The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 4

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT: Seventh-Month Movement Launched at Exeter

I. High Priest to Come Forth to Bless People

On August 12, 1844, a five-day camp meeting opened at Exeter, New Hampshire, a few miles from East Kingston, scene of the first Millerite camp meeting in the United States, just two years prior. This Exeter meeting was quite representative, with some three or four thousand in attendance. The participants came from “different and distant places”—north, east, south, and west-to study anew the evidences for their faith. ¹ Different ones came anticipating “new light.” And it was here that a new concept indeed, and a new conviction, began to grip the Millerites, which changed their attitude from lassitude and indefinite waiting to intense expectancy. Christ, our heavenly High Priest, on the approaching October 22, ² they came to believe, was to emerge from the heavenly holy of holies to bless His waiting people at His second advent. And from the Exeter camp they went forth with crusading zeal in the most amazing development of the entire movement. PFF4 810.1

They had all believed that since April they were living in the “tarrying” or “slumbering” time, that is, beyond the close of “1843.” But they were in a state of uncertainty and suspense. The meeting at the Exeter camp on one day in particular was prosaic. Interest lagged and the time dragged. Men of ability spoke without anything new or fresh to present, repeating prophecies almost as familiar to their ears as the alphabet. Consequently, little impression was made, and the crowd was restive. Joseph Bates, the speaker at this particular hour, was seeking to bolster their confidence and sustain their faith in the promises of God. ³ He was rehearsing, in a labored way, the well-known evidences about the delay being a test of their faith, that Christ would surely come, that they should not lose confidence in His promises, and the like. But he was making little progress. PFF4 810.2

Suddenly a man rode up to the camp on horseback. It was Samuel Sheffield Snow. Dismounting, he came and sat down by the side of his sister, Mrs. John Couch, wife of one of the Adventist preachers, who was seated at the edge of the crowd that filled the large tent. In subdued phrases he began to rehearse to her his convictions as to the cause of their Lord’s delay, and to set forth persuasively the evidence for the coming of Christ in the autumn of 1844, on the very Day of Atonement. Her heart was thrilled with the whispered message. Unable to keep silence, she suddenly rose and in a ringing voice addressed Bates, the preacher in the desk: PFF4 811.1

“It is too late to spend time upon these truths, with which we are familiar, and which have been blessed to us in the past, and have served their purpose and their time.” ⁴ PFF4 811.2

Then she said earnestly, “Here is a man with a message from God.” It was a dramatic moment. The preacher paused, as well he might. And she continued in insistent tones that could be heard throughout the assembly: PFF4 811.3

“It is too late, brethren, to spend precious time as we have since this camp-meeting commenced. Time is short. The Lord has servants here who have meat in due season for his household. Let them speak, and let the people hear them. ‘Behold the Bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him.’ ⁵ PFF4 811.4

Then Bates responded, “Let him come and deliver his message,” and sat down to hear what he would say. The atmosphere was tense with expectancy as Snow walked forward and entered the pulpit. He began quietly but effectively to present his convictions and to submit his evidence. As he progressed, the whole camp became electrified, preachers as well as laymen. His logical reasoning carried weight, and his measured conclusions seemed inescapable. Conviction swept over the entire congregation, followed by decisive action. Time was short, and they must make ready for the coming of the Lord! Bates himself had come to the meeting anticipating more light that would give impetus to the message. ⁶ And Bates’s record, penned in 1847, was: PFF4 811.5

“There was light given and received there, sure enough; and when that meeting closed, the granite hills of New Hampshire rang with the mighty cry, Behold the Bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him! As the stages and railroad cars rolled away through the different States, cities, and villages of New England, the rumbling of the cry was still distinctly heard, Behold the Bridegroom cometh! Christ is coming on the tenth day of the seventh month! Time is short, get ready! get ready!” ⁷ PFF4 812.1

An amazing movement was started that sultry day that nothing could stay. Although the older leaders at; first were slow in accepting it, the movement quickly swept all lesser lights into ardent support. It intensified the tempo of the movement, and stepped up both its thinking and its activities. And it was this that was destined to bring Millerism to a speedy and dramatic climax as far and wide as the movement had extended. The Advent Herald, at first loath to accept the evidence, merely reported laconically: PFF4 812.2

“Brother Snow remarked with great energy on the time [Oct. 22, 1844], and displayed much research in his presentation of the evidence which, in his view, points to the tenth day of the seventh month of the Jewish sacred year, as the day of the Lord’s Advent.” ⁸ PFF4 812.3

But later, writing in retrospect, the editor describes that fateful Exeter camp and the time message that spread rapidly from there “through all the Advent bands in the land.” Then he adds: PFF4 812.4

“At first the definite time was generally opposed; but there seemed to be an irresistible power attending its proclamation, which prostrated all before it. It swept over the land with the velocity of a tornado, and it reached hearts in different and distant places almost simultaneously, and in a manner which can be accounted for only on the supposition that God was [in] it.... PFF4 813.1

“The lecturers among the Adventists were the last to embrace the views of the time, and the more prominent ones came into it last of all. It seemed not to be the work of men, but to be brought about in spite of men. The several advent papers came into the view only at a late hour; and this paper [The Advent Herald] was the last to raise its voice in the spread of the cry. For a long time we were determined to take no part in the movement, either in opposition, or in the advocacy of it.... It was not until within about two weeks of the commencement of the seventh month [about the first of October], that we were particularly impressed with the progress of the movement, when we had such a view of it, that to oppose it, or even to remain silent longer, seemed to us to be opposing the work of the Holy Spirit; and in entering upon the work with all our souls, we could but exclaim, ‘What were we, that we should resist God?’ It seemed to us to have been so independent of human agency, that we could but regard it as a fulfillment of the ‘midnight cry.’” ⁹ PFF4 813.2

Note the story in greater detail. PFF4 813.3