Advent Movement History 2
Our History: Part 2
THE GREAT TURNING POINT ...
1888-1891
A.T. Jones, E. J. Waggoner and E. G. White travel together to SDA camp meetings and local churches to proclaim the 1888 Message.
1890
BEGINNING OF THE "40 YEARS IN THE WILDERNESS"
A LANDMARK STATEMENT
The year referred to by Ellen White, two years later, in a letter and a book, A Warning Rejected, where she tells the people that - had the leaders accepted the new message in 1888, “we would have been in the Kingdom two years from that date, but now the church must be turned back into the wilderness for 40 years.” Letter from Melborne, Australia, May 9, 1892.
Ellen White speaks of the event at Minneapolis as parallel to the Kadesh-Barnea (Num. 13) episode of ancient Israel, that we are following in their footsteps into a spiritual wilderness for 40 years.
In another statement, she tells the church the Lord will give no new light to the church for 40 years.
1891
November 12, 1891, Ellen White is exiled to Australia by the GC leading brethren in order to remove her influence in the promotion of the 1888 Message. She complies with the leading brethren directions to preserve church unity and a good example, holding out hope for reform in the leadership of the General Conference.
1892
February 28 -- The “Christian Nation” decision is rendered by the Supreme Court of the United States.
Spring, 1892 -- E. J. Waggoner is made editor of the PRESENT TRUTH church magazine in England and sent overseas by the General Conference, in order to separate the 1888 messengers and weaken the influence of their message.
May 9, 1892 – Ellen G. White warns the GC leadership from her exile in Australia that the SDA Church will have to wander in a spiritual wilderness for forty years from 1892 [In 1925, SDA Pastor Taylor Bunch writes a book entitled “Israel in the Wilderness, Type and Antitype”, in harmony to Ellen White’s application of “Modern Israel” – The SDA Church].
1893
Summer – The Congress of the United States rejects the Seventh-Day Sabbath of the Fourth Commandment and votes to close the World Fair on Sunday, “the Christian Sabbath.”
A.T. Jones remains in the USA to carry the torch of truth. He preaches mightily at the GC Session and warns the leadership that a rejection of the message at this meeting will lead to a Divine Judgment be made against the SDA Church.
1894
Ellen White warns that the GC leadership’s final rejection of the 1888 Message at the 1893 GC Session will result in fanaticism and heresies entering the SDA Church.
1895
Ellen White warns that the decisions of the GC leadership can no longer be respected due to the corruption present. She states, that the church is following in the track of Romanism.
1898
In the Review and Herald, April 19, 1898, Ellen White warns that Christ’s judgment upon Jerusalem of old [from the Mt. of Olives], “is a warning to us also”, to the SDA Church, headquarters in Battle Creek, Michigan, because they rejected Christ.
In modern [spiritual] Jerusalem [the SDA Church] Christ was rejected in 1888, and subsequently. But He gives them time to repent. An Advent type, or prophecy of the judgment of the Branch Congregation on April 19, 1993, because some branches rejected Christ and His Righteousness in a message and a movement and decided to follow a man and not Yahshua (Jesus) and the messengers whom He sends. She stated in the book Christ Object Lessons page 79, that "if you reject Christ's delegated messengers, you reject Christ."
Numerous statements from the pen of Ellen White in the appendix section show the progression of growing apostasy in the SDA Church in her time. After repeated warnings, it was time for a multiple manifestation of Divine Judgment on the General Conference Headquarters and the fledgling SDA health program under Dr. Kellogg.
July 19, of 1898, there was a fire at the Sanitarium Health Food Company.
July 21, 1900, another fire broke out at the Sanitas Food Company plant.
In the early morning of February 18, 1902, a major fire broke out at the Battle Creek Sanitarium, where the natural healing arts in the USA was first pioneered. It was completely destroyed along with adjoining facilities where hygienic corsets were manufactured.
The speed of the blaze prevented saving anything but the lives of the patients who filed down the fire escapes in a very orderly manner, everyone waiting their turn with amazing courtesy.
December 30 of 1898, the Review and Herald Publishing plant burned to the ground and on May 18, 1903, the Sanitarium horse stables burned downed, but with the terrible loss of charity patient and thirteen horses.
All these fires were officially determined to be undeterminable in origin by the fire company.
Ellen White stated that these were Divine acts, indicating an angelic “flaming sword” prophecy hung over the institutions well before the events.
By 1903, the Battle Creek SDA College moved out of Battle Creek.
