One of Ellen White’s most encouraging letters is also identified as her last known letter, composed on June 14, 1914. Its message of hope and assurance was first shared publicly in 1916 at union meetings in North America. It was then printed in various tract forms before becoming permanently available in 1923 as the last chapter in Testimonies to Ministers and Gospel Workers, titled “The Victorious Life.”
Curiously, the letter is simply addressed to “My Dear Sister,” with no name provided. While the person was known to Ellen White and her office workers at the time it was sent (and no doubt for some years thereafter), the identity of the original recipient has been a mystery ever since. From recent research into contemporary correspondence, however, we now know her name and story.
Martha Andrea Creeper and her twin sister, Emma, were born in Bristol, England, on June 5, 1883, to Richard and Martha Augusta Creeper. Their German mother met and married their father, a wine merchant, while she was furthering her French and English teaching skills in England. Unfortunately, Mr. Creeper soon suffered bankruptcy on account of a friend’s actions, and in this state of distress, he ended up in an insane asylum, where he died in 1888.
Martha’s mother, now a widow, cared for six little girls ranging in age from 2 to 8, plus an 18-year-old stepson from Mr. Creeper’s first marriage. Sadly, the son secretly left home, and the family was unsuccessful in locating him. Returning to Germany, Mrs. Creeper supported her daughters by teaching English. Providentially, she connected with supportive Seventh-day Adventists and joined the Altona-Hamburg congregation in 1890.
Family members soon began employment at the newly opened publishing branch in Hamburg. Mrs. Creeper would also serve as head of the nursing department at the Friedensau Sanitarium and assisted the publishing house in translation projects, including Testimonies for the Church, The Great Controversy, and The Desire of Ages, which she especially enjoyed working on.
The power of encouragement
Each of the daughters became committed workers in the church—except the youngest, who died of diphtheria at age 5. The eldest married Elder Waldemar Ehlers, who left the Hamburg Publishing House to teach in Brazil. Another married his brother, Johannes, a pioneer missionary to Tanzania (then German East Africa). Other sisters served in either the church’s publishing or medical institutions.
Martha—the one who would receive Ellen White’s last letter—was baptized in 1896 at age 13. Three years later she began working in the editorial department of the German publishing house, and her evident talent in writing poetry and children’s books led to her becoming editor of the children’s paper Unser Kleiner Freund (Our Little Friend) in 1909.
Even with Martha’s valuable contribution to the church’s German-speaking members, feelings of unworthiness and a lack of assurance before God began to cloud her mind and service. Elder Guy Dail, a longtime friend of the family and secretary of the European Division, shared his concerns about Martha with Ellen White’s son W. C. White:
The message received from across the Atlantic Ocean continues to inspire hope and assurance in us today.
“She is now very nervous, and imagines often that she is such a great sinner the Lord is done with her, cannot let her work any more in His cause, for she is too unworthy. . . . She seems to dread the future so much, fearing about the time of trouble, and about her being cast off of the Lord. . . . According to what she has said to me, there seems to have come over her a feeling of despondency on account of the sins of which she feels guilty—tho she says she has certainly confessed them, and thinks she is forgiven. However, her attitude shows that she cannot absolutely trust herself in the hand of Jesus, knowing that He will take care of her.”1
Elder Dail expressed hope that if Ellen White sent a few words of encouragement to Martha, perhaps it would give her the comfort and peace she needed.
Upon receiving Dail’s letter, there was an almost immediate response. In a matter of days Elder White replied, “Today I am able to send to you a message from Mother [Ellen White] to Miss Creeper. I am sending two copies. One with the brief note from myself saying, ‘Mother bids me tell you that from her manuscripts she has chosen this, as something essential to the perfection of your Christian experience.’ The last half of this statement is in the words that Mother used when she handed me the manuscript.”
Then he added these words: “Urge her to turn from the manuscript to the Bible, and read the messages of hope and cheer written there, and to bear in mind that these were written for her by Him who knows and loves every one of His children.”
What was Ellen White’s message in this, her last known letter? The complete letter may be read on pages 13-15 of this issue. Among its choicest passages are these words of assurance:
Martha Creeper, 73, speaking at a Youth Celebration in Hamburg, Germany, in 1956, encouraging 22 young people who had just been baptized
“Do not talk of your inefficiency and your defects. When despair would seem to be sweeping over your soul, look to Jesus, saying, He lives to make intercession for me.”
“It is your privilege to trust in the love of Jesus for salvation, in the fullest, surest, noblest manner; to say, He loves me, He receives me; I will trust Him, for He gave His life for me.”
“Grace is an attribute shown to undeserving human beings. We did not seek after it; it was sent in search of us. God rejoices to bestow grace upon all who hunger and thirst for it, not because we are worthy, but because we are unworthy. Our need is the qualification which gives us the assurance that we shall receive the gift.”2
What was Martha’s response to this heartfelt appeal? If she wrote a reply to Ellen White, it has not been preserved, but we know that she continued to serve God faithfully at the German publishing house until she retired in 1949 after 50 years of service. “Aunt Martha,” as she was affectionately known among her associates, died in 1976 at age 93,3 but the message she received from across the Atlantic Ocean continues to inspire hope and assurance in us today.
1 Guy Dail to W. C. White, May 21, 1914. Early family history was gleaned from Dail to White, Aug. 23, 1912.
2 Ellen G. White to “My Dear Sister,” letter 2, 1914 (June 14), published in Testimonies to Ministers and Gospel Workers (Mountain View, Calif.: Pacific Press Pub. Assn., 1923),pp. 516-520.
3 Obituary, Martha Creeper, Advent-Echo 75, no. 21 (Nov. 1, 1976): 17. Courtesy of Bernd Müller and Markus Kutzschbach.