Chapter 17 — The Minneapolis Conference and the Great Revival

THE GENERAL CONFERENCE session at Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1888 is a notable landmark in Seventh-day Adventist history. It was really like crossing a continental divide into a new country. Some smiters of the brethren calling themselves reformers have tried to make out that the session was a defeat; whereas, the truth is that it stands out as a glorious victory and the occasion and the beginning of larger and better things for the advent church. At no other gathering in our entire history has the Lord in so marked a manner brought such light and victory to His people through Bible study and the Spirit of prophecy. We all need to know what happened in Minneapolis.FSG 219.1

Aside from its doctrinal controversies and deep and solemn spiritual tone and revival, this twenty-seventh session of the General Conference in Minneapolis stands out as our first great mission congress. S. N. Haskell was there to represent Great Britain. J. G. Matteson, the sturdy old pioneer of our work in Northern Europe, was the delegate from Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. L. R. Conradi, who had then been in Europe but a few years, came with a stirring report from Russia and a copy of our first tract in the Russian language. G. G. Rupert spoke for South America and T. H. Gibbs for Central America. W. C. White, who had recently spent two years overseas, reported quite at length on foreign missions. At that time a General Conference was not the huge affair that it now is. The number of delegates totaled sixty-six at the opening of the session, besides twelve who appeared as members “by virtue of conference employment.” The first meeting of the session came at 9 AM, October 17. S. N. Haskell was chosen temporary chairman, and Uriah Smith, editor of the Review, secretary.FSG 219.2

With the exception of the session held in 1881, the Minneapolis General Conference is our only session after our church was fully organized from which the president was absent. G. I. Butler, who had been president eleven years, was one of the most energetic leaders the advent movement ever had, but, worn with much work at this time, he was ill, and unable to attend the meeting. Thus the need of choosing a new General Conference president arose, with other matters that demanded careful study and prayer. There were those who thought that W. C. White, who had been prominent at the meeting, should be chosen president of the General Conference, but he firmly declined, stating that God had given him another work. The conviction became general that a new man must be found, a strong spiritual leader who by the grace of God would have the ability to gather the workers and unite them again as one body in Christ. The choice fell on O. A. Olsen, who was in Europe at the time. For the next eight years he was president of the General Conference and largely responsible under God for the strong revival work which was carried on.FSG 220.1

The advent church is the church militant. The message it brings concerning the Sabbath, temperance, amusements, fashions, and similar subjects, cuts straight across the customs and ways of the world. It takes courage for a businessman or any man to turn from Sunday-keeping to the Sabbath of the Lord. There are other external things that are not easy to overcome. However, in the life of an individual believer the outside dangers are never as perilous as those within. It is so with the church. Adventists have little to fear from the open opposition of the world. We have everything to fear lest error, impurity, or intemperance, like creeping paralysis, spread among the members.FSG 220.2

During the first thirty years of our history, our ministers were constantly battling against the prejudices and errors of the Protestant churches. But the advent cause prospered. The power of argument was so convincing that people began to see that the Adventists were right, and could not be defeated in debate. One result of this was that many joined our church, but it also brought in a perilous feeling of security and self-complacency.FSG 221.1

Many theologians have defended righteousness by faith and other basic truths as a creed or theory. They have argued and reasoned about it without knowing it as a living experience that brought deliverance and joy to their own souls. To them faith was more or less intellectual assent. Almost without knowing it themselves, they drifted into legalism. To a large extent that was our condition before the Minneapolis meeting.FSG 221.2

In the history of the remnant church, the latter part of the seventies and nearly all the eighties were a time of spiritual half warmness. At times it seemed as though the first love and the longing for the second advent were beginning to die out. Though our leaders held fast to the doctrines of the message and though new converts were won, there was a marked spiritual dearth. This tendency toward formal religion without power was really becoming alarming.FSG 221.3

But the Lord did not forsake or cast off His people. Our leaders were mightily impressed with the need of seeking God for new power. In the fall of 1882 the General Conference Committee decided to appoint three days of fasting and prayer, December 1-3. In the The Review and Herald, November 21, 1882, Elder Butler wrote of this “season of fasting and prayer.” He said in part:FSG 221.4

“We greatly need a baptism of the Spirit of God. Out of this condition of half warmness, a people are to be developed who will be ‘without fault before the throne of God.’ Indifference must be shaken off; new zeal must be obtained. The progress of the work is greatly retarded because of our unconsecrated condition as a people. We think we have as much or even more zeal as a people than other denominations, and because of this may feel satisfied; yet when we compare ourselves with the apostolic church, what a sad contrast do we present! To compare favorably in zeal with fallen Babylon may satisfy some; but if it does, their spiritual perceptions must be very obtuse. Such a condition will never meet the approbation of God. We must, if prepared for translation, compare favorably with the ancient worthies whom God accepted.FSG 222.1

“There are many things in our condition which should humble us down in the dust before God. Our ministry, as a whole, is weak in spiritual power. Their labors do not accomplish the result in gathering souls which were seen among us years in the past, though the opposition to our views is not nearly as bitter as then. Pride, vanity, and love of pleasure have greatly increased among us. Fault-finding, murmuring, and censoriousness, and criticizing spirit, are far too prevalent. Heinous sins crop out among us, and come to light from time to time among our membership. We are doing but little in circulating our publications to what we should do. Many act as though we had ages in which to do our work.”FSG 222.2

