The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 4

XIII. Important Conference Convened at Edson’s Place

As before noted, when copies of the initial Day-Dawn presentation came into the hands of Joseph Bates and James White and various other Eastern Adventists, many readily accepted the position set forth. It was therefore the Day-Dawn articles that opened up correspondence between their sponsors and the New England leaders. Later a conference of the “scattered remnant” was appointed for Edson’s place, and these Eastern brethren were invited to meet with them. Among them, Bates and White both started for the conference. White, however, was called back to conduct a funeral, and was unable to be present. But Bates arrived, and was invited to participate in the services. This he did. PFF4 903.3

Bates’s burden was the relation of the seventh-day Sabbath to the sanctuary position. During his presentation Edson became so interested and delighted that he could hardly keep his seat. And upon its conclusion he was on his feet with the declaration: “That is light and truth! The seventh day is the Sabbath, and I am with you to keep it!” He had already caught certain glimpses of the Sabbath through his study of the sanctuary, the ark, and the Ten Commandments, and through reading “a few lines from T. M. Preble,” ²⁸ but he had not yet seen its importance. This was the first public instance of joining the sanctuary and Sabbath positions in united relationship, these constituting two of three distinctive tenets of faith characterizing this slowly forming body of believers, which had their inception in widely separated spots. (See map on p. 845.) PFF4 904.1

So the Port Gibson group was the first to take its stand on the dual nature, or two phases, of Christ’s high priestly ministry in relation to the heavenly sanctuary service in general. A little later, in 1848, in the series of six important “Sabbath Conferences,” one was to be held in Edson’s barn, hallowed with sacred memories of the hour of prayer and assurance on the early morning of October 23, 1844. Nearly all of the Sabbathkeepers in western New York and adjoining States were in attendance somewhere in the series. These conferences will be carefully discussed in chapter 47. PFF4 904.2

We must now notice the second of three widely separated groups, or nuclei, of the emerging Seventh-day Adventist denomination. The first group, centered in western New York, who had studied the prophetic bearing of the sanctuary teaching, soon made contact with the second nucleus in New Hampshire—the small group who had begun to observe the seventh-day Sabbath of the fourth commandment. The rise of Sabbatarian Adventism will next be traced. PFF4 905.1