The Waldenses existed since the first century to the time of the reformation . In fact there are still Waldenses today but it is not as in bible times . Many history books and articles will tell you the Waldenses came around the 16th century by a men called Peter Waldo . This is not true . Many of the history books were changed as we know schools were mostly lead by the catholic church in the middle ages.
We know that they changed the history books to hide the destruction of many of the Waldenses villages and to eraducate their history Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? The Waldenses came from the first century . It is said that when Paul preaached in Rome he was ina rented house . Nero perseduciton cam and many of Paul converts feld in the north to the mountains . The alps mountains were the house of the Waldenses during all the 1260 years of papal persecution .
THE WALDENSES AND THE BOOK OF REVELATION
In understanding who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? We need to understand bible prophecy also . The chapte rin the book of revelation that talks about the true church is revelation 12 . Here we find the time when the churhc of born from the Jewish nation . The woman of the church give sbirth to Jesus who is taken to heaven.
Then the church goes in the wilderness for 1260 years. Then in the end times after 1260 years of papal persecution that ended in 1798 the remnant church comes out . Those who keep the commandments of God the sabbath and have the Testimony of Jesus which is the Spirit of prophecy . This proves that the true church was hiding in the wilderness for 1260 years .
So the protestant reformation could not be the start of the true church . As the protestant reformation came about the 16 th century This means that the true church must bave startes in the first century and ended when the papal persecution ended. Around 1798. Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? The bible tells us that the Waldenses is the true church of God after the apostolic church and before the reformation .
Little is known of this church . But they lasted the longest . If we take the early church the apostolic church of John and Peter they laster about 100 years. The Waldenses lasted about 1600 years until the reformation . They continued after but the torch of truth was passed on to the reformation with Martin Luther, John Calvin and Tyndale .
THE WOMAN IS THE CHURCH
JE 6 2 I have likened the daughter of Zion to a comely and delicate woman.
EPH 5 25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; 26 That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, 27 That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. 28 So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.
As a church is a woman. If could be a false church as in the case of revelation 17 or the pure church found in revelation 12. In fact the whole of revelation 12 is the story of the church since the start . Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? The name Waldenses should not put us off as God can chose different names for his church . The main point is that we find it in revelation 12 fleeing in the wilderness for 1260 years.
We know this cannot be Mary as Mary did not fell in the wilderness for 1260 years . Mary lived less than 100 years. We find the Waldenses in the bible mostly in revelation 12 as this is the clear history of the church . Let us see what revelation 12 tells us about the Waldenses .
THE WALDENSES AND REVELATION CHAPTER 12
The book of revelation chapter 12 tells us that the woman gives birth to Jesus . Jesus is caught up to heaven. This woman at the time is the Jewish church . It gives birth to Jesus who gives birth to christianity . When Jesus is caught up to heaven . The bible says that Satan persecutes the woman of the church . Then the church goes in the wilderness for 1260 years.
Can this church that comes right after Jesus is caught up in heaven be any other church than the <Waldenses? No Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? Because we know the apostolic church lasted about 100 years. The question to ask is what happened after Paul died . Paul lived in Rome . His converts went to the mountains of North Italy and southern France .
These converts were not influenced by the pagn teachings of the papal church . They believed in the sabbath . They never kept sunday . The believed in the sanctuady . They beieved death is a sleep . They believed hell is the fires of hell at the end of the millenium and that people would be burned to ashes and destroyed as the bible teaches.
All these teachings are from the bible . When paganism entered in the church . It brought in many pagan beliefs like sunday worship, immortality of the soul and eternal hell among others. Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? They wee the true church after the Nero persecution to the 16th century reformation .
RE 12 6 And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.
This woman is the church . The 1250 days are years . We find out that 1 biblical day is 1 year from these bible verses.
EZ 4 6 And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year.
NU 14 After the number of the days in which ye searched the land, even forty days, each day for a year, shall ye bear your iniquities, even forty years, and ye shall know my breach of promise.
We see here that a church went in the wilderness of the mountains to hide from the persecution of the midel ages for 1260 days . Who were these people? Do we know of any other church then went in the mountains in Europe for 1260 years? Where were people in the midel ages? Europe was the center of attention . Thus this church was to escape the persecution from the papacy . So this means this church must have lied in europe .
When we look at history book we find out that the only church fulfilling this prophecy is the Waldenses .
RE 12 13 And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child. 14 And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent. 15 And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood. 16 And the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth.
Here we see that Satan persecutes the church in the middle ages ? Who persecuted a church during the middle ages ? Have you heard of the inquisiton? Where it is said that 5à million christians lost their lives for Jesus. This persecution did not start with the reformation . In the first centuries Rome in its papal form persecuted a church .
Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? The Waldenses were that church that the papacy persecuted long before the reformation . When the bible says that the earth opened her mouth to help the woman or the church . We need to find out a moment when God helped the church .
