[Bates’ Pamphlet #2] Second Advent Way Marks and High Heaps

TO THE LITTLE FLOCK

“Set thee up waymarks, make thee high heaps; set thy heart towards the highway, even the way that thou wentest.” Jeremiah 31:21. BP2 45.1

How perfectly natural it is for every person either travelling or sailing, to have their minds excited respecting their starting place, their place of destination, and all the intermediate places on their way; among passengers on the land, but more particularly on the ocean, the continual enquiry is our whereabouts. If God’s people manifested half the anxiety concerning their spiritual welfare, they would live in a continual state of joy and thanksgiving, and a perfect state of readiness for the everlasting kingdom. But as the reverse of all this has ever been the case, with comparatively but few exceptions - hence the instruction from the Prophet of God to this people, henceforward to set them up waymarks and make high heaps, and set their hearts towards the highway, even the way they went, or had come. Every anxious traveller knows what a relief it is to his mind to find a guide board, a mile stone, or a post. But the mariner has to be more particular. Instead of finding guide boards and mile posts on the Ocean, he has to chain out the distance he runs, and so prove it by signs in the heavens - something after the following manner. - He takes the bearing by compass, and then judges his distance from the land or lighthouse that is now receding from his view. And now the watch is set to keep the ship on her course, and measure the distance run every two hours, night and day, during her passage to her destined port. At 12 o’clock every day this account is made up and recorded in the journal of the voyage. This is what the sailor calls dead reckoning. Every day when the sun is not obscured by clouds, the captain and officers ascertain the ship’s position in relation to her latitude, by watching the sun, and noting the moment she leaves the Eastern and passes into the Western Hemisphere. It is then 12 o’clock at noon; and the next day now commences, with reckoning for the next 24 hours. BP2 45.2

But there is still another more intricate and difficult process, by which the true (and not the dead) reckoning is ascertained. This is done by measuring the distance between the sun and moon, or moon and some well known star, if in the night. This process, when accomplished by the help of a nautical almanac, gives the ship’s longitude, showing clearly how many miles the ship is either east or west, as the case may be, of the port she left. This, with the above process, (taking an observation of the sun at noon, by the same instrument,) gives the true position of the ship on the ocean. Then by consulting the latitude and longitude of the land from which they took their departure, and the port to which they are bound, the true bearing and distance from each place is correctly ascertained; the ship all the while making the best of her way onward, until another observation to correct her dead reckoning. Here passengers and crew, although they are wanderers alone on the trackless ocean, are relieved from their anxiety, and inspired with fresh courage and confidence to pursue their intended voyage. What a beautiful figure this, for the truly humble, faithful followers of Jesus. As the Mariner is here dependent on the celestial scenery, (sun, moon and stars,) to correct every now and then his dead reckoning, so the followers of Jesus are ever seeking from the Sun of Righteousness, whose habitation is in the heavens, a more correct view of their wanderings over the ocean of time, to correct their dead reckoning, and inspire them with unshaken confidence to pursue their pilgrimage toward the heavenly Canaan. BP2 46.1

But ah, how many professed followers of Jesus, after launching out from the shores of sin and folly, with strong determinations to pursue the voyage over life’s rough sea for the heavenly Canaan of rest, have laid down their watch, and thrown by their instruments of observation, and concluded to pursue their onward course and trust alone for their destination to their dead reckoning. But, bless the Lord, there are some that are fully determined to correct their dead reckoning, by watching every opportunity for an observation of the Sun of Righteousness, and by faith cling fast to all the promises, doing as the Prophet has shown them - “Stand continually upon the watch tower in the day time, and set in their ward every night,” watching for all the terrestrial and celestial land marks and heaps in their pathway, “Holding fast that which they have,” (that is their experience,) trusting in the Lord, which makes them as Mount Zion, that cannot be removed, but abideth forever, and as another prophet has it, “the righteous shall also hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger.” BP2 46.2

Now although the pathway of the truly righteous is directly opposite to the world, yet the way marks and heaps which they are to set up, and have in remembrance as they pass along, are so assimilated to the literal, that the wayfaring man need not err. Of the literal in the scripture we will give an instance or two. “The case of Jacob, being overtaken by his father-in-law Laban, they finally made a covenant that they never would pass that place to harm each other, and that they may never forget this covenant, Jacob took a stone and set it up for a pillar (or way mark) and told his brethren to gather stones and make a heap, the margin reads the heap of witness, beacon or watch-tower. Laban says, this heap be witness, and this pillar be witness, that I will not pass over this heap to thee, and that thou shalt not pass over this heap and this pillar unto me for harm.” Genesis 31, 43-52. BP2 47.1

2. “The curse of God rests on all such as remove their neighbor’s land mark.” Deuteronomy 27:17. This undoubtedly means both literal and spiritual, as in the case in Isaiah 10:13. “The Assyrian (the oppressors of God’s people) make their boasts in removing the bounds of the people (or land marks.) God tells his people not to be afraid of them, for yet a very little while and the indignation shall cease, and mine anger in their destruction.” 24,25 v. BP2 47.2

Hosea says the Princes of Judea were like those that remove the bound. 5:10. The spiritual leaders in Israel remove the bound, and make sad the heart of the humble seeker. This has been done undoubtedly since the days of the going out of Egypt, but never in so general and in such a peculiar manner as within the last thirty months. Hence the pressing necessity for God’s people to set their hearts toward the highway which they went, and look well to, and remember their way marks and high heaps, or as Jesus taught those in the Philadelphia church “to hold fast that which they had.” BP2 47.3

Our object then is to present in a prophetical and spiritual point of view, the way marks and high heaps which the people of God have bitterly experienced in these last days. BP2 48.1

In directing your mind to this great and all absorbing subject, I wish you to look back on your pathway to the year 1840, when the subject of the preaching of the second Advent of Jesus aroused the dormant feelings of his people to examine their bibles as they never had done before. The best view, and I know not but the only one which was published down to May 1844, will be found in volume 1 of the A D V E N T S H I E L D and R E V I E W, under the head of Rise and Progress of Adventism, Article II. As all of my readers may not be privileged to see this standard work which marks the Second Advent believer’s pathway as above stated, I shall take the liberty occasionally to make some quotations therefrom to show the motives, feelings and determinations, of some of those who led the way in this glorious work. But to the subject of the text. Where in the Bible do we find the light in our pathway, showing us in 1840 what to call our BP2 48.2