Gereja Masehi advent Hari Ketujuh

Kamis, 01 Maret 2012

John Andrews

John Andrews was the first Seventh-day Adventist overseas missionary. His childhood home was in Portland, Maine.  Few details are available on Andrews childhood and youth.  At the age of 13, he "found the Savior" and became a seventh-day Sabbath keeper when he was only 17 years old.  He enjoyed "severe study" much more than physical activity.   In 1850, at the age of 21 he began work as a minister and was ordained three years later.
From 1850 to 1853, John conducted evangelistic meetings throughout Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York.  He even traveled further west through Ohio, Michigan, and the eastern part of Canada.   He did not limit himself to preaching.  He did lots of writing and prepared 35 articles for publication, totaling some 170,000 words.  As a result of his intense traveling, ministering and writing, in 1855, he was "utterly exhausted"; his voice failed, and his eyesight was injured. 
To recover his health he went to Waukon, Iowa, and worked on his parents' farm.  In 1859, he returned to minister once more to Massachusetts, Minnesota and New York.
Andrews got married while he was still recovering from his illness.  He married Angeline S. Stevens.  His son, Charles, was born a year later in 1857, and his daughter, Mary, was born in 1861.  John and Angeline had two other children who died in infancy.
In 1867, he became the third president of the General Conference, and continued as president for two years.  He was the editor of the Reviewand Herald from May, 1869 to March, 1870. 
John's wife, Angeline, died in 1872 and two years later he sailed from Boston with his son and daughter for Switzerland.  There were going as the first overseas missionaries sponsored by the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
John's first work in Switzerland was to visit and organize the Sabbath converts already there.  He then wrote tracts and laid plans for the publication of a paper.  In 1876, the General Conference voted $10,000 to start a printing house in Europe. 
John's daughter learned French quickly and then helped John translate his writings into French.  Not long after this, she died of tuberculosis.   Nine years after John arrived in Europe, he also died.   He had worked tirelessly.
John Nevin Andrews made significant contributions to the development of the SDA doctrines. For example, there was some confusion among seventh day keepers as to when Sabbath should start.  Joseph Bates held that the Sabbath should begin at six o'clock Friday evening.  Others held that the Sabbath should be observed from sunset to sunset, as was the custom of the Seventh-day Baptists. 
In 1855, James White requested Andrews to give the subject a thorough investigation.  Andrews published his findings in an article in which he showed, through Biblical evidence, that the Sabbath begins at sunset on Friday evening.   His conclusions were accepted by the Adventist groups.
Andrews was also among the first SDA leaders to publish an article that applied the two-horned beast of Revelation 13 to the United States of America, and in 1878 he served on the committee that recommended the tithing system. 
John Andrews was instrumental in helping the SDA church become an organization.  He was chairman of several committees to suggest a plan of organization for the SDA publishing house and bylaws of the church.
During the Civil War, when the Conscription Act (the drafting of men into war) went into effect, Andrews represented the church in Washington D.C., to explain why SDA's believe that participation in combat is contrary to Christian principles, with the result that SDA draftees could apply for noncombatant service.
When he was a youth, J. N. Andrews wanted to be a congressman in Washington D.C.  He dreamed about his future, and judging from his budding intellectual strength and his literary qualities, he might have been successful.  His Uncle Charles was a congressman and a man of political importance in Maine, but God had larger plans for John.
In the spring of 1844, a tract came into the hands of a family in Paris, Maine, named Stowell.  This tract was a reprint of an article that appeared in a Portland Adventist paper known as The Hope of Israel.   The burden of this tract was to convince people that the seventh day was the Christian Sabbath and should be observed instead of Sunday.  Stowell took the tract and laid it aside, but his fifteen-year-old daughter Marian picked it up and read it.   She was convinced.  So was her brother Oswald.   Then Marian shared the tract with John Andrews, then only 15 years of age. 
John read it, brought it back to Marian, and asked, "Have your father and mother read this?"
"No," said Marian, "but I have, and found that we are not keeping the right Sabbath. What do you think, John?"
"I think the seventh day is the Sabbath.  And if you and I think that, Marian, we must keep it."
"Oswald and I kept last Sabbath.  And we'll be glad to have you join us in worship.  Please take this tract to your father and mother and see what they think."
The senior Andrews read it, then brought it back to the Stowells.  Both families kept the next Sabbath, meeting for the service in one of their rooms.
Soon after he accepted the truth advocated by the Sabbath-keeping Adventists, young John had a strange experience.  In Paris, where he lived, were a group of fanatics who sowed the seeds of discord among the Sabbath-keeping Christians.  The presence of these fanatics was so troublesome that no meetings were held for a year and a half.  A meeting was announced and the leaders of the church attended.  At this meeting the power of God descended, somewhat as it did on the day of Pentecost.   Parents confessed to their children, children to their parents and to one another.   John Andrews, with deep feeling exclaimed, "I would exchange a thousand errors for one truth."
At this service this young man reached a point of decision that cast the die for his whole future life.  He threw himself into the work of giving the message that he had learned to love.  All the rest of his life he lived to foster the interest of God's kingdom.  John Nevins Andrews become a great author, religious leader, and missionary for his God.

Tidak ada komentar:

Posting Komentar