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Journey to the West

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Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 30, 1857

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 10, No. 13.

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Journey to the West

By A. S. Hutchins

From Bro. Hutchins.

BRO. SMITH: Through the preserving mercy of God, Bro. Sperry and myself with our wives, have just reached this place. We left Vt., with our teams, on the 6th inst., and drove to Ogdensburgh, N. Y., where we took the steamboat on the 13th, for Lewiston, which place we reached on the 14th, at 10 A. M. From here we drove to Buffalo, where we took passage in the evening, on board of the boat Plymouth Rock, for Detroit, at which place we found ourselves safely landed at 3 P. M. the following day.
Sabbath, the 11th, we spent with the church at Buck's Bridge, N. Y., and the 18th at Jackson, Mich., at which places we presented the truth to comfort and encourage the brethren and sisters, as far as we had strength.
We would be grateful to God for the mercies and blessings given to us on our prosperous journey to this place.
The urgent request of the brethren in Mass., that Bro. S. and myself should spend the season with them in their Tent enterprise, was at first quite an objection in my mind to coming West. Again, my health had failed much within a few months, which, together with the ill health of my companion seemed to forbid the idea of coming so far with the prospect of accomplishing so little as we could. But when Bro. and Sr. White were with us we prayed earnestly for light in regard to duty, and believed that the Spirit of God would lead us. The light seemed to blaze in our pathway toward the West, and thus far we all feel that we have moved in the right direction. The church in the East bade us God speed.
The rush to the West within a few years to make money, get rich, and live easier, has been great. But the Lord grant that those who are "looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God," may have a higher motive in view than these. I am sure that those of us who have just left our homes and friends in the East have not done it for objects like these; though if it should please the Lord, we should each be thankful to bear less burdens for those professing a love for the truth, and find less church trials, and hear less complaining of the roughness of the way, &c., and find the church more awake to the time in which we live, and hear more about the gold, the white raiment, and the eye-salve.
Brethren, pray for us, ever bearing in mind that Paul may plant, and Apollos water, but God must give the increase.
"So then neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase."
A. S. HUTCHINS. Battle Creek, Mich., July 22d, 1857.
P. S. Bro. and Sr. Phillips arrived here some days before we did. A. S. H.