By John Thiel, Prophetic Sketches of the Remnant Church Seminar, Study 4, mp3

1 Corinthians 1:6 Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you: 7 So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ: 8 Who shall also confirm you unto the end, [that ye may be] blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

We have examined the Old Testament and the New Testament to see Gods church from the time of Christ to the end. We will now examine the writings of Sr White to see the display of Gods remnant church. This is to experience the benefit of what 1 Corinthians has been saying to the people living just prior to the coming of Jesus. To the people who are to be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. To these people God has given the testimony of Christ which was to be confirmed in Gods people to come behind in no gift waiting for our Lord Jesus Christ.

We must not diminish this wonderful gift to prepare us for his coming. This gift of Christ, the testimony of Christ shall confirm you to the end. We know we are living so close in a time when this planet is ready to fold up. We know that is the coming of Jesus. For us to be confirmed to the coming of the end, we need to hear the testimony of Jesus Christ so we will be sealed among the 144,000. The last remnant people are mentioned in Zephaniah, these people who live just now.

Zephaniah 3:12 I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the LORD. 13 The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make [them] afraid.

What did we read in 1 Corinthians? Was it not that we would be blameless? The people who are ready just before the coming of Jesus, in their mouth is found no guile for they are without fault. If we are going to be there, what do we need? We need the testimony of Jesus Christ. We need that to be confirmed among us as by the testimony of Jesus Christ, we will be rendered blameless. It is beyond you and me to be blameless.

Jude 1:24 Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present [you] faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, 25 To the only wise Gods our Saviour, [be] glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and for ever. Amen.

What is he able to do? He is able. Do you believe it? He is able to keep you from falling. He is able to present you faultless. I sometimes wonder whether people really believe that when I hear them say I’m not going to make it. What are they saying? They are saying I doubt God can do it. Of course I’m not going to make it unless Gods takes over my life. Gods is able to keep us from falling and present us blameless. How is he going to do it? By the gift of the testimony of Jesus Christ.

Revelation 19:10 And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See [thou do it] not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Prophecy.

It is good to pay heed to prophecy because by prophecy is a more sure word by which the day star will arise in our hearts The prophetic sketch which identifies the people living right now is Revelation 17.

Revelation 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.

Here are a people who have the testimony of Jesus so that through these agencies they will be blameless. The remnant have the Spirit of Prophecy that will render them blameless. Who is the Spirit of Prophecy? How will he produce this blameless condition?

The Spirit of Truth

Jesus is speaking as a Man on Earth

John 16:12 I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. 13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, [that] shall he speak: and he will show you things to come.

Who? The spirit of truth.

John 16:14 He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall show [it] unto you.

Here is another person who will take of one person Jesus and shall show it unto us.

John 16:7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.

What will he do?

John 16:8 And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:

He will come to us in the Spirit of Prophecy and will do his work. Have you not felt him here? Hasn’t he been convincing us? Hasn’t he been showing us our undone condition and you feel uncomfortable about that? He takes of Jesus and shows him unto you and it gives you comfort. The Holy Spirit is the one in the Spirit of Prophecy who is working. The writings of E G White are a gift to the church and those writings are inspired by the Holy Spirit.

My Saviour declared me to be His messenger. “Your work,” He instructed me, “is to bear My word. Strange things will arise, and in your youth I set you apart to bear the message to the erring ones, to carry the word before unbelievers, and with pen and voice to reprove from the Word actions that are not right. Exhort from the Word. I will make My Word open to you. It shall not be as a strange language. In the true eloquence of simplicity, with voice and pen, the messages that I give shall be heard from one who has never learned in the schools. My Spirit and My power shall be with you. {1SM 32.2}

The things in the writings of E G White are there to reprove and to correct us so we will become blameless. When you read these writings, what are you doing? If this is what is happening to those who will read and absorb them, is it not imperative we spend time absorbing them?

