing you ever had in your life. O what a terrible thing it is for any one to be deceived and deluded by Satan." {1888 1656.1}

We may claim that we are not repeating that sin of our forefathers, but what is the meaning of the constant effort to suppress the actual message of 1888, and keep it from the people?

The ancient Jews continued in their course until "there was no remedy" for their impenitence. The wrath of the Lord at last arose against them (2.Chr. 36:16). Then began the tragic history of the cruel world empires, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. In a sense the guilt of ancient Israel was responsible for the rise of those empires. Untold sorrow has filled the world because of the impenitence of God's people.[600]

Unbelieving Jews still gather at the Wailing Wall in old Jerusalem to pray for God to send them their long awaited Messiah. A better plan would be for them to repent of rejecting Him when He came 2000 years ago, and recover the gospel message which they lost at that time. We pray for the Lord to send us the gift of the latter rain so that the final message can lighten the earth with glory. Says a recent Sabbath School Quarterly:

"At the 1990 General Conference session hundreds of people committed themselves to daily prayer for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in both the former and latter rains. Since then thousands all over the world have been praying daily for the special blessing of the Lord. Such prayer is sure to result in changed hearts, spiritually revitalized churches, and more earnest outreach for those who do not believe. Moreover, in response to this united prayer, the Lord promises to grant the greatest outpouring of the Spirit in human history, the latter rain predicted by Joel and Peter." {Teacher's Comments for March 9, 1992}

To pray for the latter rain is good. But is there something we are leaving out? We have been earnestly praying for it for a hundred years, as the Jews have been praying for the coming of their Messiah for thousands of years. Would it not be a better plan for us to repent of rejecting "the beginning" of that same blessing which the Lord sent us a century ago, and to demonstrate our repentance by recovering the message which we lost?[620]

Is our Lord's call to repent as serious a matter as this? Does decade after decade of spiritual drought roll by because His call has not been more seriously considered? If He calls for repentance, there must be some way that we can respond.

We must look into this more deeply.

Chapter 4. The Disappointed Christ

We sing, we pray, we say we love Him. But He says He is persona non grata among us.

Our sinful, despairing modern world desperately needs a Spirit-filled SdA Church. We cherish a deep conviction: this church is the prophetic remnant of Revelation 12:17, a unique people with whom the dragon is "enraged" and makes "war". They are called to "keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ." The same group tells the world the true good news of "the everlasting gospel" (Rev. 14:6-12). They are a vital ingredient in world stability.

Although this sense of destiny has kept the SdA Church on course for over a century, it leaves us little room for pride because our Lord rebukes us severely in His Laodicean message. Countless sermons have been preached and articles published about that rebuke, but we today generally recognize that the problems it details still exist.

If we have successfully overcome these spiritual weaknesses, there should by now be some clear evidence to show how and when the overcoming took place. Reason dictates that when the church truly overcomes, Christ's coming can no longer be delayed. This is confirmed by His parable about the farmer (Jesus Himself): "When the grain ripens, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come" (Mk. 4:29) The "harvest" is "the end of the world" (Mt. 13:39, KJV); Rev. 14:14-16.

Why has not Christ's appeal to His people already done its work? When will He have a remnant church that has bought His "gold refined in the fire," His "white garments," and applied His "eye salve"? Must we assume that Christ's message will fail in the end? Some conclude that because ancient Israel failed repeatedly, modern Israel must fail also. Surely there must be better news than this!

We are living in the time for a victory that never before has taken place in history. We have been assured:

"The Holy Spirit is to animate and pervade the whole church, purifying and cementing hearts. . . . It is the purpose of God to glorify Himself in His people before the world." {9T, p. 20,21}

As surely as the SdA Church is that "remnant" in Revelation, so surely must this message from Jesus succeed at last.

How Can We Make Sense of the Long Delay?

Is the long delay in the coming of Christ His responsibility? It is a common understanding among us that the delay is His responsibility. But to believe this creates a terrible problem. With no hope for the future except to continue repeating the history of our past, the hope of the soon return of Christ must then fade further into uncertainty.

A special 1992 issue of the `Adventist Review' on the Second Coming reported on the well-known uncertainty of many of our youth. Cheryl R. Merritt reports the frightening reality. "We are a generation of nonconviction when it comes to Jesus second coming." "I really don't think that we can have any idea of when He'll come" (Daniel Potter, 21, Union College). "I can't imagine it happening in my lifetime." (Shawn Sugars, 22, Andres University).

