Although James White and Ellen Harmon were closely associated in travel and labor through much of 1845, it seems that neither gave thought to marriage. They and their associates were of the strong opinion that Christ's second coming was very close at hand; attention was again focused on the tenth day of the seventh month [October], this time in 1845 instead of 1844. It was the conviction held by most that because of the near Advent it would not be right to marry. Of their situation James White later wrote:
We both viewed the coming of Christ near, even at the doors, and when we first met had no idea of marriage at any future time. But God had a great work for both of us to do, and He saw that we could greatly assist each other in that work. As she should come before the public she needed a lawful protector, and God having chosen her as a channel of light and truth to the people in a special sense, she could be of great help to me.
But it was not until the matter of marriage was taken to the Lord by both, and we obtained an experience that placed the matter beyond the reach of doubt, that we took this important step. Most of our brethren who believed with us that the Second Advent movement was the work of God were opposed to marriage in the sense that as time was very short it was a denial of faith, as such a union contemplated long years of married life.--Life Sketches of James White and Ellen G. White (1880), 126.
Elaborating on this, White explained that Ellen was feeble and it seemed that consumption would take her life. She weighed about eighty pounds. Frequently on the steamboats or on the train she would faint and remain breathless for minutes. He wrote:
It was necessary that she should have one or more attendants. Either her sister Sarah or Sister Foss traveled with her. And as neither her aged father nor feeble brother were suitable persons to travel with one so feeble, and introduce her and her mission to the people, the writer, fully believing that her wonderful experience and work was of God, became satisfied that it was his duty to accompany them.
And as our thus traveling subjected us to the reproaches of the enemies of the Lord and His truth, duty seemed very clear that the one who had so important a message to the world should have a legal protector, and that we should unite our labors.--Ibid., 238.
So although their courtship lacked some of the typical elements, Providence led them on to love and affection and fixed their eyes on marriage. It was now 1846, and the end of August seemed to be an appropriate time to unite their lives. Ellen had great admiration for James, "the best man that ever trod shoeleather" (DF 733c, "Interview with Mrs. E. G. White"). There is a note of excitement in a letter James wrote to Brother Collins while in Falmouth, Massachusetts, on Wednesday, August 26. James was there to conduct a funeral:
I have a chance to get to Fairhaven tonight by sailboat, and shall take the cars tomorrow morning for Boston, and the express train of cars for Portland at four-thirty. Shall be in Portland tomorrow night at six o'clock.... Sister Ellen says that the way is made plain. We are published; we shall be married perhaps Monday.-- JW to Brother Collins, August 26, 1846.
He stated that Nichols, who had visited Portland while he, James, was in Massachusetts, was concerned when he first heard of their marriage plans, "but he was now satisfied that God was in it." James added:
I have visited Holms Hall, Brother Chase, and the sisters.... They have no objections now to our marriage. But it tried them at first.... From what Ellen said in her letter, I judge that she thinks of coming west as soon as we are married.-- Ibid.
The Wedding
We would like to picture in our minds James White, 25 years of age, and his bride, Ellen Harmon, 18, with a bouquet in hand, standing in a little white New England chapel surrounded by parents, brothers, sisters, and close friends, as they listened to appropriate admonitions and exchanged their wedding vows. But it was not so.
Sometime on Sunday, August 30, James Springer White and Miss Ellen Gould Harmon stood before Charles Harding, justice of the peace, in Portland, Maine, and were married. The marriage certificate, preserved through the years, is just a small slip of paper carrying a brief form and the signature of the one who officiated. While both recognized the importance of the event, they could not, with their concept of the imminent Second Advent, foresee that this was the beginning of thirty-five years of united lives laboring incessantly in building up the cause of God.
Of their experience James White later wrote:
We were married August 30, 1846, and from that hour to the present she has been my crown of rejoicing.... It has been in the good providence of God that both of us had enjoyed a deep experience in the Advent movement.... This experience was now needed as we should join our forces and, united, labor extensively from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific....
