food

Lord’s Prayer Series – The Lord’s Provision

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Lust as body function suffers without adequate food, water, and rest, when the spiritual needs are not satisfied the spiritual condition also suffers and becomes weak.

God desires that His children will trust in Him as children trust in their earthly parents to supply all of their needs. After recognizing God as our creator, honoring His name in every activity of life, and requesting that His will be done in our lives, then, as citizens of His kingdom we have a perfect right and every confidence to begin that series of petitions which involves our needs. Our first requirement is for our daily bread, not what we need for next week or next month, or even for tomorrow, but that we will have what we need for today to sustain our physical and spiritual lives.

The Bible gives a very powerful illustration of God’s attempting to teach His people to simply trust Him to provide for their needs when the children of Israel went through the desert on their journey to the Promised Land. The Bible says there were 600,000 men besides women and children (Numbers 26:51). Thus there is no doubt that it was a very large company of possibly several million who passed through the barren and desolate wasteland where there was no vegetation or source of water. It would be natural to be concerned about how the food and water were to be provided.

God had a plan and rained down manna from heaven daily, but the Israelites complained about it. The Lord told Moses that He had heard the complaints and they would have more to eat than they knew what to do with. The next day, the Bible says, “So it was that quails came up at evening and covered the camp, and in the morning the dew lay all around the camp. And when the layer of dew lifted, there, on the surface of the wilderness, was a small round substance, as fine as frost on the ground. So when the children of Israel saw it, they said to one another, ‘What is it?’ For they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, ‘This is the bread which the Lord has given you to eat. This is the thing which the Lord has commanded: “Let every man gather it according to each one’s need, one omer for each person, according to the number of persons; let every man take for those who are in his tent.” ’ And the children of Israel did so and gathered, some more, some less. So when they measured it by omers, he who gathered much had nothing left over, and he who gathered little had no lack. Every man had gathered according to each one’s need. And Moses said, ‘Let no one leave any of it till morning.’ Notwithstanding they did not heed Moses. But some of them left part of it until morning, and it bred worms and stank. And Moses was angry with them. So they gathered it every morning, every man according to his need. And when the sun became hot, it melted.” Exodus 16:13–21.

God provided manna for them every day. They gathered only what they needed for that day and any excess would spoil. Their needs were supplied. “And so it was, on the sixth day (Friday), that they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for each one. And all rulers of the congregation came and told Moses. Then he said to them, ‘This is what the Lord has said: “Tomorrow is a Sabbath rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord. Bake what you will bake today, and boil what you will boil; and lay up for yourselves all that remains to be kept until morning.” ’ So they laid it up till morning, as Moses commanded; and it did not stink, nor were there any worms in it. Then Moses said, ‘Eat that today, for today is a Sabbath to the Lord; today you will not find it in the field. Six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will be none.’ Now it happened that some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather, but they found none. And the Lord said to Moses, ‘How long do you refuse to keep My commandments and My laws? See! For the Lord has given you the Sabbath; therefore He gives you on the sixth day bread for two days. Let every man remain in his place; let no man go out of his place on the seventh day.’ So the people rested on the seventh day.” Exodus 16:22–30.

Notice that this incident was before the giving of the Ten Commandments. There are some people who, because of lack of careful study, do not seem to understand that when the Ten Commandments were given on Sinai, it was not the first time that the law was given. On Sinai it was simply a review of the principles of God’s law that were ever in existence. You can find all the principles of the Ten Commandments in the book of Genesis. While in slavery, the children of Israel had forgotten much of what their fathers had instructed them. So on the mount the Lord reviewed with them all the principles of His law.

The Ten Commandments existed before they were given on Mount Sinai. In fact, the Sabbath existed at the foundation of the world. You can read about the institution of the Sabbath in Genesis 2:1–3. Some of the Israelites did not have enough faith in God’s provision for them and went out to gather it on the Sabbath. To their surprise they found none. Every week they gathered the manna. Every day, five days of the week they gathered enough for that day. On the sixth day they gathered twice as much to provide for the Sabbath. The portion held over did not spoil. Every week the cycle began again. How long did that go on? “And the house of Israel called its name Manna. And it was like white coriander seed, and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey. … And the children of Israel ate manna forty years, until they came to an inhabited land; they ate manna until they came to the border of the land of Canaan.” Verses 31, 35.

Each day for forty years God provided bread for them to teach them just to simply depend on Him and trust in Him. Hundreds of years later, Jesus spoke about how God provided for the birds of the air and the beasts of the field. They do not worry about where they are going to get food to eat. Thus man should not worry either.

