Fred Wright: From God or Not?

(The reason for this post, is that some here on the forum have been influenced by reading books written by Fred Wright, therefore, since we were deeply involved in the Fred Wright Movement 25 years ago, when it was at it's prime, we feel we must tell you what we know, as few people were involved like we were.)

Over 25 years ago, Al and I were introduced to Fred Wright (who was (he is dead now) the head of his own “Movement”. Al and I had just been married, less than a year, and Al was a brand new Adventist. Someone gave us one of his books, which we read, and for the next three years, we read every book he had, went to his yearly campmeetings in Arkansas, had Fred Wright stay at our house, and got to know him rather well. That is where we were first introduced to Jones and Waggoner, as well.

This was a 3-year chapter of our lives that we wished we had never experienced. We don’t like talking about this time in our lives, as we feel bad we were duped for 3 full years. At times, we felt like we had lost 3 years of our lives. But, as we look back, and contemplate this quote –

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“If you have made mistakes, you certainly gain a victory if you see these mistakes and regard them as beacons of warning. Thus you turn defeat into victory, disappointing the enemy and honoring your Redeemer.” {COL 332.2}

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we believe that we learned lessons early in our spiritual life, which have saved us from making perhaps an even worse mistake. And, we try to communicate to others, when circumstances open the way, where we fell, and learned valuable lessons, so hopefully they don’t have to repeat our mistakes. It is with this in mind, that I share with you, what we know about Fred Wright. Perhaps, when I tell you a few things he taught, you may think, "How could anyone have believed that?" Well, if someone is a masterful teacher, they can pretty much make light look like darkness and darkness look like light. Is that not what Satan did to 1/3 of the angels? Had we been stronger students in the Spirit of Prophecy, we would not have made this mistake.

I will not be able to quote from his books, as we threw them away many years ago, but believe me, we KNOW what he taught. By the way, Fred was an extremely good teacher. He was not a great preacher, but he was an extremely good teacher. Once he got you on his foundation, he could carry you along to his conclusions. It was said of Fred Wright, that “NO ONE could quote the Spirit of Prophecy like Fred Wright, except Robert Brimsmead.” At his campmeetings, he would quote Spirit of Prophecy quotes, word for word, for 5 meetings a day, for 8 days, quote after quote. It was very impressive.

Fred had a teaching called, “Let God Be Your Doctor”. Basically, the teaching was, “God didn’t want you to go to the Dr., He wanted us to make Him our Dr.” Somewhere in our 3 year period of being in the Movement, we had our 2nd child, Erin. It was a Sabbath and we were meeting with other believers at someone’s house. I had just finished nursing Erin, and I realized she had stopped breathing. She didn’t breath for what seemed like “forever”. She turned so purple…it was so scary. She had done this a couple times before, but not for so long… We decided we didn’t have “enough faith” and took her to Rainbows Children’s Hospital. It turned out that she had a valve in her esophagus that was not fully developed when she was born, and that after she nursed, she would burp, and because that valve was not working properly, she would choke. They said this is actually what happens to many babies that are said to have died of SIDS. Anyways, for the next 6 months, we had her on a monitor, and we slept with the lights on. (The really bad part about this – which we didn’t know at the time, was that he wasn’t even into the health message. God isn’t going to keep people well, who don’t do their part.)

Fred taught another teaching called, “Let God Be Your Plan Maker”. A year after we got married, Al got a job at the Post Office, as a mailman. We were living in the inner city at the time, and had no children. When the first baby was born, my desire to get out of the city was very strong. I would read what Ellen White said about living in the Country….and go driving around the Country, looking for a home….come home, and read what Fred wrote about letting God be your “Plan Maker”, and feel really guilty. His understanding was, “you do nothing but pray. If God wants to move you out of the city, He will do it…you do nothing.” So for months, I went through this mental battle in my mind, of doing what the Spirit of Prophecy taught, or doing what Fred said the Spirit of Prophecy taught. As I said, once he got you on his foundation, it was very hard to get off.

Fred had another teaching, can’t remember what it was called, but it taught that, “If your mate was not “spiritual” you had grounds for divorcing your mate.” (It broadened the Biblical teaching that if your mate dies, you are free to remarry, to include if your mate is “spiritually dead” you are free to remarry.) A woman in our very own group believed this and did exactly this.

He wrote a book called, “Behold Your God” teaching that God does not destroy. When we first read it, we thought it was full of wonderful truth, just like we thought of everything else he wrote….but after 3 years, and other things developed that caused us to restudy EVERYTHING we learned from him, we saw how he had masterfully twisted the Spirit of Prophecy and the Bible and came up with very, very wrong understandings of God’s character.

