A Country Rag By Faith Alone
Midi music (click on title):
Amazing Grace, Hosanna(traditional), Hosanna(rock), Impossible Dream, Jesus Christ Superstar
By Eunice Soper
"The Silent Messenger"
The duty of proclaiming a "thus saith the Lord" wasn't something to be desired. The chosen person often found himself delivering an unpopular message. God's people were often unwilling to hear reproof, and angry with the bearer of such messages.
So, when in 1844 a vision was presented to Hazen Foss -- a message of comfort to God's people -- this young man was unwilling to deliver it.
Hazen Foss was well educated and personable, just the type of man, one would think, who should be chosen for such a work. But Foss was aware of several things: He realized the unpopularity that could be his if he bore messages of reproof. He knew, too, that dreams and visions from God would be called "mesmerism" and "extremism," and other unkind names. Hazen Foss shrank from such a burden.
A second vision was given him, telling him to relate the message of encouragement to the people. Still Foss was silent, unwilling to undertake such a great task. Then God told him the burden would be taken from him and given to the "weakest of the weak."
Suddenly Foss awoke to the realization of what he was doing: he was rejecting a command from God Himself. Frightened, he called a group of believers together. To them he related his experience, and then said, "Now I will bring you the message God has for you." He stopped, his mind blank. God had taken the message from him.
Several months later he was visiting in his sister's home. A meeting was being held there that night, but Foss refused to go. Secretly, however, he listened in. A young woman, scarcely out of childhood, small and frail, bore a message she said she had received from God. As he listened Foss became more and more amazed as he realized that this was the same message that had been given to him by God, and which he had refused to tell.
That young woman's name was Ellen Gould Harmon.
At the time when Hazen Foss was refusing to carry God's message to His people, in Portland, Maine, Ellen Harmon had just passed her seventeenth birthday. In fact, she celebrated that birthday just five weeks after the great Disappointment that had left the Advent believers in such bewilderment. And less than a month later Ellen received her first message from God.
Ellen Gould Harmon was one of twins born to a hatter and his wife. She was a sunny, happy child, with a bright quick mind, and a religious spirit. The parents were devout Methodists, and their children had been taught to be practical. They all helped their father make the hats that were his means of livelihood.
When she was nine, on the way home from school an angry child threw a stone that struck Ellen on the face. She was unconscious for three weeks, and when she regained consciousness it was to face difficulties she had never known before. Her face was marred, and her health was impaired so that she was never able to take up her studies again. God had said He would put the message into the hands of the "weakest of the weak," and physically Ellen Harmon had become that, because for years she struggled against ill-health.
She may have been weak physically, but even as a child her spiritual experience was one expected of more advanced years. At sixteen she was converted and was among those who passed through the great Disappointment. And it was shortly after this that her first message came to her. This she faithfully delivered to the local church. But when it was revealed to her that she must go out and tell the message to others, she became frightened. How could she -- ill, uneducated, timid -- how could she go out to the other churches? For a time she was in despair, even absenting herself from the meetings. But the people of her church remembered her and prayed for her. While they were praying, she was taken off in vision where she was again reminded to make the vision known.
That was the end of her struggle. For the next seventy years this "weakest of the weak" traveled and spoke untiringly. She studied her Bible and wrote the things God showed her. During this time she was a pillar of strength to the church that was arising, and today her writings still undergird the Advent Movement.
As we have seen, Ellen Harmon faithfully gave the first message of comfort and strength to her own home church. And after those difficult weeks of struggle with feelings of inadequacy and dismay, she accepted the burden that was laid upon her, and began to carry the message farther and farther. At first, it was only in the nearby towns, then as the months passed, her travels widened to include the nearby States.
At first her messages served mainly to solve problems that arose following the Disappointment. Fanaticism and false teachings were creeping in, and she was sent to correct these.
The work God gave His special messenger to do was not popular, and many painful and distressing experiences from those who resisted rebuke brought heavy hours of grief. Her only recourse was to prayer, and God sustained her faith.
In 1846 she was married to James White, and together these two indefatigable workers for God traveled almost constantly. Gradually an organization was growing out of the formless chaos. Much Bible study was going on.
Then in 1846 Mrs. White bore a message to her husband and others at a meeting in Dorchester, Massachusetts, that they must start a paper. And thus the truths that were being organized were put into a form that could reach more people. This was the beginning of a printing work that now reaches into the "uttermost parts of the earth." And from the beginning the relating of her messages from God had an important place in the written word that was becoming such an important factor. As the years went by, more and more of her time was taken up in this important and more permanent phase of her work. Her first messages were sent out through letters and small pamphlets, then in articles in the Present Truth. Her first book appeared in 1851, which was followed by more and more as the years went by. Sometimes she was given counsel that was only to be released when some emergency situation arose that the Lord foresaw.
