(Sections from this lecture outline are adapted with permission from Roger W. Coon's lecture outline, EGW and Hermeneutics: Jemison's First Rule, April 5, 1995.  For Further study see also Herbert E. Douglass, Messenger of the Lord, pp. 372-415.)
 

Introduction

• Since we have determined in our prior lecture that we need principles of hermeneutics to study the writings of Ellen G. White, the question we now need to approach is, what hermeneutical principles should we use?

 
• Various people have published hermeneutical principles for the study of Ellen White's writings:
• The Comprehensive Index to the Writings of Ellen G. White in Appendix E (vol. 3, p. 3211-3216) lists some 21 helpful points.
• Robert W. Olson also lists 21 "Guiding Principles in the Interpretation of the Bible and the Writings of Ellen G. White" (see Sourcebook, section D-2).
• George R. Knight in his book, Reading Ellen White: A Study of Interpretive Principles, lists 15 principles.
• Herbert E. Douglass in his Messenger of the Lord: The Prophetic Ministry of Ellen G. White suggest 16 rules of interpretation (pp. 386-407).

 
• We could take these lists and explore the significance of each principle. However, for the purpose of this course, I'd like to dwell upon three broader principles that will give more focus to our study of hermeneutics.

 
• In his textbook, A Prophet Among You (1955), Dr. T. Housel Jemison (1914-1963) devoted an entire chapter on the subject of hermeneutics and the writings of Ellen G. White. He said:

 

 

Study of the Ellen White books will yield much spiritual enlightenment if a few simple rules are followed in the reading program. There are three principles to be followed in topical studies which will aid in gaining a balanced view of what the writings teach.

1. The general teaching of all the applicable counsels should be studied before conclusions are drawn.

2. The time, place, and circumstances of the giving of certain messages should be considered.

3. One should try to discover the principle involved in any specific counsel, and its applications (p. 437-438).

• These three rules of interpretation are simple, clear and relevant to our study of Ellen White's writings.

I. Background

• Some may technically argue that only the White Estate at present is able to study "all" the writings of Ellen G. White - because "all" of her writings, upon any subject, are not yet completely available to the public, and won't be until the final CD-ROM version containing the unpublished writings is completed.

• And, admittedly, they have a point.
• But it is equally true that the danger of distortion is inversely proportional to the degree to which all available data has been examined. The more one examines whatever counsel is available, the less likely one is to err in understanding and interpretation.

 

• After his resurrection, Jesus walked to Emmaus with two disciples who did not understand why he had died. "And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself." (Luke 24:27).

• For some subjects, to study all the applicable and available counsels will not be a difficult task, because the Bible (as, also, Ellen White) is either silent, or has comparatively little to say.

 

• Cinema, movies and videos: The first motion picture film was produced by D.W. Griffith, "The Birth of a Nation", in 1915, the year of Ellen White's death.
 
• Radio programs: The first commercial radio station to come on-line was Station KDKA, Pittsburgh, Pa; and the first program broadcast was the Harding-Cox presidential election returns on Nov. 2, 1920.
 
• Television programs: The first program broadcast on commercial television was a speech by President F.D. Roosevelt, which opened the 1939 World's Fair in New York City.
 
• Chemical/Mechanical contraception: Although the first serious scientific study of contraception was undertaken in 1882, commercially-available products were still decades in the future. Actually, the most widely employed methods used today were not introduced on the market until after 1960.
 
• Abortion: This was not the pressing issue in her day.
 
• Cremation.
 
• Organ transplants.

• Life insurance : There is only one statement on this subject, written in 1867, and found in 1T 549-551.
• For a correct understanding of what she wrote, however, one must first employ another important hermeneutical rule: study the context, internal and external (to be discussed more fully in the next lecture), in order to better understand the contemporary situation she addressed.
• The insurance industry in her day was almost totally corrupt and fraud-ridden, unregulated by any government agency. (Today, by contrast, it is probably the most regulated.)
• (For further help to understand this issue, see the document "Seventh-day Adventists and Life Insurance", available from the EGW Research Center.)

 
• Wedding band : There is only one statement, written in 1892, just after Ellen White arrived in Australia, found in TM 180-181.

