This General Conference Special to Seventh-day Adventists resolves the questions: Who is the Elijah today? Is he to restore all things? What to do with offshoots?
These questions are being agitated among us by an ever-increasing family of off-shoots, the most prominent and the most tormenting of which is “The Shepherd’s Rod.” In truth its tormentings have grown to such proportions as to bring every true Seventh-day Adventist squarely face to face with it. Indeed, brethren, its growing gravity challenges each one of us no longer to dodge the issue as did the Jews in their day, and thereby lose out, but rather to meet it as Christ met the Sanhedrin, and thus gloriously win out.
These questions are being agitated among us by an ever-increasing family of off-shoots, the most prominent and the most tormenting of which is “The Shepherd’s Rod.” In truth its tormentings have grown to such proportions as to bring every true Seventh-day Adventist squarely face to face with it. Indeed, brethren, its growing gravity challenges each one of us no longer to dodge the issue as did the Jews in their day, and thereby lose out, but rather to meet it as Christ met the Sanhedrin, and thus gloriously win out.
This General Conference year should resolve in every mind, once for all, the questions as to who is who and what is what. Even if you are not one who is personally tormented by the Rod, still you should fortify yourselves with the facts, so you may be able to administer the healing ointment of Truth to those who are suffering from its torments.
To bring before you the seriousness
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of the situation in which the church finds herself at this late hour, and the remedy which God would have His people apply so as to set them free from this “offshoot” annoyance, I am therefore making this second attempt to set before you the revealed facts so that no one, whether minister or layman, need longer walk blindly and in darkness.
Since there is general agreement that Inspiration direct from the Throne of God is our only spiritual eyesight, then we should be able to see eye to eye if we let the Spirit of God have His way with us. Especially so, dear fellow believers, since the time is dead ripe to look into the situation, now that God’s people everywhere are aroused by the questions:
“Has Elijah the prophet already come?” “Is the ancient prophet to appear in person himself?” “Is a group of people to do a work similar to that of the ancient Elijah?” Or what?
As no one can in either honesty or impunity stand aloof to the answer which comes from God’s infallible Word, surely you brethren will now give the most serious attention to this urgent consideration, letting nothing distract you from it for you, as well as I, must realize that it means life and eternity to all of us.
The serious issue to which these questions
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give rise, demands that we cease fooling ourselves or letting others make fools of us. If the questions cannot be answered in positive Truth, far better, then, that they be left on the shelf until the scroll unfolds further, than that they be answered by men’s idle tales, which only confuse and confound.
Now we may ask, Has the scroll unrolled far enough to clear up all these questions? Is the Spirit of God pleading for us to stop, look, and listen, or are we still to wait? For the Divine answer let us open our eyes wise to the light of “the more sure Word of prophecy” Itself, now shining more and more on our pathway:
“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: and he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.” Mall 4:5, 6.
In the light which this prophecy sheds on the subject, no one can possibly escape the conclusion that a prophet — a person — is to be sent “before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord,” and that thus only can there be a group of people in connection with Elijah’s message. The Scriptures make definite and sure the promise, the time, and the work, also the
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way to our security in the great and dreadful day, “lest,” as says the Lord, “I come and smite the earth with a curse.” Mall 4:6.
No one can afford to commit the absurdity of either treating lightly or of kindling sparks of his own on the subject. We should remember, moreover, that it is not possible that God should leave a one of us in darkness if we want to know the Truth, and if we are mindful of what God would have us to do. (“The Great Controversy,” p… 560). To the end that this may be the happy experience of all of us, we should pray that the Spirit Who leads into all Truth would direct this effort.
However, I would remind you, Brethren, that no prophet of God has ever been welcomed by the church. On the contrary, each in his time was rejected, abused, and most of them were martyred by the ones to whom they were sent — the very ones who were supposed to be serving God! Indeed, the Lord Himself paid the same price. For this very reason we must remember that when the last prophet comes he will have the greatest opposition to meet, for Satan well knows that if he loses now, he loses forever. What makes Elijah’s work especially hard is that Christendom has long been drilled in the idea that no prophet is to come, that there is no necessity for one, that it has enough revealed Truth to carry it inside the Pearly Gates.
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It is therefore only to be expected that the predicted Elijah will be denounced as a false prophet, perhaps even as the anti-Christ, offshoot, or what not.
Moreover, the old Devil has already put all his forces to work, piping pleasing tunes to lure Truth seekers to climb aboard his golden bandwagon. Its glittering tinsel of truth is already beguiling many with his wares while his captains and generals are to the top of their voices shouting their “Hallelujahs,” “Holy Ghost,” “gift of healing,” “gift of tongues,” “gift of miracles,” and all the rest, although the entire fanfare is devoid even of a spark of life. Every wind of doctrine will be blowing, false revivals and reformations will be at their peak. Everything that can be done will be done to distort the Truth and thus distract and dishearten believers and draw their attention to something other than the message of Elijah.
Thus will be the Devil’s deal while the day of God is approaching, and while Elijah is making the announcement of it as the scroll unrolls and while the prophecies concerning the day of God are being unsealed. His work and his interpretation of the prophecies for the great day will identify him as the promised Elijah the prophet (“Testimonies to Ministers,” p. 475),
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and this will enrage the Devil as never before. Nevertheless, one’s only safety will be in the teaching of Elijah, for there will be no other voice of timely Truth and authority to whom one may turn. Any others will lead their victims blind-folded into perdition.
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