Here is yet another ambitious project carried out after the manner of Advent Hymnals and Christian Temperance for the benefit of those who would benefit from the experiences of those who have gone on before us: our fathers, our grandfathers down to the earliest generation of the adventists who rose out of the great disappointment in 1844 to form that church which is in prophecy identified as the the remnant of her seed - Rev. 12:17, the church of Philadelphia - Rev. 3:7-13, etc. While Advent Hymnals makes readily available a database in a more useable form of all the hymns sung by adventists - this being the first such project as far as we know - and Christian Temperance seeks to give in a structured way resources on the great subject of health reform (and medical missionary work) the current project makes readily available in one place and in a more useable form a database of all the Sabbath School Lessons from the year 1888 to the present time, with the exception of the ones that everyone will admit that they were so corrupted that they would do the reader more positive injury than they would benefit him. While these lessons are already available, they are in a format that is not the most friendly. Nor is this project meant to furnish these in the most friendly format, with the ability to bookmark and all. But the ability to search these together is already a big step ahead of the pdf formats. And the structured way in they are presented, it is hoped, will also easily enable a focussed study of some of the subjects studied in the past. Again with the shortness of time and the greatness of the work to be done in all fields, it is a serious crime to seek to reinvent the wheel. But this is the first project, as far and as wide as we know, that seeks to achieve the given goals.
As with the two other projects, a few words may need to be offered in justification of the time, the labour and the resources expended in the course of putting this up. This work has already been quite well done in the article outlining the importance of reviewing the history of the past years under the title: “A new king which knew not Joseph”, to which we cite the visitor to this site. For the hasty visitor we may still briefly state the following:
1. God has by positive command enjoined us to review our past history as we can clearly see from Jeremiah 6:16: “Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.”
2. God requires us to keep His commandments, as summarily given in the 10 commandments found in Exodus 20. This includes not only the keeping of the fourth commandment dealing with the Sabbath, but also the sixth commandment - thou shall not kill - which answers forcefully the debate on abortion.
3. A living connection to the experiences of those gone on before is one of the means that heaven has furnished to help us in keeping the commandments of God. The Psalmist says: “Give ear, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will… utter dark sayings of old… we will not hide them from their children… that the generation to come might know them… That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments” Ps. 78:1-7. The Spirit of Prophecy also says: “We have nothing to fear for the future, except as we shall forget the way the Lord has led us, and His teaching in our past history.” - “Life Sketches,” p. 196.
4. Then we believe, as it is our prayer for all who will use these resources, that they will receive much benefit in recalling from the Sabbath school lessons of the past years not only how the Lord has led us, and His teaching in our past history, but also “the way the Lord has led us”, that is, the manner in which He has led and taught us in the past.
It has been said of adventists that they are the people of the book. This is an appelation for which all should aspire. Yet this cannot be true anymore. They still read the Sabbath School Lessons today as they did in the past. Yet there is much ignorance today of the scriptures, which was not in the past. It might be said with much safety that the average adventist today cannot defend even the basic doctrine of the Sabbath from the scriptures. Try in dear reader, and see how far you go in giving the reasons for why you keep the Sabbath. The early adventists, the real people of the book, did not attend any theological school to be able to anchored in the truth. You may also today. The Sabbath School Lessons, rightly studied, afford more than could be obtained from theological schools in any age. Why then is there ignorance today which was not in the past? The following reasons suggest themselves:
We will let the reader jugde for himself the accuracy of the first and the third suggestions, but give a few words about the second suggestion which are drawn from some of the early lessons.
From the 3RD QUARTER, 1903 dealing with the book of Ephesians we find the following: “Three months is too short a time to devote to this wonderful book, unless it is studied diligently, prayerfully. Therefore so study its wonderful message. Seek to know what the book says and means, not what the lesson writer may mean. His earnest desire is to open the book to all. Therefore study the book..
We also quote the introductory note of the 3rd Quarter of 1896 on the Gospel of John almost in its entirety: “There is no better way to express the thoughts presented in the Scriptures than in the very words of the Scriptures, and teachers are therefore urged to require that the answers to the questions shall be given in the exact words of the text. The effort of the student should be directed to obtaining a complete mastery of each lesson, not by attempting to commit the words to memory, but by so studying the thoughts that they shall become a part of his mental make-up; and he will then find that the easiest way to express the thoughts will be in the exact words of the text.
“There is constant danger of being diverted from the study of God’s thought, as expressed to us in His word, to the study of what some man has thought about God’s thought. The very object of Bible study is to be brought into direct communion with the divine mind, that we may learn from God Himself what He has condescended to reveal to us in language; but **this object is defeated when we allow another mind to interpose between us and God’s thought. The Scripture is God’s thought incarnate, so to speak, put into human speech, in order that His mind may be brought into direct contact with our minds, His thought with our thought. But just as soon as we put man’s thought between us and God’s thought, and try to let God’s thought in through some man’s thought, we shut off our minds from a direct contact with the divine mind. Thus the special blessing of real Bible study is lost. The ideal Bible student is not the one who can tell the most about the Bible, but the one who has stored his mind with the precious thoughts of God, and is able to expresS them readily in the very words in which God has expressed them.
“This method of study makes it possible that “they shall be all taught of God;” for it is when we consider what He says, as He says it, that He can give us understanding, and the Holy Spirit is appointed to this very work. Those who are skeptical as to this method of Bible study, are urged to give it a fair trial in the study of this Book. Do not consider any lesson properly prepared until any question which will admit of being answered in the words of the text set apart for the lesson, can be readily answered in the exact words of the text without looking at the printed text. This can not be accomplished by a hasty reading of the lesson a short time before the Sabbath school. Make it a subject of much meditation and the topic of conversation “when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.” Do not argue with any one as to the meaning of any passage, but be sure that you know exactly what God has said, and then seek the understanding from Him who has promised wisdom to those who ask Him for it. Those who follow this plan faithfully will not only acquire a mastery of what is revealed in the Book of John, but will also gain an experience in study which will enable them to take up any other Book in the same way for themselves, and thus to become Bible students indeed.
“Use the notes and suggestions only as a means of studying the text itself, and do not allow the mind to be diverted by them from the study of the text. Otherwise they are a hindrance instead of a help.”
To any visitor to this site who may be desirous of something more attractive to the eye, let the following apology from the developer of the tool that has graciously enabled the putting up of this site suffice:
“The command of God to the human authors of the Bible were along these line: ‘write the things which thou has seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hear after’ Rev. 1:19. So that the accompanying blessing is: “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear, etc” Rev. 1:3. God never said to any man “paint (or draw) the things which thou has seen”. The two apocalyptic prophets Daniel and John saw in vision things never seen by any man, yet the description they were to give of these were to be in writing as opposed to being in pictures. Nor does God propose now to say to any man, “blessed is he that seeth (pictures), or he that watcheth”. We do not wish to be misunderstood to be deprecating the place of pictorial representations in the spreading of the truth. These have throughout history been used to great advantage. In The Great Controversy page 99 we read about the two artist missionaries who more effectively presented “a sermon which arrested the attention of all classes” by their drawing than they had by beginning with an open attack on the Pope’s supremacy. But this tool, and the sites that will be made from it, although they may not have the best pictorial presentation - as there is just a rudimentary provision for this in the tool, may still be used to great advantage by anyone patient and careful enough to spare sometime to read.