FOUR points are made very clear in the record. Ellen White states: (1) Jesus Christ did not "enforce celibacy," but exalted marriage; (2) husbands and wives were to cherish their "marriage privileges;" (3) in this relationship "temperance" is to be the watchword and excesses are to be avoided. And she asserts (4) that extreme teachings on this question are to be avoided, for although the aim may be a high state of moral purity, such teachings have often led to disaster.
It seems that not infrequently those who make a specialty of condemning that which is not condemned in the Word of God or the Testimonies, reveal a weakness in their own character where they doubt less supposed themselves to be strong. Some have even been led to practice outside the marriage relation that which they have maintained to be sinful within it. Instances of this kind are not uncommon. We cite one:
Some years ago the writer was personally acquainted with one of our ministers of experience who while pastoring a large church counseled that husbands and wives should live as brothers and sisters, and he gave reason for those who knew him to believe that this was what was practiced in his own home. While everything seemed to be on a high moral and spiritual plane, with purity pervading, this pastor was led to seek outside of his seemingly happy marriage that which would have been proper but denied by him within it. As in his pastoral duties he counseled a young lady in her late teens who was somewhat backward in her development, he was led to engage in repeated sexual relationships with her, ostensibly on the basis of assisting her in her development. This man was relieved of his credentials and ministerial responsibilities.
Such experiences verify the Ellen G. White declaration that extreme views on the marriage relation would lead to the darkest of sins and the grossest of immorality.
Views that called for total continence were, about the time of the Anna Phillips experience, espoused or held by a number of families in and around Battle Creek. The tragedy is that when such extreme positions are adopted by one partner or both of the marriage relationship, the result is often heartache, misery, and broken homes.
One who began his ministry in Michigan and later served as a General Conference vice-president informed the writer that he and his wife at one time counted more than sixty families in the Battle Creek area that had been broken up because of extreme teaching concerning the marriage relation, such as was advocated by Anna Phillips. The Saviour says, "By their fruits ye shall know them" (Matt. 7:20).
Rather late in Mrs. White's ministry there was an unfortunate situation in a denominational center community on which she had occasion to comment. In this case the wife of a Seventh-day Adventist physician took the position that she should no longer have sexual relations with her husband. This resulted in the breaking up of the home, with its subsequent dismay and perplexity. The cause of the tragedy was not as yet generally known. One day as D. E. Robinson, secretary to Mrs. White, was driving with her past the family home where the wife re sided, Ellen White stated casually that the break which had come in that family need not have come had the wife not adopted unreasonable and extreme attitudes in the matter of sexual relationships with her husband.
A High Standard of Purity Called For
Mrs. White emphasizes the solemn fact that there are many professed Christians who are intemperate in the marital relation, concealing under a garb of holiness a degraded and lustful heart. She has writ ten much on the sin of licentiousness as manifested in its varied forms among children and youth and among adults both within and without the marriage relation. She points to the Power that can give the victory over every wrong habit and thought. Among the victories that must be gained by those who are fitted for translation, she includes the victory over sensuality and debasing practices.
God's people must not only know His will, but they must practice it. Many will be purged out from the numbers of those who know the truth, because they are not sanctified by it. The truth must be brought into their hearts, sanctifying and cleansing them from all earthliness and sensuality in the most private life. The soul temple must be cleansed. Every secret act is as if we were in the presence of God and holy angels, as all things are open before God, and from Him nothing can be hid.
In this age of our world the marriage vows are often disregarded. God never designed that marriage should cover the multitude of sins that are practiced. Sensuality and base practices in a marriage relation are educating the mind and moral taste for demoralizing practices outside the marriage relation.
God is purifying a people to have clean hands and pure hearts to stand before Him in the Judgment. The standard must be elevated, the imagination purified; the infatuation clustering around debasing practices must be given up, and the soul uplifted to pure thoughts, holy practices. All who will stand the test and trial just before us, will be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped, not participated in, the corruptions that are in the world through lust. --Review and Herald, May 24, 1887.
Her Teaching of Moral Purity
Ellen G. White was an ardent advocate of a high standard of purity and holiness. Recognizing that "Christ and His purity and His matchless charms should be the soul's contemplation" (ibid.), she sought to direct the thoughts of all to our great Example rather than to dwell upon the unsavory details of perversion and sexual excess. In connection with the experience of 1894 and the Anna Phillips teaching, Ellen White beautifully portrayed her teaching of moral purity.
By accepting Christ as his personal Saviour, man is brought into the same close relation to God, and enjoys His special favor as does His own beloved Son. He is honored and glorified and intimately associated with God, his life being hid with Christ in God. O what love, what wondrous love!
This is my teaching of moral purity. The opening of the blackness of impurity will not be one half as efficacious in uprooting sin as will the presentation of these grand and ennobling themes. The Lord has not given to women a message to assail men and charge them with their impurity and incontinence. They create sensuality in place of uprooting it. The Bible, and the Bible alone has given the true lessons upon purity. Then preach the word.
Such is the grace of God, such the love where with He hath loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses and sins, enemies in our minds by wicked works, serving divers lusts and pleasures, the slaves of debased appetites and passion, servants of sin and Satan. What depth of love is manifested in Christ, as He becomes the propitiation for our sins. Through the ministration of the Holy Spirit souls are led to find forgiveness of sins.
