Yes, I've been trying to get you to consider the historical setting, and use that to help you arrive at an interpretation of her writings, but it appears to me that you are looking at her writings and trying to figure out ways of how what she wrote might have meant something different than what it meant to everyone else.



No. This is just more of the same, looking at her words. The historical setting is not the words of Ellen White, but rather what was happening around her, what was prompting her to write the things she did. The historical setting would consider how she was understood by her contemporaries, and she understood what they were saying.



I insist is has to do with J$W's preaching because it does. She was actually preaching with them at the time, people heard them, and asked them questions about what was being said. This is what actually happened.

The people she was addressing were hearing preaching like this:



The argument is simple:
a.Christ partook of our sinful nature.
b.If not, He was not "made like unto His brethren."
c.If not, He was not "tempted in all points as we are."
d.If not, He could not help us.

Sorry to repeat myself, but don't you agree this argument accurately represents what I quoted? Don't you agree that this is what the people would have been hearing? I could cite dozens of similar statements from Jones and Waggoner's preaching. This is how they preached. This is the argument they made. This is what the letters written to Ellen White would have been asking about. *Knowing* this allows us to interpret her response in a way that's plausible.

I'm not seeing the plausibility in your suggested interpretation. You're presenting a linguistic argument, but it doesn't match the historical reality. How does your interpretation tie back to what Jones and Waggoner were presenting? I'm not seeing this.



The same point Prescott is making, that as Levi was in Abraham's loins, so that all that Abraham did Levi did in him, so all that Adam did, we did in him, and all Christ did, we did in him. Prescott says something like "What we did in Christ, without our choice, He now wants to do in us, with our choice."

Prescott makes the statement "all were justified." (talking about Romans 5:18). He talks about a corporate justification (he doesn't use this phrase, calling it something else, like "justification by blood" I think; but it's a justification that includes all). What makes the corporate justification possible is that Christ took the same sinful nature as man (although Prescott usually speaks of "sinful flesh," or "flesh of sin."

Prescott's sermon is clearly expressing the postlapsarian perspective. Prescott's argument is essentially the same argument Jones presented at the 1895 General Conference session. By this time, Prescott had come on board with Jones and Waggoner's message, and Ellen White's endorsements of Prescott were as strong as her endorsements of Jones and Waggoner. They were preaching the same message. I can present you examples from Jones' preaching where he's making the same points Prescott made.

Tom, I don’t think it needs necessarily to tie back to what Jones and Waggoner were presenting. The subject of Christ’s humanity/divinity was also receiving strong emphasis, at least on the part of Ellen White. And the quotes themselves show clearly that the subject Ellen White was referring to was humanity/divinity, not fallen/unfallen. I’ll repeat two of the quotes:

“But many say that Jesus was not like us, that He was not as we are in the world, that He was divine, and therefore we cannot overcome as He overcame. But this is not true; "for verily He took not on Him the nature of angels; but He took on Him the seed of Abraham. . . . For in that He Himself hath suffered, being tempted, He is able to succor them that are tempted." Christ knows the sinner's trials; He knows his temptations. He took upon Himself our nature; He was tempted in all points like as we are. ... Those who claim that it was not possible for Christ to sin, cannot believe that He took upon Him human nature. Christ was actually tempted, not only in the wilderness, but all through his life. In all points He was tempted as we are, and because He successfully resisted temptation in every form, He gave us a perfect example.”{BEcho, November 1, 1892 par. 6, 7}

"Christ's overcoming and obedience is that of a true human being. In our conclusions, we make many mistakes because of our erroneous views of the human nature of our Lord. When we give to His human nature a power that it is not possible for man to have in his conflicts with Satan, we destroy the completeness of His humanity. ... The obedience of Christ to His Father was the same obedience that is required of man. Man cannot overcome Satan's temptations without divine power to combine with his instrumentality. So with Jesus Christ; He could lay hold of divine power. He came not to our world to give the obedience of a lesser God to a greater, but as a man to obey God's Holy Law, and in this way He is our example. The Lord Jesus came to our world, not to reveal what a God could do, but what a man could do, through faith in God's power to help in every emergency." {6MR 341.1-4, [1892]}


I don’t know what Prescott said at other occasions, but what he said in this sermon is correct, and agrees with my view, not with yours. He says nothing about corporate justification. He says what I defend, that is, that while the whole humanity is connected to Adam, only those who have faith are connected to Christ.

