Ellen G. White: The Australian Years: 1891-1900 (vol. 4)

Working Through the Storm

We have had a terrible tempest of rain and wind. It did bad work for our small tents, but the large tent was new, and staked with poles and cross poles inside, so that it would be difficult to blow it down.... The wind became a howling gale, and continued over the Sabbath. Sabbath the rain just poured down, as if the windows of heaven were opened. Nevertheless our meetings went on, and there was a good attendance from the camp. Men had to leave the meeting and attend to securing the tents in the tempest of wind and rain.—Letter 129, 1898. 4BIO 372.4

Ellen White was the speaker for the Sabbath-afternoon meeting, and the Lord gave her freedom as she addressed the audience that filled the tent. When the storm raged too fiercely, and the speaker could not be heard well, the congregation sang. The meeting lasted from three o'clock till nearly sundown (Letters 128, 129, 1898). Saturday night, in spite of the bad weather, the large tent was again well filled. But Sunday morning, the storm over, there were no early meetings. The whole camp was busy repairing the damage done; by eleven o'clock they were ready for the preaching service in the big tent. 4BIO 372.5

On Friday night Ellen White passed through an impressive experience that molded her Sabbath-afternoon presentation. She reported it in detail in her account of the Newcastle camp meeting sent to the Review and Herald. She wrote: 4BIO 373.1

During the night of the first Sabbath of the Newcastle meeting, I seemed to be in a meeting, presenting the necessity and importance of our receiving the Spirit. This was the burden of my labor—the opening of our hearts to the Holy Spirit.... 4BIO 373.2

In my dream a sentinel stood at the door of an important building and asked everyone who came for entrance, “Have ye received the Holy Ghost?” A measuring line was in his hand, and only very, very few were admitted into the building. “Your size as a human being is nothing,” he said. “But if you have reached the full stature of a man in Christ Jesus, according to the knowledge you have had, you will receive an appointment to sit with Christ at the marriage supper of the Lamb; and through the eternal ages, you will never cease to learn the blessings granted in the banquet prepared for you.”—The Review and Herald, April 11, 1899(see Selected Messages 1:109, 110). 4BIO 373.3

In this vision of the night the angel presented the elements of salvation and the key to a successful Christian life. 4BIO 373.4

Elder Starr reported that the Newcastle camp meeting “grew until it was the largest in outside attendance, and one of the most important in its counsels and results” (UCR, January 15, 1899). Midweek, Ellen White reported: 4BIO 373.5

We have this morning, December 28, decided that the meeting must be continued over the third Sabbath and Sunday. Those who are attentive and interested must have a chance to hear the Word of God.—Letter 129, 1898. 4BIO 373.6

And hear the Word of God they did. As she described the meeting to longtime friends in the United States, she explained: 4BIO 374.1

I think we entered Newcastle at the right time.... The best class of people, it seems to us, attend our meetings, and they are deeply interested. We do not conceal our banner of truth at all. We let them know that we are Seventh-day Adventists because we believe the Bible. The Bible and the Bible only is the foundation of our faith. Before these meetings close, the people will know from the Scriptures why we are a peculiar people. The Word is the foundation of our faith. Our dependence is upon Christ.—Letter 131, 1898. 4BIO 374.2

The speakers at this meeting, in addition to Ellen White, were Elders Tenney, Daniells, Colcord, and Robinson, and Dr. Caro (UCR, January 15, 1899). On weekends the audience numbered up to 2,500. After running for seventeen days over three Sabbaths and Sundays, the camp meeting as such was brought to a close, but not the public meetings. The large new tent that had served so well was exchanged for a smaller one, which was purchased and pitched in a favorable location in nearby Hamilton for the continuation of evangelistic meetings. Elders G. B. Starr, W. A. Colcord, and H. C. Lacey and his wife were left to follow through in binding off the interest (12 WCW, p. 402). During January, Ellen White visited Hamilton each weekend and continued frequent visits while the work was developing. By the end of April, thirty-five were baptized (Letter 83, 1899), and the interest still was running high. Within a few months a house of worship was erected, and on September 2, Ellen White preached the dedicatory address. So the hastily planned Newcastle camp meeting, as “just a little one” to be held at year's end squeezed in between the well-planned meetings in Brisbane and Melbourne, surprised everyone and laid the foundation for another church. 4BIO 374.3

In the Brisbane and Newcastle meetings it would seem that Australian camp meetings reached perhaps the highest point of evangelistic thrust. 4BIO 374.4