The Spirit of Prophecy: The Tarrying Time and the Midnight Cry

In our last presentation, the question arose about how October 22, 1844, can be the tenth day of the seventh month if March 22, 1844, is the first day of the first month. The Millerites in March 1844 misunderstood what they believed to be the end of 1843. After that disappointment, they re-examined the biblical reckoning of time. This is explained in Gerhard Damsteegt's book, Foundations of the Seventh-day Adventist Message and Mission, particularly on pages 89 and 92. When they believed 1843 ended, they reevaluated two components of their time understanding: the change from 1843 to 1844, and the days that mark the beginning and ending of the years, so they could calculate the tenth day of the seventh month.

I often emphasize that from March 22nd to October 22nd is seven months. I am not suggesting that this is the Seventh Month Movement, but it is interesting that the Millerites believed March 22nd was significant, and it's a helpful mental marker—seven months later brings you to October 22nd. This is factual.

The disappointment and the tarrying time were not fulfillment's of a time prophecy, but rather the result of a misunderstanding by the Millerites. Their misunderstanding fulfilled the tarrying time and the disappointment; there was no specific prophecy stating that the tarrying time would begin at a certain point. Their belief that 1843 had passed on March 22, 1844, produced the disappointment.

Damsteegt says:

We read yesterday that Miller was expecting that date. The majority of the Millerites were looking at that date, and even their opponents knew it and were watching for it as proof that the Millerites were false. This was the standard understanding. After it passed, they began to investigate the time prophecies more closely, which led them to October 22, 1844. This provides a point of reference for the question that came up yesterday.

Today, I want to spend more time looking at the tarrying time. This is important because we are dealing with Ellen White's first vision, where she says the bright light at the beginning of the path to Heaven was the Midnight Cry, and if you deny that light, you fall off the path to Heaven. I am trying to demonstrate that the Midnight Cry in her vision includes the entire history of the Second Angel's Message.

Personally, I have no problem saying that the Midnight Cry in that vision, which is at the beginning of the path and sheds light all along the way, represents the history of the Millerites from 1840 to 1844. The dynamics of that history must be rightly understood. The fulfillment of the Midnight Cry itself was from August 12th through 17th, when the message was presented at the Exeter Camp Meeting, and then they carried the message for about two months—September and October, two months and five days. Before October 22nd, they were preparing for the Lord's return. This two-month period is the history of the Midnight Cry. However, you cannot understand this period without understanding the steps that led into it. For me, the Midnight Cry is, more specifically, the history of the tarrying time, continuing through October 22, 1844.

Here is the history of 1840 to 1844. There are several passages in the Spirit of Prophecy where Sister White tells us we need to know where to locate the messages. When you begin to locate the messages, you realize that all the messages arrive at a certain point in time and are thereafter empowered.

The First Angel arrived in 1798 at the Time of the End, when the Book of Daniel is unsealed and there was an increase of knowledge. The First Angel's Message is empowered on August 11, 1840, when the year-day principle is confirmed for the whole world, bringing down the Angel of Revelation 10, which symbolizes the empowerment of the First Angel's Message.

The Second Angel arrived in June of 1842. We read yesterday that in June of 1842, Mr. Miller gave his second course of presentations at the Casco Street church. With few exceptions, the Protestant churches closed their doors. So, in June of 1842, the Second Angel's Message arrived, because when a Protestant church closes its door against the First Angel's Message, it becomes part of Babylon. The Second Angel's Message is a call out of Babylon. It is progressive.

Sister White tells us that even though the Protestants began to close their doors in June of 1842, the call out of Babylon—the content of the Second Angel's Message—did not actually begin until the Summer of 1844.

The Second Angel's Message arrived in June of 1842 and is empowered with the message of the Midnight Cry, August 12th–17th, 1844, at the Exeter Camp Meeting.

The Third Angel arrived on October 22, 1844, because on that day the way into the Most Holy Place is opened, where men can understand that Christ is now the High Priest in the Most Holy Place. There, the ark of the covenant is recognized, and in the ark are the Ten Commandments. When Sister White was taken into the Most Holy Place and looked at the Ten Commandments, she saw that the Sabbath Commandment shone above the others, marking the significance of the Sabbath in the Third Angel's Message. It will be a test over Sabbath or Sunday. On October 22, 1844, the content of the Third Angel's Message arrived.

One characteristic of all three messages is that when the First Angel's Message arrived in 1798, no one understood it. The Lord raised up William Miller to be the messenger of the First Angel, but it was not until 1818—twenty years later—that Miller began to understand the message. The message arrived, but it takes time before God's people recognize it, and then it is empowered.

The Second Angel's Message arrived in June of 1842, but no Millerites in 1842 began calling the Protestant churches Babylon. They did not recognize it yet. It was not until the Summer of 1844 that they began to recognize it and call people out of the churches. The message arrives, then it is understood, and then it is empowered.

On October 22, 1844, when Hiram Edson had his vision of Christ moving from the Holy Place to the Most Holy Place, they received some light on Christ's change of ministration. But on October 23, 1844, Hiram Edson was not prepared to write an article or preach a sermon about Sunday being the mark of the beast. They did not understand the Third Angel's Message until after that time period.

The Third Angel's Message is empowered, as Seventh-day Adventists know, when the Fourth Angel of Revelation 18 joins it. For those watching this on LiveStreaming or later on DVDs, you may want to argue about the timing of the Fourth Angel joining the Third on September 11, 2001. At this point, we are not making any arguments about that, but we are not denying it either: The Fourth Angel joins the Third Angel with the Twin Towers coming down, and this is where the Third Angel's Message is empowered.

All three Angels' Messages have these characteristics: they arrive, are understood, and then are empowered.

In June of 1842, a door began to close, marked by the Protestant churches closing their doors against the First Angel's Message. At the beginning of this history, we see a door closing, and at the end of this history—the history of the Second Angel—the door closes again, the door into the Holy Place, the door in the parable of the Ten Virgins.

These two door closings are important to mark, especially if you are going to deal with the two temple cleansings. Christ cleansed the temple twice when He was on Earth, and Sister White tells us there will be two temple cleansings at the end of the world, as there were in the time of the Millerites. The temple cleansings in the Millerite time can be marked at the closing of the door in June 1842—the first door of the temple, Protestantism—and at the second temple cleansing, when the Millerites' temple cleansing is finished.

We are going to look at the tarrying time. In this history of the Second Angel, the tarrying time comes in at March 22, 1844, and is bookended by two temple cleansings. That is the Second Angel's Message.

This is also the story of Gideon. There were two cleansings in the story of Gideon, which is one of the symbols of the two temple cleansings and the Second Angel's Message.

Let us begin our study with a quote from Spiritual Gifts, volume 1, pages 195, 196. We are looking at the tarrying time to understand its connection with the Midnight Cry, because we do not want to reject the light of the Midnight Cry; if we do, we fall off the path to the wicked world below.

Angels were sent to aid the mighty angel from heaven, and I heard voices which seemed to sound everywhere, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues; for her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. This message seemed to be an addition to the third message,"—Now, she just quoted Revelation 18:4, "Come out of her, my people, . . . ." And she says, "This message seemed to be an addition to the third [Angel's] message and joined it, as the midnight cry joined the second angel's message in 1844."

The Second Angel's Message arrives in June of 1842, and the Midnight Cry joins it in August of 1844. This outpouring of the Spirit upon this message—the call out of Babylon—is the history Sister White uses to describe the history of September 11, 2001, when the Third Angel's Message is joined by the Fourth Angel. The Fourth Angel is when the Mighty Angel of Revelation 18 descends.

"This message seemed to be an addition to the third message and joined it, as the midnight cry joined the second angel's message in 1844. The glory of God rested upon the patient, waiting saints,"—Who did the glory of God rest upon? The patient—what? Waiting. The patient, waiting saints. Okay? The waiting saints; because, we are in the history now where prophecy says, "Blessed is he who waiteth, and cometh to the 1335. Though the vision tarry, wait for it." The people who are going to receive the outpouring of the Holy Spirit are the waiting saints.

"The glory of God rested upon the patient, waiting saints, and they fearlessly gave the last solemn warning, proclaiming the fall of Babylon, and calling upon God's people to come out of her; that they might escape her fearful doom."—Of course, this is in our day and age; but, the waiting saints in our day and age are prefigured by the waiting saints in the Millerite History which we are looking at.

"The light that was shed upon the waiting ones penetrated everywhere, and those who had any light in the churches, who had not heard and rejected the three messages, answered to the call, and left the fallen churches."—This is the "Come out of her, my people!" This is talking about those that come out of the churches of Babylon in our day and age once the Sunday Law arrives in the United States. They are the fallen churches, the churches of Babylon.

"Many had come to years of accountability since these messages had been given, and the light shone upon them, and they were privileged to choose life or death."—Now she is saying that there are people in the Protestant churches today that have come to the age of accountability since October 22, 1844; and, this is so. The people in the Protestant churches today were not alive when the Third Angel's Message arrived in Millerite History. They are not held accountable to the rejection that the Protestant churches did in their time period, and this is a key point to take note of if you ever study how the history of Christ illustrates the end of the world; because, technically, prophetically Jerusalem could have, should have been destroyed in AD34.

There were 490 years of probationary time cut off for the Jews out of the 2300 years marked in Daniel 8 and Daniel 9. Those 490 years ended in AD 34 with the stoning of Stephen. At that point, Jerusalem, prophetically, was to be destroyed, but it was not destroyed until 70. In The Great Controversy, Sister White says the same thing about that history. She says there were children and others who had not heard the message of Christ and the disciples before 34, and God in His mercy gave them time to be confronted with the message before the destruction of Jerusalem. She identifies, as does Christ, the destruction of Jerusalem as illustrating the end of the world.

That history prefigures the very history she is speaking about. When the Sunday Law comes to the United States and the message finally goes to the fallen churches, God's children now in Babylon will not be held accountable for the rejection their churches or ancestors made in the 19th Century.

In these two paragraphs, this is the second time she has compared our history at the Sunday Law at the end of the world with the history of the Midnight Cry. The first time, she says the Mighty Angel of Revelation 18 joins the Third Angel as the Midnight Cry joined the Second Angel. Even though she is addressing the history of the Sunday Law crisis, she is clearly using the history of the Second Angel as a point of reference. They are parallel histories.

When it comes to the call out of Babylon, whether at the end of the world or in the Second Angel's Message, Lot is a symbol of that history and the destruction of Sodom.

If you understand Daniel 11 correctly, in verse 41 the King of the North enters the glorious land and many are overthrown, but "these shall escape his hand, even Edom, Moab, and the chief of the children of Ammon." Moab and Ammon are the children of Lot's two daughters. Lot's family represents those who escape the hand of the papacy at the Sunday Law crisis.

Sister White uses this symbolism. The fallen churches are represented by Lot, and the precious were hurried out of the doomed churches, as Lot was hurried out of Sodom before her destruction. God's people were fitted up and strengthened by the excellent glory which fell upon them in rich abundance, preparing them to endure the hour of temptation. A multitude of voices were heard everywhere, saying, "Here is the patience of the saints; here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus."

While she is talking about the call out of Babylon at the end of the world, she uses the history of the Second Angel's Message in the Millerite time period to describe that call. The Second Angel's Message is a call out of Babylon, and this history typifies the history of the Sunday Law crisis.

One of the biblical references Ellen White uses to describe this history is the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. We will read from Genesis 19:1-11, which is part of the story of Lot.

Sister White talks about a progressive testing process in the time of Christ and in the time of the Millerites, illustrating a progressive testing process for us. In Early Writings, page 259, she says:

In that passage in Early Writings, 259, when the door is closed in the time of Christ, the Jews are in perfect darkness, blindness.

The Millerite history of the Second Angel is the history of Lot. The two angels come to town (June 1842), the Second Angel's Message arrives, and Lot has them tarry for the night (the Tarrying Time). There is a judgment, and then a door closes (October 22, 1844).

We will look at another biblical history where a tarrying time lines up with the Millerite History before pulling this together.

The next history is Moses receiving instructions on building the sanctuary and the Law.

The forty days' tarry in the mount did not include the six days of preparation.

During this history, Moses spent 46 days receiving instructions on building the temple, paralleling the 46 years from 1798 to 1844 when the Lord raised up the Millerite temple, and the 46 years of Herod's reconstruction of the temple noted in John 2:20, as well as the 46 chromosomes of the human temple. During the six days, Joshua was with Moses, and together they ate manna and drank from the brook that descended out of the mount. Joshua did not enter the cloud with Moses but remained outside, eating and drinking daily while awaiting Moses' return, while Moses fasted during the forty days.

During his stay in the mount, Moses received directions for building a sanctuary in which the divine presence would be specially manifested. 'Let them make Me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them' (Exodus 25:8), was the command of God.

This is where we find the number 46 associated with the building of the sanctuary.

We will read from Exodus and note a tarrying time in this story, as it prefigures the tarrying time in the time of Christ, the Millerites, and at the end of the world. The tarrying time produces the environment that allows the Midnight Cry to be proclaimed and to produce two classes of worshippers. Without the tarrying time, the dynamics of that history would not be in place for what the Lord wants to accomplish at the Midnight Cry. We must see what the tarrying time represents.

This 46-day period, this Tarrying Time, is when the Lord is entering into covenant with a people.

Did the Lord enter into covenant with the Millerites in this history? Yes.

Did He enter into covenant with the Christian church at Pentecost in the time of Christ? Yes.

So, this tarrying time is one of the waymarks of the Lord entering into covenant with a people.

In the history of Moses, we see a tarrying time. During this time, the two tables symbolize the covenant, and the Lord is entering into covenant and giving Moses instructions on building the temple.

From 1798 to 1844, those 46 years, the Lord was raising the Millerite temple so He might enter into covenant with modern Israel.

The period we just read about with Moses and the tarrying time of the 70 elders is called Pentecost in biblical history—fifty days after Passover. The Lord instructed Israel to commemorate Pentecost forever. In the New Testament, Pentecost is a focus of the early Christian church, commemorating this very history. We find the same components at Pentecost in the time of Christ, in the history of the Millerites, and these components will be repeated at the end of the world.

Let us look at Pentecost from Luke 24:44-52, during the story of the road to Emmaus.

Earlier in Luke, the two disciples walking with Jesus ask Him to tarry with them. The Bible uses the word 'tarry.' There is a tarrying time marked there, but we want to mark a different tarrying time in this same history.

The tarrying time is marked by the command to tarry in Jerusalem for power. This is where the empowerment of the message takes place for the Millerites.

To tarry means to wait. "Blessed is he that waiteth." For what? The empowerment.

You cannot correctly understand the empowerment of the Midnight Cry unless you understand the tarrying time, where they are commanded to wait for that power. It is part of the story. To have the light set up behind you continue to shine, you must understand the whole history.

You may not yet see where this is going, but tomorrow it will become clear.

Three prophecies led the Millerites to a misconception that caused the tarrying time and the first disappointment. These prophecies are the same three that William Miller said he was given the commencement for: the 1335, the 2520, and the 2300 days.

If you understand that the tarrying time is a specific component of the Midnight Cry, you must ask what produced the tarrying time. It was these three time prophecies: the 1335, the 2520, and the 2300.

If you reject the prophecy of the 2520 and the 1335, you are denying the Midnight Cry and fall off the path to the wicked world below.

That is where we are heading with all this.

They tarry because they are to wait for power from on high, and in the Millerite History, that power was the Midnight Cry.

Bethany is a suburb of Jerusalem, about a mile and a half outside the city. In Jesus' day, this was a significant distance, as people walked everywhere.

Bethany means 'House of the Poor.'

Jesus' favorite place to be was Bethany, where Lazarus, Mary, and Martha lived.

It is worth noting that the Triumphal Entry is the history Sister White uses to describe the Midnight Cry.

Before Jesus entered Jerusalem for the Triumphal Entry, He tarried in Bethany, the House of the Poor. There is a tarrying time that precedes the Triumphal Entry, just as there is a tarrying time that precedes the Midnight Cry. They are parallel histories, but we are still dealing with Luke 24:44-52 and waiting and tarrying in Jerusalem.

In Early Writings, page 247, speaking of the Millerite History, Sister White says:

At the Midnight Cry, the Millerites had their understanding of the Scriptures opened.

"The disappointed ones" from the first disappointment saw from the Scriptures that they were in the tarrying time, and the same evidence that led them to predict 1843 as the return of the Lord now proved 1844.

What had the Lord done for them? He opened their understanding. This is a parallel history to the disciples.

There is a tarrying time in the story of Jacob. This tarrying time illuminates many prophetic truths, though we will only touch on some of them.

Genesis 28, beginning with verse 10, shows that the story of Jacob prefigures the end of the world. Jacob's sons represent the 144,000 at the end of the world.

Jacob had sons from four women—two wives, Rachel and Leah, and two concubines. He had to work for his wives: 2520 days for Leah and 2520 days for Rachel. In Jacob's story, we see both 2520s, representing the Northern and Southern Kingdoms.

Jacob is a symbol of the Millerite History and the 144,000. His story should provide light for us at the end of the world.

The Lord is entering into covenant with Jacob. When the Lord enters into covenant with Moses and Israel, there is a tarrying time; when He enters into covenant with Jacob, there is a tarrying time; when He enters into covenant with modern Israel in the Millerite History, there is a tarrying time; and when He enters into covenant with the Christian church at Pentecost, there is a tarrying time.

In this story, during the tarrying time, the Lord opens the understanding of His people to His Word, symbolized by the ladder with angels ascending and descending—a symbol of communication between God and man.

At the Midnight Cry, the Millerite virgins are waking up and becoming the House of God. He is entering into covenant with them, making them modern Israel.

"Luz" is changed. The Millerites were not God's people in 1798. The history of the Millerites is the history of how He enters into covenant with them and makes them His people, changing them from "Luz" to "Bethel."

Jacob's vow is entering into covenant. He asks God to keep him in the way—the Old Paths—and to give him bread to eat. The Millerites are to eat their own bread and not return to Protestant foolishness.

If we continue to eat the bread God gives us, He will maintain His covenant with us. The bread and raiment in Jacob's vow symbolize the truths on the 1843 Chart, which Ellen White calls the Rock of Ages—the Old Paths and the bread.

When He opens up their understanding in the tarrying time, He does so by sending angels up and down the ladder.

If you have received the truth, you have the responsibility to share it. If you fulfill your responsibility, you become the ladder—the channel of communication. We are called to be that channel.

Jacob has a tarrying time; he tarries and dreams of the ladder, which represents the Lord opening the understanding of His Word to His people during the tarrying time. In this history, the Lord is entering into covenant with His people, taking them from Luz and making them Bethel—the House of God.

The channel of communication represented by the angels ascending and descending on the ladder, who is Christ, is also represented in Zechariah. Sister White comments on this in Review and Herald, July 20, 1897, though she uses a different symbol.

What are the "holy beings"? Angels. "By the holy beings surrounding his throne, the Lord keeps up a constant communication with the inhabitants of the earth." That is the ladder. Only, here Sister White is not going to use the ladder as the symbol.

In the story of Jacob, we have the story of the Millerite History. There is a tarrying time, and he sees the ladder representing communication between Heaven and Earth.

Zechariah tells us about two golden pipes. A ladder has two primary rails, but Zechariah calls them two golden pipes.

We are to receive the messages that come down from the ladder of Heaven and communicate them to others. If we do that, we become part of the ladder, part of the communication process.

Sister White ties this into the parable of the Ten Virgins.

In the Millerite History, they were fulfilling the parable of the Ten Virgins. Jacob's tarrying time is the tarrying time of Matthew 25 and Habakkuk 2: "Though the vision tarry, wait for it."

The story of Jacob and Zechariah are the same tarrying times.

The tarrying time marks, among other things, that the Lord is about to increase His followers' understanding of the Word of God. If you do not receive that Holy Oil, you are a foolish virgin.

When you reach this history, when the door closes and you are a foolish virgin, Sister White says, "The saddest words that were ever heard, 'I knew you not.'"

You cannot separate the tarrying time from the Midnight Cry. The tarrying time produces the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, which opens God's people's understanding to the Word at the Midnight Cry and provides the oil that distinguishes the wise from the foolish virgins.

There is a tarrying time when Christ performed His crowning act—raising Lazarus.

Jesus received the message, "Lazarus is sick. Come, take care of him." But Jesus did not go immediately.

Sister White says the disciples stumbled over this. They wondered why He was not going to help His friend, or prove His power as the Messiah. But He tarried.

He tarried to give them one more evidence that He had the ability to bring the dead to life. This crowning miracle, the raising of Lazarus, set the seal of God on His work and claim to Divinity. At the Midnight Cry, the Lord is raising up the wise virgins. This is an illustration of the sealing process. The Millerites were being sealed, providing an illustration of the sealing of the 144,000. The lesson of Lazarus is that Christ can take someone dead in trespasses and sins and bring them to life. In the passage of Lazarus, Christ defines death as sleep. They are all sleeping. He is tarrying. He will resurrect Lazarus, bringing them to life and placing His seal upon them. This is His crowning miracle. In our history, when He seals the 144,000, He lifts them up as an ensign. Zechariah says that ensign is as jewels in a crown. This is His crowning act.

With the outpouring and opening up of truth in the Millerite history, the tarrying time marks when the Lord opens up the truth. The ladder, with angels ascending and descending, is where the sealing process takes place.

Now we look at the Triumphal Entry. Notice what Sister White compares the Triumphal Entry to in the Spirit of Prophecy, volume 4, page 250.

The Triumphal Entry represents the Midnight Cry.

Let us read what Sister White says about the Triumphal Entry in The Youth Instructor, February 21, 1901.

Why? Because, they heard about Lazarus.

So, He is tarrying in Bethany before the Triumphal Entry.

This refers to the Tarrying Time.

No mourning or wailing was heard in that procession. Those who had once been blind, but whose eyes had been healed by the Son of God, led the way.

Who leads the way? Those who used to be Laodicean's.

So, Jesus tarries in the House of the Poor, referring to the Tarrying Time.

Why? Because He is about to pour out His Holy Spirit and open their understanding, referring to the Midnight Cry.

In this story, He is coming as a King, referring to October 22, 1844. Does Jesus come to receive a kingdom on October 22, 1844? Yes.

This is the Triumphal Entry, and there are those who will raise the Midnight Cry.

Who are these people? They are those transformed by the power of Christ.

The message of Christ's righteousness, His power to change us from blind to seeing, from dead to living, from leper to pure, is carried in the history of the Triumphal Entry, prefiguring the Midnight Cry. What carries that message?

What is Christ riding upon? An ass. It is the Message of Islam that carries the message of Christ's righteousness.

In 1840, the empowerment of the First Angel's Message was connected to the restraint of Islam. The First Message leads to the Second Message; they cannot be separated.

The First Message carries the Second Message.

The First Message was confirmed when Islam was restrained, fulfilling prophecy. This confirmation empowered the First Angel's Message and led to the Protestants closing their doors against it.

The closing of the doors by the Protestant churches was the rejection of the Message of Islam.

The Millerite history prefigures our history.

The message of Christ's righteousness in the sealing time of the 144,000, when the Lord pours out His Holy Spirit and opens the Scriptures to the Laodicean's and lepers of Adventism, is again carried by the ass—the Message of Islam.

The Triumphal Entry is the King coming. On October 22, 1844, He receives the Kingdom. This is the Triumphal Entry.

It is in this time period that the two classes are being sealed into their fate.

A few Scriptures highlight the tarrying time. We will go through them quickly and close with a statement by Sister White.

Right here, March 22, 1844, referring to the Tarrying Time.

March 22, 1844, is not a prediction of Bible prophecy. It is the date the Millerites misunderstood, but it produced the first disappointment and marked the tarrying time.

The Scriptures do not claim that God produces the tarrying time. It is the people's misunderstanding that produces it: 'Though the vision tarry, wait for it, for it will not tarry, it does not lie.'

You can read this two ways. Either way:

Blessed is he that waiteth, and blessed is he that cometh to the 1335. But go thou thy way till the end be: for thou shalt rest, and stand in thy lot at the end of the days.

The blessing of coming to the 1335 is not just about reaching the end of the time prophecy. The 1335 ends in 1843 on the Chart. The blessing is not just the end of the prophecy, but the experience of the tarrying time. The blessing takes place between the Tarrying Time and October 22, 1844. This is where you are to wait. "Blessed is he who waiteth."

The waiting is from the Tarrying Time to October 22, 1844. If you are waiting for Him, you will be blessed.

It was the misunderstanding of the Millerites that brought about the tarrying time. The vision is for an appointed time—October 22, 1844. It is not going to lie, but you will think it tarries because of misunderstanding.

Did the Lord design the misunderstanding? Yes. Sister White says so.

The Lord produced the misunderstanding through the 1843 Chart. William Miller said he never conclusively stated 1843, but in 1843 the brethren asked him to remove the 'if' and mark 1843 as a waymark. Sister White says this is a prophetic waymark, a fulfillment of Habakkuk 2. This waymark, dogmatically marking 1843, produced the tarrying time.

Notice Daniel 12:12, 13: "Blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days."—"Blessed is he that comes to the 1335. Blessed is he that comes to 1843," that is verse 12.

Verse 13:

Sister White ties together verses 12 and 13, saying the blessing of the 1335 is fulfilled in 1843 and 1844. It is not about a point in time, but about those who wait for the Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem by Christ, recognize the angels ascending and descending on the ladder, and enter into covenant with the Lord as He gives them the two tables of the covenant.