The Gift of Prophecy

Ellen G. White and Revelation/Inspiration ²⁴

The self-testimony of the Scriptures concerning the process of revelation/inspiration is confirmed through the prophetic ministry of Ellen G. White. In her writings she emphasizes thought inspiration in a balanced way assigning to the incarnation of the message in the human word an important role in the process. ²⁵ She used the idea of thought inspiration to indicate that it is the person, the prophet that is inspired. She wrote: GOP 90.3

It is not the words of the Bible that are inspired, but the men that were inspired. Inspiration acts not on the man’s words or his expressions but on the man himself, who, under the influence of the Holy Ghost, is imbued with thoughts. But the words receive the impress of the individual mind. The divine mind is diffused. The divine mind and will is combined with the human mind and will; thus the utterances of the man are the word of God. ²⁶ GOP 90.4

She is attempting to describe what occurs when God reaches out and touches human beings to use them as prophets; the mystery of revelation/inspiration. The statement makes some significant contributions. First, God addresses the totality of the person and not only one aspect of the personality of the individual (e.g., the oral or written skills). God establishes an interpersonal relationship with a human being at a unique level. Therefore, inspiration should not be restricted to the divine use of a specific skill of the prophets. The mind, the body, the spirit, the emotions, the whole person, is involved in this experience. This is obviously based on the biblical understanding of human nature as an indivisible unity of life. GOP 90.5

Second, what she is describing is the mysterious process through which the divine message or word is incarnated into the human condition. The divine mind, she says, “is diffused.” And by that she means that the divine mind and will interact or combine with the human mind and will—the divine and the human—in such a unique way that what is expressed by the human instrument (“the utterances of the man”) is “the word of God.” Obviously the mystery remains, but it is now clear that in the revelation/inspiration process the whole person is an instrument of God as she or he goes through a unique experience. This is what Peter was saying when he stated that men “spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:21, NIV). GOP 91.1

Third, Ellen G. White is describing an incarnational model of revelation/inspiration. She develops that thought in another place, saying, GOP 91.2

The Bible, with its God-given truths expressed in the language of men, presents a union of the divine and the human. Such a union existed in the nature of Christ, who was the Son of God and the Son of man. Thus it is true of the Bible, as it was of Christ, that “the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.” John 1:14. ²⁷ GOP 91.3

The divine thoughts are incarnated not only in the mind of the prophet but particularly in the human language of the prophet. The divine mind and thoughts cannot be placed within the human mind without divine condescension, or without the incarnation of the divine ideas: GOP 91.4

The Lord speaks to human beings in imperfect speech, in order that the degenerate senses, the dull, earthly perception, of earthly beings may comprehend His words. Thus is shown God’s condescension. He meets fallen human beings where they are. The Bible, perfect as it is in its simplicity, does not answer to the great ideas of God; for infinite ideas cannot be perfectly embodied in finite vehicles of thought. ²⁸ GOP 91.5

What she seems to be saying is that the divine mind and will approach the human mind and then adjust or adapt His infinite thoughts to the thought patterns and expressions of human beings in order to communicate with us. ²⁹ God expresses His divine thoughts in imperfect human speech; a speech damaged by sin. This is the only speech we possess, and God condescends to use it in order to reveal to us His loving character and will. This implies the existence of a correlation, no matter how limited it may be, between divine and human thinking and speaking, based on the fact that we were created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26). The revelation/inspiration process affirms both God’s transcendence and His immanence or closeness to us. At times Ellen White emphasizes the element of divine transcendence in order to point to the human dimension of the revelation/inspiration process. The human dimension does not interfere in a negative way with the trustworthiness of the divine message. ³⁰ GOP 91.6

Fourth, Ellen G. White clearly states that the words of the prophets are not inspired; yet she does not radically separate the receiving and the delivering of the message from the revelation/ inspiration process. She indicates that the words used by the prophets were not given or dictated to them from the divine language or vocabulary. ³¹ She distinguishes two moments within the revelation/inspiration process, namely, the receiving and the writing down of the revelation. In the first, God is directly involved in a unique way in passing on the message to the prophet. In the second, the prophet is working in order to pass on the message to the people. At that moment, she says, “The words I employ in describing what I have seen are my own, unless they be those spoken to me by an angel, which I always enclose in marks of quotation.” ³² Obviously that does not mean that the prophets were left to themselves when communicating the message in oral or written form. She describes her own experience by saying, “I am just as dependent upon the Spirit of the Lord in relating or writing the vision as in having the vision.” ³³ This dependence on the Spirit from the beginning of the experience to its end clearly indicates that the communication of the message to others is part of the revelation/inspiration process. ³⁴ The words used by the prophets are not inspired in the sense that they are not the words of God per se but the human words within which the divine word has been incarnated. This at least means that the Spirit guided the prophets in the writing process in the sense that the He made sure they used their own vocabulary to the best of their abilities to express in a trustworthy and reliable form the message they received. ³⁵ In such a search for precision the prophets, under the guidance of the Spirit, may have revisited or edited their own writings in order to clarify, enlarge, or adapt to new situations the content of the message received. ³⁶ GOP 92.1