A Recent Convert
Nathaniel A. Davis was a convert to Seventh-day Adventism probably sometime near the midpoint of Ellen White’s nine-year missionary career “down under” (1891-1900).GVEGW 109.7
Davis, described by one minister who knew him well as a tall, lanky man “of about six feet five inches,” 7Herold M. Blunden, “Guidance for Earth’s Last Generations,” annual Spirit of Prophecy Emphasis Day sermon, Apr. 12, 1958, p. 7. was for a time connected with the Bible Echo publishing enterprise. He had served variously as a colporteur (gospel literature salesperson) and a circulator of religious liberty petitions. Ellen White subsequently characterized him as a man with “advantages in education, ... pleasing abilities,” with “clear insight into [God’s] word,” and “blessed ... with powers to communicate that word in an acceptable manner.” 8Letter 36, 1897, pp. 1-3.GVEGW 109.8
Our first glimpse of “Nattie” Davis (as his friends called him) in the archives of the Ellen G. White Estate comes from a lengthy eight-page handwritten letter he wrote to Ellen White on September 9, 1896, from Brisbane. In great agony of soul he introduces himself by confessing:GVEGW 110.1
“I have dishonored my Lord, disgraced my profession, made shipwreck of faith, and am now in despair, for I see only the blankest ruin and the direst need confronting me and have no one to blame but myself.” 9Nathaniel Davis to Ellen G. White, Sept. 9, 1896, p. 1.GVEGW 110.2
Describing his emotional state tersely, he added: “I cannot pray; it chokes me to attempt to sing. I am a living lie, and I am ready to sink into utter despair. Yet in spite of all and base as I am, I love the truth, I love the Saviour, I desire to do right, God knows I do; and yet I wonder myself how I can, for my life is full of wrongdoings and contemptible motives.”GVEGW 110.3
“I am willing to do anything the Lord may direct, to follow in any course He may open up. But He seems not to hear me and I dread His wrath. Pray for me; beseech a testimony from the Lord regarding my case. I will submit to His word; only direct me, and I will follow.” 10Ibid.,, pp. 5, 7.GVEGW 110.4
He closed his letter with the self-description: “Yours in fear and trembling.” 11Ibid.,, p. 8.GVEGW 110.5
Davis’ immediate problems revolved around a tragic sequence of debt incurred from default against borrowed money, which, in turn, had been prompted, he said, by “personal enmities, greed, and envy.” It resulted in his losing his position as colporteur.GVEGW 110.6
Owing large sums to both customers and the publishing house, stranded in Brisbane, and “backslidden,” as he himself characterized his present state, he was unable to find secular employment because of the Sabbath. “I am ... helpless to do anything. I am ashamed to beg and dare not steal.... I am in terror lest my wife should discover how things are,” and desert. 12Ibid.,, pp. 2, 4, 5.GVEGW 110.7
Mrs. White seems not to have responded immediately—perhaps the “testimony from the Lord” regarding Davis’s case had not yet been given. So three months later, on December 18, 1896, Davis again took pen in hand to plead for help:GVEGW 110.8
“I know well that you are very busy and perhaps I ought not to have expected that you should have spent any time or trouble over me. Yet I plead for the voice of counsel. I have the most unbounded confidence in your gift and am sure that the Lord would listen to your prayer and give me some light on the dark path that seems now to lie before me.”GVEGW 111.1
The noose of debt seemed ever more tightly constricting his neck, he declared. “I lose heart. Surely the Lord has cast me off. I feel a sense of despair. It seems as though I were guilty of all the sins of the world. The lake of fire yawns before me. I can never get ready in time. I fear lest I should perish.... I feel myself to be the greatest ingrate, the vilest rebel in the universe.... I must go mad if some changes do not come. How gladly would I redeem the past.”GVEGW 111.2
Then he made an appeal for providential direction through the prophetic channel: “O Sister White, will you not for the dear Lord’s sake plead with Him for a message for me? Do write to me even if it be only to condemn. Certainty of condemnation would be better than the darkness of uncertainty.” 13Ibid.,, Dec. 18, 1896, pp. 1-5.GVEGW 111.3