Our Heresy by J. S. Osborne

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 3, 1874

Our Heresy.

By J. S. Osborne

I FIRST heard the Advent doctrine preached by Bro. R. J. Lawrence and T. J. Butler at Clinton, Kansas, one and a half years ago.

I did not accept the truth at first, but before they left that place, I began to believe that they were correct in the views they presented. My elder brother and I came to Leavenworth the following September for the purpose of attending school.

We still kept Sunday, but every time the Sabbath (seventh day) came, I felt condemned for working on it. My brother had the same feelings. About a month after we came here, as we were going from the boarding hall to our room, I said to him: “This is the last Sunday I intend to keep.” He thought we ought to be sure we were right, and then he would do likewise. The next Sabbath we both laid our school books aside and tried to keep it. We have been doing so ever since.

We soon received a letter from the pastor of the Presbyterian church at Clinton (of which church we were both members), stating that our names had been erased from the church book, “on the ground of heresy.” My brother replied to the letter, giving him the reasons for our change in opinion.

We received another letter in answer, in which was the following: “When you have taken a regular theological course of some five years, and a classical course of some three years, I will be ready to converse with you on these great subjects.”

The minister made no reply to the passages of Scripture to which my brother cited him as the foundation of our belief, but merely answered as quoted above.

We are now members of the S. D. A. church at Big Springs, Kansas.

J. S. OSBORNE.