God Calls for Workers

Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you. Exodus 31:13.
The Lord speaks to those who turn away their feet from [trampling on] the Sabbath. This is the Sabbath spoken of in the thirty-first chapter of Exodus, which God declares is a sign between Him and His people. By keeping this day holy, we show to the world that we recognize God as the One who created the world in six days, and rested on the seventh. Earnestly and untiringly we are to bear the message given us, lest time shall pass and people be left unwarned.
My heart aches almost to breaking as I see so much left undone that ought to be done. God’s ambassadors are to maintain a living connection with Him. They are to enlarge their borders and extend their labors. Their lives are to be made pure, holy, ready for the great day soon to come upon the world. When they are imbued with the Spirit of the Master, they will see all around them souls … perishing in sin, and they will make every effort to save those nigh—even in their own households—and those afar off. Earnest, consecrated effort for those who are out of the fold leaves no time for criticism or questioning.
There must be no compromise with selfishness, for selfishness leads to idolatry. Minds that are in the darkness of ignorance in regard to the truth of the Word of God must be enlightened. A breach has been made in the law of God by the transgression of the fourth commandment. The Sabbath command is to be given its rightful position in the law of God, and by those who see and realize its importance, it is to be presented to the world. Those who work unitedly, who act faithfully their part in raising the foundation of many generations with patient, persevering effort, will be called, Repairers of the breach, Restorers of paths to dwell in.
There is no excuse for those who have the light of present truth, and yet fail to impart this light to others. God calls for workers. We have a great work to do in cooperating with Him as His helping hand and helping voice. Satan is casting his hellish shadow across the pathway of every soul, seeking to eclipse the testing truth for these last days. We are to sound the message of warning to a guilty race. We are to present to men the binding claims of God’s law, so that when Christ comes they will not be found in disloyalty, on the side of the Apostate. We must now prepare the way of the Lord. We must make plain in the desert a highway for our God.—Manuscript 22, March 3, 1901, “Diary.”
The Upward Look p. 76
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Prayer Requests
—-I need prayer for my son. Josephine
—-My 15 year old son has runaway. Thank you for your prayers. Shelley
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Dear Friends,
A week or two ago, Eileen found a huge, black and yellow caterpillar in her garden. She didn’t know what it was so we looked online until we saw one that looked like it. It reminded me of the time when I was seven, my mother found a huge, green worm crawling on a plant in the garden. She brought it inside and showed me. She told me to let it crawl on my hands while she got a glass jar, poked holes in the top, and put a few leaves inside. She chose leaves from the plant on which it had been crawling, so it would have the right food to eat. Then we placed the caterpillar inside the jar.
We gave it fresh leaves every day and within a week or two, that big, green creature had made a cocoon. Every day I would watch to see if it was coming out of its self-made prison. One day, just as I was coming home from school, that cocoon began to move. By the time I had gotten home, it was beginning to split. I was so excited!
For the next hour or so, I watched the wonderful event that was taking place. No longer was the creature before me a huge green worm. When it first wriggled out of its cramped quarters, its wings were crinkled up and useless, but as it stood there, a change began to take place. It moved its wings back and forth pumping fluid into them. Before long, those crinkled up wings were about 5 inches across, fuzzy brown, and had beautiful big blue eye spots. My mother, who had collected butterflies and moths for a science project in school explained that it was a polyphemus moth. She did not add it to her collection but let it go for my sake.
Just as the fat, green worm was changed into a beautiful moth, so can we. If we allow Him to, the Holy Spirit changes us from an ugly “worm” to a beautiful new creature. The Apostle Paul was a good example of how we can be changed. Paul was very zealous in his relentless persecution of Christ’s followers. He was filled with a great hatred for those who worshipped Jesus. He was sincere in his hatred thinking to do God honor, but he was sincerely wrong.
Still, our Loving Saviour did not give up on Paul. He used the memory of Stephen’s sermon and death (Acts 6:8-8:4) to reach this man who working so hard to destroy Christians. He was fighting against that memory by being even more vigilant in his seeking out those whose beliefs differed from his. But in His mercy, our Great Redeemer stepped in to put a stop to it. On the Damascus road, our Dear Saviour met that persecutor face to face. He said to this shocked and dazed man, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.” 9:4,5
How surprised Paul was to see the Living Christ! As he listened to Jesus give him his commission, he must have thought of all of the needless deaths he had caused. Then the vision ended and Paul found that he was without sight. He must have wondered how he could ever proclaim the Good News while unable to see. For three days, Paul fasted and prayed. He went over and over in his mind the Scriptures relating to the Messiah. The Holy Spirit brought to his mind the passages that were needed and enlightened his understanding.
Then, he was ready to receive his sight again. God did this in a special way to get him in contact with fellow believers. “And there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias; and to him said the Lord in a vision, Ananias. And he said, Behold, I am here, Lord. And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the street which is called Straight, and inquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth, And hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hand on him, that he might receive his sight. Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem: And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that call on thy name. But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way: for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel: For I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name’s sake.” vs 10-16
So it was. Paul spent the rest of his life proclaiming the very message that he had tried to silence. Paul had become a changed man. He tells us, “this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” Phil 3:13,14
May we also put our former life behind us and follow Him with our whole heart. May we receive the new heart that our Great Creator promises us. “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.” Eze 36:26 May we allow the Holy Spirit to change us into a new creature as “we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” 2 Cor 3:18; 5:17
Rose