I hate to share this with you, because it makes us to “behold” our corporate hideousness – how else can I explain that things like these can be LEGALIZED?
How is killing of millions of unborn children by pulling them out “piece-by-piece” related to our daily pilgrimage under the cross? Here is a thought from our character building seminar “From Glory to Glory”, Lesson 01 that can help us:
If you really want to know, what the natural man thinks towards God, then, you need to go to Calvary. What will the natural man do to God, given a chance? He will murder Him. You see… Calvary not only reveals the character of God, in the person of Jesus Christ, it reveals the character of man, in the person of those who are nailing Him to the cross. Pretty scary what we see about ourselves there, isn’t it? We hate God naturally so much, that given a chance, we will eliminate Him. This is precisely why, dear friends, if we’re going to be able to take step 2: embrace the Truth with the affections… and remember, the Truth is ultimately, who? Jesus. If we’re going to embrace Him, rather than crucify Him; we’ve got to have something supernatural happen. Do I hear an “amen”?
Now, if we – in our carnal state – would dare to crucify JESUS anew would He come today, how much easier is to get rid of these UNWANTED BABES, we never saw FACE-TO-FACE?
Pretty scary what we see about ourselves there, isn’t it?
This is the reason I hate to share these thoughts about us – many people when they discover how miserably selfish they are can’t face this reality and quit their own lives… So sobering is this fact. Remember Judas! That’s why we need to look at the “problem” only to that decree that it will awaken in us a stirring question: WHAT SHALL I DO TO BE SAVED? (Acts 2:37; Acts 16:30) And what is the answer? REPENT – change your mind – in this question about abortion. Abortion is just an iceberg, the roots are much deeper. Abortion is not a solution for your lack of self-control, but self-control is!
Physically, Samson was the strongest man upon the earth; but in self-control, integrity, and firmness, he was one of the weakest of men. Many mistake strong passions for a strong character, but the truth is that he who is mastered by his passions is a weak man. The real greatness of the man is measured by the power of the feelings that he controls, not by those that control him. {PP 567.3}
Man was to bear God’s image, both in outward resemblance and in character. Christ alone is “the express image” (Hebrews 1:3) of the Father; but man was formed in the likeness of God. His nature was in harmony with the will of God. His mind was capable of comprehending divine things. His affections were pure; his appetites and passions were under the control of reason. He was holy and happy in bearing the image of God and in perfect obedience to His will. {PP 45.2}
Every true Christian will have control of his appetites and passions. Unless he is free from the bondage of appetite, he cannot be a true, obedient servant of Christ. The indulgence of appetite and passion blunts the effect of truth upon the heart. It is impossible for the spirit and power of the truth to sanctify a man, soul, body, and spirit, when he is controlled by sensual desires.–“Christian Temperance and Bible Hygiene,” 75-80. {CE 181.2}
Today we are mass-murdering with full legal approval millions of unborn babies. As this young man Blake Adams from the video above says: this legalized abortion in 1973 did not happen overnight, but was preceded by many decades of changing the views about the sanctity of life. “Modernization of birth control” plays a big part in this mind-change or twisting the mind.
What’s birth control about? People call it contraceptives or anti-conception, which means: we do all we can ANTI or AGAINST conception (becoming pregnant with a child), but when it fails more and more people look for a second alternative – abortion.
Did you know that once, mainly Protestant America, had a Federal Law prohibiting the use or even promotion of contraceptives? It was called Comstock laws. They came in the year 1873 as a reaction of Protestant population against contraceptives. And when this “modernization of birth control,” in the form of a mass production of contraceptives came in? It was the year 1844 when Mr. Goodyear patented his rubber vulcanization. “Thanks” to this “most liberating invention in humankind” sex became the source of pleasure without fear of causing unwanted conception. But at that time still sensitive Protestants rejected it and the movement ended up in the Federal Comstock laws. The trouble is that condoms or any other pill is not 100% safe and so the number of abortions is very high. See the statistics. Increasing pressure caused these laws to be put away, so they lasted – what a paradox – 100 years: 1873 till the end of 1960-ties. It was the year 1973, which completely reverted the intention of Protestants from 100 years before. I would dare to say: Thanks to people like Mr. Comstock the decay of human society was delayed by extra 100 years. What a grace from God! But once this barrier was legally broken in 1973 the flood of murders and loss of any morality is speedily spreading like cancer across the whole world! Doom is unavoidable. Except precious few who will repent and restore the purity of mind and intentions of heart. See Gen 6:5-6.
