Mighty in the Lord

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 14, 1875

Mighty in the Lord.

History in all its strata is full of the fossilized and rusty weapons formed against the truth which have not prospered. In the very first stratum, we find the club of Cain, which was raised against the faithful disciple of God's truth, but only scarred the forehead of him who raised it so deeply that centuries have not one whit healed the scar. A little higher, we find the rusty spears and chariots of Egyptians lying with the white bones of the warriors as tiles of the sea floor. They were formed against the truth of God to defy the command, “Let my people go;” and when their bearers found God's people flanked by mountains, confronted by the sea, and followed by their armed hosts, they thought God's truth was surely thrust into the inner prison, and its feet made fast in the stocks; but like an earthquake came the rush of many waters, and “the horse and his rider were drowned in the depths of the sea.” Their weapons only hastened God's people “forward” toward Canaan, and then were wrenched from them by the waves of God's wrath.

As God's truth “was upon Jeremiah,” that he might declare it with his words, so the Spirit of God “was upon Samson,” just as directly, that he might show forth that truth by his deeds. Men tried to fetter it with withes, and he broke them with laughter; with cords, and he snapped them with scorn; with the brazen gates of Gaza, and the gates were borne away upon his shoulders. Haman built a lofty gallows, cruelly perfect, to hang this truth, and found God's power could make the man who thought to handle the rope dangle upon it.

God said to Jeremiah: “I have put my word into thy mouth.” Men said, “We will put you and your message into silence.” But God's power made the prison walls a reflector to send forth his light to the ends of the world, and in that light every tear of the weeping prophet shines like the stars forever and ever.

The scribes and Pharisees had seen Jesus laid in the tomb, but they remembered, even better than his disciples, that he had said he would rise again, and they wished to seal the stone and set a guard about the tomb, and the governor said: “Make it as secure as ye can.” There was a big stone at the door; they added the seal, and stationed the guard; but when they have made it as sure as they can, and have, as it were, cast the truth as it is in Jesus into the inner prison, and made its feet fast in the stocks, suddenly there is a great earthquake, and the sealed stone door is opened, and the bands of death are loosed, and the cry goes forth, “He is risen.”—Sel.