An Appeal to the Unconverted and Backsliders by Dudley Marvin Canright

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 24, 1876

An Appeal to the Unconverted and Backsliders.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

BY ELD. D. M. CANRIGHT.

TEXT: “Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” 2 Cor. 6:2.

Dear Reader: I want to ask you a few solemn questions. I want them to go home to your own heart. Are you a Christian? Have you made your peace with God? Have you put away all your sins? and are you doing the will of Christ? If you should die to-day, are you ready? or are you living on from day to day without God, without Christ, and without hope in the world? Are you unprepared for the solemn Judgment? Have you once known the Lord and then turned away from him? If this is your condition, I want to make one solemn appeal to you, and I hope you will consider it earnestly and carefully. Do not hear it carelessly, nor pass it by lightly. It is for your own benefit that I make these remarks. I have many good and overwhelming reasons why you should turn square about this very day, and prepare for eternity. Shall I name some of these reasons? and will you think of them?

Your life on earth will be but very short at the longest. The allotted age of man is seventy years; but very few, comparatively, reach even this age. More than one-half die under thirty years of age. But granting that you may live to the allotted age of man, it will be but a moment as it were; it will very soon be past. James says, “For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” James 4:14. You arise in the morning and behold the dew on the grass; you return to your breakfast and again go out to your work—the dew is gone, the grass is dry. Just so is man; to-day he is here; to-morrow he is gone forever. And Peter says all flesh is as the grass, and as the blade of grass. In the spring see that grass. How beautiful it looks! how full of life! It appears as though it might live forever; but look on that field again in August. The grass is yellow and dead. Its life is ended. Just so with you. You may be enjoying the strength of youth or of manhood now, but very soon all this will end. Look at the flower; see that rose. Oh, how fresh! how beautiful! It looks as if it never would die. But, alas! look on it again in a day or two. It is faded and withered, and its leaves are falling: its race is ended. All these are fit emblems of the fleeting life which you are now living on earth.

Could we live a thousand years, such a life would seem very, very long; but yet even then an end would come. The fifth chapter of Genesis is a sad commentary upon the history of man. Although those old patriarchs lived from six hundred to nine hundred years, yet the record of each one ends in this short sentence, “And he died.” How solemn those few words, “And he died.” So has closed the record of all the millions that have lived upon our earth.

Two thousand years ago, Xerxes, a great Persian king, assembled the largest army the world ever saw—about five million men. They were gathered at the foot of the mountain. He ascended the height above, that he might have a view of them all. As he beheld that vast multitude,—soldiers in uniform, captains, generals, and great warriors, their glittering spears, their shining armor, their fierce array, and felt that he was the ruler of them all, that his word could move that mighty host hither and thither, his heart was filled with pride. But soon a change came over him. His countenance fell, and he began to weep. His friends asked him why he wept. He replied that he was meditating as to where all this vast host would be in one hundred years—dead, all dead, still and silent in the dust, and himself lying with them! This was a true thought. How many ages have rolled by since that time, and those soldiers have all been slumbering with the dead. So it will soon be with us. To-day, like the generation before us, we are alive, full of the ambitions and the passions and the business of life. But in a short time this will all be over with us, and our generation, our race, will be ended. Go back three hundred years, and Luther was alive. He was surrounded by a generation of living men in every age and condition of life. He appealed to them solemnly, earnestly, to give their hearts to God and prepare for the Judgment. But most of them were too busy or too careless to heed his warnings. But, dear reader, where are they now? Luther is dead, they are all dead,—men, women, and little children.

The other day I saw a copy of the Boston Gazette, published in 1772. That was more than one hundred years ago. The articles in that paper were written by the hands of living men. The type was set by the fingers of living persons. Those sheets were handled by living beings, and those words were read by eyes of the living. But though that frail sheet of paper still survives, not one of that then living host is alive now—not one. Is it so, reader, that you and I are not as enduring as the paper in your hands? Think of it, this paper on which I am writing, this paper which you are reading, as frail as it is, is more enduring than we ourselves. It can be preserved ages on ages, but we must soon turn to corruption; and this is true of you. Your father is dead, your mother is dead, your uncles and aunts are dead, your brothers and sisters are dead, perhaps your children are dead; many of your neighbors are dead, have died by your side. You are like them; your race must also soon end. My brother, my sister, what are you doing? How are you spending these fleeting moments? Are you improving them as you should? Are you preparing for eternity, for the Judgment, for the dread hereafter? You have no time to spare. You should be up and about the work now. My text truly says, “Behold, now is the day of salvation; behold, now is the accepted time.” To-morrow may be too late. You have no assurance of it.

