July

Salvation Promised, July 1

Look to Me, and be saved, all you ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. Isaiah 45:22.FH 194.1

When Adam and Eve were created and placed in their Eden home, they had a knowledge of the law that was to govern them.... When they transgressed that law, fell from that state of happy innocence, and became sinners in the sight of God, the dark future of the fallen race was not relieved by a single ray of hope. Because of the transgression of the divine law, paradise was lost to the human family, the curse was pronounced upon the earth, and the reign of death commenced.FH 194.2

But Heaven pitied fallen men and women, and the plan of salvation was devised. When the curse was pronounced upon the race, in connection with the curse there was given the promise of pardon through a Savior who was to come. This promise was the star of hope that lighted up the gloom that, like the pall of death, hung over the future of Adam's descendants and of the world which was given them as their dominion. The gospel was first preached to Adam and Eve in Eden. They sincerely repented of their guilt, believed the promise of God, and were saved from utter ruin....FH 194.3

For three hundred years [Enoch] walked with God, giving to the world the example of a pure and spotless life, one which was in marked contrast with the lives of his contemporaries in that self-willed and perverse generation, who openly disregarded God's law and boasted of their freedom from its restraints. But his testimony and his example were alike unheeded, because men and women loved sin better than holiness. Enoch served God with singleness of heart; and the Lord communicated to him His will and through holy vision revealed to him the great events connected with Christ's second appearing. And then this favored servant of the Lord was borne to heaven by angels without seeing death.FH 194.4

At length the wickedness became so great that God could no longer bear with it; and He made known to Noah that because of the continual transgressions of His law, He would destroy those whom He had created by a flood of water which He would bring upon the earth. Noah and his family were obedient to the divine law, and for their loyalty to the God of heaven they were saved from the destruction that overwhelmed the ungodly world around them. Thus the Lord preserved to Himself a people in whose hearts was His law.—Signs of the Times, April 22, 1886.FH 194.5