There Shines A Light

Chapter 1—Light of the Ages

I saw,” declared a young prince of Jerusalem, beginning his description of the most stupendous spectacle ever afforded man. “In the year that King Uzziah died” [715 B.C.], “I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and his train filled the temple.” That young man was a seer. TSAL 5.1

Born to the purple, as Jewish tradition affirms, he yet looked not upon earthly rank and pomp as his mark. He reached for a higher prize—through faith and loyalty, through suffering and contumely, to know his God and to do His will. And there was granted him the honor and the glory to see, in vision, the ineffable God upon His throne. Covering it were the six-winged seraphim, crying: TSAL 5.2

“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts:
The whole earth is full of his glory!” TSAL 5.3

And at the music and thunder of their voices, the temple shook, and smoke of incense filled the air. Awed and overwhelmed, the young man cried: TSAL 5.4

“Woe is me! for I am undone;
Because I am a man of unclean lips,
And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips:
For mine eyes have seen the King,
The Lord of hosts.” TSAL 5.5

Then from the throne there flew to him a seraph, having in his hand a live coal from the altar, which he laid upon the young man’s lips, and declared: TSAL 6.1

“Lo, this hath touched thy lips,
And thine iniquity is taken away,
And thy sin purged.” TSAL 6.2

Immediately he heard the voice of God, saying: “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” TSAL 6.3

Then he cried: “Here am I! Send me!” His offer accepted, the seer at once became the prophet, the speaker, the herald—a prophet standing midway in time between Moses and Christ, at the apex of the prophetic line, foreseeing and foretelling the Messiah; in vision, in grandeur of concept, in eloquence, in power, one of the greatest of the prophets: Isaiah! ¹ TSAL 6.4

In its primary sense, “seer” means “one who sees.” But long ago, in the childhood of the race, men applied the term to one who sees God, or who sees things which God reveals, and who then gives to men what he has seen. The Hebrew people, to whom “were committed the oracles of God,” ² were advantaged through nearly all their history by having among them seers or prophets, who spoke to them the messages of God. TSAL 6.5

A prophet is one who “speaks forth,” proclaims, declares. This term was, in early usage, restricted to one who spoke for God, or for a God. Other peoples than the Israelites, other religions than the Jewish and the Christian, and other gods than Jehovah God, had prophets. ³ But because Israel had the most notable prophets, who taught the ways of the true God; and because those prophets foretold the history of the world and of the Christian church, and the advent of the Messiah, the Christ, around whom and upon whom Christianity is built; the term “prophet,” though used occasionally in a secular sense, in chief part holds for us the concept of a spokesman for God. TSAL 6.6

The terms “seer” and “prophet” were for a period in Israel used interchangeably, though perhaps with some distinction, “prophet” becoming the broader and more notable term, and finally absorbing “seer.” ⁴ Other terms than these two were occasionally used for God’s spokesmen, such as “man of God,” “sons of the prophets,” “son of man,” “my messenger.” ⁵ But prophet (and prophetess) are the most prominent. TSAL 7.1

Why do men need seers and prophets? In the beginning there was no such need; for man could come face to face with God, could see Him, and hear Him, and speak with Him. Adam and Eve in their innocence had free access to their Creator, who was also their Teacher. ⁶ But after they had sinned, they and their descendants were increasingly unable to see God face to face, or to hear His voice speaking to them. Sin cannot live in the full glory of the presence of God, and for sinful man to see Him, unveiled, would mean death. Even Moses, greatest of Adam’s descendants, though he saw God, was not permitted to see His face. ⁷ TSAL 7.2

To maintain contact, God chose holy men, men who were nearest to perfect obedience, and who also possessed traits and abilities peculiarly fitted to channel His word; and in visions and dreams He communicated through them His will and teaching. As their lives were controlled by the Holy Spirit and were lived in harmony with God, they received divine instruction which formed the basis of their messages, spoken and written. ⁸ These men were the seers, the prophets. TSAL 7.3

Time has rolled on nigh six thousand years since that sad day when our first parents, sinning, were driven from their Garden home, and in His mercy and love God set up the office of the seer and prophet. During all this long stretch of time, the seers and prophets have not failed to connect heaven with earth, and to serve as the links between God and man. Sometimes the line stretched thin over long periods; sometimes the chain thickened; but either the living messenger or his written testimony bridged the centuries, and there remained “the more sure word of prophecy.” ⁹ Some of these messages have been preserved in sacred Scripture, and constitute our Bible. This holy Book, though containing but a fraction of the instruction given by God through the ages, is sufficient to acquaint us with Him and to guide us to salvation and in right living. ¹⁰ TSAL 8.1

But it is evident that the men who speak through the Bible have not been the only spokesmen for God. Their careers and missions cover only about a third of the history of the race. Before them, and among them, and since them, God has had other seers and prophets who have represented Him to their generations. Doubtless Adam might be called the first seer; for, though he lost his high estate, since claimed by no man save Jesus Christ, yet through repentance and faith Adam was received back into favor, and served as the teacher of his children. But the first prophet so designated in Scripture is Enoch, the seventh from Adam, who prophesied of the coming of the Lord. ¹¹ Noah was a prophet; Abraham is called a prophet; so is Aaron. Indeed, all three children of Amram and Jochebed—Miriam, Aaron, and Moses—exercised the prophetic gift. ¹² TSAL 8.2

