Challenging the continuity of history

What do Marxism and Adventism have in common?

In the words of Paul, I might add, "Much in every way." While I do not intend to examine the "every way" similarities, we will take a look at two significant relationships that could be included in the "much."

Marxism: an eschatological movement

Marxism is an eschatological movement that reflects a great deal of Christian content. Marxism began as a movement with a global mission to usher in the millennium through preaching its own version of the "good news." It might be postulated that the reason Marx ism hated Christianity is that it was in essence its rival rather than its opposite. It had its own prophets, scriptures, and stringent ethical codes, as well as its own millennial vision of the last events of Planet Earth.

In short, Marxism was in competition with Christianity in the marketplace of human souls and cosmic ideologies. It was fighting for victory for its own version of the "great controversy."

Generations of idealistic young people have been thrilled with the essential Marxist message—that all people should do "all they can to contribute to the general welfare." Thus individuals should put as much into the collective pot as possible, while taking out only what they need. At its best, that dictum is also near the heart of the Judeo-Christian ethic.

One reason Karl Marx despised Christianity is that he saw it as an inadequate avenue to millennial bliss. Worse! Christianity was a deceptive lie. It promised the truth, but turned out to be a deception. For example, in place of operationalizing Christian values, Western Christianity, Marx indicated, uplifted the survival-of-the-fittest law of the capitalistic jungle and became a tool for the rich and powerful to control the masses. Thus Marx saw that Christianity was too often not the way of salvation, but "the opium of the people"—a way to get the masses to swallow the medicine of oppression. That insight was not only brilliant; it was too often correct. For Marx, Christianity had become the antichrist.

Thus Marx and his followers developed their own "true philosophy" their own true religion, their own avenue to salvation, and their own road to the millennial kingdom. Their beliefs impelled their missionaries throughout the world.

Marxism, therefore, should not be viewed as an economic system, but as an eschatological philosophy in which economic socialism was an essential aspect of reality.

Marxist eschatology was built upon the philosophy of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, especially Hegel's triadic dialectic. Hegel's philosophy of history allowed for historical progression through the opposition of opposing forces. Thus every idea or thesis would come up against its opposite or antithesis. The result would be a new resolution or syn thesis. That new synthesis would in turn become a thesis that would be met by a new antithesis to form a new synthesis, and so on. Thus for Hegel history was progressive and dynamic. It flowed from point A to point B to point C.

But Marx pointed out in his adaptation of Hegelianism that the dialectic would come to an end. The final synthesis would come with the dictatorship of the proletariat, when the egalitarian ideas of socialism at its best would be established forever throughout the world. There would follow a time of peace and plenty for all. The age of the oppressor would be over for all time. The Marxist millennial kingdom would have arrived.

The flaw in the Marxist gospel

But the Marxist eschatological dream has obviously failed. Why? What was wrong with its end-time formula? That is not always an easy question to answer. My own doctoral work is in social reconstructionism (a revolutionary philosophy). Before entering doctoral studies, I had, in my frustration with my church and my personal life, resigned from the Seventh-day Adventist ministry and had determined to leave both the church and Christianity, but I needed the answer to life. So I studied social philosophies. Still being a fairly young idealist, I was enthralled with the revolutionary doctrines I was imbibing. In fact, my dissertation was on the theories of George S. Counts, who in the depths of the depression of the 1930s put fire into the possibilities for educational revolution through his Dare the School Build a New Social Order? It was a beautiful theory, built upon the best human values.

But at the end of several years of such study I was forced to ask the hard question: "This is all so beautiful, but why hasn't it worked?"

My answer is that the Marxist and non-Marxist revolutionary spirits of a socialist nature had not taken into account the true nature of humanity and the problem of sin.

It sounds good for rosy-eyed idealists to say that all should put in what they can and take out what they need. But in practice people take out as much as possible and put in as little as possible. Thus the fall of Marxist socialism.

But it was built upon good doctrine in part. Many conservative American religionists are going to be shocked when they get to heaven and find out that God is a socialist. After all, He couldn't be a capitalist. ¹ The functional strength of capitalism is based upon the insight of the truth of human selfishness get all you can for yourself at the expense of others. That doctrine is appealing to "normal" people, so capitalism works in a sinful society as long as it is heavily regulated by socialism to keep it from being too brutal. The driving force of capitalism is to maximize profits at the expense of labor. It is a survival-of-the-fittest economic doctrine that arrived at its glory days at the same time as Darwinism and social Darwinism. The strength of capitalism is that it has captured the basic truth on the nature of human selfishness the centerfold of sin. That is an essential aspect of capitalism's correct vision of doctrinal truth.

