The Fullness of Time by George Ide Butler

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 16, 1870

The Fullness of Time.

By George Ide Butler

I was struck with an idea expressed by D'Aubigne while reading the history of the Reformation the other day, which I will give to the readers of the REVIEW. He says, "A reformation is not arbitrarily made as charters and revolutions are in some countries. A real reformation prepared during many ages is the work of the Spirit of God. Before the appointed hour the greatest geniuses and even the most faithful of God's servants cannot produce it. But when the reforming time is come, when it is God's pleasure to intervene in the affairs of the world, the divine life must clear a passage, and it is able to create of itself the humble instruments by which this life is communicated to the human race. Then if men are silent, the very stones will cry out."

It seems to me the author has here expressed a very great truth. Any one conversant with the history of the Reformation will give an assent to it. It seemed wonderful that so many ages could pass away and the masses of the people be so long held under papal corruptions and such gross error. The priesthood were known, many of them, to lead the most abandoned lives, and the popes themselves, who were looked up to with such reverence, were many of them guilty of the grossest immorality and most brutal cruelty. All the forms of religion seemed corrupted. And yet this condition of things continued right on, even when there was a general feeling among very many of the people that these things were not as they should be. And the priests were held many times in contempt and even ridicule by the common people. There were many eminent men in the two or three centuries preceding the Reformation who did much toward enlightening the people in the arts and sciences. The light seemed to be dawning in all directions except in religion. And more than this, individuals arose and made an attempt at reform in religion; men apparently as pious and devoted as Luther; men of ability and learning. Wickliffe arose in England more than one hundred and fifty years before Luther. He was a man of great ability, preached against the Catholics, caused the Bible to be translated, and labored faithfully and ardently in the cause of true religion. But all his efforts accomplished very little in comparison with those of Luther. The time had not come.

Huss arose in Bohemia a century before Luther. He was a man of God. He preached the truth faithfully. He held up the corrupt lives of the priests and spoke boldly against them. Multitudes followed him even while wandering in the fields, suffering persecution. Yet it seems he could not seriously affect the permanence of the Roman power. He died a martyr, and his work was nearly all crushed. The time had not come.

God has the control of the events of the world. When his time comes all agencies will be ready. So it was in the Reformation. We are apt to give too much credit to the simple agents that God uses, and forget that after all, the glory belongs entirely to him. Had Martin Luther, and Zwingle, and the other Reformers, arisen a century before, we have no reason to expect they could have fared better than Huss.

Had it not been that God wrought, and as it were steered the bark of the Reformation through the perils that environed it, the result would have been far different. He seemed to raise up special agencies at the right time to upset the skillfully-laid plans of the devil for the destruction of his work. Yes, in all past ages the same principle has been seen. The seed of Israel were not permitted to inherit the land of promise at first, and what a curious plan it would seem to us that God laid, and how contrary to what we should naturally adopt. They must be sent down to the land of Egypt, and there become slaves, be grievously oppressed, come into a condition where it would seem almost impossible that God's promises ever could be verified to them, and there they had to wait till the fullness of time came, till the "iniquity of the Amorites" was full; then God by his mighty power brought them out. Moses, it would seem, thought it could be done before, but when he made the attempt it turned out a failure.

Jesus Christ came in the "fullness of time." Many may have wondered why he was not manifested before. Why the Lord waited four thousand years before sending his Son into the world. But those who have given this much reflection tell us the condition of things was such at that time as would render the proclamation of the gospel much easier than at any other time before. The Roman empire was at its hight, and generally in a state of peace. The human mind was active. The old religions of polytheism were losing their hold upon the people. The gods of the different nations of antiquity were nearly all brought face to face in the pantheon at Rome, that there in each other's presence they might show their mutual insignificance. The Grecian gods could not save Greece. The Carthaginian gods could not save Carthage, and so on ad infinitum. What a glorious time for the religion of Jesus to come in and show its superiority. It came, and in a few years spread all over the empire. The fullness of time had come.

It has often seemed strange to me that a truth so plain as the Sabbath should have lain dormant so many years, to be revived down here at the close of time. Why did not the Reformers preach it generally? We believe they were honest men, engaged in the work of God. And yet one of the plainest truths in the canon of inspiration was overlooked or ignored by them. To be sure this was preached by our Seventh-day Baptist friends. But it never has seemed to make that stir in the religious world that its great importance demands. Somehow there has seemed to be a hindering cause. It seems lamentable that such men as John Bunyan should have written against the claims of the Sabbath, when the arguments are so clear. It would seem that God had purposely determined to reserve a truth of great clearness by which to especially test the last generation of men. The fullness of time had not come. The true Reformers of that age had all upon their hands they could do to bring out those truths God had intrusted to them. They did that work well and nobly, and fell at their posts.

Now the time for the great Sabbath Reform has come. The third angel's message must be preached. The commandments of God are to be restored and take their rightful place in the plan of God, and in the affections of his people. And we see the needed agencies springing into existence, the work moving forward according to God's order, bearing marks of permanency, of sound sense, of true religion. We easily discern the hand of God in it. God's Spirit bears witness to it. The seal is plainly set to the work. All these things should give us faith in God, that if we do our part he will do his. And although the "mills of God grind slow," yet his plans are certain of their accomplishment in his own good time.

GEO. I. BUTLER.