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Stewards of God’s Grace, November 8
Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of
Midian.
Exodus 3:1
.
Moses spent forty years as a shepherd of flocks to prepare him to under-
stand himself and to purify himself by emptying himself that the Lord could
accomplish His will in him. The Lord did not take for His workmen mere
machines in intellect or feelings. Both are essential to do the work, but these
human elements of character must be purged from defects, not by talking of
the will of God, but by doing His will. “If any man will do his will, he shall
know of the doctrine” (
John 7:17
). Moses was under training to God. He
endured a long process of mental training to fit him to be leader of the armies
of Israel.
Inspiration will come to men of God’s appointment, but not to any man
who retains a high idea of his own mental superiority. For every man whom
God will use to do His will must have humble ideas of himself, and must seek
in persevering earnestness for light. God will not require any man to become
a novice and to sink down into a voluntary humility, and become more and
more incapacitated. God calls upon every one with whom He works, to do
the very highest kind of thinking and praying and hoping and believing.
Many have, as had Moses, very much to unlearn in order to learn the very
lessons that they need to learn. He had need to be self-trained by severest
mental and moral discipline, and God wrought with him before he could be
fitted to train others in mind and heart. He had been instructed in the Egyptian
courts. Nothing was left as unnecessary to train him to become a general of
armies. The false theories of the idolatrous Egyptians had been instilled into
his mind, and the influences surrounding him and things his eyes looked upon
could not be easily shaken off or corrected. Thus it is with many who have
had a false training in any line. All the idolatrous rubbish of heathen lore
must be removed, bit by bit, item by item, from Moses’ mind. Jethro helped
him in many things to a correct faith, as far as he himself understood. He was
working upward toward the light, when he could see God in singleness of
heart....
God has done everything for us. What have we done? Shall we become
faithful stewards of His grace?—
Manuscript 45, November 8, 1890
, “At
Sands [now Stanley], Virginia,” diary.
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