GCxi: As the Spirit of God has opened to my mind the great truths of His word, and the scenes of the past and the future, I have been bidden to make known to others that which has been revealed B to trace the history of the controversy in past ages, and especially so to present it as to shed a light on the fast-approaching struggle of the future.

ERROR 2: Again, the book is full of errors.

 

Chapter 18, An American Reformer (William Miller), 317-342

GC320: Endeavoring to lay aside all pre-conceived opinions ...

GC324-325: “Miller accepted the generally received view that in the Christian age the earth is the sanctuary...”

ERROR 3: The first statement is wrong because the second one is correct. Most of Miller’s ideas were pre-conceived popular explanations within the historical school of prophetic interpretation of his own age.

 

GC326-327: In the seventh chapter of Ezra the decree is found. Verses 12-26. In its completest form it was issued by Artaxerxes, king of Persia, 457 B.C. But in Ezra 6:14 the house of the Lord at Jerusalem is said to have been built “according to the commandment [“decree,” margin] of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia.” These three kings, in originating, reaffirming, and completing the decree, brought it to the perfection required by the prophecy to mark the beginning of the 2300 years. Taking 457 B.C., the time when the decree was completed, as the date of the commandment, every specification of the prophecy concerning the seventy weeks was seen to have been fulfilled.”

ERROR 4: It is impossible to make an absolute statement that the 457 B. C. decree of Ezra 7 is the fulfillment of the beginning of the prophecy found in Daniel 9:24-25.  Whereas EGW’s references only mention the rebuilding of the temple, the decree of Daniel 9 only mentions the rebuilding of the city. Thus, “every specification” was not met.

ERROR 5: The context of Daniel 8:1-13 offers several much better beginning points for the 2300 days in Daniel 8:14 than does Daniel 9:24, 25.

ERROR 6: The very location of this remark is deceitful. It implies that William Miller discovered Ezra 7’s decree when he did not. This remark honestly does not belong in the context of this chapter about William Miller.

 

GC328-329: Miller and his associates at first believed that the 2300 days would terminate in the spring of 1844, whereas the prophecy points to the autumn of that year. The misapprehension of this point brought disappointment and perplexity to those who had fixed upon the earlier date as the time of the Lord’s coming. But this did not in the least affect the strength of the argument showing that the 2300 days terminated in the year 1844, and that the great event represented by the cleansing of the sanctuary must then take place.

ERROR 7: Omissions are deceitful. For 25 years, from 1818 until 1843, Miller preached that Christ would return between March 1842 and March 1843. The spring of 1844 was his third (of four) wrong predictions.

ERROR 8: “The prophecy points to the autumn of that year” is another common absolute declaration from one claiming to be an inspired prophetess. The attitude is sinful.

ERROR 9: There was no “strength of the argument” of Miller’s false prophecy that Christ would return in October 1844.  EGW also ignores the obvious that Miller did not teach the Investigative Judgment at all.

GC339: [God] sent chosen messengers to make known the nearness of the final judgment.

GC339: As God sent His servant to warn the world of the coming Flood, so He sent chosen messengers to make known the nearness of the final judgment. And as Noah's contemporaries laughed to scorn the predictions of the preacher of righteousness, so in Miller's day many, even of the professed people of God, scoffed at the words of warning.

ERROR 17: Noah was a true prophet of God; Miller was a false prophet.  It is error to compare Noah’s true message to Miller’s false message. Miller was not a chosen messenger of God.

 

Chapter 19, Light Through Darkness (William Miller), 343-354

GC352-353: Those [Millerites] who proclaimed this warning gave the right message at the right time. But as the early disciples declared, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand,” based on the prophecy of Daniel 9, while they failed to perceive that the death of the Messiah was foretold in the same scripture, so Miller and his associates preached the message based on Daniel 8:14 and Revelation 14:7, and failed to see that there were still other messages brought to view in Revelation 14, which were also to be given before the advent of the Lord. As the disciples were mistaken in regard to the kingdom to be set up at the end of the seventy weeks, so Adventists were mistaken in regard to the event to take place at the expiration of the 2300 days. In both cases there was an acceptance of, or rather an adherence to, popular errors that blinded the mind to the truth. Both classes fulfilled the will of God in delivering the message which He desired to be given, and both, through their own misapprehension of their message, suffered disappointment.

ERROR 18: Jesus’ early disciples were correct; Miller was wrong. In order to justify Miller, EGW declares Jesus= disciples were teaching error. “The time is fulfilled” in Mark 1:15 was spoken by Jesus, not by his disciples.

ERROR 19: One cannot dogmatically state that “The time is at hand” is “based on the prophecy of Daniel 9.”

