It Is Not Convenient by William Boynton

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 22, 1872

“It Is Not Convenient.”

By William Boynton

WHEN we present before others the truth for this time, and urge upon them the necessity of taking their stand upon it, we are often met with the assertion, “It is not convenient to be so different from the majority of mankind; it will be such a great hindrance to me in my business that I shall not be able to make a livelihood.” Do such consider that all the blessings they now obtain are directly from the hand of that kind Providence who has laid down these great truths for them to obey? It is not convenient! What an excuse for mortal man to offer to his Maker who gives him all he has to enjoy! Look at the Christians of past ages. Did they consult their convenience in things pertaining to godliness? Was it convenient for righteous Abraham to leave his father’s house and go “out, not knowing whither he went,” and “sojourn as a stranger in a strange land”? Was it convenient for Enoch to walk with God for “three hundred years,” among the prevailing degeneracy of that wicked age? Was it convenient for Noah to warn the world for one hundred and twenty years of their approaching doom, and bear their scoffs and sneers? Was it convenient for Moses to leave the honors of being king, and endure afflictions with the people of God, taking upon himself, for forty years, the humble life of a shepherd, and finally the cares and murmurings of an ungrateful people? Was it convenient for Elijah to follow God, when all of his brethren (to outward appearance) had fallen into idolatry, and because of his warnings be obliged to flee for his life into the wilderness? Or for Joseph, because he could not “do this great wickedness and sin against God,” to suffer years of imprisonment? Was it convenient for Job to be bereft of his children, and suffer by disease all that was possible for Satan to inflict, and still hold on to his integrity?

Was it convenient for Jeremiah to remain “many days” in prison, or to be cast into the miry dungeon because of his prophesyings? or for Daniel to be cast into “the den of lions,” because he would worship the God of Heaven only? Was it convenient for the three Hebrew children to say, “We will not serve thy gods,” even at the risk of being cast into “a burning fiery furnace”? Was it convenient for Peter and John to say to their persecutors, “We ought to obey God rather than man”? or for Stephen to stand boldly for the truth and be stoned to death?

Was it convenient for Paul to leave his high position among the Jews, and become a poor despised teacher of the doctrines of Christ? or for the cause of truth suffer imprisonment, and five different times “scourgings,” to be “beaten,” “stoned,” and “shipwrecked,” to be in “perils of robbers,” of his “own countrymen,” “by the heathen,” “in the wilderness,” and “among false brethren,” to have “weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness,” and all this that he might by “this means save some”?

And lastly, was it convenient for Jesus to leave his glorious home on high, and come down and lead a life of sacrifice and suffering, having “not where to lay his head,” being “a man of sorrows and acquainted with griefs,” and finally to die on the cruel cross to save a lost and ruined world?

And if it has not been “convenient,” since our first parents left Eden, to be righteous, and God has marked out the path of affliction for the righteous since that time, that he might wean them from the love of the world and fit them for his heavenly kingdom, why should men talk about convenience in the service of God? No; we shall not find it convenient, but nevertheless very profitable, if we keep his commandments. And we should not seek “convenience,” but with Abraham “a better country, even a heavenly,” and with Moses, “have respect unto the recompense of reward,” that we may, with Job, “see God.” Oh! that we might now say with Paul, “I delight in the law of God after the inward man,” and not like Felix put it off “till a more convenient season.”

WILLIAM BOYNTON.

Williamsburgh, N. Y.