72
The Adventist Home
of God unitedly. I would say, Make God your counselor. Blend, blend
together
Counsel to a Newly Wedded Pair—My Dear Brother and Sister:
You have united in a lifelong covenant. Your education in married
[103]
life has begun. The first year of married life is a year of experience,
a year in which husband and wife learn each other’s different traits
of character, as a child learns lessons in school. In this, the first year
of your married life, let there be no chapters that will mar your future
happiness....
My brother, your wife’s time and strength and happiness are now
bound up with yours. Your influence over her may be a savor of life
unto life or of death unto death. Be very careful not to spoil her life.
My sister, you are now to learn your first practical lessons in
regard to the responsibilities of married life. Be sure to learn these
lessons faithfully day by day.... Guard constantly against giving way
to selfishness.
In your life union your affections are to be tributary to each other’s
happiness. Each is to minister to the happiness of the other. This is
the will of God concerning you. But while you are to blend as one,
neither of you is to lose his or her individuality in the other. God is
the owner of your individuality. Of Him you are to ask: What is right?
What is wrong? How may I best fulfill the purpose of my creation
A Pledge Before Heavenly Witnesses—God has ordained that
there should be perfect love and harmony between those who enter
into the marriage relation. Let bride and bridegroom, in the presence
of the heavenly universe, pledge themselves to love each other as God
has ordained they should.... The wife is to respect and reverence her
husband, and the husband is to love and cherish his wife
Men and women, at the beginning of married life, should reconse-
crate themselves to God
[104]
Be as true as steel to your marriage vows, refusing, in thought,
word, or deed, to spoil your record as a man who fears God and obeys
His commandments
[105]
10
Manuscript 170, 1905
.
11
Testimonies For The Church 7, 45
.
12
The Bible Echo, September 4, 1899
.
13
Manuscript 70, 1903
.
14
Letter 231, 1903
.