Jesus said, “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” Matthew 6:25–34.

Jesus does not want us to spend our lives in anxiety and worry over temporal things but to trust in God to provide for what we need. Those who are not His children and do not have faith in God and His word are dependent on themselves or maybe their parents, or the government, or somebody else. But if you are God’s child, your dependence is on Him to provide the things that you need.

Although my parents called themselves New Testament Christians, my father often said that they worked eight days a week. What that means is that they worked morning, noon, and night, never having time to stop. But after they became new covenant Christians, they only worked six days because they knew God has promised that He would provide for them. However, when God makes that promise, He does not mean that you have nothing to do, but you do not need to spend your life worrying and fretting about how you are going to make ends meet.

The Lord provides for the birds of the air and the beasts of the field but He does not put the food in their mouths. Their part is to go and gather it. In the same way, when we pray for our daily bread, we must understand that we have a role to play in obtaining it.

After man sinned, God told Adam how he would have to work to get his bread. He said, “Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. … In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread.” Genesis 3:17­, 19.

Even though we have to work for the bread that we receive, there are some people who do not want to. The Bible has a lot to say about this attitude. In fact, the Bible has many counsels and cautions and actually curses against those who are sluggards, or lazy, or do not work. The Bible teaches that every person should be a worker. Notice what the wise man said in Proverbs 6:6–11: “Go to the ant, you sluggard! Consider her ways and be wise, which, having no captain, overseer or ruler, provides her supplies in the summer and gathers her food in the harvest. How long will you slumber, O sluggard? When will you rise from your sleep? A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep—so shall your poverty come on you like a robber [prowler], and your need like an armed man.”

God expects for us to have at least as much wisdom as the creatures that set aside stores during the summer and during the time of harvest for the winter months.

How does God provide for our daily bread? Well, He provides more than enough in the harvest season so that those who gather the food will have food for a time when no food will grow. This is a principle that is taught throughout the Bible. In the very first book of the Bible, you can read the story of a very famous man who was called Joseph. Concerning him, the Bible says that he interpreted Pharaoh’s dream to mean that there were going to be seven years of plenty and after that there would be seven years of famine.

“Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the land of Egypt. Now in the seven plentiful years the ground brought forth abundantly. So he gathered up all the food of the seven years which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities; he laid up in every city the food of the field which surrounded them. Joseph gathered very much grain, as the sand of the sea, until he stopped counting, for it was without number. … Then the seven years of plenty which were in the land of Egypt ended, and the seven years of famine began to come, as Joseph had said. The famine was in all lands, but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. So when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread. Then Pharaoh said to all the Egyptians, ‘Go to Joseph; whatever he says to you, do.’ The famine was over all the face of the earth, and Joseph opened all the storehouses and sold to the Egyptians. And the famine became severe in the land of Egypt. So all countries came to Joseph in Egypt to buy grain, because the famine was severe in all lands.” Genesis 41:49, 53–57.

Notice the principle that was taught in this story. When God provides abundance, you store up for the winter months or for the time when there will not be any. Praying for our daily bread is not inconsistent with storing up food in the time of harvest for a time of scarcity. When we pray that we might be given our daily bread, we are not just asking that we might be given physical bread. When the devil tempted Jesus in the wilderness to turn stones into bread, “He answered and said, ‘It is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” ’ ” Matthew 4:4. God supplies all of our needs from His riches in glory (Philippians 4:19).

Our heavenly Father is immensely rich and abundantly able to care for all of His children. The message of the Bible is to trust in the Lord and do good and you will dwell in the land, and be fed (Psalm 37:3). To the person who walks in the ways of righteousness, the Lord says that “His bread shall be given to him and his water shall be sure.” Isaiah 33:16.

Not only that, but God has assured His people that they will not be ashamed in the evil time and in the days of famine they will be satisfied (Psalm 37:19). David, talking about this very same subject, makes the statement: “I have been young, and now am old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his descendants begging bread.” Psalm 37:25.

In this petition, “Give us this day our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11), we ask the Lord to give us that which we sometimes think we can get on our own, but the fact of the matter is that we would not be able to get it if the Lord did not first provide it. In Psalm 145:15, 16, it says, “The eyes of all look expectantly to You, and You give them their food in due season. You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.” After the worldwide flood of Noah’s time, God promised that, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease.” Genesis 8:22.

Although there are over seven billion people in the world today, God is able to feed all. If all were following in the ways of the Lord, all would be fed and we would not see people starving to death, as we see in the world today. We cannot make food because food must be given life before it can impart life to the one eating it. Since God is the Life-giver, the only Source of life, food is a gift from God. When we ask for our daily bread we are not asking for something that belongs to somebody else but for our portion of that which has been abundantly supplied for every living creature.