This reveals a terrible problem. If we lose our faith in the nearness of the second coming, we lose the reason for our existence as a special church. Our forefathers built into our denominational name our confidence in the soon return of Christ, for the dictionary defines the word "Adventist" not as some dim hope in a "far-off divine event," but confidence in the soon coming of the Lord. There is a close relationship between understanding Christ's Laodicean call to repent and our confidence in the nearness of His coming. This will be clear as we go on.

The Spiritual Crisis Of the Seventh Day Adventist Church

Roland Hegstad, for many years editor of Liberty, said that Adventism is "not attracting our own youth because all we're doing is asking them to come play church with us." {Adventist Review, February 27, 1986}

Christ's Laodicean message presents to them no spiritual challenge, for if we have already repented, we must by now be "rich and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing", except to carry on business as usual and work harder.

Can we have a reasonable hope that we will see the Lord's return? Did He deceive our pioneers by telling them it was "near" when all along He knew it would be delayed at least 140 years and no one knows how many more? Is the Calvinist idea true, that the sovereign Lord has predetermined the time of Jesus' second coming with no special preparation on the part of His people? If so, this raises serious problems that involve the Lord Himself in an ethical difficulty. He has often told us through the Spirit of Prophecy that the end is "near." His messenger frequently said, "I saw . . . that time can last but a very little longer" {Early Writings, p. 58, 1850}. "Only a moment of time, as it were, yet remains." "The battle of Armageddon is soon to be fought." {6T, p. 14, 406; 1900}

If such warnings were merely a cry of "wolf, wolf," then the Lord has not been fair with us. For Him repeatedly to say "near" when He did not mean it or intended to define the word so we could not understand it, this would be unethical. Surely He does not treat His people this way! Further, if we say or feel that "the Lord is delaying His coming," we put ourselves in the company of the "evil servant" in the parable who says that very thing (Mt. 24:48)

Any meaningful Adventism cannot survive this doubt, because no people can be reconciled to God in a "final atonement" if they feel that He has deceived them. Even if He has only allowed their comprehension of His truth to be patently false from their very beginning, they cannot trust Him.[700] This could be the basic problem that underlies much present apostasy and backsliding. There is a deep Adventist spiritual alienation because it appears that inspired messages have been crying "wolf, wolf."

But Scripture makes clear that there is an answer to this perplexity. While God is indeed sovereign, He has chosen to make the actual timing of Christ's second coming dependent on the spiritual preparation of His living people. This is the genius of the SdA idea of the cleansing of the sanctuary. The dead remain hopeless prisoners in their grave, awaiting release at the first resurrection, whenever that may come. But the living may delay or "hasten on" that coming of Christ which in turn is dependent on their getting ready for it (2.Peter 3:12, NEB, NAS, NIV, NKJV, etc. Most translations recognize the meaning of speudontas from speudo as "hasten.")

In His parable Jesus represents Himself as already eager to return, waiting only until "the grain ripens," whereupon "immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come" (Mk. 4:29) In the Revelation preview of the second coming, an angel tells Him, "The time is come for You to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe" (Rev. 14:45). The long-delayed "marriage of the Lamb" comes quickly once "His wife has made herself ready" (Rev. 19:7). The repentance Christ calls for from Laodicea is related to the Bride making herself "ready". If she does not, He is disappointed.

"It is the privilege of every Christian not only to look for but to hasten the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, (2 Peter 3:12, margin). Were all who profess His name bearing fruit to His glory, how quickly the whole world would be sown with the seed of the gospel. Quickly the last great harvest would be ripened, and Christ would come to gather the precious grain." {COL 69.2}

To go on being lukewarm and dying, generation after generation, cannot be a proper response of a Bride to Christ's last-church appeal.

The Deeper Meaning in Christ's Call to Repent

Yet if the Laodicean repentance Christ calls for has never yet taken place, this very fact gives us hope, for there is something that our repentance can rectify. Zechariah tells of a repentance that will grip the hearts of "the inhabitants of Jerusalem," making possible in them a cleansing work so Christ can return (Zech. 12:10-13:1). "The angel of the church of the Laodiceans" is equivalent to Zechariah's phrase, "the house of David," obviously the corporate body of church leadership.

Christ's final promise is directed to the same personified body, not merely to individuals: "To him who overcomes [the angel of the church of the Laodiceans] I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame, and sat down with My Father on His throne" (Rev. 3:21). This ultimate honor will be accorded to a generation, a body of God's people who will respond to His appeal, "Repent!" [750]

A probe into the meaning of repentance is not "negative." Rather, feeling satisfied with the status quo is the really negative attitude, because such spiritual laissez faire indefinitely postpones the finishing of the gospel commission. And it is a totally false idea to assume that a church that repents will not attract youth. That is the only atmosphere in our church that can attract and hold youth.

