Questions?

[John317]

This is an excellent book called, Ellen G. White, Messenger of the Lord. If you had to pick out a single book about her to read, this would have to be it. I can promise you that if you read it, you won't view Ellen White the same ever again. You will be amazed at this woman. I challenge you to study her writings and her life and find out what she was really like and what she actually believed.

http://www.whiteestate.org/books/mol/TOC.html

[nuff sed]

I like to give copies of "Prophet of Destiny" together with Great Controversy. The problem is that the reprints are $17 each. I liked it a whole lot better when the smaller version paperbacks were only three dollars. Nuff sed

[teresaq]

If this is to non-members of the SDA church, wouldn't bringing up the subject of Ellen White as a prophet get in the way of their reading the Great Controversy?

I mean, haven't a lot of people read her books and accepted them without knowing anything about whether she was a prophet or not?

I guess it seems to me that it could be more of a hindrance in the long run, even prejudice them against reading her books.

[miz3]

Good point Teresaq(sda)!

[ClubV12]

Ellen White was covered in the Evangelistic meetings I attended. I didn't make a judgment on her one way or another at first, but was impressed by how MUCH she had written. The first book I read was Steps to Christ, the Pastor gave me his personal copy. It was a bit dog eared and underlined through out, which I found interesting. Perfect for where I was at. Like that guy in Pilgrims Progess, where do I start? What do I need to do? How does this work? How do I get rid of this heavy load on my back? How do you pray? That was meat in due season. I followed that with Great Controversy, by the time I finished it, I was convinced she was a prophet.

I guess we need to approach Ellen White cautiously, I guess. All I can say is, her writings changed my life and I promote her work with enthusism when ever I get the chance.

I'm surprised at how many SDA's haven't actually read the Conflict series, I thought that was SDA 101, so not knowing any better, thats what I did next.

Folks in the church down played the "prophet" thing, they just said, "Read the books and decide for yourself."

[teresaq]

I was under the impression that 'nuff sed was handing out those books to various individuals not to those attending the church, or whatever meetings we might be having. He didn't state, tho, one way or the other.

Yes! I believe we should "promote" her work, as in hand out her books to those we come in contact with who might be interested, but you don't believe that "Prophet of Destiny" would fall into that category do you?

[miz3]

Since SDA believe Ellen White is a Prophet, and that EVERYTHING she wrote is INSPIRED it seems stupid to be shy about sharing anything and everything we have concerning Ellen White!

To me the rule should be:

IF YOU WOULD GIVE A BIBLE TO SOMEONE THEN YOU SHOULD GIVE ELLEN WHITE TO SOMEONE!

IF YOU WOULD GIVE SOMEONE A BOOK "ABOUT" MOSES THEN YOU SHOULD GIVE A BOOK "ABOUT" ELLEN WHITE!

If you are not ashamed of Moses, David, and Paul why are you ashamed of Ellen White.

Of course the rule is only for those who believe that Ellen White is on a par with the other Prophets of the Bible and that like them everything we have about them is "inspired".

[teresaq]

I wouldn't give a book "about" Moses for any reason....( confused )

[miz3]

OK!

I wasn't trying to force you into anything.

[ClubV12]

I'm not familiar with the Prophet of Destiny book.

As I'm reading the Testimonies now I'm finding Sister White to be remarkably well balanced! There are SO many examples of apparent contradiction and yet, I find harmony and common sense in everything I've read to date. Truly, you can find whatever "quote" you want to back up your position. Many instances exist, here are two. Don't eat meat, it's OK to eat meat! Don't buy into patent rights, it's OK to buy into patent rights! Confusing? Not at all, common sense! Use your head. If you live in the land of the midnight sun and can rarely get vegetables, eat meat (fish, caribou, etc.). If your traveling, as she was much in her day, and meat is all that is available, thank God and have lunch. Watch out for those "carpet baggers" and their "slick" patent right "deals". If you or a friend invent something really good, patent it. I could go on and on, recreation, games, etc. etc. all perfectly balanced!!!

miz3, like many people, goes on and on about how terrible it is SDA's think everything she wrote was inspired. This is simply not the case. It's like saying all indians ride horses and hunt buffalo. It's shows a certain ignorance regarding the position of the SDA church and in general the membership as it regards Sister Whites work. There is a balance, it isn't that hard to find, unless you don't want to find it!

