Letter
561
disappointed, that they prove untrue to God and the truth; but we feel
a deeper sorrow as we think of Jesus, who has purchased them with
His own blood. We would give all our possessions to save one, but
find we cannot do this. We would give life itself to save one soul unto
life eternal, but even this sacrifice would not do the work. The one
great sacrifice has been made in the life, the mission, and the death of
Jesus Christ. Oh, that minds would contemplate the greatness of that
sacrifice! Then might they be better able to comprehend the greatness
of salvation.
And now, Brother O, you who have had so great light, such an
abundance of evidence of Bible truth, go not onward and upward
with those who will triumph with the truth at last. You now take
the side of the first great rebel, to make void the law of God; and
he will lead others in the same path of transgression of God’s holy
law, to ridicule our faith. When the judgment shall sit, and everyone
shall be judged out of those things written in the books, how will
your case then appear? You will look on this one and that one who
would have walked in the way of God’s commandments if you had
not surrounded them with the atmosphere of unbelief, if you had not
perverted the Scriptures by misinterpreting their meaning, and led
them away from strict obedience to God’s holy law. Can you then look
on these countenances with pleasure? You will hear the voice of the
great Judge saying: “Who hath required this at your hand?”
[627]
Your present wife has had no deep religious experience in self-
denial, in self-sacrifice, in communion with God, in belief of the
truth. She would easily be led from obedience to God to transgression.
Your children will follow where their father leads the way; and unless
some special providence shall rescue them, their disobedience and
transgression will be laid upon your soul. The Judge of all the earth
confronts you with that holy law of whose claims you are not ignorant.
Your character and the characters of your wife and of your children
are judged by that holy standard of righteousness. You have led them
to transgress, and their ruin the holy law of God charges upon you.
Through various devices, with which Satan is fully acquainted, you
have worked for time and for eternity, trying to make others believe
you an honest man in leaving the light of truth. Are you so? No, no. It
is a deception, a terrible deception. What can you answer to God in
that day? You will then have a terrible dread and fear of your Creator.