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not be purged with sacrifice nor offering forever.” Many, I saw, were
flattering themselves that they were good Christians, who have not a
single ray of light from Jesus. They know not what it is to be renewed
by the grace of God. They have no living experience for themselves in
the things of God. And I saw that the Lord was whetting His sword in
heaven to cut them down. Oh, that every lukewarm professor could
realize the clean work that God is about to make among His professed
people! Dear friends, do not deceive yourselves concerning your
condition. You cannot deceive God. Says the True Witness: “I know
thy works.” The third angel is leading up a people, step by step, higher
and higher. At every step they will be tested.
The plan of systematic benevolence [
See Appendix.
] is pleasing
to God. I was pointed back to the days of the apostles, and saw that
God laid the plan by the descent of His Holy Spirit, and that by the
gift of prophecy He counseled His people in regard to a system of
benevolence. All were to share in this work of imparting of their carnal
things to those who ministered unto them in spiritual things. They
were also taught that the widows and fatherless had a claim upon their
charity. Pure and undefiled religion is defined, To visit the widows and
fatherless in their affliction, and to keep unspotted from the world. I
saw that this was not merely to sympathize with them by comforting
words in their affliction, but to aid them, if needy, with our substance.
Young men and women to whom God has given health can obtain a
great blessing by aiding the widow and the fatherless in their affliction.
I saw that God requires young men to sacrifice more for the good of
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others. He claims more of them than they are willing to perform. If
they keep themselves unspotted from the world, cease to follow its
fashions, and lay by that which the lovers of pleasure spend in useless
articles to gratify pride, and give it to the worthy afflicted ones, and
to sustain the cause, they will have the approval of Him who says, “I
know thy works.”
There is order in heaven, and God is well pleased with the efforts
of His people in trying to move with system and order in His work
on earth. I saw that there should be order in the church of God, and
that system is needed in carrying forward successfully the last great
message of mercy to the world. God is leading His people in the
plan of systematic benevolence, and this is one of the very points to
which God is bringing up His people which will cut the closest with