The Lord is not pleased with some of the
arrangements that have been made in Battle Creek. He has declared
that other places are being robbed of the light and advantages
that have been centered and multiplied in Battle Creek. It is
not pleasing to God that our youth from all parts of the country
should be called to Battle Creek, to work in the sanitarium,
and to receive their education. When we permit this, we are often
guilty of robbing needy fields of their most precious treasure.
Through the light given in the testimonies,
the Lord has indicated that He does not desire students to leave
their home schools and sanitariums to be educated in Battle Creek.
He instructed us to remove the college from this place. This
was done, but the institutions that remained failed of doing
what they should have done to share with other places the advantages
still centered in Battle Creek. The Lord signified His displeasure
by permitting the principal buildings of these institutions to
be destroyed by fire.
Notwithstanding the plain evidence of the
Lord's providence in these destructive fires, some among us have
not hesitated to make light of the statement that these buildings
were burned because men had been swaying things in directions
which the Lord could not approve.
Men have been departing from right principles,
for the promulgation of which these institutions were established.
They have failed of doing the very work that God ordained should
be done to prepare a people to "build the old waste places"
and to stand in the breach, as represented in the fifty-eighth
chapter of Isaiah. In this scripture the work we are to do is
clearly defined as being medical missionary work. This work is
to be done in all places. God has a vineyard; and He desires
that this vineyard shall be worked unselfishly. No parts are
to be neglected. The most neglected portion needs the most wide-awake
missionaries to do the work which, through Isaiah, the Holy Spirit
has portrayed:
"Is not this the fast that I have
chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens,
and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?"
"If thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the
afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy
darkness be as the noonday: and
the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in
drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered
garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. And
they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places:
thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and
thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer
of paths to dwell in." Isaiah 58:6,
For His own name's sake, God will not permit
the froward and the independent to carry out their unsanctified
plans. He will visit them for their perversity of action. "There
is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked." Isaiah 57:21.
But in His judgments the Lord will remember mercy. He declares:
"I will not contend forever, neither
will I be always wroth: for the spirit should fail before Me,
and the souls which I have made. For the iniquity of his covetousness
was I wroth, and smote him: I hid Me, and was wroth, and he went
on frowardly in the way of his heart. I have seen his ways, and
will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto
him and to his mourners. I create the fruit of the lips; Peace,
peace to him that is far off, and to him that is near, saith
the Lord; and I will heal him." Verses 16-19.
"The spirit of My people should fail
before Me," said the Lord, "if I were to deal with
them in accordance with their perversity. They could not endure
My displeasure and My wrath. I have seen the perverse ways of
every sinner. He who repents and does the works of righteousness,
I will convert and heal, and restore unto My favor."
Concerning those who have been deceived
and led astray by unconsecrated
men, the Lord says: "Their course of action has not been
in accordance with My will; yet for the righteousness of My own
cause, for the truth's sake, I will heal everyone who shall honor
My name. All the penitent of Israel shall see of My salvation.
I, the Lord, do rule, and I will fill with praise and thanksgiving
the hearts of all who are nigh and far off, even all the penitent
of Israel who have kept My ways."
"Thus saith the high and lofty One
that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the
high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and
humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive
the heart of the contrite ones." Verse 15.