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The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 3, 1867

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 30, No. 25.

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A SWEET child lay panting away her life after passing through long weeks of pain. Some one whispered in her hearing, ‘I think that this is death.’
‘No,’ cried the little sufferer, ‘I am not dying now I’m sure, for I do not feel as if I was quite ready for Heaven yet. I know that Jesus has begun a great work in my heart, and that he will not take me away half finished!’
If this dear lamb, with all her patience and love, and with a firm hope in Christ, felt that she was but ‘half finished,’ how poorly prepared for the company of the redeemed are those whose hearts and hands are fixed on the things of this earth.
She seemed to others, even then, sanctified; but as she approached nearer to God’s holiness, she saw more clearly the hidden evils of her heart. Well may we, who live amid the turmoils of business and pleasure, ask if the work of sanctification be even begun in us. If sure of this, we should grow in grace every day. Many real Christians manifest no anxiety to have the great work “finished.” We see them one day at the table of the Lord, and the next making merry with his foes at the dance or the wine cup. They may say, ‘My Lord and my God,’ but those with whom they mingle, who cry, ‘Crucify him, crucify him,’ will despise them as hypocrites and traitors; or they will stumble over their inconsistencies and perish.
A foundation well laid and a building going up, though ever so slowly, is a fair sight, giving promise for the future; but a building, however costly, half finished, where the sound of the hammer has ceased, and the rank weed has crept through the floors, is a picture of desolation. We are, if indeed chosen and called, temples which the hand of the Master is adding to and beautifying from day to day, until we shall be complete in him.