As HAS been stated, the preaching of the "hour of God's judgment come," and the second coming of Christ, by Mr. Miller and others during the few years prior to 1844, was attended by the manifest presence and power of the Spirit of God. The work was not confined to any denomination, but those who loved the appearing of their Lord and rejoiced in the glad tidings, without respect to name or belief in other points, joined in the work. Many did so in the true spirit of the message, while more did so, as was evident later when the disappointment came, through fear that what they were accepting might be true, but who at heart were false and hoped that it would prove a mistake.
When the time passed and Christ did not come as expected, the latter class turned against the former, repudiated entirely the positions which had been taken, and became most bitter in their sarcasm and ridicule, thus rejecting the message of love and mercy which God had sent to prepare a people for the coming of the Saviour. The few who had sincerely accepted the message in the love of it, though sorely disappointed in not realizing their hopes, set about more thorough examination of the prophecies, and the conclusions which they had before reached. They soon saw, as already stated, that their mistake was not in the reckoning of the prophetic periods and their consequent termination in 1844, but in the nature of the event which was to take place at that time. Going over and over again the prophetic declarations, and comparing them most carefully with chronological dates and historical facts, they were unable to detect any error in their application, yet Christ had not come, and evidently there was some mistake.
The prophecy said, "Unto two thousand and three hundred days then shall the sanctuary be cleansed." The days certainly ended in 1844, and they could not escape the conclusion. But they had assumed, without Scripture evidence, that the earth was the sanctuary, and therefore erroneously concluded that its cleansing would be by fire at Christ's coming. They were now led to examine more closely the question of the sanctuary itself, and, as they did so, they saw that a work of preparation was yet to be accomplished in the earth in order to fit a people for the coming of Christ, and that the cleansing of the sanctuary was the closing work of Christ's ministration in the sanctuary in heaven—a work of investigative judgment—preparatory to his coming to earth to raise the dead and change the living saints.
As they studied this sanctuary question, they recognized the fact that the whole sanctuary ministration centered in the law of God, the ten commandments, contained in the ark, which was in the most holy place of the sanctuary. They saw that the ministration of Christ as our high priest in the heavenly sanctuary was a reality—the reality, in fact, of which the ministration of the priests in the earthly sanctuary which Moses pitched was but a type or shadow. They began to understand Paul's language to the Hebrews where he says: "Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the majesty in the heavens; a minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man." Heb. 8:1, 2. (Read chapters 7, 8, 9, and 10.)
Another remarkable prophetic statement attracted their notice at this time, and directed their attention especially to the law of God, and its binding claims upon all men, as in this judgment work that law was evidently to be the rule of judgment.
"I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven." "And there followed another angel. . . . And the third angel followed them." Rev. 14:6, 8, 9.
NOTES UPON THE ILLUSTRATION.
1. THE first message begins previous to 1844, announcing the hour of judgment, but continues to the coming of Christ, proclaiming the gospel and the worship of the true God (the commandments) as the basis of the following messages. 2. Simultaneously with the opening of the first message, and as a special feature of its introduction, it is joined by the message of the angel of chapter 10, which continues to 1844 and ceases. 3. Subsequent to 1844 the truths of the first message became more fully understood and preached, though generally rejected, and as a consequence it is joined by the second message, proclaiming the fall of Babylon, which also continues to the end. 4. Later the two are joined by the third, warning against the worship of "the beast" and his image and the reception of his mark, and also continues to the end. 5. Just before the end of gospel work the three are joined by the message of chapter 18, announcing the complete fall of Babylon, and calling upon God's people to come out of her because of her sins. This in effect produces a loud, earnest, and extended giving of all three messages combined, resulting in the lighting of the earth with all truth, and the development of a company keeping all the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, and fully prepared to meet Christ when he appears in the clouds of heaven.
"And the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear thy name, small and great; and shouldest destroy them that destroy the earth. And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament." Rev. 11:18, 19.
This direct linking together of the "temple" (the sanctuary), the "ark," and the "testament" (the law) with the judgment of the dead, in connection with the application of the prophetic periods, and the giving of the message which they had so zealously proclaimed,—"the hour of God's judgment is come,"—threw great light upon the messages of Revelation 14, and led them to consider more fully than they had done especially the second and third.
