Blog Archives - WELCOME TO THE JOY OF TROY

March 21, 2020

3/21/2020

MUCH MORE WORK TO DO

        He said to His disciples, "The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few."--Matthew 9:37

    The message that I am bidden to bear to our people at this time is, Work the cities without delay, for time is short. The Lord has kept this work before us for the last twenty years or more. A little has been done in a few places, but much more might be done. I am carrying a burden day and night, because so little is being accomplished to warn the inhabitants of our great centers of population of the judgments that will fall upon the transgressors of God's law....

    The enemy would be rejoiced to see the grand, saving truth for this time confined to a few places. He is not inactive. He is instilling into the minds of men his deceptive theories to blind their eyes and confuse their understanding, that the saving truth may not be brought to their knowledge. Soon the Sunday laws will be enforced, and men in positions of trust will be embittered against the little handful of God's commandment-keeping people.

    Satan seems to have been permitted to gain many points of advantage. But the Lord will bring men of understanding from the various churches, to combat the enforcement of a law that the first day of the week shall be honored as a day when no business shall be transacted. (Letter 168, December 1, 1909)

REFLECTION: God calls for workers. Men of clear judgment and humble hearts are needed. Christ's sorrowful lamentation is, "The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few." (Letter 104, June 3, 1903)

March 29, 2020

3/21/2020

I HAVE A RISEN SAVIOR

        That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life.--1 John 1:1

    Nevertheless, the foundation of God standeth sure. The Lord knoweth them that are His. The sanctified minister must have no guile in his mouth. He must be open as the day, free from every taint of evil. A sanctified ministry and press will be a power in flashing the light of truth on this untoward generation. Light, brethren, more light we need. Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound an alarm in the holy mountain.

    Gather the host of the Lord, with sanctified hearts, to hear what the Lord will say unto His people; for He has increased light for all who will hear. Let them be armed and equipped, and come up to the battle--to the help of the Lord against the mighty. God Himself will work for Israel. Every lying tongue will be silenced. The bulwarks of Satan will never triumph. Victory will attend the third angel's message.

    As the Captain of the Lord's host tore down the walls of Jericho, so will the Lord's commandment-keeping people triumph, and all opposing elements be defeated. Let no soul complain of the servants of God who have come to them with a heaven-sent message. Do not any longer pick flaws in them, saying, "They are too positive; they talk too strongly." They may talk strongly; but is it not needed? God will make the ears of the hearers tingle if they will not heed His voice or His message. He will denounce those who resist the word of God. (Testimonies to Ministers and Gospel Workers, 410)

REFLECTION: Let us allow God to control our minds. Let us not say or do anything that will turn a fellow from the right way.

I feel very sad as I think of how few there are who show that they have tasted the deep blessedness of communion with a risen, ascended Saviour. Men of the world are striving for the supremacy. God's followers are to keep Christ ever in view, inquiring, Is this the way of the Lord? A holy desire to live the life of Christ is to fill our hearts. In Him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. (Letter 27, March 28, 1903)

March 21, 2020

3/21/2020

MUCH MORE WORK TO DO

        He said to His disciples, "The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few."--Matthew 9:37

    The message that I am bidden to bear to our people at this time is, Work the cities without delay, for time is short. The Lord has kept this work before us for the last twenty years or more. A little has been done in a few places, but much more might be done. I am carrying a burden day and night, because so little is being accomplished to warn the inhabitants of our great centers of population of the judgments that will fall upon the transgressors of God's law....

    The enemy would be rejoiced to see the grand, saving truth for this time confined to a few places. He is not inactive. He is instilling into the minds of men his deceptive theories to blind their eyes and confuse their understanding, that the saving truth may not be brought to their knowledge. Soon the Sunday laws will be enforced, and men in positions of trust will be embittered against the little handful of God's commandment-keeping people.

    Satan seems to have been permitted to gain many points of advantage. But the Lord will bring men of understanding from the various churches, to combat the enforcement of a law that the first day of the week shall be honored as a day when no business shall be transacted. (Letter 168, December 1, 1909)

REFLECTION: God calls for workers. Men of clear judgment and humble hearts are needed. Christ's sorrowful lamentation is, "The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few." (Letter 104, June 3, 1903)

March 20, 2020

3/20/2020

COME REST AWHILE

        He said to them, "Come aside by yourselves to a deserted place and rest awhile." For there were many coming and going, and they did not even have time to eat.--Mark 6:31

    We cannot fail to see that the Lord of the world is soon to come. Satan is working upon the minds of men and women, and many seem filled with a desire for amusement and excitement. As it was in the days of Noah, every kind of evil is on the increase. Divorce and marriage is the order of the time. At such a time as this, the people who are seeking to keep the commandments of God should look for retired places away from the cities....

    We are charged with this message: Christ is coming to judge the world for her iniquity; and the earth shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain. Then the great multitude will be without God and without hope in the world.

    One of the marked features of Noah's day was the intense worldliness that prevailed. Eating and drinking and dressing, buying and selling, marrying and giving in marriage marked all classes, high and low....

