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An Appeal

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 7, 1903

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 80, No. 27.

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An Appeal

By S. E. HAMILTON

S. E. HAMILTON
Dear brethren and sisters, do we realize the shortness of time as we should? If so, are we doing our whole duty? How is it with our own souls? are we in a saved condition? If not, why not? Is there not enough in the plan of salvation to inspire us with courage? The ark of mercy is now ready, and the Lord invites us with our children to enter in before the storm bursts. Can you not see the clouds, and hear the thunder? The Testimonies represent Jesus as reaching down over the battlements of heaven to save his people.
Fathers and mothers, are you sure the blood is on the door-posts? Have you seen to it yourselves, or are you trusting that some one else will put it there? Shall we be satisfied to go into the ark, and see our dear children outside? We have but a brief period of probation left. If you are not sure that your children are in a saved condition, take them one by one, and go by yourselves, and there on your knees before God confess to them that you have not done your duty, and ask their forgiveness for any unkind or hasty words, and tell them of the beautiful home Satan is trying to rob them of; for the Lord says in Isa. 49: 25, “For I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children.”
Angels of God are tenderly watching over our children, and O how they long for the privilege we have of sitting down and talking to our children about the beauties of eternal truth! After the Lord gave his holy law to Israel, he charged them to teach its precepts to their children. How often? morning and evening?—No; but, “Ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.” Everything we do should tell them that Jesus is soon coming, and that we are preparing to meet him. Make the reading of God’s Word so attractive that they will love it more than any other book. Let the little ones all take part.
I know of a brother who can not afford to take one of our papers for his family, and yet he pays five cents a copy for the morning paper, so he can keep up with the times. Dear brethren and sisters, let us keep pace with the message, and never mind the times. The Lord says, “He that walketh righteously, and speaketh uprightly; . . . that stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil; he shall dwell on high.” You can not continue to read the accounts of crime and bloodshed to your children, and expect them to have high and holy thoughts; and those things will increase more and more, and will take more and more of your time, until some day you will awake to find that the message has been given, the seven last plagues are falling, and you and your children are not saved.
“Shall we heed the Spirit’s pleading, While for mercy we may call, Or delay till God’s handwriting Seals the final doom of all?”