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Seekers after Truth: How to find Meaning in Mistakes

Copyright 2008 Wilma Zalabak

Scriptures to Read: Dan 8; Rev 14

I have pictured for some of you those years I committed to a mission project. You may wonder why I point so often to that experience here. It is because that experience is where I learned in the school of hard knocks so many of the principles I share here. This time I will discuss with you the topic of mistakes.

Mistaken Decision

Well, the leaders in that mission project had lot to say about a lot of things. How women dressed was one of those heavily discussed items. I listened, prayed, did the best research I knew and then decided what I believed God wanted me to do. I gave away all my clothes and sewed for myself several outfits which I felt would meet the recommendations. I sewed nicely and these outfits were well color-matched and well fitted to me. The only problem is that they were a mite odd, but I was secure in knowing I had done what I felt God wanted me to do.

About a year later, a wife of one of the leaders told me that my style of dress had offended many people. In a tone one would use if commissioned to tell a hard saying, she said that this was not what was intended by the requirements. Then I did pray. I thought and studied the problem. I believed that if I was offending that many people by mere style of dress, I should not cling to it no matter how much I had invested in it. Yet I had felt confident and happy in God's leading. My biggest concern in this incident was how to deal with the fact that I had made a mistake while under the sure care and guidance of God. I had been sincerely wrong.

I began to wonder how many other things I might be doing now in sincere response to Him that would prove hurtful and wrong later. I wondered how I could ever be sure of any decision in the future. I had lived by the promise of Jesus, "Anyone who resolves to do the will of God will know whether the teaching is from God" (John 7:17, NRSV). Since my resolve was certain, I felt betrayed and wondered why God had not done His part.

It is one thing to make a mistake for myself. It is another thing to hurt others in the process. I wondered why God would allow me to make mistakes which hurt others. How could I make restitution? What was the meaning?

I believed that God would have a people in the end to whom He can point, while saying to the universe, "Here are they that keep the commandments of God" (Rev 14:12). Yet the mistakes seemed so random, restitution so confusing, and the good so chance. Where was meaning?

The Christian's Mistakes, Disappointment, and Hope: How to Find Meaning

Today I will discuss the Christian's sins that grow out of ignorance, habitual reactions, weakness, inefficiency, or trauma. Deficits created by childhood trauma or abuse on the part of any number of surrounding individuals are not filled in automatically by conversion. Sadly, being born again does not void all the physical and emotional damage of the past.

In denial of these facts, people often expect church people to have no spiritual or emotional deficits. Sometimes a new Christian is sadly disappointed in his or her performance in Christ. Then he or she begins to cover up and deny the existence of sincere mistakes along the Christian path. The broken trust in God which one refuses to talk about turns in on oneself to destroy trust and love even toward one another. The idea of making amends or restitution feels either overwhelming or even repulsive.

Some have wondered, "What is the meaning of being a Christian, or of going to church, or of reading the Bible, if it does not protect me from mistakes?"

Today I will explore with you human hope and disappointment and God's reaction to sincere mistakes. By reviewing the stories of disappointment and hope regarding the coming of Jesus, I can have assurance that God makes Himself responsible for the Christian's growth, and for my sincere mistakes along the way.

I use the word "Christian" here for someone who is admitting need, finding hope in God, and choosing to turn over all things to His kingship. For this person, God makes Himself responsible. "God's responsibility," as I use it here, does not deny the Christian's responsibility. If I carried no responsibility there would have been no need for a cross or forgiveness, nor would there be a judgment. And, if God took no responsibility there would have been no cross, no intercession, and no hope for me. I will try to demonstrate how to hold onto the one and not let go of the other (Eccl 7:18).

By "mistakes" I mean the entire picture related to mistakes. God makes Himself responsible for controlling the results of my mistakes. He makes Himself responsible for pointing out to me whatever I can bear of those mistakes. He makes Himself responsible for healing that which I admit and bring to Him. He makes Himself responsible for making restitution, either through me or in some other way.

