Self-Caring Ministers
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excuse and worked accordingly, although you had no need of a home
of your own. Your wife had duties to do to her parents which she had
neglected all her life. If she had taken up this long-neglected duty with
a cheerful spirit she would not now be left captive to Satan to do his
will and to corrupt her heart and soul in his service.
Your want of a home was imaginary, like many of your supposed
wants. You obtained the home that your selfishness desired, and you
could leave your wife comfortably situated. But God was preparing a
final test for her. The affliction of her mother was of a nature which
would have aroused sympathy in her heart if it had not been thoroughly
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seared, calloused by selfishness. But this providence of God failed to
arouse the filial love of the daughter for her suffering mother. She had
no home cares to stand in her way, no children to share her love and
care, and her attention was devoted to her poor self.
The burden of care that her father had to bear was too much for his
age and strength, and he was prostrated with keen sufferings. Surely
then, if the daughter had a sensitive spot in her heart, she could not help
feeling and arousing to a sense of her duty to share the burdens of her
sister and her sister’s husband. But she revealed by her indifference,
and by shunning all the care and burden that she well could, that her
heart was well-nigh as unimpressible as a stone.
To be close by her parents and yet be so indifferent would tell
against her. She communicated the state of things to her husband.
Brother R was as selfish as his wife, and he sent an urgent request for
her to come to him. How did angels of God, the tender, pitying, loving,
ministering angels, look upon this act? The daughter left strangers
to do those tender offices that she should have cheerfully shared with
her burdened sister. Angels looked with astonishment and grief upon
the scene and turned from this selfish woman. Evil angels took the
places of these, and she was led captive by Satan at his will. She was a
medium of Satan and so proved to be a great hindrance to her husband;
his labors were of but little account.
The cause of God would have stood higher in-----if that last effort
had not been made, for the work was not completed. An interest was
raised, but was left to sink where it could never be raised again. I ask
you, Brother R, to compare the scriptures previously quoted relative to
the work and ministry of Christ with your course of conduct through
your labors as a gospel minister, but more especially in the instance