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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Eric Walsh

Who Stopped the Movement?

If you would turn with me to the book of Numbers, the 12th chapter.

Numbers chapter 12, starting at verse 1, Numbers 12 says, and Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married, for he had married an Ethiopian woman.

And they said, hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses?

Now the man Moses was very meek above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.

And the Lord spake suddenly unto Moses and unto Aaron and unto Mariam, come out ye 3 unto the tabernacle of the congregation.

The Lord came down in the pillar of the cloud and stood in the door of the tabernacle and called Aaron and Miriam and they both came forth.

And he said, here now my words, if there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision and will speak unto him in a dream.

My servant Moses is not so who is faithful in all mine house.

With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently and not in dark speeches, and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold.

Wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?

And the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, and he departed.

And the cloud departed from off the tabernacle, and behold, Mariam became leprous, white as snow.

And Aaron looked upon Miriam, and behold, she was leprous.

And Aaron said unto Moses, Alas, my lord, I beseech thee, lay not the sin upon us, wherein we have done foolishly, and wherein we have sinned.

Let her not be as 1 dead, of whom the flesh is half consumed when he cometh out of his mother's womb.' And Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, heal her now, O God, I beseech thee.

The Lord said unto Moses, if her father had but spit in her face, should she not be ashamed 7 days?

Let her be shut out from the camp 7 days, and after that, let her be received in again.

Verse 15 says, and Miriam was shut out from the camp 7 days, and the people journeyed not till Miriam was brought in again.

Our message this Sabbath is entitled, Who Stopped the Movement?

Father God, we thank you Lord for bringing us together on this beautiful Holy Sabbath day.

I ask Father God that you make Eric Walsh just a nail upon a wall, a rusty sorry nail, Father.

But Lord, upon that nail right now, I ask that you hang a portrait of Jesus Christ so that I'm not seen or heard today, Lord.

Instead, Father God, give us a message from your throne room of grace.

The children of Israel had come out from Egypt and in coming out had reached a point where they were trying to assemble more normal lives.

Interestingly enough, it is now, much time later, that finally Aaron and Mariam meet their sister-in-law.

When they realize that their sister-in-law is not of the house of Israel, in fact, she is a Midianite, They're angered that she is not 1 of them.

And she begins to rail against Moses and in essence begins to rail against God.

The scripture says that she is an Ethiopian from the Greek word, which means burnt skin people, dark skin people.

And here in the scripture, we get a view at a sin that we often overlook.

Here we get a chance to look at the sin first of pride that plagued Miriam and Aaron.

The idea that they would challenge God's real prophet and instead want to place themselves in the seat of prophet.

For this reason, many of our churches are not successful, because the church has become a political battleground.

People are fighting and jockeying for titles and positions, rather than simply being servant leaders.

But the other lesson, the 1 that I want to resonate on on the last day of February, a month that historically and traditionally is considered a black history month in the United States, is a lesson that has to do with the sin of discrimination and prejudice.

And I want to tell you where the sermon comes from so that you'll stay with me to the end.

As I was working in the urgent care 1 Sunday, 1 of the nurses came in and slapped down a piece of paper that she received from a local Sabbath school class.

I shudder to even mention the church that the Sabbath school class is held in, even though some of you might figure that out.

She looks at me and says, did you know that Ellen White was a racist?

She said, look, this is what we discussed in cyber school yesterday.

And she shows me a paper with all kinds of misinterpreted quotes and misaligned statements and juxtapositions that just don't stand up to the weight of evidence.

She says, I didn't know this all my life, And being an Adventist, which to say that she's an Adventist, I think, is a stretch even by her own admissions.

She's a wine connoisseur, to give you an example.

And so she begins to rail on Ellen White.

Now I went to Oakwood College, many of you know as the historically black college, and 1 of the things that we're very proud of at Oakwood College is the fact that as an Adventist school, Ellen White also picked the land for that school.

