The term “general conference” has been so often used in Adventism that we too easily forget it is supposed to mean exactly what it says: A general assembly or gathering of individuals meeting for a specific goal or purpose.

The unit found in the SDA Reform Movement is based on the Bible and Spirit of Prophecy guidelines for church organization in the last days. Thus, the primary definition for us of the term “general conference,” refers specifically to the quadrennial sessions, where delegates elected by the church membership around the world assemble to report on the progress of God’s work in the various corners of the vineyard and together elect officers to carry out the decisions made to advance His cause around the world.

In the interim between delegation sessions, the General Conference Council elected at the quadrennial sessions assembles annually. The Executive Committee meets as needed and is entrusted with carrying out many of the decisions made at the delegation session of the worldwide church.

It would be a fallacy to think that the SDA Reform Movement General Conference office building in Roanoke, Virginia, U.S.A., is just a place for a few persons to labor when they are not promoting the Lord’s work in the various missionary fields. The building actually represents the work of God’s church as a whole, and the officers laboring there have been elected as representatives of the total membership of faithful men and women who comprise the entire SDA Reform Movement worldwide. Thus it represents a people who are pressing together to keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, operating in harmony with God’s organizational guidelines.

In 1874, “Brother A” (identified as Elder George I. Butler) was a minister who, when he finally had experienced genuine conversion, was greatly blessed by improving his attitude toward leadership among God’s people. An inspired Testimony written to increase his understanding is applicable also today:

“I have been shown that no man’s judgment should be surrendered to the judgment of any one man. But when the judgment of the General Conference, which is the highest authority that God has upon the earth, is exercised, private independence and private judgment must not be maintained, but be surrendered. Your error was in persistently maintaining your private judgment of your duty against the voice of the highest authority the Lord has upon the earth. After you had taken your own time, and after the work had been much hindered by your delay, you came to Battle Creek in answer to the repeated and urgent calls of the General Conference. You firmly maintained that you had done right in following your own convictions of duty. You considered it a virtue in you to persistently maintain your position of independence. You did not seem to have a true sense of the power that God has given to His church in the voice of the General Conference. You thought that in responding to the call made to you by the General Conference you were submitting to the judgment and mind of one man. You accordingly manifested an independence, a set, willful spirit, which was all wrong.

“God gave you a precious experience at that time which was of value to you, and which has greatly increased your success as a minister of Christ. Your proud, unyielding will was subdued. You had a genuine conversion. This led to reflection and to your position upon leadership. Your principles in regard to leadership are right, but you do not make the right application of them. If you should let the power in the church, the voice and judgment of the General Conference, stand in the place you have given my husband, there could then be no fault found with your position. But you greatly err in giving to one man’s mind and judgment that authority and influence which God has invested in His church in the judgment and voice of the General Conference.”1

When called into question, Ellen White testified of her own case in 1896, “I had not one ray of light that He [the Lord] would have me come to this country [Australia]. I came in submission to the voice of the General Conference, which I have ever maintained to be authority.”2

Many students of Advent history suspect that certain leaders at that time really wanted to send the Lord’s messenger to the opposite side of the world in an attempt to silence her words of reproof. But regardless of anyone’s motives, God was still able to use her as an instrument to promote His cause in that new continent. She honored the challenge and respected the leadership of His organization. The really crucial question arises later, after her death: When the General Conference of any given church goes so far as to disown the ten commandments of God and the faith of Jesus in word or in practice, then what? Such a body would be on very shaky ground and could not be trusted to bear the candlestick. We have been warned of that exact danger. (See The Review and Herald, June 7, 1887; Testimonies, vol. 4, p. 403.) The only hope for the last faithful remnant of that church is not to settle down into an easy spirit of independence, but rather to press together and ensure that the General Conference be based on right principles of sound doctrine.

From where do we get the idea of gospel order? In reporting one vision, the messenger of the Lord wrote: “I have been shown the order, the pertect order, of heaven, and have been enraptured as I listened to the perfect music there. After coming out of vision, the singing here has sounded very harsh and discordant. I have seen companies of angels, who stood in a hollow square, everyone having a harp of gold. . . . There is one angel who always leads, who first touches the harp and strikes the note, then all join in the rich, perfect music of heaven. It is melody, heavenly, divine, while from every countenance beams the image of Jesus, shining with glory unspeakable.”3

When the crisis of dealing with Lucifer came upon heaven and there was a job to be done, “the angels were marshaled in companies, each division with a higher commanding angel at its head.”4

Indeed, gospel order comes from heaven. Cherubim and seraphim are each given individual responsibilities which they execute faithfully and cheerfully, motivated by fervent love for their Creator.

In studying the scriptures we can readily observe the divine concept of order established from the earliest days of the ancient patriarchs. A system of gospel order was also employed in the time of the Exodus when, on the wise recommendation of Jethro, “Moses chose able men out of all Israel, and made them heads over the people, rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens. And they judged the people at all seasons: the hard causes they brought unto Moses, but every small matter they judged themselves” (Exodus 18:25, 26). (See also Numbers 31:48; Deuteronomy 1:15; 2 Chronicles 25:5.) Thus the people of God’s heritage were to be one great nation, with the opportunity to establish smaller units in which they could govern themselves. It was never God’s plan for Israel to look to an earthly king.

When Christ was on earth, He also organized the vast multitude of people into small companies when He, with the assistance of His disciples, ministered to human needs at the miracle of the loaves: “And he commanded them to make all sit down by companies upon the green grass. And they sat down in ranks, by hundreds, and by fifties” (Mark 6:39, 40).

After the ascension of Christ, important decisions involving the future and the welfare of the church were made by representatives of the worldwide body assembled at Jerusalem. Acts chapter 15 relates the history of one such general conference session in the early church. The apostle James served as the presiding officer, and major doctrinal issues were decided by the believers.

The Spirit of Prophecy writes: “The Lord has shown that gospel order has been too much feared and neglected. Formality should be shunned; but, in so doing, order should not be neglected. There is order in heaven. There was order in the church when Christ was upon the earth, and after His departure order was strictly observed among His apostles. And now in these last days, while God is bringing His children into the unity of the faith, there is more real need of order than ever before; for, as God unites His children, Satan and his evil angels are very busy to prevent this unity and to destroy it.”5

“I saw that this door at which the enemy comes in to perplex and trouble the flock can be shut. I inquired of the angel how it could be closed. He said, ‘The church must flee to God’s Word and become established upon gospel order, which has been overlooked and neglected.’ This is indispensably necessary in order to bring the church into the unity of the faith.”6

The apostle explained: “God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:9, 10).

According to these statements, it is clear that gospel order is more urgently needed today than ever before. It is considered absolutely essential in order for God’s people to come into unity of the faith. And unity of the faith is a basic prerequisite for the outpouring of the latter rain—the refreshing needed to enlighten this entire planet with the glory of God.