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The information
below is a compilation of facts and tidbits that have been gathered
from interviews with family members, personal acquaintances and the
personal writings of several of the earliest 7th seal
advocates. The writer has tried to take an unbiased approach in
putting together this information and has included mostly
information that was collaborated by more than one source; however,
he does not claim to have been infallible in his conclusions. With that, the following is provided for your
consideration.
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The church of the
morning bright
Like crystal so clear her light
Triumphant she knew no fears;
In finest white linen dressed;
Pure holiness she possessed,
Two hundred and seventy years.
The above stanza is the first verse
of a song written by William G. Schell titled Biblical Trace of
the Church. Like Daniel S. Warner and other leaders of the
early Church of God Reformation Movement, Schell viewed the book of
Revelation as representing the church age with four distinct epics
of time periods. They are as follows:
1.
The rise and fall of the
early morning church – 33 A.D. to 270 A.D.
2.
The Dark Age, or the age
of Roman Catholicism rule – 270 A.D. to 1530 A.D.
3.
The Dark and Cloudy age,
or the development of Protestantism and sect making – 1530 A.D. to
1880 A.D.
4.
The Evening Light, or the
complete restoration of the truths taught by the morning church –
1880 A.D. to the 2nd coming of Christ
The
concept of dividing the church age into time periods was not
original with Warner or Schell. The Seventh Day Adventists had
already been interpreting the prophetic books of Daniel and
Revelation in this manner years before.
Uriah
Smith, editor of the Adventist paper Review and Herald for
fifty years, had written much literature on this subject,
including four major books. Using the symbolic representation of one
day for a year (Ezekiel 4:6), he had divided up the church age into
three distinct periods; Pagan, Papal and Protestant.
Warner was well aware
of Smith’s writings and prophetic teachings, and while he rejected
the timeline that was used by Smith, he used Smith’s same manner of
calculation method to define his own timeline. Warner’s personal
library, presently located in the Nicholson Library Archives,
includes Smith’s book, Thoughts, Critical and Practical, on the
Book of Daniel and the Revelation and it is evident that Warner
spent much time studying it. Warner made handwritten marginal
footnotes throughout the book. However, rather than just three time
periods, as Smith has concluded, Warner added a fourth time period,
namely, that of the “Evening Time.” --For
a detailed explanation regarding the comparison between Smith and
Warner’s timeline and conclusions,
click here to
read an excerpt from John E. Stanley’s
UNITY AMID DIVERSITY:
INTERPRETING THE BOOK OF REVELATION IN THE CHURCH OF GOD (ANDERSON).
Warner believed that this last time period began in
1880, the year that Warner published his first major book “Bible
Proofs of a Second Work of Grace.” In Warner’s mind, this new
Evening Light reformation would be “The Last Reformation” before
Christ’ imminent return. So imminent was Christ’ second coming that
Warner believed ”the Lord has promised him that he should live
until Jesus returned.” Warner died in December, 1895.
His belief that he had discovered
prophetic proof for a new epic of time in the church age created,
(1) the need for a biblical connection to prophecy that validated
its existence, and (2) a symbolic timeline that provided an
explanation for the beginning date of 1880. For the first part, he
found his biblical connection from Zechariah 14:7 But it shall
be one day which shall be known to the LORD, not day, nor night: but
it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall be light.
The second requires a closer
examination.
Every timeline prophecy must have a
starting baseline date.
Early Advent leaders such as William Miller had interpreted the
2300 prophetic days mentioned in Daniel 8:14 in a manner such that
they concluded Christ's Second Coming would be “on or before 1843
A.D.” That year came and went with no return of Christ. Many
Adventists soon left their church and were greatly troubled by this
failed prophesy. Under pressure to find answers, Uriah Smith took a
fresh look and the earlier prophetic writings of the movement and
concluded that the baseline year for their interpretation of the
books of Daniel and Revelation was in fact the year 457 B.C. (same
baseline year as Miller had used), the year in which the Jews began
the rebuilding of the Temple under the leadership of Ezra.
However, Smith concluded that the year 1844 was not to be
interpreted as the year for the return of Christ, but rather as the
year which "marked the commencement of the work of cleansing the
sanctuary." He viewed the "sanctuary" to be the heavenly temple in
which are recorded all human deeds.
Warner accepted some of Uriah Smith's calculation methods in
interpreting the 2300 days of Daniel 8:14, however, he disagreed
with Smith on one fundamental issue; the baseline starting date.
Warner placed the baseline starting date at 420 B.C., at the
completion of the restoration of Jerusalem, rather than the year
when the Jews were commanded to restore and rebuild Jerusalem.