In August, the SDA world headquarters moved to Tacoma Park, Maryland, a suburb of Washington.
By 1922, many years after Ellen White’s death in 1915, the Battle Creek great Tabernacle burned down, under mysterious circumstances.
The SDA Tabernacle was the 13th big fire in Battle Creek’s West End. Every building, except one, was a part of the Seventh-day Adventist organization.
1899
October 31 – In the Review and Herald, Ellen White prophesies that the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Angels’ Messages will again be given, repeated, first to the SDA Church, with new light given. She writes that the call to come out of Babylon will first be given “to the church” [from the Babylonish practices that had infiltrated the church at the head] not just to the churches that constitute Babylon. Alluding to previous E.G. White statement in 1889 that “We hoped that there would not be the necessity for another coming out”, quoted in Adventist Review article Oct. 3, 1991 entitled “Can the Church Fall?” See also R&H, Feb. 4 1902, E.G. White’s statement and comment by Elder Brunson concerning Babylonish practices in the SDA Church.
1901
Ellen White returns from her exile in Australia. She writes that the General Conference is no longer the “voice of God to the people.” Ellen White, [under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit] counsels the GC leadership to change the organization of the church. A.T. Jones and E.J. Waggoner give her their support. The GC Constitution is amended to abolish the GC President’s position, establish a GC Committee, form subcommittees and local conferences, etc… Not all changes called for by the Holy Spirit are made, however.
In the April 3, 1901 General Conference Bulletin, 34th Session, Vol. 4, Extra #1, page 25 Sister White states concerning the SDA General Conference:
“That these men should stand in a sacred place, to be as the voice of God to the people, as we once believed the General Conference to be, -- that is past. What we want now is a reorganization. We want to begin at the foundation, and to build upon a different principle.”
THE NEW ORGANIZATION OR “REORGANIZATION” FINALLY COMES TO PASS IN THE YEARS AFTER SISTER WHITE’S PASSING – A NEW ORGANIZATION BUILT UPON “A DIFFERENT PRINCIPLE” - THE LIVING SPIRIT OF PROPHECY THROUGH A ANOTHER LIVING MESSENGER, EVIDENCING THE SUCCESSIONAL NATURE OF THE OFFICE OF THE SPIRIT OF PROPHECY, NOT JUST ONE MESSENGER FOR THE ADVENT MOVEMENT FOR THE REMAINDER OF PROBATIONARY TIME.
1902
December 2 – In a letter to Edson and Willie White (pages 4-5) Ellen White writes to her sons that she is withdrawing her support from the GC leadership out of disgust with their spiritual condition and resolves to concentrate on her writing at home. She states specifically, “I desire now to attend to my special work, to have no part in any of their councils (the General Conference), and to attend no camp meetings nigh nor afar off. My mind shall not be dragged into confusion by the tendency they manifest to work directly contrary to the light that God has given me. I am done. I will preserve my God given intelligence. … I must now make a change.”
1903
E.J Waggoner returns from his exile in England. Due to the final and complete rejection of the important new light of the 1888 Message, the final outcome of the 1903 General Conference Session [the decision reversals of the 1901 GC Session reforms from the direct counsel to decentralize authority], Sister White states that the “Faithful city (the SDA Church) has become a harlot, …from whence the Divine presence and glory have departed!” Testimonies, Vol. 8:250.
The GC leadership that the SDA Church is being weighed in the balances of the heavenly sanctuary (8T247). Consequently, the “alpha of apostasy” is presented to the church in Dr. J.H. Kellogg’s book Living Temple with its teaching of pantheism. If not for E.G. White’s admonitions, the GC leadership would have gone into outright apostasy. She warns the church that the “omega of apostasy” is far more subtle and dangerous and is to come to the SDA Church sometime in the future. In SDA Church history, 1903 was a watershed event in the Advent Movement, an unstoppable final downward turn in church government and a final decision point in Heaven’s eyes in regards to church government. It would never be the same again.
One hundred years later, David Koresh rejects a plea by Charles Pace in January of 1993, to return to the original platform of truth and accept revival and reformation in a message that he heard and acknowledged at Passover 1984. Exactly nine years later, (9 = judgment) from 1984, he and most of his followers perished in an executive judgment for their refusal to repent. This was the omega of apostasy in the Advent Movement, that a man believed and taught that he was the reincarnated Christ, making Messiah Yahshua (Jesus Christ) of none effect, altogether human and sinful.
