2. How charming is their voice!
    How sweet the tidings are!
Zion, behold your Saviour–King,
    He reigns and triumphs here.

3. How happy are our ears,
    To hear this joyful sound!
Which kings and prophets waited for,
    And sought, but never found.

4. How blessed are our eyes,
    That see this heav’nly light!
Which prophets, kings, desired so long,
    But died without the sight.

- based on Isaiah 52:7-10; Matthew 13:16,17

The work of true Gospel ministers is to bring God’s message of salvation to the world. They not only tell about the Saviour, but God’s power accompanies their work to make it effective in the hearts of the people, so that the Saviour reigns in them, and they know the power, love, and obedience that distinguishes His kingdom.

It is also important that the church test these ministers to make sure they are really appointed by God. In our time, it is common to accept any man who can “speak well”, or who is approved by the church board, or who has a theology or ministerial degree from an established christian educational institution. But these qualifications do not necessarily constitute a man as a spokesperson for God. This is especially the case when a church becomes hardened in traditional ways and no longer advances in truth.

The early church tested its appointed men carefully. They are even commended in the book of Revelation for doing so:

Revelation 2
² I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars:

How did the early church test these apostles? First, they had to possess the true gospel, the one that had power to save from sin:

Ephesians 3
⁷ Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power.

Second, they had to have a holy character and good experience in judgment:

Acts 6
³ Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business.

Third, they had to be free from self-exaltation, knowing that ministry in God’s kingdom means humble service:

Mark 10
⁴² But Jesus called them to him, and saith unto them, Ye know that they which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and their great ones exercise authority upon them.
⁴³ But so shall it not be among you: but whosoever will be great among you, shall be your minister:
⁴⁴ And whosoever of you will be the chiefest, shall be servant of all.

Fourth, they had to have a good knowledge of the Scriptures and ability to reason from them:

2 Timothy 2
¹⁵ Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

And lastly, they had to have a burden from the Lord to do the work, so that they would not dare put it down when it became difficult:

2 Corinthians 11
²³ Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.
²⁴ Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one.
²⁵ Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep;
²⁶ In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;
²⁷ In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.
²⁸ Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches.
²⁹ Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not?
³⁰ If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things which concern mine infirmities.

When these tests are applied, the church will be spared much grief and from being led astray by messages that are not part of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Then they will be able to fully appreciate the men whom God has chosen and whose messages will bless their lives with the fruit of the Holy Spirit as they apply them in their daily lives.

About the melody

The tune is from Ananias Davisson. Davisson was one of those fascinating and resourceful early Americans, who seemed to be good at many different trades/businesses. One biography describes him as follows:

Ananias Davisson (1780-1857) was a successful entrepreneur, farmer, businessman, and publisher. Born in Shenandoah County, Virginia, Davisson lived most of his life in and around Harrisonburg, VA (Rockingham County). In 1816, Davisson published “Kentucky Harmony” which was an immediate success and ultimately became the model for most shaped-note tunebooks published in the Shenandoah Valley and throughout the South. Davisson’s collection, which went through many editions, utilized popular melodies of the day including folk hymns and anthems from some of the popular New England singing school manuals (Billings, Wyeth, et al).^[1]

This tune came from Davisson’s “Kentucky Harmony,” and is a beautiful pentatonic (5-tone scale) melody, definitely in the folk tradition. This practice, of putting together collections of sacred music from rural traditions, went on from the time of the American Revolution, until about the mid-1800′s. The “Sacred Harp” was the most popular of these collections. After that time, more popular urban music, inspired by European practices, began to push the rural music out of common use.

Refrain
As you see these signs fulfilling, do not fear, do not fear;
    For the Bible speaks of darkness, when salvation draweth near;
Turn to Him and to His promise, you will make no mistake,
    For His word will stand forever, when all man’s inventions break.

