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Testimonies for the Church Volume 6
love and sympathy. It is thus that he ruined Judas. Judas was constantly
planning to benefit self. In this he represents a large class of professed
Christians of today. Therefore we need to study his case. We are as
near to Christ as he was. Yet if, as with Judas, association with Christ
does not make us one with Him, if it does not cultivate within our
hearts a sincere sympathy for those for whom Christ gave His life, we
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are in the same danger as was Judas of being outside of Christ, the
sport of Satan’s temptations.
We need to guard against the first deviation from righteousness; for
one transgression, one neglect to manifest the spirit of Christ, opens
the way for another and still another, until the mind is overmastered
by the principles of the enemy. If cultivated, the spirit of selfishness
becomes a devouring passion which nothing but the power of Christ
can subdue.
The Message of Isaiah Fifty-Eight
I cannot too strongly urge all our church members, all who are
true missionaries, all who believe the third angel’s message, all who
turn away their feet from the Sabbath, to consider the message of the
fifty-eighth chapter of Isaiah. The work of beneficence enjoined in
this chapter is the work that God requires His people to do at this time.
It is a work of His own appointment. We are not left in doubt as to
where the message applies, and the time of its marked fulfillment, for
we read: “They that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places:
thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt
be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell
in.”
Verse 12
. God’s memorial, the seventh-day Sabbath, the sign of
His work in creating the world, has been displaced by the man of sin.
God’s people have a special work to do in repairing the breach that
has been made in His law; and the nearer we approach the end, the
more urgent this work becomes. All who love God will show that they
bear His sign by keeping His commandments. They are the restorers
of paths to dwell in. The Lord says: “If thou turn away thy foot from
the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day; and call the
Sabbath a delight, ... then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I
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will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth.”
Verses 13,
14
. Thus genuine medical missionary work is bound up inseparably