Fred was very high on Jones and Waggoner, and we don’t remember where he ever admitted they got off the track. It was through Fred’s influence that Al read nearly everything Jones & Waggoner ever wrote, and some things, more than once. (Tom, you asked once if Al was reading Jones to find light or to be critical – I can assure you, his reason for reading Jones was to find light…but he found light mixed with darkness.) You have to remember, Al was a brand new Adventist, a brand new Christian…never grew up with even a Bible in his house and had only been going to church a short time before he met me, it wasn’t like he had any kind of a foundation to compare what he was learning to…and I, well, I should have known better. I was about 21 at the time, and never have been good at memorizing Scripture and when things get very deep, they lose me….I am better at seeing “practical” things, and at reading the fruits of a person.

Just before the 3rd campmeeting the 1st red flag went up. Fred had stayed for several days at my parents house – and insisted that my mother purchase milk (cows milk) for him for his cereal, and eggs also, for his breakfast. I have been a vegan for nearly 35 years…and when he insisted on eggs and milk, well, that didn’t set too good with us. Our eyes were beginning to be opened, and we were beginning to question things. (That was a “no-no” too, as we were taught that Fred was God’s last day messenger, and if we ever thought of leaving the movement, well, basically, we were going to be lost. We were told never to communicate with those who had left, and so, when people did leave, we never really found out why.) Well, since this whole experience, we have learned that we will NEVER trust a minister who is not walking in the health reform. If he is still eating dairy products, than there is something wrong. (I hope I’m not offending anyone…but if you are still eating dairy products, then you should go and read what Ellen White has to say about it.)
So, we went then, to our 3rd campmeeting in Arkansas. By this time, we were having a problem with a few things, the diary question, “Make God Your Doctor”, and “Make God Your Plan Maker”. Yet, we still thought he was God’s messenger. We invited an elderly friend of ours from KY to come to the campmeeting with us. We picked her up and took her. This lady was a real Christian. About 2 days into the meetings, she came to us and said, “I have to go home, I can’t stay any longer.” But, she wouldn’t tell us what was on her mind. She probably didn’t think we would be able to handle it…anyways, we took her to the bus station and sent her home. Later, after we were out of the Movement, our friend told us she saw Fred making out with one of the women there, and she knew he was straight from the devil. Of course, we didn’t know this and hadn’t seen an indication of it, either.

What really opened our eyes, and was the end, was when we received a call from someone in Quebec (a SDA Pastor and his wife had left the church and gone with the Movement). Fred was staying at this Pastor’s home, and his wife was cleaning his room one day, and came upon a letter on his desk that he had written to a woman in New Zealand. A very sexually graphic and horrible letter, He obviously was having an affair with this woman. So, when we heard this, we knew, something was dreadfully wrong. We had a meeting with the people we were meeting with at the time, and they didn’t believe it. Finally, they said, “Well, let’s call Fred and ask him if it is true.” So, there were about four phones in the house….they called Fred, and he just happened to be doing a campmeeting in Australia at the time. They talked for a minute and the head elder from our place finally asked him, “Fred, what is this I hear about you and a woman in Newfoundland?” He said, “I don’t even know a woman in Newfoundland.” Thankfully Al was on one of the phone, or that would have been the end of the conversation. Al spoke up and said, “Fred, it wasn’t Newfoundland, it was New Zealand.” He stammered and said, “Ah, Ah, there was a woman in Washington…” And as it turned out, he had more than one woman around the World he was carrying on affairs with.

Well, first thing we did, was to ask God to show us, “What do we do now?” We went to the Spirit of Prophecy, and it was clear, God isn’t using a man who is living in sin. So, that made us have to go back and study everything we had learned for the last 3 years. It was a hard lesson. But, thank God, we learned much from it. We found out that every teaching he taught was mixed with error (including God Does Not Destroy). We learned to never trust a minister who is not living as well as teaching the health message. We learned to be much more critical of what someone is teaching, to not just read what they are saying, but to go back and really measure it by the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy. That alone, has saved us from accepting others who are teaching false doctrines.

Even though Fred Wright is dead, his books are still around, which means his teachings are still around, too. If we would have known what we know now, about Fred Wright, his character and all, we would never have read his books in the first place. That is why I’m writing this, hoping that it will prevent someone else from making the same mistake that we did.

The really sad thing about this is that when we found out what kind of a life he was living, we called EVERYONE in the Movement, I mean EVERYONE. Sadly, very few left the Movement. Fred was able to come up with some underhanded reasoning from the Bible, using David’s sin with Bathsheba as an example, to put most everyone’s mind at ease.

Perhaps now, you will understand a little more about us, and why we are so careful to read and stick to the Spirit of Prophecy. We have been led astray, and we don’t want to repeat our mistake. If you have read or are reading anything written by Fred Wright, know that it is truth mixed with error, which is ALWAYS dangerous.