2. Sickness, virus, epidemics; don’t you feel? don’t you feel?
    Medicines cannot control them, and the sickness does not heal.
Droughts, and floods, and storms and fires on the news! on the news!
    Stocks are falling, prices rising, try to gain, but still we lose.
Refrain

3. More and more the earth is trembling: keep awake, and take heed!
    Take up the neglected duties, turn your heart to those in need.
Don’t forget the Master’s warning: “Be prepared! Be prepared!”
    And be ready for His kingdom, in the turmoil you’ll be spared.
Refrain

- Luke 10:27

2. They are kept in perfect peace,
    Nothing then can make them sad,
Gospel truth brings sweet release,
    Jesus’ presence makes them glad.

3. Tho’ their lives a tangle seem,
    To His glory He will weave
Living patterns with great sheen
    While in Jesus they believe.

4. Ready for God’s Paradise,
    They will walk with Him in white
Heaven’s not a heavy price,
    Here and now they’re in its light.

5. Worthy is the Lamb that died,
    He redeemed them with His blood.
Worthy, who in Him abide,
    Reconciled by Him to God.

- based on The Desire of Ages, p. 331

Those who take Christ at His word, and surrender their souls to His keeping, their lives to His ordering, will find peace and quietude. Nothing of the world can make them sad when Jesus makes them glad by His presence. In perfect acquiescence there is perfect rest. The Lord says, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee: because he trusteth in Thee.” Isa. 26:3. Our lives may seem a tangle; but as we commit ourselves to the wise Master Worker, He will bring out the pattern of life and character that will be to His own glory. And that character which expresses the glory–character–of Christ will be received into the Paradise of God. A renovated race shall walk with Him in white, for they are worthy.

The text compares the work of creation to that of redemption. God’s glory, power, and beauty were seen in the unspoiled creation. But then sin entered. The beauty of God’s created works were marred, His glory stolen, his love mistreated. How would He react?

As the history of the Old Testament unfolded, promises, prophecies, and forshadowings were given that pointed to God’s full reply to the sin problem. But when Jesus, the only Son of God, one with the Father, condescended to come in the body of a fallen mortal, in order to uplift the fallen race, an even more beautiful revelation of God’s character was unfolded.

When the Son was then born in a lowly manger, lived a live of poverty, went about ministering life and healing, was mistreated, spat upon, bruised, and crucified, it seemed like the plan for reclaiming the lost creation was over.

But these were the very means by which God’s character of love shone out even brighter. And with the resurrection, the early church went out with a clear understanding of the plan of God for the redemption of the lost world, and proclaimed it boldly.

By the joining of Jesus to the fallen race, man will be lifted up even higher than he would have been had there never been a fall. In the original creation man was made “a little lower than the angels” (Hebrews 2:7). But those who have already passed through the grave and are in heaven now (see Revelation 4 and 5) stand even closer to the throne than the angels.

Jesus Christ, the second Adam, the second father to the human race, brings with Him a higher pedigree than Adam. Adam was a created being, and although he had the ability to reproduce, could only produce children that were like himself. But the Son of God was “without beginning of days or end of life” (Hebrews 7:3), and passes this inheritance to His children.

As the song teaches, it is “much, much, much more!”

2. We’re going to join the heav’nly choir,
    Now tell me, will you go?
To raise our voice and tune the lyre,
    Now tell me, will you go?
There saints and angels gladly sing,
    Hosanna to their God and King,
And make the heav’nly arches ring,
    Now tell me, will you go?

3. You weary, heavy laden, come,
    Now tell me, will you go?
In the marriage feast there still is room,
    Now tell me, will you go?
The Lord is waiting to receive,
    So hear His message and believe!
He’ll give your troubled conscience ease,
    Now tell me, will you go?

This is what it means to wear the wedding garment;
    This is what it means to wear the wedding garment;
This is what it means to be clothed with the garment
    Of His righteousness.
Repeat

- Christ’s Object Lessons, p. 312

This is not heresy, as some might imagine. It has been taught by other well-known preachers of the past. Read this paragraph from Spurgeon’s sermon #976, preached in 1871, and titled, “The Wedding Garment”:

…the wedding dress is a holy character, the imparted righteousness which the Holy Spirit works in us, and which is equally necessary as a proof of grace. If you question such a statement, I would remind you of the dress which adorns the saints in heaven. What is said of it? “They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Their robes therefore were such as once needed washing; and this could not be said in any sense of the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ; that was always perfect and spotless. It is clear then that the figure is sometimes applied to saints in reference to their personal character.

Holiness is always present in those who are loyal guests of the great King, for “without holiness no man shall see the Lord.” Too many professors pacify themselves with the idea that they possess imputed righteousness, while they are indifferent to the sanctifying work of the Spirit. They refuse to put on the garment of obedience, they reject the white linen which is the righteousness of saints. They thus reveal their self-will, their enmity to God, and their non-submission to his Son. Such men may talk what they will about justification by faith, and salvation by grace, but they are rebels at heart, they have not on the wedding dress any more than the self-righteous, whom they so eagerly condemn.

Or consider these paragraphs from a sermon of John Wesley (sermon #120, “On The Wedding Garment”), presented the year before his death:

What, then, is that holiness which is the true “wedding garment,” the only qualification for glory?

“In Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but a new creation,”—the renewal of the soul “in the image of God wherein it was created.”

In “Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love.” [Gal. 5:6] It first, through the energy of God, worketh love to God and all mankind; and, by this love, every holy and heavenly temper: in particular, lowliness, meekness, gentleness, temperance, and longsuffering.

“It is neither circumcision,” (the attending on all the Christian ordinances), “nor uncircumcision,” (the fulfilling of all heathen morality,) but “the keeping the commandments of God; particularly those: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as thyself.” In a word, holiness is the having “the mind that was in Christ,” and the “walking as Christ walked.”

Such has been my judgment for these threescore years, without any material alteration. Only, about fifty years ago I had a clearer view than before of justification by faith: and in this, from that very hour, I never varied, no, not an hair’s breadth…I am now on the borders of the grave; but, by the grace of God, I still witness the same confession.

Indeed, some have supposed, that when I began to declare, “By grace ye are saved through faith,” I retracted what I had before maintained: “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.” But it is an entire mistake: These scriptures well consist with each other; the meaning of the former being plainly this: By faith we are saved from sin, and made holy. The imagination that faith supersedes holiness, is the marrow of Antinomianism.

The sum of all is this: The God of love is willing to save all the souls that he has made. This he has proclaimed to them in his word, together with the terms of salvation, revealed by the Son of his love, who gave his own life that they that believe in him might have everlasting life. And for these he has prepared a kingdom, from the foundation of the world. But he will not force them to accept of it; he leaves them in the hands of their own counsel; he saith, “Behold, I set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: Choose life, that ye may live.” Choose holiness, by my grace; which is the way, the only way, to everlasting life.

He cries aloud, “Be holy, and be happy; happy in this world, and happy in the world to come.” “Holiness becometh his house for ever!” (Psalm 93:5) This is the wedding garment of all that are called to “the marriage of the Lamb.” Clothed in this, they will not be found naked: “They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” But as to all those who appear in the last day without the wedding garment, the Judge will say, “Cast them into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Madeley, March 26, 1790

But in spite of this clear teaching from the past, it is now popular, even in those churches who claim to be Adventist, to teach that the wedding garment is something placed to our account, and not a living part of us. The modern preachers teach that Christ will “stand in our place” in the judgment, and that God will look at Him, and not at us. They teach that the wedding garment of Christ’s righteousness is something that covers up our sinful deformities, so that when God looks at us, He does not see them. (For more details about this false teaching, see the article, Covered Sin).

But covering up and hiding sin is hypocrisy: it is giving an appearance of righteousness; it is pretending to be a lamb when you are still a wolf inside. Christ will never cover up sin, for He is not the “minister of sin” (Galatians 2:17). The covering of His righteousness is only put on after the old garments of sin have been removed. This is very clearly taught in the Bible:

Zechariah 3
⁴ Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment.

It was the contrary and false teaching (that grace covers sin but does not remove it) that John Wesley described, in the sermon above, as “the imagination that faith supersedes holiness.” It is a false imagination, and not real faith. Real faith does not do away with holiness, it establishes holiness:

Romans 3
³¹ Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.