Did you know that all Protestant denomination for 400 years were holding the same condemning position against contraception together with Catholic church? Please read this eye opening article: “Children of the Reformation”. Let me quote just few shocking thoughts:
For Luther, God’s words in Genesis 1:28, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth,” were more than a blessing, even more than a command. They were, he declared in his 1521 treatise onThe Estate of Marriage, “a divine ordinance which it is not our prerogative to hinder or ignore.”
Regarding the sin of Onan, as recorded in Genesis and involving the form of contraception now known as “withdrawal,” Luther wrote: “Onan must have been a most malicious and incorrigible scoundrel. This is a most disgraceful sin. It is far more atrocious than incest and adultery. We call it unchastity, yes, a Sodomitic sin. . . . Surely at such a time the order of nature established by God in procreation should be followed.” Onan was “that worthless fellow” who “refused to exercise love.”
On this matter, Luther was again joined by Calvin. In his Commentary on Genesis, he wrote that “the voluntary spilling of semen outside of intercourse between man and woman is a monstrous thing. Deliberately to withdraw from coitus in order that semen may fall on the ground is doubly monstrous. For this is to extinguish the hope of the [human] race and to kill before he is born the hoped-for offspring.”
A few decades later, the Synod of Dordt would declare that Onan’s act “was even as much as if he had, in a manner, pulled forth the fruit out of the mother’s womb and destroyed it.”
The nineteenth-century Reformed Pastor Johann Peter Lange, in his Christian Dogmatics, described contraception as “a most unnatural wickedness, and a grievous wrong. This sin . . . is [as] destructive as a pestilence that walketh in darkness, destroying directly the body and the soul of the young.”
At their 1908 Lambeth Conference, the world’s Anglican bishops recorded “with alarm the growing practice of artificial restriction of the family.” They “earnestly call[ed] upon all Christian people to discountenance the use of all artificial means of restriction as demoralizing to character and hostile to national welfare.”
As late as 1923, the Lutheran Church/Missouri Synod’s official magazine The Witness accused the Birth Control Federation of America of spattering “this country with slime” and labeled birth-control advocate Margaret Sanger a “she devil.” Pastor Walter Maier, founding preacher of the long-running Lutheran Hour radio program, called contraceptives “the most repugnant of modern aberrations, representing a twentieth-century renewal of pagan bankruptcy.”
As late as 1874, the average Anglican clergyman in England still had 5.2 living children. In 1911, however, just three years after the bishops had condemned contraception, the new census of England showed that the average family size of Anglican clergy had fallen to only 2.3 children, a stunning decline of 55 percent. The British Malthusian League—a strong advocate of contraception—had a field day exposing what it called the hypocrisy of the priests.
As the league explained, the Church of England continued to view contraception as a sin, and yet its clerics and bishops were obviously engaging in the practice. Apparently only the poor and the ignorant had to obey the church.
Pressures culminated at the 1930 Lambeth Conference, where bishops heard an address by birth-control advocate Helena Wrighton on the advantages of contraception for the poor. On a vote of 193 to 67, the bishops (representing not only England but also America, Canada, and the other former colonies) approved a resolution stating that:
In those cases where there is such a clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid parenthood, and where there is a morally sound reason for avoiding complete abstinence, other methods may be used, provided that this is done in the light of the same Christian principles.
This was the first official statement by a major church body in favor of contraception. Thus was Christian unity on the question broken. The decision was condemned by many religious and secular bodies, including the editors of the Washington Post. Pope Pius XI responded to it in his encyclical Casti Connubii four months later.
A Major Rethinking
“It is clear that there is a major rethinking going on among Evangelicals on this issue, especially among young people,” R. Albert Mohler, Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, recently told the Chicago Tribune. “There is a real push back against the contraceptive culture now.”
