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Great Danger

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Jan 12, 1905

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 82, No. 2.

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Great Danger

By T. E. BOWEN

T. E. BOWEN
WHEN passing along the street, did you ever see red lights ahead of you? What were they there for?—O, to warn you of danger. Some excavation had been made, and the workmen, on leaving the night before, had carefully posted danger-signals, that no one should be harmed.
Along the Christian pathway are signal lights set. The traveler will do well to heed them carefully.
Just before the end we are told that some will be putting off the day of the Lord too far. Befogged with the cares of this life, they lose their reckoning, and count on years that never will come.
In our “Duty in View of the Time of Trouble,” in “Early Writings,” pages 48, 49, are these words: “The Lord has shown me the danger of letting our minds be filled with worldly thoughts and cares. I saw that some minds are led away from present truth and a love of the holy Bible, by reading other exciting books; others are filled with perplexity and care for what they shall eat, drink, and wear. Some are looking too far off for the coming of the Lord. Time has continued a few years longer than they expected, therefore they think it may continue a few years more, and in this way their minds are being led from present truth, out after the world. In these things I saw great danger; for if the mind is filled with other things, present truth is shut out, and there is no place in our foreheads for the seal of the living God.”
It matters not to the enemy what it is that eclipses present truth in the minds of the remnant, whether it be a fine house, farms, merchandise, housework, studies, story-books, just anything,—things in and of themselves proper when used aright. The danger lies in letting our minds become so filled with these things as to shut out present truth. And if present truth is shut out, there will be found no place for the seal of God.
The great danger is (and if ever that danger has been, it is now) that the ‘brethren’—that class who are not in darkness—will reason like this: “We expected the end to have come before now, and possibly it is not quite so near, even now, as we have been wont to think, so we will invest in this enterprise and that, and try to make some money.” It is very possible that day will come upon such unawares.
My brother, beware! Take heed to the words of thy Master, and ‘watch.’ Somebody who professes now to love this present truth will be heard to say, with mourning: “The cause was languishing, God’s people were starving for the truth, and we made no effort to supply the lack; now our property is useless. O that we had let it go, and laid up treasure in heaven.”
If all humbly seek God for guidance, he will so direct each one in all his business enterprises that none need be deceived by losing sight of present truth.