Introduction—The Prophetic Gift and Ellen G. White
Preparing to Meet Christ
All Seventh-day Adventists look forward longingly to the time
when Jesus will come to take them to the heavenly home that he has
gone to prepare for them. In that better land there will be no more
sin, no disappointments, no hunger, no poverty, no sickness, and no
death. When the apostle John contemplated the privileges that await
the faithful, he exclaimed: “Behold, what manner of love the Father
hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God....
Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall
be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him.”
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John 3:1, 2
.
To be like Jesus in character is God’s aim for his people. From the
beginning it was God’s plan that members of the human family, created
in his image, should develop God-like characters. To accomplish this,
our first parents in Eden were to receive instruction from Christ and
the angels in face-to-face converse. But after Adam and Eve sinned,
they could no longer freely speak to heavenly beings in this manner.
So that the human family might not be left without guidance, God
chose other ways to reveal his will to his people, one of which was the
medium of prophets. To Israel, God explained, “If there be a prophet
among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision
and will speak unto him in a dream.”
Numbers 12:6
.
It is God’s purpose that his people shall be informed and enlight-
ened, knowing and understanding not only the times in which they live
but also what is yet to come. “Surely the Lord will do nothing, but he
revealeth his secrets unto his servants the prophets.”
Amos 3:7
. This
contrasts God’s people, “the children of light,”
1 Thessalonians 5:5
,
with the people of the world.
The work of the prophet includes much more than just making
predictions. Moses, a prophet of God who wrote six books of the
Bible, wrote very little about what was to come in the future. His
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