“God has a church. It is not the great cathedral, neither is it the national establishment, neither is it the various denominations; it is the people who love God and keep His commandments. “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20).” Letter 108, 1886. 17MR 82.2
“As soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.” (Isa. 46:8.) The above language was spoken concerning God’s ancient people; but it is equally applicable to His people now. We are in pressing need of the Spirit’s influence, and we must have the anguish of soul no less than they. At the time this language was used, Israel had fallen to a low condition, but their hearts yearned for a divine blessing. Proof is given that whenever a great blessing has been bestowed on the church, it has been preceded by a great searching of heart. Before any great deliverance has been wrought for the people of God they have cried earnestly to Him. Israel was sorely oppressed in Egypt, and as a natural result they became crushed in spirit. (1Sam. 10:18) God would not have it continue so. But before He could work, they must cry. God heard, and delivered them. The whole nation cried, not one alone, “O God of Abraham, deliver us from these stripes and this cruel bondage.” (Gen. 15:13; Ex. 1:13, 14) The result of their travail is seen in God’s smiting the field of Zoan (Ps. 78:12, 43) with plagues, and delivering his people with a high hand and an out-stretched arm. We may remember with profit the days of Josiah. When he saw that the book of the law was neglected in the temple, he was troubled for fear that misery would come upon his people for their sins. Then there came a reformation, causing the passover to be observed as never before. (2Kings 23:21-24) Sorrow of heart among God’s people wrought a happy change. Travail before increase in the church has been God’s plan all along to the present.
Look at the disciples sitting in their upper room. Their hearts are torn with grief at the death of their Lord. Each one is intent on receiving the promised Comforter. There with one mind they tarried, but not without agony and prayer. Finally the Comforter was given, and three thousand were converted to God. (Acts 2:41) Such prayer and agony must exist among us, not of one man or twenty men, but of all Zion’s people; then we shall see a mighty impetus given to the work of God.
Luther was not the only man who brought about the Reformation. There were hundreds who cried in the forests of Germany and on the hills of Switzerland. Others cried from the dungeons of Holland. Women who baked their Bibles in loaves of bread to conceal them added their cries. God’s people were then in travail. As the result, they were liberated from the bondage of the pope, and the Vatican was shaken to its base.
The people of God at the present time have a work of no less importance than Luther’s. If we have the burden of soul which they felt, we shall have a triumph even greater than they experienced. Theirs was a deliverance from the pope; ours will be a deliverance from the power of Satan. Oh let us sow liberally while we may expect a hundredfold. Why are we so slow to work when we know this is our last struggle with the enemy? We may talk the truth eloquently—all form and no power. God may bless some such labors. The truth sometimes converts people when it is spoken by men of unclean hearts. The bread brought to Elijah nourished him; but the ravens were ravens still. If God has blessed truth in the hands of the erring, what may we not expect him to do if we become pure ?
The travail of Christ—think of it. He wept, and sweat great drops of blood. He endured great trials, and fastings, and spent sleepless nights in prayer, and behold the mighty work done by Him. (Lk. 22:14) When our hearts break for sinners, then will sinners’ hearts melt under this message. Scores were converted by the sermons of Whitefield and Wesley. They were full of the Spirit of God—not formality. I know a man who gave a lecture on present truth. No one seemed affected. He grasped a farmer’s hand and sobbed, “Are you bound to be lost ?” There was an appeal that he could not resist. That was the Spirit speaking through a soul in travail. How often we come back defeated after a long argument with an awakened mind. Then we feel what weak creatures we are, and that God must take the case into his own hand. Yes, the travail is ours; the work is God’s. How humiliating to preach truth and have men pleased who should be smarting under it as they would under fire. We may have theory, but it is the Spirit that troubles hearts. The time has fully come when our scattered people should flee to their chambers, and cry mightily to God. Good results would follow. Our ministers would be clothed with might, and the truth would go to the dark corners of the earth. There is no hope of the world’s being stirred until there is more travail in the church. Through the church light is to be given. In it God’s truth is to be preserved from its enemies. Do we feel it, brethren? Christ multiplied the bread, but the multitude could only get it through His disciples. It is time for us to awake and seek the Lord and the good of dying millions. Why are we not stronger in the power of God ? Is it not because we shun responsibilities, and harbor unbelief ?
Those who depend more on the helps God has kindly given us in our publications than on him will have no travail of soul. If God’s work prospers when done by machinery, it is because of His blessing and not of our strength. Our church plow too often enters the furrow instead of being kept constantly breaking up fallow ground. Satan’s plow is always in the field. He leaves no headlands, but plows while we sleep. May a knowledge of his activity and vigilance stir us up, and awaken anxiety on the part of the church. We may each find a place to labor. Not an idler need be found. Oh brethren, are only God’s friends asleep, and his enemies awake ? Are none of the twelve awake but Judas? When the church is not serving God, there is always mischief brewing within. A church bearing no fruit will be cursed like a barren fig-tree. (Matt. 21:19) Would to God that dead churches might come to life. They breed skepticism. The fate of those who came not up to the help of the Lord in the past, will be ours if we falter here on the verge of eternity. He who hinders the work of all is the worldly-minded professor. He does not openly violate and of the commandments; but he has care for worldly things, and is carless in regard to spiritual things. He has just enough grace to make him hope he is a Christian, but not enough to prove him one.
While souls are perishing, we must wave personal differences. Even golden apples must not tempt us in this race for life. Every man who is not a worker in the message is a hinderer. In working for others we get our own souls watered. With our hands to the plow, let us not look back. Let us gird our loins for the trying scenes before us. May our travail for souls increase as we near the promised land, and at last may it be said that we have done what we could. (Mk. 14:8)
D. DOWNER.
The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald Oct. 14, 1875