In this session, I will review stories of human disappointment and hope in the coming of Jesus. I will examine how God makes Himself responsible for the Christian's growth, and for my sincere mistakes along the way. By knowing two ways God makes Himself responsible I can find meaning in the Christian’s mistakes and disappointments.

Advent Disappointment: Know that God Takes Responsibility

Expectations of the coming of Jesus have been around for a long time. Nebuchadnezzar's dream in Dan 2 showed the coming kingdom of God. That was six hundred years before Christ's first advent.

There is a very special era of hope and disappointment in salvation history which surrounds the expectation of Christ's second coming. It came at the time around 1800, the time which has surfaced in several of the lines of prophecy discussed already.

Revivals and Dan 8:14

The fifty years on either side of the turn of the nineteenth century saw great revivals and awakenings. In the eighteenth century there was in Germany Count Nicolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf (1700-1760) and the development of Moravianism. There were John Wesley (1703-1791) in England and Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) in New England. Later in the nineteenth century a "Second Great Awakening" brought camp meetings and growth to Baptist, Congregationalist, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches. Charles Finney (1792-1875) was a product of this awakening.

These revivals focused on preaching and the Scriptures and so set the climate for the worldwide advent awakening in the early nineteenth century. Manuel de Lacunza in Spain and Spanish America, William Cunninghame, Lewis Way, Henry Drummond, Joseph Wolff, and Edward Irving in Great Britain, Francois Gaussen on the continent, children as young as six years of age in Scandinavia, Thomas Playford in Australia, Daniel Wilson in India, and William Davis and then William Miller in the United States preached the imminent second coming of Christ. They all based the urgency for their second advent message on a prophecy found in Dan 8:14, believing that the sanctuary to be cleansed was this earth at the second coming of Christ.

In Dan 8:14, a heavenly voice answered the question, "How long will the vision of trampling the sanctuary go on?" He replied, "Until two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed," or justified, or vindicated, or restored. This sounds to me like real restitution.

Along with Daniel, the sincere Bible student wants to understand what the 2300 days and the restoration or vindication of the sanctuary mean.

The context in the chapter helps some. Dan 8:17,19, and 26 indicate that this time period reaches on for many days to the time of the end. Now, 2300 days make a little more than six years, and from Daniel's time would never reach even to Christ's first advent, let alone centuries later. A conversion scale is needed in order to make sense out of 2300 days spanning centuries to the end of time. I shared with you just such a conversion scale in the last session together when I discussed the 1260 days which also reach to the time of the end. Whereas on a map an inch may equal ten miles, in prophecy a day equals a year (Ezek 4:6; cf. Num 14:34). Using that scale, 2300 days becomes 2300 years. Now, 2300 years from Daniel's time, around 500 B.C., brings one to about A.D. 1800. What an incentive for revival preaching! Prophecy was being fulfilled!

Dan 8 tells the same story as does Dan 7. The progression of events in each chapter follows the same four steps in order. The time periods, 1260 and 2300 days, stand in the same place in each chapter.

Paul had warned of a falling away in the church before the second coming of Christ (2 Thess 2:3). By 1800, there had been ample time for Dan 7's 1260 years of ecclesiastical falling away since Paul's warning in the first century A.D. By 1800, time was just about running out for Dan 8's 2300 years since Daniel's vision in the sixth century B.C. All over the world, preachers announced the second coming of Christ and the victorious reward of the saints. It seemed that biblical prophecy and the unction of the Holy Spirit demanded such preaching.

But Jesus did not come in 1844 as expected. The disappointment was excruciating. The question pounds at my mind, Why did God lead so many to invest so much in an expectation which turned out to be mistaken? Was it ridiculous fanaticism? Or even sinful presumption?

