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Christian Experience and Teachings of Ellen G. White
consideration. The character of her work is to be judged by her own
life, by her teachings, and by the nature of the revelations she received.
Mrs. White always desired that her work and teachings be tested
by the standard of God’s word as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. “Let
the testimonies be judged by their fruits,” she wrote. “What is the
spirit of their teaching? What has been the result of their influence?
... God is either teaching His church, reproving their wrongs, and
strengthening their faith, or He is not. This work is of God, or it is not.
God does nothing in partnership with Satan. My work ... Bears the
stamp of God, or the stamp of the enemy. There is no half-way work
in the matter.
“As the Lord has manifested himself through the Spirit of prophecy,
past, present, and future have passed before me. I have been shown
faces that I had never seen, and years afterward I knew them when
I saw them. I have been aroused from my sleep with a vivid sense
of subjects previously presented to my mind; and I have written, at
midnight, letters that have gone across the continent, and, arriving at
a crisis, have saved great disaster to the cause of God. This has been
my work for many years. A power has impelled me to reprove and
rebuke wrongs that I had not thought of. Is this work ... from above, or
[246]
from beneath? ... Those who really desire to know the truth will find
sufficient evidence for belief.”—
Testimonies for the Church 5:671,
672
.
Christ’s Office Magnified
The incarnation of Jesus Christ, the divine son of God, “Christ
in you, the hope of glory,” is the great theme of the gospel. “In Him
dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete
in Him.”
Colossians 1:27
;
2:9, 10
. The acceptance or rejection of this
vital truth is one of the divinely appointed tests of one who claims to
have the gift of prophecy.
“Believe not every spirit,” Writes the Apostle John, “But try the
spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone
out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: every spirit that
confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: and every
spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of
God.”
1 John 4:1-3
.