We entered upon this work penniless, with few friends, and broken in health. Mrs. White has suffered ill health from a child, ... and although I had inherited a powerful constitution, imprudence in study at school, and in lecturing ... had made me a dyspeptic.
In this condition, without means, with very few who sympathized with us in our views, without a paper, and without books, we entered upon our work. We had no houses of worship at that time, and the idea of using a tent had not then occurred to us. Most of our meetings were held in private houses. Our congregations were small. It was seldom that any came into our meetings, excepting Adventists, unless they were attracted by curiosity to hear a woman speak.--Ibid., 126, 127.
Their First Home
The Harmon home in Gorham became the place of residence for the newlyweds. We know very little of the early weeks of their married life. But in November they attended a conference in Topsham some thirty-five miles to the north, at the home of Brother Curtis. Joseph Bates had come up from New Bedford and was present. Ellen White wrote:
The Spirit of God rested upon us in Brother C.'s humble dwelling, and I was wrapt in a vision of God's glory, and for the first time had a view of other planets. After I came out of vision I related what I had seen.--Ibid., 239.
Actually, during the vision, wholly unbeknown to her, she spoke of what was passing before her. J. N. Loughborough recounted in print the description of the meeting as Bates told it to him:
while in vision, began to talk about the stars, giving a glowing description of rosy-tinted belts which she saw across the surface of some planet, and added, "I see four moons."
"Oh," said Elder Bates, "she is viewing Jupiter!" Then having made motions as though traveling through space, she began giving a description of belts and rings in their ever-varying beauty, and said, "I see seven moons."
Elder Bates exclaimed, "She is describing Saturn."
Next came the description of Uranus, with its six moons; then a wonderful description of the "opening heavens," with its glory, calling it an opening into a region more enlightened. Elder Bates said that her description far surpassed any account of the opening heavens he had ever read from any author.
While she was talking and still in vision, he arose to his feet, and exclaimed, "O how I wish Lord John Rosse was here tonight!" Elder White inquired, "Who is Lord John Rosse?"
"Oh," said Elder Bates, "he is the great English astronomer. I wish he was here to hear that woman talk astronomy, and to hear that description of the 'opening heavens.' It is ahead of anything I ever read on the subject."--GSAM, p. 258.
Ellen White reported of this experience in the Curtis home:
After I came out of vision I related what I had seen. Elder Bates then asked if I had studied astronomy. I told him I had no recollection of ever looking into an astronomy.
Said he, "This is of the Lord."
I never saw him as free and happy before. His countenance shone with the light of heaven, and he exhorted the church with power.--Ibid., 239.
A few months later James White wrote:
At our conference in Topsham, Maine, last November, Ellen had a vision of the handiworks of God. She was guided to the planets Jupiter, Saturn, and I think one more. [Ellen White, neither in vision nor afterward, gave the names of the planets she saw. From her descriptions bates identified them and James White made use of his identification.] After she came out of vision, she could give a clear description of their moons, et cetera. It is well known that she knew nothing of astronomy, and could not answer one question in relation to the planets, before she had this vision.--A Word to the Little Flock, 22.
Bates had been troubled with serious doubts as to the visions, but the evidence in the experience at Topsham was such that he accepted them wholeheartedly from that time forth. Ellen White never wrote out in detail what she was shown. It is evident that God's purpose in giving this vision was to establish confidence in the heart of Joseph Bates. It should be borne in mind that the number of moons she was shown was what Bates, up to that time, had seen through the telescope. Stronger, more modern telescopes have brought into view additional moons circling the planets described. Nevertheless, had Ellen been shown what stronger telescopes now reveal, Bates's doubts would have been confirmed, rather than alleviated.
Stricken with Severe Illness
But more than other planets was shown to Ellen White in the vision at Topsham. Of this she wrote:
I was shown that I would be much afflicted, and that we would have a trial of our faith on our return to Gorham.--Life Sketches of James White and Ellen G. White (1880), 239.
