Spirit of Prophecy Writings Coordinator

[GHansen]

"Spirit of Prophecy Writings Coordinator—The church elects a Spirit of Prophecy 24 writings coordinator with the responsibility of promoting the importance and right use of the 25 Spirit of Prophecy writings, in collaboration with the publishing ministries coordinator."

I read the "Spirit of Prophecy" as a young Adventist. Thirty pages/night. One can get through a lot of books at that rate. I copied hundreds of statements on 3 by 5 cards. I wonder what is going to happen  when people start reading books like "Gospel Workers," "Evangelism," "Fundamentals of Christian Education," "Christian Service," "Welfare Ministry,"  "Counsels on Health," "Counsels on Diet and Foods?" People are going to discover that the church, including the ministry, have gone off the rails. They might discover that many of the pastors have jaded views of EGW. The Sabbath service would require an almost entire reform. Church elders would be doing a lot of the preaching. Non soul winning pastors might be dismissed. Considering that, according to EGW, the pastor's primary responsibility is soul winning, are people going to be comfortable paying a pastor's salary when he baptizes ~ 8 people a year, including children of members?

This coordinator is going to have to be pretty slippery to explain away what the people will find in EGW's writings.

[GHansen]

My remark above about pastor's was made in light of what I observed in Glendale when the Boston Movement came to town. In a matter of months, they had hundreds of young people, many college students and young professionals getting baptized and attending their church. The Boston Movement required a lot of their members, mandatory tithing, special offerings which amounted to 4 times their tithe, complete lifestyle change for unmarried members. What they emphasized was establishing a Christian home based on chastity. One SDA pastor said he was ashamed of himself as a soulwinner. One problem was that most of the members were inactive. Boston Movement required its members to disciple others. The entire SDA denomination would require reform to line up with what EGW wrote 

[GHansen]

SDA dietary reform is simply health advice. Regardless of where it came from Counsels on Diet and Foods  contains a lot of good ideas such as:

Eat two meals a day

No in between meal snacks

Avoid flesh foods

Avoid milk and eggs unless obtained from healthy animals

Avoid hardened cheese

Avoid grease of all kinds

No caffeinated beverages

I believe Ted Wilson follows this program. He has a vigorous appearance. How is the Spirit of Prophecy coordinator going to implement this program in local churches? I imagine if people are going to read EGW, they will be expected to follow what she said.

[GHansen]

The SOP coordinator should introduce members to EGW books like Medical Ministry, Counsels on Health , and Ministry of Healing.  In those volumes the reader will learn that Jesus spent more time healing than he did preaching. She elaborates on this by saying that ~a Christian Physician can accomplish ten times more as a missionary for God than one who merely preaches. The use of the word merely seems almost like a put down. I was blessed to have Dr. Sherman Nagel as a teacher. He was a surgeon and an ordained minister, worked in Africa. Truly a great man.

She also has some things to say about physician remuneration which might surprise some people.

[phkrause]

7 hours ago, GHansen said:

She also has some things to say about physician remuneration which might surprise some people.

Can you elaborate on that??

[GHansen]

deleted

[GHansen]

11 hours ago, phkrause said:

Can you elaborate on that??

Not much to elaborate upon. I'm trying to imagine how an SOP coordinator might function in a local church. Some things EGW wrote in her day might surprise readers of today. For example, her vision for Christian physicians was not one of millionaires with outsize influence or control of local congregations. The College of Medical Evangelists was to train medical evangelists who used their influence and skill to lead people to Christ. Her remarks about physicians earning the same salary as ministers need to be considered in the context of then and now. Pastors don't enter the work force with a quarter million plus of debt as do some young physicians.

SOP coordinators are going to meet a lot of unexpected questions and comments if they really read EGW. Unless they want to be perceived as nut job cultists, they will need to be well informed. 

[Kevin H]

On 6/18/2022 at 5:52 AM, GHansen said:

The SOP coordinator should introduce members to EGW books like Medical Ministry, Counsels on Health , and Ministry of Healing.  In those volumes the reader will learn that Jesus spent more time healing than he did preaching. She elaborates on this by saying that ~a Christian Physician can accomplish ten times more as a missionary for God than one who merely preaches. The use of the word merely seems almost like a put down. I was blessed to have Dr. Sherman Nagel as a teacher. He was a surgeon and an ordained minister, worked in Africa. Truly a great man.

