Opposition to Faithful Warnings
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to your opinion as personal abuse. True, refined independence never
disdains to seek counsel of the experienced and of the wise, and it
treats the counsel of others with respect.
Religion in the Family
Brother G, you must be a converted man or you will lose eternal
life. You cannot be a happy man until you obtain the meekness of
wisdom. You and your wife have too long worked at cross purposes.
You must lay down this faultfinding, these suspicions, jealousies, and
unhappy bickerings. The spirit which is developed in your family is
carried into your religious experience. Be careful how you speak of
each other’s faults in the presence of your children; and be careful how
you let your spirit control you. You see only the bad and evil in your
oldest son; you give him no credit for the good qualities, which, should
he die, you would suddenly become convinced that he had possessed.
Neither of you pursues a consistent course toward your son. You dwell
upon his faults in the presence of others and show that you have no
confidence in his good traits of character.
In each of you there is a disposition to see the faults of the other,
and of all others; but you are each blind to your own faults and many
errors. You are both nervous, easily excited and irritated. You need
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the meekness of wisdom. You cling tenaciously to your own frailties,
passions, and prejudices as though if you let them go you would
no more have happiness in this life, when they are thorns, pricking,
bruising thorns. Jesus invites you to lay down the yoke you have been
bearing, which has been galling your neck, and take His yoke, which
is easy, and His burden, which is light. How wearisome is the load of
self-love, covetousness, pride, passion, jealousy, and evil surmising.
Yet how closely do men clasp these curses, and how loath are they to
give them up. Christ understands how grievous are these self-imposed
burdens, and He invites us to lay them down. The heavy-laden and
weary souls He invites to come to Him, and take His burden, which is
light, in exchange for the burdens which they bind upon themselves.
He says: “Ye shall find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is easy, and
My burden is light.” The requirements of our Saviour are all consistent
and harmonious, and if cheerfully borne will bring peace and rest to
the soul.