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Testimonies for the Church Volume 1
order. If sin is plain in a brother, breathe it not to another, but with love
for the brother’s soul, with a heart full of compassion, with bowels
of mercy, tell him the wrong, then leave the matter with him and the
Lord. You have discharged your duty. You are not to pass sentence.
It has been made too light an affair to rein up a brother, to condemn
him, and hold him under condemnation. There has been a zeal for
God, but not according to knowledge. If each would set his own heart
in order, when the brethren meet together their testimony would be
ready and come from a full soul, and the people around that believe
not the truth would be moved. The manifestation of the Spirit of God
would tell to their hearts that you are the children of God. Our love
for one another should be visible to all. Then it will tell. It will have
an influence.
I saw that the church in New York might rise. Take hold of the
work individually, be zealous and repent; and after all known wrongs
are righted, then believe that God accepts you. Go not mourning,
but take God at His word. Seek Him diligently, and believe that He
receives you. A part of the work is to believe. He is faithful who has
promised. Climb up by faith.
The brethren can rise in New York as well as in other places; and
they can drink of the salvation of God. They can move understandingly,
and each have an experience for himself in this message of the True
Witness to the Laodiceans. The church feel that they are down, but
know not how to rise. The intentions of some may be very good; they
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may confess; yet I saw that they are watched with suspicion, and are
made offenders for a word, until they have no liberty, no salvation.
They dare not act out the simple feelings of the heart, because they
are watched. It is God’s pleasure that His people should fear Him, and
have confidence before one another.
I saw that many have taken advantage of what God has shown in
regard to the sins and wrongs of others. They have taken the extreme
meaning of what has been shown in vision, and then have pressed it
until it has had a tendency to weaken the faith of many in what God
has shown, and also to discourage and dishearten the church. With
tender compassion should brother deal with brother. Delicately should
he deal with feelings. It is the nicest and most important work that
ever yet was done to touch the wrongs of another. With the deepest