She also has some things to say about physician remuneration which might surprise some people.

Indeed. Also, should introduce her to the 4 chapters: The origin of Evil, Why was Sin Permitted, Gethsemane, and It is Finished   (and I wish the church would put these 4 chapters together under one cover. This would be a very powerful missionary book). While I forgot the order of the first two chapters, one of these was written while the Great Controversy idea was new to her and is full of the wonder and excitement of learning something new, the other after she had years of thought and meditation on it and a more mature approach. Thus the strong and weak points of each complement each other. Gethsemane is powerful looking at what Jesus went through, and the chapter "It is Finished" was by far the best to flow from her pen. Her crowning chapter. 

It would do you, and me, and the whole church well to read these four chapters together in one setting at least once a year, and pastors twice a year. Also, another important enough to read at least once a year (twice for pastors) is the introduction to the Great Controversy, and her essay on inspiration from Selected Messages, as well as (Not EGW) the essay "The Role of Israel in Old Testament Prophecy" in SDABC vol. 4. 

With how the church was talking about sending out mass mailings of "Great Controversy" I'd like them to include some things Mrs. White wrote about how difficult it was to write about her concerns about the Catholic church, but not be anti-Catholic and her fear of being more anti-Catholic than she wanted to be. I love what Great Controversy teaches, but much can get lost in what she described in those writings. Also, she writes about the last day events on two levels: One is the specific application of the role of possible Sunday Laws and the Sabbath-Sunday situation, but she also writes on a larger principle level on the issues of liberty of conscience and no force. Fortunately, we Seventh-day Adventists have an auto correct located both on the nerves that connect the eyes to the brain and the ears to the brain. When ever we read about her larger principles about individual liberty and allowing people to follow what they understand and the principle of no force, our auto correct automatically corrects it to read "Sunday laws, and you think you can use the law and court system and punishment to force Sunday on us, but we have a higher law and highest court the worst punishment of all, hell, if you don't accept the Sabbath." and the corrected message is what reaches our brain. 

While I love Great Controversy, I fear that what a lot of Adventists like about it is how they can use it in a very anti-Catholic way and to use the higher law, the higher court and the punishment of hell as threats to force people to keep the Sabbath. This mindset makes the Great Controversy useless.

[pierrepaul]

I also wonder how many "Spirit of Prophecy" coordinators will talk about the "amalgamation of man and beast observed in certain races of men", EGW's assertion that volcanoes are caused by coal fires, and her assertion that certain people alive in her day would live to see the second coming.

[Kevin H]

On 6/29/2022 at 12:25 PM, pierrepaul said:

I also wonder how many "Spirit of Prophecy" coordinators will talk about the "amalgamation of man and beast observed in certain races of men", EGW's assertion that volcanoes are caused by coal fires, and her assertion that certain people alive in her day would live to see the second coming.

That is easy, first of all give up the heresy of fundamentalism. Now I do have a question, I may have missed this, but what is the source for Mrs. White's quote about the "amalgamation of man and beast observed in certain races of men?" I'm not saying that she did not make this statement, but from years ago when I looked into this I did not see her saying those exact words, only talking about the amalgamations taking place in general before the flood. Now I did come upon second hand statements that Uriah Smith made at least a similar if not the exact statement that  you shared, and that there were people confusing the two, or assuming that since Smith held this view that Mrs. White must have assumed the idea in her more general statements. 

Even if this is an exact quote, along with her statements of volcanoes, causes of earthquakes, her commenting on the good Jewish people keeping the pigs at the sea of Galilee (This was a Gentile section), her comments about the innkeeper (the word "Inn" in Luke 2 was a guess word for translators. The word does not mean "inn" and never did. the "kataluma" was a room in the family home for out of town relatives to stay in when visiting).  once again:

1.) the first step is to give up the heresy of Fundamentalism.

2.) Then the second step is see if this was an isolated statement, or did she use it early in her ministry and move away from it, or is it something that she kept building upon, or wrote balancing statements about.

3.) The third step is did she quote someone else (While there was stricter footnoting for scholarly work, when she started her ministry it was very common for the lay books to copy from each other and other books without the footnoting. At Andrews they had a couple of sets of her books that were color coded for literary borrowing. I wish that the church would just make her works available in a color coding editions that we can at least have computer access.) If she did copy it, we ask if this was a statement that she really wanted to make, or was it a statement in passing to bring a running narrative to the next point she found important.  