In his last years, Francis Schaeffer seemed to be moving toward the historic Christian view of contraception. Since 1980, several resolutions adopted by the Southern Baptists at their annual meeting have criticized contraception. By the close of the twentieth century, the Family Research Council featured special reports on “The Empty Promise of Contraception” and “The Bipartisan Blunder of Title X,” the latter referring to the domestic contraception program in the United States.
Conservative Calvinist publishers are producing books not only against contraception but promoting Natural Family Planning. A movement of Missouri Synod Lutherans is working to overturn their church’s current teaching and return it to Luther’s, and observers report a new interest in the traditional teaching among conservative movements in the mainline churches.
Read more: http://touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=20-04-020-f#ixzz1Z5btAyhZ
While thinkers in today’s different Protestant denominations are calling back to Luther’s position on Gen 1:28, common “church goers” are still enjoying the “freedom” of anti-conception methods. Do you think this is a trivial thing? Rather think twice – here is what a report showing what a social, whole nation and international consequences it has:
It’s a must see video in this context we are addressing. People argue that sexual abstinence would cause humankind to die out, the truth of the matter is that the use of contraceptives is literally causing the whole western society to die out right in front of our eyes in these days and no one can deny that! This is not a small matter, it’s not a problem of even a single nation, this “cancer” is on the worldwide scale appealing to our carnal mind.
What was triggered in 1844 by innocent patent of rubber vulcanization and making contraceptives possible to produce in huge quantities over 100 years is bringing the western super-civilization most into miserable disaster. We all are going to feel the consequences already in our lives!!! Where do you stand in this matter? We all play part in it!
Let me share with you a chapter from the book: Menopause – A New Approach, written by Daniele Starenkyj. You can order it from Teach Services. If you right click on the name of this book, you can download (Save Link As…) one chapter, which contains pretty serious thoughts related to this subject – here are just few of them:
When her periods cease in mid-life, a Western woman’s image of herself as an active sexual partner is automatically ripped apart. Just think of the irony! Having spent her childbearing years dreading the slightest delay in her periods, a Western woman in her forties will now be convinced that once they disappear, her youth and beauty, her reason for existing and for feeling a little loved will also be lost. It is a well-known fact that a very great number of Western women frankly refuse intercourse and become frigid at this point in their lives.
Many medical books today state that the menstrual cycle is the paramount sign of the reproductive function in women. While that may be true for Western women, it is not so for women elsewhere in the world, since the paramount sign of their reproductive function is having babies.
Although we are only now beginning to be surprised by this state of affairs and question its legitimacy, it was first recorded in Europe in 1775. A physician and philosopher named Roussel conjectured that “menstrual flow, far from being a natural institution is, on the contrary, an artificial need contracted as part of the social state.” Seeking to explain what he considered an anomaly, and probably strongly influenced by Rousseau and his ideas on civilization, he put it down to what he termed “vice.” “Women having acquired vices have also acquired menstruation. Thus, menstrual evacuation, once introduced into the human species, will continue without interruption.”
It is being found less and less natural that a woman should bleed for a total of 2 months every year, or the equivalent of seven years or so of constant hemorrhaging during her gynecological life as a sterile woman! There are reports in the scientific literature that menses recurring throughout the years from puberty, which is occurring earlier and earlier in Western women (8 to 10), to menopause (48 to 52) are a far from normal condition.
To summarize our findings until now, a Mediterranean woman is prolific, and happy to be so. It is the foundation of her self-esteem, an honored social position, and an unobtrusive menopause that coincides with the acquisition of even greater dignity, independence and autonomy. As we have seen, this general picture contains important details. This woman’s approach to her menses implies not only a symbolism that is diametrically opposed to that of Western women, but also – and this is what we are going to look at now – very specific hygienic behavior. The normal lack of menstruation protects her from a whole array of related ills, and her scrupulous respect of rules of hygiene when they do occur allows her to avoid another series of painful complaints, which have unfortunately become more and more common since the liberated women of our civilization have found themselves increasingly obliged to be “full-time” sexual partners.
Since desire has become the yardstick of their morality – I want it, therefore it’s OK – they consider the increase in libido to be proof that their need is legitimate: it has to be satisfied or they will become frustrated.
