By the year 1894 there was no doubt as to whether the sealing work was going on or not. The sealing of the 144,000 was a very well-established doctrine among Seventh-day Adventists. It was understood that all who were sealed under the third angel’s message would be included in the 144,000 because, according to the message of Revelation 7:1-4, only those of that number are sealed.

Around that time a brother claimed to have “new light” on this question. One of the pioneers, J. N. Loughborough, commented:

“In reference to the subject matter of this book - the sealed 144,000 - I have been greatly moved by the Spirit of God to write and publish the facts as to how the sealing message was obtained - not only from the Bible, but by direct instruction in visions of Sister E. G. White; also as to how the message was received and taught by our ministers, and people down to the year 1894, when the ‘new light’ theory found its advocate in one who afterwards apostatized from the faith, and died without seeing the fulfillment of his expectation that he would live to the end of time, and hence be one of the 144,000. His claim was that later testimonies of Sister White taught that all the 144,000 would be made up of those who had never died.

“When I found that some were teaching that ‘all of the 144,000 who will be sealed are now living,’ I thought it time that someone should speak, and show that it is not the manner of God’s prophets to make positive statements at one time, and afterwards teach entirely contrary to them. Such surely was not the course of Bible prophets. The whole of this ‘new light’ is produced by taking words out of their connection, and away from the things of which they are spoken, and giving them a general application.” - Questions on the Sealing Message, pp. 3, 4 (author’s italic).

Sister White was concerned about this “new light” and she gave the following testimony:

“The hardest task I ever had to do in this line was in dealing with one who, I knew, wanted to follow the Lord. For some time he had thought he was obtaining new light. He was very ill, and must soon die. And oh, how my heart hoped he would not make it necessary for me to tell him just what he was doing. Those to whom he presented his views listened to him eagerly, and some thought him inspired. He had a chart made, and reasoned from the Scriptures to show that the Lord would come at a certain date, in 1894, I think. To many his reasoning seemed to be without a flaw. They told of his powerful exhortations in his sickroom. Most wonderful views passed before him. But what was the source of his inspiration? It was the morphine given him to relieve his pain.

“At our camp meeting at Lansing, Michigan, just before I came to Australia, I had to speak plainly in regard to this new light. I told the people that the words they had heard were not the truth of inspiration. The wonderful light, which presented such a show of truth, was the result of a misapplication of Scripture. The Lord’s work would not close up in 1894. The word of the Lord to me was, ‘This is not truth, but will lead into strange paths, and some will become confused over this representation, and will give up the faith.’ ” 2SM 113.

This “new light” was not accepted by the leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. In 1905 Elder H. R. Johnson published a long article in the Review and Herald on the 144,000 which contains the original doctrine.

A few years later this very teaching was published again in the German edition of the Sabbath School Quarterly, August 1, 1908, as follows:

“From this we may recognize that, at the coming of the Lord, all of the 144,000, as living saints, will be composed of those who have never seen death and those who have died during the preaching of the last message but have resurrected before the appearing of the Lord.”

In his book Los Videntes y lo Porvenir, Elder L. R. Conradi also stated that the 144,000 will be made up of those who have never died and those who will be raised before the coming of Jesus:

“In the same way, some will be resurrected from among the sleeping righteous who will complete the number of Israel according to Revelation 7.” - Page 271.

However, part of the “new light” which claims that the 144,000 will never die is now widely accepted, especially because the number of professed Sabbathkeepers is counted in the millions.