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Words of Caution
209
condemn them. To ridicule the position held by those who are in
error will not open their blind eyes nor attract them to the truth.
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When men lose sight of Christ’s example and do not pattern after
His manner of teaching, they become self-sufficient and go forth to
meet Satan with his own manner of weapons. The enemy knows
well how to turn his weapons upon those who use them. Jesus spoke
only words of pure truth and righteousness.
If ever a people needed to walk in humility before God, it is His
church, His chosen ones in this generation. We all need to bewail the
dullness of our intellectual faculties, the lack of appreciation of our
privileges and opportunities. We have nothing whereof to boast. We
grieve the Lord Jesus Christ by our harshness, by our un-Christlike
thrusts. We need to become complete in Him.
It is true that we are commanded to “cry aloud, spare not, lift up
thy voice like a trumpet, and show My people their transgression,
and the house of Jacob their sins.”
Isaiah 58:1
. This message must
be given; but while it must be given, we should be careful not to
thrust and crowd and condemn those who have not the light that
we have. We should not go out of our way to make hard thrusts at
the Catholics. Among the Catholics there are many who are most
conscientious Christians and who walk in all the light that shines
upon them, and God will work in their behalf. Those who have had
great privileges and opportunities, and who have failed to improve
their physical, mental, and moral powers, but who have lived to
please themselves and have refused to bear their responsibility, are
in greater danger and in greater condemnation before God than those
who are in error upon doctrinal points, yet who seek to live to do
good to others. Do not censure others; do not condemn them.
If we allow selfish considerations, false reasoning, and false
excuses to bring us into a perverse state of mind and heart, so that
we shall not know the ways and will of God, we shall be far more
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guilty than the open sinner. We need to be very cautious in order
that we may not condemn those who, before God, are less guilty
than ourselves.
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