Failed Predictions about PeopleCompiled by Brother Anderson At times Mrs. White made specific predictions regarding certain people. One such person was Adventist pioneer Moses Hull. In 1862, Hull was in the process of losing his faith in Adventism. It would appear that the Whites had given up on reasoning with Hull and Mrs. White now resorted to warning him of the dire consequences of the path he had chosen: "If you proceed in the way you have started, misery and woe are before you. God's hand will arrest you in a manner that will not suit you. His wrath will not slumber."1 This never happened. Despite Mrs. White's warnings, Hull did "proceed the way he had started" and left the Adventist church. However, according to D.M. Canright, "Mr. Hull lived on many long years to a ripe old age, and nothing of the kind predicted happened."2 Besides raising questions about her prophetic abilities, this incident raises some important questions about her understanding of God. What kind of a God does Ellen White portray? Does God need to frighten people with wrath in order to keep them in His church? Does God need to resort to scare tactics in order to force people to stay in His church against their own will?
Charles LeeFormer Adventist minister Charles Lee recalls an experience he had with Ellen White. The editor of the Swedish edition of Advent Herald, Mr. C. Carlstedt, had become seriously ill with Typhoid fever. Charles Lee, James and Ellen White, Uriah Smith and another man went to visit Mr. Carlstedt: "We all knelt in prayer for the sick man; and Mrs. W. praised the Lord because he was 'present with his restoring power, to raise Carlstedt, whose sickness,' she said, was 'not unto death, but to the glory of the Son of God.' To me it was darkness and death; and it was an evidence to my soul that if she was right before God, then I had never known any thing about the Spirit of God. Either of us was entirely deceived.
See also
Citations1. Ellen White, Testimonies, Vol. 1, pp. 430-431. 2. D.M. Canright, Life of E.G. White, chap. 15. 3. Charles Lee, Three Important Questions for Seventh-Day Adventists to Consider, (1876).
Category: Visions Examined
Please SHARE this using the social media icons below
|