THE "TITANIC" WAS A MESSAGE FOR ADVENTISTS!

(The Message God Left us in the Experience of the R.M.S. Titanic)
Updated 03/03/2001: Aesthetics

The Alpha apostasy which took place within the Seventh-day Adventist Church at the turn of the century, presented tremendous and heart-wrenching problems to the faithful at that time. Ellen White was in the midst of the whole thing bearing an even more heavy burden than anyone else, for she saw, with a prophet's eye, things that others could not see, and at times it was hard to communicate either the implications or the urgency of what was going on at that time.

"God's work was being challenged by something Ellen White called the "alpha of deadly heresies." And then she added an afterthought. This would not be the last such attack. Another would come, another even more treacherous for the work of God. The alpha had arrived. The Omega would surely come. And Ellen White "trembled for our people." -- Omega p. 49.

"What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun." -- Ecclesiastes 1:9

"It has been said that those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat its mistakes. For Seventh-day Adventists that statement is more than a cliché. It is a certainty.

'Be not deceived; many will depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils. We have now before us the alpha of this danger. The omega will be of a most startling nature.' -- 1SM p. 197.

That statement was made in July, 1904, as the denomination faced an array of troubles almost beyond imagining. Loss of its largest institution and the crippling of the vital medical work. Large-scale apostasy among some of its most influential men. Heresies so subtle that their implications went unrecognized even by those who urged them. Legal manipulations that poured wealth into some areas while the world field struggled to survive. And the forthcoming attack by Ballenger, striking at the very rationale for Adventism. It was a time when all the energies of every loyal member of the church were needed to keep the ship afloat, AND YET IN THE MIDST OF THE CRISIS ELLEN WHITE TOOK TIME TO WARN THE CHURCH ABOUT A DANGER STILL IN THE FUTURE." -- Omega p. 50.

"In describing the great apostasy of the future, she does not use the next Greek letter after alpha. She does not warn about a "beta" apostasy or "gamma" or even "delta." Instead she plunges far ahead, to the end of the alphabet, and chooses a symbol that Christ has used in connection with the end. Alpha and Omega." -- Ibid. p. 51.

". . . if we probe Ellen White's choice of symbolism, there seems to be even more that we can decipher. In 1904 she sees that something fearful is happening to the church. Doors that once stood open to the gospel are swinging shut. Even the most basic truths are being questioned in every way. It is a dreadful experience that she openly fears may cost her her life, and looking into the future, she sees that it will happen again, near the end of time. Somehow God's people must be warned, and Mrs. White reaches for a figure to describe two events, separated by time but similar in nature." -- Omega p. 51.

"Shortly before I sent out the testimonies regarding the efforts of the enemy to undermine the foundation of our faith through the dissemination of seductive theories, I had read an incident about a ship in a fog meeting an iceberg. For several nights I slept but little. I seemed to be bowed down as a cart beneath sheaves. One night a scene was clearly presented before me. A vessel was upon the waters, in a heavy fog. Suddenly the lookout cried, 'Iceberg just ahead!' There, towering high above the ship, was a gigantic iceberg. An authoritative voice cried out, 'Meet it!' There was not a moment's hesitation. It was time for instant action. The engineer put on full steam, and the man at the wheel steered the ship straight into the iceberg. With a crash she struck the ice. There was a fearful shock, and the iceberg broke into many pieces, falling with a noise like thunder to the deck. . . . Well I knew the meaning of this representation. I had my orders. I had heard the words, like a voice from our Captain, 'Meet it!' For the next few days I worked early and late, preparing for our people the instruction given me regarding the errors that were coming in among us." -- 1SM pg. 205, 206.

Notice the urgency of the situation. Errors were coming into the church. Why did errors coming into the church alarm our church leaders back then? Do they alarm our church leaders today? Today, if you remind our church leaders about errors in the church, they smile and tell you not to worry about it since Christ is pledged to protect the church. They tell us about this wonderful age of diversity where all the varying opinions in confusion is actually an asset to the church and will make it get stronger. Why is there a disparity here? Why should errors coming into the church bother Ellen White and others of that day? All they needed was a relationship with Jesus, wasn't it? Isn't that what we're told? Why didn't our forefathers realize that they didn't have to worry about all the errors in the church? Why couldn't they realize and take comfort in the fact that God was in control of everything?

But yet, what was truly significant about this vision Ellen White received was the timing to which it was given. Around the time this vision was given, two very massive structures were being built. What were those massive structures? These massive structures were congruous with the statement earlier made by Lewis Walton when he stated that the time of the Alpha apostasy was a "time when all the energies of every loyal member of the church were needed to keep the SHIP afloat." Yes two very massive vessels were being constructed. One of those vessels was called the Olympic, and the other vessel we can reveal through a very noteworthy book, which here states:

