Messenger of the Lord

The Message Is Greater Than the Messenger

We have emphasized throughout these pages that the message is greater than the messenger, the content more important than the container. ²⁷ Why? Because Ellen White’s highest contribution to the church and thus to the world is a reclarification of the Bible’s teaching on salvation. She has shown that all Biblical doctrines are interrelated, that to permit error on any doctrine is to invite confusion and incoherence to the entire theological system. For example, if one is confused on the nature of man, one is further confused on the nature of sin, the importance of health principles, and thoughts relating to the afterlife. MOL 518.4

Without a knowledge of when and where sin originated, men and women have no clue as to how sin will ever be irrevocably dealt with. Without an understanding of the cosmic issues in the plan of salvation, human beings too often focus on themselves, working from self-oriented motives. MOL 518.5

The history of the Christian church is littered with the casualties of theological warfare. Good people are not immune from theological error. For instance, the perils of objectivism, with the emphasis on God’s sovereignty and man’s relative passivity in the salvation process, have been defiantly met by the hazards of subjectivism, with the emphasis on human freedom exercised in feeling or reason. Each Christian group, whether among the different branches of Catholicism or the various Protestant denominations, represents either the objectivistic or subjectivistic emphasis. Or they are hopelessly confused with a mixture of both elements in their desire to be “balanced.” MOL 518.6

But Ellen White helped Seventh-day Adventist thinkers steer through the white-water theological rapids that have afflicted all other churches—not by introducing strange speculations and theological novelties but by introducing the big picture of God and His salvation plan that has been called the Great Controversy Theme. ²⁸ When people look for the strongest reason, the most satisfying evidence, for developing confidence in Ellen White as God’s messenger, many focus on her Great Controversy Theme as the bedrock on which all other evidence rests. MOL 518.7