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God’s Time to Speak

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 1, 1908

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 85, No. 40.

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God’s Time to Speak

By R. M. KILGORE

R. M. KILGORE
“THERE is . . . a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.” Eccl. 3:7.
God has waited long, and has patiently borne with the reign of evil, and the development of sin. For six thousand years he has witnessed the sad havoc made by Satan and his subjects. The long-continued rebellion carried on by these against God and his government, he has patiently endured.
Anarchy, high-handed lawlessness, and insubordination, challenging all authority and power, have borne sway. To satisfy proud ambition many millions have been slain in war; the earth has been deluged with the blood of millions more, who have been sacrificed upon the altar of their faith to satisfy the envy and hatred of misdirected zeal, and the religion of false gods; violence has covered the earth, and streams of blood have run down our streets at the behest of anger, hatred, and revenge; and the dependents of those who have raving and uncontrolled appetites for the intoxicating bowl, the gambling den, and the wretched brothel, have cried bitterly unto God, while he, filled with compassion, has witnessed the poverty, the shame, the suffering, and the distress heaped upon them; he has marked the tears and heard the groans of the poor and the downtrodden, the victims of famine, pestilence, and disease.
All this, and many, many times more, the pitying eye of Him who never slumbers nor sleeps has patiently and silently looked upon, quietly waiting till the time should come for him to speak. Yet we hear from the lips of the atheist, the deist, and the scoffer the charge that God is responsible for it all. “They see the work of evil, with its terrible results of woe and desolation, and they question how all this can exist under the sovereignty of One who is infinite in wisdom, in power, and in love.” They say that God must be in sympathy with all this evil, or he would not have tolerated it so long, if he is God. “Why has he suffered all this, and kept so quiet while such high-handed oppression and wickedness are permitted to continue? If God is God, why does he not stop this reign of sin and crime?”
They forget that God has more than once given the inhabitants of the earth object-lessons and examples of his purpose and power, once by washing the corruption and filth from the surface of the earth, and again by committing some of its cities to the devouring flames.
Is it not time for God to speak? Hear him: “Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.” Ps. 46:10. “I have long time holden my peace; I have been still, and refrained myself: now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once.” Isa. 42:14. “But unto the wicked God saith, What hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldst take my covenant in thy mouth? Seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest my words behind thee. When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him, and hast been partaker with adulterers. Thou givest thy mouth to evil, and thy tongue frameth deceit. Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother; thou slanderest thine own mother’s son. These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself; but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes. Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.” Ps. 50:16-22. “Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence: a fire shall devour before him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about him.” Verse 3. “The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man, he shall stir up jealousy like a man of war: he shall cry, yea, roar; he shall prevail against his enemies.” Isa. 42:13. “The Lord shall roar from on high, and utter his voice from his holy habitation; he shall mightily roar upon his habitation; he shall give a shout, as they that tread the grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth. A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth; for the Lord hath a controversy with the nations, he will plead with all flesh; he will give them that are wicked to the sword, saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Behold, evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great whirlwind shall be raised up from the coasts of the earth. And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried; they shall be dung upon the ground.” Jer. 25:30-33. “O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of the Lord.” Jer. 22:29. “To whom shall I speak, and give warning, that they may hear? behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they can not harken: behold, the word of the Lord is unto them a reproach; they have no delight in it. Therefore I am full of the fury of the Lord; I am weary with holding in.” Jer. 6:10, 11.
St. Bethlehem, Tenn.