“These are sad, humiliating facts, which we are forced to admit. We are ashamed to write them. But God knows them, and many of our fellow-men know them; and in view of them it becomes us all to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may turn away his anger from us. God has very plainly revealed to us our condition in the recent Testimony.”—The Review and Herald, November 21, 1882, page 722.FSG 222.3

The reading of our literature of the years referred to above reveals that our pamphlets and sermons were theoretical and doctrinal rather than spiritual. There were many debates with preachers of other denominations on the Sabbath, the immortality question, and other topics. Our ministers found it easy to defend the truth of God with the Scriptures, but sometimes the very clearness of their arguments gave them a self-confidence that endangered their spiritual life. The trend toward the argumentative also led to certain kinds of cold and speculative religious intellectualism. There were good reading courses for the preachers; there were institutes that would help them educationally; but there was lacking that power of the Holy Ghost and burden for the lost which are the secret of growth in the work of the Lord.FSG 222.4

The Minneapolis session stands out like some towering mountain above all the other conference sessions of this advent movement. It teaches us certain lessons, too, that should be understood by all. It introduced a new period in our work—a time of revival and soul saving. The truth which brought this mighty awakening was the message of righteousness by faith. Christ was lifted up, and God did marvelous things for His people. Those who lived through those days of refreshing can never forget them. In every conference and in many churches and, above all, among the young people of this denomination those days were a time of happy spiritual experience, with a great mission awakening.FSG 223.1

Mrs. White returned from Europe in 1887 with a burden on her heart for a genuine spiritual rebirth of the Adventist Church both at home and overseas. She had done a large work for the spiritual welfare of our churches in Europe. She saw that as the leaders in our church became more controversial, the members of the churches became more critical. Of this spirit of legalism and criticism in Europe she wrote:FSG 223.2

“We have now visited all the churches in Switzerland, and spoken once or more in each place. But we feel a great desire to do more thorough work for them. While the brethren are noble, wholehearted, and generous to the last with what little they have, there is a great work to be done for them. They need more of a spirit of union and brotherly love. Not only is this the case in the churches in Switzerland, but we find the same difficulty existing all through Europe. There is a criticizing, exacting spirit manifested, which, if long cherished, is sure death to spirituality and a growth in grace.”—The Review and Herald, July 20, 1886, page 450.FSG 224.1

On her return to America, she continued to plead for deep, genuine spiritual awakening. In fact, many of the most appealing and even stern words of reproof given to this church by the Spirit of prophecy came at that time. She says:FSG 224.2

“A revival of true godliness among us is the greatest and most urgent of all our needs. To seek this should be our first work.... The old standard-bearers knew what it was to wrestle with God in prayer, and to enjoy the outpouring of His Spirit. But these are passing off from the stage of action; and who are coming up to fill their places? How is it with the rising generation? are they converted to God? What is our condition in this fearful and solemn time? Alas, what pride is prevailing in the church, what hypocrisy, what deception, what love of dress, frivolity, and amusement, what desire for the supremacy! All these sins have clouded the mind, so that eternal things have not been discerned. O my brethren, will you grieve the Holy Spirit, and cause it to depart? Will you shut out the blessed Savior, because you are unprepared for His presence? Will you leave souls to perish without the knowledge of the truth, because you love your ease too well to bear the burden that Jesus bore for you? Let us awake out of sleep. ‘Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the Devil, as a roaring lion, walks about, seeking whom he may devour.’”—The Review and Herald, March 22, 1887, pages 177, 178.FSG 224.3

When Mrs. White came back to America in 1887, she attended the General Conference session in Oakland, California, in November. There again she made plain the burden for the spiritual revival that was on her heart. Concerning her labors at that conference, Uriah Smith, editor of the Review, wrote:FSG 224.4

“Sister White attends the morning meetings at 6 AM, and imparts instruction in spiritual things of the greatest value. The great inquiry, and the earnest feeling, seems to be, How long shall we fail to discharge our duty to warn the world of these things as we ought to discharge it? How long shall we fail to unite our efforts to the strength that resides in the arm of Omnipotence, to make our work effectual in arousing men to their danger? This reaching out after God brings light and hope, and a promise of soon-coming triumph. May it increase to such a degree as to make this Conference memorable above any other that we have yet enjoyed. Oakland, California, November 18.”—The Review and Herald, November 29, 1887, page 744.FSG 225.1

The wish expressed by Elder Smith concerning the conference of 1887 was to be fulfilled in the next conference a year later. It was in this Minneapolis meeting of 1888 that the Adventist Church fully faced the great need of a genuine turning to the Lord. Two younger ministers came to that meeting with a burden to study the question of righteousness by faith as an experience rather than as a mere doctrine. Their instruction called forth a great deal of discussion and some opposition. The Minneapolis session was a stormy one, but the final outcome was good. After the meeting several wrote to Mrs. White and inquired as to the messages coming to them on righteousness by faith. In her reply she said:FSG 225.2

“Several have written to me, inquiring if the message of justification by faith is the third angel’s message, and I have answered, ‘It is the third angel’s message in verity.’”—The Review and Herald, April 1, 1890, page 193.FSG 225.3