SDAs aren’t the only Adventists: The Adventist Family Tree

Coming up – a tour through this chart I made, the most detailed one in existence showing the family tree of Adventism.

When someone says “Adventist”, nearly everyone’s mind goes to one place: The Seventh-day Adventist Church. And there’s good reason for that. The SDA Church (as it is known) is by far the largest denomination that self-identifies as Adventist today. It has about 23 million people in 100,000 churches. However, there are other denominations in the Adventist family, and there are also denominations that sprang out of Adventism, even though they may not use that title today. This video will give you an overview of these groups.

“Adventist” as a name simply takes a name for the return of Christ, His second coming, that being “The Second Advent” and condenses it down to Advent, and adds a suffix to apply it to a group of people. As such, the name “Adventist” in itself is hardly controversial, as pointed out by one Sylvester Bliss in the book “Memoirs of William Miller”, where he said,

“It is again said that we have no right to be called Adventists because there are others who believe in the premillennial advent and that to apply it to ourselves is arrogancy. To this I reply that it cannot be arrogancy if no others claim it but ourselves. We do not claim it belongs to us exclusively. All have a right to it who wish thus to be designated. But those who repudiate the name have surely no right to find fault with our use of it. Such can have no claim to it.”[1]

This book was published in 1853, and the SDA church was organized a decade later in 1863, so the name “Adventist” was in use long before that. Followers of the teachings of nineteenth-century prophetic lecturer William Miller were for a while called Millerites, and Miller predicted that the Second Advent would occur between March 21, 1843 and March 21, 1844. When that didn’t happen another date was set, and what that too failed to materialize, many followers of the teaching left the movement altogether, and those who did say were rather ready to see the name of “Millerite” go away. The following was published in the Advent Shield and review:

“We confess then that Mr. Miller has published to the world as one of his principles of faith in this matter that Jesus Christ will come again to this earth cleanse purify and take possession of the same with all his saints some time between March 21, 1843 and March 21, 1844. We confess that March 21, 1844 is now in the past… We confess that so far as the time is concerned in particular we are no longer Millerites.”[2]

The date for this publication was May 1844, and the title of the article was The Millerite’s Confession and Adventist’s Apology,” so it’s clear that the name of Adventist was in use along with others like “Second Advent People” seen here in a book critical of the movement in 1843.[3]

Since the name of Adventist was already in use, and not particularly objectionable, when Millerite leaders came together to discuss the future of their movement at the Albany Conference in 1845, it’s not surprising that the name they decided to self-identify with was “Adventist.”

Though Adventism eventually resulted in formal denominations, the Millerite movement was multi-denominational. In 1844, a Seventh Day Baptist named Rachel Oakes Preston shared her belief in the Seventh-day Sabbath with a Millerite Methodist minister, Frederick Wheeler, who was preaching in a church part of the denomination called the Christian Connexion. He came to accept the teaching, and became the first Sabbatarian Adventist minister. Eventually, more Adventists began to adopt the seventh-day Sabbath and the issue of the Sabbath became controversial in the movement, leading to distinct seventh-day and Sunday Adventist subgroups. Additionally, within the Seventh-day side, a woman named Ellen White became an influential prophetic influence, and so there came to be a division between those who accepted her teachings and those who did not.

For a while, many of the Adventist subgroups consisted mostly of autonomous churches.

Of those who did accept Ellen White’s teachings, in 1863 a denomination was formed, called the Seventh-day Adventist Church. They teach Conditional Immortality, Unconsciousness in death, An Investigative judgment beginning in 1844, a future Millennial Kingdom where Christ reigns with his people from heaven, and teaches in observing the food laws.

For Adventists who did not accept Ellen White’s teachings, in 1884 the General Conference of the Church of God was organized. They have since renamed to the Church of God (Seventh Day.)

The Church of God (Seventh Day) has a Binitarian view of God – Father and son are God, but the Holy Spirit is not a person. This is another difference from the SDA church. They observe the laws of unclean meats, believe in conditional immortality, unconsciousness in death. They don’t recognize any importance to the year 1844 and won’t observe holidays like Christmas and Easter.

Before the denominations just mentioned had formed, the Advent Christian Church or Advent Christian General Conference was founded back in 1860 as a First-day Adventist Group. It is trinitarian and holds to traditional Adventist doctrines like unconsciousness in death and conditional immortality, and is part of the National Association of Evangelicals.

