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For All People

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Feb 23, 1911

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 88, No. 8.

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For All People

By W. A. S.

HUMAN nature is a stubborn thing; and it is so very natural to view matters from one's own point of view. It required many a sharp lesson ere even those apostles who had companied with Jesus from the first were delivered from their national and tribal ideas. But the message of God itself knows no boundary-lines. It is the good news of salvation for all peoples; and in that truth the sinner of every kind, no matter where, finds just the salvation that heneeds. The Lord Jesus is Elder Brother to all flesh.
One of our canvassing brethren in Germany fell in with a Lutheran priest who was very free to criticize the Bible, and naturally the priest found decided fault with our work. The following conversation ensued:—
Priest: “Adventism is an exotic plant which can never come into Europe and thrive.”
Colporteur: “Christianity is also an exotic plant in Europe, yet it thrives here. Just so it is with Adventism.”
Priest: “With Adventism it is ‘Matthew the last chapter.’” [A German proverbial saying, meaning that a thing has reached its limit, or the last gasp.]
Colporteur: “There you are right, Mr. Priest; for it is written in Matthew the last chapter, ‘Go ye therefore, and teach all nations,’ and that is what the Adventists are doing. They are a missionary people, and they are going into all the world; and everywhere that this message takes root, the fruitage springs up.”
The answer was a true one. This third angel’s message is a plant that thrives in every soil.
Speaking last summer of experiences in Europe, Elder L. R. Conradi recalled an article written by a great German theologian in one of the papers when our work was first beginning in Germany. “This third angel’s message,” said the professor, quoting our familiar phrase, “makes us smile. It sounds strange to us. It will never go here. It may make some headway in America, but it will never do so in Germany.” The history of our growing work in Germany, with its thousands of believers, and its publishing and training centers, shows how little the professor understood the nature of the third angel’s message. The third angel’s message is nothing else than the preaching of the Word of the living God as it speaks to this day and generation.
W. A. S.