Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 25 (1910 - 1915)
Lt 104, 1911
Jones, A. T.
NP
November 19, 1911 [typed]
Portions of this letter are published in 13 Crisis Years.
Elder A. T. Jones:
I have given you instruction in straight, clear lines in regard to the perverting influence under which you have placed yourself. Your lips have uttered perverse things. You have denied the clear light of truth and have linked up with strange elements. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 1
I gave you a correct statement in regard to your position, but you went on doing the very things the Lord had warned you not to do. It has been a strange course for one who has been enlightened by the Lord as you have been, but you have acted very much like a man who has lost his bearings. The question is, Do you think you can still hold your membership in the Seventh-day Adventist church and go on hurting the influence of this people by the tracts that you publish? You have done a cruel work. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 2
I have warned you in regard to these things. I presented the case as the Lord presented it to me. When your blind eyes were opened, when your spiritual eyesight is restored by the heavenly anointing, you will see that you have a work to do for your own soul and to undo what you have done to confirm others in unbelief. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 3
I think you have never yet been thoroughly converted. You have seen the strait gate, but you have not passed through it to the narrow way. In view of your recent strange experience, we cannot have confidence in you. For years your religious life has been of a character not in accordance with the Bible standard. For years you have been as a man who was in some things departing from the faith. And for a long time you have been disjointed in your experience. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 4
The experience that you and others had at the Union Conference held at Berrien Springs was an experience that need not have been; for the Lord gave you a convincing testimony that He was at work. But your spirit and experience changed until you were ranked by heavenly angels as a man departing from the faith and giving heed to seducing spirits. Your voice was changed and your countenance, O how changed it was. As scenes passed before me, you appeared as one in harmony with evil angels. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 5
If you are truly seeking to become one in spirit and faith with the remnant people of God, if you will confess your sins and give evidence of genuine repentance and conversion, you have the privilege of uniting with us. But if you suppose that by making a spurious move, you can deceive God’s people, I must tell you that we do not care to encourage a repetition of the past. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 6
You are a man of strong impulses. I have a report of that meeting at Fresno where you and Elder Corliss were so deeply moved; and if I should see an attempt being made to hurt us, I should bring the report and all the circumstances before our people. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 7
We should rejoice greatly if you would be really converted. The Lord will not receive you as a faithful minister, to be trusted with His flock, unless you throw your lot in with his people, to confirm them in the faith, not to rule them according to human ideas. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 8
The Lord comes to those whose hearts turn to Him as He came to Elijah in Horeb. Has the Lord been working with you, to transform your heart, to cast down your evil imaginations? When the Lord came to Elijah, a storm of fire and broken rocks preceded His coming. Are the rocks in your experience still unbroken? Has the fallow ground of self-righteousness and self-sufficiency been broken up? Scenes have been presented to me in which I have heard you use rough, harsh language, coarse and denunciatory. Close beside you stood the father of lies, inspiring you with his satanic energy, and you uttered words of which you should ever be ashamed. These harsh, unbecoming words were registered in the books of heaven. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 9
If you wish to renew your covenant with God by confession and repentance and rebaptism, we shall rejoice with you. When you are converted, your self-sufficiency will disappear, and you will become meek and lowly in heart. When you see and repent of your mistakes, you will be a great blessing in helping others. The destroyer now takes advantage of your self-righteousness to weave into your experience his own ideas and theories. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 10
When you are really desirous of uniting with those from whom you have withdrawn yourself, the testimony will be borne that you looked up after you had stepped off the platform on which you had previously stood, and that hands were put beneath your arms, and you and Elder Waggoner were lifted once more on to the platform, standing there with shining countenances and uplifted hands. Has this time come? 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 11
I have written this to you on the Sabbath day, and the Lord has helped me. If there is a work of reformation going on in your heart, if you are convinced of your error, we shall say, The way is open, come. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 12
*****
Elder A. T. Jones:
You must not suppose that we will give you the right of way to spoil the flock of God. In order to be a clean vessel, consecrated to the work of God, you must be thoroughly converted. You show a reckless desperation in your efforts to gain the confidence of the people of God. The charge has come to me, Watch for the souls that are in danger of being led astray. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 13
*****
When the Spirit of God convicts A. T. Jones, and he sees the wicked, desperate course he has pursued, and is filled with alarm for the safety of his soul, we shall all know this. I would not open the way to place him before our people on any pretense of his. He has gone against direct warnings given by those who were earnestly trying to save him. He has set himself in direct opposition to the work the Lord laid out for him and has gone to desperate lengths in walking and working in defiance of light. When he sees himself as the Lord sees him, there will be on his part a repentance that needs not to be repented of. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 14
The message given me to bear concerning him is, If he does not truly repent, let him alone. I do not advise that our people accept him as a safe teacher. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 15
At the Fresno meeting, Elder Jones made a heartbroken confession. He and Elder Corliss confessed to each other and to the people. At this time they determined to stand under the banner of Prince Emmanuel. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 16
But where is A. T. Jones now? He has departed from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits. He is blind and cannot see afar off. He has united with others who have despised the Lord’s warnings. The Lord would have helped them if they had come to the light, and He will help them now if they will repent. But we dare not let them, in their present spiritual condition, have influence with the people of God. The note of warning must be raised. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 17
“But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways, by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of.” [2 Peter 2:1, 2.] 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 18
The course that A. T. Jones has pursued has fulfilled these words: 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 19
“And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you, whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not. For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment, and spared not the old world, but saved Noah, the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly, and turning the city of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly, and delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked, ... the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptation, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished.” [Verses 3-9.] 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 20
The Lord gave light, but there were some who would not receive it. Even when the messages of warning were coming to them, they exalted themselves. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 21
“For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were clean escaped from them who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption, for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage. For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them.” [Verses 18-21.] 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 22
“He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.” [Proverbs 29:1.] 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 23
There are many who would rejoice to see you turning square about. But if it is your intention to deceive if possible the very elect, the Lord will reveal this. 25LtMs, Lt 104, 1911, par. 24