“There have been so very many afflictions overtaking the nations of the earth in recent years, so many disasters by sea and upon land, of appalling magnitude, and this greatest of all the wars of history, that I was induced to seek the Word of the Lord, if it might be obtained as in the days of Israel, that Christian people might come to the will of God, and learn the reason for the severity of his overruling providence.
And knowing, from repeated examples of Scripture, that supplications became effective most frequently when accompanied with fasting, I was minded to abstain from eating for a little season.
Accordingly, I took no food for several days; to be explicit, for seven days. And afterwards ate for a short time, that is, for seven days also. Then again fasted for another seven days; and after the same respite as before, fasted again; and so continued until I had fasted seven times seven days.
And I saw, in a vision of the night, a great and ferocious bull that was terrible to look upon, for he exceedingly angry. A dreadful power was in his flanks, and he strode the earth up and down looking and waiting.
Then I determined upon extending the fast a little longer, and accordingly after respite of three days, continued to fast for three days more. Whereupon my attention was drawn to the fact that I had fasted altogether one-seventh of the year, and that forty-five days had elapsed between.
And in a vision of the night, the Father came to me and laid before me a tablet of a manuscript; and another said to me that I should write; and the Spirit of the Lord came upon me that I should write, even the Word of the Lord.”
R.C. Baker
Chicago, Illinois, 1917