It is an undeniable fact that a Mediterranean woman, despite her many pregnancies, reaches menopause in an enviable physical and mental condition thanks to sexual mores which can be summed up by the triple maxim of Virginity, Chastity and Fidelity. Never having contracted infection, always having maintained her self-esteem through mutual respect, she is ready to begin a new life or, as 18th century authors termed it, “youthful old age.” They considered the postmenopause period of the middle class and peasant women of the day as a time of vigor. As these women had no further “obligations towards their species,” they could begin to live life as individuals and cultivate their intellectual faculties, greatly charming their astonished yet delighted husbands, who discovered a totally new side to their companions.
They said they were awaiting their menopause with impatience because they would then be free from the constraints of menstruation, which also meant complete sexual abstinence, and could enter a period of their lives when they would be “clean and free.”
Pretty sobering for westerners, am I right? Christian husbands like to quote the Bible when it comes to prove their “right” for sexual intercourse: 1 Cor 7:3-4. Does a woman have any right to reject? According their husbands rather no. But how is GOD looking at this situation?
There is but little real, genuine, devoted, pure love. This precious article is very rare. Passion is termed love. {AH 50.2}
True love is a high and holy principle, altogether different in character from that love which is awakened by impulse, and which suddenly dies when severely tested. {AH 50.3}
Love is a plant of heavenly growth, and it must be fostered and nourished. Affectionate hearts, truthful, loving words, will make happy families and exert an elevating influence upon all who come within the sphere of their influence. {AH 50.4}
True Love Versus Passion.–Love… is not unreasonable; it is not blind. It is pure and holy. But the passion of the natural heart is another thing altogether. … {AH 50.5}
That love which has no better foundation than mere sensual gratification will be headstrong, blind, and uncontrollable. Honor, truth, and every noble, elevated power of the mind are brought under the slavery of passions. The man who is bound in the chains of this infatuation is too often deaf to the voice of reason and conscience; neither argument nor entreaty can lead him to see the folly of his course. {AH 51.1}
True love is not a strong, fiery, impetuous passion. On the contrary, it is calm and deep in its nature. It looks beyond mere externals, and is attracted by qualities alone. It is wise and discriminating, and its devotion is real and abiding. {AH 51.2}
It may be necessary to humbly and affectionately urge, even at the risk of his [husband’s] displeasure, that she cannot debase her body by yielding to sexual excess. She should, in a tender, kind manner, remind him that God has the first and highest claim upon her entire being, and that she cannot disregard this claim, for she will be held accountable in the great day of God. {AH 126.3}
What is “excess“? If you mean “how many times per week you had a sex with your wife” you are wrong. If the contraceptives would be rejected as they were in the past 400 years – in about 1630 to 1930 – by all true Protestants, “excess” would mean number of children you procreated for the lack of self-control. This is the truth today’s “Protestants” don’t want to hear! This is the root we are discovering: crucifying JESUS anew by literally massacring millions of unborn children! Do you think JESUS won’t condemn and execute those who participate in this?
