Forbearance and Unity

Ted Wilson Wrestles With the Unity Backlash from the Women's Ordination Vote

In the wake of the kerfuffle over the 2015 San Antonio General Conference and subsequent measures to "promote unity" by the General Conference administration, GC vice president Tom Lemon, chair of the Unity Oversight Committee, made remarks about the issue. Lemon spoke about the different entities he'd met with since the last Annual Council—in North America and elsewhere. In all these meetings, he said, he didn’t find "one person who gave any hint… [of] rebellion." The attitude was "we are children of God, and we are in this thing together…." "I heard an understanding of mission and commitment to mission that would warm your hearts." Lemon saw no evidence of the rebellion, which evidently GC president Ted Wilson fears. As a result, it appears that Lemon resigned as director of the church's Unity Committee apparently under duress, although any information as to why he resigned was not forthcoming. This sort of thing does not increase confidence in President Wilson out here in the hinterlands. His reelection to a third term in 2022 was unusual as GC presidents for generations have limited their terms to two, further creating concerns that the Wilson was setting up a dynasty in Silver Springs, especially those who remember how difficult it was to dislodge his father Neal Wilson. Messenger to Adventism, Ellen G White weighed in on the matter of controversial decisions being made at the GC in response to discontent in the field over the 1888 General Conference.

“In no conference should propositions be rushed through without time being taken by the brethren to weigh carefully all sides of the question. Because the president of a conference suggested certain plans, it has sometimes been considered unnecessary to consult the Lord about them. Thus propositions have been accepted that were not for the spiritual benefit of the believers and that involved far more than was apparent at the first casual consideration…. Many, very many matters have been taken up and carried by vote, that have involved far more than was anticipated and far more than those who voted would have been willing to assent to had they taken time to consider the question from all sides” ( EGW 9T, p. 278, italics supplied).

Unfortunately, what appears to be the defining issue of the present administration thus far has been the General Conference president’s failure to report the findings of the Theology of Ordination Study Committee (TOSC) to the 2015 General Conference Session after paying hundreds of thousands of dollars of tithe funds on the project that was to solve the issue once and for all. But the findings of the carefully selected committee were out of harmony with his ideas on the topic. A large majority of the Glacier View gathering of the best SDA theologians in the world had said that Scripture did not forbid the ordination of women. Wilson and those who supported him did not agree and Wilson did not allow the study report  to be presented at the San Antonio session before the divisive vote was taken. He failed to mention that a super majority (62 for and 32 opposed) of the TOSC and nearly all of the concurrent world division reports favored permitting divisions the option of ordaining women. One result has been ongoing turbulence in the denomination and the three-year search for the proper way to punish noncompliance. 

Ellen White noted that “the very beginning of the great apostasy was in seeking to supplement the authority of God with that of the church” (GC pp. 289-290).  We need to pray for our church, its General Conference president, and the members of the General Conference Executive Committee that they might think twice (or a dozen times) before voting into policy “laws” that will take all of us down a well-beaten historical road; a road that has always led Christianity to some very unchristian practices done in the name of Christ. Many incarnations of Christ's church have confused spiritual unity with ecclesiastical compliance. May God help His church!

Sister Ellen became troublesome to the GC following the 1888 General Conference and was invited to go to Australia for much of a decade. Mrs. White made the most of the "opportunity" and left the church administration to work out its issues with God's guidance. When she returned to America, she championed the creation of union conferences to decentralize church authority. She counseled that shifting decision-making authority further afield would make the work out in the field more effective and responsive to issues that sometimes occurred half a world away from Battle Creek, the GC headquarters at the time. The creation of union conferences helped loosen the authoritarian grip of the leadership. And once God burned down the press building in Battle Creek, the GC admin decided God was displeased. As a result the General Conference moved from what had become an Adventist quagmire to Silver Spring.

Recently, a new issue as flammable as the Righteousness by Faith controversy post 1888, has risen. Much heated rhetoric over women's ordination has been delivered from pulpits, discussed in the aisles of our churches after services, in church-sponsored conferences, over church potluck tables, and in magazines and publications approved, disapproved or tolerated by the General Conference. Prominent Adventist theologians have weighed in on both sides of the issue. Seemingly harsh actions that have been taken at the General Conference have troubled the saints in North America. Enforcement committees have been proposed by the GC Executive Committee that seem to have the power to disband whole unions or local conferences that do not hew to the theological positions of the General Conference executives. The GC position is that the matter was settled in San Antonio. Other SDA leaders have questioned the San Antonio actions as the product of a flawed and even manipulative process. Some folk charged with examining the issue, like Tom Lemon, have found themselves removed for not vigorously supporting decisions originating in Silver Springs.

We stand on the precipice of momentous events in Earth's history. Of course the devil is going to seek to divide us. We see it happening in the secular world as the political prophecies of Revelation are working themselves out on the nightly news. Is squabbling over issues of whether authority should reside in Silver Springs or in the congregations of the saints something inspired by God or by some force outside the church seeking to divide us when we should be working tirelessly side by side to reach the world. Should we be putting bureaucratic burdens upon the army of the Lord. Ought we instead to use every tool in our arsenal, every resource available to us to complete the Gospel commission? Certainly, establishing a veritable Adventist FBI to root out heresy as defined by church managers won't unite the church. A Unity Conference didn't do much to put the GCs fears to rest either.

Ellen White, during a similar upheaval in our history said, "The church may pass resolution upon resolution to put down all disagreement of opinions, but we cannot force the mind and the will, and thus root out disagreement. These resolutions may conceal the discord, but they cannot quench it and establish perfect agreement. Nothing can perfect unity in the church but the spirit of Christ-like forbearance” (EGW, Ms 24, 1892, italics supplied).

At a time, when we are currently the fastest growing denomination in the United States if not the world, it probably delights Satan to stir up division in our midst. Lucifer is a master at using authority to overturn our actual agreements among the brethren. Then he tries to convince us that we who run roughshod over our brethren are thereby more sanctified than those they suppress. My prayer is that we may resist the devil when it becomes evident that he is among us, that he may flee from us. In this way we may truly have Christian unity, not just submission to human authority. In God's church, it is He who is our Lord, who is our direct guide and savior.

© 2022 by Tom King