Jottings | AdventAI

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 8, 1866

Jottings.

WHERE ARE WE?

SURELY in close proximity to the saying of "peace and safety," and the coming of "sudden destruction," if we have not already reached it. Backed by the "emancipation proclamation," the "close of the war," and the "constitutional amendment, prohibiting slavery," our political ministers and religious politicians in the minds of those who "love to have it so," can make quite a fair show of a triumph of justice and freedom over tyranny and oppression; and they will eloquently portray the state of things in the "good time coming." But with many, there is an inward distrust of the weight of evidence, and now and then one speaks out in terms that seem to intimate that the fear that is to cause men's hearts to fail, is not altogether unknown, even now.

Another remarkable omen of these times, is the extensive revival spirit, reaching from Maine to California, which, while to the popular mind it certainly betokens the dawn of the millennial day, is, nevertheless,

in fulfillment of a prediction of the "testimony of Jesus." (See Experience and Views, p. 27). The nature of these "reformations" may be judged of by the nature of the agency producing them—a worldly-minded, fashion-devoted, pleasure-loving, fallen church. A recent issue of a local journal, under the head of "———— items," notices the observance of the "week of prayer," followed by one of these "revivals," in the same column with a meeting of a "trotting club . . . to re-organize for the season," and a "Sunday School entertainment consisting of tableaux, charades, music, vocal and instrumental, &c.," which was "repeated at the request of a number of citizens." Significant.

HEALTH REFORM.

In the great work of preparation for the Lord's coming, the health reform is seen to occupy an important place, indeed, in that it cannot be fully accomplished without it. How good and gracious then, the Lord is to give us the light upon it, and how thankful we should be for the great blessing, for that it is a blessing, none who properly understand it can fail to perceive.

But do we, as a people, duly appreciate this light, and walk in it as the Lord requires? I fear we do not. In a letter written to this place recently, a good sister says, "I endeavor to be temperate in my living. I have drank but little tea for some years, and now eat but very little pork; but as we cook it in the family, I sometimes eat it; but I think the good Lord is leading us away from all these hurtful things." Yes! my dear sister; and the good Lord has already led those who have followed him, away from such things as tea and pork. And I would ask any and every Seventh-day Adventist, how, with the testimony of Spiritual Gifts, Vol. 4, and How to Live, before them, they can consistently use any tea, pork, or any other article of the same class? But abstaining from these things, is but the alphabet of the health reform. May the Lord help us to be "temperate in all things" as his word requires. S. B. WHITNEY. Grass River, Apr. 24, 1866.