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There is a movie from perhaps 100 years ago and a terrible dilemma is presented: man had a fragile wife and in her early age she got pregnant. After two days of hard labor pain she delivered their first child, daughter. Doctor said to this man that this woman shouldn’t have another child, because it can be fatal to her. Man was for three years respecting it and loved his wife dearly, so even this was a sacrifice from his part, he abstained sexually. But three years later in a moment of weakness he says he needs a son! (Who can guarantee that this time it will be a son?) He sleeps with her, but when the time to deliver comes, his precious wife dies. What a tragedy! For the rest of his life this man feels guilty…
What would you say or do in such situation? Condoms didn’t exists in his days, if yes, they were condemned from Luther all the way down by all Protestant denominations and even he would use them, they didn’t and until today they don’t guarantee 100% security of having no embryo… Would you go ahead and risk the pregnancy of your precious wife you love so dearly? Just to satisfy your “right for sex”? What a dilemma! Maybe it will work for some years and practice Onan’s method, but one day you come home and she tells you she is pregnant… What comes first to your mind? “Will she survive the birth?” For nine months you can’t sleep… Or would you consider abortion to save the life of your wife you love so much in exchange for the life of an unborn baby? Not an easy questions. But millions are facing them today!!! How do I know? Look at the statistics:
Here is a web site Porn-Free. There you can find excellent resources for helping you or someone you know from this self-destructive additions. There you can read overwhelming reality of today’s corruption – they refer to another site called Top Ten Reviews. Before a perverted man was ashamed – rightly so! – and had to do such things secretly, today we reached the point when people are not even ashamed of it and don’t even hide it! It became a new standard of living – “a normal thing”. They want you to get used to it. Can you? Maybe you think: “I am free from this disgusting stuff.” Watch out. Do you know what are your own children looking at right now, do you know what their friends are offering them? You have no idea!!! Just look:
| Children Internet Pornography Statistics | |
| Average age of first Internet exposure to pornography | 11 years old |
| Largest consumer of Internet pornography | 35 – 49 age group |
| 15-17 year olds having multiple hard-core exposures | 80% |
| 8-16 year olds having viewed porn online | 90% (most while doing homework) |
| 7-17 year olds who would freely give out home address | 29% |
| 7-17 year olds who would freely give out email address | 14% |
| Children’s character names linked to thousands of porn links | 26 (Including Pokemon and Action Man) |
| Pornography Time Statistics | |
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While you read this article there is another porn-movie created…
2006 Search Engine Request Keyword Trends
Adult Internet Pornography Statistics
Pornography consumers access pornography both at work and at home. A total of 40 million U.S. adults regularly visit pornography websites. Ten percent of adults admit to an internet sexual addiction and 20 percent of men say they access pornography at work.
| Adult Internet Pornography Statistics | |
| Men admitting to accessing pornography at work | 20% |
| US adults who regularly visit Internet pornography websites | 40 million |
| Promise Keeper men who viewed pornography in last week | 53% |
| Christians who said pornography is a major problem in the home | 47% |
| Adults admitting to Internet sexual addiction | 10% |
| Breakdown of male/female visitors to pornography sites | 72% male – 28% female |
Women and Pornography
According to statistics, men are not the only ones to access pornography at work. A total of 13 percent of women admit to accessing pornography at work. One in three visitors to pornographic websites are women.
| Women and Pornography | |
| Women keeping their cyber activities secret | 70% |
| Women struggling with pornography addiction | 17% |
| Ratio of women to men favoring chat rooms | 2X |
| Percentage of visitors to adult websites who are women | 1 in 3 visitors |
| Women accessing adult websites each month | 9.4 million |
| Women admitting to accessing pornography at work | 13% |
| Women, far more than men, are likely to act out their behaviors in real life, such as having multiple partners, casual sex or affairs. | |
Do you think the ABORTION is the big problem? Where is the root? Between our left & right ears! What do we think about, what do we look at (Job 31:1), where is our desire, what is driving us (crazy)??? Do we need character building? Oh, how much we need it! Please, help me to turn the attention of people from the problem itself to the solution of it all! If Christ is not abiding in our hearts, then we are slaves of our own appetite and passions.
Phil 3:18 For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: 19 Whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.
Note: “belly” is the seat of appetite & passion – our digestive and reproductive system.
Let’s look at some more statistics – this time from Abort73:
ANNUAL ABORTION STATISTICS
- In 2008, approximately 1.21 million abortions took place in the U.S., down from an estimated 1.29 million in 2002, 1.31 million in 2000 and 1.36 million in 1996. From 1973 through 2005, more than 45 million legal abortions have occurred in the U.S. (AGI).
- The annual number of legal induced abortions in the United States doubled between 1973 and 1979, and peaked in 1990. There was a slow but steady decline through the 1990’s. The number of annual abortions decreased by 2% between 2000 and 2007, with a slight spike in 2006. (CDC)
- In 1998, the last year for which estimates were made, more than 23% of legal induced abortions were performed in California (CDC).
- In 2005, the abortion rate in the United States was higher than recent rates reported for Canada and Western European countries and lower than rates reported for China, Cuba, the majority of Eastern European countries, and certain Newly Independent States of the former Soviet Union (CDC).