We ask for food that will impart, not drunkenness, but strength, as noted in Ecclesiastes 10:17. One of the problems we have in our modern world is that there are people spending their money for that which is really not good for them. The Bible addresses this very problem in Isaiah 55:1, 2. “Ho! Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat. Yes, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend money for what is not bread, and your wages for what does not satisfy? Listen diligently to Me, and eat what is good. And let your soul delight itself in abundance.”

The Bible says, “Eat what is good.” When we ask for our daily bread, we’re not asking that we might have something that will injure ourselves. We are not asking for food that will be injurious to our bodies, but we ask for that which will produce health and strength that we may do God’s service. Many Bible students, in studying the Lord’s Prayer, have concluded that the main subject of this petition, “Give us today our daily bread …” is a petition for both physical food and spiritual food. Actually, spiritual food is even more important than the physical food.

The day after Jesus fed the five thousand, they were still excited about that miracle. And Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.” John 6:26, 27.

The daily physical food that we need strengthens us that we may work and that we may have health day by day, but the food that we eat day by day will not provide eternal life. This is a different kind of food. To receive that food Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.” John 6:35. And He went on to tell them, “Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness, and are dead.” Verse 49. Even though God provided the physical food day by day that they needed, they still all died. But if you eat the spiritual bread that comes down from heaven you will never die because He will raise you up at the last day.

The people had a problem understanding what Jesus meant by this saying so He explained it in John 6:63. He said, “It is the Spirit Who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.”

Are you eating God’s word? Are you studying His word every day? As you study this Word and receive the thoughts of God into your mind, by beholding Him you will be changed and receive His character into your mind. Jesus promised that if you do this you will receive life. His word is indeed the bread of everlasting life.

(Unless appearing in quoted references or otherwise identified, Bible texts are from the New King James Version.)

Pastor John J. Grosboll is Director of Steps to Life and pastors the Prairie Meadows Church of Free Seventh-day Adventists in Wichita, Kansas. He may be contacted by email at: historic@stepstolife.org, or by telephone at: 316-788-5559.

Dare to be a Daniel

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In 2 Peter 2:11, Peter gives us the warning: “Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.” Friend, I believe that as we are obedient to God, abstaining from the fleshly lusts and yielding to the Holy Spirit, we increase in knowledge and grow in grace. Peter elaborates this growth in grace and presents to us in 2 Peter 1:3-7: “According as His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue: whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperence; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.” You see the high calling we are to press on towards.

Ellen White refers to these character traits and these scriptures as the ladder of sanctification. “‘And to knowledge, temperance.’ This is the third step in the path toward perfection of character. On every side there is indulgence and dissipation, and the result is degeneration and corruption. The inhabitants of our earth are depreciating in mental, moral, and physical power, because of the intemperate habits of society. Appetite, passion, and love of display are carrying the multitudes into the greatest excesses and extravagance….The people of God must take an opposite course from the world. They must take up the warfare against these sinful practices, deny appetite, and keep the lower nature in subjection….It is for us to ‘search the Scriptures,’ and bring our habits into harmony with the instruction of the Bible….‘And to temperance, patience.’ The need of becoming temperate is made manifest as we try to take this step. It is next to an impossibility for an intemperate person to be patient.” My Life Today, 97. This ladder of sanctification is referring to the true Christian experience. As we crucify self, we no longer live after the passions and indulgences to which our carnal heart pulls us to. Instead, we practice self-denial and abstinence from fleshly lusts that war against the soul, because as it says in Galatians 2:20, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” If we are to experience this in our humanity, we must also adhere and listen to the admonition of Paul in 1 Corinthians 3:16: Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?”

I love what Ellen White says in My Life Today on page 134. “The sacred temple of the body must be kept pure and uncontaminated, that God’s Holy Spirit may dwell therein.” A little further along, she says: “The Christian life is constantly an onward march. Jesus sits as a refiner and purifier of His people; and when His image is perfectly reflected in them they are perfect and holy, and prepared for translation. Every living Christian will advance daily in the divine life. As he advances toward perfection, he experiences a conversion to God every day; and this conversion is not completed until he attains to perfection of Christian character, a full preparation for the finishing touch of immortality.” Ibid. 249

Today God is waiting for His church to represent Him fully. “That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.” Ephesians 5:26,27. Not spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but living sacrifices, living stones, spiritual houses. “If we close our eyes to the light for fear we shall see our wrongs, which we are unwilling to forsake, our sins are not lessened, but increased. If light is turned from in one case, it will be disregarded in another. It is just as much sin to violate the laws of our being as to break one of the ten commandments, for we cannot do either without breaking God’s law.” Counsels on Diet and Foods, 44,45.