“It is exactly so in this spiritual family. What Christ did as head of this new family, we did in Him. He was our representative; He became flesh; He became we. He did not become simply a man, but He became flesh, and every one that should be born into His family was represented in Jesus Christ when He lived here in the flesh. You see, then, that all that Christ did, every one who connects himself with his family is given credit for as doing it in Christ. ... But as Levi paid tithe in Abraham, every one who should afterwards be born into this spiritual family, did what Christ did.”

So, the difference before and after Adam sinned is moral power and strength, right? That is, he was dependent upon God both before and after to resist the power of evil, but just not as dependent before sinned?

Did this apply to Jesus, too? Or, did He possess the moral power and strength necessary to resist the power of evil without having to depend on God? If not, what was it about His nature that made Him dependent upon God like other FMAs?


No. God has promised not to allow us to be tempted above His ability to empower us to resist it unto is honor and glory.


No. And for the same reason mentioned above. However, this makes me ask - Was Jesus dependent upon the Father, like born again believers are, to resist the power of evil? If so, why? And, how does that make His human nature different than the one we inherit at birth?

Also, does our nature change at all when we are born again? If so, is it like the human nature Jesus inherited at birth? If not, in what ways are they different?

I believe Satan is less subtle in tempting fallen beings, because they fall more easily, while he has to be more subtle in his temptations to unfallen beings. But one thing compensates the other, so the degree of difficulty remains the same. For instance, if you are in the 6th grade, you must take a test designed for the 6th grade; if you are in your last year at university, you must take a test designed for that year. So I don’t think unfallen man had to be less dependent on God than fallen man to resist temptation.
I think Adam and Eve would have been able to resist obvious evil, but they weren’t able to resist disguised evil. That’s why they needed God.

It is the power of Satan that came to Adam and Eve in Eden, the deceiving, bewitching power of the fallen angel. . . . {UL 209.5}

So fully were they seduced, that they could not discern the power that was leading them into apostasy. {SpTB07 53.2}

Satan tempted the first Adam in Eden, and Adam reasoned with the enemy, thus giving him the advantage. Satan exercised his power of hypnotism over Adam and Eve, and this power he strove to exercise over Christ. {21MR 10.1}

Satan assailed Christ with the fiercest and most subtle temptations. {RH, December 17, 1908 par. 6}

In the wilderness Christ endured temptations that no human being can comprehend. Here he was brought face to face with Satan, the fallen angel, who tempted him with all his subtle power. {YI, January 3, 1901 par. 3}

The temptations of Christ, and his sufferings under them, were proportionate to his exalted, sinless character. {YI, October 26, 1899 par. 8}


After conversion, each day we advance in moral power, so our nature becomes more and more similar to that of Christ.

This isn't taking into account the historical context, which is that EGW, Jones and Waggoner were preaching together, and she was receiving letters in regards to those sermons. If you read the entire article, it's very clear she was defending Jones and Waggoner.

It does need to tie back to what Jones and Waggoner were presenting. The article is in the 1888 materials because of it's relation to Jones and Waggoner.



Since you're not familiar with what Prescott said at other occasions, you ability to offer an informed opinion here is severely hampered. EGW endorsed all of Prescott's Avondale sermons, not just this one. He also spoke at the 1895 GC session. You can check out this to see what his viewpoints were. But until having a more informed idea as to what his views are, I, for one, would not venture to make the type of statement you're offering here.



In the 1895 GC session, he said, as I stated, that "all were justified." This is corporate justification.



Do you agree there is a sense that all were justified?

Do you believe that Jesus was only able to connect humanity to divinity because He took exactly the same flesh that we have?

Only if so you can claim that you and he believe the same thing.

To ask one specific question, Prescott used Levi and Abraham to establish his point that what Christ did we all did in Him, because Levi was in Abraham's loins. Please explain to me how this agrees with your view.

Specifically what my question is, why did Prescott bring up Levi and Abraham? How does this have anything at all to do with your view?

