TABLE ROCK | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 7, 1877

TABLE ROCK.

It is said that a few years ago a lady and gentleman were standing on Table Rock—that huge broad shelf on the Canada side of Niagara Falls. As they looked out upon the awful depth before them, they felt their nature thrilled in every fibre by the deafening roar which came up from the wild rush of the waters below. They looked down, and saw that the tooth of the angry stream had been gnawing out a vast hollow beneath them, and felt certain that ere long that delicately poised rock must inevitably fall into the boiling abyss.

Stirred by such thoughts they quickly hurried away from so dangerous a position. But they had not proceeded two minutes on their way before a deafening report, like the thunder of an earthquake shock, burst upon them with a long, loud roar, while the ground trembled beneath their feet.

Table Rock had fallen! two minutes, two short, fleeting minutes only, intervened between them and a grave beneath the roaring billows of that mighty, rushing river.

For ages the rock had stood, and men had visited it in safety, and presumption might still have said, It will not fall to-day. But it fell! There came a last day, a last hour, a last moment, and then a crash,—and those two persons were scarcely saved.

So on the toppling verge of human life stand countless mortals to-day, unconscious of their danger, and striving even to stifle their fears. But the crash will come at last. In due time their feet shall slide. Suddenly shall their calamity overtake them, for there is but a step between them and death.

So also a wicked world mocks and dances on the borders of eternity. The Judge standeth before the door. The day of the Lord is near and hasteth greatly, and while men are careless, thoughtless, and asleep, the Judge of quick and dead will come. “Of that day and hour knoweth no man.” Yet we know that it must come sometime; and it may come very soon. Are you ready? or are you standing on “Table Rock,” doomed to fall when the catastrophe shall come? Is there any time to waste? “Behold, now is the accepted time!”—Messiah's Herald.