ERROR 20: Jesus’ disciples did not “fulfill the will of God” by preaching error!

 

GC353: Yet God accomplished His own beneficent purpose in permitting the warning of the judgment to be given just as it was. The great day was at hand, and in His providence the people were brought to the test of a definite time, in order to reveal to them what was in their hearts. The message was designed for the testing and purification of the church. ... The message was designed to enable them to discern their true spiritual state; it was sent in mercy to arouse them to seek the Lord with repentance and humiliation.

ERROR 21: Blaming God for the work of Satan is called “blaspheme against the Holy Spirit” in the New Testament. This EGW statement is blaspheme!

 

GC353-354: “The disappointment also, though the result of their own misapprehension of the message which they gave, was to be overruled for good. ...  would they, in prayer and humility, seek to discern where they had failed to comprehend the significance of the prophecy? ... would they cast aside truths sustained by the clearest testimony of His word?

ERROR 22: Was the false prophecy “God=s purpose and design” (as just stated) or was it “the result of their own misapprehension and failure to comprehend”?  Both cannot be true!

ERROR 23: “The clearest testimony of His word” is definitely a lie! Only SDAs interpret Daniel 8:14 as the Investigate Judgment beginning in 1844. There is nothing “clear” about it!

  

GC354: This test would reveal the strength of those who with real faith had obeyed what they believed to be the teaching of the word and the Spirit of God. It would teach them, as only such an experience could, the danger of accepting the theories and interpretations of men, instead of making the Bible its own interpreter. To the children of faith the perplexity and sorrow resulting from their error would work the needed correction. They would be led to a closer study of the prophetic word. They would be taught to examine more carefully the foundation of their faith, and to reject everything, however widely accepted by the Christian world, that was not founded upon the Scriptures of truth.

ERROR 24: The opposite was true. They exchanged the false prophecy of the second coming in 1844 for the greater lie of the Investigative Judgment beginning in 1844.

ERROR 25: EGW and those who stayed with Miller were guilty of “accepting the theories and interpretations of men, instead of making the Bible its own interpreter.”

 

Chapter 20, A Great Religious Awakening, 355-374

GC355: A great religious awakening under the proclamation of Christ’s soon coming is foretold in the prophecy of the first angel’s message of Revelation 14 [14:7 ‘The hour of his judgment is come’].

ERROR 26: There is no “great religious awakening” seen in Revelation which began in chapter 14. The 144,000 and great multitude were converted in chapter 7. This is only a message of the wrath of God which falls in the following chapters. The un-saved curse God and refuse to repent. Revelation 14 is a final message of judgment, not salvation.

ERROR 27: EGW and Adventists changed “Christ=s soon coming” to the Investigative Judgment which has already lasted over 160 years with no apology!

ERROR 28: This statement erroneously opens chapter 20’s discussion of the nineteenth century’s evangelistic movements in the United States and Europe B with a lot of focus on the second coming (not the Investigative Judgment).

ERROR 29: What have SDAs been doing for 160 years if the world is waiting on them to save it? This “great religious awakening” was, (SDAs teach) to be accomplished by the SDA Church becoming known to every person on earth since they had the mission to preach the “true” gospel.

 

GC356: This period [1260 years] ended in 1798.

ERROR 30: EGW is wrong to make an absolute declaration like this. Few others (if any) agree that the 1260 so-called “prophetic days” of Daniel and Revelation ended in 1798. SDAs teach that the “man of sin,” the Roman Catholic pope, began his reign in A.D. 538 and was “wounded to death” 1260 years later in 1798 during the French Revolution. Yet, even in the 1800s, most historical interpreters assigned different dates. My former SDA history teachers laughed at the 538 date as meaningless and unsubstantiated.

 

Chapter 21,  A Warning Rejected, All Except SDAs Become Babylon, 375-390

Chapter 20 ends with the Adventist disappointment that Christ did not return to earth in the spring of 1844. [Again, the first (1843) date taught by Miller for 25 years is totally ignored in The Great Controversy.] Chapter 21 covers the period between spring 1844 and the next disappointment when Christ failed to return in autumn 1844. Chapter 21 introduces the phrase from Revelation 14:8, “Babylon is fallen.”

 

GC373-374: God designed to prove His people. His hand covered a mistake in the reckoning of the prophetic periods. Adventists did not discover the error, nor was it discovered by the most learned of their opponents.

ERROR 31: Blaspheme again! EGW blamed Miller’s human error on God Himself. She erroneously says that “God designed” the “mistake” of Miller’s false prophecy.

