The Evil of Continual Time-Setting
The Baptist Tidings, published in Detroit, Mich., has the following item in its issue of Dec. 3, 1888: “A general convention of the Adventists is now in session at Buchanan. They will now fix upon another day for the great destruction.”
The brevity of this notice makes it all the more forcible as illustrating the evil of the continual time-setting of which a large body of first-day Adventists have been guilty since 1844. This is the prominent feature of a notice of even three lines. It shows that the very terms Adventism and Adventist suggest the public mind only a repeated setting of time, and as oft repeated a disappointment. The evil of this is that it destroys the confidence of the public in everything connected with the movement, and shuts their ears completely against the great truths which it is the province of Adventism to promulgate. It would not be so bad if only those who are guilty were the ones to suffer; but the public will not discriminate, and the odium of these repeated failures rests alike upon all classes. We wish it distinctly understood that Seventh-day Adventists are not to be identified with the timeists.