The Closing Message by N. G. Sanders

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 18, 1875

The Closing Message.

By N. G. Sanders

In Rev. 18:1, an angel is seen to come down from Heaven having great power; and the earth is lightened with his glory. This we understand is symbolic of the power and glory which is to attend the closing work of the third angel's message.

But think of it! The earth is lightened by the sun. Now suppose the third angel's message to lighten the earth, not a part, but the whole earth, as the sun now lightens it, only substituting gospel light for sun light. Truly this message must forget its feebleness, and become a mighty power.

We have looked for a general interest to be awakened here which should spread to other lands, but God has gone ahead of his appointed agents, and has dropped here and there in distant countries rays of light which are being reflected back on our own land and people, thus reproving the lack of faith, zeal, and energy, in his chosen people, and beckoning them on to fill his opening providence.

We hail with joy every sign of advancement, every token that God's hand is in this work in laying plans and putting them into execution. These plans are partially, and but partially as yet, commensurate with the great work yet to be accomplished by the third angel. We rejoice in the evidences that the message is rising, that from comparative obscurity our work and influence are to become all-pervading.

But are we individually prepared to stand the testing rays of such clear light? Why, yes, responds every lover of the truth; we long for it, we pray for it. But remember, my brother, my sister, my own heart, remember, that the same light that lightens the world and gives your cherished faith the publicity and influence which you covet for it, will reveal to angels and men the deformities of personal character; and shall we, after having loved and labored for the truth, be set aside by its clear light as work not brought to perfection, and so be cast away, and miss the reward which is to be given the overcomer when there is a mighty shout of victory over the beast and his image? Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.

But while we rejoice that the message is rising, we remember that another and a mighty work is also progressing in every nook and corner of our earth. Darkness, made more dense by the power of evil angels, is binding in chains of delusion the unsuspecting masses, and agents are not wanting, bold, zealous, and persevering agents, who laud this darkness as the clearest possible light, and are pressing its claims as such wherever an ear can be found to hear.

And others there are—God pity them, and open the eyes of the professed church that they may not act over again the work of the people who have in past ages been highly favored of God, and become blind leaders of the blind. Oh! that they could see that sanctification without the truth is a spurious work, calculated to deceive but not to save. Oh! that they would read the history of the past conflicts of Christianity with the errors of the corresponding times and learn lessons for their own times. Oh! that they would stop and consider that we must be somewhere, somehow, connected with God's plan that reaches from creation to the consummation of the gospel, and laying aside prejudice, would search his word and see where their work is foretold, its nature, extent, and end—see, too, where abides the ark of God—see where lies the truth in the controversies of their own day.

They laud past reformers. They thank God and Luther too for the light that broke the strong power of the papal dominion and gave us back the free word of God, a free conscience, and to our land a free government. But will they prove themselves worthy of such noble predecessors, or will they stand at last with the church of which it will be said, “In her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.”

But whether they will consider it or not, we are somewhere in the great stream of time that is spanned by the prophetic word, and whether we consider or not, in the end the truth will find us all out; and how should this consideration help to chasten our hearts and steady our nerves as we are going over a road we can never retrace, and yet the choice of which will decide our destinies.

Wisconsin. N. G. Sanders.