Impending Conflict
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Thus the accusation urged of old against the servant of God will be
repeated and upon grounds equally well established: “And it came to
pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that
troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou,
and thy father’s house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of
the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim.”
1 Kings 18:17, 18
. As the
wrath of the people shall be excited by false charges, they will pursue
a course toward God’s ambassadors very similar to that which apostate
Israel pursued toward Elijah.
The miracle-working power manifested through spiritualism will
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exert its influence against those who choose to obey God rather than
men. Communications from the spirits will declare that God has sent
them to convince the rejecters of Sunday of their error, affirming that
the laws of the land should be obeyed as the law of God. They will
lament the great wickedness in the world and second the testimony of
religious teachers that the degraded state of morals is caused by the
desecration of Sunday. Great will be the indignation excited against
all who refuse to accept their testimony.
Satan’s policy in this final conflict with God’s people is the same
that he employed in the opening of the great controversy in heaven.
He professed to be seeking to promote the stability of the divine
government, while secretly bending every effort to secure its overthrow.
And the very work which he was thus endeavoring to accomplish he
charged upon the loyal angels. The same policy of deception has
marked the history of the Roman Church. It has professed to act as
the vicegerent of Heaven, while seeking to exalt itself above God and
to change His law. Under the rule of Rome, those who suffered death
for their fidelity to the gospel were denounced as evildoers; they were
declared to be in league with Satan; and every possible means was
employed to cover them with reproach, to cause them to appear in the
eyes of the people and even to themselves as the vilest of criminals. So
it will be now. While Satan seeks to destroy those who honor God’s
law, he will cause them to be accused as lawbreakers, as men who are
dishonoring God and bringing judgments upon the world.
God never forces the will or the conscience; but Satan’s constant
resort—to gain control of those whom he cannot otherwise seduce—is
compulsion by cruelty. Through fear or force he endeavors to rule the
conscience and to secure homage to himself. To accomplish this, he