Questions on the Sealing Message

THE SEALING MESSAGE—FIRST QUESTION

When did the Adventists obtain the light on the Sealing Message?

Before me are three questions which I am requested to answer: QSM 7.1

First: When did the Adventists obtain light on the sealing message? QSM 7.2

Second: When did the sealing work begin? QSM 7.3

Third: Will any of the people of God who have died since 1848, in the message, be reckoned with the 144,000? QSM 7.4

AS TO the first question, we note that in 1845, some of the Adventists began the study of the third angel’s message of Revelation 14:9-12. They saw clearly that the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath was included in the keeping of all the commandments, as set forth in that message. Of the study of the message, we read in a statement from Sister E. G. White, in Testimonies for the Church 1:78, 79. The statement relates to the situation in 1846, and onward, and reads: “When we began to present the light on the Sabbath question, we had no clearly defined idea of the third angel’s message of Revelation 14:9-12. QSM 7.5

The burden of our testimony as we came before the people was, that the great second advent movement was of God, that the first and second messages had gone forth, and that the third was to be given. We saw that the third message closed with the words: ‘Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.’ And we as clearly saw as we now see (the now was 1868, when volume 1 was first published), that these prophetic words suggested a Sabbath reform; but as to what the worship of the beast mentioned in the message was, or what the image and the mark of the beast were, we had no defined position. QSM 8.1

“God by His Holy Spirit let light shine forth upon His servants, and the subject gradually opened to their minds. It required much study and anxious care to search it out, link after link. By care, anxiety, and incessant labor has the work moved on until the great truths of our message, a clear, connected, perfect whole, have been given to the world.” QSM 8.2

Although, down to the year 1848, our people had clear light on the different features of the third angel’s message, their attention had not been especially called to the sealing message. QSM 8.3

They did not believe that, according to Revelation 14:1-5, there would be 144,000 to stand redeemed on Mount Zion. This company was also mentioned by Sister White in her first vision, recorded in “Experience and Views,” old edition, page 12. But they had not as yet studied the light on the sealing of the 144,000. QSM 8.4

As we shall see, it was the time of the conflict of the nations of Europe, in the early months of 1848, that light came to this people respecting the sealing message. In a brief consideration of that conflict, its cause and development, we shall see how the light on the message was obtained. In the “Library of Universal Knowledge,” page 536, we read of that conflict in 1848: “That revolution was caused by the French people demanding a republican form of government from under Louis Philippe; and for a time, there was republican form, the revolution contagion spreading temporarily over most of the continent of Europe.” QSM 9.1

From the time of the Reign of Terror in France, the desire of the masses was, to secure for the people a greater control of the government, and to satisfy the craving of the people for national life-in fact, to have a true government of the people, for the people, and by the people. Through the working of the papacy, a Bourbon, Louis Philippe, had been placed upon the throne, and it seemed to be an impossibility to induce the pope to submit to any government but that of his own devising. See Robinson’s “Western Europe.” QSM 9.2

The situation caused animosity not only against Louis Philippe, but also against the pope, who was upholding the Bourbon ruler. At last, the pent up feelings burst forth in a conflict, as sudden in its developments as the bursting forth of a volcano. From facts stated in the public prints of the time, it would seem that Louis was not aware of the intensity of the feeling against his rule; for on the twenty-first of February, 1848, he said to his cabinet, “I was never more firmly seated in the empire of France than I am to-night.” The next day, he had a review of his soldiers. After the parade, the soldiers, with guns stacked, were resting on the ground, when a little lad with a tricolored flag in his hand climbed upon a cannon. He waved the flag in the air, shouting: “Down with the pope! DOWN WITH THE POPE!” Probably this was what he had heard talked at home. The soldiers caught up the same, which, with increasing vigor, was passed up and down the line, and finally with the addition, “and down with the king.” QSM 10.1

Concerning the sudden outbreak of that rebellion, we read in Robinson’s “Western Europe,” chapter forty: QSM 10.2

