This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.
Lesson 3: “God’s Call to Mission”
COLLEEN TINKER
Problems with this lesson: The lesson uses Abraham as the central example of being called for “mission”, an appropriation of the patriarch’s story that misses the point of his life. The lesson states that Peter did not want to take the gospel to Gentiles, ignoring that he was the one who received the “sheet vision” and preached to the first gentile family in Acts 10. The lesson claims that Israel was to be a nation of priests serving all nations; the Bible NEVER says this.
This lesson is difficult to address fully because it is based on Adventism moralisms instead of on biblical history. In short, the author has appropriated the story of Abraham as well as of the Tower of Babel and even of Adam and Eve to illustrate the Adventist goal of getting every member to feel obligated to share Adventism with his or her acquaintances.
The lesson refers often to Abraham’s “mission” to carry the news about—what, exactly? Abraham’s “mission” as taught in the lesson is vague but is suggested to be the Adventist view of God and the Adventist “plan of salvation”. The Bible never assigns this mission to Abraham. The Teachers’ Comments say this on page 40:
This week’s lesson highlights the call of God to Abraham, found in Genesis 12:1–3. The call has several vital elements that need to be understood if we are to fully grasp what the call of God for mission has been, currently is, and will continue to be. First off, the call is rooted in the Genesis 1:26–28 narrative. This connection is most clearly articulated in Isaiah’s reference to the call of Abraham and Sarah to share the joy of Eden with the world (Isa. 51:1–3). When God called Abraham to be a blessing to the nations, the divine call implied that the blessing entailed sharing a way of life, expressed through profound freedom and creativity, intended by God from the beginning. A quick read of Genesis 12:1–3 makes it difficult to fully grasp the blessing, but its meaning becomes clearer when read within the broader corpus of Scripture. Genesis 22 adds additional detail to what Abraham was called to share, namely, the plan of God to provide a Substitute for humanity through death and subsequent resurrection. This plan gave humanity hope that the effects of sin and death could be overcome. It also gave hope that the promises of Genesis 1:26–28 could be fully realized again in the future.
As we can see in the above quote, the lesson is not clear what Abraham’s mission was actually to be as he left Ur, travelled to Haran, and then went into Egypt to avoid famine. While it refers to “mission” as being difficult (in the context of Abraham’s wrongly representing Sarah as his sister and placing her in danger), what his mission was supposed to be in Egypt is never articulated.
In the Bible, Abraham’s trek into Egypt is never explained beyond the fact that he went there to avoid a famine, he lied about his wife and placed her in danger, God protected her and revealed his lie through the pagan Pharaoh who sent him out of the land with great wealth and a female slave who became his concubine. These facts of Abraham’s Egyptian sojourn are never mentioned in the lesson—only the vague hint that mission is difficult, that Abraham made his situation worse, but God is forgiving and could still use him.
Abraham, however, was never presented as a noble or good man intrinsically. He was a deeply flawed man who worshipped other gods when God called him to leave Ur. Abraham, however, believed God when God spoke to him, and he obeyed God when God told him to do things. His belief in God is what God credited to him as righteousness (Gen. 15:6). This central fact about Abraham is never mentioned! Yet this belief is what made Abraham the central figure in the history of both Israel and the church. He was the original patriarch from whom God formed His chosen people and brought forth His promised Messiah.
Abraham’s “mission” was simply to obey God as God gave him directions, and he did. This belief is not the “mission” the lesson tries to portray. It illegitimately uses Abraham to “illustrate” Adventism’s own commitment to proselytizing, and this use of Abraham is dishonest.
What about Peter?
In Wednesday’s lesson the author tries to make the point that the early Jewish believers did not preach the message to anyone other than Jews. The even say this:
Peter, a disciple of Jesus and one of the leading figures of the early church, was averse to taking the gospel message to the Gentiles, even after Paul had begun to do so. Peter was known as an apostle to the circumcised (meaning the Jews), and Paul an apostle to the Gentiles (Gal. 2:8). Early on, Peter did not even want to be seen with the Gentiles (Gal. 2:11, 12). However, God moved Peter out of his comfort zone and changed his heart. He was starting to learn about what the gospel commission really entailed and what Jesus’ death was meant to accomplish for the whole world.