4.) Was this statement central to any of her specific ministry themes at the time.

         4a.) First, all her visions were that Adventists should not dismiss the Millerite Movement as not being lead of God and that they were merely having a false experience. Did she write this statement during this time period? If so, what does this quote have to do with encouraging Adventists to not give up their experience?

         4b.) The second  stage of her ministry was the formation of the Seventh-day Adventist church. Were these statements written during this time period? If so, what does this quote have to do with the formation of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Questions such as how to work a city etc. We can also later add here the reorganization of the General Conference in 1902.

        4c.) The third stage of her ministry was organizing the health and educational work. Again was this quote written during this time period and if so what does the quote have to do with organizing the health and medical work?

        4d.) Finally, does it have anything to do in the development of her great controversy philosophy?

        4e.) Transcending all these stages, was the quote urgent for a personal testimony?

5.) Is she giving principle or application? As in the Bible, the principles are absolute, but the applications are not absolute.

6.) She says that her job was to make applications to her day, not to give an exegesis of the text. She says that the exegesis of a text (what it meant back when it was written) was our job to study. 

Mrs. White tells how her inspiration gave her a framework, often like seeing photos, then she had to study to fill in the details. She tells us what visions did do and did not do for her, what is significant and what is insignificant.  Sadly, we refused her counsel on this topic since we have a neutronic need to  want to prove to the world that we are good Baptists, the perfect Fundamentalists. I've also noticed that when ever someone wants to show problems in her writings, they pull from the area that she says we will find problems. 

[GHansen]

Many of the accusations regarding her plagiarizing health writings are unfair. It is plainly stated in "How to Live" that contemporary writers on health topics would be quoted. One writer on the topic says that Sr. White simply lied about not having read other health writers prior to writing her own thoughts. It's not an issue, really. Regardless of the source/s, the health counsel is relevant today and continually being validated by modern research. 

[DickOdenthal]

On 7/2/2022 at 10:02 PM, Kevin H said:

That is easy, first of all give up the heresy of fundamentalism. Now I do have a question, I may have missed this, but what is the source for Mrs. White's quote about the "amalgamation of man and beast observed in certain races of men?" I'm not saying that she did not make this statement, but from years ago when I looked into this I did not see her saying those exact words, only talking about the amalgamations taking place in general before the flood. Now I did come upon second hand statements that Uriah Smith made at least a similar if not the exact statement that  you shared, and that there were people confusing the two, or assuming that since Smith held this view that Mrs. White must have assumed the idea in her more general statements. 

Even if this is an exact quote, along with her statements of volcanoes, causes of earthquakes, her commenting on the good Jewish people keeping the pigs at the sea of Galilee (This was a Gentile section), her comments about the innkeeper (the word "Inn" in Luke 2 was a guess word for translators. The word does not mean "inn" and never did. the "kataluma" was a room in the family home for out of town relatives to stay in when visiting).  once again:

1.) the first step is to give up the heresy of Fundamentalism.

2.) Then the second step is see if this was an isolated statement, or did she use it early in her ministry and move away from it, or is it something that she kept building upon, or wrote balancing statements about.

3.) The third step is did she quote someone else (While there was stricter footnoting for scholarly work, when she started her ministry it was very common for the lay books to copy from each other and other books without the footnoting. At Andrews they had a couple of sets of her books that were color coded for literary borrowing. I wish that the church would just make her works available in a color coding editions that we can at least have computer access.) If she did copy it, we ask if this was a statement that she really wanted to make, or was it a statement in passing to bring a running narrative to the next point she found important.  

4.) Was this statement central to any of her specific ministry themes at the time.

         4a.) First, all her visions were that Adventists should not dismiss the Millerite Movement as not being lead of God and that they were merely having a false experience. Did she write this statement during this time period? If so, what does this quote have to do with encouraging Adventists to not give up their experience?

         4b.) The second  stage of her ministry was the formation of the Seventh-day Adventist church. Were these statements written during this time period? If so, what does this quote have to do with the formation of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Questions such as how to work a city etc. We can also later add here the reorganization of the General Conference in 1902.

        4c.) The third stage of her ministry was organizing the health and educational work. Again was this quote written during this time period and if so what does the quote have to do with organizing the health and medical work?

        4d.) Finally, does it have anything to do in the development of her great controversy philosophy?

        4e.) Transcending all these stages, was the quote urgent for a personal testimony?

