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MARY F. WELCH

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 25, 1873

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 41, No. 11.

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MARY F. WELCH

By Mary F. Welch

Contrast.

Go back with me to the garden of Eden, when Adam and Eve were first placed there, pure and spotless; when they were visited by angels, and when everything possessed life and health, and compare it with the present. How sad the change! Man has fallen, and the same serpent that tempted Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden still lives to tempt man in his fallen condition!
And after six thousand years' experience, we find that this enemy has not lost his power, but still succeeds in deceiving thousands; and the result is, sickness and sorrow, crime and death. But had Adam and Eve resisted this temptation, and obeyed the voice of the Lord God, they might have enjoyed their happy Eden home, and, in addition to that happiness, might have received visits from the holy angels. But alas! the marks of disease and decay are seen all around us. The earth, once so pure and spotless, so free from sin and decay, has also fallen under the power of the enemy. But when restored to its Eden beauty, all traces of the curse will forever be banished away.
In contrasting this present world with the one to come, we are reminded of the words of David:—“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers; the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?” Ps. 8:3, 4.
When we think of man in his fallen state, subject to sin, remorse, and degradation, and know that he ever has an enemy to tempt him and lead him astray, and that through his power our friends are torn from our grasp; oh! then, what a sweet assurance is this, that, ere long, Satan will lose his power, and He will come whose right it is to reign, when pain and sorrow, sickness and death, will forever be banished from the earth.
What a blessed thought to cheer the lonely pilgrim on his way, that Christ is coming again, he who died to redeem fallen man from death, to have power over the grave, and reign a victorious conqueror forevermore. Is it not enough to inspire courage in every heart, to realize that He who suffered an ignominious death upon the cross, is coming again to receive the jewels he has bought with his own precious blood?

MARY F. WELCH

Battle Creek.