“Be not afraid of man, for My shield shall protect you. It is not you that speaketh: it is the Lord that giveth the messages of warning and reproof. Never deviate from the truth under any circumstances. Give the light I shall give you. The messages for these last days shall be written in books, and shall stand immortalized, to testify against those who have once rejoiced in the light, but who have been led to give it up because of the seductive influences of evil.” {1SM 32.3}

Is it to stand against you or correct you? It’s a choice you make. If you want to fall under the seductive influences of evil which are strong, it’s to testify against you but if you want to open your heart to the gift of Jesus which is the Spirit of Prophecy, it’s there also. Listen and heed to the counsel given. It is not the writings of E G White but the inspired Word of someone else. Is not her that speaks, it’s Jesus. We are to explore the nature and experience of the remnant. It does us well to find the detail in the Spirit of Prophecy.

Who did we discover is the remnant church? We saw Abel and the line from Abel to Noah, to Abraham, to Moses, to Caleb and Joshua, to Elijah, to John the Baptist and to the disciples. All those chronicled in the Old Testament and New Testament, these are the remnant church and the Waldensees and reformers. It took us to the point in time of William Miller and his associates leading on to the people that came through the disappointment and what Seventh Day Adventists experienced under the Three Angels Messages. The reformation experience continues to the First World War. The generation of that time was being tested severely. Here we were are three generations on and what now? Whatever has happened in the past that we have seen in prophecy has been identified.

Through centuries of persecution, conflict, and darkness, God has sustained His church. Not one cloud has fallen upon it that He has not prepared for; not one opposing force has risen to counterwork His work, that He has not foreseen. All has taken place as He predicted. He has not left His church forsaken, but has traced in prophetic declarations what would occur, and that which His Spirit inspired the prophets to foretell has been brought about. All His purposes will be fulfilled. His law is linked with His throne. {AA 11.3}

Prophecy has clearly identified every experience and now here we stand in this moment of earth’s history. Has prophecy clearly illuminated us that we might know clearly what now after the third generation of those who went through the terrible experience of being separated from the Seventh Day Adventist church organisation in 1914? Remember the prayer of Jesus that they should be one with him fright to the end?

The prayer of Christ is not only for those who are now His disciples, but for all those who shall believe on Christ through the words of His disciples, even to the end of the world. Jesus was just about to yield up His life to bring life and immortality to light. Christ, amid His sufferings, and being daily rejected of men, looks down the lines two thousand years to His church which would be in existence in the last days, before the close of this earth’s history. {3SM 18.2}

He sees it and do you think he’s going to leave us in the dark?

The Lord has had a church from that day, through all the changing scenes of time to the present period, 1893. {3SM 18.3}

Where are we now? 2010. Is that still relevant?

An Item of Identification

The Bible sets before us a model church. They are to be in unity with each other, and with God. When believers are united to Christ, the living vine, the result is that they are one with Christ, full of sympathy and tenderness and love. {3SM 18.3}

Here is a Spirit of Prophecy identification of the people who are to stand at the very end. Already we see an item of identification. They are what? They are a people that are connected to the living vine and the result is that they are one with Christ, full of sympathy and tenderness and love. That’s how they are identified but there are many more identification points that we are going to identify.

A careful analysis in the writings of the Spirit of Prophecy reveals that not one organisation is the church of God. All through history, while organisations contained the church, but the organisations were not the church, they contained the church. They were faithful souls which constituted the church on earth. This statement in Upward Look is to be accommodated in all the other statements under the Spirit of Prophecy. This is the understanding of what is God’s church. When people stand in the church, the authorities of their churches like the catholic church say we are the one and only church of God. The reformers said we are the church and Seventh Day Adventists say we are the church and the Seventh Day Adventist Reform Movement says we are the church.

God has a church. It is not the great cathedral, neither is it the national establishment, neither is it the various denominations; it is the people who love God and keep His commandments. “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20). Where Christ is even among the humble few, this is Christ’s church, for the presence of the High and Holy One who inhabiteth eternity can alone constitute a church. {UL 315.5}

Where two or three are present who love and obey the commandments of God, Jesus there presides, let it be in the desolate place of the earth, in the wilderness, in the city enclosed in prison walls. The glory of God has penetrated the prison walls, flooding with glorious beams of heavenly light the darkest dungeon. {UL 315.6}

That is God’s church. How has that church travelled through the organisations down the ages till now? It is not the organisation but the church has travelled through the organisation down to now. Here is the Spirit of Prophecy in the eloquence of simplicity. It is conveyed without any shade of confusion. The church of Jesus Christ among which he himself presides.

