Ellen G. White and Her Critics

Fourth Argument Against Dorchester Vision

4. According to Mrs. White and all her associates, the “present truth” was the “shut door and the Sabbath.” Therefore “how inconsistent for S. D. A.’s to teach that Mrs. White saw the gospel going to all the world when they were all teaching that probation had closed, and were condemning the people who were going out and trying to save souls.” EGWC 251.5

This argument has been examined in the preceding pages. We are concerned not with what Mrs. White’s associates believed and taught, or even with what she herself may have believed—she frankly states that for a little time after 1844 she did believe that “no more sinners would be converted.” We are concerned only with what she declared God revealed to her in vision. We believe that the evidence submitted in this and the preceding chapter reveals that none of Mrs. White’s visions teach that probation closed for all mankind, exclusive of Adventists, in 1844. On the contrary, we believe that certain of her visions, for example, this Dorchester vision, clearly reveal that God was giving to her a view of many souls yet to be saved, of a mighty message yet to be carried “clear round the world.” EGWC 251.6

We do not contend that Mrs. White’s associates immediately understood the meaning of those visions of evangelism and expansion. We hardly think they did. We need not even contend that Mrs. White herself clearly understood at the outset the full meaning of certain visions given to her. The Bible prophets did not always understand. We repeat, and it needs repeating to clear up the fog of irrelevant arguments that have been raised, that our only contention is this: Mrs. White, when exercising the prophetic gift, did not teach the false doctrine of probation’s close for all men in 1844, but rather the contrary. EGWC 252.1