Note and Comment

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 9, 1902

THE greatest need of the hour is the need of a religious revival. As the greatest need of the sick man is health, so the greatest need of a sin-stricken world is a springing up of life where sin has spread spiritual disease and death. A sense of the awful dearth that has settled upon the religious world, which only an old-time awakening of the dormant consciences of men can remove, is felt and expressed by the editor of the United Presbyterian. He says:—

There is great need of a revival. We hear it on every side. Conferences discuss the subject. Ministers preach upon it. Churches lament small attendance and low spiritual activity. Services are held with accustomed regularity, but they are cold and unresponsive. The evening service is poorly attended, the prayer meeting is but a small fraction of the membership. There is activity; missionary enterprises are undertaken, large gifts are made, but the power is lacking. Wickedness abounds; worldliness rules. The thoughtful and devout pray for a revival, and wait for it.

We need more than a revival; we need an awakening that will move the whole people. We have evangelists and special meetings with good results; but results that lie on the surface. The crowded meetings are largely composed of church goers who find in this a pleasurable diversion, and soon fall back into the old lethargy. The depths are not moved. The men are not converted, and the world-force is unchecked.

Look at the average congregation; it is composed largely of women. The prayer meeting is very much a woman’s meeting. The pastor visits the homes, but the men are not there. Missionary activities are relegated to the women of the church. The Sabbath school is, in like manner, conducted largely by women. There seems to be a line of separation,—men for business and politics; women for religion. We need the awakening of men to their duty, to new life; to godliness and the active service of God. A century ago there was such an awakening. The fear of God fell upon men. There was little heard about the church or about Christian activities, but there was a tremendous amount heard about God, righteousness, and judgment to come. Men heard and trembled; they heard and forsook their sins. Society was moved to its foundations. All classes felt the new power. The Spirit of the Lord breathed upon the people, and they lived. There was a regeneration of which the effects remain until this day. We are in a period of like sinfulness and worldliness, and a like awakening is our great need.

Let us have, then, “the preaching of the word of God in its simplicity and fullness,” and let us believe that the Word means what it says. It is for just this that the Seventh-day Adventist movement has stood from the first.