As the light and life of men was rejected by the ecclesiastical authorities in the days of Christ, so it has been rejected in every succeeding generation. Again and again the history of Christ’s withdrawal from Judea has been repeated. When the Reformers preached the word of God, they had no thought of separating themselves from the established church; but the religious leaders would not tolerate the light, and those that bore it were forced to seek another class, who were longing for the truth. In our day few of the professed followers of the Reformers are actuated by their spirit. Few are listening for the voice of God, and ready to accept truth in whatever guise it may be presented. Often those who follow in the steps of the Reformers are forced to turn away from the churches they love, in order to declare the plain teaching of the word of God. And many times those who are seeking for light are by the same teaching obliged to leave the church of their fathers, that they may render obedience. {DA 232.2}

They are the church but they had to leave the organisations they love in order to declare the plain teaching of the Word of God because Jesus moved out of the church of their fathers and they have to be where Jesus is. That is where God’s church is, not in the organisation that has just spewed him out. This is God’s remnant church. Will this scenario of people being pushed out of their organisation differ as we come to the end? Is there any new thing under the sun? it is going to happen in every branch of the future. This Word he repeats again and again and those who are not faithful after he has rebuked them, he has to leave them alone and go onto the next one right through to the very end.

What God Does in Dealing with His People

In the very end in regards to organisation interaction with God and his faithful remnant, Ellen white is speaking of the church she was part of:

Unsanctified ministers are arraying themselves against God. They are praising Christ and the God of this world in the same breath. While professedly they receive Christ, they embrace Barabbas, and by their actions say, “Not this Man, but Barabbas.” {TM 409.2}

By their actions? The servant that says in his heart my Lord delayeth his coming eats and drinks with the drunken.

Many will stand in our pulpits with the torch of false prophecy in their hands, kindled from the hellish torch of Satan. {TM 409.3}

They call themselves Jews but they are not, they are of the synagogue of Satan.

If doubts and unbelief are cherished, the faithful ministers will be removed from the people who think they know so much. “If thou hadst known,” said Christ, “even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes.” {TM 409.3}

What is stated? Like in every other generation, what is the separation? The faithful ones remaining and the others go? No it says faithful ministers will be removed from the people who think they know so much. Here is detailed prophetic sketches to understand how it proceeds right through to the end.

Matthew 24:48 But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My Lord delayeth his coming; 49 And shall begin to smite [his] fellowservants, and to eat and drink with the drunken;

The repeating of the picture from the past takes us right through to the present. Those ministers that cannot tolerate the absolute pure truth will begin to smite their fellow servant and that is how they are removed. Cain smote his brother. Why did he smite his brother? Because he couldn’t control him. When the ecclesiasts that have become corrupted mingling together both Christ and the idols, they will not tolerate their fellow brethren because they cannot control them.

The Last Generation Remnant

The war that Satan makes is at the hand of their own brethren.

The opposition which Christ received came from his own nation, who would have been greatly blessed had they accepted him. In like manner the remnant church receive opposition from those who profess to be their brethren. {RH, August 28, 1883 par. 13}

Just as Jesus was pushed out, the remnant church receive opposition from their own brethren. The faithful remnant will be pushed out by their own brethren. That is what is plainly stated in the prophetic sketches in the Spirit of Prophecy which is to confirm us in this dreadful experience we go through. Here is a distinction for identifying these faithful remnant people.

Justification by faith in Christ will be made manifest in transformation of character. This is the sign to the world of the truth of the doctrines we profess. The daily evidence that we are a living church is seen in the fact that we are practicing the Word. A living testimony goes forth to the world in consistent Christian action. {6BC 1071.1}

It declares to a world apostatized that there is a people who believe that our safety is in clinging to the Bible. This testimony is in unmistakable distinction from that of the great apostate church, which adopts human wisdom and authority in place of the wisdom and authority of God (Letter 83, 1896). {6BC 1071.2}

What is to distinguish the remnant people from the apostate church? Adopting the wisdom and authority of God in contrast to the wisdom and authority of human control. There is the careful spiritual insight you need to gain. What is being exercised in the church organisation? Is it the authority that is being delineated and exercised by Jesus? Abraham commanded his household after him. How? He had gravity over his home. He didn’t say do as I say like so many fathers do. He had gravity so the family would do as he says because they knew that he had authority. They did it not because he shattered their nerves by commanding them and by sending sensations off fear through their system, but by the authority of heaven which wins the heart by intelligent appreciation. That is the distinction of God’s remnant ministry. That people do it not because they are commanded, but because they love to obey him and for him to be their authoritarian.