 Any denomination on this chart in black still exists today.

 In 1916 the first Free SDA church left the Seventh-day Adventist Church over issues of racial segregation. They too are Trinitarian, accept Ellen White and have very similar beliefs to the SDA church including things like the investigative judgment, There are two organizations today that use this same name of “Free Seventh Day Adventist”, both quite small.

The Seventh-day Adventist Reform Movement began over issues of noncombatancy in war, which they hold to strongly. The issue that led to their founding began in World War 1, and they mark 1925 as the founding year of the church. It began in Germany but today is headquartered in the US. In 1952, the movement divided in half mostly over internal non-theological disputes, with the Seventh-day Adventist Reform Movement International Missionary Society separating. Both of these are separate denominations with their own churches. In many ways their theology matches the SDA church, but they do have a more complex view on the godhead while still affirming three persons, they are vegetarian, wear more conservative clothing, and have stricter views on remarriage. For simplicity, the chart shows many continuing denominations with downward pointing arrows at the bottom to indicate their continued existence, while making room for new denominations on the chart.

In 1929 Victor Houteff wrote a book called “The Shepherd’s Rod”, and those who followed him also went under this name. He was expelled from the SDA church in 1930, but he encouraged his followers to continue to attend SDA churches, which is still the policy today. In 1942 Houteff’s organization took the name of The Davidian Seventh-day Adventists. After Houteff’s death in 1955, His wife took over, changed some teachings, and ultimately dissolved the organization in 1962. As a result, many organizations have popped up to continue Davidian theology, and there is an ongoing dispute over which organization is the true heir of this movement. Davidians believe that Houteff in addition to Ellen White was the Spirit of Prophecy to the church, that the 144,000 in the Bible is a literal number of faithful people who will be left living in the end times, and that there will be a future judgment on the SDA church by angels which will destroy those who reject the Davidian message.

Also in 1955 the Branch Davidians were founded by Benjamin Roden. From them in 1983 David Koresh formed a competing Branch Davidian group which he used to try to legally gain control of the main Branch Davidian organization. Koresh’s group ended at the 1993 Siege in Waco, Texas, but the original Branch Davidians still exist. They have many unusual teachings, but among them they teach that God the Father has a physical body, in fact everything is physical, no non-material things exist. They teach that the Holy Spirit is female, and they have no Bible Canon. They still respect the teachings of White and Houteff though they don’t agree with everything.

Let’s go back in time now to just a few years after the Davidians began. 1932 marks the beginning of a church founded by a former SDA elder, the Adventist Church of Promise in Brazil. They rejected Ellen White’s teachings, note that groups in the area with the cream-colored background respect Ellen White’s teachings, while those in other areas of the chart do not. Additionally, the Adventist Church of Promise is Pentecostal and rejects the Investigative Judgment, but still holds many other Adventist beliefs like unconsciousness in death, conditional immortality, and the Millennial reign in Heaven.

The Seventh-day Adventist Church today is Trinitarian, and not homogeneous – there are different “wings” of the church as it were. Some Adventists in the 1950s who would identify as conservatives felt that the church was drifting from its roots, and reject the Trinitarian view. These claimed to be the heirs to true SDA doctrine and identify as “Historic Adventists.” I show them diverging from the SDA church here in the 1950s because until that point they were within it. Realize that they did exist before then, but now in most cases have their own churches outside of the SDA’s General Conference denomination structure.

Let’s look back over to the Church of God (Seventh Day). In 1933, they divided, with a group leaving and forming the Salem, West Virginia Conference. The Salem group merged back in in 1949, but not everyone was happy, and some of them left again in 1950 to re-form the Salem group which still exists today. In fact, 1950 was a three-way split with the original group, now located in Denver, Colorado, the Salem group, and another group in Meridian Idaho which exited Mainly due to a desire for congregational government.[4]

