The Fruitage of Spiritual Gifts

Chapter 3 — The Call and Work of Ellen G. White

THIS VOLUME IS NOT A BIOGRAPHY of Mrs. White. She herself has given us the several accounts of her labors. In fact, early in the advent movement Mrs. White began to tell of her life and experiences. We see this in her first little book, of 1851, entitled A Sketch of the Christian Experience and Views of Ellen G. White. A second edition was printed, and later the material was incorporated into Early Writings. In 1860 appeared Luke 2 of Spiritual Gifts, with the subtitle My Christian Experience, Views and Labors in Connection with the Rise and Progress of the Third Angel’s Message. In 1880 a book of over four hundred pages appeared, entitled Life Sketches, Ancestry, Early Life, Christian Experience and Excessive Labors of Elder James White and His Wife Mrs. Ellen G. White. Eight years later the same book in a somewhat larger form was published. Though the book was really edited by Elder White, this last edition contains over two hundred pages written by Mrs. White, which give a wealth of inspiring information about the first years of Adventism and what God had done through the labors of her and her husband. After the death of Mrs. White still another edition of this book, with certain additions by the publishers, was printed, and had a good sale. The reader is referred to these books which, even though printed years ago, are still worthy of careful study. We give here but the briefest outline of her life for those to whom it may not be known. FSG 31.1

Ellen Gould White, who is known in nearly every country as writer, temperance lecturer, revivalist, and spiritual leader, was born near the city of Portland, Maine, on November 26, 1827. She was of the old Puritan stock, and all her traditions went back to the early years of American history. On August 30, 1846, she was married to Elder James White, a promising young advent minister. His family also belonged to the old New England settlers. The White family were among the first of the Puritan immigrants, having come over from England to Massachusetts in 1620. Mrs. White’s childhood and youth and early years as wife and mother were spent in Maine, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, but in 1852 her husband moved his family to Rochester, New York. In that city they lived some time, printing and preaching the advent message in those days of small beginnings. Later, in 1855, the family settled in Battle Creek, Michigan. FSG 32.1

Without going into details about the many travels and labors of Mrs. White, we would summarize by saying that she lived about thirty years in Battle Creek, Michigan, and fifteen years near St. Helena, California. She spent two years in Europe from 1885 to 1887—and nine years in Australia—from 1891 to 1900. Her husband died in 1881, and from then on she made her home near her youngest son, W. C. White, who was her faithful assistant until her death July 16, 1915. FSG 32.2

Many feared her public efforts would cease when her husband passed away, but she really did her largest work after 1881. Though Mrs. White labored many, many years as preacher and revivalist, she was never ordained in the ordinary understanding of this term. She constantly refused to be elected to any church office, and up to the time of her husband’s death received almost no salary or other definite income. She never sought to gather wealth either for herself or her family, and died poor, having given all to the gospel work of the advent movement. It is a record that does great credit to her, her family, and her church. FSG 32.3

Mrs. White grew up in years of stirring interest to America. The forties and fifties were a fruitful ferment of furious forces for good or evil in American history—a furnace in which were forged strong women who took a prominent share in the conflicts. The Abolitionist movement was just coming into its strongest years. People in both North and South were greatly stirred over the slavery question. It is difficult today fully to sense how that agitation for or against the freedom of the Negroes then swept over America. When we read her strong words condemning slavery and her earnest pleas for the colored people in later years after the Civil War, we realize anew how closely she followed her Master in His love for all races. FSG 33.1

Another question which set the whole country afire was woman suffrage, in the discussion of which Mrs. White did not participate. Mary Lyon, the founder of women’s education in the United States, began her school, Mount Holyoke, in South Hadley in 1837. Frances Willard, eleven years younger than Mrs. White, did a mighty work for an emancipated womanhood, and especially for temperance, and her influence as a national leader was immense. In fact, there was living at the time Mrs. White came into her largest work a group of noble American women whose prodigious labors for the home, temperance, women’s education, and other reforms brought women to the front as never before. Because of this it did not seem nearly so strange in those days as it does today that a woman should be the outstanding personality and messenger of a spiritual group like the advent movement. Indeed, it did not seem strange then, and it is not strange now. FSG 33.2

Mrs. White, too, grew up in an age of intense religious revival. Even before the advent movement began, America was engaging in heated religious discussions. Her family joined the Methodist Church, and the Methodists of that day not only were godly but had a zeal for souls which many nominal Christians thought bordered on fanaticism. Some also had an intolerance which led them to dis-fellowship Mrs. White and all her family because they rejoiced in the hope of the second advent and testified of their new-found joy. FSG 34.1

Mrs. White’s maiden name was Harmon, and her father lived on a farm about twelve miles west of Portland, Maine. Nature, as anyone who has seen New England knows, is very attractive in that section. For loveliness, the spring green or the autumn tints or the beautiful winter snows in Maine are not surpassed by those of any other part of America. Mrs. White was born in a house situated on a long, high hill. The view from the house is a charming forest and meadow and a fairly large stream winding its way through the valley. When we observe in her writings how keenly she loved nature and notice the beautiful lessons she drew from this “book of God,” we cannot but think of the impressions that must have come to her in early childhood. FSG 34.2

When she was about five years of age, her family moved into Portland, and for quite a number of years that was her home. Friends there still show us the place where she went to school and the house where she was entrusted with her first vision, as well as other places of interest in her early experience. People who knew her well in her childhood have told me that she was cheerful and full of fun, though showing a deep interest in religion and other serious matters. Public schools in those days were not fully established in America. Many young people did not have an opportunity to secure an education. Ellen Harmon attended school in Portland, but an accident when she was nine years old hindered her pursuing her studies very far. She tells of her deep desire and constant effort to secure an advanced education, but the opportunity never came. She was what so many women of her day were, self-educated. This fact may have sharpened her intense interest in education later on and was used of God to give her many broad-minded and fervent lectures and books on education an even greater value. FSG 34.3