Many thousands in the church hunger and thirst for a clearer grasp of vital truth for these last days. They sense that the coming of the Lord has been long delayed and that we, not Heaven, are responsible. They realize that pinpointing the reason for repentance and exploring it is the most "positive" course we can pursue.

Repentance by "the body" does not deny or displace personal, individual repentance. Rather, it makes it effective. The daily ministry in the first apartment of the Levitical sanctuary took care of individuals' needs, but the annual Day of Atonement was concerned for a corporate cleansing for Israel as a congregation. All repentance is personal and individual. But no individual can ever be the "bride" of Christ, for as individuals God's people are all merely "guests" at the wedding. The corporate body of the last-day overcoming church will be the bride.

Something has delayed her getting "ready." It is a deeper layer of sin which, He says, "you . . . do not know" (Rev. 3:17). It makes sense to realize that the repentance which that deeper sin requires must itself also go deeper. However disturbing, the Lord's call must be faced honestly.

Repentance is indeed both, sorrow for sin and turning away from it. But repentance can be only superficial if our understanding of the sin itself is superficial. While we readily quote the text that says, "If we confess our sins, He [Christ] is faithful and just to forgive us iur sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1.Jh. 1:9), we must remember the context of this promise. It does not encourage a superficial assurance that the tape recording of our sins is scrubbed by pressing a magic button. When we thoughtlessly assume that the Lord can forgive sins while we do not realize what our sins are, John is telling us how easily "we deceive ourselves" so that, "the truth is not in us." So long as Jesus' pathetic diagnosis, "you . . . do not know," remains valid, so long do "we deceive ourselves." We cannot be truly cleansed from deep sin that we do not understandably "confess" (1.Jh. 1:8,10).

If a sin is unknown to us, does it cease to be a sin? One may smoke cigarettes for a lifetime not knowing they are harmful. Nevertheless, the damage is done. "Sin pays its wages -- death," whether we know what our sins are or not. There is a larger issue than our own personal security - the honor and vindication of Christ. The Lord may not hold against us a sin that we do not know of, but that sin brings shame upon Him nonetheless, and hinders His work of final atonement.

The message to Laodicea is not child's play. "One like the Son of man" with "eyes like a flame of fire" and "His voice as the sound of many waters" is calling His people to the most profound experience of the ages. Failure to recognize His call creates confusion and apostasy, and is an eventual time-bomb of denominational self-destruction. He has sent word to us:

"In every church in our land, there is needed confession, repentance, and reconversion. The disappointment of Christ is beyond description." (R&H, Dec. 15, 1904)

His appeal to repent is the clearest evidence we have of His love, and it is our best hope!

"He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches," especially the last one (of the seven churches)!

Chapter 5. The Lord's Most Serious Problem of the Ages

The ultimate success of the plan of salvation depends upon its final hour. Never in 6000 years has the Lord had a greater problem to solve than now.

Are we involved in a genuine crisis? The greatest crisis of the ages involved the crucifixion of Christ. But that crisis overshadows us today.

Human sin, which began in Eden, finally blossomed into that murder of the Son of God. Those who crucified Him the first time were forgiven, for Jesus prayed for them, "They do not know what they do" (Lk. 23:34). Sincere as we are, could we repeat their sin, again not knowing what we do?

There are those who "crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame" (Hebr. 6:6). Is Laodicea's sin related to this? How deep is the sin for which "the angel of the church of the Laodiceans" is called upon to repent?

Laodicea shares something in common with Israel of old - an ignorance of our true state. The Lord says, "You . . . do not know," the same as He prayed of them, "They do not know." The remnant church is pathetically unaware of her actual role as she appears on the stage of the universe. "You are . . . naked," Christ whispers to us, in alarm (Rev. 3:17). Could this be more serious than we have thought, more than mere shameful but innocent naiveté? Could it stem from a deep heart alienation from the Lord Himself, something that makes us akin to the ancient Jews?

The idea of nakedness surfaces again in the parable of the wedding garment. The deluded guest who thought that dressing up was optional was not only naive; he lacked respect for the host. An alienation deeper than his conscious understanding poisoned his feelings toward his host (Mt. 22:11-13). Laodicea improperly dressed but proudly attending the party is not only naive; there is something else involved: disrespect for the Host. Only the "final atonement" can develop proper reverence for the Host and can bring a solution to the problem.

SdAs are friends of Jesus and so would not knowingly crucify Him "again." But being His friends does not necessarily guarantee that we will treat Him right, for He says that He was once "wounded in the house of friends" (Zech. 13:6).