- Nearly half of pregnancies among American women are unintended; about 4 in 10 of these are terminated by abortion. Twenty-two percent of all U.S. pregnancies end in abortion. (AGI).
ABORTION AND CONTRACEPTION
- Induced abortions usually result from unintended pregnancies, which often occur despite the use of contraception (CDC).
- 54% of women having abortions used a contraceptive method during the month they became pregnant. Among those women, 76% of pill users and 49% of condom users reported using the methods inconsistently, while 13% of pill users and 14% of condom users reported correct use (AGI).
- 8% of women having abortions have never used a method of birth control (AGI).
- 9 in 10 women at risk of unintended pregnancy are using a contraceptive method (AGI).
Look how the amount of people in this SLAVERY are growing! Don’t we need a special EXODUS? Don’t we need to hear a voice: “LET MY PEOPLE GO!”?
Exod 5:1 And afterward Moses and Aaron went in, and told Pharaoh, Thus saith the LORD – YHVH – God of Israel, Let My people go, that they may hold a Feast unto Me in the wilderness.
If 75 millions were watching porn sites in 2008, how many are doing it today? If each is representing one family of four we talk about 300 million families!!! That’s about 25% families on the whole planet Earth! We talk about world-wide epidemics – a widespread occurrence of an infectious disease!!!
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As we stand under the cross this morning, where are we today? Shall we follow today’s Protestant reformers, quit using the condoms and other anti-conception methods to be able to compete with the nations, which still “procreate”?
Let me tell you straight just as it is: some people abhor homosexuals. Yet many of the same people do “masturbate” on their own wives! How better is that? To ejaculate the sperms into condom is just another form of what Onan did in preventing the seed to reach its destiny: Gen 38:9 And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother’s wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother. 10 And the thing which he did displeased the LORD: wherefore He slew him also.
Shall we participate in this world-wide epidemic or shall we learn to crucify our carnal nature, which is lusting and turning GOD’s gift into seeking to separate pleasure from its GOD given purpose, pleasure without consequences! Stimulated by today’s media and the way how the women dress and behave around married or single men! (Deut 22:5) We all are responsible for our daily choices in this matter. And we can see the world-wide consequences already now. There were not few men getting heart-attack in the middle of using viagra – oh, what a shipwreck! If it would be rare cases, but porn affects about 25% families worldwide if not more.
When I was a student in Wildwood Lifestyle Center, our old Pastor Boykin was teaching us: “Remember: just like there is no birth without labor pain of some mother, there is no ‘second-birth’ (Jn 3:3) into the Kingdom of GOD without someone going through labor pain.” The nice part about it is that even a man can become a ‘spiritual mother.’ Paul applies it to himself:
My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you. Gal 4:19
Many mothers suffer to bring a child to this world, but then comes “almost irresistible” influence of media, school, friends, street education in the cities she is not able to counterbalance and with tears she is looking how her beloved child is heading toward perdition… World around us offer stories after stories of lives ending as shipwrecks:
A conscience once violated is greatly weakened. It needs the strength of constant watchfulness and unceasing prayer. You are standing in a slippery place. You need all the strength that the truth can give to fortify you and save you from making entire shipwreck. Life and death are before you; which will you choose? Had you seen the necessity of being firmly settled upon principle, not moving from impulse, and not being easily discouraged, but prepared to endure hardness, you would not have been overcome as you have been. You have moved from impulse. You have not, like our faultless Pattern, been willing to endure the contradiction of sinners against yourself. We are exhorted to remember Him who endured this, lest we become weary and faint in our minds. You have been weak as a child, having no power of endurance. You have not felt the necessity of being established, strengthened, settled, grounded, and built up in the faith. {2T 90.2}
We must gain the victory over self, crucify the affections and lusts; and then begins the union of the soul with Christ…. After this union is formed, it can be preserved only by continual, earnest, painstaking effort. . . . {FLB 135.4}
Every Christian must stand on guard continually, watching every avenue of the soul where Satan might find access. He must pray for divine help and at the same time resolutely resist every inclination to sin. By courage, by faith, by persevering toil, he can conquer. But let him remember that to gain the victory Christ must abide in him and he in Christ. . . . It is only by personal union with Christ, by communion with Him daily, hourly, that we can bear the fruits of the Holy Spirit. {FLB 135.5}