Indeed neither socialism nor capital ism works in a fallen world. Socialism, as Communism found out, needed to be buttressed by capitalistic incentives to get people working, while capitalism, as in the experience of the United States, needed to be softened by socialistic humanitarianism. The real problem for pure socialism as found in idealistic Communism is that while capturing the economic principle of heaven, it missed the driving force that makes things work on earth it had overlooked human nature and the effects of sin. It missed the linchpin of the human problem, and thus fell—and mighty was the fall thereof. Marxism, in short, failed to take into account the tenacious power of vested interests among both its own leadership and followership.

Adventism and the flaw

That brings me to the second major point on the similarities between Marxism and Adventism: the temptation to downplay the force of human nature (the core of sin) and vested interests. (Note: I did not say ignore, but downplay.)

At this point I should say a word about Adventism's vision of itself as a prophetic end-time remnant force in world history. Like Marxism, Adventism finds its roots and purpose in millennial hope; in bringing about the end of human history and the ushering in of the kingdom of God the final solution, the final dialectical synthesis. Also like the Marxists, such a goal has pushed Seventh-day Adventist missionaries to the ends of the earth.

There is a major difference in the eschatologies, however, since the Marxist solution is basically humanistic. In Marxism the kingdom will be ushered in by human effort. Adventism, of course, with its view of the Bible, cannot take that viewpoint on the end of history. The Adventist solution is not humanistic but theistic: it is God's effort, not humanity's, that will result in the ushering in of the kingdom.

But at this point Adventism's theology often becomes somewhat blurred. After all, is not God dependent upon the remnant church's preaching of the three angels' messages, including the everlasting gospel, "to every nation and tribe and tongue and people" (Rev. 14:6)?* And isn't the last great accomplishment of the end-time church the preaching of "this gospel of the kingdom... throughout the whole world, as a testimony to all nations; and then the end will come" (Matt. 24:4)? Haven't Adventists believed that the Lord's coming awaits the faithfulness of His last-day remnant people on earth?

In summary, have not we as Adventists to some extent made God's theistic solution dependent upon a humanistic accomplishment? And if so, may we not possibly be tending toward the fallacy that undermined Marxist millennialism?

Now, I am not saying that Seventh-day Adventist theology is wrong or that we should stop our missionary activity, but I am suggesting that we ought to reexamine Adventism's past and present and its possible futures.

That brings us back to the secularizing stages of the church that I earlier described in Ministry.² In that article I indicated that churches, like people, go through an aging process and that religious revivals eventually succumb to the process of secularization. Thus repeatedly across history we find that once vital and reforming movements degenerated into denominations that are often preoccupied with maintaining their own existence and traditions. That article also pointed out that there are several sociological forces arrayed against the continuity of vital reformation that make it almost impossible for a religious movement to maintain its original intensity and single mindedness toward mission.

As Adventism approaches its 150th birthday in 1994 it seems to be moving in lockstep with other religious movements from the early church to the Reformation to Wesleyanism. Each went through a secularizing process that put it off its missiological course by its 150th birthday. It is of crucial importance to realize that not one major religious revival in the history of Christianity has successfully escaped that process. None has broken the process of history. None has, in Marxist terms, ended the dialectic.

And why? The answer seems to lie, as I suggested in my earlier article on the Adventist drift toward secularism and institutionalism, in the dynamics of human nature, including the problems of mixed motivation and vested interests of both individuals and national segments of the church. Those problems not only derailed Marxism and earlier Christian movements, but they could conceivably sidetrack Adventism. At least I see no empirical reasons to believe otherwise, given a church that has over-institutionalized, over-bureaucratized, and seems to be in the process of becoming increasingly happier with the kingdom of this world.

A lack of insight into the tenacity of human nature in the face of human inability in cosmic affairs eventually ended the Marxist dream. Is it not a possibility that the same forces might eventually take their toll on Adventism? To put it another way, are Adventists guaranteed a victory in just the way they have always taught it?