Fulfillment was rapid. Ellen was taken desperately ill. Earnest prayers in her behalf brought no relief. For three weeks James White's bride suffered until in her intense agony she requested that no more prayers be offered in her behalf, for she was convinced that "their prayers were protracting" her life and thus her sufferings. Every breath came with a groan. Otis Nichols, in Massachusetts, sent his son Henry to bring some things for her comfort, and while he was there he joined in the earnest prayers for her recovery. Ellen White tells of what followed:
After others had prayed, Brother Henry commenced praying, and seemed much burdened, and with the power of God resting upon him, rose from his knees, came across the room, and laid his hands upon my head, saying, "Sister Ellen, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole," and fell back prostrated by the power of God. [On several occasions in the years 1840 to 1851--and even later--there were experiences in which the power of God was manifested in physical prostration. The circumstances, and the high character of the individuals involved, would lead to the conclusion that such experiences were genuine and not the fruit of fanaticism.] I believed the work was of God, and the pain left me. My soul was filled with gratitude and peace.--Ibid., 239, 240.
Ellen was completely restored to normal health and soon with her husband was off by boat to Boston. But this trip was anything but a restful one for the newlyweds, for a storm overtook them. She described the trip:
The boat rolled fearfully, and the waves dashed into the cabin windows. The large chandelier fell to the floor with a crash. The tables were set for breakfast, but the dishes were thrown upon the floor.
There was great fear in the ladies' cabin. Many were confessing their sins, and crying to God for mercy. Some were calling upon the virgin Mary to keep them, while others were making solemn vows to God that if they reached land they would devote their lives to His service.
It was a scene of terror and confusion. As the boat rocked, one lady above me fell out of her berth to the floor, crying out at the top of her voice. Another turned to me and asked, "Are you not terrified? I suppose it is a fact that we may never reach land."
I told her I made Christ my refuge, and if my work was done, I might as well lie in the bottom of the ocean as in any other place; but if my work was not done, all the waters of the ocean could not drown me. My trust was in God, that He would bring us safe to land if it was for His glory.--Ibid., 240.
He did!
Acceptance of the Seventh Day as the Sabbath
For a few weeks prior to this trip to Massachusetts, James and Ellen had been observing the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath. Of this she wrote:
In the autumn of 1846 we began to observe the Bible Sabbath, and to teach and defend it.--Testimonies for the Church, 1:75.
Reference has been made to her negative reaction when earlier in the year, Joseph Bates introduced the Sabbath to her. Bates had taken his stand in 1845, having had his attention called to it through an article in The Hope of Israel, written by T. M. Preble. A man of conviction and action, Bates in turn prepared a forty-eight-page pamphlet, which he published in August, 1846, under the title The Seventh-day Sabbath a Perpetual Sign From the Beginning to the Entering Into the Gates of the Holy City According to the Commandment. James White took a copy home with him after the funeral service he conducted at Falmouth. As he and Ellen studied the Biblical evidences for the sacredness of the seventh day, they took their stand and began to teach it as they met with their fellow Adventists. At this time there were about fifty Sabbathkeepers in New England and New York State (Ibid., 1:77). Years later Ellen White recalled what taking this step meant:
The light upon the fourth commandment, which was new and unpopular and generally rejected by our Adventist brethren and sisters, we had accepted. If we had trials and difficulties before this in accepting the message that the Lord would soon come the second time to our world with power and great glory, we found that accepting new and advanced truth brought us into positions of still greater difficulty. It brought down upon us not only the opposition of the Christian world who refused to believe in the Lord's soon coming, but opposition unexpectedly came upon us from those with whom we had been united in the faith and glorious hope of the second advent of our Saviour. In the place of closely investigating the Scriptures as did the noble Bereans to see if these things were so, there were those with whom we had taken sweet counsel together who denounced the third angel's message as heresy.--Manuscript 76, 1886.