"For months and months in that monstrous iron enclosure there was nothing that had the faintest likeness to a ship; only something that might have been the iron scaffolding for the naves of half-a-dozen cathedrals laid end to end. . . . at last the skeleton within the scaffolding began to take shape, at the sight of which men held their breaths. It was the shape of a ship, a ship so monstrous and unthinkable that it towered there over the buildings and dwarfed the very mountains by the water. . . . A rudder as big as a giant elm tree, bossess and bearings of propellers the size of windmills--everything was on a nightmare scale; and underneath the iron foundations of the cathedral floor men were laying, on concrete beds, pavements of oak and great cradles of timber and iron and sliding ways of pitch pine to support the bulk of the monster when she was moved, every square inch of pavement surface bearing a weight of more than two tons. Twenty tons of tallow were spread upon the ways, and hydraulic rams and triggers built and fixed against the bulk of the ship so that, when the moment came, the waters she was to conquer should thrust her finally from the earth. In front of the immense steel scaffoldng, a small black sign with simple white lettering announced:

WHITE STAR

ROYAL MAIL STEAMER

"TITANIC"

Without question, she was the apogee of the steamship, the apotheosis of the ocean liner. Coincidentally, her sea birth would formally launch the epoch of the twentieth century." -- The Titanic, End of a Dream. Wyn Craig Wade, pg. 11-12.

Yes, the ship was the R.M.S. Titanic, and notice how the author stated that the events surrounding this mysterious ship would "launch the epoch of the twentieth century." The mystery surrounding this ship has inspired many to come to the conclusion that this massive vessel served as an actual parable for many things. When I had learned of the vision Ellen White received, and found out about the proximity from when the vision was given to the construction and maiden voyage of the R.M.S. Titanic, I felt convicted to do some studying on it. The actual words given by Lewis Walton in the book Omega relating to the vision Ellen White received about the ship that prompted me to study the Titanic are as follows:

"The divine instruction was to "meet it" [figuratively the iceberg, literally the alpha apostasy]--hit it head-on. There would be a bone-jolting collision; everyone aboard would be shaken, but the ship would remain afloat. Hit the obstacle a glancing blow, and one would only open a gash into which the sea would flood uncontrollably. (In just eight years that very illustration would be lived out in the experience of the "unsinkable" Titanic.)" -- Omega, p. 81.

"For 75 years, the R.M.S. Titanic has possessed a nautical mystique second only to that of Noah's Ark. The inaccessibility of the Titanic's wreckage, resting some two miles deep in the North Atlantic, has seemed only to increase the ship's strange pull on our imaginations. With the newsbreaking discovery of the Titanic's grave in 1985, we have relearned what our grandparents always knew, that there is something very special about the Titanic--something other-worldly and numinous that exploration of the wreck by manned submarine is just as likely to enhance as to dispel.

We may have forgotten that in 1912 the foundering of the fabled White Star liner was a twofold drama. One side of it was a monumental catastrophe: a luxury cruise transformed from Paradise to Chaos in less than three hours. The other side was society's response to the calamity. In America, the profound reaction to the disaster can be compared only to the aftermath of the assassinations of Lincoln and Kennedy, which were followed by periods of rapid and often frightening transition. In the case of the Titanic disaster, the entire English-speaking world was shaken; and FOR US, AT LEAST, THE TRAGEDY CAN BE REGARDED AS A WATERSHED BETWEEN THE NINETEENTH AND TWENTIETH CENTURIES. THE SINKING OF THE TITANIC MARKED THE END OF AN ERA. WITH HER SANK THE SMUG VICTORIAN DREAM THAT MANKIND'S PROGRESSING TECHNOLOGY WAS LIFTING THE PLANET CLOSER AND CLOSER TO HEAVEN. Out of the bitter loss of this cherished illusion came our present age--the Age of Anxiety--for which the foundering of the Titanic offered the first glimmer of reality." -- Ibid. Preface, p. 11.

Now some would automatically gasp to even imagine that the Seventh-day Adventist Church could in any wise be depicted as the Titanic. After all, we all well know what happened to the Titanic. Yet why was the vision of Ellen White, given around the time when the Titanic was being constructed, given to our church, when it was evident that the church was victorious over, or was able to survive the Alpha apostasy? The Seventh-day Adventist Church came out of that trial, though not unscathed. Remember that the marching orders to the church was to hit the iceberg head on. This is what the loyal leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church did, and they therefore secured a future for us as a people.

Let us not misunderstand what is being said here. I am not implying that the Seventh-day Adventist church organization is represented by the Titanic, meaning that it is fated or destined to fail or be lost. I am saying that it is represented by the Titanic FLOATING! Do you want her to sail? Do you want her to survive? If you wish her to sail or survive, you must know that her destiny rests with you. The Lord is trying to show us that if we allow this "ship"--the "church"--to operate under the same principles or in the same way the Titanic operated on that fateful night when the Titanic met destiny, the Seventh-day Adventist Church organization is going to share the same fate as did the Titanic on April 14, 1912.

We therefore ask the question throughout this entire work: Is it true that the Lord allowed the R.M.S. Titanic to be built and constructed to be a parable to the Seventh-day Adventist Church? I am not saying that the Lord allowed the Titanic to be built and fashioned as a parable to the Seventh-day Adventist church: I am saying that the Lord allowed the R.M.S. Titanic to be built and constructed to be a parable firstly to the Seventh-day Adventist Church, then secondarily to the other churches, thirdly to the United States of America, and then lastly to the rest of the world.

