p. 250 | AN ENGAGEMENT WITH GOD by G. D. Ballou

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Tuesday, April 21, 1885

FromAdvent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. 62, No. 16

AN ENGAGEMENT WITH GOD.

By G. D. Ballou

If one of us should receive word that on a certain day in each year the President of the United States would be pleased to receive and entertain us and our friends at the White House, we should feel that we had been very highly honored; and no doubt we should be very prompt in accepting such an invitation and entering into an engagement to be present if circumstances would permit.

The Christian has a special engagement with God, not once a year, nor once a month, but every week. God has seen fit to appoint a time in which all his intelligent creatures would be expected to hold special seasons of communion, through the Holy Spirit, with the Creator of the heavens and the earth,—their Father and their God,—in which they would meditate on the works of his hands and the truths contained in his word, and endeavor to render to him the homage due from the creature to the Creator.

“It must be clear to every reasonable mind that if God has appointed a special time for sacred rest and worship, it is the time when he is ready to receive special worship, and when all heaven is prepared to minister special blessings to those who have prepared their hearts to receive them. We may seek the Lord at any and all times. We may have prayer-meetings and other services, and the Lord may meet with and bless us, as he often does; but such services do not have the solemn, sacred character of those held on God’s holy rest day. The Sabbath services ought to be regarded as most solemn yet joyous occasions. This is the time appointed of God for calling to mind the infinite works of his wisdom; the time to have the heart enlarged by contemplating his boundless mercy and grace to a fallen world; the time for every faculty of our being to be ennobled and purified by having the thoughts drawn away from the perishing things of clay to contemplate the glories of the future immortal kingdom.

He who undertakes to honor God by observing his rest day has a most solemn engagement to keep, and weighty consequences hang upon the manner in which the engagement is kept. “If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable; and shalt honor him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words; then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.” Isa. 58:13, 14.

He who belongs to Christ is a child of Abraham. Gal. 3:29. The text just quoted involves the fulfillment of the promise made to Abraham. As Christ is the seed through whom the promise is to be fulfilled (Gal. 3:16), it plainly follows that if we would share the blessings of the future inheritance we must walk as he walked. 1 John 2:6. While on his earthly mission, he kept this weekly engagement with God. Luke 4:16; John 15:10. If we follow his steps in this respect it will greatly aid us to see other ways in which we can walk even as he walked. Then every Sabbath-day the people of God will be cheered by our presence at the house of worship. The Psalmist says: “I am a companion of all them that fear thee, and of them that keep thy precepts.” And again: “They that fear thee will be glad when they see me; because I have hoped in thy word.” Ps. 119:63, 74.

There will be joy and gladness in the companionship of those who keep their engagements with God. The voice of praise and thanksgiving will be heard in their assemblies. They will have words of comfort and good cheer to speak one to another, and the Lord will hearken, and write their testimonies in his book of remembrance. Mal. 3:16. And by and by, when the whole family of earth is brought home, there will be joy and gladness unalloyed in the companionship of those who have loved God and kept his commandments, and the Lord will grant them all the Heaven-sent privilege of keeping this weekly engagement with God throughout the ceaseless ages of eternity. Isa. 66:22, 23. How the minds of redeemed immortals will then expand, and how their hearts will thrill with emotion as they contemplate with undimmed vision the infinite works of God, none but the redeemed host shall ever know. G. D. Ballou.