50 Fun Facts About Seventh-day Adventist Church

Which Adventist physician ran a Michigan sanitarium where he and his brother Will developed flaked breakfast cereals?

John Harvey Kellogg also invented a process for making peanut butter, but his unorthodox theology led the church to disfellowship him in 1907.

Which Seventh-day Adventist army medic earned the Medal of Honor on Okinawa in 1945 without ever carrying a weapon?

Desmond Doss saved an estimated 75 to 100 wounded men atop the cliff known as Hacksaw Ridge, which gave its name to the 2016 film about him.

Which rock and roll pioneer left the stage in 1957 to study theology at Oakwood College, an Adventist school in Alabama?

Little Richard was ordained a minister in 1970, and he is buried at Oakwood University Memorial Gardens in Huntsville.

On which day of the week, which they count as the seventh, do Seventh-day Adventists hold their main worship service?

Saturday worship usually opens with Sabbath School, a time of small-group Bible study built around a lesson guide issued every quarter.

The word Adventist in Seventh-day Adventist Church points to belief in the nearness of which event?

The Second Coming of Christ is belief 25 on the church's list, which describes it as personal, visible and worldwide and adds that its time has not been revealed.

Which common meat do Seventh-day Adventists class as unclean and avoid, following the food laws of Leviticus 11?

Pork is ruled out along with rabbit and shellfish, and the church goes further by recommending a vegetarian diet to its members.

Which Waco, Texas, sect led by David Koresh traces back to a reformer the Seventh-day Adventist Church expelled in 1930?

Branch Davidians grew out of the Davidians of Victor Houteff, whose Shepherd's Rod tracts the church rejected before revoking his membership.

Which act of humble service do Seventh-day Adventists perform for one another before sharing the Lord's Supper?

Foot washing, known as the Ordinance of Humility, recalls the Gospel account in John 13, and participants usually separate by gender to carry it out.

According to Seventh-day Adventist belief 26, what is the condition of people who have died, until the resurrection?

Unconscious, as in sleep, is how the church pictures the dead, a teaching often nicknamed soul sleep that sets it apart from most other denominations.

Which mode of baptism does Adventist belief 15 require, following instruction and a personal affirmation of faith?

Immersion in water stands for death to sin and a new life, the belief says, and it is how a person is received as a member of the church.

Following the biblical way of counting a day, Adventists begin and end their Sabbath at which point of the day?

Sunset opens the day of rest and the following one closes it, a pattern that belief 20 sums up as from evening to evening.

Which part of the Bible do Adventists say embodies God's law and binds all people in every age?

The Ten Commandments embody the great principles of God's law, belief 19 says, though it adds that salvation is all of grace and not of works.

Which two substances does Adventist belief 22 name, along with narcotics, as harmful things members abstain from?

Alcohol and tobacco are ruled out because the belief calls the body a temple of the Holy Spirit, to be cared for intelligently with exercise and rest.

Which spiritual gift do the Seventh-day Adventist fundamental beliefs call an identifying mark of the end-time church?

Prophecy, belief 18 says, was shown in the ministry of one of the church's co-founders, whose writings still carry authority for members.

Which quality does Adventist belief 26 reserve for God alone, setting the church apart from most of Christianity?

Immortality reaches the redeemed only as a gift at the resurrection, the church teaches, so no human soul is deathless by nature.

Which doctrine, doubted by several early Adventist leaders, now stands second among the church's fundamental beliefs?

The Trinity won acceptance only in the early 20th century, since some of the pioneers had come from the Christian Connexion, a movement that rejected the doctrine.

Which belief did Adventists add in 2005 after members in developing nations sought a statement on spiritual warfare?

Growing in Christ became belief number 11 by a vote of delegates meeting in Saint Louis, Missouri, lifting the total from 27 to 28.

Which belief closes the Seventh-day Adventist list of fundamental beliefs, promising an eternal home for the redeemed?

The New Earth, belief 28, pictures a perfect environment for everlasting life, love, joy and learning, where suffering and death have passed away.

Which War of 1812 captain turned preacher led the 1840s Advent movement out of which Seventh-day Adventism grew?

William Miller began preaching after years of studying the Bible verse by verse to answer his Deist friends, and his farm at Low Hampton, New York, is now a historic site.

What name do historians give to October 22, 1844, the date the 1840s Advent movement had fixed its hopes on?

The Great Disappointment scattered the movement, but one group decided the date was right and the expected event wrong, and from it grew the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Which farmer, crossing a cornfield on October 23, 1844, had the insight behind Adventist sanctuary teaching?

Hiram Edson said heaven seemed to open to his view in that field, showing him a High Priest entering a new room of the heavenly sanctuary that day.

Which former sea captain became the foremost champion of Sabbath-keeping among the early Adventists of the 1840s?

Joseph Bates had been pressed into the British navy and held prisoner in the War of 1812 before he rose to command a ship of his own.

Which Adventist co-founder, hit in the face by a stone at age nine, reported more than 2,000 visions and dreams?

Ellen G. White wrote that the injury turned her toward faith, and the tally of her visions is an estimate made by her grandson and biographer.

Who was sent to Europe in 1874 as the first official Adventist missionary and gave his name to a Michigan university?

J. N. Andrews took his two surviving children with him, helped start a publishing house in Switzerland and a French-language periodical, and is buried in Basel.

Which longtime editor of the Adventist Review and Herald also patented a car fronted by a fake horse head?

Uriah Smith named the car the Horsey Horseless and hoped the dummy head would keep it from frightening real horses, and he also patented an artificial leg.

