To Correspondents by Uriah Smith

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 21, 1871

To Correspondents.

By Uriah Smith

J. W. Nicholson: The persons to whom you refer are mistaken when they represent us as believing that the first message closed in 1844. That message at first constituted the burden of the special movement which God ordained for the last days to prepare a people for the coming of his Son. Soon the second angel followed, adding another special truth to the proclamation. In due time the third angel followed with his proclamation, when the time came that the truths he had to utter were of leading importance. Meanwhile, the other messages do not cease, but continue a part of present truth; so that it may now be said that we have a three-fold message.

In reference to the objection that the proclamation from 1840 to ’44 could not have been correct because the Judgment work in the sanctuary did not commence till the latter year, we call attention to the language of the message. It does not say, Fear God and give glory to him for the Judgment is commenced, but, “the hour of his Judgment is come.” The word hour, when not used in a prophetic sense, means first, one of the equal periods into which a day is divided, and secondly, a brief and indefinite space of time. This is evidently the sense in which it is used in Rev. 14: 7; and in this sense its application would be broad enough to cover a few years before that Judgment work commenced, bringing us down to the opening of that work, and then yielding its place as a leading proclamation to a message based upon that change in the ministry of our Lord. As an illustration of the use of the word “hour” in this sense, see John 5: 25: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live.” The hour had come; yet it was some time after this, before he raised any of the dead to life.

H. A. St. John: The word rendered graves, in John 5: 28, is μνημειον (mnemeion), and is defined to mean a tomb or sepulcher. It occurs forty-two times in the New Testament, and is twenty-nine times rendered sepulcher, five times tomb, and eight times grave.

F. Howe: The sophistry of our opponents on Matt. 28: 1, &c., is thoroughly exposed in the little tract lately published at this Office, entitled, Sabbaton. We send you a package to scatter among those who listened to the perversions of the elder of whom you speak.

U. S.