When was it ? When did the christians that followed the bible in Europe were helped the flew from a flood of persecution,? It was when they fled to America and a new land was founded in religious liberty and religious freedom .
THE WALDNESES AND THE GREAT CONTROVERSY
Here we are going to look at a few passages from the book The great controversy from Ellen g White called the Waldenses.
Amid the gloom that settled upon the earth during the long period of papal supremacy, the light of truth could not be wholly extinguished. In every age there were witnesses for God—men who cherished faith in Christ as the only mediator between God and man, who held the Bible as the only rule of life, and who hallowed the true Sabbath.
How much the world owes to these men, posterity will never know. They were branded as heretics, their motives impugned, their characters maligned, their writings suppressed, misrepresented, or mutilated. Yet they stood firm, and from age to age maintained their faith in its purity, as a sacred heritage for the generations to come. GC 61
In this passage it says that God kept the light of truth shinning through the midel ages through the Waldenses . Later on of course with the reformation . These people kept the bble alive as they were handwriting the bible and thus kept the bible alive.
The history of God's people during the ages of darkness that followed upon Rome's supremacy is written in heaven, but they have little place in human records. Few traces of their existence can be found, except in the accusations of their persecutors. It was the policy of Rome to obliterate every trace of dissent from her doctrines or decrees. Everything heretical, whether persons or writings, she sought to destroy.
Expressions of doubt, or questions as to the authority of papal dogmas, were enough to forfeit the life of rich or poor, high or low. Rome endeavored also to destroy every record of her cruelty toward dissenters. Papal councils decreed that books and writings containing such records should be committed to the flames. Before the invention of printing, books were few in number, and in a form not favorable for preservation; therefore there was little to prevent the Romanists from carrying out their purpose. GC 61
Here it says that the Waldenses history was destroyed by the papal church .Very little is known to us from that period of time . In heaven we will know what happened in this period of history . This is why today it is taught that the Waldenses came about with Peter Waldo in the 16 th century . I cannot believe that such a lie is taught in our major schools and institutions around the world . Thank God we have some record that proves that the Waldenses came around the first centiry .
The faith which for centuries was held and taught by the Waldensian Christians was in marked contrast to the false doctrines put forth from Rome. Their religious belief was founded upon the written word of God, the true system of Christianity. But those humble peasants, in their obscure retreats, shut away from the world, and bound to daily toil among their flocks and their vineyards, had not by themselves arrived at the truth in opposition to the dogmas and heresies of the apostate church.
Theirs was not a faith newly received. Their religious belief was their inheritance from their fathers. They contended for the faith of the apostolic church,—“the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.” Jude 3. “The church in the wilderness,” and not the proud hierarchy enthroned in the world's great capital, was the true church of Christ, the guardian of the treasures of truth which God has committed to His people to be given to the world. GC 64
Here it says that the Waldenses kept the faith pure from the apostolic times no false doctrines were brought in . No paganism . In searching out who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? This church was send by God to kept the faith pure throughout the middel ages . As the papal power riled the world . A mix of paganism and christianity the which is called Babylon . God keot the truth through the Waldenses .
Behind the lofty bulwarks of the mountains—in all ages the refuge of the persecuted and oppressed—the Waldenses found a hiding place. Here the light of truth was kept burning amid the darkness of the Middle Ages. Here, for a thousand years, witnesses for the truth maintained the ancient faith. GC 65
Here is says that the abode of the Waldenses was the lountains of the Alps. France Itally mostly .
THE WALDENSES PART OF THE TRUR CHURCH
We ses then that the Waldenses is the true church . Who were the Waldenses and what did they stand for? Chapter 12 of revelation tells us the true church has different stages . The true church starts with Jesus . When Jesus is caught up to heaven the true church becomes the Waldenses. After the Waldenses pass it befomes the protestant reformation . After the protestant reformation the true church has to come out after 1798 when the papal supremacy ended .
The papacy started in 538 when Justinian gave to the popespiritual and temporal power . The bible says we need to see its end 1260 years later . That year is 1798 when Napoleon s general went to Rome and Berthier took the pope captive . Later the pope died in France and the deadly wound was given . People thought the papacy was ended forever. Yet the bible says that the deadly wound would be healed . The which started to happen in the second world war .
Now we can answer the question who is the church that comes in revelation 12 verse 17
RE 12 17 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.
Which church came out after 1798 who kept the same teachings as the Waldenses and the early church. Keeping the sabbath, believing in the sanctuary , believing that the dead sleep and that there is no etenal hell. ? The only one that could fit this description that also have the Testimony of Jesuswhich re 19 10 says is the Spirit of prophecy .
Who preach the 3 angels message and preach the judgment sanctuary message is the 7th day adventist church . To know more about the Waldenses i urge you to read
