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| As the books of record are opened in the judgment, the lives of all who have believed on Jesus come in review before God. Beginning with those who first lived upon the earth, our Advocate presents the cases of each successive generation, and closes with the living. Every name is mentioned, every case closely investigated. Names are accepted, names rejected. When any have sins remaining upon the books of record, unrepented of and unforgiven, their names will be blotted out of the book of life, and the record of their good deeds will be erased from the book of God's remembrance. . . . {FLB 212.2} |
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| As the books of record are opened in the judgment, the lives of all who have believed on Jesus come in review before God. Beginning with those who first lived upon the earth, our Advocate presents the cases of each successive generation, and closes with the living. Every name is mentioned, every case closely investigated. Names are accepted, names rejected. When any have sins remaining upon the books of record, unrepented of and unforgiven, their names will be blotted out of the book of life. . . . {Mar 93.2} |
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| If a brother does you a wrong, you are not to retaliate by doing him a wrong. If you have done him a wrong, you must go to him, and ask him to forgive you. You must not let an injury to your brother remain unrepented of, and unforgiven, for even one night. You must say, "I will get this out of the way. I will have harmony between my soul and my brother's." In pursuing this course, you are giving others an example. If there is any one backslidden from God, how anxious we should be that he might forsake his evil ways, and return to the Lord, who will have mercy upon him, and to our God, who will abundantly pardon! If we see a brother stumble, it is our first duty to seek to set his feet in the path of life again. We should let the love of Jesus into the soul. We must be merciful to all around us, for to the merciful, God will be merciful; but those who judge and condemn others, will be judged by the Judge of all the earth. God wants parents and their families to come to the foot of the cross. The settled peace of Jesus should abide with every member of the family: If Jesus comes into your home, he will say, "Peace be unto you;" but he cannot come into your house if you are scolding, and fretting, and finding fault with one another. What says the word?--"Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord." {RH, August 14, 1888 par. 7} |
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| I appeal to you, my young friends. How anxious are you to remove the record of the past, to have your wrong-doings blotted out? What depths of iniquity are open to God's sight, that are hidden from all mortal view! Every secret thing shall be brought into judgment, whether it be good or evil. Past sins, unrepented of and unforgiven, will be brought up then, only to condemn us, and appoint our portion with the lost. But the promises of God are full of encouragement for us. "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." "I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin." "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy." "Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile." "Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." {RH, January 13, 1891 par. 11} |
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| If the people so mercifully spared by God would repent with that repentance which needs not to be repented of; if they would serve God and honor his name, their sin on this occasion would no more be remembered against them. But if, when tempted, they pursued a similar course; if they showed no strength to resist temptation, but repeated their evil work; if they murmured and complained against Moses, these former sins would be placed to their account as unforgiven. {RH, March 14, 1899 par. 9} |
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| In these days of peril those who have been unfaithful in their duties in life, and whose mistakes and sins of neglect are registered against them in the book in Heaven, unrepented of and unforgiven, will be overcome by Satan. Every one is to be tested and severely tried. Satan will exert all his energies, and call to his aid his evil host, who will exercise all their experience, artifice, and cunning, to deceive souls and wrest them from the hands of Jesus Christ. He makes them believe they may be unfaithful in the minor duties of life, and God will not see, God will not notice; but that Being who numbers the hairs of our head, and marks the fall of the little sparrow, notices every deviation from truth, every departure from honor and integrity in both secular and religious things. These errors and sins corrupt the man, and disqualify him for the society of heavenly angels. By his defiled character he has placed himself under the flag of Satan. The arch deceiver has power over this class. The more exalted their profession, the more honorable the position they have held, the more grievous their course in the sight of God, the more sure the triumph of Satan. These will have no shelter in the time of Jacob's trouble. Their sins will then appear of such magnitude that they will have no confidence to pray, no heart to wrestle as did Jacob. On the other hand, those who have been of like passion, erring and sinful in their lives, but who have repented of their sins, and in genuine sorrow confessed them, will have pardon written against their names in the heavenly records. They will be hid 'in the day of the Lord's anger. Satan will attack this class, but like Jacob they have taken hold of the strength of God, and true to his character he is at peace with them, and sends angels to comfort and bless and sustain them in their time of peril. The time of Jacob's trouble will test every one, and distinguish the genuine Christian from the one who is so only in name. {ST, November 27, 1879 par. 6} |
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| I have not as much strength now as I have had in the past. God helps, lives, and reigns, and you can seek Him individually. What souls are there here who will have their sins unforgiven and their names blotted out of the book of life? We do not know what we are doing. If we have unclean hands we cannot enter heaven. Is it so that we are being fitted for the society of angels? Is it so that we are to come in the presence of a holy God? Do we sense it? Do we sense that we are to make characters every day, that God is watching the development of character and weighing moral worth, and that our lives are daguerreotyped on the books of heaven as your face is stamped on the polished plate of the artist? I cannot see how you can be so lazy and so indolent and so easy and contented. {1SAT 56.2} {1888 158.2} |
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| The mental anguish I passed through at this time was very great. I believed in an eternally burning hell; and as I thought of the wretched state of the sinner before God, I was in deep despair. I feared that I should be lost, and that I should live through eternity suffering a living death. But I learned better than this. I learned that I had a God who is altogether too merciful to perpetuate throughout eternity the lives of the beings whom he created for his glory, but who, instead of accepting the Saviour, had died unrepentant, unforgiven, and unsaved. I learned that the wicked shall be consumed as stubble, and that they shall be as ashes under our feet in the new earth; they shall be as though they had not been. There is no eternally burning hell; there are no living bodies suffering eternal torment. {YI, November 3, 1908 par. 7} |
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| The mental anguish I passed through at this time was very great. I believed in an eternally burning hell, and as I thought of the wretched state of the sinner without God, without hope, I was in deep despair. I feared that I should be lost, and that I should live throughout eternity suffering a living death. But I learned better than this. I learned that I had a God who was altogether too merciful to perpetuate throughout eternity the lives of the beings whom He had created for His glory, but who, instead of accepting the Saviour, had died unrepentant, unforgiven, unsaved. {2SAT 232.3} |
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