Many statements from the Lord's messenger declare that the same enmity against Christ that characterized the ancient Jews has been manifested by leaders in our SdA history. Further, this "just-like-the-Jews" syndrome has been the root of our basic spiritual problem for most of a century.

It is easy to suppose that Laodicea, being lukewarm, is not very bad and not very good, so that our sin must be a mild one. We have often acted and spoken as though Heaven is quite proud of us. But there is a problem. Our spiritual understanding has not kept pace with the tremendous increase of scientific knowledge in the world. No one of us in this computer age would want to live in a cave and count on an abacus by candlelight. But spiritually speaking, Christ represents His last-day church as virtually poverty-stricken, content with spiritual resources far behind our time. We are a pathetic sight to Heaven. We shall someday look back on our era as the dark ages. In a time of exploding knowledge in technology, God's people have not broken through this spiritual barrier of "you . . . do not know." The last unexplored continent is not Antarctica, but the inner depths of Laodicea's soul. The enmity buried there is what Christ says we do not know.

The Cross and the Pathology of Sin

Modern science has discovered that harmful bacteria and viruses produce disease. While pathology can often identify these tiny organisms, our understanding of what sin is and how it proliferates has not kept pace with the world's knowledge of how disease works. Yet we are near the time when Christ's intercession as High Priest must end, when the virus of sin must be forever annihilated. If any alienation from God or enmity against Him survives beneath the surface of our hearts at that time, it will proliferate unchecked into total full scale, uninhibited enmity against Christ without the restraint now imposed by the Holy Spirit. No buried virus of sin must survive the final crisis.

In essence, all sin is a re-crucifixion of Christ, and its final display will be Armageddon. No one can deny that sin has abounded in our modern age; knowledge of much more abounding grace is the solution.

The master inventor of all fiendish schemes wants to embarrass Christ. If Satan can perpetuate sin among God's people; he has his success made. This is his best way to sabotage Christ's kingdom. Let's face a reality: continued apathy now is sin. And as time goes on, it will be seen to be a re-crucifixion of Christ. The enemy cannot at present use physical force. His strategy has been to take advantage of our ignorance of what sin is and thus induce in us a spiritual paralysis. Our singular lukewarmness is an enchanted-ground lethargy on the borders of Heaven.

What is the Pathology of Lukewarmness?

How do succeeding generations of Adventists get re-infected by it? How does it spread even to Third World churches? It must be caused by a sin virus. If so, what is the nature of the sin? Why have we not found healing for it?

Peter's sermon at Pentecost unlocks our understanding. He shocked his listeners with the news that latent enmity against God had flared out in the crucifixion of their Messiah. The Holy Spirit used his sermon to press home to their hearts the conviction of how awful that previously unknown sin was. They cried out, "What shall we do?"

The apostle's answer was, "Repent" (Acts 2:22-38). And they responded. They received the Holy Spirit in a measure that has never since been equaled. This is because they came to realize that their sin was of significantly greater dimensions than they had supposed. That blessing of the former rain will be surpassed in a final reception of the Holy Spirit known as the latter rain. As at Pentecost, the gift will depend on a full realization of our true guilt.

The Lord has in reserve a means of motivation that will be fully effective. What happened at Pentecost fueled the early church with extraordinary spiritual energy that flowed naturally out of their unique repentance. No sin in all time was more horrendous than that which those people were guilty of - murdering the Son of God.

Sin has always been "enmity against God," but no one fully understood its dimensions until the Holy Spirit drove the truth home to the hearts of Peter's audience. The realization of their guilt came over them like a flood. Theirs was no petty seeking for a shelter from hell or for a reward in Heaven, nor was it a craven search to evade punishment. The cross of the ages was towering over them, and their human hearts responded honestly to its reality. No selfishness was involved.

A repentance like that of Pentecost is what Christ calls for from us today. It will come, like a lost vein of gold on the earth that must surface again in another place. Hazy, indistinct ideas of repentance can produce only hazy, indistinct devotion. Like medicine taken in quantity sufficient to produce a concentration in the blood stream, repentance must be comprehensive, full range, in order for the Holy Spirit to do His fully effective work.

Why Laodicea's Repentance Must Now Be Different in Depth and Extent

This full spectrum of repentance is included in "the everlasting gospel" of Revelation 14. But its clearest definition has been impossible until history reaches the last of the seven churches. The original word "repentance" means a looking back from the perspective of the end: metanoia from meta ("after") and nous ("mind"). Thus, repentance can never be complete until the end of history. Like the great Day of Atonement, its full dimension must be a last-day experience. To that moment in time we have now come.

