The Story of our Health Message

Elder Haskell to Help

In response to Mrs. White’s appeal, Elder and Mrs. S. N. Haskell had come from the East to Loma Linda in the spring of 1906, and with the help of the nurses and the staff of Loma Linda they conducted a medical evangelistic tent effort in San Bernardino. Some of these sanitarium workers, through the sale of Elder Haskell’s periodical called the Bible Training School, helped to raise the first $1,000 toward the establishment of the new college. Studies given by Elder Haskell to the helpers at the sanitarium were calculated to strengthen their confidence in the divine leadership of the church, and to deepen their knowledge of the fundamental Bible truths to be given by Seventh-day Adventists. SHM 367.2

Those at Loma Linda who were about to open the College of Evangelists were eager that their new school should be conducted along right lines. To obtain what counsel Mrs. White might have to guide in the issuance of a school calendar, and in launching a campaign for students, Professor Howell visited Mrs. White at her home in St. Helena, California. Of their interview, she wrote under date of June 8, 1906: SHM 367.3

“Yesterday I had a long visit as I rode out with Brother and Sister Howell. Brother Howell is very desirous of knowing how to plan for the educational work with which he is connected, so that no mistakes may be made. I told him that the Lord will lead all who are willing to be led. The Bible is our safe guidebook. Said Christ, ‘He that will come after me, let him take up his cross, and follow me.’ SHM 367.4

“We cannot mark out a precise line to be followed unconditionally. Circumstances and emergencies will arise for which the Lord must give special instruction. But if we begin to work, depending wholly upon the Lord, watching, praying, and walking in harmony with the light He sends us, we shall not be left to walk in darkness.”—E. G. White Letter 192, 1906. SHM 368.1

Here was a clear indication that the work at Loma Linda was to be entered upon with faith that God would lead in its development, even though its future destiny might as yet not be fully understood. In a further communication from Mrs. White, dated August 19, 1906, she emphasized the need for the training of medical missionary students in an environment where their faith in God’s guidance would not be undermined. Again, in the following exhortation, given at that time, we note the appeal for the blending of the medical and evangelistic parts of the work: SHM 368.2