Page 295 - Counsels to Parents, Teachers, and Students (1913)

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Teacher’s Need Of The Holy Spirit’s Aid
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better satisfied to work with the students ourselves.” Thus despite
has been done to God’s gracious Messenger.
Are not the teachers in our schools in danger of blasphemy, of
charging the Holy Spirit with being a deceiving power and leading
into fanaticism? Where are the educators that choose the snow of
Lebanon which comes from the rock of the field, or the cold, flowing
waters that come from another place, instead of the murky waters of
the valley?
A succession of showers from the living waters has come to you
at Battle Creek. Each shower was a consecrated inflowing of divine
influence; but you did not recognize it as such. Instead of drinking
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copiously of the streams of salvation so freely offered through the
influence of the Holy Spirit, you turned to satisfy your soul thirst
with the polluted waters of human science. The result has been
parched hearts in the school and in the church. Those who are
satisfied with little spirituality have gone far in unfitting themselves
to appreciate the deep movings of the Spirit of God....
There is need of heart conversions among the teachers. A gen-
uine change of thought and methods of teaching is required to place
them where they will have a personal relation to a living Saviour. It
is one thing to assent to the Spirit’s work in conversion, and another
thing to accept that Spirit’s agency as a reprover, calling to repen-
tance. It is necessary that both teachers and students not only assent
to truth, but have a deep practical knowledge of the operations of the
Spirit. Its cautions are given because of the unbelief of those who
profess to be Christians....
You who have long lost the spirit of prayer, pray, pray earnestly,
“Pity Thy suffering cause, pity the church, pity the individual believ-
ers, Thou Father of mercies. Take from us everything that defiles.
Deny us what Thou wilt, but take not from us Thy Holy Spirit.”
There are and ever will be those who do not move wisely, who
will, if words of doubt or unbelief are spoken, throw off conviction
and choose to follow their own will, and because of their deficiencies
Christ has been reproached. Poor, finite mortals have judged the rich
and precious outpouring of the Spirit and passed sentence upon it as
the Jews passed sentence on the work of Christ. Let it be understood
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in every institution in America that it is not commissioned to you to
direct the work of the Holy Spirit and to tell how it shall represent