Probably not. It was one of the great fallacies of the first-century Jews to believe that the God of heaven was some how dependent upon them. They had carefully read the Old Testament and correctly concluded that the main line of Messianic prophecy taught that Christ was to come as a mighty king after the order of the conquering David; that an earthly millennium would be set up and that all the faithful from around the world would come to Jerusalem to pay homage to Yahweh; that the Messiah would conquer all Israel's enemies.

The point to remember is that the first-century Jews had come to correct prophetic conclusions. From Isaiah to Malachi the theme of a victorious Israel and an earthly millennium dominate the prophetic literature. On that basis, it is little wonder that they rejected Jesus, who claimed to be the Christ. It must be admitted that Jesus was a Christ who was truly out of harmony with the main prophetic thrust of the Old Testament scriptures. I would suggest that most of us, had we lived in the time of Christ, would have drawn the same conclusion, along with the arrogant one that God was dependent upon the literal Jewish remnant.

The first-century Jews forgot only two things: (1) human nature and (2) the right of God to be God in spite of human failure.

They forgot that the prophetic promises fell within the covenant relationship', a relationship that promised blessings if and only //God's people remained selflessly faithful to Him. The Jews had forgotten the big "if of the covenant: "If you obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments which I command you this day, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth" (Deut. 28:1). "But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord your God ..., then all these curses shall come upon you" (verse 15).

God had done all He could for His remnant, but they did not respond in heartfelt allegiance to Him. Human nature overcame them, and they forgot that God could still be God independent of them. Many Jews of the New Testament era had come to believe that God was dependent upon them for the coming of His Messianic kingdom. "If Israel were to keep two Sabbaths according to the laws thereof," cried some of their rabbis, "they would be redeemed immediately." ³ "If," cried others, "Israel repented in one day, the Son of David would come immediately. If Israel would keep one sabbath correctly, the Son of David would come immediately." ⁴

"But," Jesus remonstrated with them, "you have missed the boat. You have missed the meaning of the covenantal relationship. Therefore, God can raise up children of Abraham from the stones if need be" (Matt. 3:9, paraphrased). That God is not dependent upon human beings was Christ's message. God could still be God. He could still act independently to achieve His goals.

Because of the failure of the Jewish remnant, God altered His eschatological promises and put into action Messianic plan number two. That plan was tucked away in such passages as Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22, passages that were not even perceived as being Messianic. Messianic plan number two was not one of Jewish victory, but of a suffering and rejected servant;⁵ a Messiah most Jews could not even recognize because of their fixation on their victory and on God's dependence on them and their actions. Thus, even though the first-century Jews taught a biblically correct end-time doctrine, the first coming of Jesus overtook those students of prophecy as a thief in the night. They were passed over, and God raised up the Christian church to complete the Jewish mission to the world.

The conditional nature of covenant

But once again, it must be noted, the Christian church is also a covenant people. God's New Testament people are still in an if I then relationship with the promises of God. They, as God's people, still have to wrestle with the frailty and self-centeredness of human nature. They still must recognize the fact that God can still be God and independently act to bring the affairs of earth to a close in His own way if His church loses its missiological integrity.

I would like to suggest that we as Adventists ought to keep our eyes open to the possibility that God might have a plan number two to bring about the end of the Christian age, just as He had for Christ's first coming. We need to keep open the possibility that even in our time the covenant-keeping God has not made Himself dependent upon human faithfulness. Prophetic confidence resides in the absolute certainty of Christ's first and second ad vents, rather than in any secondary promises concerning those advents or any specific human means of bringing them about.

That distinct possibility first came to my mind as a seminary student in the mid-1960s while reading Selected Messages. There we read about the Adventist work spreading "like fire in the stubble." The passage goes on to state that "God will employ agencies whose origin man will be unable to discern; angels will do a work which men might have had the blessing of accomplishing, had they not neglected to answer the claims of God." ⁶ We generally call attention only to the first part of that passage, while neglecting the if/then language and the plan number two type talk of its second part. Again, Ellen White wrote: "None of us can do without the blessing of God, but God can do His work without the aid of man if He so choose." ⁷

