HOW DOES IT HAPPEN?

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 4, 1868

HOW DOES IT HAPPEN?

Those who have not been satisfied with the great adjustment of the prophetic periods in 1844, but have seemed to consider them since that time a proper subject for incessant tinkering, have of late years set forth Shimeall and Thurman as the grand oracles whose light upon this question the Advent people should follow, and to whose utterance they should make their profoundest bow of assent. Under these circumstances it may be of interest to the reader to learn something of the relation these men have sustained in times past to the Advent movement. In the Advent Herald of April 17, 1844, under the heading of “Another ‘Prophet,’” we find the following notice of Mr. Shimeall:

“By a notice in the Mail of Thursday, April 4, of ‘A new reading of the Prophecies,’ by ‘the Rev. Mr. Shimeall,’ which we are told are read in one of the pulpits in our city, on fast day, with this remark by the officiating clergyman—‘That is just right,’—it appears that Mr. S. has predicted that the ‘final subversion’ of the Millerites ‘will take place between the spring and fall equinoxes of A. D. 1844.’

“It also appears by this notice that Mr. S. has published a sermon, the text of which is taken from Dan. ii, 14, ‘Also the robbers of thy people shall exalt themselves to establish the vision, but they shall fall.’ The design of this sermon, it appears, is to show that ‘the rise, progress, and failure of these prognosticators (not only Mr. Miller, but all other modern expositors, from Prof. Stuart, and Bush, and Bishop Hopkins, down to Mother Ann Lee, Matthias and Joe Smith,) are predicted by Daniel and the Revelator.’

“So it seems that the ‘Rev. Mr. Shimeall’ has placed himself fairly among the ‘prognosticators,’ in reference to ‘Millerism.’ Others have predicted that we should ‘burn our Bibles,’ ‘turn infidels,’ ‘put off the time,’ &c., after 1843, but we believe all these have failed; and now we have a prediction that their final subversion is to occur as early as ‘the fall equinox of 1844.’ Really, we begin to think ‘the public’ will take it for granted that this ‘Millerism’ which has been ‘dying’ and ‘dead’ so long and so often, is to live forever! (so we think at any rate) or they will look upon the ‘predictions’ of Mr. S. to be like those of Mad. Adolphus, ‘predictions of the past’ as well as the ‘present and the future.’

“It is, however, remarkable that a man who claims to be so well acquainted with the prophecies as Mr. S. should apply a portion of Daniel to this age of the world, for the sake of ‘beating’ the Millerites, which all the old, as well as the new writers on Daniel, have applied to events which took place more than one hundred years before Christ.

“It is also remarkable that he should charge the Millerites with having ‘declared the covenant’ (with Abraham) ‘abrogated, and robbed God’s people of their inheritance.’

“The Millerites declare no such thing, they have committed no such robbery. Mr. S. may need to be a little cautious, or he will find himself among the ‘false teachers’ of the last times. We say to him, and all others in his line, ‘Do thyself no harm!’”

Mr. Thurman, we learn, also sustained a similar relation to the Advent cause. If we have been correctly informed, he was, at the time of the first message, an atheist, and took up an examination of the prophecies for the express purpose of overthrowing “Millerism.”

Now we have no objection to persons receiving the truth, even though they are led to it by first trying to oppose it. But this is not the case with these men. Though their work may have resulted differently from what they first intended, yet the result was equally pertinent to their original design, namely, to accomplish the overthrow of “Millerism.” For if their calculations and conclusions are correct, what was then understood by “Millerism” was a fallacy of the wildest kind. How then does it happen that some of the very leaders in the original Advent movement are now following in the wake of these men, and receiving their positions which effectually undo the work in which said persons were formerly engaged? If the Spirit of God was in the Advent movement from the commencement (and who that has any spiritual discernment can doubt it?), then, certainly, God was not guiding, instructing, and enlightening these men, while they were elaborating their theories in opposition to it. This is good presumptive evidence that the conclusions to which they arrived, though, no doubt, highly satisfactory to themselves, are not in accordance with the mind of the Spirit of God. For would God at one time lead his people in a certain direction, and accomplish a certain work, and meanwhile be raising up men with hearts filled with hatred against that work to mark out another path, and finally become the leaders of his people therein. This, to say the least, does not look like his work.