The counsel, from my take, on giving out literature, is that it should go to those that show an interest. NOT in all cases "scattered like the winds of Autumn". All though that does apply in some cases! How are we to know when and where? Find the balance, it's not that hard to find if you look for it. Impossible to find if your not looking.

Plenty of hooks to hang your doubts on, plenty! miz3 has a whole clothes line strung up. :)

[miz3]

Usually clothes on the clothes line are clean.

However, SDA clothes line is filled with dirty laundry! You would think they would clean it up first!

[ClubV12]

Eh eh, good come back, but your still "unbalanced". :)

[miz3]

Thanks ClubV12, I always try and deal in Truth!

[teresaq]

I should say, miz3, I can't think of any reason I would give out a book about moses. I am not that interested in reading "about" EGW either, tho I do appreciate personal views of her from her contemporaries.

Yes, ClubV12, I highly appreciate Ellen White, also. I am becoming more and more thankful to God for her, as well as to her for suffering all the abuse she did yet continuing to exhort us.

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

>Divination is the practice of foretelling the future...

no, it isn't..

[miz3]

You are absolutely correct rudywoofs!

Divination is something entirely different then Prophecy from the Lord!

Divination comes from Satan while True Prophecy comes from the Lord!

There is a very serious difference between the two and they should never, ever be fooled with capriciously!

[ClubV12]

I agree Rudywoofs, the word divination does not apply in Sister Whites case, regardless of what status one might choose to give her.

I think it's a word more typically associated with seances, fortune tellers, mystics, ghosts, clairvoyents, the dark side of life and the like. People who claim their knowledge comes from some mystical realm or spirit or "planet X". On the other hand, people who claim to be prophets, and there are many, typically claim their information comes from God.

We know from the bible (and the bible alone) we can write off the first group without so much as a test. Witches, sooth sayers, magicians, etc. As for prophets, there are certain tests that need to be applied to determine their rightful place.

Of course, Sister White is in harmony with the tests of a prophet and her works testify to that. There were some 200 people claiming to be prophets in her time, all except Ellen White, have been swept into the dust bin of history.

I won't go there as it concerns the latest "thing", white witches, good witches, whatever witches. Maybe divination means something new to that group.

[miz3]

I agree Rudywoofs, the word divination does not apply in Sister Whites case, regardless of what status one might choose to give her.

I think it's a word more typically associated with seances, fortune tellers, mystics, ghosts, clairvoyents, the dark side of life and the like. People who claim their knowledge comes from some mystical realm or spirit or "planet X". On the other hand, people who claim to be prophets, and there are many, typically claim their information comes from God.

We know from the bible (and the bible alone) we can write off the first group without so much as a test. Witches, sooth sayers, magicians, etc. As for prophets, there are certain tests that need to be applied to determine their rightful place.

Being up front I want to say I am only quoting the "first part of what ClubV12 actually stated in his post!

Having said that I want to say how happy I am that I can agree 100% with every word above that ClubV12 wrote. In this statement he is perfect!

"Divination" is to never even enter the mind of the believer in Christ.

I know ClubV12 and I disagree completely about Ellen White, but I will say that in my opinion she never engaged in, believed in, or practiced "divination".

Yes, I know about dream, and Letter 17 1881.

[Truth Files]

Deuteronomy 18:22

Jeremiah 14:14

Jeremiah 28:9

Ezekiel 13:2

Ezekiel 13:3

Matthew 7:15

1John 4:1

2Peter 2:1

Revelation 2:20

[Kevin H]

Since SDA believe Ellen White is a Prophet, and that EVERYTHING she wrote is INSPIRED it seems stupid to be shy about sharing anything and everything we have concerning Ellen White!

To me the rule should be:

IF YOU WOULD GIVE A BIBLE TO SOMEONE THEN YOU SHOULD GIVE ELLEN WHITE TO SOMEONE!

