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GEO. O. STATES

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 6, 1906

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 83, No. 49.

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GEO. O. STATES

By GEO. O. STATES

Lessons from Past Experiences — No. 9

GEO. O. STATES

NEARLY forty years ago a preacher in one of our Eastern conferences yielded to Satan’s temptations and fell into sin. For some time this man traveled extensively through that conference, living in secret sin. Finally this corrupt course was brought to light, and he gave up preaching, moved to Michigan, and engaged in farming in a county adjoining the one in which I was living. Although a man of very pleasing address, he was never again recognized as a minister nor granted credentials.
Soon after his fall into sin, we were told by the servant of the Lord: “God designed that this case of hypocrisy and villainy should be brought to light in the manner it has been, that it might prove a warning to others. Here is a man who is acquainted with the teachings of the Bible, and who had listened to testimonies borne by me in his presence against the very sins which he was practising. More than once he has heard me speak decidedly in regard to the prevailing sins of this generation, that corruption was teeming everywhere.
“The Lord reproves the sins of one, that others may take warning and fear. Warnings and reproofs are not given to the erring among Seventh-day Adventists because their lives are more blameworthy than are the lives of professed Christians of the nominal churches.”
This counsel was given our people many years ago, with much more of the same nature, which we do well to study and heed.
It was nearly fifty years ago that one of the ministers in Michigan was reproved for using tobacco, and instead of reforming he rejected the light, and started out independently. I held a series of meetings about twenty-two years ago near a company of people raised up by this man, and found many of them using tobacco, tea, and coffee. About the only points they seemed to be united upon was in keeping the Sabbath (which they kept about as many keep Sunday) and in opposing the Testimonies. I lived near this people for over a year, and many times I was impressed with the words, “So can no fountain both yield salt water and fresh.”
It is a sad surprise that comes to us when those in whom we have had such confidence go into sin; and yet if the counsel that has been constantly coming to this people had been heeded, these sorrowful losses in our ranks need not occur.
Nearly every week important counsel is given showing the terribly corrupt age in which we live, and pointing out our dangers, and yet many do not heed this counsel. We are living in an age of the world when in order to be kept from these corrupt influences we must live very near the Lord, and heed the timely counsel that God is constantly sending us.
We are told that before the flood “the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” The Bible positively states that “so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”
From all the counsel given in the Bible and Testimonies we do well to study along these lines, and to heed the counsel given; for as surely as we do not, we shall be overtaken in the snares that Satan has prepared for this people. Satan is especially working against the remnant people, and his energy increases as he realizes that he has less time to work. We must firmly stand on the Word, and follow man only as he follows Christ, and in so doing we shall be simply following the perfect pattern.
All along through our history different ones have fallen out by the way, and our only safety from going in the same way is to heed the timely counsel the Lord is sending.
Cedaredge, Colo.