p. 10 | Success in Our Work by L. D. Santee

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 7, 1909

Success in Our Work

By L. D. Santee

L. D. SANTEE

“For yet a little while, he that cometh shall come, and shall not tarry.” Heb. 10: 37, R. V.

There is nothing that will give success and power to our work like a realizing sense of the nearness of the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul said: “I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom: Preach the word.” In presenting reasons why men should accept the truth, we should not merely consider the brevity of human life, and the uncertainty of all things earthly, but the grandeur and nearness of the advent, and the events connected with it. Paul reasoned of “righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come” (Acts 24: 25), and we should hold up the certainty of the judgment and its results. The grand truths of the coming of the Lord and the judgment will always find interested hearers.

The prophetic words of the apostle will lose none of their force or significance until they are fulfilled, and we are actually in the kingdom of God. “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” 1 Thess. 4: 16, 17.

In addition to this, is the terror unspeakable, and the final destruction of the unsaved. Of the ransomed, resurrected, or translated, can be said, “Neither can they die any more: for they are equal unto the angels.” When he comes the second time, it is as “the Lion of the tribe of Judah,” and he will “gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity.” Matt. 13: 41. Were we to live a life of expectation of these events, we should be a power indeed. Here was the secret of the astonishing success of the primitive church. They never preached Jesus Christ crucified, without preaching Jesus Christ glorified. They never preached the first advent, without preaching the second; for the two are complemental, and their union makes the entire gospel.

Paul says, “I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God.” Acts 20: 27. The third angel’s message will have power, just as we make prominent the event that follows. Let us give to the world the evangel of the

throne, as well as of the manger, the glad tidings of the scepter, as well as of the cross. To feel the apostolic power within us, we must have the apostolic doctrine within us.

John the Baptist cries, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” John 1: 29. John the revelator points to the “Lion of the tribe of Judah,” and it is the “same Jesus.” Peter, when near his death, left the promise of the advent as a precious legacy to his successors. Hear him in his second letter. 2 Peter 1: 12: “Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and be established in the present truth. Yea, I think it meet, as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up by putting you in remembrance; . . . moreover I will endeavor that ye may be able after my decease to have these things always in remembrance. For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of his majesty.” He had heard the promise from the lips of his Master, “I will come again.” He had listened to the wonderful prophecy given to us in Matthew 24, and later had seen on the mount of transfiguration a miniature of his coming. No wonder that he wanted the church to remember it forever.

John joyously assures us, “We shall soon be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” 1 John 3: 2. Paul counsels to “wait for his Son from heaven.” 1 Thess. 1: 10. Above five hundred had seen him ascend from the mount of Olives, and heard the assurance from the angels, “This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.” Acts 1: 11. The prayer of the church through all the ages has been, “Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.” Now that it is about to be realized, we can tell to the church and the world, “Maranatha,”—the Lord cometh. His coming is not the advent of the Holy Spirit, for that is denominated “another Comforter,” but it is to be “this same Jesus,” or, as Paul says, “the Lord himself,” and when he comes, the redeemed will bid farewell to pain and sorrow forever. As coworkers with him, our success is in telling of his advent, and the events attending it, the preparation necessary to “abide the day of his coming,” and that “he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.” Heb. 7: 25. May the Lord help us to be among the number that “look for him.”

Moline, Ill.