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Mind, Character, and Personality Volume 2
confessors; no man must be exalted as supreme. Our work is to humble
self and to exalt Christ before the people. After His resurrection, the
Saviour promised that His power would be with all who would go
forth in His name. Let this power and this name be exalted. We need
to keep continually before our minds the prayer of Christ when He
prayed that self might be sanctified by truth and righteousness.—MS
137, 1907. (
Selected Messages 2:170
.)
Do Not Confess Secret Sins to Humans Unless Led by Holy
Spirit—Present these thoughts to the persons who come asking for
your prayers: we are human; we cannot read the heart or know the
secrets of your life. These are known only to yourself and God.
If you now repent of your sin, if any of you can see that in any
instance you have walked contrary to the light given you of God and
have neglected to give honor to the body, the temple of God, but by
wrong habits have degraded the body which is Christ’s property, make
confession of these things to God. Unless you are wrought upon by
the Holy Spirit in special manner to confess your sins of private nature
[777]
to man, do not breathe them to any soul.—Our Camp Meetings, pp 44,
45, 1892. (
Counsels on Health, 373, 374
.)
Make God Man’s Confessor—Everyone needs a practical expe-
rience in trusting God for himself. Let no man become your confessor;
open the heart to God; tell Him every secret of the soul. Bring to
Him your difficulties, small and great, and He will show you a way
out of them all. He alone can know how to give the very help you
need.—
Gospel Workers, 418
(1915).
I Have Confessed to God; He Has Forgiven My Sin—It is not
praiseworthy to talk of our weakness and discouragement. Let each
one say, “I am grieved that I yield to temptation, that my prayers
are so feeble, my faith so weak. I have no excuse to plead for being
dwarfed in my religious life. But I am seeking to obtain completeness
of character in Christ. I have sinned, and yet I love Jesus. I have fallen
many times, and yet He has reached out His hand to save me. I have
told Him all about my mistakes. I have confessed with shame and
sorrow that I have dishonored Him. I have looked to the cross and
have said, All this He suffered for me. The Holy Spirit has shown
me my ingratitude, my sin in putting Christ to open shame. He who
knows no sin has forgiven my sin. He calls me to a higher, nobler life,
and I press on to the things that are before.”—MS 161, 1897.