p. 69 | Our Precious Hope by E. B. Saunders

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jan 24, 1865

Our Precious Hope.

By E. B. Saunders

How precious is the hope of the Seventh-day Adventists. The hope of eternal life—of life without an end. Just think of it? What mind can grasp the idea! Then too it will be a life without pain or sorrow, sickness or death; with real tangible bodies which will inhabit a real place, a country, with real sunshine, real fruit and vineyards, houses and land, rivers and mountains, light and glory, joy and praise forever.

Then too the hope of seeing Jesus our lovely Redeemer with our own eyes, of worshiping at his feet, and casting our glittering crowns before him, and with our golden harps swelling the rich notes of praise to "Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins, in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God, and his Father; to him be glory and dominion forever and ever, Amen."

Then the comforting hope of seeing our dear Christian friends, who have long since moulded back to dust. How wonderful! How far beyond all human reasoning is this great truth! How grand the thought that the sleeping nations are to awake from their dusty beds, and receive the reward for their deeds; if righteous a joyful welcome home to the city of God; if wicked, to miserably perish in the lake of fire.

Then to see the gigantic persons of the first inhabitants of earth, as they come up in all their majesty and greatness, while the feeble puny race now living, will together with them, be swiftly carried by the living chariots home to Zion, the City of our God. There our crooked, dwarfed forms will straighten and expand, until we obtain that noble stature first given to man.

Then we shall know how to live, how to eat and drink, work and worship, and with our faces full of the sunshine of glory, we shall render unto God an acceptable offering of grateful praise and thanksgiving for our great salvation.

We believe that the realization of these hopes is just at hand. The coming of Jesus marks their commencement. And if such is our hope and desire, why should we not long for the coming of our absent Lord? If then our sorrows end, while before us is an eternity of unspeakable joy, why should we not express our desires to every one that our Lord might speedily return. O how sweet, how glorious, how precious is the advent hope? It is above price. Let us love it, cherish it, and live it, till we are called to realize it in all its glory. E. B. SAUNDERS. Penfield, N. Y.