One of the greatest illustrations of true sanctification is the story of Daniel. In Daniel, I see an example of one who was a spiritual house. As I studied and prayed to God for greater light, I saw that Daniel, when he refused the meat and drink of the king’s personal table, refused all of it. I believe that even included the dainties. Proverbs tells us to beware of the king’s dainties for they are deceitful meat (Proverbs 23:3). God led me to the Adventist message through the health message. As I went to the potlucks at a typical Seventh-day Adventist church, I said, “It looks like these people have substituted meat for junk.” Though it may not be at the risk of our lives, as it was with Daniel when he refused everything at the king’s table, when we choose our diet according to principle, we run the risk of being labeled: narrowed, bigoted, even borderline fanatic.

“What if Daniel and his companions had made a compromise with those heathen officers, and had yielded to the pressure of the occasion by eating and drinking as was customary with the Babylonians? That single instance of departure from principle would have weakened their sense of right and their abhorrence of wrong. Indulgence of appetite would have involve the sacrifice of physical vigor, clearness of intellect, and spiritual power. One wrong step would probably have led to others, until, their connection with heaven being severed, they would have been swept away by temptation.
“The life of Daniel is an inspired illustration of what constitutes a sanctified character. Bible sanctification has to do with the whole man….It is impossible for any to enjoy the blessings of sanctification while they are selfish and gluttonous.” Counsels on Health, 66

“Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things.” Luke 21:34-36.

You see, the devil throws all these things right in front of us as snares. He knows what food products will do today. Why do you think he has the Big Macs twenty-four inches high on your TV screen with the cheese running out and the big Coca-Cola and is now using advertisements for movies?
Jesus said, “But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be….they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage.’ Matthew 24:37,38. As I studied the Spirit of Prophecy, I saw that we were give the greatest light in health and temperance. You see, it was not just cigarettes and alcohol that Ellen White wrote about. She states; “True temperance teaches us to abstain entirely from that which is injurious, and to use judiciously only healthful and nutritious articles of food.” The Health Reformer, April 1, 1877.

As I continued to study, I became a vegetarian. I realized that eating meat was not a test of fellowship, but I read where Ellen White tells us, “Greater reforms should be seen among the people who claim to be looking for the soon appearing of Christ. Health reform is to do among our people a work which it has not yet done. There are those who ought to be awake to the danger of meat eating, who are still eating the flesh of animals, thus endangering the physical, mental, and spiritual health. Many who are now only half converted on the question of meat eating will go from God’s people, to walk no more with them.” Review and Herald, May 27, 1902. I also read: “The diet reform should be progressive. As disease in animals increases, the use of milk and eggs will become more and more unsafe. An effort should be made to supply their place with other things that are healthful and inexpensive. The people everywhere should be taught how to cook without milk and eggs, so far as possible, and yet have their food wholesome and palatable.” Counsels on Diet and Foods, 365.

As I began to study, I saw articles coming out estimating that there are ten million pure vegetarians within the United Stated today. I found articles like: “A High Fat Diet Related to Lung Cancer.” I saw a report of the Surgeon General’s findings in the Herald, July 28, 1988. The headlines read, “Fatty Foods are Killing Us.” The Stockton Record, reporting on the Surgeon General’s report, stated that the United States is eating its way to the grave by eating too many animal products, dairy products and high triglyceride, high cholesterol foods today. I found one article that told of steel fingered eviscerating machines in poultry slaughterhouses. These machines rip out the entrails of the chicken at a rate of ninety birds a minute. When they do this, the fecal waste material of the bird gets on this machine and spreads the bacteria contamination to every bird that comes down the pike. “If the American public knew what garbage they were eating, they would revolt,” said USDA inspector, Hobert Bartley, in an article in the San Francisco Examiner, Sunday, June 29, 1986.

The February, 1992 issue of Consumer Reports tells us that of 113 samples of fish taken across this country, 44 of them were contaminated with human fecal bacteria. How are the fish getting human fecal bacteria? Then the articles start coming out in the newspapers and the one that made me laugh was “Pollution cited for 1,429 beach closings in 1990.” Stockton Record, August 15, 1991. Do not swim in it, but throw the pole in there, catch whatever lives in it and eat it; that is okay. Does that make sense? “San Diego Sewage Spill Fouls the Ocean.” Stockton Record, February 6, 1992. Millions of gallons of partially treated sewage poured out! Then you have the third rate countries like Peru and others who do not have the water treatment plants as the United States and they are letting all this human fecal bacteria out into the water and it is migrating our way. That is why a newspaper reported that cholera cases surge Mexico. You get cholera from human fecal bacteria. The paper says officials try to suppress the report of the disease’s outbreak. Friend, have you walked down a beach lately and seen the birds and fish lying dead on the beaches. I believe it is from poisoning.