It reminds me of A.D. 31. The disciples had invested all to herald the coming of Messiah's kingdom. Jesus knew those disciples would soon wail, "But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel" (Luke 24:21)! And Jesus Himself took responsibility for the continuation of their misconception of His kingdom. He said, "I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now" (John 16:12).

Something did happen in A.D. 31! And it is my belief that something did happen also in 1844, something so important that God wanted it to attract immense attention, yet something so grand and infinite as to run the danger of seeming irrelevant to finite humans. Therefore, He let humans perceive it in the framework of His imminent return and He then cared about them through the disappointment, gradually opening to them the grander truth. This grander truth has to do with how God deals with mistakes.

The Sanctuary Today

In Dan 8:14, it is the sanctuary which is to be cleansed. By 1800, there was no Jewish temple or sanctuary for God here on earth. But the letter to the Hebrews affirms that there is a better sanctuary in heaven, the great original of which Moses' tabernacle was a copy (Heb 8:1-5; 9:23-24).

I showed you in another session that the Old Testament sanctuary was God's plan for separating the sin from the people and consuming it so that He could dwell with them without consuming them along with their sin. In order to do that, God Himself took responsibility for the evil for a time, until the Day of Atonement once a year when the final residue of responsibility was laid back on Satan for his part in the evil.

Revelation pictures the sanctuary as arranged in the same order as in the Old Testament system. There was the altar in the courtyard where the lamb was slain (Rev 6:9-10). There was the altar of incense with forgiveness affirmed by the priest (Rev 8:3-4). There was the ark of the testament where God's law resided, and where the high priest went once a year for the cleansing of the sanctuary (Rev 11:19). In the end, Revelation pictures the obsolescence of the sanctuary, stating that John "saw no temple . . . for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it" (Rev 21:3,22).

Evidently God will find a way to dwell with His people, even without the need of a sanctuary. This will be possible because even the residue of responsibility for sin will have been finally disposed of. That disposal will have vindicated God, His sanctuary, and His plan for bearing the responsibility for evil which does not belong to Him.

Actually, the sanctuary dealt with the mistakes of God's people. The people gathered around the sanctuary were God-worshipers who made mistakes. When they learned of their error, they brought their sin to the sanctuary. There it became God's responsibility.

When I accept Christ as my Saviour, when I first know I can't, God can, and I decide to let Him, then I become His responsibility. He writes my name in His book. It is His responsibility to point out my unrecognized mistakes, as I can take it. Of course, if I felt them all at once, I would die. When I do recognize my sin I confess to Him. It is then His responsibility also. It will be carried by the Lamb, forgiven, then consumed. If I should refuse to bring my mistakes to Him, if I should reverse my decision to let Him do this work in me, then my sins cannot be consumed without my being consumed along with them (Ezek 18;33). In the judgment, either my name or my sins will be blotted out; either I or my sins will be consumed.

But in that courtroom, the ledger will be balanced one day. God's truth will be vindicated. Then He will make wonderful restitution about all the mistakes Satan foists upon humans here.

For me, one of Satan's favorite ploys is to hurt another by my mistakes. His accusations work overtime when he can show me that my ignorance provided pain for someone else. I find peace in knowing that God Himself will make restitution to that other person for the evil Satan brought into his or her life. I also find strength in the eighth Law of Recovery, "Our new inner security frees us for thorough restitution."

Because God is helping me know my worth to Him, I find the willingness to make amends to others. Because I know I cannot save myself (remember Babylon) by good restitution, I do not have to force amends where they only open wounds. Because I trust Him for wisdom and courage, I can wait for His timing in the restoration of my relationships. Because I know He takes responsibility, I can take up the willingness.

In fact, the middle three Laws of Recovery are all operative in this restoration of relationships with others. Here is a shorthand version: "Affirm others, free others, and make restitution to others."

None of these can I do on my own, so I find myself repeating the first three: "I can't, He can, and I decide to let Him." Yet now is the time, especially since 1844, when God is in the business of restitution and restoration. He wants to do that restoration both in and through me.

