Faculty Research Grant 2022-2023

Denis Kaiser (Church History).

The Way the Lord Has Led Us: The Doctrine of God in Seventh-day Adventist History.

The doctrine of the Trinity is a foundational belief of Christianity in general and Seventh-day Adventists in particular. In the last twenty years, Adventist historians have shown how the early Adventists gradually grow from their initial Antitrinitarian beginnings to a biblical Trinitarianism starting in the mid/late 1890s (macro-developments). However, modern-day Adventist Antitrinitarianism challenges those findings by using historical sources selectively, and continues to spread around the world by using new arguments that were not addressed in prior studies. My preliminary research shows that neither prior Adventist historians nor those Antitrinitarians are aware of numerous micro-developments and a massive number of historical documents that show how advocacy of the full divinity of Jesus, the personality of the Holy Spirit, and the doctrine of the Trinity started far earlier than initially thought. Some of the data has been misinterpreted by both Trinitarians and non-Trinitarians. In this research project, I want to research Adventist historical documents in various archives, research centers, and online databases to prepare a definitive study with a more precise and balanced delineation of the historical-theological development of the doctrines of God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit in Seventh-day Adventism from the mid-1840s to the 1950s.