    Who will be warned? We say again, Out of the cities. Do not consider it a great deprivation, that you must go into the hills and mountains, but seek for that retirement where you can be alone with God, to learn His will and way....

    Do not consider it a privation when you are called to leave the cities and move out into country places. Here there await rich blessings for those who will grasp them. By beholding the scenes of nature, the works of the Creator, by studying God's handiwork, imperceptibly you will be changed into the same image.

    I have been given a decided message to bear regarding this matter. I am bidden to say to our people, Prepare to meet thy God. (Manuscript 85, June 30, 1908)

March 19, 2020

3/19/2020

OUT OF THE CITIES

        Let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her.--Luke 21:21

    Christ is soon coming, and Satan knows that his time is short. As we draw near to the close of time, the cities will become more and more corrupt, and more and more objectionable as places for establishing centers of our work. The dangers of travel will increase, confusion and drunkenness will abound; and if there can be found places in retired mountain regions where it would be difficult for the evils of the cities to enter, let our people secure such places for our sanitariums and advanced schools....

    Let parents understand that the training of their children is an important work in the saving of souls. In country places abundant, useful exercise will be found in doing those things that need to be done, and which will give physical health by developing nerve and muscle. "Out of the cities" is my message for the education of our children....

    It is Satan's purpose to attract men and women to the cities, and to gain his object he invents every kind of novelty and amusement, every kind of excitement. And the cities of the earth today are becoming as were the cities before the flood....

    In the days before the flood, every kind of amusement was invented to lead men and women to forgetfulness and sin. Today,...Satan is working with intensity, that the same conditions of evil shall prevail. And the earth is becoming corrupt. Religious liberty will be little respected by professing Christians, for many of them have no understanding of spiritual things. (Manuscript 85, June 30, 1908)

REFLECTION: Of the vast population of the earth before the Flood, only eight souls believed and obeyed God's word through Noah. For a hundred and twenty years the preacher of righteousness warned the world of the coming destruction, but his message was rejected and despised. So it will be now....

While God's servants are giving the message that the end if all things is at hand, the world is absorbed in amusements and pleasure seeking. There is a constant round of excitement that causes indifference to God and prevents the people from being impressed by the truths which alone can save them from the coming destruction. (Patriarchs and Prophets, 102-103)

March 18, 2020

3/18/2020

FOLLOW THE LIGHT

        For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little.--Isaiah 28:10

    The wickedness that is being revealed in the cities of San Francisco and Oakland shows that the world is fast becoming as it was before the flood. The union men who have struck for higher wages, by their destruction of property, and their attempts to destroy life, are plainly showing to what a pass men will come who are determined to carry out their own plans regardless of others. Many of the police will not come out and act their part. They are discouraged. What the end will be, the human mind cannot determine.

    The Lord is bringing the perplexities of these social problems to our notice, that we may see the evil of seeking to carry out our own way and will. This is an evil that has appeared again and again in our work, and which is appearing now. The natural man needs to be converted; the Spirit of God is needed to operate upon human hearts. Many of our church members are becoming weak because, instead of depending upon God, they are self-sufficient.

    I am instructed to say to our churches, Study the testimonies. They are written for our admonition and encouragement upon whom the ends of the world are come. If God's people will not study these messages that are sent to them from time to time, they are guilty of rejecting light. Line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little, God is sending instruction to His people. Heed the instruction; follow the light. The Lord has a controversy with His people, because in the past they have not heeded His instruction and followed His guidance. (Letter 292, September 12, 1907)

REFLECTION: The will is the governing power in the nature of man, the power of decision, or choice. Every human being possessed of reason has power to choose the right. In every experience of life, God's word to us is, "Choose you this day whom ye will serve." Everyone may place his will on the side of the will of God, may choose to obey Him, and by thus linking himself with divine agencies, he may stand where nothing can force him to do evil. (Education, 289)

March 17, 2020

3/17/2020

I AM THE LORD

        I am the Lord, and there is no other; there is no God besides Me. I will gird you, though you have not known Me.--Isaiah 45:5

    Bible history is to be repeated. Calamities will come, calamities most awful, most unexpected; and these destructions will follow one after another. If there will be a heeding of the warnings that God has given, and if churches will repent, returning to their allegiance, then other cities may be spared for a time. But if men who have been deceived continue in the same way in which they have been walking, disregarding the law of God, and presenting falsehoods before the people, God allows them to suffer calamities, that their senses may be awakened....

    The Lord will show before a world transgressing his holy law that He is God, and beside Him there is none else. He has born long with the deceptions of men claiming piety. While he has been provoked by their impieties, He has inflicted less punishment than they deserved.

    The Lord will not suddenly cast off all transgressors or destroy entire nations, but He will punish cities and places where men have given themselves up to the possession of satanic agencies. Strictly will the cities of the nations be dealt with; and yet they will not be visited in the extreme of God's indignation, because some souls will yet break away from the delusions of the enemy, and will repent and be converted, while the mass of the people will be treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath. (Manuscript 35, April 27, 1906)

REFLECTION: The Deliverance of Daniel from the den of lions had been used of God to create a favorable impression upon the mind of Cyrus the Great....