God forbid that we should try to turn the wedding garment into something that makes holiness void, or not required. The wedding garment IS holiness. And the standard of the kingdom, that which the King looks for when He inspects the guests, is this wedding garment. It is a character purified and perfected with the blood of Jesus Christ: His own attributes and life imparted to the believer to give him victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil. For “this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith.” (1 John 5:4)

2. Now they say greenest fields are waving there,
    And that never a blight ever know;
And the deserts wild are blooming fair,
    And roses of Sharon grow.
There are loveliest birds within the bowers green,
    And their songs are so blithe and so sweet;
With their warblings resounding ever new
    And the angel’s harpings greet,
    And the angel’s harpings greet.

3. We have heard of the palms, the robes, the crowns,
    And the silvery band all in white;
Of the city fair with pearly gates,
    With radiant, crystal light.
We have heard of the angels and of all the saints,
    With their harps of pure gold, how they sing;
Of the mount, with the fruitful tree of life,
    Of the leaves that healing bring,
    Of the leaves that healing bring.

4. And the King of that country, He is fair,
    He’s the joy and the light of the place;
In His beauty we’ll behold him there,
    And bask in His smiling face,
We’ll be there, we’ll be there in just a little while;
    We will join all the pure and the blest;
We’ll be given the palm, the robe, the crown,
    And forever be at rest,
    And forever be at rest.

2. This is my Father’s world, the birds their carols raise;
    The morning light, the lily white, declare their Maker’s praise.
This is my Father’s world! He shines in all that’s fair;
    In the rustling grass I hear Him pass—He speaks to me ev’rywhere.

3. This is my Father’s world, oh let me ne’er forget
    That tho’ the wrong seems oft so strong God is the Ruler yet.
This is my Father’s world! The battle is not done;
    Jesus who died shall be satisfied, and earth and heav’n be one.

2. All night their horses onward spurr’d:
    On they came with scoff and boast:
Till God look’d down, and wrath was pour’d
    On the bravest of their host.
Then the strong met the Stronger;
Vengeance then slept no longer;
Then the Wrong’d triumph’d o’er the wronger.

3. True Moses of the Christian band;
    Your renown and hard-won fame,
When on the cross, by mighty hand,
    Sin and death were brought to shame:
Victor o’er pow’rs internal,
King amidst foes infernal,
Lead us on, up to joys eternal.

I’ve modified the text a bit, but the original words were written/translated by D.M Neale, a minister in the Church of England in the 1800′s who was keenly interested in the medieval and eastern church. He was an active poet and translator as well, and almost finished a 4-volume commentary on the Psalms (it was completed after his death), which was drawn from many early church and medieval sources. In these books the Psalms are interpreted as prophecies of Christ.

This song is much in the same tradition. It treats the story of Moses’ victory over the Egyptians as a prophecy or symbol of Christ’s victory over sin and death. This is a valid comparison, since Egypt was the enslaver of the Israelites, and sin/death are the enslavers of the human race.

As well, this story gains new significance in light of the statement in the book of Revelation that the 144,000 sing the “song of Moses and the Lamb” (Revelation 15:3) This prophecy tells us that there is yet to be another experience of mighty victory for God’s church: the victory over the beast and his image, or otherwise called “Babylon the Great.” This mighty victory will usher in the return of Christ in the clouds of heaven and the end of the kingdoms of this world. It will be a combination of both of the previous victories:

• the victory of Moses and the children of Israel over their outward oppressors—this corresponds to the deliverance of God’s children from the persecuting power of Babylon the Great
• the victory of Christ over sin and death—this corresponds to the victory of God’s children over the fierce temptations that Satan brings upon them during the time of “Jacob’s trouble” during which, along with the outward persecution, they will be plunged into a time of much internal distress, similar to Christ’s experience in the garden of Gethsemane. Just as Job’s experience of suffering made his beautiful faith shine more brightly, so will this last trial do the same for those waiting saints.

When Christ finally appears, and turns their mortal bodies into immortal ones, their victory over sin and death will be as complete and triumphant as was Moses’ victory over his enemies, and Christ’s victory over the same. It will be a complete inward and outward victory, and so is called the song of “Moses and the Lamb.”

To understand this last battle more clearly, I highly recommend the book, The Seven Angels.