ERROR 32 (198): Those opponents of Miller who were Hebrew scholars had long disagreed with all of his 15 calculations which were taken out of context.

 

GC375: In preaching the doctrine of the second advent, William Miller and his associates had labored with the sole purpose of arousing men to a preparation for the judgment. They had sought to awaken professors of religion to the true hope of the church and to their need of a deeper Christian experience, and they labored also to awaken the unconverted to the duty of immediate repentance and conversion to God. They made no attempt to convert men to a sect or party in religion. Hence they labored among all parties and sects, without interfering with their organization or discipline.

ERROR 33: If this were true of Miller, then why was it not true of their subsequent church organization? If Miller could (as they claim) preach the Three Angels’ Messages the first time without an existing so-called “remnant church,” then why is an organization needed to preach those “same” Three Angels’ Message the second time?

ERROR 34: Again, EGW’s attempts to change Miller’s second coming message into the entirely different Investigative Judgment.

 

GC376: Those [non-Millerites] who sought to shut out the testimony of God=s word they [the Millerites] could not regard as constituting the church of Christ, ‘the pillar and ground of the truth.’ Hence they felt themselves justified in separating from their former connection. In the summer of 1844 about fifty thousand withdrew from the churches.

ERROR 35: Miller was wrong and deserved ridicule as a false prophet. During Old Testament times he might have been put to death. The “pillar and ground of the truth” was actually in the churches who rejected Miller’s errors.

ERROR 36: In the summer of 1844 the Millerites were still preaching the soon second coming of Christ. Yet EGW and SDAs still define the true believers as those who believed Miller’s prophecy and criticize those who rejected the lie as false Babylon.

ERROR 37: The irony is that, when SDAs changed the Asecond coming@ to the AInvestigative Judgment@ they inadvertently defined themselves among those whom Miller called Afallen Babylon.@ See GC430.

 

GC376: About this time a marked change was apparent in most of the churches in the United States. ...in that year there were evidences of a sudden and marked declension in nearly all the churches of the land.

ERROR 38: This is the error of judging those who disagree with you. Spiritual darkness actually fell on those who were wrong and rejected the truth [the Millerites], not on those who admitted their error and left the Millerites.

  

GC379: The first angel’s message of Revelation 14, announcing the hour of God’s judgment and calling upon men to fear and worship Him, was designed to separate the professed people of God from the corrupting influences of the world and to arouse them to see their true condition of worldliness and backsliding. In this message, God has sent to the church a warning, which, had it been accepted, would have corrected the evils that were shutting them away from Him. Had they received the message from heaven, humbling their hearts before the Lord and seeking in sincerity a preparation to stand in His presence, the Spirit and power of God would have been manifested among them. The church would again have reached that blessed state ...

ERROR 39: Remember, this chapter is about the events between the spring and autumn of 1844. Miller was preaching the second coming. Yet EGW still calls it the First Angel’s Message!

ERROR 40: God does not warn his children with a false “message from heaven.”

ERROR 41: The church did not miss a blessing because it rejected the false message of a false prophet.

 

GC380-381: In refusing the warning of the first angel, they rejected the means which Heaven had provided for their restoration. They spurned the gracious messenger that would have corrected the evils which separated them from God, and with greater eagerness they turned to seek the friendship of the world. Here was the cause of that fearful condition of worldliness, backsliding, and spiritual death which existed in the churches in 1844. In Revelation 14 the first angel is followed by a second proclaiming: ‘Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.’ Revelation 14:8. The term ‘Babylon’ is derived from ‘Babel,’ and signifies confusion. It is employed in Scripture to designate the various forms of false or apostate religion. In Revelation 17 Babylon is represented as a woman --a figure which is used in the Bible as the symbol of a church, a virtuous woman representing a pure church, a vile woman an apostate church.

ERROR 42: The first angel’s message preached by William Miller at that time period was totally wrong.

ERROR 43: God does not “warn” His church with a false message.

ERROR 44: God does not “restore” His church with a false message.

ERROR 45: God does not “correct” His church with a false message.

ERROR 46: False Babylon best fits the SDA church. Its Investigative Judgment message is one of the best examples of “confusion” in all Christendom.

 

GC389: The second angel’s message of Revelation 14 was first preached in the summer of 1844 ... The churches then experienced a moral fall, in consequence of their refusal of the light of the advent message; but that fall was not complete.

ERROR 47: In the summer of 1844 Miller preached the second coming -- not the Investigative Judgment. Therefore, his was a false message to both the entire Christian world and also to later SDAs who changed it to the even worse Investigative Judgment.

ERROR 46: Churches cannot fall “morally” because they reject false prophets like Miller.