Miriam was not the only woman among the prophets. We note, besides, such personages as the unnamed wife of Isaiah, and Deborah, Huldah, and Anna. ¹³ In the beginning of the Christian era, moreover, mention is made of the four daughters of Philip the evangelist, “which did prophesy”: and Paul, in his first letter to the Corinthians, mentions women who prophesied. ¹⁴ TSAL 9.1

We commonly think of prophecy, and prophesying, and the prophet as all relating to prediction of future events. This was indeed a part of the work of the most prominent prophets, from Moses to Daniel in the old dispensation, and from Christ to John in the new. But prophets also had other functions, and some of the prophets are not known to have made any predictions. Most of them are presented to us as being engaged in other work, predictions being incidental or supplementary. The primitive meaning of prophecy is, to speak forth; and this was manifested not alone in foretelling the future, but also in counseling in the present. TSAL 9.2

Take the four major prophets. Isaiah was a counselor of kings at the court of Judah, for the most part honored and heeded, though at last perhaps he died a martyr. Jeremiah, a priest, in the next century likewise gave his testimony to kings, as well as to priests and people and to other nations; but the morals of court and people had deteriorated, and he met strong opposition, imprisonment, and finally exile. Ezekiel, likewise a priest, began his prophetic duties while an exile in Chaldea, in the second captivity under Nebuchadnezzar; his messages were chiefly to the skeptical elders of his people. Daniel, among the captives in the second transplantation, was successively a student, head of the body of Babylon’s wise men, and, after a season of neglect, prime minister in the court of Persia. These prophets all uttered predictions, both of doom and of glory in the kingdom of the Messiah. Daniel’s prophecies were the most comprehensive and systematic, extending to the end of the world. But all four of these prophets were also counselors, men of business, historians, statesmen. TSAL 9.3

The prophet, therefore, is not alone a foreteller of events to come; he is, or he may be, a man of affairs, giving wise counsel upon many matters. Some prophets, like Nathan and Gad in the courts of David and Solomon, were counselors who transmitted the testimonies of God, but of whom there is no record that they ever uttered predictions. TSAL 10.1

The prophets of God were marked by humility, simplicity, austerity, divine learning, and devotion. Their dress was simple, even coarse: of Isaiah, Elijah, and John the Baptist we read that their garments were of sackcloth or of camel’s hair, with a leathern girdle; and it is intimated that the dress of the other prophets was in keeping. ¹⁵ The food of Elijah was meager, bread and flesh, and at the last bread alone; that of John the Baptist was locusts and wild honey. It is presumable that other prophets were equally abstemious. ¹⁶ TSAL 10.2

They were not boastful or ambitious. Some of them, like Amos and John the Baptist, even disclaimed the status of prophet; and Jeremiah voiced his own creed when he advised his secretary, Baruch, not to seek great things for himself. ¹⁷ While the prophets differed in endowment, estate, and training from the simple herdsman to the counselor at court, in the essential learning they were at one, and their aim was expressed by Paul in his counsel to Timothy: “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” ¹⁸ TSAL 10.3

The spirit and gift of prophecy belong also to the Christian church, and are necessary for its health, activity, and growth. ¹⁹ Jesus Christ, the Founder and Head of the church, was not only the supreme Prophet, in His work as teacher, healer, and revealer of God, as Moses foretold, ²⁰ but He filled the predictive office as well, foretelling many events, including His death and resurrection, and finally the history of His people to the time and event of His second coming. ²¹ TSAL 11.1

His apostles followed in His steps, as ministers to men; and notable predictive prophecies were given by Paul, Peter, and John. ²² After the apostolic age, while there continued to be men in the true church who, by the nature and power of their teachings, warnings, and reforms, may be recognized as prophets, the prediction of future events was chiefly confined to the study and interpretation of the prophecies already contained in the Bible, particularly Daniel in the Old Testament and Revelation in the New. A great array of expositors of these prophecies confronts us through all the Medieval Age and the Reformation. ²³ TSAL 11.2

But in God’s foreknowledge and providence, the last generation of men, in the closing act of the great drama of the ages, was to have a new manifestation of the prophetic gift. The twelfth chapter of Revelation contains a condensed prophetic history of the Christian church, under the figure of a woman “clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars,” who, “being with child cried, travailing in birth,” and who “brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron.” Before her appeared “a great red dragon,” waiting “to devour her child as soon as it was born.” But “her child was caught up unto God,” while “the woman fled into the wilderness,” where she was protected and fed for “a thousand two hundred and threescore days.” TSAL 11.3

To the student of prophecy this narrative in figurative language is readily interpreted. The woman is the church; her child is the Saviour, Jesus. The dragon is the devil, mortal enemy of Christ; but Jesus is caught away from him, ascending into heaven. The church then endures a sentence of persecution for 1260 years, filling the Dark Ages. TSAL 12.1

The revelation then goes on to tell of the continuing war between the dragon and Michael, until we are carried into the last stage, when, with an excess of fury, “the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed,” the last-day church, “which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” This last church is represented as keeping all the commandments of God and as possessing the testimony of Jesus. “What is that?” wondered the prophet who received the revelation. And the angel answered his unspoken question: “The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” ²⁴ TSAL 12.2

While in the broad meaning of “prophet,” as inspired teacher and leader and spokesman, there may in our age have been, may now be, and may in the future be, prophets in the church. “Seventh-day Adventists believe that in special measure, not only in foreknowledge and revelation but in counsel and guidance, this gift of prophecy was bestowed upon one of the founders of their church, Ellen Gould Harmon-White. And in brief compass, to acquaint the inquiring public, the following pages are devoted to an account of her life and work.” TSAL 12.3

“We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.” ²⁵ TSAL 13.1