Jeremy Rifkin, on page 144 of his book Beyond Beef, Penguin Books USA, Inc. Cites that the FDA acknowledges that they do not know today whether or not BIV (Bovine Immunodeficiency Virus), once it hits human blood, becomes HIV positive, and the FDA is not telling anybody anything.
I was shocked at what I read in an article that recently came out in the Tennessee Tallahassee Democrat, May 28, 1993. The department of agriculture recently conducted surprise visits to ninety slaughterhouses in the United States. Thirty of the facilities were shut down immediately. The article says there are 1,200 in the country. Can you believe or can you imagine what is the condition of the others that have not yet been checked?

Ellen White said the day would come when we would have to discard milk and other things. It is surprising and amazing to me that as I continued to study, I found these headlines: “Study Links Cow’s Milk in Infancy to Diabetes.” Stockton Record, July 30, 1992 from Medical Tribune News Service. The article states: “Protein in cows milk ingested during infancy may be the trigger that sets off insulin dependent diabetes in susceptible children.” This was a study that was recently done and verified. What was amazing to me was that, at the same time, the United States responds with “Doctors Cry Over Milk Drinking.” Stockton Record, September 30, 1992. Here is a doctor saying that the common dinner time refrain, ‘Drink your milk’ may be replaced by ‘Eat your tofu’ if a group of doctors, nutritionists and the venerable Dr. Spock have their way. Once regarded as a perfect food, cow’s milk is coming under increasing fire as a part of the daily diet of babies….We need to leave cow’s milk where it belongs, in cows.” This is the world crying out now.

“It hasn’t been a good year for milk. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommended that parents not give their children whole milk during the first year of life because it causes hidden blood loss and possibly anemia….Milk is often contaminated with traces of antibiotics; is a common cause of allergy and digestive problems.” Stockton Record, September 30, 1992. A statistic that interested me was one that suggested that twenty percent of the dairy cows in this country have leukemia. When the truck goes to the dairy farm, all the dairies are pooled into one truck. It is all mixed together. Is it any wonder that Agatha Thrash recently said in a public interview that seven out of nine cartons of milk that come off the grocery store shelves are contaminated with active cancer viruses.

People come to me and say, “You know, Danny, Ellen White said the day would come when God would reveal this.” Friend, all you have to do is open your eyes. It is being revealed all around you through the world today. People come to me and say, “Well, the diet reform needs to be progressive, Brother.” And I say, “How long have you been an Adventist? How old are you? What do you need, another sixty-five years before you are going to throw this stuff away?” Maybe I look too narrow and bigoted when I sit and eat with people because I will no take part of some food that has dairy in it, but I am convicted myself. For myself, I cannot defile my body with cancer viruses. I believe that as we look at the test Daniel’s three friends faced in refusing to bow to the image, we are looking at our future. I do not believe that there is any question that had they failed the test of food, they would never have been prepared to stand the test that followed. “If ever there was a time when the diet should be of the most simple kind, it is now! [1905]” Counsels on Diet and Foods, 389 (Emphasis supplied). We are also told that all those who are preparing for translation to heaven will eat a most simple diet; fruits and grains prepared free from grease will be placed on the tables of all those who are preparing for translation. See ibid., 64.

“Seventh-day Adventists are handling momentous truths. More than forty years ago the Lord gave us special light on health reform, but how are we walking in that light? How many have refused to live in harmony with the counsels of God! As a people, we should make advancement proportionate to the light received.” Counsels on Diet and Foods, 24. Ellen White continues that, “As a people, we should make advancement proportionate to the light received. It is our duty to understand and respect the principles of health reform. On the subject of temperance we should be in advance of all other people; and yet there are among us well-instructed members of the church, and even ministers of the gospel, who have little respect for the light that God has given upon this subject. They eat as they please, and work as they please. Let those who are teachers and leaders in our cause take their stand firmly on Bible ground in regard to health reform and give a straight testimony to those who believe we are living in the last days of this earth’s history. A line of distinction must be drawn between those who serve God, and those who serve themselves.” Ibid.

Peter admonished us to abstain from fleshly lusts that war against the soul. How is it with you, my friend? Are you willing to take your stand on the side of truth, living up to all the light God has given us for this time in which we live?

The End