Reviewing the Way the Lord Has Led
Bro. J. Y. Wilcox writes from Cromwell, Ct., May, 1860: “It is some eleven years this month since I embraced the truth of the Bible Sabbath, and nearly as long have been a constant reader of the Review. The first issue, under the title of “Present Truth,” was dated at Middletown, Ct., July, 1849, a file of which I have carefully preserved since that date, and consequently have enjoyed a favorable opportunity to watch the rise and progress of the truth to the present time; and it is with feelings of mingled sorrow and joy that I review our past experience. I have never seen the time even in the darkest hour that I felt to regret having enlisted in the precious cause. I have only to regret my unfaithfulness. I have sometimes in sad and lonely hours for the encouragement of faith and hope, looked back and reviewed the way the Lord has been leading his people; and, contrasting the past with the present, I would get out my papers and lay them side by side. Those who have a copy of the little paper in its first appearance, compared with the present size and prospects, will best judge of the feelings of the heart as faith becomes more fixed and firm. I rejoice that I still live. I rejoice for past and present experience, for the success of the message, and for the settled confidence I have in its final triumph. My greatest fears are of the fatal result of a surface work. I dread that which lacks heart. O, brethren, let us be in earnest. Soon, very soon, our cases will pass in order before the piercing eye of the Judge of quick and dead, our doom will be fixed, and we receive a just reward.”