Well, he’s not a JW, he’s Seventh Day Adventist.
While the SDA statement of faith is a bit more orthodox than the JWs, the problem with the SDAs is that they add keeping the OT law to faith in Christ, which basically is a rejection of Christ.
That’s why SDAs, for instance, worship on Saturday (the sabbath) and keep the dietary laws - they believe that keeping these helps you to be righteous. Biblical Christianity, on the other hand, says that righteousness comes ONLY through the grace of God through faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross. If you add anything to that, then you’re essentially rejecting Christ for your own works.
One could quite rightly say that the book of Galatians was written specifically to combat the false doctrine of groups like the SDAs, who add works and lawkeeping to faith, and thereby have “fallen from grace.”
Ah. Thank you for clarification.
But to me, that doesn’t make him a non-Christian any more than Peter was right after the Ressurection.
Peter did not fully understand God’s Will, but he was still a Christian the moment he saw Christ had risen.
If you recall in the Scripture, Peter received the sign that compelled him to accept pagan Christians.
I grant you that — Peter was misguided to demand Old Testament orthodoxy.
But ... was Peter a non-Christian prior to that sign?
He was flawed but yes, Christian, just as literalists who think that the earth was created in six [or seven] solar days.
[Note that the Sun was not created until the third ‘day’.]