p. 36 | Untitled article by R. F. COTTRELL

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jan 26, 1869

SACRED NOTIONS. No. 1.

By R. F. COTTRELL

PARDON me for the title. I only mean certain religious notions or fancies which are esteemed sacred by those who hold them. Almost every person has some of them, and they stand right in the way of the reception of the truth. The truth would be embraced if it only harmonized with the various notions of individuals—mere fancies which they hold as fixed facts and established doctrines. But if the truth is fully embraced, these notions have to be parted with, though the yielding of them be as painful as the pulling of eye-teeth.

My early religious education was a cross between the doctrines of Seventh-day Baptists and those of the denomination calling themselves Christians. The true Sabbath was taught me from my infancy, and I thank God that I never have been tempted to give it up; but in other doctrines my bias was toward the Christian denomination, so that my proper appellation would have been Seventh-day Christian.

A leading feature of the Christian denomination was the rejection of all human creeds. This I heartily embraced, and believe to this day that it is a sound plank in the platform. But it is the policy of Satan, when people are embracing truth, to mix in some error, some mere notion, which they may hold with all the assurance and pertinacity with which they hold the truth. And so it happened that with this truth a mere notion was connected, which was esteemed equally sacred with the truth. A motto with me was, “No creed but the Bible, and no name for Christians but such as is found applied to them in the Bible.” This connecting a mere whim with a truth so self-evident, was the cause of the difficulty in my mind in regard to choosing an appropriate name for ourselves, suggestive of the peculiar and important doctrines which we hold. It would have been a bad thing for me, though it would have pleased Satan well, had I gone down to perdition because I could not relinquish a mere notion which I had connected with truth, and esteemed equally sacred.

I am well pleased with the name, Seventh-day Adventist. It tells at a breath what we profess, and what the church of Christ that are to be translated, will be. When you tell an inquirer that you are a Seventh-day Adventist, if he knows the meaning of these simple words, you have suggested to him your faith and practice. It may lead him to a volume of reflections. But had we taken the name of Christian, Disciple, or Church of God—Bible names, but already appropriated to themselves by factions—after giving our name, to make it intelligible we should have to go through a long circumlocution of our faith and practice. I like our name, and like to tell it to the inquirer. And as it was not wrong for the disciples to be called Christians first at Antioch, some years after the commencement of the proclamation of the gospel

of a risen and glorified Saviour, so it is no more wrong for the remnant of God's people, “who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ,” and are to be translated at the second advent, to be first called Seventh-day Adventists while they are embracing the last prophetic message of the gospel, and preparing for that advent. We can prove from the Scriptures that those Christians who will be found living upon the earth at the second coming of Christ, will be Seventh-day Adventists; for they will keep the commandments of God, and be found waiting for his Son from Heaven. Rev. xii, 17; xiv, 12; Isa. xxv, 9; Heb. ix, 28; Matt. xxiv, 46; Luke xii, 36, 37.

But this article is long enough for the space it should occupy; therefore I must reserve further thoughts for a second number. R. F. COTTRELL.