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Is it of God?

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 8, 1875

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 46, No. 2.

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Is it of God?

By R. F. Cottrell

We are not certain that the counsel of Gamaliel, recorded in Acts 5:35–39, was inspired of God; but it commends itself as sound sense, and justifies the reputation in which he was held. The apostles were proclaiming Jesus as the promised Messiah. The work in which they were engaged was true or false. It was from Heaven or of men. It was a part of the unfolding and fulfillment of the great plan of promised redemption and salvation, or it was false—it was a genuine fulfillment of what God had promised in prophecy; or it was spurious—a vile counterfeit. In short, it was of God, and a verification of the faithfulness of his holy promises; or it was a device of Satan to oppose the plan and work of God.
The rulers of the Jews had succeeded in obtaining the crucifixion of Jesus as a criminal, and now they were persecuting the apostles and taking counsel to slay them. Then stood up one in the council, a Pharisee, named Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, had in reputation among all the people, and gave his advice. Said he, “Refrain from these men, and let them alone; for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to naught; but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.”
To this counsel of his they assented, and so do we. It would have been strange had they not. Nothing but the greatest blindness and insanity of passion could dissent from it. The disciples were committing no outrages against the people. They were only persuading men that God had fulfilled his promise in giving a Redeemer and Saviour to men, that the great atoning sacrifice had been made for mankind, and that salvation was offered to the believers on the terms of faith and obedience.
If this was a delusion, it would soon run its course and come to nothing. But should it prove true, should it prove to be in reality the fulfillment of God’s promise, it would be vain to think to defeat it, and those who should attempt it would ultimately find that they were even fighting against God.
If the reasoning of Gamaliel was good then, it is good to-day. Then, the opening message of the gospel dispensation was being proclaimed; now, the closing message of the same gospel is sounding abroad in the world. Then, it was claimed that the voices of the prophets had been fulfilled in condemning Jesus Christ to death, and that “the promise which was made unto the fathers” God had fulfilled in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, as it had been written in the ancient Scriptures. See Acts 13:23–37. Now, it is claimed that the last warning message of the gospel, a message long ago promised in prophecy, is being proclaimed to mankind. See Rev. 14:9–12. Then, it was proclaimed that Christ had been “offered to bear the sins of many;” now, that he is about to “appear the second time without sin unto salvation,” to those “that look for him.”
The present message, like the former, is truly a message of the gospel, or it is not. It is the message promised in prophecy, or it is a base counterfeit. The work is of God, or of men. What shall be our course in regard to it? The counsel of Gamaliel is applicable in the case: If it be of men, it will come to naught; but if it be of God, it is vain to fight against it. Those who fight against it fight against God, and persisting in this course to the close of probation, they must drink of the wrath threatened in the message.
The men engaged in the proclamation of this message are not men of violence, nor invaders of the rights of others. They come to us “in the way of righteousness;” they are men that “fear God and keep his commandments.” (See Matt. 21:32.) For myself, I accept the counsel of Gamaliel. Twenty-four years ago I embraced this message as the fulfillment of the promise of God in the prophecy. Not from the number—the little handful—of those who then believed and taught it, but from the harmonious testimony of prophecy and its fulfillment, I was compelled to believe that this counsel and work was of God, and not of men. For twenty-four years I have been watching it; but never with the least hope of seeing it come to naught. Many have been its exposers, who have labored to overthrow it, and anxiously watched to see it come to nothing. They have had a painful labor, and have waited in vain to see the end of it.
And what do we now see? Is the present prospect discouraging to believers in the work, and encouraging to those who watch for its perdition? No, indeed. Instead of the signs of its speedy dissolution, we see the work spreading among the nations of the earth. According to prophecy, it is going to “many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings.” Rev. 10:11. Three weekly papers and one monthly are publishing it in the English language, and monthlies in the Danish and Swedish tongues; and besides these, a great number of books, pamphlets, and tracts, in these languages, and also in the French, German, and Holland, are being sent forth from our Offices of publication, and several power presses are kept at work in their production.
Our leading paper, the REVIEW AND HERALD, besides being sent to nearly all the States and Territories of our Union, is regularly sent to subscribers in China, India, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, South America, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, England, Scotland, Ireland, New South Wales, and Italy. Inquiry is being awakened concerning the reforms in doctrine and practice which are advocated in these publications, and especially is the Sabbath of the moral law of God, which has been so nearly supplanted for so long a time by the rival institution of the Sunday festival of the church of Rome, gaining prominence and demanding investigation, and gaining adherents in many parts of the Christian world. This is the proper fruit of a message which bears conspicuously upon its banner “the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.”
Now this work is of God, as we have said, or of men. It is the real work promised of God in the prophecy, or a vile counterfeit. We are right in proclaiming it at this time, or we are in a great delusion. If it is a delusion, we ought to be helped out of it; but if it is the truth of God, it should be embraced. It is a deeply important inquiry, Is it from Heaven, or of men? Reader, will you decide the question, before you dismiss the subject? May God lead you to a right decision. R. F. COTTRELL.