Section 5—Life’s Energizing Force
Chapter 25—Love and Sexuality in the Human Experience
Note: Ellen White lived and worked in a day when great restraint was exercised in speaking publicly or writing about sex and the sexual relationship between husbands and wives.
She was married to James White on August 30, 1846, after assuring herself through prayer that this was a proper step. It should be noted that she was well into her ministry, for she had for twenty months been the recipient of visions from the Lord. As a result of this union with James White she gave birth to four sons, born in 1847, 1849, 1854, and 1860.
It was in the 1860’s—the decade of two basic health-reform visions (June 6, 1863, and December 25, 1865)—that Ellen G. White began to discuss matters relating to sex. Statements in later years provided some elaboration. In referring to sexual intercourse in marriage she employed such terms as “privilege of the marriage relation,” “privilege of the family relation,” “sexual privileges.”
To gain an accurate and balanced concept of Ellen White’s teaching in this delicate field, statement should be placed with statement. The balance revealed in many of the statements should be observed. Careful note should be taken of the meaning of the words employed.
Terms such as “passion” and “propensities” are at times used. These are often qualified by such words as baser, animal, lustful, depraved, corrupt. This strong language could lead some readers to assume that all passion is condemned and all sexual activity is evil. The following quotations would hardly sustain this:
Not only does God require you to control your thoughts, but also your passions and affections…. Passion and affection are powerful agents….Positively guard your thoughts, your passions, and your affections. Do not degrade these to minister to lust. Elevate them [passions and affections] to purity, devote them to God.—Testimonies for the Church 2:561, 564 (1870).
All animal propensities are to be subjected to the higher powers of the soul.—Manuscript 1, 1888. (The Adventist Home, 128.)
In the same context in which some of the strong terms referred to above are used, she urges that the passions are to be controlled by what she called “higher, nobler powers,” “reason,” “moral restraint,” and “moral faculties.” She writes of temperance and moderation and avoiding excess. In marriage those passions common to all human beings are to be subject to control, they are to be governed. Note again:
Those who regard the marriage relation as one of God’s sacred ordinances, guarded by His holy precept, will be controlled by the dictates of reason.—Healthful Living, 48.
Very few feel it to be a religious duty to govern their passions…. The marriage covenant covers sin of the darkest hue…. Health and life are sacrificed upon the altar of base passion. The higher, nobler powers are brought into subjection to the animal propensities…. Love is a pure and holy principle; but lustful passion will not admit of restraint and will not be dictated to or controlled by reason.—Testimonies for the Church 2:472, 473 (1870).
She writes of the marriage relation as a “sacred institution” which may be “perverted.” She speaks of “sexual privileges” which “are abused.” Again, it is not passion that is condemned, but “base” and “lustful” passion. And it is worth observing that Ellen White pictures the intimacy of marriage as a “privilege.” Though she warned against gross sexual behavior in marriage, she wrote of a time when affections held in proper restraint can be “unfettered.” Another enlightening statement is worthy of close examination:
In regard to marriage, I would say, read the word of God. Even in this time, the last days of this world’s history, marriages take place among Seventh-day Adventists….We have, as a people, never forbidden marriage, except in cases where there were obvious reasons that marriage would be misery to both parties. And even then, we have only advised and counseled.—Letter 60, 1900.
At one time when because of the demands of the work in which she and her husband were engaged a half a continent separated them, she confided in a letter to James:
We feel every day a most earnest desire for a more sacred nearness to God. This is my prayer when I lie down, when I awake in the night, and when I arise in the morning, Nearer my God to Thee, nearer to Thee….
I sleep alone. This seems to be Mary’s preference as well as mine. I can have a better opportunity for reflection and prayer. I prize my [being] all to myself unless graced with your presence. I want to share my bed only with you.—Letter 6, 1876.
At no time did she participate in or condone teachings which called for a sort of platonic brother and sister relationship in marriage. When dealing with some who pressed teachings of this nature, Ellen White counseled against urging such views. To dwell on them, she wrote, opened the way for Satan to work “upon the imagination so that impurity” instead of purity would result.—Letter 103, 1894.
For every lawful, God-given privilege, Satan has a counterfeit to suggest. The holy, pure thought he seeks to replace with the impure. For the sanctity of married love he would substitute permissiveness, unfaithfulness, excess, and perversion; premarital sex, adultery, animalism in and outside of marriage, and homosexuality. All are referred to in this chapter.—Compilers.
https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/77.1112#1112
Dear Heavenly Father, Thank You for the privilege of prayer, knowing that through the name of Your Son we may expect what we ask, because we ask according to Your will to be like Jesus. Please bless us to commit to doing right with the motive of love. Please grant us a pure, wholesome, consistent Christian life, which is obtained by daily studying the Bible to behold and reflect the character of Jesus to each other and the world. Like Jesus, please bless us to not be conformed to this world, but to be truly transformed into the persons You would have us be that we in our marriages and our families might honor You. Please bless us truly to contemplate the life of Jesus and to allow Your Word to develop within us that true religion, which ennobles the mind, refines the taste, sanctifies the judgment, and makes us patient partakers of the vibrant health, purity, and holiness of Heaven. Because we ask all these in the Awesome name of Your Son, Almighty Jesus the Christ, our Savior, we say Thank You and Amen.
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DID YOU KNOW THIS…? And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies.—Hosea 2:19 KJV—[The WORD OF GOD—It’s the only flesh that is safe to eat (meditate on) to live forever!]
Do you feel sorrowful, disconnected—without a place to feel at home or useful? I pray this might show you the way forward. Watch…
https://www.youtube.com/live/2QB6fcwVuws?si=fsEvZU-rkI-BngfD
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NOTE: These began as daily texts to encourage my academy roommate and dear friend of nearly 50 years, until she suddenly passed March 2023. Now I continue to compile and send them to anyone who will receive them and to her family in honor of their mom. Lately, I have begun featuring consecutive chapter portions of a select Bible-based book.
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My personal prayer is that God will bless me to find ways to multiply this gift, so that we all may be encouraged to be found faithful in the sight of a Holy God, whenever Christ returns or our eyes are shut in the sleep of death.
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