Our Good Camp-meeting by M. P. Stiles

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 18, 1870

Our Good Camp-meeting.

By M. P. Stiles

Our good camp-meeting is now in the past. With what eager longing have we looked forward to that event. Many of us, while contending with the adversary, have hoped, after making use of this means of grace, which a gracious God has provided for us, to return with our hearts burning anew with the love of God, and to have the armor girded more closely about us, and to be in every way strengthened to go forward in the work until we can say, Blessed be God who giveth us the victory, through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We read of a sower who went forth to sow his seed, and as he sowed, some fell by the wayside, and the fowls of the air devoured it. And some fell upon a rock, and it withered for lack of moisture. And some fell among thorns, and they sprang up and choked it. And other fell on good ground, and sprang up and bare fruit an hundred-fold.

The Saviour defines it thus: Those by the wayside are those that hear; then cometh the devil and taketh away the word out of their hearts lest they should believe and be saved. They on the rock are they which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; which for awhile believe, and when tribulation or persecution arises, fall away. And that which fell among thorns, are they which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares, and riches, and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection. But that on the good ground are they which, in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience.

Now a question of great interest to us all is, Which of these characters shall we develop? Are our hearts all unbroken, unsubdued? Have we come up to this point in the Judgment with our hearts so uncultivated as not to be able to receive and hold fast such testimonies as we have heard.

“Blessed are your eyes, for they have seen, and your ears for they have heard.” “But take heed how you hear: for whosoever hath, to him shall be given; and whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he seemeth to have.” Margin, thinketh that he hath. We that are alive to-day, and can claim the dear Saviour as ours, have the greatest reason to praise God, and adore him, for his mercies toward us. First, in the tarrying of the vision. We should recognize his loving hand in that the vision has tarried. What would have been our present position, or that of the most of us, had there been no disappointment?

We should undoubtedly have been in our graves, waiting the second resurrection. And nothing is more certain than that, though we are living in the full blaze of the light of prophecy, and startling fulfilment of events, unless we hasten to redeem the time, and heed in its fullest sense the counsel of the True Witness, it will still be our portion, and that very soon.

The evidences of the nearness of the great event for which we should all be waiting, are positive, strong, and accumulating. The work is deepening. The hearts of the consecrated are being drawn up to God and Heaven; they are seeking that perfection of character that will insure them protection in the fearful “hour of temptation” which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth,-

Oh! let us awake! and press with courage on! Let us go forward! though the Red Sea lie before us, and more than Pharaoh’s host is behind, let us advance and trust in Israel’s God to cleave the waters before us and lead us safely to the other shore.

M. P. STILES.

Kent Co, Mich.