Seek Meekness and Righteousness
By Sarah Jones
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS : My heart has been made to rejoice by reading the cheering resolutions and admonitions in the Review. I am still striving with you to be an overcomer of surrounding evil, and become an heir to eternal salvation. We are truly living in perilous times, and nothing but a well founded hope and faith in God will enable his children to come off victorious. It is with shame and deep contrition of heart that we confess our backsliding from the Saviour, but we do thank his great name that we yet have hope in his mercy. And what a great work is yet to be done before we shall be ready to meet our coming Lord. It is high time for us to earnestly seek the needful preparation by constantly humbling ourselves, and bowing more meekly beneath the mighty hand of God, that his merciful garb of righteousness may hide us from wrath and fierce anger in the last great day. Dear brethren and sisters, we are living in that all-important time when the holy message calls us to be "zealous and repent," and will we speedily obey its summons, or shall the Lord of hosts raise up others to take the celestial crowns? Let us refer to the testimony given in Rev. iii, 16. Are not our cases hanging in suspense here in this day of atonement? I fear if we do not move soon it will be too late, and the Lord will fill our places with others. Oh, let us seek meekness and righteousness that we may be hid in the day of the Lord's anger. We want more of the fear of God, the love of his truth, and a vivid sense of the scene before us, to rise above the attractions of earth. While we are the antitype of ancient Israel, should we not do well to remember and lay to heart what God did with them? The light given them was little compared with the light we have in these days. What a fearful time is this we occupy? Oh, what an unwillingness to yield our wills and become what the Lord wants us to be. My prayer is that he will help us to search ourselves daily and not let the straitness of the way slip from our minds. When I reflect upon the goodness of God to me, one so unworthy, and think of the precious truths his Spirit has unfolded to my mind, I strive to incline my heart more fully to his ways, and inquire if my name is engraved with the righteous, whether I shall be permitted to stand on mount Zion with the little flock of the redeemed, which by the help of him in whom the holy prophets trusted have come up to sing everlasting praises. Yes I mean to overcome; and I pray the Lord to give me strength by the aid of a diligent heart and contrite spirit, that I may hold fast and at the end receive the blessed reward of the faithful. Your sister in the Lord, SARAH JONES. Hillsdale, Mich., Dec. 2nd, 1858.