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God’s People Delivered
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lately pale, anxious, and haggard, are now aglow with wonder, faith,
and love. Their voices rise in triumphant song: “God is our refuge
and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we
fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be
carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and
the troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.”
[
Psalm 46:1-3
.]
While these words of holy trust ascend to God, the clouds sweep
back, and the starry heavens are seen, unspeakably glorious in con-
trast with the black and angry firmament on either side. The glory of
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Heaven is beaming from the gates ajar. Then there appears against
the sky a hand holding two tables of stone folded together. The
hand opens the tables, and there are revealed the precepts of the
decalogue, traced as with a pen of fire. The words are so plain that
all can read them. Memory is aroused, the darkness of superstition
and heresy is swept from every mind, and God’s ten words, brief,
comprehensive, and authoritative, are presented to the view of all
the inhabitants of earth. Wonderful code! wonderful occasion!
It is impossible to describe the horror and despair of those who
have trampled upon God’s holy requirements. The Lord gave them
his law; they might have compared their characters with it, and
learned their defects while yet there was opportunity for repentance
and reform; but in order to secure the favor of the world, they set
aside its precepts and taught others to transgress. They have en-
deavored to compel God’s people to profane his Sabbath. Now they
are condemned by that law which they have despised. With awful
distinctness they see that they are without excuse. They chose whom
they would serve and worship. “Then shall ye return, and discern
between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God
and him that serveth him not.” [
Malachi 3:18
.]
The enemies of God’s law, from the ministers down to the least
among them, have a new conception of truth and duty. Too late
they see that the Sabbath of the fourth commandment is the seal of
the living God. Too late they see the true nature of their spurious
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Sabbath, and the sandy foundation upon which they have been build-
ing. They find that they have been fighting against God. Religious
teachers have led souls to perdition while professing to guide them
to the gates of Paradise. Not until the day of final accounts will it