This claim is wrong. Jesus appointed Peter to be the apostle with the “keys to the kingdom”. It was Peter who preached first in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost (Acts. 2) and saw 3,000 Jews come to faith in Jesus, be filled with the Holy Spirit, and baptized. Then, in Acts 8, it was Peter whom the church sent to Samaria to check up on the converts Phillip had made. He found they had not been baptized into the Holy Spirit, so he baptized them into the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the first Samaritans received the Holy Spirit. This followed Jesus’ command to go first to Jerusalem and Judea (to the Jews), and then to Samaria. The Lord appointed Peter to be the eyewitness to these first non-Jews receiving the gospel and the indwelling Holy Spirit.
If an apostle had not been the witness to this miracle, the church would have been divided from the beginning. The Jews back in Jerusalem would never have believed that the Samaritans could receive the Holy Spirit and be Christians equally with them, the chosen people. Yet Peter witnessed them being born again in exactly the same way as the Jews were—without coming under the law!
Finally, in Acts 10, the Lord sent Peter the famed “sheet vision” filled with all kinds of unclean animals and told him to “Kill and eat” and not to call unclean what He had declared to be clean. Then Peter was summoned to go to the home of Cornelius, the Roman centurion. Peter the Jew had to stay in a gentile home, eat gentile, unclean food, and realize that God had declared both these gentiles as well as their food, Clean!
As he preached, Cornelius and his whole family believed and were also filled with the Holy Spirit exactly as the Jews had been—and all without coming under the law! Peter baptized them, and his eyewitness was the official proof that gentiles could be saved and equal in God’s eyes. There could be NO division or caste system in the church. All were equal in God’s eyes. When a person believes, he becomes a new creation, and he is equally God’s child as all others who believe, whether Jew, gentile, or Samaritan.
Peter was the FIRST to be sent to the gentiles. His later episode with the Galatians was sin, and Paul called him out. But he was appointed by the Lord Jesus Himself to take the gospel to the gentiles first and to witness their coming to faith in exactly the same way as the Jews did.
The lesson’s self-serving claim that Peter didn’t want to take the gospel to the gentiles is simply a lie!
A nation of priests
Finally, the Teachers Comments state that God made Israel a nation of priests to serve all nations. The comments even continue by appealing to Solomon and the prophets. It’s incredible, really. The text the author uses to establish this idea is Exodus 19:4–6:
“You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and [how] I bore you on eagles’ wings, and brought you to Myself. ‘Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine; and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel” (Exodus 19:4-65).
His making them a nation of priests was not to serve the world. It was to be wholly dedicated to HIM. They were set apart from the nations and were to be a holy people for His glory, a people who would be ready to welcome the Messiah who would come from their own bloodline one day. God dealt with Israel as a nation, and they were to remain separated from the nations in order to stay pure, both genetically and spiritually. Their priesthood was for the purpose of their knowing they were dedicated to the One True God, unlike the pagans around them who had multiple cruel gods.
The lesson misuses the biblical accounts because Adventism is a false religion. Because they have taken their cues from a false prophet, they have a completely wrong worldview and a wrong hermetic for reading Scripture. They feel free to use the Bible creatively to force it to fit their own agenda. They mislead people by misquoting Scripture out of context and applying wrong ideas to it.
This lesson is subtle, but its misuse of the Word of God is egregious and inexcusable.
I urge the reader to get a notebook and to begin copying the book of Galatians or Hebrews, a few verses a day, into the notebook, praying to know what God wants you to know. He is faithful, and His word cannot fail. †
Colleen Tinker, the editor of Proclamation! magazine, and her husband Richard left Adventism in 1998 with their two sons, Roy and Nathanael, who were in grades six and ten. They have co-led the Former Adventist Fellowship since 1999. Colleen, a graduate of Walla Walla University, is a former high school English teacher and also the former managing editor of Adventist Today magazine. Colleen became the stepmother of Roy and Nathanael in 1989, and in 2008 she adopted them. Romans 8:15-17 has assumed new depth and significance for her and Richard since she and her sons chose to claim each other legally and permanently. She and Richard share an office and a commitment to sharing the gospel of the true Jesus with all of those seeking a way out of the bondage of the false gospel of Adventism.
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