Chapter 17—Purity of Heart and Life
God has given you a habitation to care for and preserve in the best
condition for His service and glory. Your bodies are not your own.
“What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost
which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For
ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in
your spirit, which are God’s.” “Know ye not that ye are the temple of
God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the
temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy,
which temple ye are.
In this age of corruption when our adversary the devil, as a roaring
lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour, I see the necessity
of lifting my voice in warning. “Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter
into temptation.” There are many who possess brilliant talents who
wickedly devote them to the service of Satan. What warning can I
give to a people who profess to have come out from the world and to
have left its works of darkness? to a people whom God has made the
repositories of His law, but who, like the pretentious fig tree, flaunt
their apparently flourishing branches in the very face of the Almighty,
yet bear no fruit to the glory of God? Many of them cherish impure
thoughts, unholy imaginations, unsanctified desires, and base passions.
God hates the fruit borne upon such a tree. Angels, pure and holy, look
upon the course of such with abhorrence, while Satan exults. Oh, that
men and women would consider what is to be gained by transgressing
God’s law! Under any and every circumstance, transgression is a
dishonor to God and a curse to man. We must regard it thus, however
fair its guise, and by whomsoever committed
The pure in heart shall see God. Every impure thought defiles the
soul, impairs the moral sense, and tends to obliterate the impressions of
the Holy Spirit. It dims the spiritual vision, so that men cannot behold
God. The Lord may and does forgive the repenting sinner; but though
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Testimonies for the Church 2:352, 353
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Testimonies for the Church 5:146
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