Conclusion

(1) Ellen White’s interesting employment of certain prepositions in her description of the 1847 visions, (2) her flat declaration that Moses, Paul, and John in Scripture give us “indisputable proof” of the existence of a real heavenly sanctuary, (3) her designation of the “no sanctuary” theory as heretical in her day, and (4) her forecast that in the time following her death this false theory would again arise leave us in no doubt as to where she stood on this issue.GVEGW 47.2

But the existence of a real sanctuary or temple in heaven was not the only reason we remember the visions of March 6 and April 3, 1847. As mentioned above, this was the first confirmation in vision that Ellen White received that she and her husband were correct in keeping the seventh-day Sabbath.GVEGW 47.3

Note also that the Holy Spirit came to Ellen White in vision after Bible study, to confirm positions already taken (or, on occasion, to correct false conclusions, or to suggest new directions if those studying the Word had come up against a brick wall and could go no further) rather than to initiate such positions. This was a foretaste of how the Spirit would operate in the next three years during the early Sabbath Conferences of 1848-1850, when our doctrinal framework was hammered out in thorough, exhaustive Bible study and prayer. ^{33“‘Sabbath Conferences,’” SDAE 1255, 1256; see also Roger W. Coon, “Ellen G. White’s Role in the Development of SDA Doctrines” (unpublished lecture outline, Andrews University/SDA Theological Seminary, Jan. 30, 1992).}GVEGW 47.4

Seventh-day Adventists received their doctrine of Sabbath sacredness from Bible study and prayer, not from the visions of Ellen White. The same may truthfully be said of every other doctrine that they teach—whether “pillar” or “platform.”GVEGW 47.5

Finally, in the last half of her written account of this interesting vision concerning the heavenly sanctuary, Ellen White probably for the first time linked the observance of the Sabbath with eschatological significance, tying it to the end-time “mark” of the “beast” of Revelation 14:9-11. ^{34Early Writings, 34; cf. 1Bio 121.}GVEGW 47.6