The purity, the holiness of the life of Jesus as presented from the word of God, possess more power to reform and transform the character than do all the efforts put forth in picturing the sins and crimes of men and the sure results. One steadfast look to the Saviour uplifted upon the cross will do more to purify the mind and heart from every defilement than will all the scientific explanations by the ablest tongue.
Before the cross the sinner sees his unlikeness of character to Christ. He sees the terrible consequences of transgression; he hates the sin that he has practiced, and he lays hold upon Jesus by living faith. He has judged his position of uncleanness in the light of the presence of God and the heavenly intelligence. He has measured it by the standard of the cross. He has weighed it in the balances of the Sanctuary. The purity of Christ has revealed to him his own impurity in its odious colors. He turns from the defiling sin; he looks to Jesus and lives.
He finds an all absorbing, commanding, attractive character in Jesus Christ, the One who died to deliver him from the deformity of sin, and with quivering lip and tearful eye he declares, "He shall not have died for me in vain. Thy gentleness hath made me great." Letter 102, 1894.
Birth Control
While birth control as such was not dis cussed openly and candidly in Ellen White's day, and safe and medically accepted contraceptives were unknown, a careful reading of the counsel leads to the conclusion that it is acceptable in God's sight for the partners in the family relationship to determine the number of children they shall have and choose the time of their birth.
"In view of the responsibility that devolves upon parents," Ellen White declares, "it should be carefully considered whether it is best to bring children into the family." ---The Adventist Home, p. 162.
And she asks:
Has the mother sufficient strength to care for her children?---Ibid.
Can the father give such advantages as will rightly mold and educate the child?--Ibid.
And she states that:
There are parents who, without consideration as to whether or not they can do justice to a large family, fill their houses with these helpless little beings, who are wholly dependent upon their parents for care and instruction. . . . This is a grievous wrong, not only to the mother, but to her children and to society. --Ibid. (Emphasis supplied.)
In various statements, well represented in The Adventist Home, pages 162-166, in the chapter, "Size of the Family," such considerations as the welfare of existing children, the feeding and clothing of the children, their education, the mother's health, and the relationship of the size of the family to the potential missionary activities of the parents are all set forth as valid reasons for regulating the size of the family.
Elder Loughborough Counsels a New Believer
The testimony of a highly revered pioneer minister, J. N. Loughborough, makes an illuminating and appropriate summation. He had been acquainted with James and Ellen White since 1852. He had pioneered the work in many new fields. He had led out in the establishment of our first medical institution in 1866 and had written a Handbook of Health,, a 205-page work published in 1868. He had often worked closely with the Whites. Ellen White regarded him highly. He reports that he saw her in vision some fifty times, and he wrote considerably on her life and work for publication.
In 1907 Elder Loughborough had occasion to reply to an earnest letter of inquiry from a young husband and a new believer in the East who was endeavoring in the light of his new faith to find his way in the matter of sexual relationships in his own home. He placed several direct questions before the pioneer worker. In comprehensible chaste language, the venerable elder laid in simple and practical lines his Bible- and Spirit of Prophecy-based understanding of the matter. Here is his letter, omitting the content of the portions of Scripture quoted but giving the references:
"Mountain View, California April 21, 1907
DEAR BROTHER:
In reference to the inquiry in your letter of April 7, I refer you to the following scriptures: Prov. 5:18-20, Prov. 7:2-5, and 1 Cor. 7:2-9.
You will note in these texts that other inter course is intimated beside the conception of children. Read from Testimonies, vol. 2, p. 90, the last paragraph on the page, speaking of the "privacy and privileges of the family relation." Id., p. 380. It speaks "of the privilege of the marriage relation" and has a bearing on the matter of in creasing the number of their children. Id., p. 391, speaks of the abuse of the marriage relation of privilege, and calls for temperance in the use of the privilege (1 Cor. 7:9).
In the same vol. 2, pp. 472-4, speaks of "excessive indulgence," and being "destitute of moral restraint."
Again on page 477, the whole page, speaks of "sexual excess," intemperance in that direction. That many have "no strength to waste," that "temperance should be the watchword," in these things.
These quotations will show you that your idea expressed in your letter to me of "a moderate indulgence" and exercising judgment as to the number of children in the family is sanctioned. I never saw anything in any testimony that sexual indulgence should only be for the raising of children. And I know Sr. White has given no sanction to those who have advocated that position.
One man here in California had written a tract to that effect and wanted to get her sanction to his printing it. He went down to see her, but she said she could not see him but sent word to him that "he had better let that matter alone."
He pressed the matter and wanted to see her and finally she consented to see him. When he had finished what he had to say to her she asked him if he was through. He replied that he was and she said: "Go home, and be a man." He took the hint and the tract was never printed.
The above testimonies you and your wife can read for yourselves and draw your own conclusions in harmony therewith, instead of being condemned by some radical teaching that in some cases has divided families.
Yours for right and temperance in all things,
(Signed) J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH
As might be expected, this testimony of a trusted minister and administrator who was closely associated with James and Ellen White and a very attentive student of the Spirit of Prophecy writings, corroborates the principal points of these articles.