• Two special resurrections:

• On Easter Sunday (Mat 27:52,53)
• Immediately prior to the second coming (Dan 12:1; Mat 26:64; Rev 1:7; 14:13; EW 285; GC 637):
• Ellen White identifies three categories of individuals, two of which will be brought back to life only temporarily:
• SDAs who have died, since 1844, under the Third Angel's Message, keeping the Sabbath.
• The unsaved crucifiers of Jesus.
• The most violent opponents of Christ and his kingdom in all ages.
• The various facts she contributes to our understanding to these two special resurrections are "extra-biblical", they provide information in addition to that found in the Bible. It, however, is not "anti-biblical", contrary to what the Bible reveals. This distinction is crucial.

    1. The Holy Spirit:

• The Comprehensive Index to the EGW writings list 38 sub-categories, in 59 columns of references, spread over 30 pages, in the first three volumes. (There are additional references in vol. IV.)

• There are 50 different sub-categories, in 174 columns of references, spread over 87 pages, in the first three volumes of the Comprehensive Index.

 

 

A. The Wrath of God ("Does God destroy sinners?")

• For many people the concept of the wrath of God is a difficult concept, in that it seems to be a contradiction to say on the one hand that "God is love" and, on the other hand, say that he will destroy the unrepentant sinners. Some passages from the writings of Ellen White may lend to the conclusion that in the end God will not destroy mankind for refusing to accept His offer of salvation.

            b. "Like Israel of old the wicked destroy themselves...." (GC 37, emphasis supplied).
 

• The biblical doctrine of the wrath of God.
• The Bible clearly teaches that God has--and will, again-- destroy sinners.
• Isaiah speaks of it repeatedly:
• "Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger to lay the land desolate: and He shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it" (Isa. 13:9).
• "For, behold, the Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity.... (26:21).
• "For the Lord shall rise up..., He shall be wroth..., that He may do His work, His strange work, and bring to pass His act, His strange act" (28:21).
• Other Bible writers speak frankly and clearly about God's destruction of humans created in His image but who defied the Lord of heaven, in, among other examples:
• The flood of Noah's day.
• The destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
• The breaking down of the walls and the destruction of the city of Jericho.
• And the Bible declares that He will destroy the living wicked at Christ's Second Coming, and all of the wicked after the 3^rd Coming (at the end of the Millennium), in the executive phase of His judgment (2 Thess 1:6-10; Rev 20:7-15).
 

• Ellen White affirms the clear testimony of Scripture:
• The Flood: In 1876 the question of whether or not God was responsible for the death of the wicked antediluvians was apparently raised in various SDA circles; and Ellen White wrote a seven-page manuscript ("The Days of Noah," Ms 5, 1876), the first two pages of which have been lost. But the last five which survive today leave no one in any doubt as to who was responsible for the Flood: "But God drowned the vast world!" (For the complete text, see Appendix.)
• Jericho: "God's judgments were awakened against Jericho.... The Captain of the Lord's Host [Jesus] Himself came from heaven to lead the armies of heaven in an attack upon the city" (3T 264:1).
• After the Close of Probation:
• "The same destructive power exercised by holy angels when God commands, will be exercised by evil angels when He permits" (GC 614:2; emphasis supplied).
• "Then I was shown that the seven last plagues will be poured out, after Jesus leaves the sanctuary. Said the angel, 'It is the wrath of God and [of] the Lamb that causes the destruction or death of the wicked'" (Present Truth, Nov. 1850; cited in 1 Bio 189; emphasis supplied)--one of her earliest statements upon the subject.

• How, then, do we explain the seemingly contradictory statements in COL 84 and GC 37?
• We have already alluded to a second hermeneutical rule about the context (to be discussed in greater detail in the next lecture), but let us again refer to it here.
• An examination of the internal context of these two statements quickly reveals that Ellen White was not addressing the question of whether or not it is God who does the killing but, rather, whether or not He can be considered guilty of murder, for doing acts that the Bible and Ellen White manifestly declare He has done before, and will do once again.
• The thrust of her argument on these pages is: God is not guilty of murder, for in the case of murder the victim has no option, no choice, but to suffer the intent of the killer; in short, the victim has no alternative to death.
• But God freely offers life or death to each human being, upon certain clearly stated conditions--here the sinner does have an alternate choice, a way to avoid death.
• Isaiah 54:8, "With a little wrath I hid my face from you for a moment; but with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you," says the Lord, your Redeemer.
• Now, if men deliberately embark upon a course of action which God has already decreed will bring them personal destruction, their punishment comes simply as a cause/effect consequence; and, in that sense, the sinners are themselves guilty of destroying themselves, because in the end they simply reap that which they themselves have sown.
• "In the laws of God in nature, effect follows cause with unerring certainty. The reaping will testify as to what the sowing has been" (COL 84).

