Many years ago I read the story of a Soviet KGB agent by the name of Vladimir Nikolaevich Sakharov [1]—not to be confused with the football player with an almost identical name [2]—who in time defected to the United States and became a spy for the Central Intelligence Agency [3]. Eventually the Soviets suspected his treachery, and while working at the Russian embassy in the country of Kuwait, he was forced to flee for his life [4].
As a member of the high society of the former Soviet Union, Sakharov seemed to have every advantage—intelligence, good looks, many friends, a beautiful wife, a lovely daughter. But as a young man he both perceived and experienced the moral rot that festered within the upper echelons of Soviet culture, which nurtured a deep hatred within him of the system that had spawned this corruption [5]. Believing that the only way to truly undermine the Soviet system was through secret resistance, he chose espionage for the West as the means he would employ [6].
In a book including a collection of KGB spy accounts, author John Barron writes as follows regarding Sakharov’s thinking:
To Sakharov, espionage represented the only effective, practical form of rebellion. It caused him neither feelings of guilt nor disloyalty. For like others of his generation and class, he never had acquired a sense of personal identity with the Soviet Union or any allegiance to it. He thought of the Soviet Union simply as the place where by means of birth the calculated, pitiless pursuit of his own self-interest was to occur [7].
More than once, as I’ve reflected on this story through the years, I have found myself wondering if there aren’t many Seventh-day Adventists who employ exactly the same reasoning as a way of justifying their continued presence in a church whose faith and standards they have long since rejected. We’re dealing in rough comparisons, of course; whatever problems the Seventh-day Adventist Church suffers from can’t be compared to the evils and corruption of the former Soviet state. But rationalizing one’s presence in an organization whose principles one has never internalized has been very real throughout human history, both sacred and secular. And it is very real in God’s remnant church today.
When a Sect Becomes a Church
In 1978, Elder Robert H. Pierson stepped down as president of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. At the Annual Council of that year, when he officially retired, Elder Pierson delivered a valedictory that has long been noted and cherished by the striving faithful in the denomination. His words in that memorable address call to mind, to a degree, the experience of Sakharov as described in John Barron’s narrative. Indeed, it can be said that what Elder Pierson described has been replicated in the experience of countless social and political movements in the human experience.
Speaking of how a religious group considered by many to be a “sect” eventually evolves into a church, Elder Pierson noted four (4) steps in the process by which this can happen:
They say a sect is often begun by a charismatic leader with tremendous drive and commitment and that it arises as a protest against worldliness and formalism in a church. It is generally embraced by the poor. The rich would lose too much by joining it, since it is unpopular, despised, and persecuted by society in general. It has definite beliefs firmly held by zealous members. Each member makes a personal decision to join it and knows what he believes. There is little organization or property, and there are few buildings. The group has strict standards and controls on behavior. Preachers, often without education, arise by inner compulsion. There is little concern about public relations.
And then it passes on to the second generation. With growth there comes a need for organization and buildings. As a result of industry and frugality, members become prosperous. As prosperity increases, persecution begins to wane. Children born into the movement do not have to make personal decisions to join it. They do not necessarily know what they believe. They do not need to hammer out their own positions. These have been worked out for them. Preachers arise more by selection and by apprenticeship to older workers than by direct inner compulsion.
In the third generation, organization develops and institutions are established. The need is seen for schools to pass on the faith of the fathers. Colleges are established. Members have to be exhorted to live up to the standards, while at the same time the standards of membership are being lowered. The group becomes lax about disfellowshiping nonpracticing members. Missionary zeal cools off. There is more concern over public relations. Leaders study methods of propagating their faith, sometimes employing extrinsic rewards as motivation for service by the members. Youth question why they are different from others, and intermarry with those not of their faith.
In the fourth generation there is much machinery; the number of administrators increases while the number of workers at the grass-roots level becomes proportionately less. Great church councils are held to define doctrine. More schools, universities, and seminaries are established. These go to the world for accreditation and tend to become secularized. There is a reexamination of positions and modernizing of methods. Attention is given to contemporary culture, with an interest in the arts: music, architecture, literature. The movement seeks to become "relevant" to contemporary society by becoming involved with popular causes. Services become formal. The group enjoys complete acceptance by the world. The sect has become a church! [8].
Elder Pierson continued with an impassioned appeal to the denomination he had led for the previous twelve years:
Brethren and sisters, this must never happen to the Seventh-day Adventist Church! This will not happen to the Seventh-day Adventist Church. This is not just another church—it is God's church!
But you are the men and women sit ting in this sanctuary this morning on whom God is counting to assure that it does not happen [9].
The parallel between the above and the historical journey taken by other movements and organizations, be they religious or secular, may not always be exact. But they help us understand how people can persistently cling to an outward identity whose core meaning and principles they either ignore or deny. Powerful economic, social, and reputational ties play a key role here. Ideas are one thing, but when physical structures and self-contained environments are produced in the name of these ideas, on which people become dependent for pay and the necessities of life, a whole new factor enters the picture. An institution has come to exist which, whatever its departure from the beliefs it professes, nevertheless meets the temporal needs of a large number of individuals.
Because of its comprehensive impact on the lives of men and women, the Seventh-day Adventist Church has produced a culture of its own like few other Christian denominations. From the beginning of this movement, God commanded that institutions be established to nurture and propagate the beliefs and practices which comprise the Advent message. But these institutions are in any case a social unit as well, where many church members earn their livelihood, receive education for earthly as well as spiritual reasons, form lasting friendships, retain fond memories, and meet future spouses. These social functions continue regardless of the institution’s degree of faithfulness to its founding principles.
