A Solemn Appeal Order Printed Copy

Author: Ellen White
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About the Book

"A Solemn Appeal" by Ellen White is a Christian religious text that urges readers to reexamine their faith and devotion to God. It emphasizes the importance of living a life of pure motives and genuine repentance, and warns against hypocrisy and insincerity in one's relationship with God. The book encourages readers to seek redemption through prayer, forgiveness, and deep spiritual reflection.

Xi Shengmo

Xi Shengmo, whose birth name was Xi Zizhi, was born into a literary class family of traditional Chinese medical doctors in Western Zhang village near Linfen, Shanxi Province. Young Xi received traditional Chinese education which would one day place him among the ranks of the learned Confucian scholars. Among his friends, he was a high-spirited boy, very forceful in character and a born leader. But, when alone, there were always questions about human life, perplexing and disturbing him, and he longed for an answer to the problem of existence. When his father passed away, his estate was divided. Young Xi purchased a farm on the outskirts of the town. He now became a Confucian scholar who in 1851 obtained Xiu Cai (BA), the first of three literary degrees. He soon won the esteem of the humble villagers and was asked to mediate in quarrels, law suits and other emergencies. As a result, his reputation for wisdom spread far and wide. But with Xi, happiness and rest of soul were not purchased by such paltry trifles. His first wife passed way, leaving no children, and Confucianism did nothing to still the tumult of his soul. His study of Chinese classics, while stimulating the intellectual side of his nature, did not bring peace. At the age of thirty, he was married again, to a girl in her late teens, who became a loving and understanding wife. But the continued conflict in Xi’s soul was affecting his health. When friends suggested that an occasional use of the opium could do no harm and might bring relief, he decided to test its merits. Temporary exhilaration was followed by a deeper depression of spirit than he had suffered before, however. He soon became an addict and resorted to opium again and again, until he was only a shadow of his former self. Committed to death by his wife and friends, he was dressed in his best clothing and laid on his bed, awaiting the moment of departure. To his great relief, his world-weary spirit seemed to be leaving the body. Suddenly it was arrested by the authoritative command, “Go back! Go back!” Sadly, the order was obeyed and the sick man found himself again facing the realities of life. After his conversion, Xi never conceded that what had happened was the fantasy of a distorted mind, but felt rather that it was the voice of God. In 1877, a famine of fearful proportions stalked Shanxi province. For several years, there was no rain and, consequently, no crops. Thousands of people perished from hunger, diseases or suicide. In the midst of the distress, it was learned that two foreigners, David Hill (British Methodist missionary) and Timothy Richard (British Baptist missionary), had come to a nearby town. They wore Chinese dress, distributing food and money to the starving people. They also brought with them a religion of which the people of Shanxi never had heard. With the end of the severe famine in 1879, Hill and Richard conducted a unique type of literature evangelism at the time of the triennial examinations in Taiyuan, and offered prizes for the best literary essays on Christian themes, which covered such subjects as opium, images of the gods, and the regulation of the heart and life; the essays sought to lead scholars to examine the Christian faith. Urged on by his family to prove his prowess, Xi wrote four essays under four different names, and submitted them for examination. When the results were announced, he won three out of the four prizes offered. He went reluctantly to collect the prize from Hill at the missionary’s house in Pingyang, accompanied by his brother-in-law. Later Xi described the meeting: As daylight banished darkness, so did Mr. Hill’s presence dissipate all the idle rumors I had heard. All sense of fear was gone; my mind was at rest. I beheld his kindly eye and remembered the words of Mencius: ‘If a man’s heart is not right, his eye will certainly bespeak it.’ That face told me I was in the presence of a true, good man. Xi became Hill’s assistant in writing literary tracts and translating the New Testament. Within two months, he became a Christian and accepted Hill’s help in breaking his addiction to opium. After Xi started to read the Bible, the Book began to exert a great influence upon him, giving him hope of deliverance from the dreadful habit of opium smoking. One day, as he was reading the story of the crucifixion, he fell on his knees, with the Bible before him, weeping as he read. At that moment, he felt that the dying, yet living Savior, enfolded his weary soul in his great love. His search was ended; peace like a river became his portion. The slave of sin was now and forever the bond-servant of God. This peace did not last long, however; for a week, Xi neither ate nor slept. In the fierce combat between good and evil, he experienced almost every agony known to the human body. Weakness, faintness, dizziness, exhaustion, fever, chills, depression—-all attacked his enfeebled frame. When the struggle was most critical, the addict cried out, “Though I die, I never will touch opium again.” Through prayer “without ceasing” and Bible reading, it was revealed to him that only the Holy Spirit could enable him to conquer in the conflict. Xi said later of the Spirit: He did what man and medicine could not do. From that moment, my body was perfectly at rest. Then I knew that to break off opium without faith in Jesus would indeed be impossible. He was finally delivered from opium bondage and became a new man. When this victory over opium was won, Xi adopted the name Shengmo, meaning “conqueror of demons.” Along with a sense of abundant grace given him came an intense longing to spread the possibility of such an experience to men near and far. Soon he became convinced that he was commissioned by God to do that very thing. Thus, in a very brief time, he was converted, committed to holiness of life, and feeling a call to preach the Gospel. After Hill received a new appointment and returned to Hankou, Xi was baptized in November 1880 at Pingyang by J. C. Turner, missionary with the China Inland Mission (CIM). Subsequently he worked with CIM missionaries in pioneer evangelism in Shanxi and surrounding areas. His education, forceful personality, and spiritual gifts, together with a fervent faith expressed in a deep prayer life, quickly led to his emergence as a spiritual leader. Now the opium-drugged victims of Shanxi occupied Xi’s attention. The wide-spread use of the opiate required earnest and intense effort if the enslaved were to be rescued. His first attempt to do so was in a small town near his village. Since they were short of funds, Mrs. Xi sold some of her precious bridal garments and jewelry. They rented a shop and stocked it with medicines, and furnished it with Christian texts on the walls. For twenty years, the system adopted in this area became a pattern for between forty and fifty others that were opened as refuges for the users of opium. In each station, hundreds of persons were treated with pills that eventually Xi made himself by a secret formula which he believed was revealed to him by God. Loving care, presentation of Gospel truth, and much prayer led to the liberation of thousands of addicts, who then carried the news of their freedom to others. Every new patient was expected to attend daily prayer sessions. Indeed, only those willing to make prayer a major factor in their treatment were admitted. The pills, which took the place of expensive, imported ones, the supply of which had often failed at a crucial time, were the fruit of a season of fasting and prayer, plus Xi’s knowledge of native drugs. His notable achievement was to establish as many as 50 opium refuges in four provinces; these also functioned as centers for church planting. One of the largest of these centers was at Hongtong County, thirty miles north of Pingyang. These refuges were run by reformed addicts who had come through his system, first as patients, then as converts, evangelists, and assistant refuge keepers. Churches established as a result of the outreach by opium refuges were made up largely of recovered addicts. Xi remarked that his Christian life was a very real and constant warfare with the powers of Satan. His battle to develop that most effective evangelistic spearhead, the opium refuge project, met with opposition and difficulties. The only thing he could do was to ignore criticism and resist Satan with spiritual weapons. He relied on the strength of God, rather than his own. At times he became conscious of great fatigue and weakness, and these occasions became the call to much prayer and fasting, for it was in this way that he could know that some immediate, perplexing problem was to be prayed through. Always when he thought the will of God was ascertained, or the problem resolved, the unusual energy which was “usual” for him—- and which he considered to be from God—-was regained and the work resumed. Xi also developed a utopian community called Middle Eden, where he worshipped and ministered together with family members, 50 or 60 disciples, and many recovering opium addicts. Many of the hymns used in churches and the opium refuges were composed by Xi. These were published as Xi Shengmo Hymns by the Shanghai Presbyterian Press in 1912. Xi was an independent, strong-willed man. For the most part, he was respectful in his relationships with the Western missionaries, although some of them fiercely proud themselves noted that he frequently manifested an anti-foreign attitude. Not all agreed with his charismatic emphasis, his desire for control, nor his use of opium refuges as the principal method in his evangelism. Despite