As soon as the time passed and the fears of the false hearted were allayed, a marked spiritual declension was everywhere noticeable, evidently resulting from the rejection and utter disregard, by the majority of professed Christians, of the message of mercy which had, though only in part, so graciously been given. They now saw the application of the second message: "Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication," viz., the fallen spiritual condition of the professed religious world, as indicated by the almost universal tendency on the part of nearly all classes of religionists to engage with renewed zest in every kind of worldly business and pleasure. This tendency has increased until at the present time it is impossible to distinguish the ordinary professor of religion, either in language, dress, or deportment, from the ordinary worldling. False doctrines, too, received though unwittingly from the Church of Rome, existed in the various denominations, presenting to the world, instead of the gospel of Christ, which Paul says is "yea" and "amen," an endless mass of confused and contradictory theories, fully expressed by "yea" and "nay," and symbolized by the term used in the message itself, Babylon, which literally means confusion.
This condition of worldliness and doctrinal confusion in which the professed followers of Christ were found, needed correcting before Christ should return for his church; for he prayed before he went away that "they all may be one," even as he and his Father are; and when he returns, he will surely find his true followers as perfectly united as those whom he left. For this very purpose he placed the gifts of the Spirit in the church: "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ; till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." Eph. 4:11-13.
So, while it is a fact that, through the working of the "mystery of iniquity," as Paul calls it (2 Thess. 2:7), or "Mystery, Babylon the great, the mother of harlots," as John calls it (Rev. 17:5), worldliness, and confusion of faith and practice corrupted the great bodies of believers in Christ to that extent that they are presented prophetically under the symbol of Babylon, yet the Lord in infinite mercy sends messages of truth calculated to help this condition and remedy the evil. This is the design of the first message, embracing as4it does the pure gospel and the worship of the true God. But as the individual rejection of light and truth always hardens the heart, and produces coldness and formality, so the general rejection of the truths of this message produced a corresponding moral decline or fall in the religious bodies of the land. Formality in a great measure took the place of true piety, and this condition has steadily grown worse, until we see Paul's picture of the last days filled out in every detail, where he speaks of a "form of godliness" being prevalent, but without the "power" of it being manifest. (Read 2 Tim. 3:1-5.)
This being the case, those who shortly after 1844 comprehended the work which was still to be done for the world, continued to present the truths of the first message, so far as they understood them, proclaiming with voice and pen and press that truly the hour of God's judgment was come—that the investigative judgment preparatory to the coming of Christ was actually taking place in heaven, and that the present generation would not pass until Christ would come personally, just as they had looked for him to come. They, however, now saw plainly from Christ's own words, as recorded in Matt. 24:36, "But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only," that the definite time for his coming could never be preached scripturally. The preaching of time, however, as they had done had been permitted by God for a purpose. The time itself was correct, and the mistake connected with it served to separate the false from the true, and test most severely the faith of the few who really loved God's word and truth more than all else.
Since that time, although some, claiming to be Adventists, have set various dates for Christ's coming, none who have been proclaiming these messages to the world have done so; but they have simply presented the subject in the light of Christ's own words: "So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled." Matt. 24:33, 34.
Since the force and application of the second message were understood, the increasing evidences of moral and religious degeneracy in the popular churches of this land, and in all the world, have called for the continuous sounding of the warning it contains, in addition to the simple, plain, and powerful truths embraced in the first. Truly "Babylon is fallen." Space need not be occupied with an enumeration of facts exhibiting the utter disregard of the pure principles of the gospel of Christ, the almost universal adoption of a worldly policy, of worldly principles and worldly practices, in the so-called orthodox churches of to-day. Suffice it to say that, in the light of the Scriptures, any church, of whatever name or belief, which holds unscriptural doctrines received from the Church of Rome, or partakes of the worldly spirit and policy of that church, is in just the proportion to which it does this a part of "Babylon," and its members should give heed to the message which is now sounding, "Babylon is fallen," and thus be prepared to heed the voice which will soon be heard from heaven saying, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues."
