p. 39 | My Experience by D. P. Curtis

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 15, 1873

My Experience.

By D. P. Curtis

About sixteen or seventeen years ago, while pastor of the First S. D. Baptist church in Verona, N. Y., my attention was first called to the S. D. Adventist’s positions upon the “nature of man,” and some other points. Storrs’s “Six Sermons,” Hall’s “Man not Immortal,” Stephenson’s “Atonement,” and Dobney’s “Future Punishment,” were placed in my hands. I read them, and was much interested. I found that I had “taken for granted,” on these points, ground which it was very difficult for me to sustain. After careful examination, I was convinced that my former views were wrong, and gave them up, and have never preached them since.

Some two years later, I examined the subject of “The Kingdom of God,” and became fully convinced that it was to be the fifth universal kingdom upon the earth, and have ever since maintained that position. In connection with this, I learned that Christ was destined to sit as King upon the throne in that kingdom, in accordance with the word of the Lord to David (2 Sam. 7; Ps. 89), and by Isaiah (chap. 9), and by the angel Gabriel (Luke 1: 31–33). I have never seen any reason to reverse my opinions upon this subject. These views gave me a very different idea of the Bible, from what I had previously entertained. Since embracing these views, I have ever advocated them when called out upon these subjects; but I have not made them prominent in my preaching among my brethren. I have, from time to time, received some light upon other points. I have ever believed and preached the personal advent of Christ, and, for many years, have been fully convinced that the time of that advent was near at hand.

It was not, however, till Bro. Canright came to this place, last winter, and gave a series of sermons and lectures, that I became acquainted with the subjects of the sanctuary, the Judgment, the three messages of Rev. 14, and the Sabbath as being the seal of the law of God, the two-horned beast, &c., and the position of the S. D. A. people as being the “remnant people,” and having the special work upon their hands of proclaiming the third angel’s message. These were new things to me, and I listened with deep interest to his presentation of them, and have examined them as carefully as I am able to examine them, in the light of the word of God. As the result of my investigation, thus far, I can but give them the assent of my mind, as being the truths of God. I may err in my conclusions. To err is human, to forgive is divine. I pray the Lord to give me “wisdom” which “is profitable to direct.”

I have just returned from the Minnesota Camp-meeting, at Medford. It was my first experience of the kind. To say that I enjoyed it, is too tame. I prized it as among the most blessed seasons of my life. The acquaintance which I there formed with Bro. Butler and Bro. Matteson, as messengers of the Lord, and with many others, less prominent laborers in the great gathering work, was very pleasant and very cheering and precious to me. The instructions which I received from the word of the Lord, by these messengers, were to me of great value. I love the truth of God. I desire to walk in all his truth. I pray the Lord to give me of his Spirit, to help me “walk in the light, as he is in the light;” “for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth.” I trust that the way will be opened before me, so that I may not only understand, but “declare, the whole counsel of God.”

D. P. CURTIS.

Alden, Minn., July 3, 1873.