A Response to the Video:
Seventh-day Adventism, the Spirit Behind the Church

by Bob Pickle

Answers to Questions Raised by:
Mark Martin, Sydney Cleveland
Dale Ratzlaff, The White Lie
. . . and Others

Discern Fact from Fiction

Her Predictions and Views

#32: "Again, Mrs. White foretold in Early Writings that she would be among the living saints when Jesus returned. 'Soon our eyes were drawn to the East, for a small black cloud had appeared, about half as large as a man's hand, which we all knew was the sign of the Son of Man... the graves opened... and in the same moment we were changed and caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air.' The Day-Star January 24, 1846. Mrs. White was not among the living saints seen in her vision. This event did not occur in her lifetime. We are still looking for the glorious return of our Lord Jesus Christ. Rather than being caught up with the living saints at Jesus's return, Mrs. White died on July 16, 1915, and was buried beside her husband James. Another one of her prophecies failed."—Sydney Cleveland.

#32: She said she would be among the living saints. She never said that. Moreover, this charge destroys the credibility of the Scriptures, for it in essence declares the apostle Paul to be a false prophet.

The reader will notice that this quotation from Mrs. White is very close in wording to 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17, where Paul says essentially the same thing:

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

Some portions of the quotation from The Day-Star that the video left out make the parallels with 1 Thessalonians 4 even more striking:

Then Jesus' silver trumpet sounded, as he descended on the cloud . . . . The graves opened, and the dead came up clothed with immortality. . . . and in the same moment we were changed and caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air.—italics added.

If Paul can say, "We which are alive and remain shall be caught up," and not be a false prophet, then Mrs. White can too.

In the Bible, God chose to reveal events in vision to a prophet as if he were alive at the time the events were taking place, and sometimes as if he were even participating in those events. The book of Revelation gives a number of examples of this phenomenon. Thus, a prophet who saw future events in vision as if he were participating in those events is not necessarily a false prophet.

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