How the Angels Are to Gather the Elect

Complying With Conditions of Election.–If we comply with the conditions the Lord has made, we shall secure our election to salvation. Perfect obedience to His commandments is the evidence that we love God, and are not hardened in sin. {6BC 1079.4}

Christ has a church in every age. There are in the church those who are not made any better by their connection with it. They themselves break the terms of their election. Obedience to the commandments of God gives us a right to the privileges of His church (MS 166, 1898). {6BC 1079.5}

Romans 11:2 God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. Wot ye not what the scripture saith of Elias? how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying, 3 Lord, they have killed thy prophets, and digged down thine altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life. 4 But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to [the image of] Baal.

What do you see here? This remnant man Elijah, the remnant people who have the message of Elijah, are they conscious of the others? No. God has reserved the others too. They will not be able in the remnant to accumulate together and have a General Conference and all know each other. They don’t know even know who the others are but God is reserving them. All through the history they have travelled from one church to the other and there is no more room to hold international contact. This is the way identified which the Spirit of Prophecy illuminates.

Romans 11:5 Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace. 6 And if by grace, then [is it] no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if [it be] of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work. 7 What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded

He is going back over the history and he is saying for his time we have the same problem. For now our time, is it any different? There is no new thing under the sun. It’s still going to be the same. Prophecy identifies that. Elijah, that prophetic figure for our time, why can we draw what apostle Paul is talking of for our time? How can we do it? What will God do in these last days?

Malachi 4:5 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:  6 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.

What apostle Paul wrote of Elijah with the 7000 others that he didn’t know of, is a scenario we can expect in the last days, I will send you Elijah. These different Elijah people will be doing their work and you won’t know of them. All you need to know is that you are Elijah in the area that you live. You must recognise the distinction just read in the Spirit of Prophecy.

Elijah and John the Baptist

Elijah immediately connects us with John the Baptist doesn’t it? We can learn something from both of these men.

In this age, just prior to the second coming of Christ in the clouds of heaven, God calls for men who will prepare a people to stand in the great day of the Lord. Just such a work as that which John did, is to be carried on in these last days. The Lord is giving messages to His people, through the instruments He has chosen, and He would have all heed the admonitions and warnings He sends. The message preceding the public ministry of Christ was, Repent, publicans and sinners; repent, Pharisees and Sadducees; “for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Our message is not to be one of peace and safety. As a people who believe in Christ’s soon appearing, we have a definite message to bear,–“Prepare to meet thy God.” {4BC 1184.6}

If that message doesn’t come out loud and clear and with earnest severity, then the people of God will keep on sleeping in a Laodicean condition and we know that is happening. If that was to be the same of Elijah and John the Baptist, were these men recognised by the admin of God’s church? Elijah was among the ten tribes. Who administered the ten tribes? Ahab and the priest and Elijah was the only one there. Recognised? John the Baptist, back then, was he recognised by the admin? Where was he preaching? In the temple? In the wilderness. The faithful men are going to be pushed out. These men that God has chosen are not regarded by the administration.

The Pharisees were silenced for the time, but only became more determined in their enmity. They next sought out the disciples of John the Baptist, and tried to set them against the Saviour. These Pharisees had not accepted the mission of the Baptist. They had pointed in scorn to his abstemious life, his simple habits, his coarse garments, and had declared him a fanatic. {DA 275.5}

Have you heard those words? What is that clothing? You should be up with the times more. You are making yourself too obvious with your strange clothing and your abstemious in your diet. You’re fanatics. Heard that? Same thing, no new thing under the sun.