Unless our veiled eyes can see the depth of our sin as identical to that of Peter's congregation at Pentecost, only a veneer (?) repentance can be possible, thus perpetuating the Lord's problem for further generations. It is not enough that sin be legally forgiven; it must also be blotted out.

Not only are we frustrated by the long delay; Christ Himself is deeply pained. We can turn off the horrifying nightly news and find relief in sleep; but the Lord cannot do that. He can "neither slumber nor sleep" (Ps. 121:4). The agony of a suffering, terrorized world weighs heavy upon Him. He cannot take a vacation to some remote corner of the universe and forget it. In our weakness, we can feel a little for the agonies of starving, homeless, despairing people when we know about them, yet Jesus is infinitely more sensitive and compassionate than the best of us. In ancient times "in all their affliction He was afflicted" (Isa. 63:9), and He is still the same today.

"Those who think of the result of hastening or hindering the gospel think of it in relation to themselves and to the world. Few think of its relation to God. Few give thought to the suffering that sin has caused our Creator. All heaven suffered in Christ's agony; but that suffering did not begin or end with His manifestation in humanity. The cross is a revelation to our dull senses of the pain that, from its very inception, sin has brought to the heart of God. Every departure from the right, every deed of cruelty, every failure of humanity to reach His ideal, brings grief to Him. When there came upon Israel the calamities that were the sure result of separation from God,--subjugation by their enemies, cruelty, and death,--it is said that "His soul was grieved for the misery of Israel." "In all their affliction He was afflicted: . . . and He bare them, and carried them all the days of old." Judges 10:16; Isaiah 63:9. {Ed 263.1}

Our Lord is not an impassive Buddha-like deity in a nirvana trance. Our prayers do not move Him to a pity that He would not otherwise feel. When we beg Him, "Please do something to help," He responds hopefully, "Why don't you do something?"

When the mind and heart of "the angel of the church" are truly at-one with Christ, the roadblock will be eliminated. Then He will employ His people effectively to do what He wants done for the world. It is especially of SdAs that Ellen White said, "The disappointment of Christ is beyond description." How can we relieve that disappointment?

The Lord's Problem Has Become The Crisis of the Ages

The Bible reveals God in a dimension unknown in the Qur'an, the Vedic Hindu, or Buddhist, scriptures. The world's pain is God's pain, only intensified. Think how a loving, sensitive father feels the pain of a wounded child; then multiply that over six billion times.

Revelation goes a step further and pictures Christ as an eager Bridegroom who longs for "the marriage of the Lamb" to come soon, but who is disappointed that His bride has not yet "made herself ready" (Rev. 19:7-9). She has kept Him at arm's length all this while. This means that as yet she cannot be truly reconciled to Him. When she is at-one with Him in heart and mind, every church will be pulsating with the life of the Holy Spirit, overflowing with Christlike love. Each member will be spiritually alert, radiant with a miraculous unselfishness that transforms him/her into a unique revelation of Christ.

Some inspired statements declare that this full-fledged revival will never take in the "whole church," because there will always be tares among the wheat. But there are other equally inspired statements that say that "the whole church" is to be animated and pervaded by the Holy Spirit, overflowing with Christlike love. How can these apparent contradictions be harmonized?

God's purpose in His people will be gloriously fulfilled in "a revival of true godliness among us," "that the way of the Lord may be prepared," "a great movement - a work of revival - going forward in many places. Our people were moving into line, responding to God's call." "the spirit of prayer will actuate every believer and will banish from the church the spirit of discord and strife. . . . All will be in harmony with the mind of the Spirit." "In visions of the night, representations passed before me of a great reformatory movement among God's people . . . even as was manifested before the day of Pentecost. . . The world seemed to be lightened with the heavenly influence. . . . There seemed to be a reformation such as we witnessed in 1844. . . . Covetous ones became separated from the company of believers" (compare 9T, 20-23, 46, 47, 126; 8T, 247-251; 1SM 116,117, 121-128.)

The apparent contradictions are resolved by that last sentence. There is a pre-shaking and a post-shaking church. The post-shaken church will fulfill these prophecies.

This grand finale of the work of God's Spirit will be a work of extraordinary beauty and simplicity:

"Those who wait for the Bridegroom's coming are to say to the people, "Behold your God." The last rays of merciful light, the last message of mercy to be given to the world, is a revelation of His character of love. The children of God are to manifest His glory. In their own life and character they are to reveal what the grace of God has done for them." {COL 415.5}

Committee actions, polished programs, high-pressure promotion, can never truly motivate. Truth must be the vehicle, reaching human hearts, for only truth, "the third angel's message in verity," can penetrate the secret recesses of the human soul.

