You've Got Issues The Unread Prophet Evan, age 16

"Why should I listen to Ellen White?"

It’s a question you hear from many young members of the Adventist Church today. Some say, “She lived a long time ago and her writings don’t apply to me today.” Why is it that so many kids are coming to this conclusion? The fundamental Adventist belief on “the gift of prophecy”states that Ellen White was called and used by God as a messenger. It reads that “her writings are a continuing and authoritative source of truth which provide for the church comfort, guidance, instruction, and correction” and that they also “make clear that the Bible is the standard by which all teaching and experience must be tested.”

Far too often people don’t pay attention to the conclusion their church has reached about Ellen White. Others are sometimes confused and conclude that what Ellen White wrote goes against the Bible because of what they have heard their friends say.

This brings me to my second point: Most people who say they don’t believe in Ellen White aren’t reading her. People are listening to second-hand information about her ministry and writings. But there’s really no substitute for figuring things out for yourself! So read the Bible and read Ellen White: compare the two, and with the Holy Spirit’s guidance draw your own conclusions. If you want to discover the truth about Ellen White, read her books.

Finally, it’s apparent that we are living in the last days, and that makes it more important than ever that we pay attention to what God wants us to know. If you need examples of what happened when people did not listen to prophets, read about them in the Bible. Almost no one listened to Noah, and as a result, they were caught by surprise when the flood came. No one believed Jeremiah’s prophecy that if they didn’t change their ways the Babylonians would come and conquer them. But the Babylonians came, they saw, and conquered.

In Biblical times the Jewish nation sometimes had to wait hundreds of years for a messenger from the Lord. I find it sad that about only one hundred years after the time of Ellen White so many write her off as being outdated. As we come closer and closer to the end of this world we are becoming more asleep to the prophet of our time, and many of us will be caught off guard.

My challenge for you is to actually pick up a book, an article, even a paragraph Ellen White wrote. If you do, you’ll find that many of the myths you have heard about her are untrue, and that your spiritual relationship with Jesus Christ will be deeply enhanced.