Fulcrum7’s Gerry Wagoner interviews Steve Wohlberg about the 1888 Message.
Gerry: Thanks for granting us this interview, Steve. I joined the Seventh-day Adventist Church in 1989, attracted by the biblical truth of it. The following year someone mentioned 1888 to me and I thought they had made a bit of a mistake. “Do you mean 1844?” I asked.
No, they meant 1888.
Hmm…
Steve Wohlberg: Thank you Gerry for doing this interview about 1888. I have been researching this topic for many years and I believe publishing this info on F7 can be a real blessing to God’s work.
1. What is significant about 1888, and why isn’t the original Adventist Message good enough for some people?
Bible history, Christian history, and Adventist history reveal certain monumental events, such as (but not limited to) the Exodus, the giving of the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai, Israel’s entrance into Canaan, the Babylonian captivity, the ministry of John the Baptist, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ (the Great Center of everything), the influence of Constantine, the Great Apostasy, the Protestant Reformation, the rise of America, the beginning of the Advent Movement in the 1830s, the Great Disappointment in 1844—and in its wake, the official organizing of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in 1863 to proclaim the Three Angels’ Messages worldwide to prepare a people for the glorious return of Jesus Christ (Revelation 14:6-16).
From the 1860s—1880s, Seventh-day Adventists made steady progress in proclaiming the Three Angels’ Messages, yet the inspired writings of Ellen White reveal that they still needed more biblical light so the Lord could more fully use them to “finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness.” Romans 9:28. Notice carefully that Paul here connected the finishing of God’s work with “righteousness.”
In the year 1886, two years before 1888, a holy angel said this to Ellen White while she was traveling in Switzerland:
Said my guide, “There is much light yet to shine forth from the law of God and the gospel of righteousness. This message, understood in its true character, and proclaimed in the Spirit, will lighten the earth with its glory. 1888 Materials, p. 166
Two years later, at a General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, two young Adventist ministers—Alonzo T. Jones and Ellet J. Waggoner—were mightily used by God to bring this very “light” to Adventists to be given to the world. Their biblical messages greatly encouraged and blessed many, yet they also created terrible controversies which have continued to this day. For those of us who have prayerfully studied this 1888-era history and those messages, beneath those raging controversies we still discern—over 130 years later—many rays of “much light” that we still need to finish God’s work.
2. I understand you have written a book on the 1888 message. How did that come about?
Yes, I have. The title is, God’s Last Message: Christ our Righteousness. The publisher is Pacific Press, and the book is now available from White Horse Media. My personal journey into this topic started when I read this statement:
“The Lord in His great mercy sent a most precious message to His people through Elders Waggoner and Jones. This message was to bring more prominently before the world the uplifted Saviour, the sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. It presented justification through faith in the Surety; it invited the people to receive the righteousness of Christ, which is made manifest in obedience to all the commandments of God. Many had lost sight of Jesus. They needed to have their eyes directed to His divine person, His merits, and His changeless love for the human family. All power is given into His hands, that He may dispense rich gifts unto men, imparting the priceless gift of His own righteousness to the helpless human agent. This is the message that God commanded to be given to the world. It is the third angel's message, which is to be proclaimed with a loud voice, and attended with the outpouring of His Spirit in a large measure.” Testimonies to Ministers, pp. 91,92
Hmm…I thought to myself. If “the Lord” Himself sent “a most precious message to His people through Elders Waggoner and Jones,” then I should study that message. This led me to do a lot of research into this topic. When I was a teacher at Weimar Academy in the 1980s, a friend gave me a large folder (unpublished, copied from microfilm, almost impossible to find today) of original articles that E.J. Waggoner wrote in the Signs from 1886-1891. I devoured those articles and looked up the Bible verses quoted, many of which came from Romans and Galatians. I also read the 4-volume set, The 1888 Materials, written by Ellen White, plus the companion volume, Manuscripts and Memories of Minneapolis, written by other Adventists who lived through the 1888-era and witnessed first hand its controversies. I also read other writings of Jones and Waggoner, especially during the period from 1888-1895. My research is summarized in my book, God’s Last Message: Christ our Righteousness.
