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Imitate Christ, Not the World, June 22
For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have
strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through
with many sorrows.
1 Timothy 6:10
, NKJV.
I saw that God’s people are in great peril; many are dwellers upon the earth;
their interest and affections are centered in the world. Their example is not right.
The world is deceived by the course pursued by many who profess great and noble
truths. Our responsibility is in accordance with the light given, the graces and gifts
bestowed. On the workers whose talents, whose means, whose opportunities and
abilities, are greatest rests the heaviest responsibility....
Brother A was presented before me to represent a class who are in a similar
position. They have never been indifferent to the smallest worldly advantage. By
diligent business tact and successful investments, by trading, not on pounds, but on
pence and farthings, they have accumulated property. But in doing this they have
educated faculties inconsistent with the development of Christian character. Their
lives in no way represent Christ; for they love the world and its gain better than
they love God or the truth. “If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not
in him.”
All the abilities which men and women possess belong to God. Worldly confor-
mity and attachments are emphatically forbidden in His Word. When the power
of the transforming grace of God is felt upon the heart, it will send a person, hith-
erto worldly, into every pathway of beneficence. Those who have in their hearts
a determination to lay up treasure in the world will “fall into temptation and a
snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and
perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil [the foundation of all avarice
and worldliness]: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith,
and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.” ...
Jesus has opened to everyone a way by which wisdom, grace, and power may be
obtained. He is our example in all things, and nothing should divert the mind from
the main object in life, which is to have Christ in the soul, melting and subduing
the heart. When this is the case, every member of the church, every professor of
the truth, will be Christlike in character, in words, in actions.—
Testimonies for the
Church 5:277, 278
.
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