5.) Is she giving principle or application? As in the Bible, the principles are absolute, but the applications are not absolute.

6.) She says that her job was to make applications to her day, not to give an exegesis of the text. She says that the exegesis of a text (what it meant back when it was written) was our job to study. 

Mrs. White tells how her inspiration gave her a framework, often like seeing photos, then she had to study to fill in the details. She tells us what visions did do and did not do for her, what is significant and what is insignificant.  Sadly, we refused her counsel on this topic since we have a neutronic need to  want to prove to the world that we are good Baptists, the perfect Fundamentalists. I've also noticed that when ever someone wants to show problems in her writings, they pull from the area that she says we will find problems. 

The biggest problem with your response to the amalgamation quote is the fact that you obviously try and obfuscate the horrific nature of the quote. If my memory serves me correctly I think it was Uriah Smith (I could have the name wrong) came out with a pamphlet that did its best to defend the amalgamation statement. The White’s even pushed the selling of the pamphlet. The fact of the matter is the amalgamation statement can’t be defended.

[Gregory Matthews]

The official EGW Estate response contains the following statement which is found  in the larger document cited below: 

 

“The only passages in Mrs. White’s writings that are of interest in this connection are found in Spiritual Gifts, volume 3, already mentioned and republished in Spirit of Prophecy, volume 1, in 1870. The first, in chapter 6, “Crime Before the Flood,” is this:

 

But if there was one sin above another which called for the destruction of the race by the flood, it was the base crime of amalgamation of man and beast which defaced the image of God, and caused confusion everywhere. God purposed to destroy by a flood that powerful, long-lived race that had corrupted their ways before him.—Spiritual Gifts, vol. 3, p. 64.”

https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/752.8#8       Also see:

https://whiteestate.org/about/issues1/unusual/scientific-issues/amalgamation-man-and-beasts/

http://www.adventisthistory.org/2014/03/25/amalgamation-ellen-whites-most-controversial-statement/

[GHansen]

Referencing circumstances prior to the flood. Nobody knows what went on in those days.

[DickOdenthal]

I’ve read all of them. The fact that they have never made a Sabbath School Quarterly in my lifetime says it all. They frankly are indefensible. The best response would be that these are simply uninspired statements and were just that. 
 

Genesis 6 gives the reason for the flood and that is good enough for me. 

[Gustave]

20 hours ago, DickOdenthal said:

The biggest problem with your response to the amalgamation quote is the fact that you obviously try and obfuscate the horrific nature of the quote. If my memory serves me correctly I think it was Uriah Smith (I could have the name wrong) came out with a pamphlet that did its best to defend the amalgamation statement. The White’s even pushed the selling of the pamphlet. The fact of the matter is the amalgamation statement can’t be defended.

There is no doubt that amalgamation of man and beast meant to Ellen White what it meant to her contemporaries and what it meant to the "Naturalists" who had been promulgating the idea for over a hundred years. 

[Gregory Matthews]

On a personal basis, for me to say what it meant to Ellen White, I would need to see a statement from her as to what it meant to her.  I do not know of any such statement by her.  Therefore, I consider all statements as to what she meant to be speculative and potentially wrong.  But such statements could be correct.

However, it should be clear that Ellen White could have been wrong in her understanding of amalgamation.  I have no problem with that.   Ellen White was subject to error.  She was not without error.  She did not claim to be without error.  I have no problem with anyone who states that she was wrong in her statement on amalgamation.

 

[DickOdenthal]

That is probably the most acceptable answer I have seen an Adventist Minister make. 
 

[Gregory Matthews]

Dick, if you want an in-depth perspective on how divisive the issues of the role of Ellen White in Adventism was during the 60s and 70s, and are willing to read a 456 page book read:

Valentine, Gilbert M., Ostriches & Canaries: Coping With Change in Adventism, 1966 to 1979.

If you want a much shorter treatment, and from a slightly different focus see:

Campbell, Michael W., 1919, The Untold story of Adventism's Struggle With Fundamentalism,  124 pages.

Campbell, Michael w., 1922, The Rise of Adventist Fundamentalism,  144 pages.

NOTE:  All three books may be purchased from Amazon.

 

[DickOdenthal]

Was not aware of the first one. Will check it out. I find that her biggest proponents acts as though whatever Biblical situation she addresses that all study stops because she has spoken.