When I think of affirming others, freeing others, and making restitution to others, I have a most delightful awareness of God's affirmation of me, His freedom for me, and His restoration of all things in my life.

What is the meaning of my mistakes? God takes responsibility.

And I? I take surrender—again.

Continued Hope of the Advent: Know that God Takes the Needed Time

If expectations about the coming of Jesus have been around for a long time, so have adjustments to a delay in that coming.

Some of the disappointed preachers from 1844 renounced the entire experience and returned to apathy and materialism and the new evolutionism. Others renounced the date, setting ever new dates for new disappointments. A few renounced not the date but the narrow understanding of the sanctuary. These found their identity in the prophecy of Rev 14:6-12.

Identity in Rev 14:6-12

In Rev 14:6-12, three angels fly in sequence. The disappointed ones found themselves in the first angel's announcement, "the hour of His judgment is come." They had preached it worldwide, as if flying in the midst of heaven.

They also found themselves in the second angel's announcement of the fall of Babylon. The revival had crossed denominational boundaries such that the preachers of the advent belonged to Baptist, Methodist Episcopal, Congregationalist, and Presbyterian persuasions. However, as some of those churches officially rejected the revival and expelled those believing in the soon coming of Jesus, the preachers of the advent began to apply the name "Babylon" and the state "fallen" to the churches who so turned them out. This was in late 1843 and early 1844.

These disappointed ones saw in the third angel's announcement the fate of those who rejected the hope of the soon coming. However, it was not until after the disappointment that they focused on Rev 14:12 as the part of the third angel's message which could provide them identity. The opening of the sanctuary to their minds (pictured in Rev 11:19) must call their attention to the Ten Commandment law housed in this ark of the testament. They noted the wording of the first angel's message as pointing back to the fourth commandment and saw the need for keeping God's commandments in this important time of history.

One of those believers who kept the date and broadened her understanding of the sanctuary was Ellen White. She had a vision in which she saw the three angels' messages compared to a platform of three steps. Two items are to be noted from the picture she recounts. First, the messages were to be understood in order, the steps taken in sequence. Second, one standing on the third was also standing on the first and second; the foundation was firm (Ellen G. White, Early Writings (Washington, DC: 1945), 256-259).

That little group has now become a worldwide Christian movement maintaining two distinctives: (1) they keep the seventh-day Sabbath; and (2) they look for the literal second advent of Christ as the culmination of an entire line of prophecy, as did most of the Christian world in 1800. (Next session I will discuss what happened to replace that teaching for many Christians.) Hence this little group, become big group, is called "Seventh-day Adventists."

This story of disappointment reminds me of Paul, who begged in vain for God to remove his thorn in the flesh. But God took responsibility for it, saying, "My grace is sufficient for you; for My strength is made perfect in weakness" (1 Cor 12:9).

The Three Angels' Messages Today

Then I want to review with you the three angels' messages of Rev 14 to understand their meaning for Christians today. Since they occupy the same place in Revelation as do the judgment and the cleansing of the sanctuary in Daniel, and since these are the apex of the two books, the hinges of reversal, they are of key importance to meaning of the books.

The purpose of the messages is to prepare a people to stand "without fault before the throne of God" (Rev 14:5) as Daniel stood without fault before the king and was vindicated (Dan 6:4).

The first angel announcing the everlasting gospel presents a worldwide call to fear, glorify, and worship the Creator God in this time of judgment (Rev 14:6-7).

According to the second angel, all systems which fear, glorify, or worship someone or something else are fallen systems. Babylon is a system of self-worship (Dan 4:30; Isa 14:4, 12-14) and self-dependence (Gen 11:4,9).

According to the third angel, there is coming a time of test, initiated by the angry accuser (Rev 12:12,17). Out of this time of test God will have a people to whom He can point in the universe for their patience (like Job), their commandment-keeping (cf. Rev 12:17), and their faith in Jesus (cf. Rev 12:11).