To substantiate this fact and also to show the supernatural character behind the mystery of this vessel, it would help us to understand that Ellen White was not the only one who received some sort of supernatural premonition regarding the ill-fated vessel. Several secular authors have added to the mystery of the Titanic through writing and publishing works closely paralleling the events which took place with the Titanic before they actually happened. Our author gives us some insight regarding this:

"It was revealed that Mayn Clew Garnett, a fiction writer, had written a story remarkably foreshadowing the wreck of the Titanic. Garnett's story, "The White Ghost of disaster," had been run off the presses at the time the Titanic was preparing for her maiden voyage and would eventually appear in the May issue of Popular Magazine. Garnett's tale concerned a giant 800-foot liner which struck an iceberg and foundered, losing half the people aboard because of an insufficient number of lifeboats. (Rumor intimated that the author had dreamed the story while returning home from Europe aboard the Olympic.) People then discovered another piece of fiction--an obscure one, but even more uncanny than Garnett's premonition. Morgan Robertson's 1898 novel, Futility, also featured an 800-foot liner named, of all things, the Titan. Robertson's plot was frighteningly similar to the Titanic disaster. Finally, Celia Thaxter's 1887 book of poetry was uncovered; her poem "A Tryst" told the same story. It was almost as if the catastrophe was prophecy fulfilled--an inevitable toppling of Titans by an outraged divine Power." -- Ibid. pg. 42, 43.

The author of the book, not to doubt every other book which deals with the subject, has presented the comments of many at that time and since who have documented what they thought were the conditions and reasons behind the foundering of the Titanic. Interestingly, at the time the Titanic foundered, the world was boundlessly optimistic about the future. Understanding that this ship was built on the climactic point of the Gilded age in light of optimism, the narrative tells us:

"By 1840, the steam engine alone had transformed England's industries into sprawling, whirling beehives, and no part of her culture was free from the dizzying influence of a leaping technology. The telephone was invented; then came mechanical refrigeration. Faradays electrical dynamo, then Edison's electric light permitted factories to stay open all night long, swelling production to a hitherto unimaginable degree. The turbine and internal combustion engines appeared. In time, the sorcery of Marconi's wireless telegraphy. As Winston Churchill recalled, 'Every morning when the world woke up, some new machinery had started running. Every night while the world had supper, it was running still.'" -- Ibid. pg. 2.

"It was as exhilarating as only the experience of seemingly limitless growth can be. The feeling at a mass level spawned an optimism childlike in its innocence and adultlike in its determination. It was a consuming optimism, oblivious to the complications that would ensue once the natural limits of growth appeared. Furthermore, the breadth and immediate consequences of the growth were so unprecedented that people could no longer rely on past solutions for their problems. Instead, novel solutions had to be invented almost on a daily basis. In time, the need to keep eyes affixed on the future buoyed optimism even further, for the future had become tautly intertwined with the Victorian Dream." -- Ibid. pg. 2.

"Twenty years later saw the beginning of an era that lasted until 1912. The Second Industrial Revolution had been born, and English-speaking nations achieved intellectual and social domination of the world. Progress in all its myriad forms continued, the Dream remained intact, but something was amiss. Advances in science had trammeled former religious beliefs, substituting a new credo in which people actually grew skeptical of anything that could not be proved in a laboratory. More and more, the real became equated with the material. The Dream slowly crystallized into a goal of mere acquisition." -- Ibid. pg. 4.

Now how does our church relate to this quotation? Are we being urged to turn away from relying upon past solutions for our problems? Are we being told to "jump out" into the unknown through our publications, our educational institutions and our pulpits? When was the Bible created? In the future?! It was written in the past. What therefore would happen if we decide amongst ourselves that we can no longer rely on past solutions to solve our problems?

Another point about the Titanic was that there was controversy surrounding its very construction. Amazingly there was controversy surrounding the very construction of the denominational structure of the Seventh-day Adventist Church at the time of the Alpha apostasy at the turn of the century. This controversy is still just as strong today. Within our church it is the issue of their [our new theology leadership's] insatiable desire to follow what the other churches are doing in purchasing and constructing mammoth buildings or concentrating means and talent in singular places and projects, and certainly with everything else (including, as we are finding out more and more: Sunday worship), contrary to the repeated and very clear admonitions of the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy. These warnings are described in the book Omega:

"There were a few detractors. The editors of the Economist growled at shipbuilders attempting to 'lick creation.' Their objections were entirely pragmatic: These 'monster ships' would 'involve too great a concentration of life and wealth in a single bottom'; moreover, the size of the ships surpassed existing underwriters' ability to insure them. Seaman and novelist Joseph Conrad would become the most eloquent opponent of the 'big-ship movement.' Increase in the size of ships, said Conrad, was not progress: 'If it were, elephantiasis, which causes a man's legs to become as large as tree-trunks, would be a sort of progress, whereas it is nothing but a disease, and a very ugly disease at that.'" -- The Titanic, End of a Dream, pgs. 16, 17.