In Church
“It is the work of the Christian to mend, to restore, to heal. This healing process saves many a soul and hides a multitude of sins. God is love; God is, in Himself, in His essence, love. He makes the very best of what appears an injury, and gives Satan no occasion for triumph by making the worst appear and exposing our weakness to our enemies. The world must not be introduced into the church, and married to the church, forming a bond of unity. Through this means the church will become indeed corrupt, and as stated in Revelation, “a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.”
Influence of Union With Worldlings
Through association with the world our institutions will become unsubstantial, unreliable; because these worldly elements, introduced and placed in positions of trust, are looked up to as teachers to be respected in their educating, directing, and official position, and they are sure to be worked upon by the spirit and power of darkness; so that the demarcation becomes not distinguished between him that serveth God and him that serveth Him not. The parable is given by Jesus Christ in regard to the field in which it was supposed had been sown pure wheat, but the entrusted ones look upon the field with disappointment, and inquire, “Didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? From whence then hath it tares?” The master of the vineyard answers, “An enemy hath done this.”
Accuser of The Brethren
Thus hath it been presented to me in regard to the Rural Health Retreat. I had a message of warning. I spoke with earnestness, and I know the Lord put His Holy Spirit upon me while I presented the danger of association with and love of the world. The worldling is ever on the watch to criticize and accuse those who serve God. This will reveal itself in the querulous complaining of professed Christians, who have never been transformed by the grace of Jesus Christ. They are deadly enemies to those who believe. They despise the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, and if they can make it appear that those who are striving to obey the commandments of God are faulty, Satan has cast his arrow, and now what? He has shown his accusing power; but his cruel thrusts will do little harm if the professed believers will stand true to the words of Christ, and be doers of His word and not hearers only. Those to whom these complaints are made are under bonds to Jesus Christ to love and respect and be faithful to one another who are united to Christ in church fellowship. To unite with the faultfinding element, to be accusers of the brethren, to take up the reproach they lay at your door is seconding the work of the enemy by playing yourself into his hands to make his work a success.
TM 265-266
“We are in a world where light and knowledge abound, yet many claiming to be of like precious faith are willingly ignorant. Light is all around them, yet they do not appropriate it to themselves. Parents do not see the necessity of informing themselves, obtaining knowledge, and putting it to a practical use in their married life. If they followed out the exhortation of the apostle, and lived upon the plan of addition, they would not be unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But many do not understand the work of sanctification. They seem to think they have attained to it, when they have learned only the first lessons in addition. Sanctification is a progressive work; it is not attained to in an hour or a day, and then maintained without any special effort on our part.
Many parents do not obtain the knowledge that they should in the married life. They are not guarded lest Satan take advantage of them and control their minds and their lives. They do not see that God requires them to control their married lives from any excesses. But very few feel it to be a religious duty to govern their passions. They have united themselves in marriage to the object of their choice, and therefore reason that marriage sanctifies the indulgence of the baser passions. Even men and women professing godliness give loose rein to their lustful passions, and have no thought that God holds them accountable for the expenditure of vital energy, which weakens their hold on life and enervates the entire system.
The marriage covenant covers sins of the darkest hue. Men and women professing godliness debase their own bodies through the indulgence of the corrupt passions, and thus lower themselves beneath the brute creation. They abuse the powers which God has given them to be preserved in sanctification and honor. Health and life are sacrificed upon the altar of base passion. The higher, nobler powers are brought into subjection to the animal propensities. Those who thus sin are not acquainted with the result of their course. Could all see the amount of suffering which they bring upon themselves by their own sinful indulgence, they would be alarmed, and some, at least, would shun the course of sin which brings such dreaded wages. So miserable an existence is entailed upon a large class that death would to them be preferable to life; and many do die prematurely, their lives sacrificed in the inglorious work of excessive indulgence of the animal passions. Yet because they are married they think they commit no sin.”
