A Word to Those to Whom the Review Is Sent on Trial.
By C. R. Austin
To your hand and homes comes this weekly paper, not merely as a social friend to enjoy a pleasant chat and pass a leisure hour, but it comes on a special mission to invite your candid attention to a God-given message for this generation; yes, this very one which stands on an eminence far above any that have preceded us for many long centuries. Copies of the Bible, which were so scarce in the last century, are now so multiplied that one is to be found in the hand of almost every person throughout Christendom. And with the scattering broadcast of the word of God have come showers of light from the sanctuary in Heaven, revealing through the sure word of prophecy, by evidences unmistakable, the fulfillment of many signs that were to herald the coming of the Son of man as King of kings and Lord of lords.23 These signs given by God himself stand forth before the face of those now living and say with thunder tones, “The time is fulfilled, the hour of his Judgment is come.” While these notes are still ringing through the air, an angel clothed in mercy is hovering over the people, arresting their attention, holding up the Sabbath of the Lord, raising it out of the mire of tradition, earnestly pleading with them to take their feet off from it, and join in repairing the breach made in God’s holy and perfect law by the man of sin. Will you open your eyes and carefully watch events as they pass before you? Will you listen to the voice of the prophets? If you do, may God give you an understanding heart and convert you, prepare you for the solemn scenes just before us, and to stand before the Son of man. Perhaps you will say, I am already converted. No doubt most of you can point to some definite time in your past experience and say, There is where I made a consecration of myself to God and was converted. Thank God you were enabled to do this; but did that act make you a perfect overcomer, and fit you to stand the searching test of the Judgment? or did it only place your feet in the straight and narrow path where the Christian race must be run? Having our feet placed there, are we to stand still, satisfied with present attainments? or shall we go on step by step, growing in grace and the knowledge of the truth, closely watching for and correcting every defect in our character, also bringing every habit we have by education or adoption to the unerring rule God has given us, and whatever does not harmonize with that, lay aside and follow only that for which we can bring a “thus saith the Lord”? Poor, fallen humanity needs a daily conversion, and almost an hourly turning from some wrong act or thought to the right. It is now, even now, that the meek of the earth have especial need to seek meekness, seek righteousness, that they may be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger. Solemn are the scenes transpiring in the heavenly sanctuary. Short is the time we have to labor for ourselves or souls around us. Great is the responsibility of those who have named the name of Christ to separate themselves and be not conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of their mind, that they may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Fearful will be the fate of that professing Christian who can scarcely be told by word, or act, or dress, from the fashionable, fun-loving, pleasure-seeking world. May the Spirit of the living God so impress the solemnities of the Judgment hour, through which we are rapidly hastening, upon the readers of the Review that every one shall be constrained to turn his feet into the testimonies of the Lord, and so walk therein that in a little time from this, they shall be permitted to stand with the Lamb on Mt. Zion, and be found without fault before the throne of God. C. R. AUSTIN.