Death with you is absolutely certain. Whether you live till Jesus comes or die before, your probation will close in either case. God has said, “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the Judgment.” Heb. 9:27. What a solemn fiat concerning us! “It is appointed.” God has appointed, hence there is no evading it. Appointed unto us to die. Then the very next thing in the future will be the Judgment. There is no evading it, there is no getting around it. Again the Lord says, “There is no man that hath power over the spirit to retain the spirit; neither hath he power in the day of death; and there is no discharge in that war.” How true this statement is, “There is no discharge in that war.” We must all be brought face to face with the Judgment. If there is war and a man is drafted, he may pay a ransom for himself, or he may hire a substitute to take his place. He may run away and evade the officers, or he may get discharged. There are a thousand ways to get out of the war.

But, says the word of God, speaking of death, “There is no discharge in that war.” You may be beautiful in form and features, but that will not save you; you may be young, but that will not save you; you may have the strength of Samson, but yet you must die; you may have the wisdom of Solomon, but this will not save you. You may have the riches of a kingdom, but you cannot buy off. No man can die for you, your friends around you cannot save you. To death and the Judgment, you must come. Every time the sun sets it is bringing that dread hour one day nearer. Every beat of the pulse numbers one less moment for you to live. You know that this is so,—you will not deny it. You who now are alive reading this paper, listening to these words—you will one day realize in your own person just what we are to-day saying. My friend, are you prepared to face the Judgment? If you are not, let me earnestly appeal to you to stop now in your foolish career; turn right about; begin this moment; set your house in order; prepare to meet your God.

A few weeks ago, after an absence of thirteen years, I returned to my old home, where I was born and where I lived till I was twenty-one. I went back to the old farm. Every hill and hollow was familiar to me; every tree and rock, every mark, reminded me of some scene in the past. When I was there the last time my father was alive. With him I had been over every rod of ground on that farm many times. Together we had talked, and worked, and hoped, but where is he now? I went to the graveyard; there was a new-made grave. My father was dead and lying there. Then I inquired for the old neighbors. Our neighbor on the right hand was dead. Our nearest neighbor on the other side was dead, and so there was scarcely a family but had lost one or more since I was there. A large number of my schoolmates, young men and women of my age, with whom I had associated in parties, in pleasure, and in the church, with whom I had studied, side by side, in classes so many times,—many of these were now silent in death. I was so sadly reminded of the vanity of all earthly things that I did not wish to return again. But what is now true of them will soon be true of us all. Then how important that we prepare for this solemn event.

Death often comes very suddenly, when least expected. David expressed this truth pathetically when he said to Jonathan, “As thy soul liveth, there is but a step between me and death.” It is like stepping, or walking, in the dark. One does not know but the next step he takes will precipitate him headlong into the jaws of death. Death is all around us, everywhere and constantly. It is in the air we breathe, in the water we drink, in the food we eat. When we think we are the most secure, we are perhaps in the greatest danger. When we are dreaming of a long life, our last hour may have come. What slight accidents, seemingly, often prove our death. A man walks out of his house, and is brought back a lifeless corpse. We get into a wagon, and meet death. We go to our work, and death is there. We take the cars or the boat, and suddenly death is on every hand.

How many illustrations we have all seen of this. It is not simply the old that die suddenly. It is not the feeble, but it is more frequently the young, the strong and the careless, those who are least expecting it. Just the other day, where we were stopping, there was a young couple just married. They ate their dinner together, and parted with laughter and jesting. The young husband went to his work at the mill. Before night the boiler exploded and he was thrown fifty feet into the air, and came down a lifeless mass of flesh. How little did they dream that that was his last day, his last meal, his last parting with his wife. But just so death is going here and there, taking his victims from our midst every day. We flatter ourselves that we shall escape, but so do all.