[ March 12, 2006, 09:45 AM: Message edited by: Tammy Roesch ]

Here is one example of how Fred Wright twists the Spirit of Prophecy, in regards to God Does Not Destroy or God Does Not Kill.

One of Fred’s key quotes for supporting his doctrine that God does not kill is this:

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“God destroys no one.” 5T -120.

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But he fails to tell you that the very next paragraph shows the context of “God destroys no one.” It is in the context of the “soul” not the “body”.

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“We want all to understand how the soul is destroyed. It is not that God sends out a decree that man shall not be saved. He does not throw a darkness before the eyes which cannot be penetrated. But man at first resists a motion of the Spirit of God, and, having once resisted, it is less difficult to do so the second time, less the third, and far less the fourth. Then comes the harvest to be reaped from the seed of unbelief and resistance. Oh what a harvest of sinful indulgences is preparing for the sickle! {5T 120.2}

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This is an example of how he twists the Spirit of Prophecy. God is a God of Love, and even when He kills, He kills in love.

Thank you for that wonderful testimony Tammy. I cannot imagine the shock you and your husband must have felt when you discovered the errors coming from Fred. His teachings are still going around and you can see the veins still running with many people.
God Bless,
Will

It was a shock, Will...I remember sitting on the living room floor, looking at all his books we had accumulated while in the Movement, and thinking of all the time we had wasted! I'm so very thankful for the Spirit of Prophecy! You never have to wonder, when you read the Spirit of Prophecy, "Is this really true?"

Tammy, it amazes me how easy it is to follow a Movement. It is still happening today. I well remember how good it felt to be a part of something new and exciting, something that seemed so right, so righteous. Most Movements, however, seem to focus on the problems and shortcomings of the Church and pretend to be the remnant within the remnant, or something similar.

The trick is not to toss out the baby with the bath water. The Devil mixes just enough truth with his lies to make it believeable, if you really want to believe. Most people who follow Movements are the best of the best, real sincere people, and desiring nothing more than to see Jesus. But they get caught up in believing they are right and the Church is wrong, and that it is their job to fix it.

But not everybody is called to a Jeremiah type ministry, that is, to rebuke and reform the Church. In fact, most people are not called to fix the Church. Most of us are called to share the love of Jesus with people outside the Church - a work the Devil hates more than anything - but a work Jesus loves more than anything.

Yes Mike, it does seem to be that Satan gets the really dedicated ones into false movements, if he can. It was a hard lesson, but one we’ll never forget, and hopefully we can help others to not make the same mistakes along the way.

What is even more amazing to me is the prevalence of the “God does not destroy” theory that dominates MSDAOL. But even more disturbing is the idea that Jesus’ human nature was somehow different than ours, that He wasn’t tempted like we are tempted.

The idea that Jesus was tempted in all points like us but that He wasn't tempted like us in all points is discouraging. The difference being, according to this view, is that He wasn't tempted from within like we are, that is, all of His temptations originated outside of Him. This view also tends to teach that Jesus wasn't tempted to do evil but that He was tempted to do the right thing at the wrong time or in the wrong way.

Tammy, I wasn’t a follower of FTW. I was part of the Family Fellowship Movement in Spokane back in the early 80’s. Their doctrines where correct, but their attitude toward church leadership and policies was somewhat strained. They never concluded that the church was Babylon, instead some of them taught it was worse than Babylon (something I never bought into).

Regarding the human nature of Jesus and how He was tempted: I think we disagree as to whether or not Jesus was tempted from within like we are. I believe He was tempted from within in the same way and for the same reasons we are tempted from within. I suspect you believe all of Jesus’ temptations originated outside of Him, that He was never tempted from within. Did I read you right?

Another question: Do you believe Jesus was ever tempted to do something inherently evil? For example, was He ever tempted to steal, cheat, lie, murder, break the Sabbath, etc.? Or, do you believe He was only tempted to do things that were inherently right at the wrong time or for the wrong reasons?

When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness He was tempted to do the right things for the wrong reasons. For example, He was tempted to feed Himself, something that is inherently right. But He was tempted to do it to prove to the Devil that He was the Son of God. Again, proving that He is the Son of God is inherently right. But to do it for the reasons the Devil suggested was wrong.

Do you believe Jesus was ever tempted to do something inherently evil, something that was in and of itself completely wrong, totally self-serving and absolutely selfish?

If Jesus was never tempted to lie, steal or covet something, would He then really know what it means to be a human? The bible says that He becourse of comming here can empathise with us in all things. Well, we all know that the experience of being human includes other things than walking around serving others without ever being tempted to do something else.

/Thomas