 

    1.In a sermon in the Battle Creek Tabernacle on Mar. 6, 1869, EGW raised the question of inconsistency in the practice of health reform vis-a-vis the daily living of the Christian life:

        a. "You place upon your table butter, eggs, and meat, and your children partake of them, . . . and then you come to meeting and ask God to bless and save your children. How high do [you think] your prayers go?" (2T 362).
 

    2. That same year she also wrote a letter to a "Brother and Sister E," in which she focused upon one particularly serious problem (among others) in the home involving their two adolescent sons ("Sensuality in the Young," 2T 390-411).

        a. And in a simple declarative sentence of eight words she stated, "Eggs should not be placed upon  your table." Why? "They are an injury to your children" (2T 400).
 

    3. And this immediately raises a logical question: Is "your table" to be understood in the singular, referring specifically (and only) to the table of Brother and Sister E; or does "your table": refer, collectively, to the tables of all SDAs?
 

    4. The application of the first rule demonstrates that, at least for her day, the use of eggs was not banned across-the-board by EGW; for, elsewhere, she wrote of a "beneficial" use of eggs. Note these additional balancing statements:

        a. "In some cases the use of eggs is beneficial" (7T 135).

        b. "In some cases of persons whose blood-making organs are feeble [e.g., anemia] . . . milk and eggs should not be wholly discarded" (MH 320).

        c. "While warnings have been given . . ., yet we should not consider it a violation of principle to use eggs from hens that are well cared for and suitably fed. Eggs contain properties that are remedial agencies in counteracting certain poisons" in the body (9T 162).

    5. What, then, precipitated this 1869 warning to Brother and Sister E?

        a. An examination of the internal context reveals that both of the adolescent sons in the "E" family were unable to keep their sexual passions under control, and were practicing masturbation.

        b. God had revealed to EGW that eggs rank high as a substance which tend to arouse human sexual desire.

        c. And so EGW was saying, in effect: as far as the control of sexual appetite is concerned, if one has a problem here, he or she should not unnecessarily aggravate the situation by using substances which generally tend to do just that. In other words, if you are attempting to extinguish a fire, don't put gasoline on it; use water, instead!
 

    6. Even more relevant for those of us living today, however, is the warning, with its promise-penned in 1901:

        a. At the turn of the century there were in our midst sincere but misguided members who advocated health reform "in its most extreme form", with the result that "harm" was being "done."

        b. Attempting to bring in balance, EGW, while continuing to advocate the discontinuance of flesh-foods, tea, and coffee, nevertheless held that urging abstinence of dairy products (mild, cream, and butter) and poultry products (eggs) by all, was still going too far at that time.

        c. She declared, further, that "the time will come" when we will need to discard from the diet all animal products; but "when the time comes . . . God will reveal this. No extremes in health reform are to be advocated" (Letter 37, 1901, to Bro. and Sister D.H. Kress, in CD 358, 359).
 

    7. She did not tell when that time would come, nor how God would then reveal it to His people; but the implication is clearly left that intelligent persons, sincerely and earnestly desirous of doing God's will, will clearly understand when that time has fully come (see John 7:17).

        a. Are we there yet? Opinion of equally intelligent, equally sincere individuals, within Adventism as well as without, presently differ on how to interpret the data recently come to light through scientific inquiry over the last decade:

            (1) On the one hand, disturbing questions are raised about the safety of ingesting animal products, such as milk, vis-a-vis the high incidence hormone, bovine somatotropin (BST). (See, for example, "Udder Insanity," Consumer Reports, May, 1992, pp. 330-32; "Is Your Food Safe?," 48 Hours, CBS News, Feb. 9, 1994, transcript of Program 270; Sharon Begley, "The End of Antibiotics," (cover story) and Jerry, Adler, "The Age Before Miracles," Newsweek, Mar. 28, 1994, p. 46-52; and "Has the Time Come?", Loma Linda University scientist Dr. Richard W. Hubbard statement, "Letters to the Editor" column, Pacific Union Recorder, July 4, 1994, p. 31).

