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things were shown me that are open to the eye that never slumbers nor
sleeps.
This is written in the books of heaven, and in a little time your case
will be decided, whether your name shall be blotted out from the Book
of Life or not. It certainly will be unless you are a converted man, and
humble your soul before God, and confess your sins, and turn unto the
Lord with your whole heart, and purge from you every impure thought
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and corrupt action. Says the True Witness, “I know thy works.” Do
not attempt to teach the people until you are a changed man, until you
have in humble penitence sought the Lord with true contrition of soul,
and have a new heart.
Satan’s Strong Attempts to Corrupt Ministers—I was shown
that Satan would make his temptations strong to corrupt the ministers
who are teaching the binding claims of the law of God. If he can
tarnish the virtue, confuse the sense of purity and holiness, if he can
insinuate himself into their thoughts, suggest and plan for them to sin
in thought and deed against God, then their defense is gone. They have
separated themselves from God; they have not the power and Spirit
of God with them, and the sacred message of truth they bear to the
people is not blessed of God; the seed is not watered, and the increase
is not realized.
Lust as a Hindrance to the Teaching of Truth—What you need,
my brother, is a pure and holy heart. Cease at once from attempting
to teach the truth until you know that in the strength of God you can
overcome lust. If your mind had been, in the years you have professed
to be a child of God, educated and taxed to dwell upon Jesus, to pray
when traveling on the cars, when walking in the streets, and wherever
you were, and had you been binding about your thoughts and teaching
them to dwell upon pure and holy things, I should not have to address
you as I do today. The Lord must be in all your thoughts, but this work
is strangely neglected.
A Minister’s Work Not Like Common Business—There are
some of our ministers who are engaged in active service who have
some sense of the importance of the work, but there is a large num-
ber who are handling sacred truth about as they would engage in any
common business. They have not been refined, ennobled, sanctified
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by the truth. They have not advanced step by step, growing in grace
and the knowledge of Jesus Christ. They have not real, genuine faith