Читать книгу A Vindication of the Seventh-Day Sabbath and the Commandments of God - Joseph Bates, Joseph Bates - Страница 1

TO THE LITTLE FLOCK:

I dedicate to you the following pages, with my continued prayers to God, through our Great High Priest and coming King, that they may, in connection with God's Holy Word and guidance of the Divine Spirit, enable you more clearly to discover the deceptive arts of the Devil, and the agents he is employing in these last days, to betray and ensnare you in his (almost) innumerable and complicated variety of sins and snares; and see your true position just here under the High Lands of Immortality! Do not forget, while seeking to understand the Scriptures with a simple and honest desire to live here by every word of God, to read again and again the warning that God in his infinite mercy gave to Jesus more than fifty years after his glorious resurrection and triumphant ascension to his Father's seat in his Sanctuary in the heaven of heavens; and he sent it by his angel, who presented it before John in holy vision, recorded in his Rev. xii: 13 and 17, and in xvi. chapter, first part of the 13th, and 14th and 15th verses. You will see the opening developement of these very things in the work before you. None will fully realize them but those who are keeping all of the Commandments of God, especially his Holy Seventh-day Sabbath. Without fear of contradiction here or hereafter before the great White Throne, I tell you there is not an Advent paper (that I have heard of) published in the land, that is leading to the kingdom. I do not say but what they publish many truths; but their heretical doctrines will, if followed, never, no never, lead you to God! And as you pass along through these peace and safety valves in your prophetical history, watching and anxiously waiting for God to give the fourth sign of the coming of Jesus by shaking the heavens and earth, the sea and all nations, and give you the time of Jesus' coming, you will more clearly discover the widening track these advocates are pursuing with almost to a unit every professed advent minister in their train. You will also see that the Waymarks and high heaps in your pathway, past and present, are the only sure earthly guides to the peaceful haven of eternal rest. From my watch-tower I have discovered and pointed out to you some of the devouring wolves in sheep's clothing. Let us avoid them, and live prayerful, humble and watchful, for more will yet be seen, and perhaps start right out of your midst!

As I am unable to pay the Printer, your means – as God has given you ability – will be needed. I trust that God's true children are ready.

Fairhaven, Mass. Jan. 1848.

J. B.