3. What do you see as the main point of 1888?
“The main point” is actually a combination of points centered around what that holy angel told Mrs. White in 1886. Her “guide” spoke of “much light yet to shine forth from the law of God and the gospel of righteousness.” This law-of-God-gospel-of-righteousness combination is the central truth of what is often called the 1888 message which, just to clarify, is God’s own message found in His Word.
To make this biblical message easier for us to grasp (which is God’s will), the Holy Spirit inspired Ellen White to write a number of simple summaries of this message in Testimonies to Ministers, pp. 91-93, 1 Selected Messages 234-235, 6T 19, and especially in her monumental book, Steps to Christ. If we carefully and prayerfully read those simple summaries, we will discover “the main point(s)” of that “most precious message.”
Ellen White was in Minneapolis in 1888. She heard Waggoner speak. She wrote:
I see the beauty of truth in the presentation of the righteousness of Christ in relation to the law as the doctor [E.J. Waggoner] has placed it before us. You say, many of you, it is light and truth. Yet you have not presented it in this light heretofore. 1888 Materials, p. 164
Waggoner gave numerous talks at the Minneapolis conference, yet four times Ellen White summarized his core biblical message as “the beauty of [Bible] truth” in the combination of “the righteousness of Christ in relation to the law.” Read the following quote carefully. It summarizes the core issues. Pray for understanding. Open your heart to the inspired Word of the Lord:
“The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24). In this scripture [which Waggoner often quoted in his Signs articles and at Minneapolis], the Holy Spirit through the apostle is speaking especially of the moral law. The law reveals sin to us and causes us to feel our need of Christ and to flee unto Him for pardon and peace by exercising repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.
An unwillingness to yield up preconceived opinions, and to accept this truth, lay at the foundation of a large share of the opposition manifested at Minneapolis against the Lord's message through Brethren [E.J.] Waggoner and [A.T.] Jones. By exciting that opposition Satan succeeded in shutting away from our people, in a great measure, the special power of the Holy Spirit that God longed to impart to them. The enemy prevented them from obtaining that efficiency which might have been theirs in carrying the truth to the world, as the apostles proclaimed it after the day of Pentecost. The light that is to lighten the whole earth with its glory was resisted, and by the action of our own brethren has been in a great degree kept away from the world (1 SM, pp. 234, 235).
The conclusion of the third angel is “the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.” Revelation 14:12. “The law reveals sin to us and causes us to feel our need of Christ.” Galatians 3:24, Romans 3:19-26, and Romans 7:7-25 (all quoted by Waggoner and Jones), teach these clear, straightforward biblical truths. When we look specifically and closely at each of the Ten Commandments (one by one, see Exodus 20:1-17) and then soberly contemplate God’s summary of His holy law in the two great principles of loving God and loving our neighbor as ourselves (see Matthew 22:36-40), the Holy Spirit works directly to convict us “of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” John 16:8
“Sin” is “the transgression of the law” (1 John 3:4; Rom. 3:20; 7:7). “Of righteousness”—we have “none” (Rom. 3:10; Isaiah 64:6). “Of judgment” that will someday fall on every persistent devil-led sinner who stubbornly resists God’s infinite goodness and refuses to repent (Romans 2:4-11; Luke 13:3). When God’s Holy Spirit lays “the glory of man in the dust” (TM, p. 456), we will be smitten with a deep realization that we are undone, lost, helpless, Satan-controlled violators of the “holy, just, and good” (Romans 7:12) Royal Law of the Ruler, King, and just Judge of the Universe (James 2:8-12; Eccl. 12:13,14). “That every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” Romans 3:19. “Oh wretched man that I am!” moaned Paul, “who shall deliver me from this body of death?” Romans 7:24
Biblically, there is only one answer.
“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” John 1:29. “This is His name whereby He shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS” (Jeremiah 23:6).
Alleluia!
To be continued in Part 2.
Steve Wohlberg is the Speaker/Director of White Horse Media. He is the author of 40+ books, including God’s Last Message: Christ our Righteousness. Pastor Steve also teaches two online courses, Sprouting with Steve (about health) and Grow Your Money With God (Christian stewardship). White Horse Media’s YouTube channel contains many more “present truth” biblical messages. Its online Bible school is also great for sharing with the public.