Ellen G. White and Her Critics

Hope for Adventist Children

In a following issue of the Review, Bates writes thus, under the title, “Duty to Our Children“: EGWC 604.2

“When the Master of the house (the Lord Jesus) rose up and shut to the door, all honest believers, that had submitted to his will, and children that had not arrived to the years of accountability, were undoubtedly borne in on his breast-plate of judgment which is over his heart.—The names of all that fully keep the commandments are retained. Those that do not, will have their names erased before Jesus leaves the Holiest. EGWC 604.3

“The children, that are taught, and that keep the commandments of God, as they come to the years of accountability, are believers just as fully as adult persons, that are now embracing all of the commandments, in addition to what they believed before. EGWC 604.4

“It is true, some persons that are ignorant of this message may, and undoubtedly will be saved if they die before Jesus leaves the Holiest.—I mean those that were believers before 1844. Sinners and backsliders cannot get their names on the breast-plate of judgment now. God in infinite mercy has borne with our ignorance on this subject until now; and our children have been neglected as they should not have been.—Let us then do all that our hands find to do towards their salvation.”—January, 1851, vol. 1, no. 5, p. 39. EGWC 604.5

The thought here seems to be that children have opportunity for salvation because they had not been formerly of “years of accountability,” and likewise “some persons that are ignorant of this message.” He believes it is too late for “sinners and backsliders.” They had had opportunity to accept truth and rejected it. EGWC 605.1

James White, in the February, 1851, issue, comments on a criticism by a Mr. Dennett, who implies that the Review was an advocate of “spurious doctrines, such as the old Jewish Sabbath, door of mercy closed, dreams, visions, &c.” White, who was the editor of the Review, comments thus, in part: EGWC 605.2

“Mr. Dennett speaks of the ‘door of mercy;’ but the Bible speaks of no such ‘door.’ True, Bro. Miller, and others, have used this unscriptural term, (which gives a very wrong idea of our views,) to express their work done for the world; but if we believed that God had forgotten to be merciful to his erring children, we should cease to present truth to them.”—Page 46. EGWC 605.3

The editor here offers no comment on the phrase “erring children.” EGWC 605.4

Immediately following this editorial note is a long, unsigned communication entitled “A letter written by a Second Advent brother to his son.” The editor evidently thought it contained truth and worthwhile counsel for his readers. Said this letter writer, in part: EGWC 605.5

“I think it is more safe to acknowledge that we may have been mistaken in what constituted the coming of the Bridegroom, and the shut door, than to throw the whole prophecy away.... EGWC 605.6

“My time and your patience might be exhausted, were I to undertake to bring to your view the whole subject connected with the Shut Door. Suffice it to say, it does not in my opinion, exclude all conversion. But it does exclude those who have wilfully rejected all these Messages.”—Ibid., p. 47. EGWC 605.7