Which Michigan city, later nicknamed Cereal City, hosted the 1863 meeting that founded the Seventh-day Adventist Church?

Battle Creek also housed the denomination's first hospital, college and publishing office, until fires in 1902 led the church to spread its institutions elsewhere.

Which Maryland community became the Seventh-day Adventist world headquarters after a 1989 move from Takoma Park?

Silver Spring took over from nearby Takoma Park, which had itself replaced the first head office in Michigan.

Which distinctive Adventist doctrine holds that Christ began a final phase of ministry in heaven's sanctuary in 1844?

The investigative judgment, belief 24 says, shows the watching universe who truly belongs to Christ and so vindicates God's justice in saving them.

Which Old Testament book contains the 2,300-day vision that Advent preachers of the 1840s used to reach the year 1844?

Daniel 8:14 ties the 2,300 days to the cleansing of the sanctuary, and the preachers counted each day as a year to reach their date.

Adventist belief 24 likens Christ's work since 1844 to the cleansing of the sanctuary on which ancient Hebrew holy day?

The Day of Atonement fell on October 22 in 1844 by the calendar the Advent movement followed, which is how that date came to be chosen.

Which book of the Bible contains the three angels' messages that Seventh-day Adventists treat as their special mission?

Revelation 14 is the passage, and the church's former symbol showed the three messengers circling a globe.

Which biblical term do Adventists use for the faithful group called out in the last days to give a final warning?

The remnant, in belief 13, has a worldwide witness to give, yet the same belief says the universal church is made up of all who truly believe in Christ.

In Seventh-day Adventist belief 6, what were the six periods of the creation week that ended with the first Sabbath?

Literal days, the belief says, joined with the Sabbath to form the same unit of time that we call a week today, in a creation it describes as recent.

Which archangel's name do many Adventist scholars read as a title of the pre-existent Christ, not a created angel?

Michael, in this reading, is the eternal Word by whom all things were created, a view Adventists say takes nothing away from the full deity of Jesus.

Because Adventists do not baptize infants, which service do parents and congregations hold for a young child instead?

A dedication expresses the gratitude of parents and church for the child and their pledge to raise it in the faith, since baptism is held to need knowing consent.

According to belief 16, who is welcome to take the bread and cup at a Seventh-day Adventist communion service?

All believing Christians may take part, a practice known as open communion, and Adventist congregations usually hold the service four times a year.

Which world gathering of Adventists, like the one held in San Antonio in 2015, may revise the fundamental beliefs?

A General Conference Session is where the preamble says revision may be expected, whenever the church reaches a fuller understanding or finds better language.

Which 1892 book, the most widely read work of an Adventist co-founder, has been translated into about 160 languages?

Steps to Christ first appeared through the commercial publisher Fleming H. Revell, and the Adventist Review and Herald press began printing it in 1896.

The Seventh-day Adventist school system is described as the world's second largest, behind that of which church?

Catholic schools alone outnumber the Adventist network, which runs from primary schools up to more than 100 colleges, universities and other post-secondary institutions.

Which Adventist youth club, official since 1950, resembles scouting and gathers its members at events called camporees?

Pathfinders grew out of boys' clubs started at Takoma Park, Maryland, in 1911, and the first camporee met in Massachusetts in 1953.

Which Adventist neurosurgeon led the 1987 team credited with first separating twins joined at the back of the head?

Ben Carson had become the youngest chief of pediatric neurosurgery in the United States three years earlier, at the age of 33.

Which Pacific island, settled by the Bounty mutineers, turned largely Adventist after a lay missionary's 1886 visit?

Pitcairn heard the message from layman John Tay, who came back in 1890 aboard a mission schooner named for the island, bringing a minister to baptize converts.

In Seventh-day Adventist belief 27, who occupies the desolate earth with his angels during the millennium?

Satan is left on a planet without living human inhabitants while the saints reign in heaven, and the Holy City descends only when the thousand years close.

In Seventh-day Adventist belief 27, what does fire from God do to the unrighteous once the millennium has ended?

It consumes them entirely, leaving a universe free of sin and sinners, a teaching called annihilationism that rejects the idea of an ever-burning hell.

What was the title of the first periodical of the Sabbath-keeping Adventists, launched in July 1849 with 1,000 copies?

The Present Truth ran to eleven issues in 1849 and 1850, and its first number was posted to friends the believers hoped would take an interest.

Which abolitionist minister became the first president of the Adventist world church when it organized in 1863?

John Byington, a former Methodist who left that church over slavery, served two one-year terms after the first man elected had declined the post.

Which retired Navy rear admiral became the first Seventh-day Adventist chaplain of the United States Senate in 2003?

Barry Black, who had headed the Navy's own chaplains, was also the first African American to hold the Senate post.

Which breakfast cereal, sold in Australia and New Zealand, is the flagship of the Adventist-owned Sanitarium company?

Weet-Bix comes from a company founded in Melbourne in 1898 and wholly owned by the church, and every product it makes is plant derived or vegetarian.

Which humanitarian agency, at work in more than 100 countries, serves as the Seventh-day Adventist Church's aid arm?

ADRA stands for the Adventist Development and Relief Agency, and it groups its projects under health, education, livelihoods and emergency response.

Which official Adventist television network launched in 2003 as the successor to Adventist Television Network?

Hope Channel broadcasts around the clock on cable, satellite and the internet, and its Spanish-language arm for the Americas is called Nuevo Tiempo.