30
Selected Messages Book 1
Receiving and Imparting the Light
As inquiries are frequently made as to my state in vision, and after
I come out, I would say that when the Lord sees fit to give a vision, I
am taken into the presence of Jesus and angels, and am entirely lost
to earthly things. I can see no farther than the angel directs me. My
attention is often directed to scenes transpiring upon earth.
At times I am carried far ahead into the future and shown what is
to take place. Then again I am shown things as they have occurred
in the past. After I come out of vision I do not at once remember all
that I have seen, and the matter is not so clear before me until I write,
then the scene rises before me as was presented in vision, and I can
write with freedom. Sometimes the things which I have seen are hid
from me after I come out of vision, and I cannot call them to mind
until I am brought before a company where that vision applies, then
the things which I have seen come to my mind with force. I am just as
dependent upon the Spirit of the Lord in relating or writing a vision,
as in having the vision. It is impossible for me to call up things which
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have been shown me unless the Lord brings them before me at the
time that He is pleased to have me relate or write them.—
Spiritual
Gifts 2:292, 293
(1860),.
Although I am as dependent upon the Spirit of the Lord in writing
my views as I am in receiving them, yet the words I employ in de-
scribing what I have seen are my own, unless they be those spoken to
me by an angel, which I always enclose in marks of quotation.—
The
Review and Herald, October 8, 1867
.
The question is asked, How does Sister White know in regard to
the matters of which she speaks so decidedly, as if she had authority to
say these things? I speak thus because they flash upon my mind when
in perplexity like lightning out of a dark cloud in the fury of a storm.
Some scenes presented before me years ago have not been retained in
my memory, but when the instruction then given is needed, sometimes
even when I am standing before the people, the remembrance comes
sharp and clear, like a flash of lightning, bringing to mind distinctly
that particular instruction. At such times I cannot refrain from saying
the things that flash into my mind, not because I have had a new vision,
but because that which was presented to me perhaps years in the past