Holding Fast to the Truth
By S. Howard, Jr.
Bro. Smith: I have long felt a desire to communicate a few words to the dear saints scattered abroad, to let them know that I am still trying to hold on to the truth by keeping the Commandments of God and the Faith of Jesus. It is now one year and eight months since Bro. Cornell came here and preached to us the Third Angel's Message. I do rejoice that I ever heard it, and was willing to keep God's holy Sabbath. I can truly call it a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable. I can say with David, "Thy word is true from the beginning, and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth forever." Ps. cxix, 160. I believe that this is the last message to fallen man, and soon our probation will be closed up. Christ will have finished his work in the Sanctuary, and then every case will be decided; and by the grace of God I am determined to confess all my sins in this day of atonement that they may go beforehand to judgment, that Christ may confess my name before the Father, and my sins be blotted out of the book of God's remembrance, and my name retained in the book of life so that I may receive the seal of the living God and be enabled to pass down through the time of trouble; and when Christ is seen on the white cloud with all the angels of glory to convey the waiting saints home to the city of the living God, that I shall be enabled to say in the language of inspiration, "Lo, this is our God, we have waited for him." Yours in hope of immortality. Monterey, Mich., Sept. 20th, 1857.