Despite such negative responses from several in key leadership positions, the manifestations of the Holy Spirit continued into the momentous year of 1893. A three-week Minister's Institute began on January 27, followed by three weeks of the General Conference session, starting February 17 and lasting until March 9. O. A. Olsen considered the upcoming Conference to be a very important meeting-"probably the most important ever held by our people." Therefore it was expected that "each local Conference should be represented by as full a delegation as consistent with all the circumstances, and also that the delegates be present during the Institute as well." Once again the majority of church leadership from around the country and the world, along with a "large number of both ministers and lay brethren" would attend and expectantly avail themselves of the benefits and blessings God had in store. It is no wonder that Olsen asked "our people everywhere to make the coming Institute and General Conference a subject of special prayer, that God's blessing may be present in a large measure." [1]
S. N. Haskell, J. N. Loughborough, R. A. Underwood, A. T. Jones, W. W. Prescott, R. C. Porter, O. A. Olsen, and others, had been selected by the General Conference Committee in August of 1892, with topics assigned for the Bible lessons to be given to the hundreds of Adventists who would gather there in Battle Creek from around the world. [2] Two daily sessions were planned--forenoon and evening--during which two Bible lessons would be given during each session for the ministerial Institute. The evening session would continue throughout the General Conference, as ell, all of which gave a significant amount of time during this six-week gathering to study the Bible together. [3]
Ellen White, being thousands of miles away in Australia, had North America and the forthcoming General Conference much on her mind. Once again, General Conference leadership, delegates, ministers, colporteur leaders, Bible instructors, and laymen from around the country and the world would gather at this most important meeting. Not wanting to miss the opportunity to bring the Lord's counsel before the vast assembly of Adventist leadership, Ellen White told E. J. Waggoner that she was led to write and send "about 200 (over 400 with manifolds) pages of matter in caligraph copy" to America. Out of this material a "large portion of it [was] to be used in the Conference." [4]
Thus, in Ellen White's absence, the voice of God through the Spirit of Prophecy could be read and heard by all those meeting at the heart of the work. Complete Testimonies were read several times during the six-week period, and each of the several speakers had plenty of present truth counsel to read from during their Bible lessons. S. N. Haskell reported that as a result, "at this Conference the Testimonies are used more I think than you would have spoken were you here. A number have been converted. Some [from] the city, those who have scarcely heard a sermon. They were convicted of their sins and could not rest until they had given their hearts to God and then went around to their neighbors and told them what the Lord had done for them." [5]*
On Friday morning, January 27, the Ministerial Institute convened in the Tabernacle at Battle Creek, Michigan, with over 300 first attendees present. Although Uriah Smith had been assigned the first series of lessons on "The Study of the Bible," he had resigned a short time before the Institute, and S. N. Haskell had been appointed to take his place. [6] Now Haskell began his lesson on the importance of personal Bible study, not to "find an argument to use against some other person," but to "receive the word of God for our own benefit." J. N. Loughborough followed with his opening lesson on the Spirit of Prophecy set in the context of early Advent history and "dwelt particularly upon their effect in producing unity among believers." [7] There was perhaps no better place to start at the 1893 Ministerial Institute and General Conference than with these two subjects.
On the opening weekend, and at the request of the General Conference Committee, W. W. Prescott had opportunity to read one of the recently received Testimonies from Ellen White to a packed Tabernacle audience in Battle Creek. [8]* Ellen White was seeking to arouse the church members in Battle Creek to their responsibility of supporting missionary efforts around the world. Rather than pouring money into a costly pipe organ for the Tabernacle, they should give sacrificially for churches to be built in other localities, like all of Australia, which had only one meeting house. The present truth message, "as it is in Jesus," must be given to the world, and God was calling members to action:
Brethren and sisters in Battle Creek, who have had those precious truths set before you, I ask you to think of the many, many souls who need to hear the message of redeeming love....
How can those who have been long in the faith, as at Battle Creek, expend more and more upon their own enjoyment, when they know, by actual representation of the case, the great necessities of the work in foreign countries?...
