The Shepherd´s Rod

 

I recently discovered this channel on YouTube, moderated by some kind of nerdy sect-watcher. In this somewhat interesting clip, Mr Ready to Harvest talks about the "Davidian Seventh Day Adventists", not to be confused with David Koresh´s notorious cult Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas (which was a breakaway faction from "real" Davidian Adventism). 

The Davidian Seventh Day Adventists are sometimes called Shepherd´s Rod, named after their foremost scripture, published in the 1930´s by Bulgarian-American preacher Victor Houteff, who is regarded as the prophet of this particular Christian movement. While teaching various distinctive doctrines, Houteff called on his supporters to remain in the Seventh Day Adventist Church. Still today, Davidian groups seem to concentrate on evangelizing other Adventists. The Davidian current is split into many different sects, often with bewilderingly similar names. 

Most of the Davidian doctrines are similar to those of the official SDA Church. Others, surprise, are not. Houteff believed that as the apocalypse draws near, the SDA Church will be judged and cleansed, only 144,000 faithful remaining. These will preach the Shepherd´s Rod message and convert millions, at which point a Davidic kingdom will be established in Palestine. That is, a kind of "Messianic" polity will be set up already *before* the apocalypse and the millennium! Naturally, Houteff´s role is prophesized in the Bible, and since he called himself "President and Prophet", most Davidian groups call their present leaders by the title "Vice President". Houteff, it seems, is president forever...

The differences between post-Houteff Davidian groups strike me as highly esoteric, but often revolve around the Prophet´s non-published writings, released posthumously by his widow Florence Houteff. Or did Florence write them herself?

My general impression is that the Davidians are more "hard" in their lifestyle than mainline Adventists, for instance being strictly vegetarian, avoiding TV, and so on. Otherwise, I must say that I find these kinds of sectarian conflicts extremely tiresome. Why can´t Jehovah just show himself at Mount Carmel with a huge rod and tell us who is right, once and for all? But nah, that would spoil all the sectarian-cultic fun for these and other people...

Something tells me "Ready to Harvest" can continue for another 50 years making this kind of content!