Ellen G. White in Europe 1885-1887

Chapter 22—The Fourth European Council

September 27 to October 4, 1886

The fourth session of the European Missionary Council was scheduled for late September, 1886, in Great Grimsby, England. So after two weeks at home in Basel, Ellen White left on Tuesday, September 14, to attend this council and the meeting of its British workers that preceded it. EGWE 216.1

Since W. C. White had to remain behind at the publishing house a little longer, Louis Aufranc, a translator from the office appointed to attend the council, was asked to travel with Mrs. White and Sara. The trip had its difficulties. The first night there was space enough in the second-class compartment for only her to lie down, while Sara and Mr. Aufranc had to do the best they could on the hard seats. EGWE 216.2

The channel crossing was a stormy one, and everyone was tossed about by the giant waves. “It was a joy to leave the boat and look upon something that stood still,” she wrote with a sigh of relief (Manuscript 59, 1886). EGWE 216.3

Arriving in London the next day, they took a cab to the Great Northern Hotel, where they spent the night. The prospects for the council that lay just ahead were in some respects not nearly so encouraging as those for the one held the previous year in Basel, but Ellen White approached it with the same total dedication. She awakened on Thursday morning in that London hotel with a great desire for the Spirit of the Lord in large measure to be imparted to her. She wrote: EGWE 216.4

“I arose early and sought to draw nigh to God. I felt wholly inefficient for the work before me unless the Lord should help me then and there. How could I be a help and blessing to others unless my own soul was quickened and abundant grace supplied? I must work for the Master, giving myself unreservedly to Him; and, catching the divine rays of light from Jesus, I must impart them to others. This is the work of every Christian.”—Ibid. EGWE 217.1

When they reached Great Grimsby later in the day they were delighted to find their old friends William and Jennie Ings. The Ingses and the Whites had been friends since 1866, when the couple had come to help in the publishing house in Battle Creek. Not only had they pioneered the work in the British Isles, as mentioned earlier, but after their return from their first tour of duty in Europe in 1882 they had traveled extensively with Ellen White. Mrs. Ings, a native German, served as her nurse and helper. EGWE 217.2