Ms 4, 1853

July 2, 1853, Rochester, New York1EGWLM 375.1

Extract From a Vision Given at Rochester, July 2, 1853.¹

According to her account written a few days later, it took Ellen White 24 pages to record the vision she received on Sabbath, July 2, 1853, of which this fragment is a small part. “Last Sabbath the power of God settled upon me. I was taken off in vision and saw many things of great interest to us. I have scribbled off the vision. It covers 24 pages” (Lt 5, 1853 [July 5]). Although the full account has not been preserved, this manuscript, in addition to Ms 3, 1853, and Lt 5, 1853, relates parts of the vision, also published some months later in Supplement to the Christian Experience and Views of Ellen G. White.

See: Ellen G. White, Lt 5, 1853 (July 5); Ms 3, 1853 (July 2); idem, Supplement to the Christian Experience and Views of Ellen G. White, pp. 22, 23 (Early Writings, p. 104).

1EGWLM 375.2

Previously unpublished.1EGWLM 375.3

On public evangelism: benefits of working two and two; need to enter new areas.1EGWLM 375.4

I saw that it was now time for the brethren to move out wherever there was an opening and God would go before them and would open the hearts of some to hear. New places must be entered, and when new places are entered, it would be well to go two and two so as to hold up the hands of each other, whenever they can consistently and not neglect other places.²

The practice of ministers going out two by two in public evangelism was sometimes followed before this time, but with the beginnings of tent evangelism the following summer (1854) it seemed to become the rule that it should not be a solo effort but involve two or more ministers. From the 1880s and onward Ellen White frequently urged those engaging in public evangelism, including colporteurs, to work in teams of two, with the motivation given that this was the method of Christ. “Calling the twelve about Him, Jesus bade them go out two and two. … None were sent forth alone. … In our own time evangelistic work would be far more successful if this example were more closely followed” (The Desire of Ages, p. 350).

See: Search terms “tent meeting,” “tent meetings,” in Words of the Pioneers; Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 350. For extracts from Ellen G. White's writings recommending team evangelism, see section “Advantages of Two and Two,” in Ellen G. White, Evangelism, pp. 72-74.

I saw that the brethren must not go over and over through the same field of labor, but must be hunting out souls in new places, setting the truth before those who are not now enlightened as to our present position.3

A conspicuous example of following this instruction can be seen in the shift of focus of evangelism from East to West starting in the mid-1850s. James White expressed the principle behind this shift in 1857: “We have labored in the East and in the West, and speak the things we know. And no consideration whatever, excepting a sense of positive duty, could induce us at present to labor on the gospel-hardened shores of New England, while so much can be done in the wide West.”

See: [James White], “Moving West,” Review, May 7, 1857, p. 5.

1EGWLM 375.5

Picture: Rochester, New York, City Directory (1853-1854), listing James White's home address on Monroe Street. Courtesy of the Reynolds Library, Rochester, New York.1EGWLM 376