“The Visions Were Right”

During the week Mr. S began to get curious as to the content of the testimony he had received many years earlier and had placed, unopened, in the bottom of his trunk. With trembling hand he took the letter from the trunk, tore the envelope open, and eagerly read it. The next Sabbath, after Elder Farnsworth had finished speaking on the Spirit of prophecy, he was on his feet again and said, as we read in this same letter to Mrs. White:EGWMR 20.14

“I received a testimony myself twenty-eight years ago. I took it home and locked it up in my trunk, and I never read it till last Thursday.EGWMR 21.1

“He said he did not believe his testimony, although he did not know a word there was in it. He said he was afraid to read it for fear it would make him mad, but, said he, ‘I was mad all the time nearly.’ But finally he said, ‘Brethren, every word of the testimony for me is true, and I accept it, and I have come to that place where I firmly believe they are all of God, and if I had heeded the one God sent to me, as well as the rest, it would have changed the whole course of my life, and I should have been a very different man.EGWMR 21.2

“Any man that is honest must say that they lead a man toward God and the Bible always. If he is honest he will say that; if he won’t say that he is not honest.EGWMR 21.3

“If I had heeded them it would have saved me a world of trouble. The testimonies said there was to be no more definite time preached after the ‘44 movement, but I thought that I knew as much as an old woman’s visions, as I used to term it. May God forgive me! But to my sorrow, I found the visions were right, and the man who thought he knew it all was all wrong, for I preached the time in 1854, and spent all I had, when if I had heeded them I should have saved myself all that and much more. The Testimonies are right and I am wrong.’”—Ibid.EGWMR 21.4

Then the aging man said in conclusion. “Brethren, I am too old to undo what I have done, I am too feeble to get out to our large meetings, but I want you to tell our people everywhere that another rebel has surrendered”—Ibid.EGWMR 21.5

For twenty-eight years the counsels and cautions which would have saved Brother S from a bitter course in life were in his home, unopened and unread. How much our experience may be like his. Although we are not named individually, yet in the Spirit of prophecy books there are invaluable counsels, instruction, and information presented there for our personal benefit; yet the books may remain on the shelf unopened, the messages unread, and the counsels unheeded. If so, are we any less responsible than was old Brother S?EGWMR 21.6