All through the Bible, when most of God’s people turned away, He kept a faithful “remnant.” Revelation says there will be one at the end of time too, and Seventh-day Adventists have long believed that God raised up their movement to call that remnant together. But the Bible never defines the remnant by a church roll. It defines it by character. This study looks at the marks God Himself gives, so that each of us can ask the only question that really matters: do I have them?
A Bible study · Arthur Baldwin · StandUp4Jesus.Org · 9 min read
God Has Always Had A Remnant
A remnant is what is left: the part that remains when the rest is gone. Again and again, God’s cause has been carried by a faithful few:
- Noah’s family: “wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water” (1 Peter 3:20).
- Gideon’s three hundred, chosen out of thirty-two thousand by a simple test of readiness (Judges 7).
- Elijah’s seven thousand, whom he did not even know about.
- The returning exiles: “the remnant of Israel… shall stay upon the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, in truth” (Isaiah 10:20).
“Yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him.”
1 Kings 19:18
And Paul applied it to his own day: “Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace” (Romans 11:5). Notice: by grace. Never by birth, nationality or membership.
The Remnant Of The Last Days
Revelation 12 traces God’s people, pictured as a woman, through centuries of persecution. Then it describes the last generation:
“And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.”
Revelation 12:17
“The remnant of her seed.” The same people appear again in Revelation 14, after the three angels’ messages:
“Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.”
Revelation 14:12
Seventh-day Adventists believe God raised up this movement in 1844 to proclaim those messages and to call His remnant together. (See The 3 Angels Messages, The Bride And The Dragon on Revelation 12 and The Everlasting Gospel To Every Nation on Revelation 14.) But notice how both verses describe the remnant: not by a name on a building, but by what they are.
The Marks Of The Remnant
1. They Keep The Commandments Of God
All ten of them, including the fourth, the one the rest of the world has forgotten (see The Bible Sabbath). Not as a way to earn salvation, but because they love the Lawgiver: “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15).
2. They Have The Faith Of Jesus
Not only faith in Jesus, but the faith of Jesus, the same trusting, obedient faith He lived by. This is righteousness by faith, the message God sent to this church in 1888 (see Jones And Waggoner Messages). Commandment-keeping without it becomes legalism; faith without obedience becomes presumption. The remnant has both.
3. They Have The Testimony Of Jesus
“The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy” (Revelation 19:10). The remnant values the prophetic gift God gave it, and lets it lead them back to the Bible (see The Gift Of Prophecy).
4. They Have Patience
“Here is the patience of the saints.” The Greek word means steadfast endurance. The remnant holds on through ridicule, loss and, in the end, a death decree.
5. They Follow The Lamb Wherever He Goes
“These are they which were not defiled with women; for they are virgins. These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God.”
Revelation 14:4-5
Not following a preacher, a tradition or a personal opinion, but following Jesus, even when the path costs them something.
6. No Guile In Their Mouth
Zephaniah described the remnant of his day in almost the same words John used:
“I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the LORD. The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid.”
Zephaniah 3:12-13
An “afflicted and poor people,” humble, honest and trusting. No hidden agendas, no flattery, no gossip. What they say is what they are.
7. They Sigh And Cry Over Sin
In Ezekiel’s vision, God marked only those who grieved over the sins around them, starting in His own sanctuary:
“And the LORD said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof.”
Ezekiel 9:4
“The class who do not feel grieved over their own spiritual declension, nor mourn over the sins of others, will be left without the seal of God.”
Ellen G. White · Testimonies for the Church, vol. 5, p. 211
8. They Are Filled With The Spirit
In Jesus’ parable, all ten virgins belonged to the wedding party, and all ten had lamps. Only five had oil (Matthew 25:1-13). The oil is the Holy Spirit (see The Holy Spirit and The Latter Rain).
9. They Love One Another
“By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another” (John 13:35). A people who keep every commandment but tear each other down have missed the heart of the law.
Not Every Adventist Is In The Remnant
This is the hard part, and it has to be said plainly. Belonging to the Seventh-day Adventist Church does not make anyone part of the remnant, any more than being born a Jew made someone part of Israel’s faithful few. Jesus warned:
“Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.”
Matthew 7:21
The last of the seven letters in Revelation is to Laodicea, the church of the end time. It is not a letter to unbelievers. It is a letter to a church that thinks it is rich and in need of nothing, and does not know it is “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked” (Revelation 3:17). Ellen White did not soften whom it applies to:
“The message to the Laodiceans is applicable to Seventh-day Adventists who have had great light and have not walked in the light. It is those who have made great profession, but have not kept in step with their Leader, that will be spewed out of His mouth unless they repent.”
Ellen G. White · God’s Remnant Church, p. 44
“Not all who profess to keep the Sabbath will be sealed. There are many even among those who teach the truth to others who will not receive the seal of God in their foreheads. They had the light of truth, they knew their Master’s will, they understood every point of our faith, but they had not corresponding works.”
Ellen G. White · Testimonies for the Church, vol. 5, p. 213
She also foresaw a shaking in the church, caused by the Laodicean message itself:
“Some will not bear this straight testimony. They will rise up against it, and this will cause a shaking among God’s people.”
Ellen G. White · Testimonies for the Church, vol. 1, p. 181
(See The Last Three Of The Seven Churches on Laodicea.)
But The Church Is Not Babylon
Some have drawn the wrong conclusion from all this and called on faithful members to leave the Adventist church. Ellen White firmly rejected that. The True Witness rebukes Laodicea, but He never calls it Babylon, and He is still knocking at its door (Revelation 3:20).
“They are not to be pronounced Babylon, but to be as the salt of the earth, the light of the world. They are to be the living messengers to proclaim a living message in these last days.”
Ellen G. White · God’s Remnant Church, p. 45
“True, there are tares with the wheat; but Christ said He would send His angels to first gather the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into the garner.”
Ellen G. White · God’s Remnant Church, p. 45
So the answer is not to leave, and not to judge who is wheat and who is tare. It is to make sure that I am wheat. The separation is the angels’ work, not ours.
The Remnant Is Bigger Than You Think
Just as not every Adventist will be in the remnant, not every member of the remnant is an Adventist yet. God has faithful people in every church who have never heard these truths:
“Notwithstanding the widespread declension of faith and piety, there are true followers of Christ in these churches.”
Ellen G. White · The Great Controversy, p. 464
In the last days, heaven itself will call them:
“And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.”
Revelation 18:4
“My people.” They already belong to Him. When the final message lightens the earth, they will hear His voice and come. The remnant at the very end will include many who today are Baptists, Catholics, Methodists or no church at all.
How To Be Part Of The Remnant
The remnant is not an exclusive club. Its door is open, and Joel describes who walks through it:
“And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the LORD hath said, and in the remnant whom the LORD shall call.”
Joel 2:32
Call on the name of the Lord. Let Him write His law in your heart. Ask Him for the faith of Jesus and the oil of the Spirit. Grieve over sin, starting with your own. Follow the Lamb wherever He goes. None of these marks can be earned or inherited; every one of them is a gift of grace, “a remnant according to the election of grace.”
(See The Hundred Forty And Four Thousand Defined, The Sanctuary And 1844 and The Mark Of The Beast.)
Keep Studying
- The 3 Angels Messages
- The Bible Sabbath: the commandments of God
- The Gift Of Prophecy: the testimony of Jesus
- Jones And Waggoner Messages: the faith of Jesus
- The Last Three Of The Seven Churches: Laodicea
- The Hundred Forty And Four Thousand Defined
- Important SDA Issues