character weaknesses of impatience, dogmatism, and authoritarianism, which mellowed with years, he eventually came to exercise a ministry widely described as apostolic. His pastoral gifts leadership were recognized in 1886 when Hudson Taylor ordained him as superintending pastor over a wide area in Shanxi. Three groups of missionaries—-the seven CIM missionaries known as the Cambridge Seven, CIM single women, and CIM missionaries from Scandinavia—-worked under Xi’s direction. This reflected Taylor’s conviction that Western missionaries were merely the “scaffolding” in the building of an indigenous Chinese church. In 1895, Xi planned a conference in his own home village with the purpose of enlarging the refuge work. Two hundred persons were present, and the last sermon that he preached was unusually solemn. At the close of the conference, he decided to visit Mr. Dixon Hoste, who later was to succeed Hudson Taylor as General Director of the China Inland Mission. In the midst of genial conversation with Hoste, Xi fell to the ground unconscious. He rallied, suffering more from weakness than from pain. Within weeks, signs of a serious heart problem developed. For six months he remained with those who loved him. Xi ceased his labor and entered into everlasting rest on February 19, 1896. Sources Taylor, Mrs. Howard, Pastor Hsi: Confucian Scholar and Christian (1900; rev. 1949, 1989). Austin, Alvyn James, “Pilgrims and Strangers: The China Inland Mission in Britain, Canada, the United States and China 1865-1990” (Ph. D. diss., York University, North York, Ontario, 1996). Broomhall, A. J., Assault on the Nine, Book 6: of Hudson Taylor and China’s Open Century (1988). Latourette, Kenneth Scott, A History of Christian Missions in China (1966). About the Author G. Wright Doyle, Director, Global China Center; English Editor, Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Christianity, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA.

saved when the lord appears

Texts: Acts 1:11 — "Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18 — "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words." These two texts of Scripture are plainly presented and there can be no question as to their interpretation; they mean just what they say, namely, that the Lord Jesus Christ is coming back again to this earth, and just as He ascended from the midst of His disciples, clothed with his physical body, and a cloud received Him out of their sight, so He will come again. He left a wondering company of disciples when He was on the slopes of Olivet, and from their midst began to ascend up towards heaven, and strange to say He will come back again to a company of disciples, for notwithstanding the plain statements of Scripture with reference to His coming, many in the Church are apparently unacquainted with the fact of His glorious appearing or else are indifferent to it. This may be because those of us who are in the pulpit have not been faithful in teaching the Word of God, or it may be that the rank and file of Christians have studied the Scriptures indifferently, if indeed they have studied them at all. All evangelical Christians believe that Jesus Christ is coming again sometime. We have said it over and over in our repetition of the Apostles Creed, and there can be no question about the fact at all. The only question is as to when He is coming; some say before the millennium, and they are called pre-millenarians; others expect Him after the millennium, and they are spoken of as post-millenarians. But if He comes after the millennium He will come to a world made ready for His appearing by human effort, righteousness will be asserting its power, and have in its control all things. If this position is accepted, then His coming is far removed from the present time, for just when men thought the world was rapidly growing better, the world-war was upon us and today the world is scarred and marred by its effects. If He comes before the millennium, then He will come to set the world right; He will set up His Throne and establish His Kingdom. He himself will work mightily in all ways and it will be a world worth while living in when it is all under the sway of His Almighty Power. As for myself, I prefer the millennium which He makes ready rather than the one which might be set up or prepared by man himself, therefore I am a pre-millenarian. Just what will it mean to be saved when the Lord appears? To be saved at all is the wonder of heaven and earth. We are saved from sin's penalty by His death on the Cross and our personal acceptance of Him. We are saved from sin's practice by the indwelling of His Spirit strengthening our wills. This is what the Apostle Paul meant when he said "I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." We are saved from sin's presence by His coming again, for when He comes the last enemy shall be overthrown, temptation will be a thing of the past, and our deliverance shall last forever. Let us put it in this way: We have been saved by His death on the Cross and our identification