As James and Ellen White made their trip to Massachusetts they undoubtedly spent time with Bates, reviewing their experience and the sound basis for the step they had so recently taken.
The Profitable Time in Massachusetts
We have reported Ellen's desperate sickness and healing just before the Whites left for Massachusetts. They were gone for nearly seven weeks. Two days after their return home to Gorham, James wrote of the trip and of his wife's health, she was now pregnant with her first child.
Ellen has enjoyed the best state of health for six weeks past that she has for so long a time for six years. We are both enjoying good health.--JW to S. Howland, March 14, 1847.
Of their united labors on this extended tour, White reported in his letter to Stockbridge Howland:
Since we left Topsham we have had some trying times. We have also had many glorious heavenly refreshing seasons. On the whole it has been one of the best visits we ever had to Massachusetts. Our brethren at [New] Bedford and Fairhaven were mightily strengthened and confirmed in the truth and power of God. Brethren in other places were also much blessed.
This included the Otis Nichols family, with whom James reported they had a "very free time," finding them "all devoted and strong in the faith as ever" (Ibid.). The picture begins to develop, revealing four strong families with whom they were in close touch and at whose homes they were always welcome, sometimes for extended visits:
The Stockbridge Howland family residing in Topsham, Maine. Howland was a successful civil engineer, but still suffering from being discredited for his Adventist faith and experience.
The Otis Nichols family living in Dorchester, Massachusetts, a suburb south of Boston. Nichols was a lithographer, in the printing and engraving business. He was a successful businessman.
The Joseph Bates family in Fairhaven, across the Acushnet River from New Bedford, the whaling seaport center. A sea captain who had retired with some means, Bates was a strong supporter of the Advent movement. He had chaired one of the large conferences in Boston in 1842. In 1844 he had sold everything to spread the Advent message, and now he was of necessity living frugally.
A fourth group would soon enlarge the circle. The Hastings family resided in New Ipswich, New Hampshire, some sixty miles north and west of Boston. At the point of which we write, the Whites and Hastings had not yet met but were in touch through occasional letters. Hastings was a farmer, engaged in fattening cattle for the market. He was one of the earnest Adventists who left his potatoes in the field unharvested in the autumn of 1844 as a witness to his faith. He had been well rewarded financially, as his potatoes did not rot and brought a good price on the market the next spring. On May 21, James White, addressing Mrs. Hastings, introduced his letter, "All I know of you is from what I have seen in the Day-Dawn from your pen." He had just received from Fairhaven the copies of the broadside Bates had published for him carrying Ellen White's vision confirming the Sabbath truth. This he put with the 1846 broadside carrying Ellen White's first visions, saying:
When I get anything good I have a desire that all the faithful should share a slice. This is my apology for addressing you at this time and enclosing these two visions to you.--JW to Elvira Hastings, May 21, 1847.
The Harmons, Ellen's parents, with whom they lived in Gorham, had not yet accepted the Sabbath, and did not until a year later, which caused some problems. James mentioned this in his letter to Howland at Topsham:
You have a number to meet with at your place, but here is not one soul that we can meet with or unite in serving the Lord.--JW to S. Howland, March 14, 1847.
We gain a sense of the uncomfortable and unstable situation in which James and Ellen lived and moved as James continued his letter to Howland, recounting circumstances and tactfully throwing out some suggestions and hints:
We have been thinking much of home as well as of you at Topsham and Brunswick for two weeks. I think it will be the Lord's will for us to visit you soon. It seems a long time since we saw you last.
We should be glad to see you and Sister Howland here. Will you come up and see us? If you will we will return with you to Topsham. If you cannot come, send Brother Cobb or some other of the brethren. Let not the want of money prevent you from coming if you feel free to come, for I have $8 and can pay a part, or can and will gladly and freely pay the whole if necessary. I want you to write as soon as you receive this and tell me of your prosperity unless some of you can come and see us immediately.
If you do not conclude to visit us, please inform me by letter as soon as you can so that we may make some other arrangement. We should be very glad to see you here. I think it might prove a blessing to you and the folks here....