The whole earth is to be lightened with the glory of God's truth. The Lord will not close up the period of probation until the warning message shall be more distinctly proclaimed.... Yet the work will be cut short in righteousness. The message of Christ's righteousness is to sound from one end of the world to the other. This is the glory of God which closes the work of the third angel.
Are the people in Battle Creek asleep? Are they paralyzed? Will the light that has been shining in new and clear rays, beam after beam, move them to action? You have long expected the wonderful startling events that are to take place just prior to the coming of the Son of man in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. Now I ask, Are you prepared to give the trumpet a certain sound? Do you know that you are connected with God, and living in the light of his countenance?...
The Lord is coming; the scenes of this earth's history are fast closing, and our work is not done. We have been waiting in anxious expectancy for the co-operation of the human agency in advancing the work. All heaven, if I may use the expression, is impatiently waiting for men to co-operate with the divine agencies in working for the salvation of souls. [9]
Once again, as Ellen White did numerous other times, she connected endtime events and the loud cry with the message of the righteousness of Christ then shining upon the church. [10]*
On Monday evening, January 30, W. W. Prescott began his series of lectures on the "Promise of the Holy Spirit." Ever since the subject was assigned him, he had been thinking of how it could be "studied in a way most practical." It was his plan to "move along by easy steps to receiving the Spirit, and when the Spirit is received it will teach us more about itself that [sic] we can learn in any other way."
Toward the latter part of his lecture Prescott read Revelation 18:1, followed by portions of Ellen White's November 22, 1892 Review article, where she unmistakably confirmed the beginning of the loud cry and time for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit--the latter rain. "The loud cry and the latter rain go together," Prescott declared. "As the time has come for the loud cry it has also come for the latter rain, and we are to ask for it.... The Lord has long been waiting to give us his Spirit. He is even now impatiently waiting that he maybe stow it upon us. How much longer shall he have to wait? Now we have been accustomed to turn to pentecost as the time when the Lord did the greatest work he ever did for his people. But now a work that will be greater than pentecost has begun, and there are those here who will see it. It is here, it is now we are to be fitted for the work."
Prescott also read from Historical Sketches, where Ellen White declared that Scripture was our only safeguard and that "'indulgence of one known sin will cause weakness and darkness, and subject us to fierce temptation.'" In light of such a statement Prescott admonished that "we must overcome the disposition to sin or we cannot receive the latter rain. The light that is to lighten the earth with its glory has already begun to shine. What does this mean to us practically? It means that the shaking time is here and that God is going to make a separation in his own people, and those who do not have Jesus living in them will not be permitted to take any part in the work of God when it swells into a loud cry." [11]
The following morning, S. N. Haskell quoted the same loud cry statement from Ellen White's November 22 article in his lecture on the study of the Bible. "Notice what follows," Haskell pointed out, "'for it is the work of every one to whom the warning message has come, to lift up Jesus, to present him to the world as revealed in types, as shadowed in symbols, as manifested in the revelations of the prophets, as unveiled in the lessons given to his disciples and in the wonderful miracles wrought for the sons of men. Search the Scriptures, for they are they that testify of him.' I would like to know how much Bible is left outside of that." Haskell knew that if they would take Christ into their souls, He would become in them "a well of water, springing up into everlasting life. Then we are prepared to search the Scriptures, which is the Spirit of revelation that is given to us; and it will fit us to stand in the coming storm." [12]
Those who came to the Ministerial Institute would not only be reminded from the various speakers that the loud cry had begun, but also through the various periodicals published by the church in Battle Creek. For instance, W. A. Colcord, writing in the January edition of the Home Missionary in reference to the same Ellen White Review article, asked the insightful question: "Why did the loud cry begin with a work for us rather than with a work from us? Why did it begin with 'the revelation of the righteousness of Christ, the sin-pardoning Redeemer' among us, as stated by Sister White in the Review of Nov. 22, 1892, rather than with the cry from us to the world of the fall of Babylon?" Colcord's answer to these questions should be of interest to us even today: "But the answer is easy. The Lord saw that we ourselves needed a fitting up before we were prepared to do the work he designed us to do. He saw that we needed to know what the gospel--the power of God unto salvation--is indeed, before we could preach the everlasting gospel in power and demonstration of the Spirit to others." [13]
On Tuesday evening, W. W. Prescott would introduce a new dimension in his lecture that would become an all-consuming theme for the remainder of the Institute and General Conference--a theme not only in his lectures but in every other speaker's, as well. As Prescott began his second lecture in the series, he pointed out how Christ had been anointed or sealed by the Holy Spirit for His work because He had "loved righteousness and hated iniquity" (Heb. 1:9). Yet that hatred for sin did not keep Christ from the work He came to do in taking the sinner's place. Now, at the very end of time during the "special outpouring of the Spirit" or sealing time, "we want to know what hinders its taking place immediately," Prescott asked. "I say that the presence of sin and the practice of iniquity is what hinders it," was his answer.