with Him; this has to do with the past. We are being saved by His Spirit who makes Christ real to us and makes the Word of God powerful in the changing of our lives; this has to do with the present. We shall be saved when He appears and the body of this humiliation is made like unto His own glorious body; this has to do with the future. In order to prevent confusion, we must keep in mind the fact that there are to be two appearings of our Lord: First — He comes for His Saints. This is what the Apostle Paul meant when in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18, he said, "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words." Second — He comes with His Saints. When the time is up and Scripture has had its fulfillment, he will set up His Kingdom on the earth; His sway will be almighty and His power irresistible. This truth has always been of the greatest possible inspiration to me. I learned it when I was a young minister, and it changed my whole conception of Christ and my interpretation of the Scripture, and filled me with a zeal to attempt at least to do His Will. It has never made me fanatical, and I am sure that it has not made me listless, and from the first day I received the truth until this present time, it has been to me "the blessed hope." In common with other Christians, I believe the Church to be the body of Christ and that as individuals we go to make up that body and as men are won to Christ and they surrender to Him, they are parts of that body. So of necessity, one day the body will be completed — the last member will be added to it — and I have always thought that perhaps the one who comes under the influence of my preaching, might be the last, and the skies would brighten and the Lord return, and I have hardly preached an evangelistic sermon for years without this in mind. It is to me a glorious hope. I have frequently been asked "Would you not be startled, indeed, would you not be afraid, if suddenly the skies should brighten and the Lord appear?" And my answer is "I might be, except for the statement made in my first text of Scripture, 'Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven,'" it is "this same Jesus" who is coming back; He who was cradled in the manger and wrapped in swaddling clothes, He who lived in Nazareth as a boy, a youth, and a young man, He who preached in Galilee as never man had spoken before Him, He who suffered in Gethsemane until the blood drops rolled down His face, He who died upon the Cross as my substitute, He who rose from the dead when the time was up and the stone was rolled away from the door, He who ascended up into heaven — He is coming back again. How could I be startled when He appears? So human that He grew weary as He toiled, so human that He fell asleep when He was in the little boat with His disciples, so human that He toiled in the carpenter shop, making this implement and that, and making them well... So divine that the water blushed into wine when He looked at it; so divine that devils feared Him and went rushing into a herd of swine and drove them into the sea; so divine that disease was staid by His presence and His touch; so divine that death was overpowered by Him, and Lazarus, at the sound of His voice, came forth from the tomb bound in his grave clothes. He is coming back again and we shall see Him. "Just to see Jesus once scarred as Redeemer, Jesus, my Lord, from all suffering free, Just to see Jesus transfigured forever, That will be glory, be glory, for me. Just to see Jesus, when saved ones are gathering, Jesus who died upon Calvary's tree, Just to see Jesus with all heaven ringing, That will be glory, be glory, for me." He is surely coming back again and it is well worth while to ask the question as to what this coming will mean to certain classes of people. 1. What will it mean to the saved? 1 Corinthians 15:51-52. — "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." So many times we hear people use the expression, speaking of certain events, "This is as certain as death," but death is by no means certain, it is not at all sure that we shall all die. St. Paul himself tells us we shall not all sleep, and he is speaking of death; some will be alive when the Lord comes back, and perhaps we who are today in health and strength, shall be of the company. (a) Some day the skies will brighten and He will appear, and just as Saul of Tarsus saw what others did not see, so some eyes will be opened to behold Him, while others will be blinded to His coming, and when those who have their trust in Him are taken away, others will remain behind in wonder and in amazement. (b) Families will be separated. In this household a mother was a humble follower of Jesus Christ and all the others were indifferent to Him. She will be taken; the others left. In another household the father was a saint of God. The Bible and Jesus were his constant delight, but he was unable to lead his children to Christ, and with the godly mother he will be taken and the others left. A Christian business man who has been careful in