Early Beginnings by George I. Butler

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Aug 17, 1911

Early Beginnings

By George I. Butler

Many Voices—No. 1

Early Beginnings

GEO. I. BUTLER

The Spirit of God unifies and solidifies. It gives us comfort, and helps us to love one another more than we otherwise should. It leads to union, tending to produce one united body. It is Satan’s forte to create suspicion, to divide, to separate, to scatter, and to break down all love and union. After the great disappointment in 1844, the Adventist body, some fifty thousand strong, was rent by divisions, till its influence as a religious body largely ceased.

This Seventh-day Adventist movement, starting in weakness and obscurity, with the heavy cross, of an unpopular Sabbath, soon began to gather converts, making a steady and marvelous growth, doubling in numbers every decade, till now it stands a united people, a hundred thousand strong, and its influence and missionary efforts reach to earth’s remotest bounds.

It is doubtful if any religious movement ever had greater difficulties to confront or greater opposition to meet. In our early history, wherever we made a deep impression on the public mind, the professional debaters of the other denominations presented themselves, demanding debates. As a denomination, we have never felt that debates were desirable as a means of propagating the truth, and have as a rule sought to avoid them. The truths of our message are so clear and plain that we have no reason to fear opposition. Our cause has gathered great momentum during recent years, and our progress is more and more rapid. Our opponents have come to know that in Bible arguments we are strong, and they are weak. The popular denominations are not making converts from Seventh-day Adventists; but many honest souls are drawing away from them to us, and they know not how to hinder the process.

Our dangers of losses of membership come from an entirely different direction. In that remarkable little volume, “Early Writings,” written for the benefit of our people near the beginning of our work and still widely circulated, much is said about the “shaking time,” a condition which would be more or less manifest throughout the history of this cause, but especially as we draw near the end of our work.

This shaking time is but another illustration of our Saviour’s parable of the sower who went forth to sow the seeds of truth. Four classes are presented,—the wayside, stony-ground, thorny-ground, and good-ground hearers. The word made little or no impression on the first class; the second class were impressed and quite zealous at first, but soon, for lack of endurance, gave up. The thorny-ground hearers received the seeds of truth, but other growths choked the springing seed, so it brought no fruit to perfection. Love of the world, love of pleasure, in short, greater love for something else than Christ and the salvation of their fellow men forbade the production of fruit. The good-ground hearers received the seed into sincere and honest hearts, and brought forth fruit, some thirty, some sixty, and some an hundred-fold. So it will be in this cause. All will be tested and tried. The first three classes will make an utter failure. Some will drop out by the way, going back to the world, as many did in the days of Jesus and his disciples. Christ said to his apostles, “Will ye also go away?” Peter nobly answered, “Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life.”

The writer believes this message was started right, that God raised up persons who laid the foundations of this work on a solid basis. The Word of God was the rock upon which it was founded. God witnessed to it by his Spirit. The promised gifts of the Spirit were manifest at its very commencement. Elder J. N. Andrews, one of the noble band of men who helped in laying the foundation of this cause, once remarked to me, when I was young in experience and naturally unbelieving, that he had watched matters very closely and had never in a single instance, when positions had been taken carefully and prayerfully in this message, seen it necessary to change or discard a vital doctrine. The old landmarks have stood the test for sixty years or more. We do not mean to say that additional light has not been given from time to time, but as a people we have not had to suffer the shame of casting aside great principles which we had believed. The doctrines taught by Seventh-day Adventists stand like the solid rock in the mighty current.

But we have been taught that before the end there would be “many voices” leading away from this truth. These voices would not come from outside unbelievers or the popular churches. They would come from those once of us, but not now with us, from those who had gone off on some side track, teaching some “new light,” but really differing from the old message of sixty years’ standing. These old doctrines have stood the test of opposition triumphantly. Are they now to be undermined and suspicion thrown upon them by specious arguments, advocated with some degree of plausibility and labeled “New Light,”

till old believers who have stood stanchly for years begin to question the very foundations of our faith?—God forbid. “The foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his.” It is reasonable to question whether those who are thus engaged are working for God. How can they be while they are undermining the faith of believers in God’s eternal truth? Various voices are already being heard, and others may be expected.