Now I am mostly not mentioning groups that don’t exist today, but I brought up the existence of the 1933-1949 Salem Church of God Seventh Day because it was this group that Herbert W Armstrong belonged to. He was ordained in 1931 before the division, and in 1934 he founded the Radio Church of God, and his credentials were revoked by the Church of God Salem West Virginia in 1937. The Radio Church of God became the Worldwide Church of God and experienced rapid growth. It taught the necessity of keeping the Biblical Feast Days and that people could become part of the God Family. They believed that the Millennium will be on earth and most of humanity will be resurrected to life at that time and receive an opportunity for salvation. They taught British Israelism, that the people of Great Britain, and by extension most in the US and Australia, were descendants of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. They opposed voting and running for political office. I put this church and those that divided from it on this chart because it developed from Adventist roots and theology. However, today it may be viewed as having moved outside Adventism, it is sometimes but not always categorized as Adventist. Shortly after Armstrong died in 1986, the following presidents moved the church’s beliefs radically away from their original teachings, leading to the majority of members leaving over the next decades. Some of these formed new denominations to retain the doctrines that Armstrong taught. Even before the changes the Church of God International was formed in 1978, and from it in 1998 came the intercontinental church of God. In 1989 the Philadelphia Church of God was founded, and 1992 was the beginning of the Church of the Great God. Also in 1992 the Global Church of God was founded. There were major upheavals, leading to the almost complete dissolving of the church’s US operations, but years later it relaunched in the US as the Church of the Eternal God. From the Global Church of God the Living Church of God split in 1998, and the Restored Church of God in 1999. In 2012, the Continuing Church of God split from the Living Church of God, and in 2020 the Church of God Assembly split from the Living Church of God. In 1995, what is currently the largest Church of God group was founded, the United Church of God. In 1998 it split, with the Church of God an International Community being founded. Again in 2010 it split with the formation of the Church of God a Worldwide Association.

This is less than 1/10 of the splits that have occurred from the breakup of the Worldwide Church of God. One count says that there have been over 200 groups formed, and others give higher numbers.

 In 2009 the Worldwide Church of God, no longer teaching Armstrong’s doctrines, renamed to Grace Communion International.

Let’s also look at a few more groups that are Adventist-influenced. Back in 1848 the Christadelphians came into Existence. They are Unitarian, and their founder John Thomas belonged to the Church of Christ restoration movement of Stone and Campbell before leaving due to major doctrinal differences. Being founded in the early days of the Adventist movement, there was a lot of cross-discussion here and there’s no doubt that Adventism had an influence here, for example, they affirm conditional immortality and unconsciousness in death. They meet on Sunday, and teach that there is no literal Devil, that Baptism is necessary for salvation, have weekly communion, and that some who have already died will never be raised to life, even to face judgment.

 

In 1881, Charles Taze Russell founded the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, and those who followed his theology were called Bible Students. He admitted that Adventist theology had affected his own, for example, in their understanding of unconsciousness in death and conditional immortality. After Russell Died, future Watchtower presidents changed some teachings, and many Bible Students left the organization to start independent Bible Student congregations. To distance from these, the main group picked the name of Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1931. Though neither Jehovah’s Witnesses or Bible Students are often categorized as Adventists, again, there’s no doubt of the Adventist influence in their theology.

Both groups are theologically Unitarian, viewing only God the Father as the Almighty God and the Holy Spirit as just the influence of God. Both generally meet on Sunday.

Bible Students believe Christ returned already in 1874 and Jehovah’s Witnesses say he did in 1914, and both teach that he is present invisibly today.
 Jehovah’s Witnesses don’t observe holidays, but Bible Students in most cases are fine with them.
 Bible students have autonomous congregations, while Jehovah’s Witnesses are led by a Governing Body. Neither group observes the unclean food laws of the Bible.

 

The Church of God General Conference is a Biblical Unitarian group that formed from other looser movements merging and officially organized in 1921. Unlike some of the groups just mentioned, this one is normally categorized properly as Adventist. They affirm conditional immortality, unconsciousness in death, and have congregational government. They are mostly young-earth creationists, believe the Devil is a personal being, generally meet on Sunday, and don’t observe food laws.

Finally, the Sacred Name Movement has been Adventist-influenced. Assemblies of Yahweh is the largest group within it, and its founder was influenced by others who had been associated with Herbert Armstrong and with the Church of God Seventh Day. Because of this, they also teach in a God Family and the necessity of keeping the Biblical Feast days. They observe the food laws, teach in a future Millennium on earth, and they also teach that a person must know the proper name of God, Yahweh, and the Son, Yahshua, to be saved. Men do not shave and women wear head coverings in worship. They teach nonviolence and avoid politics.

This list is not exhaustive, but hopefully it has broadened your understanding of the Adventist movement. I have made detailed videos on a dozen or more of the denominations mentioned in this video, so make sure to check out the Adventist playlist here if you want to learn more.