The "Beginning" of the
Fourth Angel’s Message
Jones’ and Waggoner’s message
was "good news" of deliverance from sin, an
"easy" conquest by faith of the only remaining hurdle
between God’s people and entering their Promised Land. Ellen
White soon recognized it as the
"beginning" of the long-awaited "Loud Cry"
that is to lighten the earth with glory:
The time of test is just upon
us, for the loud cry of the third angel has already begun in
the revelation of Christ, the sin-pardoning Redeemer. This is
the beginning of the light of the angel whose glory shall fill
the whole earth.7
Frequently she referred to the
message as the initial outpouring of the Latter Rain of the Holy
Spirit.8 As a farmer’s crops need rain if the harvest is to
come, so the Latter Rain is to ripen the "grain" and
prepare "for the sickle." This is "the completion
of the work of God’s grace in the soul … that prepares the
church for the coming of the Son of man."9 And Satan’s
slanderous charges against God can never be silenced and the
"great controversy" resolved for the government of God,
until His people receive this "completion" of grace
"in the soul." Ellen White and the 1888 messengers spoke
openly and frankly about getting ready for "translation"
then and there.10
She also said that Israel’s
"leading men" refused the message so that it was shut
"away from our people in a great measure" and "by
the action of our own [leading] brethren has been in a great
degree kept away from the world."11 God’s plan was to give
the message first to the leadership; they were to give it to the
laity; and the church unitedly was to give it to the world.12
Had the purpose of God been carried
out in giving the message of mercy to the world, Christ would have
come, and the saints would have received their welcome into the
city of God.13
Like Israel’s history at
Kadesh-Barnea, can any aspect of our history be more important
than our preparation for the sealing, our reception of the Latter
Rain, and giving of the Loud Cry, and a preparation for the coming
of Christ?
Why
Was This History So Long Neglected?
NOTES:
-
RH Nov. 22,1892.
[Return to text]
-
See Letter S-256, Aug. 30,1892; RH
July 26,1892; Special Testimonies, Series A, No. 6, p. 20;
A.V. Olson, Through Crisis to Victory (hereafter TCV)
p. 296 (MS 15, 1888); MS 10, 1889; RH Extra, Dec. 11,1888; RH
May 27,1890; ST Dec. 22,1890; ST May 26,1890; RH
Feb. 18, 1890; Letter B2-a, 1892. See also GCB 1893, pp.
183, 377, 463; L.E. Froom, Movement of Destiny (hereafter, MD),
p. 345; RH Nov. 29,1892. [Return
to text]
-
TM 506.
[Return
to text]
-
Compare GCB 1893, pp. 185,
205; RH Mar. 4,1890. [Return
to text]
-
1SM 234, 235 (1896).
[Return to text]
-
See Letter B-2a, 1892; TCV 291,
292 (MS 9,1888), pp. 297, 301 (MS 15,1888); compare 1SM 234, 235;
see RH Extra Dec. 23,1890. [Return
to text]
-
Ibid. Dec. 24,1903.
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