But Prescott was also positive that "it is utterly impossible for us to separate sin from ourselves. God can do that thing; God can take sin from us, but he will not take that from us contrary to our will. When he tells us that that is sin, and that He wants to remove it, we must consent to it, or it will not be removed." Now Prescott turned to the experience of the disciples and the lessons to be learned:
What was the experience of the disciples as a preparation for this outpouring? Let us read a brief statement concerning it:
"For ten days the disciples prayed before the Pentecostal blessing came. Then it required all that time to bring them to an understanding of what it meant to offer effectual prayer, drawing nearer and nearer to God, confessing their sins, humbling their hearts before God, and by faith beholding Jesus, and becoming changed into his image."--Special Test., No. 2, p. 19.
Now I want you to think of this. Those disciples had been with Christ for three and a half years, had seen him after his resurrection, sat and spoke with him, but had not yet received the Holy Ghost, and even after his ascension, before this special blessing could come upon them, it required ten days of confession and repentance in order not to be consumed by that blessing.
Now, if that was the case with them, what shall we say of ourselves? To my mind, the worst feature of the whole situation is just what the Laodicean message says, and the worst is we don't see it. Now, if we don't see it, let us take the word of God as it is, and say it is so, let us so continue. We have sinned and done iniquity, and there is no good thing in us. Day by day let us draw near to God by repentance and confession, and God will draw near to us with mercy and forgiveness. Now that is the point that I want to dwell specially upon, that the reason why the special outpouring of the Spirit of God does not come upon his people, is that they must repent, else they would be consumed by it. [14]
The new dimension to which Prescott would seek to draw his listeners' attention was the Laodicean message, and this would become one of the main themes for the 1893 Ministerial Institute and General Conference session. But before we proceed with Prescott's lecture, we need to review briefly what the Laodicean message entailed and when it began to be applied to Advent believers.
The Laodicean Message
An understanding that the message to the Laodiceans was applicable to Seventh-day Adventists was nothing new. As early as 1852, years before the 1863 official organization of the church, God had sought to bring the attention of His people to this message. For years following the 1844 disappointment, the Laodicean message was applied to nominal Sunday-keeping Adventists by the Sabbath-keeping Adventists. [15] But this began to change when Ellen White indicated that as a people, Sabbath-keeping Adventists were "cold and formal, like the nominal church, that they but a short time since separated from. The words addressed to the Laodicean Church, describe their present condition perfectly." [16]
In July of 1856, James White would write for the last time the view that Philadelphia, the sixth church of Revelation 3, described Sabbath-keeping Adventists. [17] Through a series of events that summer, he as well began to realize the fact that Laodicea, the seventh church, was more applicable. He would publish his views in several articles run through the Review, [18] even connecting the patient knocking of the "True Witness" of Revelation 3 with the "Beloved" of Song of Solomon, chapter 5: "'Behold I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.' How careless many of you have been of the reproofs and warning which the dear Saviour has given for your benefit. He has been slighted and shut out by you till his locks are wet with the dew of night. O, open your hearts to him. Let your hard hearts break before him. O, let him in." [19]
Ellen White would note that same summer that a change had come over "the professed peculiar people of God" since 1844. She saw "the conformity to the world, the unwillingness to suffer for the truth's sake.... [and] a great lack of submission to the will of God" as the cause of the problem. She even drew parallels between the children of Israel after leaving Egypt and the Advent people who were looking for the soon-coming Promised Land. [20] In February of 1857 Ellen White would have her first vision relating the Laodicean message to the Advent people. Their "present lukewarm state" was caused by "worldly-mindedness, selfishness, and covetousness," fault-finding, and lack of church order. [21]
