In 2022, for the first time in 180 years of Adventist history, a directive was included in the Church Manual (CM) implicitly calling for conferences to implement “authorized speaker guidelines” on a per conference basis (currently, 2025 ed. CM, p. 131). We believe those who framed and voted the idea exercised no ill intent. The guideline states that only “speakers worthy of confidence” shall be invited to speak in the pulpit––a worthy goal. Nevertheless, consider what must be the inevitable result of this (unprecedented) change.
(1) Such guidelines, by their very creation, reduce the scope of what can be presented from the pulpit. Meanwhile, the Bible itself contains widely diverse forms of content, from Ecclesiastes’ extended monologue, to parables, to the symbols of apocalyptic.
(2) The new existence of such guidelines introduces the question of who has authority to interpret them, adding an until-now non-existent layer of control over the pulpit.
(3) Such guidelines cannot possibly address in any adequate way the special needs of unique situations, contexts, and emergencies. All will recall that a form of authorized speaker guidelines was introduced at Acts 4:18; 5:28, as well as the response of the early church to those guidelines (Acts 5:42).
(4) Such guidelines will lead presenters to second guess themselves, accelerating self-editing and self-censorship.
(5) The piecemeal introduction of such guidelines on a per conference basis must inevitably lead to fragmentation and reduction in unity––thus reducing mission clarity. The North American Division alone has 59 conferences, which in accordance with the Church Manual directive, will doubtless lead to the production of several divergent, unique, and in some cases mutually exclusive guidelines. A kingdom divided against itself must falter.
(6) Conceptually, “guidelines” serves as a euphemism for “rules.” The harsh light of practice shows that guidelines are often treated as rules.
(7) The introduction of authorized speaker guidelines is a concrete demonstration of erosion of trust in the spiritual experience and Spirit-guidedness of speakers. Is this the message the Church means to transmit to pastors and lay presenters in their conferences?
(8) As the independence and initiative of the speaker is reduced by such guidelines, centralization of authority in conference administrators is correspondingly increased. “God has not given to special ones all the brain power there is in the world…. Men in responsible positions should credit others with some sense, with some ability of judgment and foresight, and look upon them as capable of doing the work committed to their hands” (Testimonies to Ministers, p. 301f).
(9) In the heat of perceived “crisis,” is it not inevitable that church administrators might go along with external pressure, employing “guidelines” to close the mouths of those workers who might speak out against the preferred narrative of the hour––exactly as Jewish leaders reacted to Jesus in John 11:48? We may ask what might have been the outcome if in the 2020-2022 period such guidelines had been pressed into operation on a wide scale when our civilization was awash in the propaganda of that hour?
(10) It may be that across several terms conference administrators would uphold the best aspects of such guidelines in full integrity. But such machinery, once introduced, must thereafter remain, ready to seduce administrators to seek to control the thought of workers.
To ask, “What alternative then,” is a fair question. The alternative is liberty.
Trust our workers. They will make mistakes sometimes, even as administrators make mistakes sometimes. Everyone’s authority is still in place just as it was in the first ~180 years of this movement. All must exercise discernment. But if there is any sacred place to exercise our greatest caution, it is at the pulpit. There we gather to hear the word of God proclaimed untrammeled by human restrictions. Otherwise, we may ourselves become the source of a dearth in the land, “not a famine for bread or a thirst for water, but rather for hearing the words of the Lord” (Amos 8:11).
****
Larry Kirkpatrick is the Executive Secretary of the Northern New England Conference.
