Appendix
569
“to the border of his sanctuary.” Thus these texts do not prove that the
earth is the sanctuary, but rather the reverse.
Jehoshaphat’s prayer gives the true idea of the relation of that
land to the sanctuary: “Art not thou our God, who didst drive out the
inhabitants of this land before thy people Israel, and gavest it to the
seed of Abraham thy friend forever? And they dwelt therein, and have
built thee a sanctuary therein for thy name.”
2 Chronicles 20:7, 8
. This
corresponds to the command in
Exodus 25:8
: “And let them make me
a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.” In this same book is given
a minute description of the sanctuary, its erection, and approval by the
Lord. The process of cleansing the sanctuary is described in
Leviticus
16
. While the children of Israel possessed Canaan, Solomon built a
temple, in which was a holy and a most holy place; and the vessels
of the movable sanctuary, which was made in the desert of Sinai,
were transferred to the temple. This was then the sanctuary,—the
dwelling-place of God’s glory upon the earth.
Some have inferred that the earthly sanctuary was a symbol of the
church, reasoning from those scriptures in which the church is called
the temple of God. But it is not infrequently the case in scripture
that in different connections the same figure is employed to represent
different objects. The Bible plainly teaches that the holy places of the
earthly sanctuary were “patterns of things in the heavens.”
Hebrews
9:23
. The expression, “temple of God,” is sometimes employed to
designate the sanctuary in heaven, and sometimes the church. Its
significance, in each case, must be determined by the context.
Note 7. Page 429—Almost all Adventists, including Mr. Miller,
did, for a short time after their disappointment in 1844, believe that the
world had received its last warning. They could hardly think otherwise,
with their faith in the message which they had given,—“the hour of
[685]
his judgment is come.”
Revelation 14:6, 7
. They naturally thought that
this proclamation must close the dispensation.
But the idea that the work of the gospel was finished was soon
renounced, except by some fanatical ones who would neither be coun-
seled nor receive instruction. One class who relinquished the view that
“the door of mercy was shut,” were led to do this because they discov-
ered that Other messages were to be proclaimed after that declaring,
the hour of judgment is come; and that that of the third angel, the last
one, was to go to “many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings.”