In November of 1857, Ellen White would be shown her most comprehensive vision hitherto on the far-reaching ramifications of the Laodicean message. She was shown two groups of people--those who were actively seeking repentance and cleansing and those who were careless and indifferent. This illustrated the two responses to the Laodicean message, which would bring about a shaking among God's people: "I asked the meaning of the shaking I had seen and was shown that it would be caused by the straight testimony called forth by the counsel of the True Witness to the Laodiceans.... Some will not bear this straight testimony. They will rise up against it, and this is what will cause a shaking among God's people." When Ellen White asked what had made the great change between the agonizing, praying ones and those clothed with the armor speaking forth "the truth with great power," the angel answered: "'It is the latter rain, the refreshing from the presence of the Lord, the loud cry of the third angel.'" Thus those who accepted the Laodicean message took it to heart and repented and were themselves empowered and enlightened through the latter rain and the loud cry message. They were then enabled to "pour forth the straight truth" of the loud cry message to the world. This would bring about a rapid fulfillment of the final events and Christ's Second Coming. [22] Because all of the final events hinged on the response to the Laodicean message, which was nothing short of true repentance, Ellen White would declare that it was the most "solemn testimony upon which the destiny of the church hangs." [23]
The reaction to James White's articles and Ellen White's Testimonies during 1856 and 1857 were life changing. From across the little church letters poured into the editor's office at the Review confessing that the message had struck home. A powerful revival began to surge through Adventism. [24] Between November 1856 and December 1857, 348 articles, Testimonies, or editorial reports appeared in the Review and Herald on the Laodicean message--most of them by lay members--a very high percentage, considering that only about 2,500 members made up the entire church those days. [25] Ellen White stated that "as this message affected the heart, it led to deep humility before God. Angels were sent in every direction to prepare unbelieving hearts for the truth. The cause of God began to rise, and His people were acquainted with their position." [26] Thus revivals began to break out in the large cities and towns among other Christian churches, not only in America but all over the world, as angels prepared the hearts of the people for the loud cry message. [27]
Sadly, Adventist believers did not keep pace with the movements of God. By 1859 Ellen White would ardently state that "the message to the Laodiceans has not accomplished that zealous repentance among God's people which I expected to see." The message still applied to their condition at that time, and the reason it had "not accomplished a greater work is because of the hardness of their hearts." God had given over two years for the message to do its work, but what had been the result?
The heart must be purified from sins which have so long shut out Jesus. This fearful message will do its work. When it was first presented, it led to close examination of heart. Sins were confessed, and the people of God were stirred everywhere. Nearly all believed that this message would end in the loud cry of the third angel. But as they failed to see the powerful work accomplished in a short time, many lost the effect of the message. I saw that this message would not accomplish its work in a few short months. It is designed to arouse the people of God, to discover to them their backslidings, and to lead to zealous repentance, that they may be favored with the presence of Jesus, and be fitted for the loud cry of the third angel.... If the counsel of the True Witness had been fully heeded, God would have wrought for His people in greater power....
Many moved from feeling, not from principle and faith, and this solemn, fearful message stirred them. It wrought upon their feelings, and excited their fears, but did not accomplish the work which God designed that it should. God reads the heart. Lest His people should be deceived in regard to themselves, He gives them time for the excitement to wear off, and then proves them to see if they will obey the counsel of the True Witness.... Those who come up to every point, and stand every test, and overcome, be the price what it may, have heeded the counsel of the True Witness, and they will receive the latter rain, and thus be fitted for translation. [28]
In 1868 Ellen white lamented the "long night of gloom," yet recognized that in mercy God deferred His coming because "so many would be found unready. God's unwillingness to have His people perish has been the reason for the long delay." [29] But such a statement neither placed the blame on God for the delay nor negated God's call for Laodicea to repent before He could return. In fact, a failure to heed that call was the very reason His people's eternal destiny was in jeopardy. If He were to return without delay, how many alive would have been saved?