These messages prepare a people for the coming of the Son of Man on the clouds (cf. Dan 7:13); they ripen the harvest (Rev 14:14-15).

Ellen White compared the three messages to a firm platform so that anyone standing on the third is, by that fact, the more firmly planted on the first. Because there are similarities I see each set of three which I have explored with you tonight as a platform of three steps.

By affirming Christ's work of cleansing in my life, I have more firmly established myself on the cross; I am not leaving the cross. By going on into the inner sanctuary where the ark of the testament is and the law, I have not left the lamb behind; instead, He is the more surely there with me. By expecting a time of test in the future, I have not left the gospel of the first angel, but I preach it the more consistently.

My hope in the judgment is only in Christ, not at all in myself, in either a decision I have made or one I will yet make. Still, I find a certain assurance in decisions now that I know God makes Himself responsible for my sincere mistakes, as long as I remain in Him.

I would remember one more time now that God makes Himself responsible for all these things, the mistakes, the decisions, the growth, and the Three Angels' Messages. Only He can prepare a people to stand without fault (Jude 24). If I try, I fall into faultfinding!

Only He can arrange and empower the proclamation of the gospel (Acts 1:8). Only He is well able to bring me or anyone else to the realization of helplessness (Rom 2:4). Only He can accept the commitment of my will to Him without enslaving it, but instead empowering it.

Only He knows how much of the ignorance, habitual reactions, weakness, inefficiency, or trauma must be discovered and healed in order for me to be recognized as a commandment-keeper by the universe. Only He knows how quickly He can work in my life. Only He can determine the ripeness of the harvest or just what is required before He can come. Only He knows the day and the hour of His coming (Matt 24:36).

I have reviewed the story of continued hope regarding the second advent of Christ. I have found that God makes Himself responsible for the Christian's growth, and for sincere mistakes along the way. Perhaps you have kept Sunday diligently for as long as you have been a Christian, maybe years. You are not here by accident in this seminar. God made Himself responsible, and in His own right time, He brought you and me here to learn together what next steps He has in mind. God has a next step for your growth. Is it keeping the seventh-day Sabbath? You can know what is next for you.

God will indeed have a people to whom He can point, while saying to the universe, "Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus" (Rev 14:12). He will have that people who can be recognized as commandment-keepers precisely because they also keep the kind of faith which operated in Jesus' life. More on that next time.

What is the meaning of my mistakes?

God takes responsibility.

He takes the needed time.

And I? I take surrender—again.

Today I have explored with you human hope and disappointment and God's reaction to sincere mistakes. By reviewing the stories of disappointment and hope regarding the coming of Jesus, I can have assurance that God makes Himself responsible for the Christian's growth, and for my sincere mistakes along the way.

No Quick Cleaners

Suppose I found an unchipped antique crystal vase while I plowed up my garden. It had been buried as trash for many years. It was covered with algae and all sorts of other scum. It had drizzles of tar hardened in many places. And in the bottom of the crystal vase, cement had poured in and hardened. Evidently it had once lain near a construction site.

Suppose I happened to recognize the beauty and value of the vase and wanted to restore it. Would I expect to have it restored immediately? No, I would take great care—and time. I would take responsibility for the removal of the scum, algae, tar, and cement, even though I had nothing to do with causing it.

I would first scrub all the scum and algae off, and the sparkle would begin to show. Then I would begin work on the tar, perhaps with a solvent, but I would take time. During any of the process, I might show it to a friend so as to revel together in its perfection and the way it reflects the sunlight.

Finally, I would have a sparkling, unblemished vase except for the cement in the bottom. I might take it to some specialists; I might try some chemicals. I might chip away at that cement ever so slowly. Whatever I might do, it would take time.

I would be careful to take the time required not to break the vase. There are no quick cleaners.

Will you trust God today?

How to Find Meaning in Mistakes and Disappointment: