The Ellen White Cult: Conclusion and References

 :: Afterword ::

 

I write this last part while in Thailand. It is fitting that I finish it here, with distance between me and others. I am taking a much-needed rest from missionary activities and wonder where life will take me going forward. I have decided to remain a missionary for another year as it was something I told my wife I would do—and I do believe somewhere deep down inside that I can still be a positive influence while working in the church. I earnestly pray that there is never an occasion for a sequel to this book. Yet, if the occasion arises, I will write more.

My in-laws were deeply hurt by the first book I wrote and I have since

unpublished it. I wrestled with publishing this book for a variety of reasons. First, I was worried that I would become fired or disfellowshipped for it. I worry more about it affecting my wife than it affecting me. Yet, I do feel that this is my story and it must be told.

Second, I was deeply troubled at how the first one hurt my in-laws. However, the first book was written anonymously with no names mentioned. It was Albert who brought it to their attention and caused years of family drama and “us versus them” thinking to take place. Although I feel bad for them, I realize that there is still a need to speak the truth, and they have a part in it. I leave their names anonymous and I have no desire to reveal who they are. Like me, their religion was hijacked by this “Ellen White cult.” The only difference is that they choose to push forward and believe it. That is their choice.

As a church, we preach that people must be held accountable for their actions. I don’t write this to hold anyone accountable, but to get the word out. To warn people. We are told that there is such a thing as a sin of omission. Then it follows that to omit this warning would be a sin, wouldn’t it? I don’t know anymore, to be honest. It seems that the word “sin” has been thrown around a lot. Yet, I do feel that the positive outweighs the negative with this book, and that’s enough for me. This is a book for good, although many people won’t necessarily see it that way.

Religion is a choice for everyone. Any religion that uses force or coercion or threats to try to control the thoughts or beliefs of another is not a religion that is worth paying attention to. If I am disfellowshipped because I do not believe in Ellen White, that speaks volumes about the church. If one can put differences aside and work together in love, then that sends another message. I truly don’t believe for a second that the latter result will happen. I would love for the church to prove me wrong. One day this book will be found by someone and I will hear about it. I am ready, though. I said what needed to be said. Now it’s time to live my life and rediscover what I truly believe.

 

The Great Awakening

When one creates something controversial or tells their story, there is backlash. There was much for me, and this helped me to understand that I was not in “the truth” as it was called. The supervising pastor, Stephen, and his associate, Monte, came and paid us a visit, telling us that our time in Queets was up. The Washington Conference was horrified by the things that I had written and shared on the internet. I had made the church look bad, and this was the greatest sin in Adventism. As a result, I was told it would be time for my wife, daughter and I to leave Queets. I was presented with a check for $3000 and given the term of a month and a half to be gone. My wife was hurt by this, and broke down crying. I sat silent, taking it all in. Stephen and Monte bombarded me with messages about how I was on the road to damnation and how Ellen White prophesied such a pathway for those who had turned their back on the faith. 

Stephen and Monte relayed information about how the Forks Seventh-day Adventist church was “exhausted” with me and the way I had handled things since the very start. I could imagine that Pastor Jay Coon of the Port Angeles Seventh-day Adventist Church would be all too happy about our departure. I could envision the gleaming smile upon his face as he lingered in the Forks Creation Garden on a hot autumn day, feeling that he was finally free of us. My wife and I once again told Stephen and Monte about the issue with the electric, and we were told the conference would reimburse us. Of course, Jay Coon would be free of any repercussions for turning his back on the church. 

Stephen and Monte did not pray as the customarily did before such meetings, and I found this strange. On the way out they seemed perturbed that they had to make a drive across the state to speak to us, even though we had asked time and time again for them to talk about it to us on the phone or through e-mail. 

“We hope that you go without making a big deal about it,” we were told. My wife shook her head. Of course we would tell our friends about what happened. To not tell them, and to hide the reason we were moving seemed deceptive to me.

A few weeks later, Stephen called my wife and said that we should talk to some of the other missionaries from Adventist Frontier Missions. I was told that they hoped we would stay. Yet, they said that my past showed that I would leave. We found this strange. It was a typical tactic of trying to use my own life course as a source of guilt. At this point I had already decided to move on back to Europe. 

Monte offered me the chance to ask some questions about the faith and he would answer them to help bring me back into the light, so to speak. I felt uneasy about this, because I always disdained how many in the church seemed to have a love of arguing about doctrine and belief. I sent one email with questions about how Ellen White said to live a life that she did not follow. I was told to “let go of Ellen White and one day God would reveal the truth to me again.”

Over the course of the next couple of months we packed and left to Eastern Europe. I immediately contacted the Forks Seventh-day Adventist church and had my membership removed. I was happy to no longer be a Seventh-day Adventist. It felt incredibly good to have that part of life behind me, but the trauma of devoting so much of my life to it and the beliefs that I held so dear being shattered remained. I look back at the damage that it has caused and sigh. I gave over ten years of my life as a missionary to this organization. I also paid tens of thousands of dollars to go to where they needed me to be. That is in addition to the ten percent or more of my income that was demanded of tithe “lest we rob the storehouses of the Lord.” When I left, there was no words of appreciation. Instead, the church was happy to have me gone. Later, I was told that I was “untrustworthy” due to the things I said or wrote about, despite the amount of time and effort I poured out for this denomination. 

With all that has happened in the past few years, it probably comes as no surprise that my views on religion have radically shifted. Steve told my wife that I am spiritually immature. My lack of belief in the prophetic standing of Ellen White makes me “lost” in the eyes of some in the church, despite the absurdly huge about of evidence that exists painting her as a false prophet. The truth is, I no longer care to delve into Christian religion and am content to be me. I quickly found that my life and conception of self and others improved greatly after I let go of the perfectionist cage that is Adventism. No longer did I hold myself or others up to impossible and unattainable standards. I started to actually love myself, rather than loathe who I was. I broke down in tears when I realized that I spent so much of my life hating myself and finally learned what self-love felt like. I apologized to my younger self for all the time that I spent thinking it was a virtue to attack the person who I was. 

I started to realize that the things that I was forbidden from reading and seeing did not cause me to become possessed by demons. In fact, many of them were greatly enlightening and increased my perception and appreciation of the world around me. The wide variety of books that I now read allow me to appreciate others and I am no longer locked into a world of books that revolve around Ellen White, Adventist theology, and a proscribed view of the Bible. Now I can explore all I want and take in the vast riches of the world, and I love that. I can not put into words how much I love how the world has opened up to me. For being such a limitless God, the SDA church sure put a lot of limits on what God would accept. The legalism was completely unreal. 

I started to explore various religions and began to attend a “Sunday / Mark of the Beast” church. I found the people to be just as caring and loving as those in Adventist churches, but without the ridiculous limits that the SDA faith and its leaders place upon its people. I know that I will likely never commit to a church again, and I do not know or care where I stand in the whole religious affiliation thing. In fact, I enjoy allowing the course of life to present itself to me, rather than some long-dead prophetess telling me how to live my life. It feels so good to be free. 

Upon my studies, I learned how scrupulosity is a psychological issue that affects many, and creates within them a need to be perfect. This drives people to works-heavy religions. I thought about my health-stricken father-in-law who battles guilt and insecurity, as well as the many others at Countryside Sabbath Fellowship who spend their lives working to be good enough for a work’s obsessed God. 

As part of my exit, I began to write affirmations and loving myself once again. I practiced telling myself good things rather than focusing on how I was possibly lost or not good enough in God’s and Ellen White’s eyes. This has also helped me to love myself more. This was such a huge shift for me. I now feel happier than ever before in my life. Leaving Adventism and having Stephen and his associate tell me that it was over was enough to help me cross over into a place of joy. My health blossomed in ways that I never dreamed of. In the two months immediately after Stephen and Monte’s visit, I lost 20 pounds merely from shedding my depression. I connected with so many friends from before in ways that I had not previously. The sense of joy I felt was of the kind that I never felt in the church. This alone proved to me that Adventism was not the way, nor the truth that it was said to be. 

Yet, despite the changes I had made in life, I found myself under attack from the leaders of the church from time to time. Stephen and Monte still send me messages that state that I am lost, or that I need to “let go of the anger” and believe. My wife was told that it would be likely we would get a divorce and that a believer and a spiritually insecure person (such as myself) could not coexist. 

It was asserted that my publishing this book and telling my story was a form of “being angry” and I should be quiet to protect the church. But, I ask, how can one not feel a tinge of anger when they were lied to all these years? Why, when I brought up the questions about Ellen White, was I told to be silent? In the end, the Seventh-day Adventist church has no monopoly on heaven or salvation, and the doctrine of Ellen White is a lie that stands as a cornerstone in the church. I am so thankful for the internet and social media and the ability to get the word out that never existed before. I think that every story like this needs to be told, and the world needs to understand the “real” truth, not the narrative that the church calls “the truth.” 

I am now in counseling and can see myself healing, although it is slowly. I talk to a wide range of people who have left the church and other similar churches and they tell me that the wounds remain even decades later. No matter what, I am happy to know that I am a free person and that I can choose to be empathetic and loving to everyone I meet going forward. I am not perfect, and I am happy about that. I don’t want to be one of the perfect people that I could never live up to. I am just myself, and I have learned that imperfection is truly a mark of beauty. If God really is love, then that’s the only God I ever hope to one day meet.

Acknowledgements

 

I would like to offer a thank you to the following people:

First, I want to thank my wife, for being incredibly understanding in my healing process. There were times I thought she would leave me for questioning my faith and beliefs. Looking back, we were married with the church as a centerpiece of our lives. I also want to thank my daughter, for helping me understand that this was not what I wanted for her. It was her birth that pushed me to become a missionary, and I thought I had to attain salvation for her based on what I was taught and read. If that is how God operates, then I have no desire to have anything to do with him. My daughter also opened my eyes to what love truly is. If God can not accept me when I accept my daughter wholeheartedly, than what is love? 

I also thank all of the brave people who spoke out, wrote articles, and posted on various forums talking about religious trauma, the fallacies of Ellen White, and shared their own journeys. Learning from each other is so important.

There are many within the church that I also am thankful for. Your love and acceptance has been treasured by me. I am glad that some are brave enough to question, and I know that some people see things so differently than I do. We should not be chastised for the things we discover and believe. We should be allowed to think differently if we choose. Although this was a huge threat my supervisors, the truth is, we all have different minds and lives, and we all have different views. 

I would love to hear your honest thoughts about the material in this book. Please post a review of this book on Amazon or Goodreads. Feel free to also discuss it or share it on social media to help get the word out.

 

Resources

 

Arthur White, Ellen G. White: The Australian Years: 1891 - 1900 vol. 4, p. 282.

Dissertation published January 2021: “The BITE Model of Authoritarian Control: Undue Influence, Thought Reform, Brainwashing, Mind Control, Trafficking and the Law” <https://www.proquest.com/docview/2476570146/

 

E.G. White, Letter 16, 1882, dated May 31, 1882, from Healdsburg, California. Also found in MR852 - Manuscript Release No. 852: The Development of Adventist Thinking on Clean and Unclean Meats (1981), compiled by Ronald Graybill.

 

E.G. White, Testimonies Vol. 4, p. 435.

 

E.G. White, Manuscript 8, 1882, published in Counsels on Diet and Foods (1938), 55.

 

E.G. White, Selected Messages, Book 2, p. 305.

 

E.G. White, Counsels on Diet and Foods, p. 468.

 

E.G. White, Letter 6a, 1880. Published in Manuscript Releases, Vol. 11, pp. 142, 147.

 

E.G. White, Review & Herald, June 17, 1880 para. 19.

 

E.G. White, Testimonies, Vol. 2, pp. 371-372.

 

Ellen White, Manuscript Releases Volume 7

 

Ellen White, Christian Service, 91.3

 

Ellen White, Review & Herald, Sept. 19, 1854

 

Ellen White, Broadside 2, January 31, 1849, par. 11.

 

Ellen White, Early Writings, pp. 64-67. In Letter 30, 1850, to Brother and Sister

Loveland, in a section as of yet unreleased by the White Estate (as of Dec. 26, 2018),

 

Ellen White wrote: "Time is almost finished.”

 

Ellen White, The Gospel Herald, March 1, 1901, para. 20.

 

Ellen White, Manuscript 7, 1896. Selected Messages Book 2, page 343, paragraph 2.

 

Fannie Bolton to Mrs. E. C. Slawson, Dec. 30, 1914, as published in Fannie Bolton Story (Ellen G. White Estate, 2018), 108-109.

 

Harry Brown, Memoirs, 1984.

 

Letter quoted in Ellen G. White letter to Lucinda Hall, May 16, 1876.

 

Miles Grant, An Examination of Mrs. Ellen White's Visions (Boston, Massachusetts: Advent Christian Publication Society, 1877).

 

Meeting notes from the Conference on the Spirit of Prophecy, 1919.

Spotify, “I Was a Seventh-day Adventist, Ep. 4, Church Skeletons” retrieved from:

https://open.spotify.com/episode/7zyecxe4DkOJJvOEh6DoWM

 

White, Ellen — 23 Manuscript 155, 1902

 

White, Ellen — Ministry of Healing, 446.2

 

White, Ellen — Maranatha 42