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Ellen White Seeks To Balance Things
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August 20 - Ellen White Seeks To Balance Things

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Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Matt. 5:5, RSV.

Ellen White was becoming ever more deeply concerned about her church and where it was heading. She put some of her thoughts and fears in a letter to Jones and Waggoner on February 18, 1887. "There is danger," she emphasized," of our ministers dwelling too much on doctrines, preaching altogether too many discourses on argumentative subjects when their own soul needs practical godliness. . .The wonders of redemption are dwelt upon altogether too lightly. We need these matters presented more fully and continuously. . .There is danger of keeping the discourses and the articles in the paper like Cain's offering, Christless"(Lt 37, 1887).

Part of her letter was a rebuke to Jones and waggoner for making divisive issues public in a time of crisis and for certain of their undesirable character traits. Both men replied positively, humbly apologizing for their public and private faults.

A copy of the letter reproving Jones and Waggoner went to Butler. Ecstatic with its contents, he mistakenly interpreted it as confirmation of his position on the law. In his euphoria he wrote to Ellen White that he had really come to "love" the two young men, noting that he felt sorry for them. "I always pitiy those who suffer keen disappointment." Despite his "pity," Butler joyfully published an aggressive article in the Review of March 22 promoting his position on the two laws.

To put it mildly, Butler's use of her letter to Jones and Waggoner upset Mrs. White. On April 5, 1887, she fired off an epistle to Butler and Smith, claiming that the only reason tht she had sent them a copy of her letter to the younger men was that they needed to follow the same caustions in bringing disagreements into public. But now that Butler had reopened the battle publicly, it was only just to give Waggoner a chance to present his view.

As Ellen White began to see the issues more clearly, she became more aggresive toward the high-handed methods of the General Conference leadership. "We must work as Christians," she wrote. Always yielding to Bible truth, "we want to be filled with all the fullness of God, and have the meekness and lowliness of Christ"(Lt 13, 1887).

That is still needed by each of us.

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Help us, Lord, to have Your humility and Your spirit, even in times of theological controversy.
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