THE GOSPEL IN THE SETTING OF END-TIME EVENTS

The ADVENTIST CHURCH is a child of the Millerite Movement. Ellen Harmon, James White, and Joseph Bates, the three primary founders of the Adventist Church, were all members of the Millerite Movement. The Millerite Movement resulted from the proclamation of the first angel’s message of Revelation 14 by Father Miller, as he was called. For the Millerites and later for Seventh-day Adventists, end-time events were of major interest. The very reason for their existence was the expectation of the Second Coming.

When Jesus did not come on October 22, 1844, the disappointed little group of believers that was to become the Seventh-day Adventist Church searched the Scriptures to find out why Jesus had not appeared in the clouds of heaven as they had expected. Once they discovered that October 22 was the beginning of the pre-Advent judgment in Daniel 7:9-14, rather than the Second Coming, they proclaimed with certainty that Daniel’s prophecy had not failed and that Jesus’ coming was still in the future.