The Church: Its Organization, Order and Discipline

The Crisis Reached

How the Lord used the opposition to develop a separate people is further described by Brother Himes. He compared it to the course of Paul at Ephesus:” ‘But when divers were hardened, and believed not, but spake evil of that way before the multitude, he departed from them, and separated the disciples, disputing daily in the school of one Tyrannus.’ It was not until ‘divers were hardened’ and ‘spake evil of that way’ (the Lord’s coming) ‘before the multitude’ that our brethren were moved to come out and separate from the churches. They could not endure the evil speaking of the ‘evil servants.’ And the churches that could pursue the course of oppression and ‘evil speaking’ toward those who were looking for the ‘blessed hope,’ were to them none other than the daughters of the mystic Babylon. They so proclaimed them, and came into the liberty of the gospel.”-Letter of Aug. 29, 1844. COOD 83.3