Immediately following 1844, of course there was no organization. It was difficult to achieve much in this formless state. Gradually Mrs. White's messages began to give more and more emphasis to the need for some organization. Little by little the individual groups combined into churches, and then the churches into State conferences. In 1863 the struggle to bring a church out of chaos resulted in the formation of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists.
Mrs. White herself never acted as a leader and never held a church office. She merely related the instruction sent by God to His people who needed it. She was the one who helped "prepare the way."
|
Widely varied in size and structure, picturesque houses of worship cling throughout generations to Appalachia's hills and hollers. There's an echo of faith in everyday conversation and an ancient devotion steels residents in courage, humor and grace as they struggle with weather-related and man-made catastrophes. Eunice Soper has written many devotional books, mostly for children. Semi-retired from professional service worldwide for the Seventh Day Adventist Church, she and her husband, Francis, radiate peace, strength and practical good-heartedness from their adopted home in Virginia's central Shenandoah Valley. Sister Mary Rose McGeady, administrator of Covenant House, writes a very readable monthly on-line newsletter about her experiences with some of the 44,000 homeless and runaway children CH helps each year. Covenant House offers assistance, including food, clothing, medical aid, educational and vocational training and counseling, through shelters in 15 major cities. Their toll-free NINELINE (1-800-999-9999) connects children to counselors and resources in any area. "Love is the answer to the final question." -- Unknown. Spirit Web: Spiritual Consciousness on the WWW, a site maintained in Switzerland with copious worldwide links, introduces alternate and ancient paths of enlightenment which have become increasingly popular throughout this century, including within Appalachia. "The path of knowledge is that of the occultist and the sage; that of love is that of the mystic and the saint. The head or heart approach is not dependent upon the ray, for both ways must be known; the mystic must become the occultist; the white occultist has been the saintly mystic. True knowledge is intelligent love, for it is the blending of the intellect and the devotion. Unity is sensed in the heart; its intelligent application to life has to be worked out through knowledge." -- Alice A. Bailey, A Treatise on White Magic, page 120; quote from The Feather of Maat and other words of wisdom The Hindu Tantric Home Page explores the ancient, complex spiritual tradition of India. "And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul, that I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.... Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them with a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes.... that your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth." -- Deuteronomy 11:13,14,18,21 
Beth El Shaddai, a small Messianic Synagogue uniting Jews and Gentiles from Birmingham Alabama, updates their informational site weekly with pertinent Biblical history, feasts and holidays, and maintains related web links. "Mine is the secret that opens upon the door of youth and mine is the Cup of the Wine of Life and the Caldron of Cerridwen, which is the Holy Grail of Immortality. I am the Gracious Goddess who gives the gift of joy unto the heart of man upon earth. I give the knowledge of the Spirit Eternal, and beyond death I give peace and freedom and reunion with those that have gone before.... I who am the beauty of the Green Earth, and the White Moon amongst the stars and the mystery of the Waters, and the desire of the heart of man, I call unto thy soul to arise and come unto me. For I am the Soul of Nature who giveth life to the universe; from me all things proceed and unto me all things must return.... I have been with thee from the beginning, and I am that which is attained at the end of desire." -- Book of Shadows |
Midi (click on title): "The Rose," Words & Lyrics by Amanda McBroom Some say love, it is a river that drowns the tender reed. Some say love, it is a razor that leaves your soul to bleed. Some say love, it is a hunger, an endless aching need. I say love, it is a flower, and you it's only seed. It's the heart, afraid of breaking, that never learns to dance It's the dream, afraid of waking, that never takes a chance. It's the one who won't be taken, who cannot seem to give. And the soul, afraid of dyin', that never learns to live. When the night has been too lonely, and the road has been too long, And you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong, Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows, Lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes The Rose.
"My wish for all of you is that your Light may shine brightly and purely, that your Dark Nights of the Soul may bring you awareness and knowledge. That you may at the last find someone to take on your light and set you free." -- To Serve the Light, an address by Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki.
Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn seeks to unite Western abstract and esoteric traditions (e.g. Gnostic, Cabalistic, Masonic, Rosicrucian,...).
Word Preserve --
A Country Rag Index
By Faith Alone, text © Eunice Soper, 1999. All rights reserved.