It may be a duty to come up to Gorham and cheer us with your words of comfort. How good it would be if Gorham were only about five miles from Topsham so that we could spend our holy Sabbaths together.
Oh, I am sick of our ungodly, hypocritical, dishonest, cheating neighbors. What a wicked world we are living in! I love to think of the kingdom. Take away our hope, and we are perfectly miserable. What a deathly degrading thought, to think of spending a life in this horribly unchristian world and then lay down in the dust. But it won't be so. No! No! No!-- Ibid.
Just what the immediate response was, and whether the Howlands visited Gorham at the time, is not known, but we do know that in April, James and Ellen White were residing in Topsham, staying with the Howlands in their well-constructed home. On Sabbath, April 3, Ellen White was given a significant vision. The following Wednesday, April 7, she wrote of it in a letter to Joseph Bates:
Vision Confirming the Sabbath
Dear Brother Bates,
Last Sabbath we met with the dear brethren and sisters here, who meet at Brother Howland's. We felt an unusual spirit of prayer. And as we prayed, the Holy Ghost fell upon us. We were very happy. Soon I was lost to earthly things, and was wrapped up in a vision of God's glory. I saw an angel swiftly flying to me. He quickly carried me from the earth to the Holy City.
In the city I saw a temple, which I entered. I passed through a door before I came to the first veil. This veil was raised, and I passed into the holy place. I saw the altar of incense, the candlestick with seven lamps, and the table on which was the shewbread, et cetera. After viewing the glory of the holy, Jesus raised the second veil, and I passed into the Holy of Holies.
In the Holiest I saw an ark; on the top and sides of it was purest gold. On each end of the ark was a lovely cherub, with their wings spread over it. Their faces were turned towards each other, and they looked downwards. Between the angels was a golden censer. Above the ark, where the angels stood, was an exceeding bright glory, that appeared like a throne where God dwelt. Jesus stood by the ark.--A Word to the Little Flock, 18 (see also Early Writings, 32-35).
In the vision she saw Jesus ministering in the Most Holy Place in behalf of the saints, and then the ark was opened to enable her to see its contents. Here is what she saw:
In the ark was the golden pot of manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of stone which folded together like a book. Jesus opened them, and I saw the Ten Commandments written on them with the finger of God. On one table was four,
and on the other six. The four on the first table shone brighter than the other six. But the fourth, the Sabbath commandment, shone above them all; for the Sabbath was set apart to be kept in honor of God's holy name. The holy Sabbath looked glorious--a halo of glory was all around it.-- Ibid. see also Early Writings, 32-35)
In successive scenes she was carried through a review of the factors that give validity to the Sabbath and its observance. She was shown that the Sabbath is the point at which all mankind must make a decision to serve God or an apostate power. The vision was climaxed with a view of the second coming of Christ and the ascension of the redeemed to the Holy City, where Jesus opens the gates to welcome those who have "kept the 'commandments of God,"' and have a "'right to the tree of life"' (Ibid., 20).
A letter containing this message was sent to Joseph Bates. James White suggested to Bates that he have one thousand copies printed on a broadside and send him the bill. This Bates did. When James received the bill of $7.50, he borrowed the money to pay it. Writing to Elvira Hastings, of New Ipswich, New Hampshire, he stated that he would "trust in the Lord for the money to be sent in" (JW to Elvira Hastings, May 21, 1847).
James and Ellen White had accepted the Sabbath solely on the evidence of Scripture called to their attention by the Joseph Bates tract. The vision of April 3 impressed upon them the singular importance of the Sabbath, and the mention made in the vision of "the mark of the beast and his image" helped them put some things together, adding to their understanding of the significance of that message.
Rebaptism of Ellen White
Soon after accepting the Sabbath truth, Ellen White requested rebaptism--undoubtedly into the third angel's message. James White writes of this in Life Incidents, page 273, in connection with his presentation of Ellen White's visions:
On receiving baptism at my hands, at an early period of her experience, as I raised her up out of the water, immediately she was in vision.