Chapter 6. A First in Human History, A Day-of-Atonement Repentance

The cleansing of the sanctuary since 1844 is a non-negotiable truth to Seventh-day Adventists, the foundation of our existence. It also has profound ethical significance.

Why does "antitypical" heavenly Day of Atonement involve a special experience for God's last-day people on earth? Has He arbitrarily withheld that unique blessing from previous generations? Would it be fair for Him to grant the last generation something He deliberately kept away from others in past ages?

No, but previous generations were not able to avail themselves of the full grace Heaven longed to bestow. Not God's unwillingness to give, but man's unreadiness to receive, has caused the long delay of thousands of years. History had to be allowed to run its course. In no other way could the human race, "Adam," learn.

An example is ancient Israel. The Lord was ready and willing at Mt. Sinai to grant them the same justification by faith which Abraham enjoyed when "he believed in the Lord" (Gen. 15:6), and the same precious experience that Paul's Letter to the Romans described. But their unbelief made it impossible at that time, and the law had to become their "schoolmaster" or "tutor" to lead them on a long detour of history, back to the place where Abraham was, that they "might be justified by faith" (Gal. 3:24, KJV).

The prophetic word, "for two thousand three hundred days, then shall the sanctuary be cleansed" (Dan. 8:14), predicts that during the last era of human history, the faith of God's people will mature, making possible their full reception of Heaven's grace. The prophecy of Daniel comprehends their spiritual development "to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Eph. 4:13).

God withheld nothing from Adam that arbitrarily barred him from the company of the 144,000. Rather, his own spiritual immaturity made it impossible to appropriate the grace an infinite God would have granted even then. God could have cleansed the sanctuary anciently, if human spiritual development had made it possible. We must not limit God's infinite resources; the deficiency has been ours. Jesus calls every generation to repent, for "all have sinned." "The knowledge of sin" comes through "the law" (Rom. 3:23,20). The Holy Spirit imparts this wholesome knowledge of his guilt to "every man." Its "light" has passed no one by (Jh. 1:9). But the final generation will receive the gift of repentance, a metanoia, an after-perception, a contrite view of the past as history finally reveals it. Then it will be said, "The marriage of the Lamb has come, and his wife has made herself ready." (Rev. 19:7).

How Repentance Takes Place

King David's double crime of adultery and murder illustrates how the Holy Spirit convicts of sin. For the Holy Spirit to abandon him would have been the cruelest punishment possible. No, God loved him still. The Holy Spirit pricked him with a sharp conviction. "Day and night Your hand was heavy upon me," David says. The Lord "broke" his "bones," metaphorically. Then, David adds, "I acknowledge my sin to You, and my iniquity I have not hidden, I said, `I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.' and you forgave the iniquity of my sin." (Ps. 51:3-5) This was genuine repentance.

One may never have heard the name of Christ, but he senses in his heart that he has sinned, and come short of the glory of God. There is an awareness, however dim, of a perfect standard in the divine law as it is in Christ. The Holy Spirit penetrates human hearts with the conviction of "sin, and of righteousness." (Jh. 16:8-10)

Guilt, Like Pain, Is a Signal That Something Is Wrong

A wound in the body triggers pain messages to the brain. While a painkilling drug can superficially alleviate the discomfort, it provides no healing. Serious disease or death can follow an artificial suppression of symptoms. Thus, when the sinner rejects the pain of the Holy Spirit's merciful conviction of sin, spiritual sickness and death follow. Pain in the body prompts the sufferer to seek healing. African lepers, whose sense of pain is anesthetized, lose fingers at night, bitten by rats because they cannot feel. Of how much greater value to us is the Holy Spirit's painful conviction of sin.

The grateful sinner prays, "Thank you, Lord, for loving me so much as to convict me of my sin. I confess the full truth. You have provided a Substitute who bears my penalty in my stead, and His love motivates me to separate from the sin that has crucified Him." This miracle occurred in David's heart when he prayed, "I will declare my iniquity; I will be in anguish over my sin." (Ps. 38:18)

Such repentance reflects not only sorrow for sin and its results, but a genuine abhorrence of it. It produces an actual turning away from the sin. The law can never do this for anyone. This miracle comes only by grace. "The law brings about wrath," imparting only a terror of judgment, but when grace works repentance, "old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new" (Rom. 4:15; 2.Cor. 5:17). Sin, once loved, is now hated, and righteousness, once hated, is now loved. "The goodness of God leads you to repentance" (Rom. 2:4).