Unless strict accountability is demanded by church leaders and constituents, apostasy will neither disrupt the daily routine of such an institution nor diminish the human capacity for acclimation to a convenient comfort level. At the bottom line, when so much of a church employee’s life is bound up with the church, the rejection by such a one of various doctrinal and moral principles doesn’t make a compelling case for taking one’s leave. However illogical or unethical, reasons for staying are not difficult to contrive, especially when financial security and lifelong dreams hang in the balance. Compromise, rationalizing, and spiritual improvisation invariably result.
It’s easy to see how the broad outlines of what Elder Pierson described were followed by the trajectory of the former Soviet Union. By the latter part of the twentieth century, it would have been as foolish to assume that most Soviet leaders held devoutly to Marxist-Leninist ideology as it would be to assume that every Adventist leader today holds devoutly to the teachings of Ellen White. One is amazed how many alarmists and even mainstream policy-makers during the Cold War took it for granted that the goals and policies held by the Soviet Union and other Communist states rigidly adhered to the founding principles of those states. That would be as naïve as assuming that because so many Adventist colleges and universities were founded under the guidance and direction of Ellen White and our denominational pioneers, that those graduating from these schools can be assumed to adhere to the founding tenets of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
I remember when a friend of mine, many years ago, insisted that U.S. President Bill Clinton had to be an agent of the so-called “New World Order” conspiracy, because Clinton was (1) a Rhodes scholar and (2) that Cecil Rhodes, for whom the scholarship program was named, supposedly believed in a one-world government. I couldn’t help but think, reflecting on my friend’s reasoning, that this assumption on his part made about as much sense as to assume that because Andrews University was named for Adventist pioneer John Nevins Andrews, that every graduate from Andrews can safely be assumed to be a staunch believer in the teachings of Seventh-day Adventist pioneers like the one for whom the University is named!
One is led to wonder how much blood and treasure might have been spared the United States and its allies during the Cold War had leading policy-makers only understood the steps in an institution’s or movement’s corporate journey as described in Elder Pierson’s farewell message to the Seventh-day Adventist Church. During the latter decades of the twentieth century, it is difficult not to see that the Soviet Union had reached the fourth of the steps in the sect-to-church paradigm that Elder Pierson had spelled out.
Conclusion: Laodiceanism Writ Large
Jesus identified the condition of the end-time church of Laodicea as “neither cold nor hot” (Rev. 3:15)—an indictment poignantly applicable to those wearing the badges of the faith community while living and believing otherwise. The human story is abundantly clear that once a movement spawns institutions which become self-sustaining, self-perpetuating social entities, men and women will choose to remain with such a movement and its institutions simply for their social and economic benefits, regardless of whether such persons still believe in the movement’s founding ideals. Such a course on the part of a movement’s corporate adherents can truly be called Laodiceanism writ large.
Elder Pierson urged his fellow leaders, “Don’t let it happen!” [10]. Many would say that even by the time Elder Pierson gave this warning, it had already happened to a significant degree. And few can honestly deny that the conditions described in Step Four of the process Elder Pierson outlined have grown significantly worse in the decades since his retirement. But unlike the Soviet Union and other strictly human constructs, the Seventh-day Adventist Church is a divine construct whose message and mission is foretold in Scripture (Zeph. 3:13; Rev. 12:17; 14:12) and whose triumph over internal apostasy is foretold in both Scripture (Zeph. 3:11-19) and the writings of the Spirit of Prophecy [11].
When we study the inspired predictions of the church’s ultimate victory, it becomes clear that while the failure of leaders and members at a given time to demand rightful accountability of the church and its institutions will not result in the annulment of the church’s divine charter, it will in fact result in the individual damnation of those who thus fail, unless of course they repent. Mordecai’s admonition to Esther in this respect comes vividly to mind:
For if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place, but thou and thy father’s house shall be destroyed (Esther 4:14).
Mordecai knew God wouldn’t permit the wholesale slaughter of His people. After all, the seventy-week prophecy of Daniel and its fulfillment in the Messiah’s first advent (Dan. 9:24-27) had yet to be fulfilled. And the divinely-promised triumph of Laodicea over internal apostasy will also be fulfilled. There will be no eighth church. The only question to be posed to any member of this final covenant community—be his or her place lofty or low—is: Will I triumph with her?
REFERENCES
1. John Barron, KGB: The Secret Work of Soviet Secret Agents (New York: Reader’s Digest Press, 1974), pp. 29-62.
2. “Vladimir Sakharov,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Sakharov
3. Barron, KGB, p. 59.
4. Ibid, pp. 59-61.
5. Ibid, pp. 59-60.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid, p. 59.
8. R.H. Pierson, “A Final Appeal,” Ministry, December 1978 https://www.ministrymagazine.org/archive/1978/12/from-the-editor
9. Ibid (italics original).
10. Ibid.
11. Ellen G. White, Selected Messages, vol. 2, p. 380; Testimonies, vol. 4, p. 89; The Great Controversy, p. 608; Manuscript Releases, vol. 12, p. 327; vol. 20, p. 320.
Pastor Kevin Paulson holds a Bachelor’s degree in theology from Pacific Union College, a Master of Arts in systematic theology from Loma Linda University, and a Master of Divinity from the SDA Theological Seminary at Andrews University. He served the Greater New York Conference of Seventh-day Adventists for ten years as a Bible instructor, evangelist, and local pastor. He writes regularly for Liberty magazine and does script writing for various evangelistic ministries within the denomination. He continues to hold evangelistic and revival meetings throughout the North American Division and beyond, and is a sought-after seminar speaker relative to current issues in the Seventh-day Adventist Church. He presently resides in Berrien Springs, Michigan