1905
Ellen White writes that the “great apostasy” at the head of the work will continue and get worse. Testimonies, Series B. #7 page 56.
1906
E. J. Waggoner is disfellowshipped from the SDA Church.
1909
A. T. Jones is disfellowshipped from the SDA Church.
1915
July 16 – Sister Ellen G. White, the messenger of the Great Advent Movement – the Third Angel’s Message of Revelation chapter 14, dies at her home in California, at age 87, awaiting the heavenly call, the special resurrection (Daniel 12:2), to ”take up her work once again” (7T17) in the finishing up of the Gospel Harvest and the establishing the full manifestation of the Kingdom of Heaven, on earth. (Thoughts from the Mount of Blessing page 108).
Under the half century leadership of Ellen G. White, she wrote over forty-six books, not including periodicals and letters, totaling more than 25 million words, dealing with practically every facet of Adventist beliefs, advanced health and social issues. Not only was she the most prolific female writer of all time, she was the most prolific writer of all time with the assistance of her editing staff of two women.
She was primarily responsible for the establishment of Adventist health institutions, Adventist colleges, the largest parochial school system in the world, evangelistic centers and missions. Her influence was extensive in the initial structure and founding of the SDA Church and theologically she was credited with moving the “church away from Arianism, crass legalism, and pantheism.”
Her death created a prophetic leadership vacuum in the SDA Church, which was one of the founding principles and unique doctrines of the original Adventist Movement. After her death, the mainstream SDA Church strayed far from its founding message and leadership structure. She warned the General Conference many years before her death of the coming greater apostasy of the SDA Church.
1916
May 28 – E. J. Waggoner dies of heart disease at age 61.
1923
May – A. T. Jones dies at Battle Creek at age 73.
1925
Thirty-five years later, from 1890, in 1925, the concept of an antitypical “wandering in the wilderness” is addressed and published by an SDA minister, Taylor Bunch, in his landmark study syllabus, “40 Years in the Wilderness, Type and Antitype”, explaining fully what Ellen White taught three decades before, relating to the sealing and gathering of the 144,000 Firstfruits of the antitypical Gospel harvest from the Seventh-Day Adventist Church.
Most Adventists do not realize that the whole purpose of the SDA Church and the Advent Movement from its inception, was to gather and dedicate the Firstfruits of the end time Harvest of souls, a purified group of Torah (Commandment) observant Christians, to be qualified to receive the full outpouring of the Holy Spirit to finish the Work of the end time Harvest of Second Fruits gathering into “the barn”, the Kingdom.
The study given by Taylor Bunch is a wonderful confirmation of what took place in 1888, and the consequences to the church.
BUT NOW…. the end of the 40 years wandering was almost complete! ………1890 to 1930!
1929
The end of the 40 years of spiritual wilderness in the Advent Movement – New Light is to be given.
In Los Angeles, California, at the SDA University Church, a well liked Sabbath School teacher and Sabbath School superintendent, Victor T. Houteff, begins teaching a series of prophetic lessons, based initially on the Sabbath School Quarterly, that is well received and gaining in popularity among the local church membership.
Victor T. Houteff was born in Raikova, Bulgaria in 1886, and was raised in the Eastern Orthodox Church. He prospered as a merchant, selling perfume. His ability to undercut his competitor's prices resulted in several instances of vandalism. He asked Eastern Orthodox Church authorities to help settle his business conflict. When they refused, he decided on a permanent solution to his business problems, and immigrated to the United States in 1907. He operated a small hotel in Rockford, Illinois, after leaving Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he first settled. He attended an Adventist evangelistic meeting in 1918 and accepted the SDA Message and joined the church on May 10 of 1919. Due to the cold weather, he moved to California in 1923.
What the humble Sabbath School teacher shared with the SDA people is no less than new light concerning many Old Testament prophecies not previously understood or taught by church founders.
The Sabbath School classes become so popular that the church leaders became concerned and threatened.
Unbelief and church control is always the motivating factor.
Victor Houteff’s Sabbath School class is soon CLOSED DOWN by the church leaders.
The Hand of Providence provides a member’s home across the street from the church for the Sabbath School to move to and continue, without official church sanction and without leadership intervention.
The Sabbath School class continues to prosper and grow in the new location.
There is NO OTHER prophetic event in the SDA Church to mark the close of the 40 year period proclaimed by Ellen G. White in the early 1890s and confirmed by Taylor Bunch in 1925.
Continued in Part 3 -- The "addition to the Third Angel's Message" (EW 277).