IF YOU WOULD GIVE SOMEONE A BOOK "ABOUT" MOSES THEN YOU SHOULD GIVE A BOOK "ABOUT" ELLEN WHITE!

If you are not ashamed of Moses, David, and Paul why are you ashamed of Ellen White.

Of course the rule is only for those who believe that Ellen White is on a par with the other Prophets of the Bible and that like them everything we have about them is "inspired".

Prophets played different roles. There were prophets who were given a universal message, and this given to enough different people where while each were writing from their backgrounds, taken together as a group you get a sufficient message as to who God was. They had long, busy ministries. Part of their job, part of their writings were that became the Bible.

Then you had local prophets, who were equally inspired and equally authorative, but who's job was to apply the messages of the canonical prophets, or the message of the Bible, to certain periods of time and develop local policies and applications for the Lord's work. I believe that God has raised up prophets from time to time. We have not needed any universal prophets since we have the completeness of the Bible. But the New Testament does put emphasizes on the need in the church for the local prophets. People like Agabus (Spelling?) who came to Paul on his way to Jerusalem, Phillip's daughters etc. Even prophets mentioned in the Old Testament who we do not have their writings or only a quick quote. Even the canonical prophets, we only have a small portion of their work, the parts that was for the whole world for all times and periods.

Yes, I know that the church has confused the fact that Mrs. White is a prophet to think that she is canonical, but most of these prophets are not canonical. For centuries Joachim of Fiore was seen as a true prophet of God and the Franciscan Priests (from which Adventism developed from) Protestantism, and even Evangelical Christianity and Dispensationalism are based on his being a prophet (Dispensationalism is taking part of what he said and adding a lot of speculation going way beyond what he said and leaving behind the core of his message... as some of our more conservative members do to Mrs. White). However we have scholars who study him and we trust them to tell us what we need to know. We don't go to church to study his writings. He had a different ministry than say Isaiah or Paul or Moses. I have not yet seen conformation of this but when I was a child I saw a play on Harriet Tubman. There was a scene she and those who she was guiding was near a river and were being closed in on. White everyone was panicking around her the actress who played Harriet sat still looking out into space then came back and said that she had a vision of a place in the river that was shallow enough to cross and got them across, and referred to her having visions on how to get out of tight spots. I have not come across anything else about her visions besides this play, but if the play was correct, then she was a prophet, a local prophet who's job was to lead the slaves to freedom. We don't go to church to study her visions and writings. Joachim and Harriet Tubman might have been true prophets of God, but again just local prophets. Now the locality may be something as local as to where escaping slaves can cross a river, or to push the church into the direction that about 400 years later lead to Prostestantism and 700 years later modern Christianity (Adventism is basically Joachim via the Franciscan Priests, Evangelical Christianity is basically Joachim via the Augustinian Priests). There are many other prophets who we may not have known of but who did their job, or who did their job but that we don't think about as inspired (like maybe Milton's Paradise Lost). Also we have to remember William Foy who had a short public prophetic ministry then left the big city to spend the rest of his life seeking out those in the backwoods of Maine, people out of the loop of civilization, and ministering to those people who society forgot but who God loves. I would not be surprised if God gave him visions to find some of these people living out in the backwoods.

I am not assamed of Iddo, Agabus, Philip's daughters, nor Ellen White. However I don't go digging around to find the writings of these prophets to give to people. Yet according to your logic I should be digging around so that I can give people writings of all the prophets. Let the canonical prophets do their job and the non-canomical prophets do theirs.

Mrs. White's prophetic ministry was to: 1. Tell the Millerites not to give up their experience that God was leading them. 2. Lead us back (using the methods of God, being non-assuming avoiding being forceful unless it was an extreme situation) into orthodoxy, thus avoiding or leading us back from the ideas that people like Armstrong and the Jehovah's Witness took and ran with, yet also pointing out neglected Biblical truth. Also here was the keeping us from becoming either a liberal modernist church or a fundamentalist dispensationalist church. 3. Develop into a church, schools and medical work. 4. Give the issues of the Great Controversy.

