The preceding paragraph, as we have seen, brings to view two classes in the church. How fitting, then, to ask a question to be answered individually: “Who can truthfully say, ‘Our gold is tried in the fire; our garments are unspotted by the world’?” SDACBB 6.6
Is it correct to assume that in this quotation from the Testimonies the pronoun “our” refers to the Seventh-day Adventist Church as a body? Evidently not. It is plain that the insertion of “The Seventh-day Adventist Church’s” as the antecedent of this interrogatory pronoun is inconsistent with the call to purification and reformation set forth as the precious privilege of the backslidden, yet divinely beloved church. The Lord condemns, that He may pardon and save. It is Satan who uses the Lord’s rebukes to discourage and destroy. SDACBB 6.7