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Kalamazoo SDA Church

Jermaine Gayle

Heartburn

Father, we want to thank you for another glorious, wonderful Sabbath.

It is good to be in your house together as a family, to worship together, to study together, and we're asking dear father that your Holy Spirit will set our hearts on fire Is our prayer in Jesus name?

Disappointed anybody Ever been disappointed perhaps.

It's something you ordered off Amazon that showed up and it wasn't what you ordered.

Or maybe you ordered something from Timu and when it showed up it just wasn't the same size you saw online.

I remember I was driving from Indiana to Michigan in my 1999 Chevy Malibu.

And as I'm driving on the highway, surprisingly, I was coming to be interviewed in Michigan.

Otherwise, I mean, this was going to be my first shot at pastoral ministry.

I was coming to a job interview, and I knew that if somehow I got to work in Michigan, I would still be in Michigan, perhaps.

I was working at Indiana University as a field chaplain with the local church there.

I was looking forward to this next new chapter in my life.

And as I'm Driving from Indiana to Michigan on the highway, my car broke down on the highway.

My bank account said, you cannot afford any car repairs today and there I was on the side of the road in my car I was so disappointed I remember calling the record service they came and took the car to a shop And I knew I couldn't pay for the car to get fixed, but somehow the car ended up at the shop.

I wanted them to haul me to Michigan, but they weren't going to do that.

But I remember I was so disappointed, friends.

I went out and I got me some Chinese food, and I sat down in the comfort of my food and relaxed.

In fact, some of you might have been disappointed this week.

Let down by someone, let down somewhere, and you're trying to find how to pick yourself up and somehow still believe disappointed.

Well, there is not a single disappointment that you and I might experience today that could compare to what happened to Adventist in 1844.

October 22nd Jesus didn't come And many who had sold their homes and lands figured out that they were still here on earth and heaven was not in their future, at least not right away.

Imagine the disappointment as they walked the streets of Michigan, some parts, and they were being taunted, asking, well, Brother Joe, why are you still here?

By the way, they had said that Adventism had swollen to about 50, 000 people, and after the Great Disappointment, it narrowed down to about 50.

But in the year 1850, a man who was disappointed as a result of Jesus not coming again, coming back in 1844, is named Stephen Smith.

A very not well-known individual, but I'm going to tell you about Stephen Smith.

Stephen Smith received a letter from Ellen White in the year 1850.

And he had believed in the Advent message back in 1844, but the disappointment somehow shook his faith to the core, and Stephen no longer believed in the second coming of Jesus Christ.

Stephen was a gifted and eloquent speaker.

He was said to have many talents and he was a very promising and prominent man in Adventism.

But after the disappointment, he struggled.

He couldn't find his footing anymore and his faith was on the cusp of being let go altogether, but he had walked away from the church.

And 1 day, Stephen Smith received a letter.

The envelope was addressed to him and the name on the envelope was Ellen G.

I don't know about you but if I show up at my mailbox and I got a letter with the name Ellen G.

The prophet writes to you, you're probably thinking, wait a minute, what's going on?

But Stephen Smith received the letter and when he saw it he said, oh, don't want anything from her.

He took the letter, threw it in a trunk in 1 of his rooms, and closed the trunk, closed the closet door, and left the letter for years, friends.

His sentiment when he received the letter was, there it is, she thinks she's going to give me 1 of her testimonies.

He thought as he threw this letter in the bottom of this chest, that that was it.

I'm done with this second coming thing and this Adventism thing but then in the year 1885 friends 1885 how many years later is this any math whiz here anybody math how many 35 I heard multiple answers A preacher by the name of Eugene Farnsworth came to town and he was preaching an evangelistic series and Stephen Smith showed up to listen to the message.

This was by the way in New Hampshire and Stephen Smith was there and this is where Stephen Smith grew up and he came to listen to this preacher that was still preaching this great message and Stephen Smith had showed up with the intent to criticize and also to challenge this preacher on account of what he was saying and he was going to prove to everybody in the gathering that what this preacher was preaching was false and not true.

But the more Stephen listened, the more he realized that everything that pastor Farnsworth was preaching was straight biblical and on point and Stephen could not refute what the Holy Spirit was doing he said I was going to this is Stephen Smith quoting him is I was going to listen to Farnsworth's messages and I was going to be his greatest critic.

He walked, by the way, 14 miles to get to this church to prove Stephen, to prove Mr.

And he listened and he listened and he listened day after day he listened to Mr.

Farnsworth preaching and Stephen Smith became convinced by the message because he believed that the Holy Spirit was working in that gathering and so he said you know what As he listened to a sermon on the spirit of prophecy, Stephen Smith decided, you know, I'm going to actually go home, open this chest and read the letter that was sent to me.

Old man now, much older, went home, opened the chest, took the letter out, opened it up, got the pages together, and he started reading.

That, as he read the letter, I recognized that Ellen White had given me a picture of my life, just exactly as I lived it for the 28 years that I refused to read this letter.

And all the things that I could have prevented, Ellen White wrote in that letter.

But I end up living because I refused to open the letter.

Later in church, he showed up in the meeting and he said, brethren, I received the testimony myself 28 years ago and I took it home and locked it in my trunk and I never read it until last Thursday.

Brethren, every single word of the testimony for me is true and I accept it and I have come to that place where I firmly believe that they are all from God." Exactly as he was about to live his life, Ellen White told him and she had written to warn him, Stephen do not go down this road because if you do, this is going to be the result.

And as he read it years later, he discovered that he lived exactly as she wrote when she wrote that letter initially to him.

Friends, it is not a good idea to leave an unopened letter after a disappointment.

It is not a good idea to leave an unopened letter after a disappointment.

I want to talk to you about another letter that was sent, friends.

And this letter is still available for disappointed people.

If you get nothing from the sermon today, this is it.

Because The Word of God gives you a clear description of your life.

And if you study the Word of God, friends, you will see that you can live a better way than how we're used to living.

And you'll find that there are better solutions to dealing with our disappointments even better than Chinese food.

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Heartburn

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