“So thou, son of man, I have set thee a watchman unto the house of Israel; therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me.”
There are two distinct duties of the watchman: first, and as the chiefest thing, he is to hear the word of God. He can not be a faithful watchman upon the walls of Zion unless, by God’s grace, he himself is where he can hear the word of God as God’s word. Second, having heard the word, he is to give the people warning from God, and that makes one a faithful watchman upon the walls of Zion.
John the Baptist had exactly this experience; for it is said that the word of God came to John the Baptist in the wilderness, and it was because the word of God through the prophet Isaiah came unto John the Baptist in the wilderness as God’s message to him personally that he was able to go forth from the wilderness and to speak to men the word of God as the message of God directed to them; and it was because John the Baptist simply stood between God and the people, and was in his own person, in his own flesh, the translation of the word of God to the people, that John the Baptist himself was lifted up to be what he was in the world.
The watchman who is to be a faithful watchman is to be where God can speak to him the word that he would have spoken at any special time. There are many words of God, and all God’s words can not be spoken at the same time; but at every step of the way in the development of God’s work, in the building up of his work in the earth, God’s watchman is to know the word for the time. He can know this only as he himself is in such touch with God that day by day and hour by hour God can speak to him as his servant, and thus can directly make him the mouthpiece to speak to the world the word that should be spoken at that time.
A Definite Message
In our day there is a distinct word of God to be spoken to the world, a definite statement of the truth of God. I desire to call attention just briefly to one or two special phases of this truth, or to the standpoint from which we are to view this work, and do this work. I will therefore emphasize the contrast between what I may for convenience speak of as the doctrinal message and the historical message.
The doctrinal message is that setting of the gospel which is especially emphasized in Rev. 14:6-12. We are not to think that all the truths that are to be spoken in this generation are specifically mentioned in these few verses in that chapter; that chapter is a kind of syllabus of the whole truth, and the truths that are there emphasized do themselves involve every phase of truth and every specific statement of truth that will prepare a people to meet our Lord when he comes.
Now note: There is what might be spoken of as the doctrinal message. What is the historical message?—We are a part of it. We ourselves constitute a part of the historical message. In 1833 William Miller was set apart by the Baptists to go forth and preach the truth that burned in his heart, the truth of the near coming of Christ; since that time there has been raised up a people in whose hearts and lives this message has become an experience. And that people growing and extending to all lands, with a message that was enlarging in their own minds and experiences, constitute what we might call the historical message. And you can not possibly separate between these two phases or these two views of this message. What that message means in Revelation 14ought—mark the word—to be seen distinctly in the lives of the people constituting the body of believers in that message; and the people who have been raised up under this message ought, in their own lives and experiences, to be to the world the interpretation of that message.
The Living Message
That is, to-day, just as before, when one man was spoken of as a type of a people, there should be a whole people constituting one body, speaking the same thing, who should be in such touch with God, the source of truth, that, standing between him and the world, they can unitedly, with a loud voice, speak the message that God would have spoken to the world, both in the words which they utter, and in their experience before the world; so that when this people proclaim in words that the coming of the Lord is near, their lives of devotion and sacrifice, their separation from the world, should be the emphasis to the message that the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.
When this people say to the world that health reform is an essential part of this message, that a people who are being prepared for translation need just such a truth; that the word of God should be for their bodies as well as for their souls, they themselves in their home practice, in their daily experience, should be the emphasis to that preaching.
When they set forth any truth, whatsoever it be; when they set forth to the world that the spirit of prophecy is in the church, that it belongs with this church, they themselves, in their own attitude toward that truth, should emphasize to the world the value of that truth.
And speaking of that, I would like to emphasize one thought. It seems to me that it must be evident to us all,—certainly evident to those who have long been connected with this work,—that the spirit of prophecy can not possibly be separated from this message. Then, inasmuch as this historical message among the people has inseparably connected with it, even as the nerves are throughout the bodily frame, that work of the spirit of prophecy, every time anything connected with this message is emphasized to enforce to our own minds or to the world that this people are the people doing this work, and that this message is the message of Revelation 14, whether we mention the spirit of prophecy or not, we are emphasizing the truthfulness of that as a part of this work.5
Two Great Truths
Now what I wish to call attention to in this message, this doctrinal message and this historical message, I will emphasize under two specific heads: first, as relates to what we might term outward events, the near second coming of Christ, the personal, visible, literal second coming of Christ in the clouds of heaven, to gather his people, is the keynote of this message. This coming is an event for which we look, toward which we are moving, and for which we are seeking to be prepared.
Secondly, in its relation to the preparation for that event, the truths which center in what we speak of as the sanctuary question are the central truths of this message.
Now mark the two things: first, the outward event to which we look, toward which we are moving, an event set forth and emphasized in the prophecies, an event marked by the signs, an event which is to mark the end,—that event is the second literal, visible, personal coming of our Lord and Saviour in the clouds of heaven, to gather his people home. But the center of the work of preparation, the work which will make a people ready for that event, is that which we speak of as the sanctuary question, the center of a whole group of truths relating to our personal attitude toward God, our personal experience in the forgiveness of sin, in the cleansing from sin, in the acceptance of the righteousness of Christ as our personal experience. There may be found the central theme of this message.
I do not expect to dwell upon these things, but I want to say this, that when in the minds of those who compose what I have spoken of as the historical message, the truth of the near coming of our Lord, ceases to be a living thing, a vivid thing, a thrilling thing; when that ceases to have an influence, a power to shape and to mold the thoughts, the lives, the plans, the purposes, and the work of this people, this message has turned backward.