In 1873 Ellen White ran a four-part series on the Laodicean Church through the Review. [30] She declared that the message of the True Witness had not accomplished His purpose. The people continued to slumber in their sins while questioning why the Testimonies continually charged them with backsliding and grievous sins: "We love the truth; we are prospering; we are in no need of these testimonies of warning and reproof." But this response demonstrated that the greatest reason why the people of God were found in a state of spiritual blindness was that they would "not receive correction. Many have despised the reproofs and warnings given them. The True Witness condemns the lukewarm condition of the people of God, which gives Satan great power over them in this waiting, watching time."
Ellen White was shown that "unbelief in the testimonies of warning, encouragement, and reproof" was "shutting away the light from God's people." She encouraged the ministers not to neglect the message to the Laodiceans, which was not a smooth message: "The Lord does not say to them, You are about right; you have borne chastisement and reproof that you never deserved; you have been unnecessarily discouraged by severity; you are not guilty of the wrongs and sins for which you have been reproved. The True Witness declares that when you suppose you are really in a good condition of prosperity you are in need of everything." [31]
Although the Laodicean condition is an individual malady, there are also community ramifications. The Church as a whole suffered under the ailment symptoms. At no place was this more noticeable than at the center of the work in Battle Creek. In 1875 Ellen White would describe this very situation:
As the human heart throws its living current of blood into all parts of the body, so does the management at this place, the headquarters of our church, affect the whole body of believers. If the physical heart is healthy, the blood that is sent from it through the system is also healthy; but if this fountain is impure, the whole organism becomes diseased by the poison of the vital fluid. So it is with us. If the heart of the work becomes corrupt, the whole church, in its various branches and interests, scattered abroad over the face of the earth, suffers in consequence.
Satan's chief work is at the headquarters of our faith. He spares no pains to corrupt men in responsible positions and to persuade them to be unfaithful to their several trusts. He insinuates his suspicions and jealousies into the minds of those whose business it is to do God's work faithfully. While God is testing and proving these helpers, and fitting them for their posts, Satan is doing his utmost to deceive and allure them, that they may not only be destroyed themselves, but may influence others to do wrong and to injure the great work. He seeks by all the means in his power to shake the confidence of God's people in the voice of warning and reproof through which God designs to purify the church and prosper His cause. It is Satan's plan to weaken the faith of God's people in the Testimonies. [32]
It is for this reason that the Laodicean message is directed to the "angel of the church"--the leadership--whose response and influence will permeate the entire flock. And it was for this reason that Satan fought so hard to divert the work of the True Witness which came to God's people at the heart of the work in Battle Creek. And nowhere was his anger directed greater at the remnant church than toward the commandments of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ, which is the Spirit of Prophecy (Rev. 12:17; 19:10).
In 1882 Ellen White was shown again "that unbelief in the testimonies" had been steadily increasing "as the people backslide from God. It is all through our ranks, all over the field." [33] Pharisaism would creep into the church during the 1870s and 1880s, through a false defense of the law, thus undermining both the law and the gospel. By 1886 Ellen White was warned that "a time of trial was before us, and great evils would be the result of the Phariseeism which has in a large degree taken possession of those who occupy important positions in the work of God." [34] By 1888 she would declare that Pharisaism had been at work leavening the camp here at Battle Creek, and the Seventh-day Adventist churches were affected." [35]
Such conditions would inevitably continue to delay the return of Christ. In 1883 Ellen White would look back on the nearly forty years following the 1844 disappointment and the work God had committed to His people "to be accomplished on earth." The third angel's message was to be given, believers' minds directed to Christ's atoning work in the sanctuary, Sabbath reform carried forward, the world warned through the loud cry, and God's people purified through obedience to the truth, enabling them to stand without fault at Christ's coming. But now there had been a long delay for which God was not responsible:
Had Adventists, after the great disappointment in 1844, held fast their faith and followed on unitedly in the opening providence of God, receiving the message of the third angel and in the power of the Holy Spirit [latter rain] proclaiming it to the world [loud cry], they would have seen the salvation of God, the Lord would have wrought mightily with their efforts, the work would have been completed, and Christ would have come ere this to receive His people to their reward....