Such repentance includes the actual "remission of sins", that is, sending them away (Lk. 24:47). The New Testament word for forgiveness means a separation from sin, a deliverance from its power. True repentance thus actually makes it impossible for a believer in Christ to continue living in sin. The love of Christ supplies the grand motivation, a change in the life (2.Cor. 5:15).

One finds a kind of joy in the experience:

"The sadness that is used by God brings a change of heart that leads to salvation - and there is no regret in that! But sadness that is merely human causes death. See what God did with this sadness of yours: how earnest it has made you. . . . Such indignation, such alarm, such feelings, such devotion" (2.Cor. 7:10,11, TEV)

Peter manifested genuine repentance. We can identify with him, for he failed miserably, yet he accepted the precious gift of repentance which Judas refused. After basely denying his Lord with cursing, Peter "went out and wept bitterly" (Mk. 14:71; Lk. 22:62). His repentance never ceased. Always afterward tears glistened in his eyes as he thought of his sin contrasted against the Lord's kindness to him. But these were happy tears. The tempest of contrition always brings the rainbow of divine forgiveness. Even medical scientists recognize there is wholesome healing therapy in tears of contrition, for men was well as for women. We ruin our health and shorten our lives when we resist or suppress the tenderness, the melting influence of God's Spirit that tries to soften our hard hearts.

The Lord Himself who "so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son" has prepared the way for His gospel. He has given humanity this capacity to feel the personal pain of conviction of sin. It is a clear evidence of His love!

But legalism or a perverted "gospel" short-circuits this work of the Holy Spirit in human hearts. As a consequence, millions are not able to experience the repentance that alone can heal the hurt they know deep inside. But Scripture foretells a time when the gospel will be restored to its pristine purity and the earth will be "illuminated" with its glory (Rev. 18:1-4). It will be like restoring a broken electric connection. The circuit will be complete - the Holy Spirit's conviction of sin will be complemented by the pure gospel, and the current of Heaven's forgiveness will flow through every repentant soul.

This is Solid Happiness

Far from being a negative experience, such repentance is the foundation of all true joy. As every credit must have a corresponding debit to balance the books, so the smiles and happiness of life, to be meaningful, must be founded on the tears of Another upon whom was laid "the chastisement for our peace" and with whose "stripes we are healed" (Isa. 53:5)

Our tears of repentance and sorrow for sin do not balance the books of life. Rather, our "appreciation" of what it cost to bear our griefs and carry our sorrows - this brings salvation within our reach.

"So will it be with all who behold Christ. The nearer we come to Jesus, and the more clearly we discern the purity of His character, the more clearly shall we see the exceeding sinfulness of sin, and the less shall we feel like exalting ourselves. There will be a continual reaching out of the soul after God, a continual, earnest, heartbreaking confession of sin and humbling of the heart before Him. At every advance step in our Christian experience our repentance will deepen. We shall know that our sufficiency is in Christ alone and shall make the apostle's confession our own: "I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing." "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world." Romans 7:18; Galatians 6:14. {AA 561.2}

"At every advance step in Christian experience our repentance will deepen. It is to those whom the Lord has forgiven, to those whom He acknowledges as His people, that He says, "Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not good, and shall loathe yourselves in your own sight." Ezekiel 36:31. Again He says, "I will establish My covenant with thee, and thou shalt know that I am the Lord; that thou mayest remember, and be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more because of thy shame, when I am pacified toward thee for all that thou hast done, saith the Lord God." Ezekiel 16:62, 63. Then our lips will not be opened in self-glorification. We shall know that our sufficiency is in Christ alone. We shall make the apostle's confession our own. "I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." Romans 7:18. "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world." Galatians 6:14. {COL 160.3}

A repentance like this is beyond us to invent or to initiate; it must come as a gift from above. God has exalted Christ "to give repentance to Israel" (Acts 5:31). And to the Gentiles also He "granted . . . repentance to life" (Acts 11:18). Is He any less generous to us today? The capacity for such a change of mind and heart is a priceless treasure worth more than all the millions in Las Vegas. Even the will to repent is His gift, for without it we are "dead in trespasses and sins" (Eph. 2:13).

Such an experience seems almost wholly out of place in this last decade of the 20th century. Can a sophisticated modern church ever receive it?

What Makes Repentance Possible

The Bible links "repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ" (Acts 20:21). Repentance is not a cold calculation of options and their consequences. It is not a selfish choice to seek an eternal reward or to flee the pains of hell. It is a heart experience that results from appreciating the sacrifice of Christ. It cannot be imposed by fear or terror, or even by hope of immortality. Only "the goodness of God leads you to repentance." (Rom. 2:4).

