@Davy
Here is a quote from one of the most prolific Adventist writers on the subject of salvation, righteousness by faith. This is Adventist teaching to the very core. Read carefully, and cease your constant accusations and false claims of legalism and salvation by works simply on the basis of your prejudices against not only Adventism, but the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.
Quote.
Christ has been set forth by God as the One through whom forgiveness of sins is to be obtained; and this forgiveness consists simply in the declaration of His righteousness (
which is the righteousness of God) for their remission. God, "who is rich in mercy" (Eph. 2:4) and who delights in it, puts
His own righteousness on the sinner who believes in Jesus, as a substitute for his sins. Surely, this is a profitable exchange for the sinner, and it is no loss to God, for He is infinite in holiness and the supply can never be diminished. The scripture that we have just been considering (Rom. 3:24- 26) is but another statement of verses 21, 22, following the declaration that
by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be made righteous. The apostle adds, "But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe." God puts His righteousness upon the believer. He covers him with it, so that his sin no more appears. Then the forgiven one can exclaim with the prophet: "I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels. Isa. 61:10.
But what about "the righteousness of God without the law"? How does that accord with the statement that the law is the righteousness of God, and that outside of its requirements there is no righteousness? There is no contradiction here. The law is not ignored by this process. Note carefully: Who gave the law? Christ. How did He speak it? "As one having authority," even as God. The law sprang from Him the same as from the Father, and is simply a declaration of the righteousness of His character.
Therefore the righteousness which comes by the faith of Jesus Christ is the same righteousness that is epitomized in the law, and this is further proved by the fact that it is "witnessed by the law." Let the reader try to picture the scene. Here stands the law as the swift witness against the sinner.
It cannot change, and it will not call a sinner a righteous man. The convicted sinner tries again and again to obtain righteousness from the law, but it resists all his advances. It cannot be bribed by any amount of penance or professedly good deeds. But here stands Christ, "full of grace" as well as of truth, calling the sinner to Him. At last the sinner, weary of the vain struggle to get righteousness from the law, listens to the voice of Christ and flees to His outstretched arms. Hiding in Christ, he is covered with His righteousness, and now behold! he has obtained, through faith in Christ, that for which he has been vainly striving. He has the righteousness which the law requires, and it is the genuine article, because he obtained it from the Source of Righteousness, from the very place whence the law came. And the law witnesses to the genuineness of this righteousness. It says that so long as the man retains that, it will go into court and defend him against all accusers. It will witness to the fact that he is a righteous man. With the righteousness which is "through the faith of Christ, 63 the righteousness which is of God by faith" (Phil. 3:9), Paul was sure that he would stand secure in the day of Christ.
That is a small excerpt from his book, Christ and His Righteousness, by E J Waggoner.
There is not a hint, or the slightest suggestion in any of what he wrote, a later Adventist pioneer, that Adventists, as a denomination, seek to be justified by the law.