For forty years did unbelief, murmuring, and rebellion shut out ancient Israel from the land of Canaan. The same sins have delayed the entrance of modern Israel into the heavenly Canaan. In neither case were the promises of God at fault. It is the unbelief, the worldliness, unconsecration, and strife among the Lord's professed people that have kept us in this world of sin and sorrow so many years. [36]
In 1884 Ellen White would once again draw her readers to the "history of ancient Israel" as the "striking illustration of the past experience of the Adventist body." Again she would indicate that Christ "would have come for the redemption of His people" if a united Advent movement had received the light and power of God and proclaimed the warning message to the world. [37] She would repeat these same thoughts in The Great Controversy, published in the spring of 1888. [38] But the fact that the Lord was ready to finish up the work before 1888 did not negate the need for the message He sent through Jones and Waggoner at the Minneapolis Conference. Their message was the culminating message to the Laodiceans--the beginning of the latter rain and loud cry message. God would have sent the message earlier if He'd had willing messengers. [39] The point is that the message that is to lighten the whole earth with its glory is the same message for all time. The message God sent through Jones and Waggoner would have been the same prior to their arrival and will be the same when it once again returns to the Advent people before Christ's return. [40]* And the message is wrapped up in the repentance call to the Laodiceans.
Thus, in 1888 the Lord "in His great mercy sent a most precious message to His people through Elders Waggoner and Jones. This message was to bring more prominently before the world the uplifted Saviour, the sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. It presented justification through faith in the Surety; it invited the people to receive the righteousness of Christ, which is made manifest in obedience to all the commandments of God." [41] But Ellen White also defined that message of justification by faith as "the work of God in laying the glory of man in the dust, and doing for man that which it is not in his power to do for himself. When men see their own nothingness, they are prepared to be clothed with the righteousness of Christ." [42] It is no wonder that Satan was "not willing that this truth be clearly presented; for he knows that if the people receive it fully, his power will be broken." [43] And so it was through pharisaical attitudes, strife, unbelief, and doubting of the Testimonies of the Spirit of Prophecy, that Satan held the church captive in its Laodicean state.
In December of 1888, just following the Minneapolis Conference, Ellen White would once again assert that "the Laodicean message is applicable to the people of God at this time." Indifference to all of God's counsel, a loss of zeal for the truth, and a disregard for the "light contained in the 'Testimonies'" was part of the cause. [44] But as she would continue to draw attention to the Laodicean message during the 1889 summer camp-meetings, she connected the divine remedies with the message of Minneapolis. [45]
By August 1890, following almost two years of battles fought over the precious message of righteousness by faith, she would express the generally declining condition in the church: "Since the time of the Minneapolis meeting, I have seen the state of the Laodicean Church as never before. I have heard the rebuke of God spoken to those who feel so well satisfied, who know not their spiritual destitution.... Like the Jews, many have closed their eyes lest they should see." God had allowed light to shine on the ranks of Adventism, but those who "claimed to believe the truth" but did not act upon it, as well as those "who despised the divine grace," were alike foolish virgins. Now the call of the True Witness took on a broader meaning than it ever had before.
The state of the church represented by the foolish virgins, is also spoken of as the Laodicean state....
Those who realize their need of repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ, will have contrition of soul, will repent for their resistance of the Spirit of the Lord. They will confess their sin in refusing the light that Heaven has so graciously sent them, and they will forsake the sin that grieved and insulted the Spirit of the Lord. They will humble self, and accept the power and grace of Christ, acknowledging the messages of warning, reproof, and encouragement. [46]
Soon after arriving in Australia in December of 1891, Ellen White lifted up her voice again, directing God's people to the high calling they had been given: "Jesus did not seek you and me because we were his friends; for we were estranged from him, and unreconciled to God. It was while we were yet sinners that Christ died for us. But he has promised to give us his Holy Spirit, that we might become assimilated to his nature, changed into his image." Ellen White then proclaimed the divine remedies being offered the Laodicean church which would bring about these changes: "Buy faith and love, the precious, beautiful attributes of our Redeemer, which will enable us to find our way into the hearts of those who do not know him, who are cold and alienated from him through unbelief and sin. He invites us to buy the white raiment, which is his glorious righteousness: and the eyesalve, that we may discern spiritual things. O, shall we not open the heart's door to this heavenly visitor?" [47]
In numerous letters the following year Ellen White would continue to hold up the Laodicean message as the message for that time. In a letter to Uriah Smith in late August, 1892, Ellen White confronted him once again for his continued antagonism toward A. T. Jones and for running countering articles through the Review. She told Smith that "God bestows upon his people great blessings in giving them faithful, upright ministers." God was empowering these messengers "by his Holy Spirit to cry aloud, to spare not, to lift up his voice like a trumpet" giving a decided message of warning to His people "that they may be aroused and convicted of their sins and be led to repent and reform." But while this message was being given, others were at work "to counteract the working of God through his appointed agencies."