“The gathering discontent, and demand for reform, suddenly showed their full strength and extent. It seemed for a time as if all western Europe was about to undergo as complete a revolution as France had experienced in 1789. With one accord, and as by obeying a preconcerted signal, the liberal parties in France, Italy, Germany, and Austria, during the earlier months of 1848, overthrew or gained control of the government, and proceeded to carry out their program of reform in the same thoroughgoing way in which the National Assembly in France had done its work in 1789. The general movement affected almost every state in central Europe. QSM 10.3

“On February 24, 1848, a mob attacked the Tuileries. The king abdicated in favor of his grandson. But it was too late. He and his whole family were forced to leave the country. The mob invaded the assembly, as in the Reign of Terror, crying: ‘Down with the Bourbons, old and new! Long live the republic!’” QSM 11.1

Of this revolution of 1848, and its sudden checking up, Horace Greeley said, in the New York Tribune, “It was a great wonder to us politicians what started so suddenly that great confusion in Europe; but a greater wonder still, what so suddenly stopped it.” QSM 11.2

I have a copy of a testimony given to Sister White in 1852, in which reference is made to the war of 1848. This was found among Brother Bates’s papers, after his death. In it are these words: “That desire was, to dethrone kings; but that could not be, for kings must reign until Christ begins His reign. I saw in Europe, just as things were moving to accomplish their designs, there would be a slacking up once or twice. Thus the hearts of the wicked would be hardened. But the work will not settle down (only seem to), for the minds of their kings and rulers were intent on overthrowing each other, and the minds of the people to get the ascendancy. I saw all minds intently looking and stretching their thoughts on the impending crisis before them.” QSM 11.3

There was one slacking up after the revolution of 1848. In the present war, beginning in 1914, is manifest on a still larger scale the determination to overthrow kings and rulers, and a still greater intensity in watching, than in that revolution of 1848. The testimony seems to indicate a second slacking up before the final conflict of the nations shall come. QSM 12.1

Of that outbreak in Paris, we have read already that Louis Philippe and his entire family fled from France. The fury of the mob was such that he feared for their lives, and accomplished their escape by placing his family in a coach, while he disguised himself in the driver’s clothes, and in the twilight passed unrecognized through the gates of Paris, thus effecting his flight to England. QSM 12.2

From a pamphlet entitled “The Seal of the Living God,” published by Elder Joseph Bates, dated January 1, 1849, we gain some facts as to that 1848 revolution, and the reception of the light on the sealing message. On page 45 we read, “The public journals have stated that on the twenty-second of February last, France became disorganized, deposed their king, and burned up his throne, and himself and family fled to England for safety.” On page 49, we read of the fury of that conflict: “See what a rushing and struggling has been and is going on among the people to overthrow the potentates of Europe; namely, Prussia, Hanover, Sicily, Naples, Venice, Lombardy, Tuscany, Rome, etc. See the account from the Boston Times of October 28, 1848, of the flight of the emperor of Austria from Vienna, the capital of his vast dominions, and of the insurrection and siege of that city for eight days, from the ninth of October; how they, in their work of slaughter, when they became victorious, tore up the railways, and demolished bridges, to stop all further intercourse. See also a similar state of things in Berlin under the king of Prussia.” This gives us some idea of the revolt which broke out on the continent of Europe on February 22, 1848. QSM 13.1

In the month of March of the same year, in Hydesville, Wayne County, New York, spirit rappings began in the home of the Fox and Fish family, which was moved to Rochester, New York, for more public investigation. For a time, these rappings were called “the Rochester knockings.” The first-day Adventists then said, with great zeal: “This conflict in Europe will culminate in the battle of Armageddon, and the Lord is about to come. These spirit rappings are the spirits of devils, going forth to gather the nations to the battle of the great day of God Almighty.” As our people had the light of the third angel’s message and the Sabbath, and were confident that this truth must be proclaimed to the world, they could not accept the faith made by the first-day Adventists, that the Lord was about to come. Those people would say to the Sabbath keepers: “You had better give up your Sabbath message. You are too late with it. Join us in warning the world to get ready for the immediate coming of Christ.” QSM 14.1