It's pretty easy to see this isn't the case. We know there are a vast number of worlds with unfallen beings who have never sinned. There are perhaps quadrillions of such creatures, not a single one of which has fallen to temptation.

On the other hand, all of the billions of fallen human beings who are capable of being tempted have fallen to temptation.

To assert that our temptations are no more difficult to overcome than those of unfallen beings is to fly in the face of a huge mountain of evidence.

That’s why I pointed out that what he said in this sermon is correct.


Unless Prescott was talking out of two sides of his mouth, what he said in the other sermons must agree with what he said in this one. Maybe he changed his view later, but his view here is correct.


The same flesh, but not the same mind.


Please explain to me how it doesn’t.


Prescott is explaining how we are connected to the two heads of the human race. All of us are connected to Adam as our head, our representative, since we are his descendants, born into his family (like Levi was born into the family of Abraham). Jesus took our flesh, was born into the human family and became the new head, the new representative of the race. Although he died for the whole human race, only those who are born into His spiritual family are also connected to Him as their head and may be said to have done what He did.


It’s pretty easy to see that the perhaps quadrillions of unfallen creatures you mention didn’t even approach the tree and weren’t even tempted at all, because temptation is removed from them as far as possible. This is completely different from our case. Not to mention that, if Satan were dead and gone, as MM puts it, we probably would do wrong things anyway, because our nature is identified with evil.

Here's what you wrote:



Back in 1990 I read Prescott's sermons, and wrote a paper on corporate solidarity and the Gospel. My views were largely shaped by Prescott.

Jones and Prescott, in the 1895 GC sessions, spoke of how what Adam and Christ as representatives of the race. The sin of Adam is a representative sin. The righteousness of Christ is a representative righteousness.

Romans 5:18 says that as all are condemned in Adam, so all are justified in Christ. Prescott explains this not in terms of a condemned human nature passed down by Adam to his descendants (your view) but in terms of all of us being in Adam, because we were in his loins (my view). Similarly, Prescott speaks of all men being justified. Prescott speaks of different justifications. One of them he calls "justification by blood" I'm pretty sure (95% sure), which applies to all men. This is precisely the same thing that "corporate justification" is. There's no difference, other than a difference in terminology.

Another justification is justification by faith. That applies only to believers.

What Prescott presented in the particular sermon is not going to be different than his ideas in other sermons, right? So until you know what he presented in the other sermons, it would be prudent to tread carefully as to your interpretation of this particular sermon. That should be easy to see.

I'll see about presenting quotes on Prescott's other sermons. It's not as easy from here as it was at Andrews.

Regarding flesh and mind, I'm not understanding the confusion here. No one has said Christ took our sinful mind. He took our sinful flesh, with "all its hereditary inclinations" as Haskell put it.



His flesh was identical to ours, but His mind was "the mind of Christ." Christ perfectly denied Himself. He never acceded to the temptations produced by His flesh.





Here are three formulations of the idea. There should be no difficulty from reading any of the above to understand that while Christ's flesh was like ours, with tendencies to sin, His mind was unlike ours, because He never gave in to those tendencies.

Do you not see that Prescott's sermon is a post-lapsarian presentation of Christ's human nature? Christ is said to have had "flesh of sin," "exactly the same flesh that we have." Our flesh has tendencies to sin. That Prescott understood this to be the case is certain. There's also no doubt what his hearers would understand his meaning to me.



This isn't the argument though. The argument is that Levi was present in Abraham, and so paid tithes to Melchizadec in Abraham. Similarly, we were in Adam when Adam sinned, and in Christ was Christ was righteous.

"What we did in Christ, without our choice, He now desires to do in us, with our choice." This is a corporate idea being expressed.



Every world had a tree, like ours. The forbidden tree was beautiful to behold, just like ours. They were tempted no more nor less than we were. It was no more easy or difficult for us to overcome as for them. If this weren't the case, God would be guilty of partiality.

That was the case in Eden, when the tree's temptation was spatially limited. But since the Fall, our entire planet is temptation piled upon temptation. Furthermore, our forbidden tree sits in our hearts - the battle against self is the greatest battle to be fought. That is a condition unique to Earth.

Sounds like we're in agreement here.

This "greatest battle" was won by Christ.