Ellen White ended her letter directing Smith's attention to the call of the True Witness: "We should heed the counsel of the True Witness. When God's people humble the soul before him, individually seeking his Holy Spirit with all the heart, there will be heard from human lips such a testimony as is represented in this scripture, 'After these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory.'" [48] The implications were evident; Smith was still working to counteract the work of Jones and Waggoner and the message God had sent through them. To answer the call of the True Witness meant to repent and accept His remedies, which would usher in the latter rain and loud cry in all its fullness. Ellen White would send the letter to Smith through the hands of A. T. Jones, with copies going to O. A. Olsen as well. [49]
In September, Ellen White would once again send off a letter to Uriah Smith. This time she was even more explicit in regard to the Laodicean message and the connection with the Minneapolis message:
The word of God cannot work effectually in the heart when it is barred out by unbelief. The message which the messengers have been proclaiming is the message to the Laodicean church. [Revelation 3:14-20, quoted.] This message has not had the influence that it should have had upon the mind and heart of the believers. The true state of the church is to be presented before men, and they are to receive the word of God not as something originating with men, but as the word of God. Many have treated the message to the Laodiceans as it has come to them, as the word of man. Both message and messenger have been held in doubt by those who should have been the first to discern and act upon it as the word of God. Had they received the word of God sent to them, they would not now be in darkness....
The message given us by A. T. Jones, and E. J. Waggoner is the message of God to the Laodicean church, and woe be unto anyone who professes to believe the truth and yet does not reflect to others the God-given rays. Elder Smith, had you been unprejudiced, had not reports affected you and led you to bar your heart against the entrance of what these men presented; had you, like the noble Bereans, searched the Scriptures to see if their testimony agreed with its instruction, you would have stood upon vantage ground, and been far advanced in Christian experience....
The many and confused ideas in regard to Christ's righteousness and justification by faith are the result of the position you have taken toward the man and the message sent of God. But oh, Jesus longs to bestow upon you the richest blessings....
The Laodicean message has been sounding. Take this message in all its phases and sound it forth to the people wherever Providence opens the way. Justification by faith and the righteousness of Christ are the themes to be presented to a perishing world. Oh, that you may open the door of your heart to Jesus! [50]
Ellen White could not have been clearer; Jones and Waggoner had been sent with the very message that was meant to open the floodgates of heaven. If accepted by leadership and laity alike, it would then go to the whole world. Two weeks prior, Ellen White made similar statements to S. N. Haskell in a letter dealing with the monumental times in which they were then living. After quoting from Revelation, chapter 3, Ellen White again expressed the great need for repentance, even stating that through God's delegated messengers He was standing at the door and knocking:
There is stern necessity of repentance when we consider what occasion we have given to the world to doubt the truth of Christianity. As those who have had great light we are today more guilty before God than any other people....
These warnings and invitations should no longer be regarded with cold indifference. The wares of heaven are offered to our churches....
Clothed with your own self-righteousness you feel whole, walking in the sparks of your own kindling, you do not discern your defects of character. You need the garments woven in the loom of heaven, that your nakedness may not disgrace you in the day of God. You are living in guilty, self-deception, because you keep yourselves away from the light and rich treasures of God's grace. You imagine yourselves rich when you are bankrupt. Your whole life has been a lie.