Because he denounced their hypocrisy, they had resisted his words, and had tried to stir up the people against him. The Spirit of God had moved upon the hearts of these scorners, convicting them of sin; but they had rejected the counsel of God, and had declared that John was possessed of a devil. {DA 275.5}

I will send you Elijah the prophet and John the Baptist in the last days. What do you expect from the prophetic sketches we are reading? When the truth comes to us under any guise, the guise of a rough looking Elijah and John the Baptist, very similar characteristics. It has to meet the agreement of the administration otherwise you have no right. It is messengers that God has chosen, not the church.

Let me tell you that the Lord will work in this last work in a manner very much out of the common order of things, and in a way that will be contrary to any human planning. There will be those among us who will always want to control the work of God, to dictate even what movements shall be made when the work goes forward under the direction of the angel who joins the third angel in the message to be given to the world. God will use ways and means by which it will be seen that He is taking the reins in His own hands. The workers will be surprised by the simple means that He will use to bring about and perfect His work of righteousness. {TM 299.2}

The simple means, not the highly complicated means, simple. We are to compare with those who have been before us.

Nehemiah

Ellen White under inspiration now turns us to other men such as Nehemiah. What do we learn of Nehemiah as an example from the prophetic writings of the Spirit of Prophecy?

The success attending Nehemiah’s efforts shows what prayer, faith, and wise, energetic action will accomplish. Nehemiah was not a priest; he was not a prophet; he made no pretension to high title. He was a reformer raised up for an important time. It was his aim to set his people right with God. Inspired with a great purpose, he bent every energy of his being to its accomplishment. High, unbending integrity marked his efforts. As he came into contact with evil and opposition to right he took so determined a stand that the people were roused to labor with fresh zeal and courage. {PK 675.3}

He had to meet the opposition and he had to put a firm stance, sorry, this it he way, this is the characteristic.

In their work, Ezra and Nehemiah humbled themselves before God, confessing their sins and the sins of their people, and entreating pardon as if they themselves were the offenders. Patiently they toiled and prayed and suffered. {PK 675.2}

There is need of Nehemiahs in the church today–not men who can pray and preach only, but men whose prayers and sermons are braced with firm and eager purpose. {PM 256.1}

These last days are to be identified by a remnant people who are like Elijah, John the Baptist, Nehemiah, Ezra and Noah. Isn’t that what Jesus says in Matthew 24?

Matthew 24:37 But as the days of Noe [were], so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

What is the prophetic sketch for us in the writings of Ellen White for this verse, as in the days of Noah? This is a most remarkable statement.

Just before us is a time of trouble such as never was, {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 1}

Where are we now? 2010? Has this come about yet? It has, we’ve been born in it.

Every soul who loves God will be tested in regard to his sacred law {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 1}

God tested the world when he sent, through Noah, a message to the antediluvians. {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 2}

Only faithful Noah and his family entered into the ark, and were saved when the deluge engulfed the world. {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 2}

Heavenly messengers visited Sodom, and told Lot of the impending destruction, and he was permitted to warn his relatives and friends, and to invite them to seek the protection of God. Lot earnestly besought them to believe his words. He knew that their destiny for life or death depended upon their decision to obey or reject the warning. . {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 4}

When Christ came to the world, his own nation rejected him. He brought from heaven the message of salvation, hope, freedom, and peace; but men would not accept his good tidings. Christians have condemned the Jewish nation for rejecting the Saviour; but many who profess to be followers of Christ are doing even worse than did the Jews, for they are rejecting greater light in despising the truth for this time. {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 5}

We are living in the last days, and the generation that is to witness the final destruction has not been left without warning of the hastening judgments of God. Says the apostle, “I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 7}

Through the warning that God has sent to the world, an opportunity is given to all to escape the general ruin that is threatened to fallen Babylon. The whole earth is to be lightened with the glory of this message, and hearts and minds will be prepared by its reception, for the coming of the King of kings. {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 8}

The word came to Noah, “Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me.” Noah obeyed and was saved. The message came to Lot, “Up, get you out of this place; for the Lord will destroy this city.” He placed himself under the guardianship of the heavenly messengers, and was saved. Those who obeyed the warning of Christ in marking the sign of the coming ruin, and in fleeing from Jerusalem, were not involved in her destruction. The message comes in our own time, “Babylon is fallen, is fallen. . . . Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” Those who obey this message will escape the terrible plagues that will surely be visited upon her. {RH, November 5, 1889 par. 11}

As in the days of Noah, who will be protected? Who? 144,000 scattered from the time of 1844 to that very end. How many does that make in each generation all across the world? Can you see the picture that prophecy plays out before us? If you permit it to penetrate and you think about it under inspiration then you will know what to do. You will know we must go ahead and not permit anything to deviate us from our high calling. If you will be among those people, what does the Spirit of Prophecy reveal if you will be among those people?