This is the only reference to this step in her experience; the date of the rebaptism is not known.
The Visions of Ellen White
Frequent mention has been made in this narrative to the visions Ellen White received, but little has been said of the physical phenomena that accompanied these visions and provided those who witnessed them with strong evidence of the work being of God. As she herself was totally unconscious during a vision, we must turn to others who were eyewitnesses of the unusual and thrilling experience. Several who had long acquaintance with her from early years have provided us with vivid descriptions. One such is J. N. Loughborough, who first saw her in vision in 1852 and declared that he had seen her in vision fifty times. He wrote:
In passing into vision, she gives three enrapturing shouts of "Glory!" which echo and re-echo, the second, and especially the third, fainter but more thrilling than the first, the voice resembling that of one quite a distance from you, and just going out of hearing.
For about four or five seconds she seems to drop down like a person in a swoon, or one having lost his strength; she then seems to be instantly filled with superhuman strength, sometimes rising at once to her feet and walking about the room. There are frequent movements of the hands and arms, pointing to the right or left as her head turns. All these movements are made in a most graceful manner. In whatever position the hand or arm may be placed, it is impossible for anyone to move it.
Her eyes are always open, but she does not wink; her head is raised, and she is looking upward, not with a vacant stare, but with a pleasant expression, only differing from the normal in that she appears to be looking intently at some distant object.
She does not breathe, yet her pulse beats regularly. Her countenance is pleasant, and the color of her face as florid as in her natural state.--GSAM, pp. 204, 205.
Mrs. Martha Amadon, also acquainted with Ellen White from early years, after giving a similar description of what took place in connection with the visions, declared:
There was never an excitement among those present during a vision; nothing caused fear. It was a solemn, quiet scene, sometimes lasting an hour....
When the vision was ended, and she lost sight of the heavenly light, as it were, coming back to the earth once more, she would exclaim with a long-drawn sigh, as she took her first natural breath, "D-a-r-k." She was then limp and strengthless.--DF 373, Martha Amadon, "Mrs. E. G. White in Vision."
Individual visions were marked by various characteristics, some of which will be noted as the stories in which they are involved are told. James White, in introducing Ellen White's experience in his Life Incidents in 1868, described the visions under four numbered points:
1. She is utterly unconscious of everything transpiring around her, as has been proved by the most rigid tests, but views herself as removed from this world, and in the presence of heavenly beings.
2. She does not breathe. During the entire period of her continuance in vision, which has at different times ranged from fifteen minutes to three hours, there is no breath, as has been repeatedly proved by pressing upon the chest, and by closing the mouth and nostrils.
3. Immediately on entering vision, her muscles become rigid, and joints fixed, so far as any external force can influence them. At the same time her movements and gestures, which are frequent, are free and graceful, and cannot be hindered nor controlled by the strongest person.
4. On coming out of vision, whether in the daytime or a well-lighted room at night, all is total darkness. Her power to distinguish even the most brilliant objects, held within a few inches of the eyes, returns but gradually....
She has probably had, during the past twenty-three years, between one and two hundred visions. These have been given under almost every variety of circumstance, yet maintaining a wonderful similarity.--Page 272.
In the earlier years of Ellen White's experience the visions were almost always accompanied by physical phenomena similar to that described in the Scriptures in connection with the respective prophets. In the later years, her work having been established and accepted, the visions were usually given during the hours of the night, as the one described by Daniel in the opening verse of chapter 7: "a dream and visions of his head upon his bed." Such night visions were briefer, more frequent, but of equal importance and value as the visions given during the hours of the day, accompanied by the physical phenomena.
Ellen White's Letter to Eli Curtis
On April 21, 1847, Ellen White penned a letter to Eli Curtis, of New York City, in which she referred to light given to her on a number of points. She wrote:
Dear Brother,
In the Day-Dawn, volume 1, Nos. 10 and 11, you kindly invite me to address you a communication.
