Our Roots, Pt. 38

As we have seen earlier, Ellen White did not involve herself with the practical details of determining organizational form. Her concern was with the principles on which that form was based and how well church leaders imbibed and practiced those principles. Any specific form church leaders devised which was in harmony with those principles was acceptable to her. Being content that the form chosen in 1901 and tweaked in 1903 was in accordance with those principles, she focused her energies on counseling church leaders to take the principles to heart. This was significant and necessary because many of the same church leaders that had been in power before the reorganization still held positions of power after it, and unless they took to heart the corrected principles of operation they could just as easily abuse the improved system as they had the earlier system of organization.

The concern that leaders practice the principles on which the reorganization was based is seen in warnings like this one:

“Too much power is invested in humanity when matters are so arranged that one man, or a small group of men have it in their power to rule or to ruin the work of their fellow-laborers. In the erection of medical institutions and the development of their work, there is not to be a ruling, kingly power, as there has been in the past. The kingly power formerly exhibited in the General Conference is not to be perpetuated. The publishing work is not to be a kingdom of itself. It is essential that the principles that govern in General Conference affairs shall be maintained in the management of the publishing work and the sanitarium work. No one is to think that the branch of work with which he is connected is of vastly more importance than other branches.

“The division of the General Conference into District Union Conferences was God’s arrangement. In the work of the Lord for these last days there are to be no Jerusalem centers, no kingly power. And the work in the different countries is not to be tied up by contracts to the work centering in Battle Creek; for [this is] not God’s plan. Brethren are to counsel together; for we are just as much under the control of God in one part of His vineyard as in another. Brethren are to be one in heart and soul, even as Christ and the Father are one. Teach this, practice this, that we may be one with Christ in God, all working to build up one another” (Manuscript 156B, 1901).

This statement from Ellen White is expertly commented on by Barry Oliver in his book, SDA Organizational Structure, Past, Present, and Future, “These paragraphs which were written on 27 November 1901, seven months after the General Conference session, pointed to a danger which still existed—the danger of failing to implement the principle of decentralization in all the features of the church organization. Ellen White wrote in a manner which was conducive to unity, not disunity. But her burden was that there should not be any centers of kingly power. Her implication was that such concentrations of power would supplant the possibility of that unity which was to be a symbol of the relationship in the Godhead” (p.212, emphasis supplied).

Ellen White stayed out of the Daniells/Kellogg/Jones disputes until the substance of those disputes strayed onto the territory of principle. This happened when the no-debt policy came up and again in regard to Kellogg’s book, The Living Temple. As we have already seen, the issue of the no-debt policy was settled fairly quickly. The matter of Kellogg’s book, and the pantheistic viewpoint it contained, was more complicated. In promoting the book, and in the book itself, Kellogg had used statements from Ellen White—out of context and misinterpreted—to make it appear that she supported his pantheistic philosophies. Ellen White did not correct this abuse of her writings until the statements she sent to be read at the 1903 Autumn Council. Afterwards, these same materials were published in the Review and Herald so that the entire church could understand the situation.

“I have some things to say to our teachers in reference to the new book, ‘The Living Temple.’ Be careful how you sustain the sentiments of this book regarding the personality of God. As the Lord represents matters to me, these sentiments do not bear the indorsement of God. They are a snare that the enemy has prepared for these last days. I thought that this would surely be discerned, and that it would not be necessary for me to say anything about it. But since the claim has been made that the teachings of this book can be sustained by statements from my writings, I am compelled to speak in denial of this claim. There may be in this book expressions and sentiments that are in harmony with my writings. And there may be in my writings many statements which, when taken from their connection, and interpreted according to the mind of the writer of ‘The Living Temple,’ would seem to be in harmony with the teachings of this book. This may give apparent support to the assertion that the sentiments in ‘The Living Temple’ are in harmony with my writings. But God forbid that this opinion should prevail” (Review and Herald, October 22, 1903, par. 1).

As mentioned previously, this public denouncement of Kellogg’s position strengthened the bond between Kellogg and Jones (who thought that Kellogg was being mistreated). These two were equally unwilling to either abandon their position or to openly dismiss the guidance of the Spirit of Prophesy. Instead, they began to sow doubts about the authority of the writings coming from Ellen White. One of the ways they did this was by suggesting that some of the things she said were from God and others were just her own human opinions. A variation on this suggestion was that W.C. White was influencing his mother’s opinions and writings. They also suggested that some of the documents coming out under her name hadn’t actually been written by Ellen White—that W.C. White or some of her other assistants would write out their own thoughts and send them out under her name.

Ellen White was not in the habit of directly addressing challenges to the authority of her work. Such challenges had been popping up now and then throughout her ministry and her typical approach was to ignore them and allow other church leaders to deal with them. In this case she undertook to address them herself (possibly because this time around the other church leaders were also under attack from the Kellogg/Jones camp). In early 1906 Ellen White sent a letter to more than a dozen of the primary agitators in the Kellogg/Jones camp at Battle Creek, inviting them to ask any questions they might have about the authoritativeness of her writings so that she could clear up any doubts or misunderstandings they might have. The questions poured in and she spent several months responding to them.

Next: Meeting a Direct Attack