INDEX

I.  MYTHS & MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT…BEING A CULT

1. Is the Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) Church a cult?

2. Are Seventh-day Adventists really Christians and what do they believe?

3. Doesn’t the SDA Church have a range of unusual beliefs, which makes it a cult?

4. Do other 'mainstream' Christians have peculiar beliefs that seem bizarre or cult-like?

5. Isn’t the SDA Church a cult because its distinctive doctrines were invented quite recently (i.e. last 150 years), rather than conform to ancient tradition?

6. Some Adventists do act in a cult-like manner though? What about the Seventh-day Adventist Reform Movement (SDARM)? 

7. Weren’t the people involved in the tragedy of Waco Texas Seventh-day Adventists?

8. Does the SDA Church practice ‘shunning’?

9. Are Seventh-day Adventists subject to some sort of authoritarian centralised control over their beliefs and actions, as is often found in modern-day cults?

10. Is it true Adventists refuse blood transfusions?

11. Are Adventists ‘door-knockers’?

12. Do Adventists cloister themselves away from the world?

13. Doesn’t the SDA Church prohibit its members from voting, running for office, siting on a jury, singing the national anthem or having anything to do with government or politics?

14. Do Adventists believe the same as Jehovah’s Witnesses?

15. Isn’t the SDA Church a cult because it is cautious of ecumenicalism and will not join the World Council of Churches (WCC)?

16. Isn’t the SDA Church anti-Catholic and doesn’t this make it a cult?

17. Who says the SDA Church is a cult?

18. Why is there a perception that the SDA Church is a cult?

19. Why does the SDA Church have all these distinctive beliefs – was it random or is there some sort of overall conceptual and theological framework?

II.  MYTHS & MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT…THE BIBLE AND SCRIPTURAL TRUTH

20. Do Adventists use the Bible or Book of Mormon?

21. Is it true that the SDA Church has produced its own version of the Bible the ‘Clear Word’?

22. Is it true the SDA Church endorses the Proof Text method of scriptural interpretation?

23. Do Adventists claim they have ‘the truth’ and the SDA Church is the one true and exclusive Church?

III.  MYTHS & MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT…JESUS CHRIST AND THE TRINITY

24. Is it true that the SDAs reject the Trinity?

25. But don’t Adventists believe Jesus was really Michael the Archangel?

26. Is it true the SDA Church really teaches Tritheism?

27. Is it true that the SDA Church teach the heretical view that Jesus Christ was sinful?

IV.  MYTHS & MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT…THE LAW AND SABBATH

28. Are Adventists trying to be Jewish?

29. Is it true that Adventists keep the seventh-day Sabbath by going to church on Saturday, even though it was only a Mosaic Law for the Jews, and done away with at the Cross?

30. Can’t Christians just keep any day as their Sabbath – doesn't the Bible teach 'today' replaces the seventh-day Sabbath?

31. What about the Bible texts saying Christians are free from the seventh-day Sabbath day?

32. Is it true that Adventists are legalists, who do not believe we are really saved by grace but by works?

33. Is it true that the SDA Church teaches eating ‘unclean meat’ such as pork is a sin, even though it is merely a Mosaic Law found in Leviticus?

34. Is it true that SDAs are all vegetarians and that eating meat is considered a sin?

V.   MYTHS & MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT…ELLEN G. WHITE

35. Does the SDA Church teach that Ellen G White was a prophet, and that her words are more important, override or take precedence to the Bible?

36. Doesn’t the belief in a modern-day prophet automatically make the SDA Church a cult?

37. Is it true that Ellen White is the founder of the SDA Church and introduced most of its ‘distinctive’ beliefs?

38. Did Ellen White (whilst alive) have effective control over the SDA Church in the same manner as many so-called ‘prophets’ do over cults today?

39. Do all Adventists view Ellen White in the same way?

40. Didn’t Ellen White teach that Christians are saved by works rather than grace through faith?

41. Is it true Ellen White taught some really crazy things, such as that Adventists should not ride bicycles?

VI. MYTHS & MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT…ESCHATOLOGY AND END TIMES

42. Is it true Adventists believe Christians won’t go to heaven after they die?

43. Is it true that the SDA Church teaches that only literally 144,000 will go to heaven, and that only Adventists will go to heaven?

44. Is it true the SDA Church claimed Jesus was going to return in 1844, and have made many predictions about the date of Jesus’ return since, all of which have been incorrect?

45. Is it true the SDA Church teaches that Jesus’ 2nd coming has already happened, except that He came invisibly?

46. Is it true that Adventists nevertheless believe the date 1844 has some special significance – something about a pre-Advent Investigative Judgment?

47. Doesn’t believing in a date-specific prophecy, in this case 1844, seem rather cult-like?

48. Doesn’t it seem a little cult-like to believe in some pre-Advent Investigative Judgment?

49. Do all Adventists believe in the doctrine of the Investigative Judgment and 1844?

50. Does believing in an Investigative Judgment mean Adventists do not believe the atonement was completed at the Cross?

FURTHER QUESTIONS AND RESOURCES?