Open your doors, says the heavenly merchantman. The summons has been almost in vain. Every crevice of the heart has remained sealed. The self-satisfied Laodiceans have shut Jesus out. Worldliness, self-righteousness, pride, and lukewarmness have so long bound the souls in chains of unbelief that now when the Saviour's voice is heard, through His messengers, rebellion and stubbornness of soul are added to deepen the guilt. Clad in their worthless garments of self-righteousness, they feel insulted when told that they are naked. The Saviour's voice is heard, "Behold, through my delegated messengers I stand at the door and knock." Will you let Him in? Will you open the heart to the sacred, softening, subduing influence of the grace of Christ? Can you keep your heart closed against His love and the riches of His grace? Shall Satan himself triumph in your terrible deception that you have need of nothing? [51]*
As the 1893 General Conference appeared on the horizon, Ellen White once again sought to draw the attention of the ministry to the Laodicean message. "We are certainly living amid the perils of the last days," Ellen White declared as she began her fifteen-page letter. Heart-searching truths had continued to be "passed by with indifference by the churches." Now, the "only hope for our churches today is to repent and do their first work." She pled with the "brethren who shall assemble at the [1893] General Conference to heed the message given to the Laodiceans. What a condition of blindness is theirs! This subject has been brought to your notice again and again, but your dissatisfaction with your spiritual condition has not been deep and painful enough to work reform." Now Ellen White turned once again to the Minneapolis message and the messengers. What treatment had they received? We will quote a large section from this letter:
I ask, What means the contention and strife among us? What means this harsh, iron spirit, which is seen in our churches and in our institutions, and which is so utterly unChristlike? I have deep sorrow of heart because I have seen how readily a word or action of Elder Jones or Elder Waggoner is criticized. How readily many minds overlook all the good that has been done through them in the few years past, and see no evidence that God is working through these instrumentalities. They hunt for something to condemn, and their attitude toward these brethren who have zealously engaged in doing a good work, shows that feelings of enmity and bitterness are in the heart. What is needed is the converting power of God upon hearts and minds. Cease watching your brethren with suspicion. [52]*...
Many have been convinced that they have grieved the Spirit of God by their resistance of light, but they hated to die to self, and deferred to do the work of humbling their hearts and confessing their sins. They would not acknowledge that the reproof was sent of God, or the instruction was from heaven, until every shadow of uncertainty was removed. They did not walk out into the light. They hoped to get out of difficulty in some easier way than by confession of sin, and Satan has kept hold of them, and tempted them, and they have had but feeble strength to resist him.
Evidence has been piled upon evidence, but they have been unwilling to acknowledge it. By their stubborn attitude they have revealed the soul malady that was upon them, for no evidence could satisfy them. Doubt, unbelief, prejudice, and stubbornness, killed all love from their souls. They demanded perfect assurance, but this is not compatible with faith. Faith rests not on certainty, but upon evidence. Demonstration is not faith.
If the rays of light which shone at Minneapolis were permitted to exert their convincing power upon those who took their stand against light, if all had yielded their ways, and submitted their wills to the Spirit of God at that time, they would have received the richest blessing, disappointed the enemy, and stood as faithful men, true to their convictions. They would have had a rich experience. But self said, No. Self was not willing to be bruised. Self struggled for the mastery.
And every one of these souls will be tested again on the points where they failed then. They have less clearness of judgment, less submission, less genuine love for God and for their brethren now than before the test and trial at Minneapolis. In the books of heaven they are registered as wanting. Self and passion developed hateful characteristics.
Since that time, the Lord has given abundance of evidence in messages of light and salvation. No more tender calls, no better opportunities, could be given them in order that they might do that which they ought to have done at Minneapolis. The light has been withdrawing from some, and ever since they have walked in sparks of their own kindling. No one can tell how much may be at stake when neglecting to comply with the call of the Spirit of God.
The time will come when many will be willing to do anything and everything possible in order to have a chance of hearing the call which they rejected at Minneapolis. God moved upon hearts, but many yielded to another spirit, which was moving upon their passions from beneath. Oh, that these poor souls would make thorough work before it is everlastingly too late. Better opportunities will never come, deeper feelings they will not have. [53]
Notes: