Dwell more on the idea of Wednesday’s study about our need to be part of something bigger than ourselves and our meager, short-lived, often corrupt, damaged, and disappointing lives (who doesn’t have some of those things in their existence?). This desire makes so much sense, too. Physically, what are we but small packets of flesh carrying around our own brains — a couple of pounds of carbon-based organic material closer in composition to a bucket of fried chicken than to a hard drive.

 What can these small, self-contained packets of meat mean in contrast to the infinity that surrounds it? To live only for yourself, to live for something no bigger than yourself, when there’s so much all around us and beyond us, is like being locked for life in solitary confinement amid a large city that you can feel vibrating through the walls. And what larger, grander, and more glorious and consequential thing could we live for than proclaiming the promise of eternal life that we have been given in Jesus?

 “Servants of God, with their faces lighted up and shining with holy consecration, will hasten from place to place to proclaim the message from heaven. By thousands of voices, all over the earth, the warning will be given. Miracles will be wrought, the sick will be healed, and signs and wonders will follow the believers. Satan also works, with lying wonders, even bringing down fire from heaven in the sight of men. Revelation 13:13. Thus the inhabitants of the earth will be brought to take their stand.” — Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy,p. 612.

 1. “Several have written to me, inquiring if the message of justification by faith is the third angel’s message, and I have answered, ‘It is the third angel’s message in verity.’ ” — Ellen G. White, The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, April 1, 1890. What relationship does justification by faith have to the three angels’ messages?
 2. Dwell more on the phrase “everlasting gospel.” What is everlasting about the gospel?
 3. What does it mean that Seventh-day Adventists are in so many countries of the world? What does it say about how God has so far blessed our efforts? At the same time, how can your local church, even your local Sabbath School, play a larger role in “finishing the work”?