The Great Second Advent Movement: Its Rise and Progress

The Midnight of the Message

“How long is the tarrying time?-Half a year. How do you know?-Because our Lord says, ‘at midnight,’ while the Bridegroom tarried. The vision was for ‘twenty-three hundred evening-mornings,’ or days. An ‘evening,’ or night, is half of one of those prophetic days, and is, therefore, six months. That is the whole length of the tarrying time. The present strong cry of time commenced about the middle of July, and has spread with great rapidity and power, and is attended with a demonstration of the Spirit, such as I never witnessed when the cry was ‘1843.’ It is now literally, ‘Go ye out to meet him.’ There is a leaving all that I never dreamed could be seen. When this cry gets hold of the heart, farmers leave their farms, with their crops. There is a strong crying with tears, and a consecration of all to God, such as I never witnessed. There is a confidence in this truth such as was never felt in the previous cry, in the same degree, and a weeping or melting glory in it that passes all understanding except to those who have felt it. GSAM 162.1

“On this present truth, I, through grace, dare venture all, and feel that to indulge in doubt about it would be to offend God and bring upon myself ‘swift destruction.’ I am satisfied that now ‘whosoever shall seek to save his life,’ where this cry has been fairly made, by indulging in an ‘if it don’t come,’ or by a fear to venture out on this truth, ‘shall lose his life.’ It requires the same faith that led Abraham to offer up Isaac, or Noah to build the ark, or Lot to leave Sodom, or the children of Israel to stand all night waiting for their departure out of Egypt, or for Daniel to go into the lions’ den, or the three Hebrews into the fiery furnace. We have fancied that we were going into the kingdom without such a test of faith, but I am satisfied we are not. This last truth brings such a test, and none will venture upon it but such as dare to be accounted fools, madmen, or anything else that antediluvian Sodomites, a lukewarm church, or sleeping virgins are disposed to heap upon them. Once more would I cry, ‘Escape for thy life;’ ‘Look not behind you;’ ‘Remember Lot’s wife.’ “ GSAM 162.2