[GHansen]

What interested me was the comment she made in Spiritual Gifts in 1864. There she said that even after the flood, amalgamation took place, amalgamation that was evident in certain races of her day. Who could she have been referring to?

[Gustave]

Ellen White's contemporaries defended her Amalgamation affirmation by referencing Naturalists who had for over 100 years been affirming that Great Apes had been abducting & breeding Negro women (specifically Hottentot) who would then give birth to confused fruit - this fruit would in turn would perpetuate the hybrid man-ape race.

A collection of these Naturalists statements can be read in Jahoda's "Images of Savages". 

Images of Savages: Ancient Roots of Modern Prejudice in Western Culture by Gustav Jahoda (goodreads.com)

From my understanding of Adventist thought at that particular time the SDA believed that even a hybrid ape-man still had ADAMIC BLOOD and even a small percentage of Adamic blood entitled the creature to respect and attempting to instruct it in religion. 

 

[GHansen]

4 hours ago, Gustave said:

Ellen White's contemporaries defended her Amalgamation affirmation by referencing Naturalists who had for over 100 years been affirming that Great Apes had been abducting & breeding Negro women (specifically Hottentot) who would then give birth to confused fruit - this fruit would in turn would perpetuate the hybrid man-ape race.

Please provide some references from her contemporaries defending her amalgamation views.

[DickOdenthal]

"The visions teach, says the objector, that the negro race is not human. We deny it. They do not so teach. Mark the language: " Since the flood there has been amalgamation of man and beast, as may be seen in the almost endless varieties of species of animals, and in certain races of men." This view was given for the purpose of illustrating the deep corruption and crime into which the race fell, even within a few years after the flood that signal manifestation of God's wrath against human wickedness. There was amalgamation; and the effect is still visible in certain races of men." Mark, those excepting the animals upon whom the effects of this work are visible, are called by the vision, "men." Now we have ever supposed that anybody that was called a man, was considered a human being. The vision speaks of all these classes as races of men; yet in the face of this plain declaration, they foolishly assert that the visions teach that some men are not human beings! But does any one deny the general statement contained in the extract given above? They do not. If they did, they could easily be silenced by a reference to such cases as the wild Bushmen of Africa, some tribes of the Hottentots, and perhaps the Digger Indians of our own country, &c. Moreover, naturalists affirm that the line of demarkation between the human and animal races is lost in confusion. It is impossible, as they affirm, to tell just where the human ends and the animal begins. Can we suppose that this was so ordained of God in the beginning? Rather has not sin marred the boundaries of these two kingdoms? But, says the objector, Paul says that " God hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth," and then they add, " Which shall we believe, Paul or E. G. White ?" You need not disbelieve E. G. White, in order to believe Paul; for there is no contradiction between them. Paul's language will apply to all classes of men who have any of the original Adamic blood in their veins; and that there are any who have not this, is not taught by the visions, nor claimed by any one. But for this text to weigh anything in favor of the objector, he must take the ground that God made every particle of blood that exists, in any human being. Is this so? Then God made all the scrofulous, leprous, or syphilitic blood that courses in the worst transgressor's veins! From any view which leads, to such a blasphemous conclusion, we prefer to be excused.

But what has the ancient sin of amalgamation to do with any race or people at the present time? Are they in any way responsible, or to be held accountable for it ? Not at all. Has any one a right to try to use it to their prejudice? By no means. The fact is mentioned simply to show how soon men relapsed into wickedness, and to what a degree. But we are to take all races and peoples as we find them. And those who manifest sufficient powers of mind to show that they are moral and accountable beings, are of course to be esteemed as objects of regard and philanthropic effort. We are bound to labor, so far as in our power, for the improvement of their mental, moral and physical condition. Whatever race of men we may take, Bushmen, Hottentots, Patagonians, or any class of people, however low they may apparently be in the scale of humanity, their mental capabilities are in every instance the basis on which we are to work, and by which we determine whether they are subjects of moral government or not. Then what about all this ado over the charge, which is itself false, that the visions teach that the negro is not a human being? What does it amount to? It is simply an effort to create prejudice in the minds of the people, unworthy any one who makes any pretensions to being a Christian, or even a gentleman." —Uriah Smith, THE VISIONS OF MRS. E. G. WHITE, A MANIFESTATION Of SPIRITUAL GIFTS ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURES, pp.102-105, 1868.

 

[DickOdenthal]

I just posted an excerpt that Uriah Smith wrote to defend the Amalgamation statement.