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 But this does not authorize any one man to undertake the work of ordering his brethren arbitrarily to do as he thinks advisable, irrespective of their own personal convictions of duty. Nor are God’s chosen laborers to feel that at every step they must wait to ask some officer in authority whether they may do this or that. While cooperating heartily with their brethren in carrying out general plans that have been laid for the prosecution of the work, they are constantly to look to the God of Israel for personal guidance. { TM 491.3} |
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| No one is to understand from this scripture that God arbitrarily blinded the eyes and hardened the hearts of the Jews. It was Christ’s work to soften hard hearts. But if men resisted the work of Christ, the sure result would be that their hearts would become hardened. { RH November 13, 1900, par. 10 } |
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| As the twenty-fifth day of December is observed to commemorate the birth of Christ, as the children have been instructed by precept and example that this was indeed a day of gladness and rejoicing, you will find it a difficult matter to pass over this period without giving it some attention. It can be made to serve a very good purpose. The youth should be treated very carefully. They should not be left on Christmas to find their own amusement in vanity and pleasure-seeking, in amusements which will be detrimental to their spirituality. Parents can control this matter by turning the minds and the offerings of their children to God and his cause and the salvation of souls. The desire for amusement, instead of being quenched and arbitrarily ruled down, should be controlled and directed by painstaking effort upon the part of the parents. Their desire to make gifts may be turned into pure and holy channels, and made to result in good to our fellow-men by supplying the treasury in the great, grand work for which Christ came into our world. Self-denial and self-sacrifice marked his course of action. Let it mark ours who profess to love Jesus; because in him is centered our hope of eternal life. { RH December 9, 1884, par. 5 } |
| The desire for amusement, instead of being quenched and arbitrarily ruled down, should be controlled and directed by painstaking effort upon the part of the parents. Their desire to make gifts may be turned into pure and holy channels and made to result in good to our fellow men by supplying the treasury in the great, grand work for which Christ came into our world. Self-denial and self-sacrifice marked His course of action. Let it mark ours who profess to love Jesus because in Him is centered our hope of eternal life. { AH 478.3} |
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| Your holy example will be the greatest corrector of these things. You have noticed these little things and spent many words upon them and have suffered yourself to become irritated over them. Even if the ones you reproved sinned, your sin was greater by arbitrarily bearing down upon them for these small matters when in many things you were more faulty than they.—Letter 5, 1864, p. 2 (February 22, 1864, to Brother Hutchens). { ChL 69.1} |
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| In his labors each worker is to look to God. We are to labor as men and women who have a living connection with God. We are to learn how to meet the people where they are. Let not such conditions exist as we found in some places when we returned to America, in which individual church-members, instead of realizing their responsibility, looked to men for guidance, and men to whom had been committed sacred and holy trusts in the carrying forward of the work, failed of understanding the value of personal responsibility and took upon themselves the work of ordering and dictating what their brethren should do or should not do. These are things that God will not allow in His work. He will put His burdens upon His burden-bearers. Every individual soul has a responsibility before God, and is not to be arbitrarily instructed by men as to what he shall do, what he shall say, and where he shall go. We are not to put confidence in the counsel of men and assent to all they shall say unless we have evidence that they are under the influence of the Spirit of God. { FE 529.3 } { GCB May 21, 1909, par. 3 } |
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| It was generally believed by the Jews that sin is punished in this life. Every affliction was regarded as the penalty of some wrongdoing, either of the sufferer himself or of his parents. It is true that all suffering results from the transgression of God’s law, but this truth had become perverted. Satan, the author of sin and all its results, had led men to look upon disease and death as proceeding from God,—as punishment arbitrarily inflicted on account of sin. Hence one upon whom some great affliction or calamity had fallen had the additional burden of being regarded as a great sinner. { DA 471.1} |
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| Moses was greatly moved at these unjust accusations. He appealed to God before the people whether he had ever acted arbitrarily, and implored him to be his judge. The people in general were disaffected, and influenced by the misrepresentation of Korah. “And Moses said unto Korah, Be thou and all thy company before the Lord, thou, and they, and Aaron, tomorrow; and take every man his censer, and put incense in them, and bring ye before the Lord every man his censer, two hundred and fifty censers, thou also, and Aaron, each of you his censer. And they took every man his censer, and put fire in them, and laid incense thereon, and stood in the door of the tabernacle of the congregation with Moses and Aaron.” { 1SP 299.1 } { 4aSG 30.2 } { 3T 348.2} |
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| The mother is to teach the children through their earlier years, and in order to fulfill her great responsibility, she needs to be moulded and fashioned after the similitude of the character of Christ. She is never to use her influence fitfully, unwisely, arbitrarily, simply because it is in her power to do so. She must ever remember that she must render up an account to God for the way she has done her intrusted work. The father should see to it that the mother is not overburdened with the care of many children. Children are not to be crowded upon her so that her physical strength and training capabilities are taxed. Men and women should carefully, conscientiously consider, with an eye single to the glory of God, what is involved in bringing children into the world. When mothers bring forth children in rapid succession, the burdens of caring for and training them are so heavy that they become discouraged, and are not able to accomplish the work that they should in educating their numerous and fast-increasing flock. { ST May 14, 1894, par. 2 } |
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| God has sent the instruction to break every yoke. We are one—one in Christ Jesus. Position does not make the man. Position does not give liberty to exercise power arbitrarily over others. It is counsel that is needed; righteousness in deportment that is to be made manifest with meekness and humbleness of mind, and a spirit to seek the Lord until He is found.... { UL 56.4} |
| God has sent the instruction to break every yoke. We are one, one in Christ Jesus. Position does not make the man; position does not give liberty to exercise power arbitrarily over others. It is counsel that is needed, righteousness in deportment that is to be made manifest with meekness and humbleness of mind, and a spirit to seek the Lord until he is found. { RH March 18, 1909, par. 7 } |
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| In heaven Satan was next to the Son of God. But he yielded to the desire for self-exaltation, and was expelled from the heavenly courts. He came to this earth, to exercise over man his debasing power. This power increased with the ages, but its evil was not recognized, and God could not arbitrarily condemn its author. Satan’s work was a deadly peril to the universe, but for the security of the world and of the government of heaven, he must be allowed to develop his principles in their true light. { YI April 16, 1903, par. 3 } |
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| But this does not authorize any one man to undertake the work of ordering his brethren arbitrarily to do as he thinks advisable, irrespective of their own personal convictions of duty. Nor are God’s chosen laborers to feel that at every step they must wait to ask some officer in authority whether they may do this or that. While cooperating heartily with their brethren in carrying out general plans that have been laid for the prosecution of the work, they are constantly to look to the God of Israel for personal guidance. { SpTB09 21.3 } |
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| In no case should men handling sacred responsibilities so misrepresent the Lord’s purpose concerning His work as to say arbitrarily to a fellow-worker, You shall not do this, or You must do that. By His Holy Spirit the Lord impresses His workers to go to certain places, and to do a certain work. He does not desire to have the human mind interpose itself to forbid any work that He has bidden shall be carried forward.—Letter 88, 1908, pp. 5, 6. (To H. W. Cottrell and S. N. Haskell, February 16, 1908.) { 7MR 405.1 } |
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