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Here are some strong thoughts for PARENTS, who dearly love their children:
“And pleasures of this life.” [Lk 8:14] There is danger in amusement that is sought merely for self-gratification. All habits of indulgence
– that weaken the physical powers,
– that becloud the mind, or
– that benumb the spiritual perceptions,
are “fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.” 1 Peter 2:11. {CSA 22.2}
“And the lusts of other things.” [Mk 4:19] These are not necessarily things sinful in themselves, but something that is made FIRST instead of the kingdom of God. Whatever attracts the mind from God, whatever draws the affections away from Christ, is an enemy to the soul. {CSA 22.3}
When the mind is youthful and vigorous and susceptible of rapid development, there is great temptation to be ambitious for self, to serve self. If worldly schemes are successful, there is an inclination to continue in a line that deadens conscience, and prevents a correct estimate as to what constitutes real excellence of character. When circumstances favor this development, growth will be seen in a direction prohibited by the Word of God. {CSA 22.4}
In this formative period of their children’s life, the responsibility of parents is very great. It should be their study to surround the youth with right influences, influences that will give them correct views of life and its true success. Instead of this, how many parents make it their first object to secure for their children worldly prosperity. All their associations are chosen with reference to this object. Many parents make their home in some large city, and introduce their children into fashionable society. They surround them with influences that encourage worldliness and pride. In this atmosphere the mind and soul are dwarfed. The high and noble aims of life are lost sight of [by beholding in wrong direction most of each day…]. The privilege of being sons of God, heirs of eternity, is bartered for worldly gain. {CSA 22.5}
Many parents seek to promote the happiness of their children by gratifying their love of amusement. They allow them to engage in sports, and to attend parties of pleasure, and provide them with money to use freely in display and self-gratification. The more the desire for pleasure is indulged, the stronger it becomes. The interest of these youth is more and more absorbed in amusement, until they come to look upon it as the great object of life. They form habits of idleness and self-indulgence that make it almost impossible for them ever to become steadfast Christians. {CSA 22.6}
Even the church, which should be the pillar and ground of the truth, is found encouraging the selfish love of pleasure. When money is to be raised for religious purposes, to what means do many churches resort? To bazaars, suppers, fancy fairs, even to lotteries, and like devices. Often the place set apart for God’s worship is desecrated by feasting and drinking, buying, selling, and merrymaking. Respect for the house of God and reverence for His worship are lessened in the minds of the youth. The barriers of self-restraint are weakened. Selfishness, appetite, the love of display, are appealed to, and they strengthen as they are indulged. {CSA 22.7}
The pursuit of pleasure and amusement centers in the cities. Many parents who choose a city home for their children, thinking to give them greater advantages, meet with disappointment, and too late repent their terrible mistake. The cities of today are fast becoming like Sodom and Gomorrah. The many holidays encourage idleness. The exciting sports—theater-going, horse racing, gambling, liquor-drinking, and reveling—stimulate every passion to intense activity. The youth are swept away by the popular current. Those who learn to love amusement for its own sake open the door to a flood of temptations. They give themselves up to social gaiety and thoughtless mirth, and their intercourse with pleasure lovers has an intoxicating effect upon the mind. They are led on from one form of dissipation to another, until they lose both the desire and the capacity for a life of usefulness. Their religious aspirations are chilled; their spiritual life is darkened. All the nobler faculties of the soul, all that link man with the spiritual world, are debased. {CSA 23.1}
It is true that some may see their folly and repent. God may pardon them. But they have wounded their own souls, and brought upon themselves a lifelong peril. The power of discernment, which ought ever to be kept keen and sensitive to distinguish between right and wrong, is in a great measure destroyed. They are not quick to recognize the guiding voice of the Holy Spirit, or to discern the devices of Satan. Too often in time of danger they fall under temptation, and are led away from God. The end of their pleasure-loving life is ruin for this world and for the world to come. {CSA 23.2}
Oh, how sad and oh, how many of our children are on this “broadway” leading to perdition!!!
Fathers & Mothers, come under the cross of Jesus today
and WAKE UP!
