Here's how she puts it in another place:
So if we want to get rid of selfishness, and all sin is selfishness, the fundamental solution is to behold God's love.

Arnold, I very much appreciate what your sharing here. How does this principle play out in Lucifer's case in heaven? He was totally familiar with God's love and yet it didn't prevent him from sinning and rebelling against God.

Yes, Satan knew God's love. But he stopped at the intellectual level (step 2 in my ladder). He did not trust God's love, that God loved him enough to give him everything that was good for him. This was the point where he began with Eve, insinuating that God was withholding something that was good for her.

Instead of trusting God's love, Satan believed that he loved himself more. And thus, selfishness was born.

Amen!!!

Arnold, are you saying Lucifer's love for God was faulty and imperfect before he sinned and rebelled? Would this explain why he sinned and rebelled?

The initial problem was his misunderstanding of his love FROM God. His damaged love FOR God resulted from this initial problem. And once you start down that road, sin and rebellion are not far away.

Arnold, are you saying this explains why Lucifer sinned and rebelled? Also, please explain what "misunderstanding of his love from God" means?

I only outlined my understanding of the steps Lucifer took to perdition. As for explaining it, I can't even begin to try; I am limited to describing it. Why, in the light of God's presence, anyone would even start to doubt His love is beyond me.

"misunderstanding of his love from God" = thinking that it is possible to find love from another source that is of higher quality or greater quantity than the love we receive from God.

IOW, if you think someone else loves you more than God, then you don't know how much God loves you.

Ellen makes it clear Lucifer's relationship with God was perfect. Nothing was lacking. There was no more God could do to reflect or reveal His love more fully. Listen:

But even as a sinner, man was in a different position from that of Satan. Lucifer in heaven had sinned in the light of God's glory. To him as to no other created being was given a revelation of God's love. Understanding the character of God, knowing His goodness, Satan chose to follow his own selfish, independent will. This choice was final. There was no more that God could do to save him. But man was deceived; his mind was darkened by Satan's sophistry. The height and depth of the love of God he did not know. For him there was hope in a knowledge of God's love. By beholding His character he might be drawn back to God. {DA 761.5}

It is impossible to explain the origin of sin so as to give a reason for its existence. Yet enough may be understood concerning both the origin and the final disposition of sin to make fully manifest the justice and benevolence of God in all His dealings with evil. Nothing is more plainly taught in Scripture than that God was in no wise responsible for the entrance of sin; that there was no arbitrary withdrawal of divine grace, no deficiency in the divine government, that gave occasion for the uprising of rebellion. Sin is an intruder, for whose presence no reason can be given. It is mysterious, unaccountable; to excuse it is to defend it. Could excuse for it be found, or cause be shown for its existence, it would cease to be sin. Our only definition of sin is that given in the word of God; it is "the transgression of the law;" it is the outworking of a principle at war with the great law of love which is the foundation of the divine government. {GC 492.2}

I didn't say that God held something back, that He could have shown more love. What I said was that Lucifer didn't have faith in it. Had he trusted God's love, he wouldn't have trusted "his own selfish, independent will." That is the same problem you and I have whenever we sin - we think we love ourselves better than God.