DiggingforTruth

Let no one from among us ever stoop to the use of ridicule when dealing with men who do not believe our doctrines. When this is done, it is evident that the would-be defender of truth is filled with self-importance and self-righteousness and with the very spirit that prompted the Pharisees to reject the light which God had graciously given them from heaven. When those who are claiming to investigate the Scriptures for truth, cease to have the meekness and the lowliness of Christ, and form a confederacy to resist every doctrine and view that differs from what they have regarded as truth, then Satan himself presides in their assemblies; and when this is the case, all who are brought within the sphere of their influence are leavened with the spirit of doubt, of questioning, and of unbelief, even as were the Pharisees in the days of Christ. All heaven is looking down upon the people who are to be defenders of truth, to see if they will follow the same course of action as did the Pharisees, and as have all the churches when new rays of light have been sent to them in messages of warning and exhortation. The Pharisees rejected Christ because he did not come in the very manner in which they had flattered themselves that he would come, and as a consequence, they were fettered in chains of their own forging, and bound themselves in doubt, in questioning, in criticism and unbelief, and worked their own eternal ruin.  {HM, August 1, 1894 par. 6}