She tells us specifically that we are NOT to use her for questions dealing with exegeses, that it is OUR role to study the Bible for those answers. (however we keep rejecting her counsel on this by using her for exegeses, while ignoring points such as her counsel on how to work a city, or how many Adventists are there who can list the 3 deceptions of Satan?)

Moses, Isaiah and Paul are messages to give to all people. Mrs. White is someone for US to study to learn how to work a city and to remind us that the Bible writers were living in a culture where people were concerned with the issues of the Great Controversy, which we do not live in so use Mrs. White to help lead us back to those points.

This was wide ranging but still not as universal as the canonical prophet's ministry. Her's is a ministry like Iddo, Agabus and Phillip's daughters. God raised her up for the church's edification, we need her, but we need to accept her on her terms, and from what archaeology teaches us of the different roles of prophets, not try to make her fit some mold of what human speculation tells us a prophet should be and then reject her because she does not fit the picture of what human speculation tells us that she should be doing.

By the way, words are not inspired, people are. There is an office of prophet. We are so stupid when we thing that words are inspired and argue over "Is this inspired and is that not inspired" Inspiration is like being shown pictures and trying to describe the pictures. Prophets are those who saw the pictures. There is an office we call the President. We don't pick say the writings written by Abraham Lincoln between the years 1861-1865 and ask "Is what he wrote here presidential and what he wrote there non-presidential?" it is just as stupid to say the same about prophetic writings. Bible writers are God's penmen, not his pen.

[teresaq]

By the way, words are not inspired, people are.

Good point.

[Lysimachus]

Originally Posted By: Kevin H

By the way, words are not inspired, people are.

Good point.

Ditto!!

[ClubV12]

I can think of several (if not many) people who had inspired dreams, did miraculous healings, even had "revelations" some might call "visions" in Ellen Whites time! She reports several such dreams related to her by those that had them. Hiram Edson had some kind of heavenly inspired revelation in a corn field. It's reported he also healed people! Loughborough had an interesting dream about a train, no doubt it was inspired. There were others. "Men of God", like some we find in the bible identified that way, might be a fitting term for such folks. I'm not sure I would use the word prophet in any given case, reserving it for a more profound gift, as in Ellen Whites case.

When I came into the church handing me a bible wouldn't have meant much one way or the other. I HAD a bible and was reasonably familiar with various doctrinal points, a mish mash of mixed beliefs from here and there. What I needed was something simpler, HOW do I become a christian? What steps does one take? I knew where I wanted to go, I just didn't know how to get there. I needed sound, practical advice in words and language I could easily understand. Like Steps to Christ.... :)

[Lysimachus]

I can think of several (if not many) people who had inspired dreams, did miraculous healings, even had "revelations" some might call "visions" in Ellen Whites time! She reports several such dreams related to her by those that had them. Hiram Edson had some kind of heavenly inspired revelation in a corn field. It's reported he also healed people! Loughborough had an interesting dream about a train, no doubt it was inspired. There were others. "Men of God", like some we find in the bible identified that way, might be a fitting term for such folks. I'm not sure I would use the word prophet in any given case, reserving it for a more profound gift, as in Ellen Whites case.

When I came into the church handing me a bible wouldn't have meant much one way or the other. I HAD a bible and was reasonably familiar with various doctrinal points, a mish mash of mixed beliefs from here and there. What I needed was something simpler, HOW do I become a christian? What steps does one take? I knew where I wanted to go, I just didn't know how to get there. I needed sound, practical advice in words and language I could easily understand. Like Steps to Christ....

If only every person was as hungry for the truth as you are, and wished to seek it out with an open and contrite heart. It's amazing to me how you didn't put up all these "red flags" against this "Ellen White". You were open, and decided to read her writings for yourself! Well done sir, well done. :)

[Truth Files]

"It's amazing to me how you didn't put up all these "red flags" against this "Ellen White". You were open, and decided to read her writings for yourself"

Bad advice .... wrong way .... backwards

Take the Lord's first ..... study yourself approved .... learn His truth .... not what others tell you

This is possible to do you know .... and you have His Word in you hand .... no excuses

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise .... your salvation is at the testing

.... and He will hold all accountable for their own seeking .... there will be no blame to place elsewhere