all his business dealings, and consistent in his following of Jesus Christ, taken, and those with whom he is associated, left behind; perhaps the saved children of a household whose parents were worldly and cared not for Christ and His Church are taken. (c) It should be remembered, however, that before these are taken, the dead in Christ shall rise first; their spirits safe with Him from the moment of their death, their bodies have been resting in the tomb, and when He appears, the tombs of the Christian dead shall be opened, and spirit and body united. They shall go up to be with Him. There are some places I should like to be at that wonderful time. I think I should like to be standing here speaking of Him, or I should like to be pleading with an audience to turn to Him, or I should like to be sitting beside some one who is helpless and hopeless and urging them to accept Him, or I should like to be at the grave of D. L. Moody, and behold his tomb open and see him ascend to meet the Lord whom he so faithfully preached; or I should like to be at my mother's tomb where years ago we placed her and said "goodbye" to her with tears blinding our eyes. To sum it all up, however, I think I should like to be just anywhere, seeking to please Him and trying to find out concerning His Will, that I might do it. I stood one day in Wales before the grave of the famous Welsh preacher, Christmas Evans, and was told that he was buried in the same grave with a friend, a brother minister, whom he loved dearly, and this was all because they wanted to be together when the Lord came and they be caught up. They had agreed that hand in hand they would ascend to greet Him. (d) In the Scriptures we read that we who are alive shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, that is, with our beloved who have gone on before. No more separation, no more fear of the cable's message, no more funerals, no more visits to the cemetery, no more going back to the home that has been made empty because the loved one has departed. "We shall not all sleep, what ineffable bliss, Some living at present may taste even of this, His coming, the rapture, the joyful surprise, One moment a mortal, the next in the skies. Our Saviour will come in the air, He'll descend, The living, the sleeping, to Him shall ascend, Some wait there in heaven, some wait here below, Then raptured in triumph to Him we all go. We shall not all sleep, but changed we shall be, Yes, changed in a moment when Jesus we see, In the blaze of His glory, the flash of an eye, (e) When St. Paul was nearing the end of his remarkable career, he writes, "That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead." The expression "if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead" is literally "the out-resurrection from among the dead"! that is, St. Paul knew that the Lord was coming back, that the Christian dead would rise to greet Him, and he wanted to be of the company, and thus expresses his hope and desire... 2. What will it mean to the unsaved for Christ to appear? (a) If they are dead then it will mean that at His appearing their tombs will not be unsealed, they shall wait longer for another great event which is so startling that one shudders even as he reads of it, that is Judgment. (b) If they are living they will be left behind when others ascend to greet Him with their loved ones in the skies. (c) And when the time comes those who have rejected Jesus Christ will face the Judgment. In Revelation 20:11-13, I read, "And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works." It is a white throne, to me, at least, it is significant that when the saved greet Him there will be "a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald." The emerald is green and green rests the eye. In contrast the full blaze of the white of the throne of God's judgment will be torture indeed. He will be upon the throne; the One whom men have rejected and despised in spite of His mercy, and love. "The dead, small and great, shall stand before God." There can be no favoritism there. The books shall be opened and on the basis of one's record, men will be judged. Those who have accepted Christ need have no fear of the judgment of the Great White Throne. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus," but if he has been rejected, and finally rejected, we know what the end must be, for the word of the Lord hath spoken it. Recently the Honorable Elihu Root, in one of his addresses used this expression: THE TIMETABLE OF THE ALMIGHTY. What a striking sentence, how suggestive, how true it is to these days, how it fits in to my subject. (a) The hour has come. Jesus said that as he was nearing the end of his earthly ministry, and when the price of our redemption was to be paid in full. (b)"Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation." (c) The door of mercy is open; it may close at any moment. "Seek ye the LORD while He may be found, call ye upon Him while He is near." From Evangelistic Sermons by J. Wilbur Chapman. New York: Fleming H. Revell Company, ©1922.