Messenger of the Lord

The Gospel Sieve

The Whites remained at Dansville for three months although Dr. Jackson strongly advocated six to eight months. ¹⁰ What did they learn? By late November, Ellen White, convinced that James was not getting better, decided to return to their Battle Creek home. MOL 301.5

However, she “did not feel that the three months ... was in vain.” They had gathered “many things of value from those who had obtained an experience in health reform.” But she concluded that there was no further “necessity of gathering the chaff with the wheat.” ¹¹ Here, in a practical setting, her vision-driven understanding of health reform was able to separate worthy principles of her day from the ill-advised. For example: MOL 301.6

Discarding salt at Dansville was not in everyone’s best interest. Because of an emerging digestive problem, Dr. Jackson suggested that Ellen White eat in her room where she could use salt in moderation without raising questions in the minds of others. ¹² MOL 302.1

Overheated lecture halls seriously affected James’s head. Fresh air was needed at all times for clear thinking as well as for physical comfort. ¹³ MOL 302.2

Though they considered Dr. Jackson to be a “clear and impressive speaker” and “decidedly thorough,” ¹⁴ he and the other physicians believed that the Whites were “too intensely religious, and that is the reason why we are invalids.” ¹⁵ The Dansville program emphasized “amusements and pleasure, dancing, card-playing, theater going, etc.,” which the Whites could not harmonize with the “teachings of Christ recorded in the New Testament.” ¹⁶ While experiencing severe mood swings and sinking hope, many prayer sessions through the days and nights provided James with the peace of mind that led to sleep. MOL 302.3

Believing that overwork caused James’s physical and mental breakdown, the Dansville physicians strongly promoted complete physical and mental inaction. But Ellen White realized that this dictum was “one of the most serious obstacles to his recovery. Because of her vision-driven insights, she knew that for him “to sink down in aimless inactivity was to foster disease and to become the prey of despondency.” ¹⁷ MOL 302.4

Though she often stated that the Dansville “water-cure establishment” was the best institution of its kind in the United States, she soon saw that those accompanying her and James would have to “carry along with them at all times the gospel sieve, and sift everything they hear, that they may choose the good and refuse the bad.” ¹⁸ MOL 302.5

Early in December, Mrs. White was convinced that further time at Dansville would not help James recover. She saw his courage and buoyancy of spirit slipping rapidly. Weeks of inaction had brought him to the place where he himself feared physical exercise. Furthermore, she knew that trust in God was the pathway to courage and hope and that Dansville was not the environment to encourage such faith. And so to Rochester, New York, forty miles (64 km) from Dansville, the White party went where they would be surrounded by men and women of faith. MOL 302.6