Such was the situation in the summer of 1848. This led the Seventh-day Adventists to earnest, prayerful study for light. The Lord led their minds to the holding of the winds (wars) and the sealing work, with a determination to find the meaning of the situation. They found, in their study of the Scriptures, that the Seventh-day Sabbath was the sign of the living God, and the seal of His law. This newly received light from the word of God gave still greater force to the Sabbath message, and doubly assured them that this, as the sealing message, must be proclaimed to the world before the actual coming of Christ. QSM 14.2

In Brother Bates’s book, he refers to a meeting held in the home of Brother Otis Nichols, at Dorchester, near Boston, Massachusetts, on November 18, 1848, and says: “A small company of brethren and sisters were assembled in a meeting near Boston, Massachusetts.... We had made it (the manner of publishing the message) the subject of the prayer at the Topsham conference meeting a little previous, and the way to publish not appearing clear, we (now) therefore resolved unitedly to refer all to God. After some time spent in prayer for light and instruction, God gave Sister White a vision.” QSM 15.1

Then he gives words which she spoke in the vision, which he copied down as she spoke them. From these words we quote the following: “He (God) was well pleased when His law began to come up in strength. That truth [the Sabbath truth] arises, and is on the increase, stronger and stronger. It’s the seal! It’s coming up! It arises, coming from the rising of the sun, like the sun, first cold, grows warmer, and sends its rays. When that truth arose, there was but little light in it; but it has been increasing. Oh, the power of these rays!” QSM 15.2

Next came words that spoiled the claims of the first-day Adventists that “the angels were no longer holding the winds of war and strife, but were letting them blow.” The words spoken in vision were: “The angels are holding the winds. It is God that restrains the powers. The angels have not let go, for the saints are not all sealed. The time of trouble has commenced. It has begun. The reason why the four winds are not let go, is because the saints are not sealed. It (the trouble) is on the increase more and more: that trouble will never end until the earth is rid of the wicked. Why, they (the winds) are just ready to blow. There is a check put on because the saints are not all sealed. Yes, publish the things thou hast seen and heard, and the blessing of God will attend.” QSM 16.1

After coming out of this vision, Sister White said to her husband: “James, I have a message for you. Begin to print a little paper, small at first. Send it out free. The readers will send you money to print it. It will be a success from the first. I saw from this small beginning it was like streams of light that went clear around the world.” QSM 16.2

In a vision given to Sister White at Rocky Hill, Connecticut, January 5, 1859, she had another view of the sealing work. This view, written by herself, is in “Early Writings,” old edition, pages 29-31, and reads as follows: “I saw four angels who had a work to do on the earth, and were on their way to accomplish it. Jesus was clothed with priestly garments. He gazed in pity on the remnant, then raised His hands upward, and with a voice of deep pity cried, ‘My blood, Father, My blood, My blood, My blood.’ Then I saw an exceeding bright light come from God, who sat upon the great white throne, and was shed all about Jesus. Then I saw an angel with a commission from Jesus, swiftly flying to the four angels who had a work to do on the earth, and waving something up and down in his hand, and crying with a loud voice, ‘Hold! Hold! Hold! Hold! until the servants of God are sealed in their foreheads.’” QSM 17.1

The explanation made to her by her attending angel was “that the four angels had power from God to hold the four winds, and that they were about to let them go, but while their hands were loosening, and the four winds were about to blow, the merciful eye of Jesus gazed on the remnant that were not sealed, and He raised His hands to the Father, and pleaded with Him that He had spilled His blood for them. Then another angel was commissioned to fly swiftly to the four angels, and bid them hold, until the servants of God were sealed with the seal of the living God.” QSM 17.2

Being thus fortified with light from the Scriptures, and the testimony of the Spirit of God, those having the light of the third angel’s message were shielded from these claims of the first-day Adventists, with their “new time message,” and were filled with new energy to press forward with the third angel’s message, being confident that the God whom they trusted would clear the way for this, the last message to the world, to accomplish its purpose. QSM 18.1