            (2) but, on the other hand, other equally-qualified scientists warn about over-[or wrongly-] generalizing from the data. (See, for example, Dr. Jim E. Riviere [Director, Cutaneous Pharmacology and Toxicology Center, North Carolina State University], "Stop Worrying and Eat Your Salad," in "My Turn" opinion column, Newsweek, Aug. 8, 1994; and "Evaluating the Buyer's Bible," Time, Feb. 20, 1995, pp. 64-670), which offer an alternate view on the alleged dangers from BST, by equally-prestigious scientific bodies.)

        b. So, has "the time" come? Since opinions differ, certainly this is a question that each one must settle for himself/herself, but not press one's own personal views upon others. "Let every man [and woman] be fully persuaded in his [her] own mind" (Rom. 14:5).
 

C. Is It a "Sin" to Eat Desserts?

    1. In the matter of eating desserts at a meal, many of EGW's counsels focus upon two problems:

        a. Excessive use of Sugar:

            (1) Far too much sugar is ordinarily used in our food preparation (CD 113).

            (2) Sugar, when used "largely," is more injurious to the body than even ingestion of flesh-meats (2T 368-70).

                (a) Because of the danger of excess-sugar use, EGW was opposed to the use of many pastries, again indicating that a meat-diet was the lesser of two evils (if one were forced to choose) because of potentially serious injury that could be caused by too-generous intake of sweet-cakes and pastries (CD 334, 410, 411).

        b. Undesirable Combination of Certain Foods:

            (1) Especially harmful, she added, were foods in which milk, eggs, and sugar were combined in preparation; and the "free use" of milk and sugar, especially, should be avoided (CD 311).
 

    2. Many, upon reading these cautions and warnings, have concluded that the only safe approach should be a total ban on desserts at all meals.
 

    3. But a careful survey of all that she wrote upon the subject brings to view balancing statements that help put all in perspective:

        a. Plain, simple pie is an acceptable dessert (though eating two, or even three, pieces at the same meal, is quite another matter!).

        b. While EGW eschewed a large use of sugar, she did not ban it totally from her table.

            (1) Her own dish of applesauce was artificially sweetened ("as required") in the kitchen before it was brought to her table (CD 330).

        c. A moderate amount of milk/sugar combinations is acceptable, as, also, plain cakes with raisins, and rice-pudding with raisins, which she recommended as an acceptable dessert (2T 383, 384).

        d. Lemon pie, which requires an egg/sugar combination (and, in certain instances, even the addition of cream) was not forbidden as dessert for sanitarium patient meals (CD 334).

            (1) EGW herself occasionally ate lemon pie (CD 491); and a White family oral tradition handed down through the years intimates that lemon pie was EGW's favorite dessert--though, of course, always eaten in moderation.
 

    4. She also strongly recommend that it was preferable that desserts be placed on the family table at the same time as the other main-course dishes, so that the eater might better gauge the total intake of food for the meal as a whole (CD 334).
 

D. The Human Nature of Christ

    1. The issue: Was Christ's human nature like that of Adam:

        a. Before the Fall ("pre-lapsarian")? Or

        b. After the Fall ("post-lapsarian")?
 

    2. The subject has become hotly debated among SDA's (especially during the 1980's, and even into the 1990's), with two warring sides tending to develop.

        a. The debate, unfortunately, has split some churches.

        b. And the issue, for some, has been made into a litmus test of one's SDA orthodoxy.
 

    3. In the interest of bringing the subject into focus, hopefully to promote greater understanding, the editors of Ministry devoted 14 pages of the June, 1985 edition (nearly half of that entire issue) to the presentation of two contrasting positions-which were printed in two parallel columns, divided by a bold vertical rule.

• Dr. Herbert Douglass (under the pseudonym of "Kenneth Gage") held that Christ took Adam's "fallen" nature after the Fall.

• Dr. Norman Gulley (under the pseudonym of "Benjamin Rand") claimed that Christ took Adam's pre-fall, unfallen nature.

 

        a. And some wondered if she were like a "wax nose," that could be twisted and bent to suit the desire (and prove the point) of whichever author happened to examine her material at any given time.

        b. Others concluded that she was talking out of both sides of her face, for it appeared that she supported both views (which seemed diametrically opposed to each other.
 