"There is a deplorable lack of spirituality among our people," Ellen White wrote in the late 1880s. She had seen that "self-glorification was becoming common among Seventh-day Adventists and that unless the pride of man should be abased and Christ exalted we should, as a people, be in no better condition to receive Christ at His second advent than were the Jewish people to receive Him at His first advent." ⁸ In another passage she suggests that the great crisis could steal upon Seventh-day Adventists as a thief,⁹ and in yet another place she claims that if a church is not faithful to God it can be bypassed in His work, "whatever" its "position." ¹⁰ She drew a lesson from history: "Because" we read of the ancient Jews, "they failed of fulfilling God's purpose, the children of Israel were set aside, and God's call was extended to other peoples. If these too prove unfaithful, will they not in like manner be rejected?" ¹¹

From the perspective of Ellen White, God did not grant the Adventist Church any immunities. "In the balances of the sanctuary the Seventh-day Adventist Church is to be weighed. She will be judged by the privileges and advantages that she has had. If her spiritual experience does not correspond to the advantages that Christ, at infinite cost, has bestowed on her, if the blessings conferred have not qualified her to do the work entrusted to her, on her will be pronounced the sentence: 'Found wanting. ' By the light bestowed, the opportunities given, will she be judged." ¹²

Finally, in the midst of the Minneapolis crisis Ellen White deplored the fact that Seventh-day Adventists had been acting like other churches. She went on to say that "we hoped that there would not be the necessity for another coming out." ¹³ Thus Ellen White at the very least hinted at the possibility of Adventist failure. Finally, in 1883 she wrote that "it should be remembered that the promises and threatenings of God are alike conditional." ¹⁴

After coming across a few such hints of alternative eschatological futures in the writings of Ellen White, I began to read the Bible for hints of a backup eschatological vision in the New Testament, that, like plan number two in the Old Testament, might possibly read clearer or even differently by way of hindsight. ¹⁵

The first text that came to my mind was Luke 17:26-30: "As it was in the days of Noah, so will it be in the days of the Son of man. They ate, they drank, they married, they were given in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise as it was in the days of Lot they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built, but on the day when Lot went out from Sodom fire and sulfur rained from heaven and destroyed them all—so will it be on the day when the Son of man is revealed."

Now, there are two ways to read that eschatological passage. The first under stands it from God's perspective, as reflected in Genesis 6:5. Speaking of the time of Noah, Genesis claims, "the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." From that viewpoint, the eating and drinking and marrying be came degenerate signs of the times.

But there is another perspective in Luke 17: the human interpretation of what was happening in the days of Noah and Lot. Their contemporaries were eating, drinking, marrying, buying, selling, planting, and building until the very day of their destruction. In other words, life appeared to be going on just like normal. "So will it be on the day when the Son of man is revealed." Thus it seems that we should at least admit the possibility that that day could come as a thief to modern-day students of prophecy if the if/then covenant obligations have been disrupted.

Jesus told us to be ready, "for the Son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect" (Matt. 24:44). That hour is today and tomorrow. It is a time for which Adventists could be unprepared if they have not even considered the possibility of an eschatological plan number two.

Lessons for Adventism

Now, what can we conclude from all this? Not, I would suggest, that the end will definitely come about in a different way than Adventists have always taught. But it does seem necessary to conclude that Adventists must allow for the possibility (1) that God can close the events of history in a different way than promised if the faith conditions of the covenant are not fulfilled by His people; (2) that God still reserves the right to be God; and (3) that He is no more dependent upon modern spiritual "Jews" than He was upon ancient literal Jews.

Furthermore, another possible conclusion is that if Adventism hopes to complete its historic mission it will have to come to grips with the sociological forces of history that eventually spelled failure for Marxism and drove other Christian bodies off their missiological course by the end of their first 150 years. The human factor expressing itself in such realities as secular drift, vested interests that hinder top-to-bottom radical reform in Adventist organizational and institutional structures, and mixed motivation among both laity and clergy can only be overcome by conscious, heroic, and continuous efforts at reform and revitalization.¹⁶ And those efforts can come only through renewed and daily surrender in faith to the cosmic God of the covenant.

Adventism needs to come to its individual and collective senses if it is to maintain meaningful existence.

And, you may ask, "what if Advent ism fails to come to a sense of its contingent/conditional/finite status?" Then God will still be God, just as human nature will still be human nature. He is not short on power or dedication to bring about the coming eschaton.