Printed in the Review and Herald, June 20, 1935
During the summer of 1852 the cholera was prevalent in Rochester. Night after night the members of the family living at 124 Mount Hope Avenue might hear the rumbling of carriages bearing the dead to the cemetery. Rich and poor alike were cut down by the epidemic. Mention has been made of little Edson's attack, and his healing in answer to prayer, before Elder and Mrs. White drove east on their seven-week trip.
Soon after they left Rochester, Lumen Masten, the foreman of the printing office, was stricken with the dread disease. The story of his illness, his miraculous healing, and his conversion, is so interestingly told by himself that we give it here, as it appeared in the Review of September 30, 1852:
"I bless God that there is a way open by which I can make known to you His mercy toward me. Although a stranger to most of you, I trust the time is not far distant when we shall receive the 'seal of the living God,' and recognize each other upon the sea of glass, to sing the song of Moses and the Lamb. ...
"About the middle of last April, I entered into the employment of Brother White, to take charge of the printing department of the Review and Herald. ... It seemed the will of God to place me among His remnant, where I might come to a knowledge of the truth.
"My mother (when living) was a member of the Methodist Church, and used all the persuasion she could to keep me from Sabbath [Sunday] breaking, and to become a follower of Christ. ... Notwithstanding her teachings and persuasions, there was a great query arose in my mind when I was taught the ten commandments,--why they did not keep the seventh day, as God commanded, and I would frequently ask the question. The answer I received, was that generally given by those who keep the first day of the week.
"When I came here, I was obliged, of course, to comply with the request of my employer; that is, to commence work on Sunday, and end it on Friday evening. This practice went somewhat against my conscience, so different was it from my usual practice and early teachings. However, I continued on, quite anxious to learn the reasons of their faith, etc., and if possible to find out whether or no they had the truth.
"I attended one or two of their meetings, and heard a lecture upon one occasion, from Brother Bates, on the Sabbath and Catholicity. I received considerable light, different from that I had ever thought or even dreamed of. I saw that spirit and power of God made manifest in their meetings which I never saw in any church that I had ever attended. I began to see plainly that they had the truth; and I must confess that I was under deep conviction for some time, but tried to conceal it as much as possible. ...
"On the 18th of August, ult., I was taken with a very severe attack of the cholera--the fatality of the disease is too well known by all of you, for me to comment upon. I called a physician, and his first treatment was to bleed, and after administering a variety of remedies, ended his medical process with doses of calomel. Such treatment is pronounced, by some of the most skillful physicians, to be sure death! But it seems the Lord wanted to give me another chance for repentance, and gave me strength (through the prayers of the brethren, unknown to me) to be removed from my boarding place to Brother White's, but a few rods distant.
"The wife of the man I was boarding with was taken with this fatal disease the day I was, and underwent the same treatment by the same physician, and lived but a few hours.
"On Sunday, the morning after my removal, I was taken again--worse, if anything, than the first attack. Another physician was called, and all the medicine he could produce seemed to have no effect. About three o'clock, if I recollect right, the relapse took place, and my physician pronounced me beyond the reach of medicine. All that he could do for me was of no avail. I was fast sinking into the grave.
"About six o'clock it seemed as though I was drawing my last breath. Death seemed to stare me in the face, and visions of hell and the grave rose up before me. Demons danced before my eyes, and seemed to grasp my breath. The history of my past life rose like a specter, to haunt my expiring moments. The scenes of horror, anguish, and suffering, no pen is able to portray. I knew I was not prepared to die; I had made no confession whatever, but lay a guilty sinner in the sight of God.
"Some of the brethren and sisters kneeled by my bed and prayed for me. I appeared to be somewhat relieved, so that I lingered along several days without any apparent change, neither to advance nor recede. Brother Patten and several others then came to me, and asked if I would give up all to God, and if I recovered, keep His commandments. I replied in the affirmative. They then commenced praying. God, in His infinite mercy, heard and answered prayer. The blessing came upon me like a shower. I soon fell asleep, and when I awoke, the blessing of God was still resting upon me; the relapse had left me, and I felt as if God had again breathed into me the breath of life.
"I had been in the hands of a physician until then. I discharged him, and held fast the arm of God and the faith of Jesus. I continued to gain rapidly, and in about two weeks I was able to walk to the post office, about one mile distant. I called on my physician, and so unexpected was my visit that he did not, at first, recognize me, not expecting, as he said, to see me out under a week to come; and he pronounced my case a 'miracle of the present age.'...
"It is my candid opinion that, had it not been for my avowal to God and the prayer of faith, I should, ere this, [have] been slumbering in the tomb. O, what shall I render unto Him for His goodness and mercy! How important that we should fear God, keep His commandments, and live separate from the world; and when we are sick, call in faith upon the great Physician, who will heal without the use of medicine!
"Christ is my Physician, my Shepherd, and my Guide. In Him I have faith, in Him I put my trust. I hardly know how to praise Him enough. I fear, sometimes, that I do not realize His goodness as much as I ought. My prayer to God is, that He will give me a realizing sense of it; and let light so shine into my soul, that I may be able to outride the storm of affliction. I feel determined to continue to the end, let what will come. I mean to try and go with the remnant, and enter the pearly gates of the Holy City."
After his healing Mr. Masten gained strength rapidly. Soon he was back at the office, superintending the work, and now a converted man. Occasionally he wrote for the paper. About a year after his restoration to health, there appeared in the Review an article from his pen, entitled "Faith." In this article, as a comment on the instruction given in James 5 regarding prayer for the sick, he testifies not only of his own healing, but of other remarkable cases that he had witnessed:
"We have already shown that they who believed on Christ were none other than the commandment keepers, 'who keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.' Among them we are to look for 'these signs' which 'follow them that believe.' Take a glance among them, and behold how many have already been snatched from the jaws of death, and in a very short time restored to perfect health, by no other means than the prayer of faith! I speak not only from what I have seen and heard, but from my own happy experience. My heart is often led to praise the Lord for the wonderful manifestation of His power in healing my body, and more especially about a year since, when I was struggling with death for my last breath."-- Review and Herald, Oct. 4, 1853.
The little office of publication was a busy place. Not only was it a printing plant, but a school in which the first Sabbath-keeping Adventist printers learned the trade. The entire group were young in years and most of them young in experience. The editor, James White, was in his early thirties, and his wife six years younger than he. The foreman and only experienced printer, and the assistant editor were young men of twenty-three, and those who had come to learn the business were only boys or young men.
If the great adversary of the printing plant newly established to combat his satanic work had been successful at this time in removing the foreman, Lumen Masten, by cholera, the work would have been seriously hindered. The affliction, however, was turned, through the prayers of the believers, into a blessing; for it resulted in the salvation of the printer's soul, and the work in the little office of publication went forward without interruption, each of the workers learning eagerly and well his part.