And in the very same way, when this system of truth, which centers in what6we so familiarly speak of as the sanctuary question, has lost its hold upon our minds and hearts, has lost its place in our teaching, has lost its power in our personal experience to cleanse from sin, and to keep from sin, when that great truth of a high priest in heaven, One who has become our sacrifice, our substitute, and our surety, has dropped out of our reckoning, then this message as the message that God would have given to the world in this generation has lost its power.
I would never for a moment call upon this people to go back one year, or ten years, or forty years, merely to find what people believed at a certain time, and have that our belief; but I would call this people to the same prayerful study of God’s Word as the pioneers in this message gave to it. I would call them to the same simplicity of faith as those men had in what they found in the Word. I would call them to the same personal devotion and consecration and sacrifice to the truth that they found, as those men showed.
And I want to tell you that when this people as a people take that position, not going backward simply to find what men believed at a certain time, but adopting the same platform which gave to them sacred truth, we may expect to find the same truth greatly enlarged, greatly glorified, greatly expanded, for our own experience. And the people of God to-day, as compared with the very same people of thirty and forty and fifty and sixty and seventy years ago, ought to be standing on great vantage ground with reference to God’s message to the world. But what is the situation? Then there was an authority in the truth that those men taught, not because they knew all the truth, but because they sincerely believed, and were, in their own experiences, the message of truth they knew.
It was not a doubtful or an uncertain or a wavering note that the leaders of this message struck in those days. They did not have a tremolo stop in their organ. They held a strong, steady, straightforward note in their work.
Warning and Exhortation
Now the warning that I wish to emphasize is this, let every soul know that he knows his ground where he stands. Unless a man deliberately closes his eyes, unless a man deliberately draws something over his face that hides the whole situation from him, he must perceive that this historical message needs to be strengthened; he must perceive that what we have spoken of as this historical message has had an uncertain movement in it, has had a wavering note, has had a tendency, to say it in the mildest form, to swerve from the definite work that God has committed to this people.
And the exhortation which I would give is, “Choose you this day whom ye will serve.” “If the Lord be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him.”
And that brings to our minds distinctly the fact that the message of John the Baptist was the Elijah message, to be given in the spirit and power of Elijah; and the crisis of all Elijah’s experience, when he saw God’s people being led astray from the truth, was that day when he uttered that very message, that day when God witnessed in answer to his prayer, and the people said, “The Lord, he is the God; the Lord, he is the God.” I would like to hear from every one who believes in this message as distinct a note of response to God’s leading and working, who could say openly and devoutly, The Lord is God, and this is God’s message.
It is time that God’s watchmen should hear the word of God, and should speak his word to the people for this time; and it is certainly time that those whose hearts respond to the message that God is sending at this time, and who in themselves constitute the historical message to the world, should stand out clear and distinct from the world, and openly declare themselves to be standing for the message of God for this time. “Come out from among them, and be ye separate.” This is a separation, not bodily simply, if at all, but separation of character, separation of purpose and thought and habit.
If there is now a historical message from God to this world in the person of believers scattered over the face of the earth, how can there be a distinct, definite message declared to the world unless the people who themselves constitute that message stand out clear in their belief, united in their work, and declaring definitely to the world God’s message in their own experience?
To my mind the very circumstances of the hour call upon this people all over the world, call upon you and me to-day, in our relation to God’s work and God’s truth, to take that stand, not in a spirit of antagonism, but for the safety of our own souls, and the safety of other perishing souls whom we can not reach by a wavering, uncertain message; we can not seize them and draw them out of the current, unless our own feet are planted solidly upon the eternal Rock.
For our own souls’ sake, then, in this hour of peril, for the sake of souls that are going down in this hour of peril, for the sake of those right about us who are standing in slippery places, I call, in the name of the Lord, upon every believer in this truth to stand forth with such an experience with God, with such an experience in the message for this hour, with such knowledge, and such ability to set it forth in his own life as shall be a warning to every one in peril. It is time to recognize our responsibility in this matter.
The Time of Deliverance
It is certainly time that the hour of deliverance should be manifested,—deliverance for every personal believer in this truth,—deliverance for this whole people,—deliverance from everything that would bind us down in sin, in hesitancy, in uncertainty,—a deliverance that shall set us forward, free from the things that have bound us, free from the things that have veiled our eyes, free from the things that have kept the light out of our lives,—that the message may be spoken to the world,—not merely a message delivered as a sermon from the desk, but a message emphasized by the lives of sixty thousand believers in this country,—a message which speaks in no uncertain tones,—a message which must have a hearing,—The coming of the Lord draweth nigh; prepare to meet thy God. And we must give the message in its fullness; for those who live through the time of trouble and do not see death, must necessarily have a physical experience such as no people have had in recent years.
And there is, therefore, most emphatically a place for that work which shall prepare a people physically for the experiences through which they are to pass. And I wish to bid Godspeed to every one who is devoting his life to that work, for that purpose. And so we have a complete message, which will take hold of people, body, soul, and spirit, and transform them physically, and spiritually, and make new men and women in Christ Jesus; yea, that shall do such a work in this generation that a whole people, who have been waiting, and watching, and looking for his return, shall be prepared, that there may come to them that great consummation of all the ages, when this corruptible shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality.
The power for that experience is in the message that God has given to us. Let us individually know the transforming power of this message, and then let us be to the world a historical truth in its power, that shall win souls for Jesus Christ and his kingdom.