I was once preaching in the evening in a crowded hall, when a young man came and sat by my side. I knelt down and prayed by his side, and we sang together out of the same book. We talked together after meeting, but that night at one o’clock he died, without one minute’s warning. So it is everywhere we go. Dear reader, if it shall be your lot to be called thus suddenly, are you prepared? Are you willing to go up to the bar of God and risk the issues of the Judgment just as you are this minute? If you are not, then let me admonish you to get ready immediately.

Your destiny through an endless eternity hangs upon the actions of this short life which may terminate in a moment. This is a fearful thought. ETERNITY! who has weighed the meaning of that awful word? ETERNITY! who can measure it? Did you ever stop to carefully consider what this means, and where it will end? It would be well for you to try to grasp this idea as far as you can. Think of one thousand years in the future. That is a great while. Then go beyond this and try to conceive of one hundred thousand years. Oh! how long a time that is, but that is not eternity. Stretch your imagination a little further and think of one hundred million years. Lay this paper down and see if you can comprehend the thought. One hundred million years! but that is not a moment compared to eternity. To eternity there is no end at all. It is on, and on, and still on. Let your mind penetrate into the future, just as far as you possibly can, and still that is not eternity.

Let us illustrate: Suppose that God should grant to you to live in Heaven just as many years as there are particles of dust in all this big earth of ours? This would seem to be almost an endless life. Yet if the Lord should take away from our earth one grain of sand this year, and one next, and so on, each year taking one, the time would come when this mighty earth would all be exhausted, and then you would have to die. This would not be eternity. The man who had secured eternal life would still have just as long to live as before. And then when we consider that that life is to be free from all pain and sorrow, is to be perfect happiness, who can comprehend what a wonderful treasure eternal life is? My brother, how can you be so foolish as to peril this boon and lose it, for the vanities of this world, the uncertain pleasures of sin? And yet you are risking all this, day after day and year after year. As an ambassador of Christ, I earnestly beseech you to awake to your awful danger while there is time. If you do not

wake up now, you will when it is too late. May God bless these words to the awakening of your conscience.

Some will make their bed in hell. This may be an unpleasant picture to dwell upon, yet we may better dwell upon it now than to dwell in the unquenchable fire hereafter. Not every one will be saved, some one will be damned. The word of God is very plain upon this point. God does not warn men of things which will never happen, and yet you know that the Bible paints everywhere, in most terrible threatenings, an awful punishment hereafter.

While we do not believe this punishment will be eternal torment, yet we must believe that it will be a real, tangible punishment, a real lake of fire in which the wicked will suffer severe and continued pains, and, finally, extinction. Paul says, “Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men.” 2 Cor. 5:11. Yes, God has terror in store for the wicked. Once more we read: “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second death.” Rev. 21:8. Reader, this will prove to be no idle fancy. It will be literally true. The blessed Jesus once said: “Then shall He say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” Matt. 25:41. Again he says, “As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.” Matt. 13:40–42.

When such a person as the tender-hearted Prince of Peace warns us of such a terrible thing as this, we must know that something awful is meant. Somebody will feel in his own person the punishment here threatened. Somebody will be damned; somebody will go into the lake of fire. We may talk of this now very coolly. We may philosophize and speculate about it; we may jest about it, and put it off as a thing of the imagination. But some day it will come as a dread reality; then it will rise up before us in all its terror, as we see no way to escape, see that it has really come, feel its consuming flame kindle around us and know that we ourselves must enter that burning lake. Oh! the terror that will seize the lost soul!

Reader, you are in danger of that lake yourself. If you are unreconciled to God, if you are unpardoned, if your name is not in the book of life, if you are not God’s child, to-morrow your doom may be sealed, and your portion forever settled. Will you brave it out to the bitter end? Will you risk the wrath of Heaven? Will you despise the warnings of the book of God? Will you turn a deaf ear to all the entreaties of your friends? Will you stifle the convictions of your own conscience? Will you go against the dictates of your best judgment? Will you grieve away the Spirit of God? Oh! will you trifle away the day of your probation, with such terrible, terrible consequences before you?

My brother, I lay my hand upon your arm, and I beseech you to stop; if you do not, these warnings will rise up and meet you in the Judgment. I invite you to carefully consider these solemn words of the Lord: “Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at naught all my counsel, and would none of my reproof; I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh; when your fear cometh as a desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me; for that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord. They would none of my counsel; they despised all my reproof.” Prov. 1:24–30.

(Concluded next week.)