Here Am I; Send Me by Emma Hildreth Adams

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Apr 11, 1911

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 38, No. 15.

“Here Am I; Send Me”

By Emma Hildreth Adams

USUALLY, if not always, in periods of impending peril to communities or nations, there has stood out from the front ranks of the people some one man, fearless, faithful, unbribable, having foresight to discern in the distance the inevitable consequences of vicious national or party policy and conduct; and who has been steadfast in heralding the danger, the hazard in such threatening contingencies.

Such a man was Isaiah (Esaias) during the historically great harvest-yielding reigns of four of the most powerful kings of Judah — Uzziah, called Azariah in 2 Kings 15:1; Jotham; Ahaz, the astounding apostate; and devout, valiant, loyal Hezekiah, son of Ahaz.

These four reigns embrace a period of one hundred thirteen years. Of these years Uzziah occupied the throne during fifty-two. Through forty-five of them he prospered mightily, under the guiding influence of the prophet Zechariah. Then, “when he became strong,” like Solomon before him, “his heart was lifted up” with confidence in his own might and power; and one day he attempted to usurp the office and prerogative of the priests, and defiantly essayed to offer incense upon the altar in the temple.

Instantly he was smitten with leprosy in his forehead, and was compelled to pass the seven final years of his life in a “house apart,” “cut off from the house of the Lord,” with Jotham ruling in his stead. 2 Chron. 26:16-21.

The office and eminent services of the prophet Isaiah began toward the close of Uzziah’s reign, for he tells us (Isa. 6:1) that “in the year that King Uzziah died,” he had, in a remarkable vision, the peculiar experience during which were uttered the clarion words heading this article, “Here am I; send me.”

But not until Isaiah had undergone a most singular and fundamental preparation for his awaiting commission could he exclaim vehemently, gladly, eagerly, “Here am I; send me.”

It required FIRE from off the temple altar, that glowing coal of divine grace, to cleanse the soul and efface all stain of world life; to infuse into his lips the force, the efficacy, the independence necessary for the charge which was to be laid upon him, with which he was to be entrusted. It needed the glow incited by the Spirit of God to irradiate his sin-clouded mind, the ardor inspired by the voice of Jehovah to animate his total being, that he might approach his task free, clean, adequate; might announce with no restraint, “Here am I; send me.”

But God does not ask all His willing servants to bear adverse messages to headstrong, rebellious nations; to carry stinging admonitions to false worshipers; to accept startling commissions to His apostatized children; to utter dire prophecies against insolent representatives of His government, His character, His purposes touching the earth and its races; tho under any of these conditions one might joyfully respond, whenever, wherever ring out the inspiring questions, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”—“Here am I; send me.”

The divine Father controls other and widely different occasions for saying to those who love Him, as He did to Isaiah, “Who will go for us?” Daily to thousands of devoted followers, spring opportunities — sometimes minute, sometimes important, sometimes tremendously urgent — for speeding back to Him, by mental or spiritual wireless, “Here am I; send ME.”

Now the occasion requires but a kindly smile and a moment of time for some sad-hearted fellow voyager; now but a quick grasp of the hand and a tender word for one tortured with pain; now but a few sentences of sane advice to one impeded by doubt, hesitating as to choice of paths, and craving counsel; now but a quick, keen, pungent warning to him who stands at the threshold of misdemeanor or of crime; now but a shelter for a night for one who has not where to lay his head. To all such may the coal-purified, the glow-infused servant entreat the listening Master, “Here am I; send ME.”

Yet further: In the dark quarters of cities, where gloomy homes crowd like thickets of the tropical wood; where total lives of men and women are scant, bare, wasting away; where the world, here and now, alone appeals to them; where opportunity to step outward and upward holds back, keeps out of sight; and, saddest of all, where the life-giving rays of the Gospel of the Son of Man flash in only now and then, — are the depths, rayless and cold, into which the Spirit-equipped herald may beseech, “Here am I; send me.”

Further: Day by day, in these final, speeding hours of this dispensation, when the flinty purpose of a powerful tithe of mankind is solely to mountainize wealth; to acquire power over armies of their fellows; to enlarge the cost of their food, apparel, implements, pleasures; to lessen their personal comforts; to curtail their freedom; to dwarf their civic rights; to acquire dominion over wide areas of God’s acres and their munificent products; when protest against such sweeping absorption is just, is due; when defense of man’s inherent right to think and believe as seems to him best, is imperative, — then may men who possess safe influence, sound views, controlled sentiments, step forth and plead with Him in whose hand is the destiny of all mankind, “Here am I; send me to the field of need.”