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The Danger in Amusements
Recent experiences in our colleges and sanitariums lead me to
present again instruction that the Lord gave me for the teachers and
students in our school at Cooranbong, Australia.
In April, 1900, a holiday was appointed at the Avondale school
for Christian workers. The program for the day provided for a
meeting in the chapel in the morning, at which I and others addressed
the students, calling their attention to what God had wrought in the
building up of this school, and to their privilege and opportunities as
students.
After the meeting, the remainder of the day was spent by the
students in various games and sports, some of which were frivolous,
rude, and grotesque.
During the following night I seemed to be witnessing the per-
formances of the afternoon. The scene was clearly laid out before
me, and I was given a message for the manager and teachers of the
school.
I was shown that in the amusements carried on at the school that
afternoon the enemy gained a victory, and teachers were weighed
in the balances and found wanting. I was greatly distressed and
burdened to think that those standing in responsible positions should
open the door and, as it were, invite the enemy in; for this they did in
permitting the exhibitions that took place. As teachers, they should
have stood firm against giving place to the enemy in any such line.
By what they permitted they marred their record and grieved the
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Spirit of God. The students were encouraged in a course the effects
of which were not easily effaced. There is no end to the path of
vain amusements, and every step taken in it is a step in a path which
Christ has not traveled.
This introduction of wrong plans was the very thing that should
have been jealously guarded against. The Avondale school was
established, not to be like the schools of the world, but, as God
revealed, to be a pattern school. And since it was to be a pattern
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