Hello Bob.
I thought Miller was an adventist?
A lot of people get that false idea because at the time the 'term" meant "pre-millennial 2nd coming" and concept which almost nobody endorsed - but Miller was one of the first to take it to the streets in America. Even Walter Martin in his book "Kingdom of the Cults" where he states that the SDA church is not a cult - argued that the big problem with Millerites and later Seventh-day ADventists by far - was their insistence on a pre-mill literal 2nd coming.
Mllerites themselves were called "Adventists" and most were Sunday keeping. Most never became "Seventh-day Adventists"
Miller never became a Seventh-day Adventist, never accepted the Sabbath never took our view of the 2300 years and Investigative Judgment event that it points to, never took any of our doctrines developed in the the SDA denomination which organized in the 1860's and never taught or promoted any of the visions of Ellen Harmon (later Ellen White) that started in late 1844.
The Methodists were ten commandment folk anyway.
So was C.H. Spurgeon and the "Baptist Confession of Faith".
So were Presbyterians and the "Westminster Confession of Faith"
So were Catholics.
So was almost every Christian denomination on the planet at that time.
That would not have been much of a unique identifier back in the early 1800's.
Are you proposing that the SDA was the only sabbath practicing
church?
Not at all - Adventists up until 1845-1846 were Sunday keeping. And it was Seventh-day Baptists that came along and convinced the early Adventist leaders that would later form the Seventh-day Adventist church -- to accept the fact that the TEN Commandments could not be edited not even the Sabbath Commandment. That was "news".
Miller started preaching in the 1830's about the 2300 year timeline and the expected 2nd coming in 1843-1844 - he was always Sunday keeping, never had any calms about eating pork, never vegetarian , never held our view of soul sleep, never knew anything at all about Ellen Harmon or Ellen White until near the very end of his life - and certainly not before the Oct 22, 1844 disappointment where he was fully convinced that his timeline had not worked and just gave up the whole thing.
People that attack William Miller as if they are attacking the SDA denomination are simply - clueless.
People that think that Ellen White was working or helping or in any way influential in the Millerite Oct 22, 1844 movement - are also without a clue when it comes to actual history. She was pre-teen and then teenager for most of that time - having a 3rd grade education and zero influence on the Millerites at all. In her own biographical account she states that it was shortly after the Oct 22, 1844 crisis and failure of Miller's movement to predict the correct event pointed to by the 2300 year timeline - that God first came to her with the anointing to be a prophet. She was very reluctant to have anything to do with it - but would not dishonor God by a determined 'no' as a response. William Foy had also been anointed by God as a prophet before that time and was relating his visions in the 1843-1844 time period but he turned away from it shortly after the spring of 1844.
Also Joseph Smith - a Mormon - was shot and killed in 1844 and his life was a horrific warning about false prophets. The 17 year old Ellen Harmon at the end of 1844 was not at all inclined to get into a prophetic ministry.
Adventists respect Miller like they respect Luther - as a great Christian, saint, a great pioneer that moved the ball down the field toward the goal line -- but we would never want to "Go back to what he believed" in either case.