The ultimate source from which this superb gift flows is the truth of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. As faith is a heart appreciation of the love of God revealed there, so repentance becomes the appropriate exercise of that faith which the believing soul experiences. We follow where faith leads the way as illuminated by the cross - down on our knees. Peter's call to "repent, and let everyone of you be baptized" followed the most convicting sermon on the cross that has ever been preached (Acts 2:16-18). The compelling response at Pentecost was the fulfillment of Jesus' promise: "I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all . . . to Myself" (Jh. 12:32).

Why do we not see more of this precious gift? Is modern man too sophisticated to welcome it? No, human nature is not beyond redemption, even in these last days. Genuine repentance with "works befitting repentance" is rare only because that genuine preaching of the cross is rare (cmpr. Acts 26:20; 2.Cor. 5:14). Its essence is powerfully set forth in Isaac Watts' memorable words:

"When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride."

All through past ages since Pentecost, believing sinners have individually received the gift. Sleeping in the dust of the earth, they all await the "first resurrection." Theirs has been one phase of repentance. Without a preparation for His coming on the part of His living people, Christ cannot come. Until then, those sleeping saints of all ages who personally repented are doomed to remain prisoners in their dusty graves. Thus the "remnant" must unlock this logjam of last-day events by a special repentance. Such an event - unique in history - is the reason for the SdA Church's existence.

What is Different About Laodicea's Repentance?

Laodicea is not innately worse than the other six churches. But since she is living in the last days which is the time of the cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary, a never-before phase of our great High Priest's Day-of-Atonement ministry calls for a never-before kind of response. This becomes another phase of repentance.

While Christ performs His "final atonement" in the second apartment of the heavenly sanctuary, can we continue living as though He were still in the first? The gap between Laodicea's unique opportunities and her true state has widened so much that her pathetic condition has become the most difficult problem the Lord has ever had to deal with. And unless we walk carefully, we are in the greatest peril of the ages. Ellen White was given a glimpse of the significance of the transfer of Christ's ministry from the heavenly sanctuary's first apartment to the second.

"Those who rose up with Jesus would send up their faith to Him in the holiest, and pray, "My Father, give us Thy Spirit." Then Jesus would breathe upon them the Holy Ghost. In that breath was light, power, and much love, joy, and peace.
I turned to look at the company who were still bowed before the throne; they did not know that Jesus had left it. Satan appeared to be by the throne, trying to carry on the work of God. I saw them look up to the throne, and pray, "Father, give us Thy Spirit." Satan would then breathe upon them an unholy influence; in it there was light and much power, but no sweet love, joy, and peace. Satan's object was to keep them deceived and to draw back and deceive God's children." {EW 56.1}

In a later statement, the author spoke of those who "have no knowledge of the way into the most holy [apartment,] and they can not be benefited by the intercession of Jesus there." We used to assume that those were Sunday-keepers; but now there are many within the remnant church who "have no [such] knowledge":

"Like the Jews, who offered their useless sacrifices, they offer up their useless prayers to the apartment which Jesus has left; and Satan, pleased with the deception, assumes a religious character, and leads the minds of these professed Christians to himself, working with his power, his signs and lying wonders, to fasten them in his snare. Some he deceives in one way, and some in another. He has different delusions prepared to affect different minds. Some look with horror upon one deception, while they readily receive another. Satan deceives some with Spiritualism. He also comes as an angel of light and spreads his influence over the land by means of false reformations. The churches are elated, and consider that God is working marvelously for them, when it is the work of another spirit." {EW 260.1}

The experience of Laodicea will fit the potential of the heavenly Day of Atonement, because the message to Laodicea parallels this cleansing of the sanctuary. What does this mean in practical, understandable terms?

Repentance and the Cleansing of the Sanctuary

The "daily" ministry in the sanctuary includes the forgiveness of sins, but the "yearly" goes further. The blotting out of sins takes place in the "times of refreshing," that is, the cleansing of the sanctuary (Acts 3:19). The Day-of-Atonement ministry includes the blotting out of sins, and can occur only at the end of time, after the close of the 2300 years. {GC 421, 422, 483}

In these last days there is something Laodicea "does not know," some deeper level of guilt that has never been discerned. Here is where that deeper repentance takes place.

It will not suffice for us to say, "Let the heavenly computers do the work - our sins will be blotted out when the time comes without our knowing about it." There is no such thing as automatic, computerized blotting out of sins that takes place without our knowledge and participation. It is we who are to repent individually and understandably, not the heavenly computers. "The expulsion of sin is the act of the soul itself", not of heavenly computers. {DA, 466}

A little thought will make it clear that no sin can be "blotted out" unless we come to see it and confess it understandably. Our deeper level of sin and guilt must be realize