I saw the nominal church and nominal Adventists, like Judas, would betray us to the Catholics to obtain their influence to come against the truth. The saints then will be an obscure people, little known to the Catholics; but the churches and nominal Adventists who know of our faith and customs (for they hated us on account of the Sabbath, for they could not refute it) will betray the saints and report them to the Catholics as those who disregard the institutions of the people; that is, that they keep the Sabbath and disregard Sunday. {SpM 1.5}

The Catholics will say where did they come from as they don’t recognise them as an organisation that they have had to deal with but the organisations they have had to deal with have been swung under their umbrella if not entirely but of the same spirit. The Catholics know every organisation exists but here is a company little known, an obscure people little known by the Catholics.

The Stand of the Remnant

Notice it didn’t say discard, but unsettle.

I saw a company who stood well guarded and firm, giving no countenance to those who would unsettle the established faith of the body. God looked upon them with approbation. I was shown three steps– the first, second, and third angels’ messages. Said my accompanying angel, “Woe to him who shall move a block or stir a pin of these messages. The true understanding of these messages is of vital importance. The destiny of souls hangs upon the manner in which they are received.” {EW 258.3}

This company will stand firm. As soon as you see a church unsettling, not opposing, just unsettling, you are in grave danger. You will give no countenance to those people, you won’t even stop to argue with them. You will leave them out of the scene, you will stand on the platform that has been established by Gods remnant church all through the ages. This is what the Spirit of Prophecy tells us.

What else characterises this company as they stand in this primeval condition as it was in Jesus time? What was identified in them? This is what they will do.

The 144,000 were all sealed and perfectly united. On their foreheads was written, God, New Jerusalem, and a glorious star containing Jesus’ new name. At our happy, holy state the wicked were enraged, and would rush violently up to lay hands on us to thrust us into prison, when we would stretch forth the hand in the name of the Lord, and they would fall helpless to the ground. Then it was that the synagogue of Satan knew that God had loved us who could wash one another’s feet and salute the brethren with a holy kiss, and they worshiped at our feet. {EW 15.1}

Have we got more to understand? How can these non-acceptable people conduct the Lords ordinance? The authorities of the church won’t let you do it. How will they do it? You see, there is something in the word of God that deals with all those questions. They greet one another with a holy kiss and they wash one another’s feet in the Lords ordinances.

The Synagogue of Satan and You

All the churches that have thrown out this remnant. Are you and I being challenged right now at this present time as Abel was challenged? Doing what you know you need to do and Cain doesn’t want you to do it feeling angry at you? It began at the woman’s seed all through the ages together with Christ at this very time. I lay this challenge at your heart from the inspiration of the Spirit of Prophecy.

Until Christ shall appear in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory, men will become perverse in spirit and turn from the truth to fables. The church will yet see troublous times. She will prophesy in sackcloth. But although she must meet heresies and persecutions, although she must battle with the infidel and the apostate, yet by the help of God she is bruising the head of Satan. The Lord will have a people as true as steel, and with faith as firm as the granite rock. {4T 594.3}

They can do what they like, it will not change them.

They are to be His witnesses in the world, His instrumentalities to do a special, a glorious work in the day of His preparation. {4T 594.3}

Are you going to be that people?

It is as certain that we have the truth as that God lives; and Satan, with all his arts and hellish power, cannot change the truth of God into a lie. While the great adversary will try his utmost to make of none effect the word of God, truth must go forth as a lamp that burneth. {4T 595.4}

It is up to you and me whether we will respond to that call.

Amen.

Further reading:

Remnant Church Sketches