1TT 266-267
Intercourse With Evil Spirits Forbidden
“The Lord has purchased his people for himself, and has manifested his love toward them by the greatest possible evidence, even by shedding his blood and yielding his life on Calvary. He came down to our world to redeem us, to betroth and marry us to himself by an eternal covenant. The marriage union is taken as a symbol of the sacred and enduring character of the relation that exists between Christ and his church. He says, “I will betroth thee unto me forever;” and again, “I am married unto you;” and Paul employs the same figure in the New Testament when he declares, “I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.”
With untold love our God has loved us, and our love awakens toward him as we comprehend more of the length and depth and height and breadth of this love that passeth knowledge. But when we turn aside to another master, we break our vows to him, and make void the covenant; and we become adulterers, choosing the friendship and favor of others, and proving untrue to him who has died for us. We declare by this act of separation, that we have found his service hard and his love unsatisfying; and thus we dishonor him, and bring his name into reproach before the world.
The Lord, infinite in power and wisdom, has declared, “Thy Maker is thine husband.” Everything that will serve for the best good and the highest interest of the people of God will be provided; and although the world seeks to entice them from their allegiance, although they are brought into difficult places, and experience affliction, they are not to seek the counsel of man, but to put their whole trust in God, casting all their care upon him. Christ proves the sincerity of the faith and love of his church by trial and sorrow; and he will bring those who are faithful out of the furnace, refined and purified.
There are many who do not bear the testing of their fidelity. When affliction comes upon them, and they are perplexed by circumstances, and cannot discover the purpose of God’s providence, they become impatient and distrustful. They cast away their confidence, forgetful of the tender mercies of the past, and their hearts are filled with unrest and repining. They neglect prayer, and refuse the comfort and instruction of the Bible. They seek for counselors among the children of men, questioning the dealing of God, and striving to know what he has wisely concealed.
The Lord, who knows all, will make known the very things that are for the best interests of his children; and if he sees fit to veil the events of the future, it is only because he loves us, and would work out our highest good. Should he permit us to see the future mapped out before us, some of us would be distracted by anticipating coming sorrows, and others would be self-confident and daring, and the very good that our heavenly Father intended to bring about by his all-wise providences, would be thwarted and frustrated.
We have an enemy who is ever seeking whom he may devour; and it is his purpose to draw away men’s confidence in God, to make them dissatisfied with their condition in life, and to lead them to seek to know what God has veiled from them, and to despise what he has revealed in his holy word. He controls the minds of evil men, and the spirits of devils become the counselors of those who reject the wisdom of God. But shall we who have a holy God, infinite in wisdom, go unto wizards, whose knowledge comes from a close intimacy with the enemy of our Lord? Shall we be among those who turn “after such as have familiar spirits, and after wizards, to go a whoring after them,” and thus prove false to our best friend until his face be set against us?
We are living in an age of peril, in an age of apostasy; evil men and seducers are waxing worse and worse, Satan is working with all “deceivableness of unrighteousness,” and the servants of God must make no concessions to the enemy, nor listen to his suggestions to doubt God. There are many who become restless when they cannot see the definite outcome of affairs. They cannot endure uncertainty, and in their impatience they refuse to wait to see the salvation of God. Apprehended evils drive them nearly distracted. They give way to their rebellious feelings, and run hither and thither in passionate grief, seeking intelligence concerning that which God has not revealed.
If they would but trust in God and watch unto prayer, they would find divine consolation. Their spirit would be calmed by communion with God. The weary and the heavy laden would find rest unto their souls, if they would only go to Jesus; but when they neglect the means that God has ordained for their comfort, and rush off to other sources for information, hoping to learn what God has withheld, they commit the error of Eve, and thereby gain only a knowledge of evil. God is not pleased with this course, and has expressed it in the most explicit terms. This impatient haste to tear away the veil from the future, reveals a lack of unfaltering trust in God, and leaves the soul open to the suggestions of the master-deceiver. Satan can lead the mind to seek unto those that have familiar spirits, and through the agency of his mediums he can reveal extraordinary views of the future. Through his knowledge of the past he inspires confidence, and he has the poor, misguided soul in his power to lead captive at his will; but the Lord says, “The soul that turneth after such as have familiar spirits, and after wizards, to go a whoring after them, I will even set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from among his people.”
ST August 19, 1889,