Counting forward 2,300 years from 420 B.C., Warner arrived at 1880
A.D.,
the establishment of the Evening Light Church of God.
Clearly, Warner got it wrong. In Daniel 9:25, the angel Gabriel told Daniel specifically that the prophesy clock was to begin at
“the going forth of the commandment to rebuild” rather than the
completion of the work of rebuilding Jerusalem. After Warner’s
death, Eventually, H M Riggle came to realize this mistake and he
corrected it when he published the book titled The Cleansing of the Sanctuary.
Yet, the year 1880 was forever etched in the minds of Warner’s
followers.
Soon after 1880 was accepted as being a prophetic year, others began
to use this date in their prophetic writings. They concluded that
since the “Evening Light” was now brightly shinning, the years
immediately preceding 1880 were the “dark and cloudy” day of Ezekiel
34:12. Using the expression “three days
and an half”, it was concluded that this expression was a symbolic
representation of 350 years, where “a day” equates to
100 years. Subtracting 350 years from 1880 A.D., the difference is
1530. 1530 A.D. was therefore viewed as the beginning of the cloudy
day of Protestantism, particularly since the establishment of the
first Protestant creed happened in that year (the Augsburg
Confession). They believed that the dark day of Ezekiel 34:12 represented the Dark Ages, where Roman Catholicism ruled much of
the world. Using 1530 A.D. as the beginning date of Protestantism
and the 1,000 year symbol mentioned in Revelation Chapter 20, they
concluded that the Dark Ages started in 530 A.D.
However, there is a problem with all of this.
What is the biblical basis of “a day” representing 100
years? Peter stated that “one day is with the Lord as a thousand
years, and a thousand years as one day.” (2 Peter 3:8). Old
Testament prophesy points to a prophetic day representing one year,
but nowhere is one day described as being representative of a
century!
Church of God songwriter, C W Naylor said in his self published book,
The
Teachings of D. S. Warner and his Associates,
“The interpretation
that these three and one-half days signify three and one-half
centuries has not one fact to sustain it. Nowhere else in Scripture
is a time prophecy where days signify centuries to be found. The
only support that can be given to this interpretation is the support
of the interpreter's word. It is a pure assumption: it is a mere
guess: it is an interpretation that has no standing.
Chronologically, therefore, 1880 was not a prophetic year.”
However, the tell-tell sign of a
misinterpretation in the development of the church age timeline is
with the representative year 270 A.D. As early as 1890, we can
find references to this date in Church of God literature. H C
Wickersham references 270 A.D. in his book, Holiness Bible
Subjects. He vaguely stated that “about this date, the dark day
began.”
However, there is absolutely no
significant historical evidence or event to back-up the use of this
date in the church age timeline. One can search through literature
books, historical books, and religious writings or simply do an
online Google search and when all the research has been completed;
one will still come up short in finding any event that justifies the
use of this date.
Other than the death of Saint
Valentine in or around 269 A.D. or 270 A.D., the emergence of the
story of St. Nicholas around the same year, and some Monks running
around nearly naked in Egypt (one brother actually used this as
evidence), there is nothing of any historical
significance about the year 270 A.D. Nor is there any event or
happening of historical significance near this date in history.
So, why do we have 270 A. D. on our
charts? Because it was a backwards calculated date. It is a factious
date.
Revelation 12:6 and Revelation 13:5
both present a prophetic time period of “a thousand two hundred and
threescore days” and “forty and two months”. Both of
these expressions were viewed as one and the same by Warner and his
followers. The forty-two month symbol was calculated to be 1,260 days, when a 30
day "Jewish month" was assumed (42X30=1,260). It was believed that this symbol
represented the time of the full reign of the first beast, namely
Roman Catholicism.
(the same time period was assigned to the "3 1/2 times" symbol as
described in Daniel 7:25, Daniel 12:7 & Revelation 12:14, where 1
time was assumed to equal 1 year or 12 months)
Since it was already assumed in the
beginning that 1880 A.D. was the opening of the Evening Light Age, and
that 350 years prior to that date that the Protestant Age began in
1530 A.D., a simple subtraction of 1260 A.D. from 1530 A.D.
produced a date of 270 A.D. (1530-1260=270)
So, with no evidence of any
historical significant event, and with a retroactive calculation, we
now have a date on our charts that no one can seem to fully explain.
And yet for many years, we have sung
about it, talked about it, looked at on many charts, yet we never
questioned it! Because, it seemed to fit in perfectly with the rest
of the picture.
The 7th seal advocates
continued on with the same line of thought as Warner and his
followers, yet they divided up the church age into not four time
periods, but seven time periods or time!
In the next article, we will compare
the timelines of the 6th and 7th seal teachings.
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