“For our Learning.” Rom. 15: 4 by Joseph Harvey Waggoner

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 27, 1870

“For our Learning.” Rom. 15: 4.

By Joseph Harvey Waggoner

YE HAVE KILLED THE PEOPLE OF THE LORD.

“And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods.”

“And there came out a fire from the Lord, and consumed the two hundred and fifty men that offered incense.”

“But on the morrow all the congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron, saying, Ye have killed the people of the Lord.” Num. 16: 32, 35, 41.

THIS was surely one of the most singular instances of rebellion on record. Indeed, it has sometimes seemed hard to reconcile such blindness, such mad infatuation, with the ordinary sense with which they must have been possessed, and the light they had received from the many manifestations of God's power in their behalf. And,

1. We read that the earth opened, and swallowed up a certain company who were in open rebellion. By what method of reasoning could they make Moses and Aaron answerable for this?

2. A fire came out from the Lord and consumed a company who aspired to the priesthood in direct opposition to the ordinance of God. Was this the work of Moses and Aaron? or if they thought it was, would it not then prove to them that Moses and Aaron had power over heaven and earth? that they held them under such control that they would do their bidding. How, then, dared they so soon inaugurate a new rebellion against them? Such blindness seems almost unaccountable.

But the Lord said, by Samuel, “Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.” 1 Sam. 15: 23. We know that witchcraft has a power to so pervert men's faculties, that everything is distorted to their vision. Wrong is made to appear right, and they are blinded to the simplest and plainest reasons and facts. And such, too, is the power and tendency of rebellion. This alone appears to account for their conduct. A person bewitched feels perfectly secure in his position, and is scarcely moved by evidence of his error. So, too, with a person with rebellious tendencies. It is always selfish and unreasonable. Seldom, very seldom, does a person recover himself from the strong influence of witchcraft. And so hard is it for a person of a rebellious spirit to entirely escape from this terrible snare of the enemy. Not realizing the awful danger of his position, he can hardly be persuaded to make the strong effort necessary to break away from it. The victim is like a charmed person, who thinks he is enjoying the greatest freedom and the richest pleasures, while the toils of the destroyer are closing around him.

The New-Testament prophecies of the last days inform us that Satan will work “with all power, and signs, and lying wonders.” All these are plain to be seen, easy to be identified. But who shall describe, and sufficiently warn against, that spoken of in the same text, “all deceivableness of unrighteousness?”

God has a great and important work to be accomplished in and for “this generation.” His commandments must be restored, and thereby a people fitted for translation. Doubtless, the deceptions of the enemy are aimed against this work; but thousands fall into the snare who know not for what purpose the enemy has entrapped them.

But God has always carried on every great reform through certain instrumentalities. A work necessarily requires workers; and the last are as much a part of God's plan as is the first. Some, strangely enough, seem blinded to this fact, and think they are friends to the work, while they are opposing the workers. If they are not beyond the reach of reason, they must see that their position is most unreasonable. And if their senses are so stupefied that they cannot see it, it is the duty of others to take warning, and avoid the danger into which they have so heedlessly run. Through all the inspired records, we find that God has looked upon his instruments as an essential part of his plan; and rejection of them, has always been counted as rejection of Him. “The tree and its fruit” are always classed together; and they who love the fruit, will show it by their regard for the tree. J. H. WAGGONER.