p. 182 | Past Experience by H. G. Buck

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 20, 1873

Past Experience.

By H. G. Buck

Many things in the past I think of with deep regret, and often ask myself the question, Can all my past faults be forgiven, and I finally be saved on Mount Zion? But when I read the notice of the death of Bro. Ezra Odell of Minnesota, my mind was carried back to some of my past experience, which I never can regret. Twenty-seven years ago last July, while in great distress of mind about my duty, I felt a strong impression to leave my work and go to the Odell school-house to start some meetings, and see if I could not settle my mind with regard to future duties.

This school-house was sixteen miles north of Ogdensburgh, on the banks of the St. Lawrence river, in St. Lawrence Co., N. Y. Sister Lydia Mires (now Hilliard) was then living there, and a few other praying ones. After the notice had been given out for a meeting that night, I went into the woods, with a heavy burden on my mind. There I plead with the Lord that, if it was my duty to go and hold a meeting there, he would convert one soul or reclaim one backslider that night. The Spirit of the Lord was present with power at the beginning of the meeting, and when an invitation was given for any one who wanted religion to arise, the first one to comply was Ezra Odell. While the great tears rolled down his face, he said he was a poor backslider and wanted to come back to the Lord again. We continued the meetings three or four weeks, and some forty souls were persuaded to become reconciled to God. Now, Bro. Odell sleeps in Jesus, and I praise the Lord and will try to meet him “over on the other shore.”

H. G. Buck.

Monterey, Mich., 1873.