ERROR 49: There was, and is, no such thing as the “light of the [SDA] advent message.”

 

GC390: Notwithstanding the spiritual darkness and alienation from God that exist in the churches which constitute Babylon, the great body of Christ’s true followers are still to be found in their communion. There are many of these who have never seen the special truths for this time.
 

ERROR 50: EGW has completely changed the Second Angels’ Message. Between the spring and fall of 1844 Miller called the other churches “fallen Babylon” because they rejected his prediction of the return of Jesus in 1844. EGW’s completely different explanation is that the other churches are “fallen Babylon” because they have rejected the “special truths” of the Investigative Judgment, Sabbath, soul sleep, acceptance of EGW as a prophet, unclean foods and avoidance of jewelry.

 

Chapter 22: Prophecies Fulfilled, 391-408

GC391: When the time passed at which the Lord’s coming was first expected,--in the spring of 1844-- those who had looked in faith for His appearing were for a season involved in doubt and uncertainty. While the world regarded them as having been utterly defeated and proved to have been cherishing a delusion, their source of consolation was still the word of God. ... Signs which could not be mistaken pointed to the coming of Christ as near.

ERROR 51: EGW ridicules the many who returned to their former churches after Miller=s second (of three) false predictions for the second coming of Christ. “Yes,” they had been “cherishing a delusion” and “yes” they did deserve a certain amount of ridicule.

ERROR 52: See GC333-335 and 410. The “unmistakable prophecies” included the 1755 “fulfillment” of  Revelation 6:12, the 1833 “fulfillment” of Revelation 6:13 and the 1840 “remarkable fulfillment” of Revelation 9:15.

 

GC392-393:  [EGW quotes Habakkuk 2:1-4; Ezekiel 12:21-25, 27, 28 and Matthew 25:1-12 to prove that God’s Word taught a delay in Christ’s second coming.]

ERROR 53: These texts say absolutely noting about the Investigate Judgment beginning in 1844.

 

GC396: William Miller had no sympathy with those influences that led to fanaticism.

ERROR 54: EGW is trying to justify Miller and free him from being the cause of any of the fanaticism.

 

GC398: It was not the proclamation of the second advent that caused fanaticism and division. These appeared in the summer of 1844, when Adventists were in a state of doubt and perplexity concerning their real position. The preaching of the first angel’s message and of the “midnight cry” tended directly to repress fanaticism and dissension.

ERROR 55: Both the spring 1844 and the autumn 1844 prophecies preached by Miller concerning the soon second coming were false prophecies.

ERROR 56: In reality Miller’s false teachings from 1818 until 1844 were the cause of fanaticism.

 

GC398: That which led to this movement was the discovery that the decree of Artaxerxes for the restoration of Jerusalem, which formed the starting point for the 2300 days, went into effect in the autumn of the year 457 B. C., and not at the beginning of the year, as had been formerly believed.

ERROR 57: There is no proof that the decree in Ezra 7 and the Day of Atonement from Leviticus 16 both occurred on October 22, 457 B. C. which would last to October 22, 1844 (2300 years later).

ERROR 58: Again, Ezra 7’s decree says nothing about Daniel 9:25’s “restoration of Jerusalem.” It focuses entirely on the rebuilding of the “temple.”

ERROR 59: This chapter is still in the context of Miller’s preaching of the second coming of Christ in 1844 -- not the Investigative Judgment. 
 

GC400: Like a tidal wave the movement [that Jesus would return in October 1844] swept over the land. From city to city, from village to village, and into remote country places it went, until the waiting people of God were fully aroused. [Between the spring and autumn of 1844] Fanaticism disappeared before this proclamation like early frost before the rising sun. Believers saw their doubt and perplexity removed, and hope and courage animated their hearts. The work was free from those extremes which are ever manifested when there is human excitement without the controlling influence of the word and Spirit of God.

ERROR 60: The opposite was/is true. Miller’s prophecies during these months about the second coming were false and were later totally re-interpreted by SDAs. (Thus they admit they were false.)

ERROR: 61: EGW is guilty of blaspheme again; she credits the “work” with being “free from those extremes” because of the Acontrolling influence of the Spirit.”

 

GC401: Of all the great religious movements since the days of the apostles, none have been more free from human imperfection and the wiles of Satan than was that of the autumn of 1844.

ERROR 62: This is probably the stupidest statement in The Great Controversy!  Nothing preached in this time period was correct! Even SDAs completely changed everything Miller taught! EGW is still referring to the Millerites who taught that Jesus would return and destroy the earth by fire on October 22, 1844!!!