    5. Dr. Robert W. Olson, then Secretary of the White Estate, did his own exhaustive research in the White Estate vault.

        a. In the early 1980's he compiled a list of eight EGW statements which seemed to support a post-fall, "sinful" human nature of Christ; and another list of 11 EGW statements which seemed to indicate she believed in a pre-fall, "sinless" human nature.

        b. Later, in 1989, he prepared a 32-page compilation (Pacific Press), on The Humanity of Christ.

            (1) By this time he had concluded that a correct view of EGW's position required one to arrive at a third alternative.

                (a) It is not an "either/or" dilemma, he declared.

                (b) For, in certain respects, Christ took Adam's pre-fall nature; but, in certain other respects, He took his post-fall nature.

            (2) Morris L. Venden's Faith That Works, a 1980 daily devotional book (Review & Herald) arrived at the same position (see, especially, pp. 348-50).
 

III. Other Topics Suitable for This Hermeneutical Approach

    1. Was the atonement complete at the Cross (31 A.D.), or only the sacrifice of Christ?

    2. What was the nature of the physical limitation placed upon Satan at Calvary?

    3. Is it permissible for SDA women to wear "slacks" on appropriate occasions?

        a. Or do they come under the Mosiac ban against women wearing anything that "pertaineth to a man" (Deut. 22:5)?

    4. Does God really abandon the willful sinner?

    5. Since "cooking" [main meal preparation] on the Sabbath is discouraged by EGW, is it yet permissible to warm-up food on that day which was originally prepared upon the previous "preparation day" (Friday)?
 
 

Ellen G. White, Manuscript 5, 1876, "The Days of Noah"  (This manuscript originally consisted of seven pages.  The first two pages are no longer extant, having become lost.  However, the surviving five pages are sufficient to place Ellen White clearly, unequivocally, on record as opposing the idea that God has not -- and will not again -- destroy sinners.  This manuscript was released by the White Estate, piecemeal, over a period of years, and is found in 10MR 265-266, 372-374, and 12MR 207-209.)
 

     The Days of Noah--Because of his holy integrity and unwavering adherence to God's commands, Noah was counted singular indeed and made himself an object of contempt and derision by answering to the claims of God without a questioning doubt. What a contrast to the prevailing unbelief and universal disregard of His law!

     Noah was tested and tried thoroughly and yet he preserved his integrity in the face of the world--all, all against him. Thus will it be when the Son of man shall be revealed. The saved will be few, as is represented by Noah and his family. The world might have believed the warnings. God's Spirit was striving with them to lead them to faith and obedience, but their own wicked hearts turned aside the counsel of God and resisted the pleadings of infinitive love. They continued their empty ways as usual, eating, drinking, planting, and building, up to the very day Noah entered into the ark.

     Men in Noah's day were not all absolute idolaters, but in their idolatry they professed to know God, and in the grand images they had created, their plan was to represent God before the world. The class who professed to acknowledge God were the ones who took the lead in rejecting the preaching of Noah and through their influence leading others to reject it.

     To every one comes the time of test and trial. While Noah was warning the inhabitants of the world of the coming destruction, it was their day of opportunity and privilege to become wise unto salvation. But Satan had control of the minds of men. They set light and truth for darkness and error. Noah seemed to them to be a fanatic. They did not humble their hearts before God but continued their occupation the same as if God had not spoken to them through His servant Noah. But Noah stood like a rock amid the pollution and wickedness surrounding him, and wavered not in his faithfulness. He stood amid the scoffs and jeers of the world, an unbending witness for God, his meekness and righteousness shining brightly in contrast to the crime and intrigue and violence surrounding him.

     Noah connected with God, and he was strong in the strength of infinite power. For one hundred and twenty years he daily presented God's warning in regard to events which so far as human wisdom was concerned, could not take place. The world before the Flood reasoned that for centuries the laws of nature had been fixed; the recurring seasons had come and gone in regular order. Rain had never yet fallen, but a mist or dew had fallen upon the earth, causing vegetation to flourish. The rivers and brooks had never passed their boundaries, but had borne their waters safely to the great sea. Fixed decrees had kept the waters from overflowing their banks. The people
did not recognize the Hand that had stayed the waters, saying, "Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther."

     Men began to feel secure and to talk of the fixed laws of nature. They reasoned then as men reason now, as though nature was above the God of nature, that her ways were so fixed that God Himself would not or could not change them, thus making God's messages of warning of none effect because, should His word be fulfilled, the course of nature would be disturbed. The men before the Flood sought to quiet their consciences, which the Spirit of God had aroused, by arguing how impossible it was for the message of Noah to be true and a flood to deluge the world, which would turn nature out of her course.