My only apology I have to offer for not writing before is I have not had a clear duty to write till now. You will, I doubt not, excuse me for addressing you so publicly, at this time. I have been much interested in your writings in the Dawn, and Extra, and fully agree with you on some points, but on others we widely differ.--A Word to the Little Flock, 11.
Then Ellen enters into a discussion of a number of points, some of them theological, based on the spectrum of visions given to her during the past two years. Note the careful, positive way she comes before the public as she writes of these matters:
Your Extra is now on the stand before me; and I beg leave to state to you, and the scattered flock of God, what I have seen in vision relative to these things on which you have written.
I fully agree with you, that there will be two literal resurrections, one thousand years apart. I also agree with you that the new earth will not appear till after the wicked dead are raised, and destroyed, at the end of the thousand years.
I saw that Satan was "loosed out of his prison" at the end of the thousand years, just at the time the wicked dead were raised; and that Satan deceived them by making them believe that they could take the Holy City from the saints. The wicked all marched up around the "camp of the saints," with Satan at their head; and when they were ready to make an effort to take the city, the Almighty breathed from His high throne, on the city, a breath of devouring fire, which came down on them, and burnt them up, "root and branch."
And I saw that as Christ is the vine, and His children the branches, so Satan is the "root" and his children are the "branches": and at the final destruction of "Gog and Magog," the whole wicked host will be burnt up, "root and branch," and cease to exist. Then will appear the new heaven and the new earth. Then will the saints "build houses," and "plant vineyards."
I saw that all the righteous dead were raised by the voice of the Son of God, at the first resurrection; and all that were raised at the second resurrection were burnt up, and ceased to exist.--Ibid., 11, 12
After laying this affirmative foundation, revealing a clear-cut concept of the order and nature of some future events--a part of the great controversy story--she takes up points with which she differed, on the basis of the visions, from Eli Curtis:
You think that those who worship before the saints' feet (Revelation 3:9) will at last be saved. Here I must differ with you; for God showed me that this class were professed Adventists, who had fallen away, and "crucified to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame." And in the "hour of temptation," which is yet to come, to show out everyone's true character, they will know that they are forever lost, and overwhelmed with anguish of spirit, they will bow at the saints' feet.
You also think that Michael stood up, and the time of trouble commenced, in the spring of 1844.
The Lord has shown me in vision that Jesus rose up, and shut the door, and entered the holy of holies, at the seventh month, 1844; but Michael's standing up (Daniel 12:1) to deliver His people is in the future. This will not take place until Jesus has finished His priestly office in the heavenly sanctuary, and lays off His priestly attire, and puts on His most kingly robes, and crown, to ride forth on a cloudy chariot, to "thresh the heathen in anger," and deliver His people.--A Word to the Little Flock, 12.
The grasp that 19-year-old Ellen White had, at this early time, of future events and their sequence is significant. She continued her presentation of the events to transpire as Jesus closes up His ministry in the heavenly sanctuary:
Then Jesus will have His sharp sickle in His hand (Revelation 14:14), and then the saints will cry day and night to Jesus on the cloud to thrust in His sharp sickle and reap.
This will be the time of Jacob's trouble (Jeremiah 30:5-8), out of which the saints will be delivered by the voice of God....
The Lord showed me in vision, more than one year ago, that Brother Crosier had the true light on the cleansing of the sanctuary, et cetera, and that it was His will that Brother C. should write out the view which he gave us in The Day-Star Extra, February 7, 1846. I feel fully authorized by the Lord to recommend that Extra to every saint.--Ibid.
She closed this presentation with the words: "I pray that these lines may prove a blessing to you, and all the dear children who may read them. E. G. White."
The message, presented so simply, quoting Scripture often, and putting many future events in an understandable sequence, was a great blessing to the "little flock" who were weighing various concepts that were being projected here and there. God was gently but firmly guiding His somewhat bewildered people.