 

GC402: At the call, ‘the Bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet Him, the waiting ones arose and trimmed their lamps;’ they studied the Word of God with an intensity of interest before unknown. Angels were sent from heaven to arouse those who had become discouraged and prepare them to receive the message. The work did not stand in the wisdom and learning of men, but in the power of God. It was not the most talented, but the most humble and devoted who were the first to hear and obey the call. Farmers left their crops standing in the fields; mechanics laid down their tools, and with tears and rejoicing went out to give the warning. Those who had formerly led in the cause were among the last to join this movement. The churches in general closed their doors against this message, and a large company of those who received it withdrew from their connection. In the providence of God this proclamation untied with the second angel=s message and gave power to that work. The message, ‘Behold the Brindegroom cometh’ was not so much a matter of argument, though the Scripture proof was clear and conclusive.

ERROR 63: Incredible! Read this paragraph again slowly for its full effect! It is still referring to Miller’s second coming message preached between the spring and autumn of 1844.

ERROR 64: God does not send “angels from heaven” to help people receive a false message that Jesus was coming to earth in 1844!!!

ERROR 65: Miller’s false prophecy did not stand in “the power of God.”

ERROR 66: The churches should have closed their doors to “this FALSE message.”

ERROR 67: It was not the “providence of God” to, once again, deceive thousands of believers into believing that Jesus was about to return to earth in 1844 and destroy it.

ERROR 68: Miller’s use of “Behold the bridegroom cometh” was referring to the soon second coming of Christ B not the Investigative Judgment.

ERROR 69: If the scripture proof were “clear and conclusive,” then Jesus would have returned in 1844 as William Miller predicted!

 

GC407: God did not forsake His people; His Spirit still abode with those who did not rashly deny the light which they had received, and denounce the advent movement.

ERROR 70: God’s people are not those who repeatedly follow false prophets who have already proven to be wrong several times.

ERROR 71: It was not rash to admit that Miller had been wrong several times, return to your previous church and forget the wrong interpretations of Daniel 8:14.

ERROR 72: They were not “denying light” from God; they were rejecting false teaching.

 

Chapter 23, What is the Sanctuary, 409-422 [Why Miller Was Wrong]

Chapters 23 and 24 explain the SDA reason that Jesus did not return to earth on October 22, 1844. The vast majority of Adventists, including Miller himself, admitted they were wrong and returned to their churches. However, a very small group which later became the SDA Church insisted that the Miller’s date and prophetic calculations which pointed to October 22, 1844 were correct, but the “event” was wrong.

 

GC409: Many rashly cut the knot of difficulty by denying that the 2300 days ended in 1844.

ERROR 73: They had been embarrassed by three false dates for the second coming of Christ (1843; spring 1844; autumn 1844). There was nothing “rash” about admitting error. The overwhelming majority of William Miller’s followers, including Miller himself, admitted error.

 

GC410: To accept this conclusion was to renounce the former reckoning of the prophetic periods. The 2300 days had been found to begin when the commandment of Artaxerxes for the restoration and building of Jerusalem went into effect, in the autumn of 457 B.C. Taking this as the starting point, there was perfect harmony in the application of all the events foretold in the explanation of that period in Daniel 9:25-27.

ERROR 74: Miller used 15 ways to prove 1843 B none of which were Ezra 7’s 457 B. C. SDAs themselves Arenounced@ all of the “former reckoning” of those 15 other ways.

ERROR 75: The 2300 days of Daniel 8:14 actually began with the desolation of the Temple by the little horn of Daniel 8:9-13 which is totally ignored in The Great Controversy. The little horn did not desolate the Temple in 457 B.C. and neither did the saints!!

 

GC410: In the midst of the seventieth week, Messiah was to be cut off. Three and a half years after His baptism,

ERROR 76: This interpretation of Daniel 9:24-27 is far from absolute. Many theories exist.

 

GC410: Christ was crucified, in the spring of A.D. 31.

ERROR 77: This is not the date accepted by most Christian experts.

 

GC410: At the expiration of this period the nation sealed its rejection of Christ ...

ERROR 78: This is only one of many interpretations of Daniel 9:24-27.

 

GC410: The first 490 years of the 2300 having then ended, 1810 years would remain. From A.D. 34, 1810 years extend to 1844.

ERROR 79: There is not proof that the 2300 days were prophetic years. Even if it were true, there is no proof that the prophecy of Daniel 9 provides the beginning point of the 2300 days of Daniel 8:14.

ERROR 80: While implying that Miller began with 457 B. C. from Ezra 7, Miller actually used this reckoning (his seventh of fifteen points) to reach 1843. He subtracted 490 from 2300 reach 1810; he then added A. D. 33 to 1810 to reach 1843 –not 1844.