In fact, her son came down on a boat called the Morning Star down the Mississippi River and in secret was able to reach the poor multitudes of what was then called Negroes or colored people preaching to them the gospel of Jesus Christ and liberation.

So out of that I began to do some research, and I think you'll find that we have a strong history as a church of racial equality in principle, but not always in practice.

And for that reason, this is not an easy message to preach.

But I believe it is a necessary message for God's remnant people.

Because the Scripture says, by this will men know that you are my disciples, that you have love 1 for another.

You cannot be Christ's disciple without true love for your brothers and sisters regardless of what they sound like, look like, dress like, or even smell like.

But I also want to point out that something else happens in verse 15.

When God goes to punish Mariam for her sin, it doesn't simply affect Mariam.

Instead, when God goes to punish Mariam for her sin, the entire nation of Israel stands still.

Sin ultimately stops the movement, especially secret, tucked away sin.

It causes God's church not to work effectively because there are those who are too busy trying to cover their tracks rather than preach the gospel and live the life that Jesus Christ would have them live.

Unrepentant sin damages the church and Racial discrimination or prejudice is no different.

If we allow it to exist among us, it will destroy the movement.

Now, let me say that if you are a real Ellen White reader and you enjoy her writings, 1 of the books you must get, even though it's no longer in print and probably difficult to find, is a book entitled Southern Works.

It is a book that is actually far ahead of its time, and 1 of the greatest proofs, in my opinion, of the prophetic nature of the work of the writings and teachings of Ellen White.

Ellen White said things in Southern works like, we should not evangelize to the blacks in the South unless we have first educated them.

She understood that dignity in the individual needed to be restored.

Their ability to work and learn and think and read was critical before you gave them the 3 angels' messages.

She understood that it was important that people be brought to a place of unity and equality if they're going to receive the gospel on fair ground.

So that the church would not create a permanent underclass.

She understood the need that every single person who would become a Seventh-day Adventist should have an exposure to education that would ennoble each individual and enlighten the mind so that when the precious truths begin to drop, they are in a place to accept it without being congealed into it.

She said this even before men like Booker T.

Washington, who thought it not necessary to educate African-Americans.

He's considered a hero in Black History Month.

Yet he said, just lay down your buckets where you are.

Way ahead of her time on the issue of race, So much so that she establishes and has established Oakwood College before even Loma Linda University is set up.

So the idea that she's a racist really upset me.

Because at the end of the day, just as Miriam and Aaron were really angry at Moses' close relationship with God, don't miss this, they were really angry at the position that they viewed Moses to be in that was privileged, and at some level did not like taking orders from him and did not like the idea that he was God's messenger, there are many today who still view Ellen White in the same way.

The truth is that their beef with her is more about the fact that she speaks to true Christian living that supersedes popular culture or political correctness.

And so they attack the prophet on many fronts.

And in this case, she's attacked from a side I didn't know she could be attacked from after having read the book Southern Works many years ago.

She says in Southern Works, walls of separation have been built up between the whites and the blacks.

These walls of prejudice will tumble down of themselves as did the walls of Jericho when Christians obey the Word of God, which enjoins on them supreme love to their maker and impartial love to their neighbors.

Well, you find it interesting also, when you study black history, that 1 of black history's greatest, I'll say heroes, is a man whose birth name was Malcolm Little but was made famous as Malcolm X.

He actually died by the name El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz.

After going and making Mecca for himself to Saudi Arabia and worshiping around the holy black stones there in Mecca and sleeping and eating with blonde hair, blue-eyed Muslims, he came back to the United States after having been a racist himself and publicly announcing that he would give up racism as a practice because he had worshipped with people he did not think he could ever worship with.

But there's something about Malcolm X that very few people know.

When he was Malcolm Little, he was raised a Seventh-day Adventist.

As a matter of fact, on page 21 of the autobiography of Malcolm X, he speaks about his experiences as of being a Seventh-day Adventist.

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Who Stopped the Movement?

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