Stephen N. Haskell
Stephen N. Haskell was an evangelist and administrator. He began preaching for the non-Sabbath keeping Adventists in New England in 1853. Later that year he began to worship on Saturday, or Sabbath. He worked without pay in New England until his ordination in 1870. He was president of Seventh-day Adventist churches in various parts of the United States.
In 1885 he led a group of missionaries who began to spread the Adventist mission in Australia and New Zealand. In 1887 he began to establish the Adventist church in London, England. He travelled the world as a missionary between 1889 and 1890, visiting Western Europe, Southern Africa, India, China, Japan, and Australia.
Haskell is also remembered as the person who organised the first Adventist Church of African Americans in New York City in 1902. He led in temperance work in Maine in 1911, began printing books for the blind in 1912, and assisted in the development of the White Memorial Hospital in 1916. He wrote: “The Story of Daniel the Prophet”, “The Story of the Seer of Patmos”, and “The Cross and Its Shadow”.
John Nevins Andrews
A Seventh-day Adventist minister, missionary, writer, editor, and scholar. Born in Poland, Maine in 1829, Andrews was converted in February 1843 and began to observe the seventh-day Sabbath in 1845. He met James White and Ellen G. White in September 1849. Later, the Whites boarded with the Andrews family. In 1850 he began itinerant pastoral ministry in New England and ordained in 1853. Andrews played a pivotal role in the establishment of Adventist theology.
As a theologian, Andrews made great strides in the development of church doctrines. He applied the two-horned beast of Rev. 13 to the United States of America. Further, he was influential in creating the church’s bylaws and constitution. In 1855, after thorough investigation, Andrews adopted sunset Friday evening as the beginning of the Sabbath. In 1874, he became the first SDA missionary in Switzerland. He worked to gather the scattered Sabbath-keeping companies and organize them with a united message. While living in Basel, he contracted tuberculosis and died. He was 54.
Hiram Edson
Edson spent October 22, 1844 with friends waiting for the event, and was heart-broken when Jesus did not return as expected. He later wrote:
“Our fondest hopes and expectations were blasted, and such a spirit of weeping came over us as I never experienced before. It seemed that the loss of all earthly friends could have been no comparison. We wept, and wept, till the day dawn.”
On the morning of October 23 they were passing through Edson’s grain field where he had a vision. In this vision, Edson came to understand that “the cleansing of the sanctuary” meant that Jesus was moving from the Holy Place to the Most Holy Place in the heavenly sanctuary, and not to the Second Coming of Jesus to earth:”We started, and while passing through a large field I was stopped about midway of the field. Heaven seemed opened to my view, and I saw distinctly and clearly that instead of our High Priest coming out of the Most Holy of the heavenly sanctuary to come to this earth on the tenth day of the seventh month, at the end of the 2300 days, He for the first time entered on that day the second apartment of that sanctuary; and that He had a work to perform in the Most Holy before coming to the earth.”
Edson shared what he believed he saw with many of the local Adventists who were greatly encouraged by his account. As a result Edson began studying the bible with two of the other believers in the area, O. R. L. Crosier and Franklin B. Hahn, who published their findings in a paper called the Day-Dawn. This paper explored the biblical parable of the Ten Virgins.
John Loughborough
In December 1852, Uriah Smith accepted the message taught by the Sabbath-keeping Adventist and soon was associated with the publishing interests of the believers in Rochester, New York. For about a half century he was the editor or on the editorial staff of the church paper, the Review and Herald. Smith was the first Secretary of the General Conference starting in 1863.
John is well known for writing the books The Rise and Progress of Seventh-day Adventists and The Great Second Advent Movement. Like most of the early Advent leaders, Loughborough took a real interest in the literature work. He and James White discussed ways and means of advancing the work of the gospel.
It was suggested that if books were offered to the public in connection with preaching services, the people would be willing to pay a small price for them. Thus, the way would be prepared for more literature to be produced. Young Loughborough tried this method, and it was a success. Loughborough spent his last years in the St. Helena Sanitarium, where he passed away peacefully on April 7, 1924, at the ripe old age of ninety-two.
Uriah Smith
Born in 1832 in West Wilton, New Hampshire. His family accepted the Millerite message and in 1844 experienced what has become known as the Great Disappointment. That same year, Smith had his left leg amputated due to an infection. Following the Disappointment. Around 1852, he became involved in the early Seventh-day Adventist Church as in December of that year he accepted the message taught by the by them and soon was associated with the publishing interests of the believers in Rochester, New York.
In 1853, he began working at the offices of the Advent Review and Sabbath Herald (now the Adventist Review), becoming its editor in 1855. His main contribution to Adventist theology was a commentary on the prophetic Biblical books of Daniel and the Revelation originally called ‘Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelation) This book was greatly endorsed by Ellen White and she even referred to it as ‘God’s helping hand.’
Alonzo T Jones
Alonzo was baptized when he left the Army, and began preaching on the West Coast. In May, 1885, he became editor of the Signs of the Times, and was later joined by E. J. Waggoner.
In 1888, these two men stirred the General Conference session in Minneapolis with their preaching on righteousness by faith. For several years thereafter, they preached on that subject from coast to coast. Ellen White accompanied them on many occasions. She saw in Jones‚Äô presentations of “the precious subject of faith and the righteousness of Christ…a flood of light” (EGW 1888 Materials, p. 291).
Jones was on the General Conference Committee in 1897 and editor-in-chief of the Review and Herald from 1897 to 1901.
In 1889, with J. O. Corliss, he spoke against a bill in the U.S. Congress on Sunday observance; the bill was defeated. Thereafter he was a prominent speaker for religious freedom, serving as editor of the forerunner of the Liberty magazine.
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