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Heavenly Visions

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    CHURCH BUILT UP BY THE GIFT

    Yes, brethren, it is a gift that has built up this church in all the world, and it is building us up today. Even in the lands where our people have but a few fragments of these writings in their own language, God has wrought in a wonderful way for the edifying, the building up, of the church.HEVI 91.4

    Again, notice what this gift has wrought in building up great lines of work. It is a building gift. Mrs. White spent about eight years in Australia up to 1900. I was over in Australia in 1931. One of our business brethren, taking me in his car to an appointment, told me a story. He said: “Some time ago I met one of Australia’s leading businessmen, now largely retired from affairs. Knowing that I had become a Seventh-day Adventist, he said to me: ‘Do you know, Mr. Sandeman, I hold it as one of the cherished memories of my life that it was my privilege in representing the business community, to welcome Mrs. E. G. White to Australia when she arrived from America many years ago. She impressed me as being a remarkable woman; and we recognized the fact that her stay in this country contributed much to the development of the work your people have built up. I shall always count it a privilege that I had a part in welcoming that gifted lady to this country.HEVI 91.5

    Now, you think of Mrs. White, a quiet, unassuming, motherly little woman, not given to appearing in public save as she might be asked to deliver a lecture on Christian temperance or Christian home in some town hall. Yet the people of the world saw that there was something in her work that built up. And wherever she went, things were built up. Why, brethren, let the critics talk. Men of the world have recognized the things that this gift was continually doing, for seventy years. It was a gift that God conferred on a sister, and where she went, people saw the edifying, the building up, of the body of Christ.HEVI 91.6

    Let us look just for a few minutes at three great institutional departments-the publishing work, the educational work, the medical work.HEVI 91.7

    The Edinburgh International Review of Missions (Scotland) said some time ago that of all the denominations, the Seventh-day Adventists were making the greatest use of the press. How does it come? In the Chinese Recorder, some years ago, a writer said that the Seventh-day Adventists had “put more brains” into their publishing work than anybody else. Looking on, they think we must be a clever, brainy people. But we know where the credit belongs for the launching of our publishing work.HEVI 91.8

    In the early days, when the leading brethren had held a meeting late into the night, and dispersed deciding that they could not begin the publishing work, God gave to Mrs. White a vision. In the morning that young woman of twenty-two said to her husband: “I have a message for you. You must begin to print a little paper... Let it be small at first; but as the people read, they will send you means with which to print... It was shown to me to be like streams of light that went clear round the world.”HEVI 92.1

    James White brought out the first little paper in 1849, and our ever-growing publishing work has been like streams of light around the world. Not one of those leading brethren would have said that in 1848. Only the agent of the gift of the Spirit of prophecy could have dared to say that from that little beginning the light would go streaming round the whole world. We have seen it with our own eyes, have we not?HEVI 92.2

    But it has been the colporteur work that has impressed men of the world. In fact, one of the pioneers of Korean missions, Doctor Gale, once wrote that the Seventh-day Adventists had been wiser than any of the others in their work, referring to the bookwork in Korea. He said: “I move that we take off our hats, and make a low bow to the Seventh-day Adventists.” Now these people of the world generally have little use for the idea of the Spirit of prophecy today. But, in reality, that low bow is a bow to the gift of the Spirit of prophecy in this advent movement.HEVI 92.3

    In 1879, when there was not a colporteur on earth, Mrs. White wrote to the publishing managers at Battle Creek that some things of grave importance had “not been receiving due attention.” (See Testimonies for the Church 4:388, 389.) She urged that books teaching the message should be brought out to be carried to the people in their homes. Hundreds of people, it was said, should be out selling books in the cities and villages and country. That message of 1879 woke things up. Soon the colporteur work began, the publishing work expanded. The world, looking on, says, “They are clever, they put brains into it.” But back of it all was the gift of the Spirit of prophecy building up our publishing work.HEVI 92.4

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