As the king saw the words foretelling, more than a hundred years before his birth, the manner in which Babylon should be taken; as he read the message addressed to him by the Ruler of the universe,...his heart was profoundly moved, and he determined to fulfill his divinely appointed mission. (Prophets and Kings, 557-558)

March 16, 2020

3/16/2020

A WARNING MESSAGE OF TRUTH

        Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.--James 1:12

    I saw...scenes that would soon take place in Chicago, and other large cities....As wickedness increased, and the protecting power of God was withdrawn, there were destructive winds and tempests; buildings were destroyed by fire and shaken down by earthquakes....

    Some time after this, I was shown that the vision of buildings in Chicago, and the draft upon the means of our people to erect them, and their destruction, was an object lesson for our people, warning them not to invest largely of their means in property in Chicago, or any other city, unless the providence of God should positively open the way and plainly point out duty to build or buy as necessary in giving the note of warning. A similar caution was given in regard to building in Los Angeles. Repeatedly I have been instructed that we must not invest means in the erection of expensive buildings in cities....

    The wickedness of Chicago is as the wickedness of Sodom and Gomorrah....

    The Lord would have the people warned; for a great work will be done in a short time. I have heard the Word of God proclaimed in many localities outside the city of Chicago. There were many voices proclaiming the truth with great power. That which they proclaimed was not fanciful theories, but the warning message.

    While the solid truth of the Bible came from the lips of men who had no fanciful theories or misleading science to present, there were others who labored with all their power to bring in false theories regarding God and Christ. And miracles were wrought, to deceive, if possible, the very elect. (Manuscript 33, March 20, 1906)

REFLECTION: The Christian life is a battle and a march. In this warfare there is no release; the effort must be continuous and persevering. It is by unceasing endeavor that we maintain the victory over the temptations of Satan. Christian integrity must be sought with restless energy and maintained with a resolute fixedness of purpose. (The Ministry of Healing, 453)

March 15, 2020

3/15/2020

BE WHEAT--NOT A TARE

        Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, "First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn."--Matthew 13:30

    In the time of the harvest the Lord will say to His reapers, "Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn." [Matthew 13:30.] God has a people on the earth who will see the evil of every phase of oppression and will refuse to unite with the enemy in carrying out his plans....

    God help us to walk and work as men and women on the border of the eternal world. Soon an awful surprise will come upon the inhabitants of this earth. Suddenly, and with power and great glory, Christ will come. (Letter 201, December 15, 1902)

    It is God's design that our people should locate outside the cities and from these outposts warn the cities and raise in them memorials for God. (Manuscript 20, April 3, 1903)

    San Francisco and Oakland are becoming as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the Lord will visit them. Not far hence they will suffer under His judgments. (Manuscript 30, April 20, 1903)

REFLECTION: In the explanation of the parable, Christ declared that He Himself was the sower. He spread His redeemed seed, true believers, in the field of the world. Through His grace, these Christians bear the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-24). Their presence on earth is the reason the "kingdom of heaven" is like the field of the world. When Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is at hand" (Matthew 4:17; 10:7), He meant the spiritual realm which exists on earth side by side with the realm of the evil one (1 John 5:19). When the kingdom of heaven comes to its fruition, heaven will be a reality, and there will be no "weeds" among the "wheat." But for now, both good and bad seeds mature in the world.

March 14, 2020

3/14/2020

HE HEARS OUR CRIES

        There is a severe evil which I have seen under the sun: riches kept for their owner to his hurt.--Ecclesiastes 5:13

    The same state of things exists today that existed before the flood, and the nearer we get to the large cities, the worse the evil is....

    How long will the Lord suffer oppression of the poor that rich men may hoard wealth? These men are heaping together treasures for the last days. Their money is placed where it does no one any good.

    To add to their millions, they rob the poor, and the cries of the starving are no more to them than the barking of a dog. But the Lord marks every act of oppression. No cry of suffering is unheard by Him. Those who today are scheming to obtain more and more money, putting in operation plans that mean to the poor starvation, will in the last great day stand face to face with their deeds of oppression and injustice.

    Those who claim to be the children of God are in no case to bind up with the labor unions that are formed or that shall be formed. This the Lord forbids. Cannot those who study the prophecies see and understand what is before us? The transgressors of the law of God have taken sides with their leader, the general of rebellion.

    He understands how to devise his satanic schemes and through whom to work for the carrying out of them. He is striving to lead every soul to take sides with him, and under the influence of his temptations, thousands are binding themselves up in bundles, ready to be consumed by the fires of the last day. Those who yield to his temptation become in their turn tempers, standing among the ablest of his helpers. (Letter 201, December 15, 1902)

REFLECTION: Riches and worldly honor cannot satisfy the soul. Many among the rich are longing for some divine assurance, some spiritual hope. Many long for something that will bring to an end the monotony of their aimless lives. Many in official life feel their need of something which they have not. Few among them go to church; for they feel that they receive little benefit. The teaching they hear does not touch the heart. Shall we make no personal appeal to them? (The Ministry of Healing, 210)