     The same reasoning is heard today. "Why, the world will not be destroyed by fire." The siren song is sung, "'All things continue as they were from the beginning.' No need to pay any regard to this preaching that the world's history will soon close. Why, the laws of nature show the inconsistency of this." He who is Lord of nature can employ it to serve His purpose; He is not the slave of nature.

     They reasoned that it was not in accordance with the character of God to save Noah and his family, only eight persons in that vast world, and let all the rest be swept out of existence by the waters of the Flood. Oh, no. There were great men and good men on the earth. If they did not believe as Noah did, Noah was deceived. It could not be otherwise. Here were the philosophers, the scientific men, the learned men. All could see no consistency in this message of warning. This fanciful doctrine was an illusion of the brain. If this was the truth the wise men surely would know something about it. Would all of these learned men perish from the face of the earth and Noah be found the only one worthy of being spared? . . .

     But the days before the Flood steal silently on as a thief in the night. Noah is now making his last effort in warnings, entreaty, and appeal to the rejecters of God's message. With tearful eye, trembling lip, and quivering voice he makes his last entreaty for them to believe and secure a refuge in the ark. But they turn from him with impatience and contempt that he should be so egotistical as to suppose his family are the only ones right in the vast population of the earth. They have no patience with his warnings, with his strange work of building an immense boat on dry ground. Noah, they said, was insane.

     Reason, science, and philosophy assured them Noah was a fanatic. None of the wise men and honored of the earth believed the testimony of Noah. If these great men were at ease and had no fears, why should they be troubled?

     God's love is represented in our day as being of such a character as would forbid His destroying the sinner. Men reason from their own low standard of right and justice. "Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself" (Ps. 50:21). They measure God by themselves. They reason as to how they would act under the circumstances and decide God would do as they imagine they would do.

    God's goodness and long forbearance, His patience and mercy exercised to His subjects, will not hinder Him from punishing the sinner who refused to be obedient to His requirements. It is not for a man--a criminal against God's holy law, pardoned only through the great sacrifice He made in giving His Son to die for the guilty because His law was changeless--to dictate to God. After all this effort on the part of God to preserve the sacred and exalted character of His law, if men, through the sophistry of the devil, turn the mercy and condescension of God into a curse, they must suffer the penalty. Because Christ died they consider they have liberty to transgress God's holy law that condemns the transgressor, and would complain of its strictness and its penalty as severe and unlike God. They are uttering the words Satan utters to millions, to quiet their conscience in rebellion against God.

     In no kingdom or government is it left to the lawbreakers to say what punishment is to be executed against those who have broken the law. All we have, all the bounties of His grace which we possess, we owe to God. The aggravating character of sin against such a God cannot be estimated any more than the heavens can be measured with a span. God is a moral governor as well as a Father. He is the Lawgiver. He makes and executes His laws. Law that has no penalty is of no force.

     The plea may be made that a loving Father would not see His children suffering the punishment of God by fire while He had the power to relieve them. But God would, for the good of His subjects and for their safety, punish the transgressor. God does not work on the plan of man. He can do infinite justice that man has no right to do before his fellow man. Noah would have displeased God to have drowned one of the scoffers and mockers that harassed him, but God drowned the vast world. Lot would have had no right to inflict punishment on his sons-in-law, but God would do it in strict justice.

    Who will say God will not do what He says He will do? "Let God be true, but every man a liar" (Romans 3:4). The Lord is coming in flaming fire to take vengeance on those sinners who know not God and obey not His gospel. And because, in His infinite mercy, He delays His coming to give the world a larger span for repentance, sinners flatter themselves [that] He will never come.

     In the public press, in the haunts of sin, as well as in the schools of science so-called, there is one sentiment: They curl the lips with scorn and jest and ridicule at the warnings given them, and look upon the thousands who will not believe. Jests are uttered, witty paragraphs published at the expense of those who wait and look for His appearing, and [who] with fear, like Noah, prepare for the event. This is not new, but as old as sin. It is as false as the father of lies.

     When ministers, farmers, merchants, lawyers, great men and professedly good men shall cry, Peace and safety, sudden destruction cometh. Luke reports the words of Christ, that the day of God comes as a snare--the figure of an animal prowling in the woods for prey and lo, suddenly he is entrapped in the concealed snare of the fowler.