Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 9 (1894)

Lt 75, 1894

Rousseau, Sister

George’s Terrace, St. Kilda Road, Melbourne, Australia

March 1894

Previously unpublished.

Dear Sister Rousseau:

You are not a happy woman, and never will be until you shall see things in an altogether different light. I have great pain of heart for you. Satan has worked upon the imagination of both yourself and Sister Daniells, until you both have been unable to view matters in a clear light. Do you think that God has placed you on the judgment seat to detect the motes in the eyes of His workers and pass censure upon them? Did you suppose He had given you such discernment and nice discrimination that you were to decide what was just, pure, selfish, or unselfish in the character of your brethren and sisters? The course of both of you has been an offense of God. You have worked on Satan’s side of the question in this matter, and have communicated your thoughts and feelings to others. God will tolerate no such spirit as you have indulged. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 1

The watching for evil, the sharpness of eyesight to detect a mote in another’s eye, is evidence that you have a beam in your own eye. Everything may not be done in just the way you suppose that you would have done it, but if you were, in mind and heart and character, submitted to the control of the Spirit of God, you would see that the Lord’s way and His thoughts are as much above your way and your thoughts as the heavens are higher than the earth. As far as your influence upon each other is concerned, it would have been far better for you both had you never become associated together in the school building. Neither of you has been the blessing to the school that you might have been, for God cannot bless any evil work. You might have exerted your influence with a purpose to help rather than to hinder. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 2

When Sister Starr was placed in the position of matron, no one supposed that she was infallible and would never make a mistake. But here were three sisters in the faith, wives of ministers, missionaries from America, living in the same building, who should have been helps to one another; they should have strengthened one another with encouraging words, that all might be a blessing to the school by precept and practice. But how has it been? Decidedly the opposite from that which God designed. Through two women, professed disciples of Christ, a little leaven of evil has been leavening the lump. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 3

Now God calls upon you both to get the beam out of your own eye before it shall be forever too late. Until you do this, you cannot see clearly to pull out the mote out of the eye of your brother or sister. Oh how much you both need to learn lessons daily and hourly in the school of Christ. You both need a better knowledge of yourselves. You need to talk far less and to learn that the important part of true education is self-discipline. The feelings, the thoughts, the passions are to be under the control of the Spirit of God. You talk so much you do not know what you do say, and Satan laughs in triumph. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 4

The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity; it needs to be guarded and restrained. But you have drawn away the shoulder from advice, reproof and counsel. God is dishonored. You have drawn away from Christ to Satan’s side. New principles of action must be supplied—principles that are true, pure, refined, Christlike. Motives such as inspired our Saviour must be implanted in your hearts. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 5

There should be no boasting of fine sensibilities; this savors of sentimentalism, while good common-sense is not appreciated. Those who have a proper education will appreciate knowledge as a means of discipline and guidance in all their conduct, in mental exercises as well as physical. It is of little advantage to learn more and more of either science or the Bible, unless the learner appropriates his knowledge for his own improvement and for the good of others. To be good and to do good, which is the real end of education, is an object that but few appreciate. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 6

Your tongues must be sanctified, for they are God’s property; but the work must begin at the heart, the seat of affection. You have given yourselves to a work of suspicion, of distrust, of talkativeness, hinting to some, while you speak more plainly to others. Jesus is grieved. I have been conducted into your presence, I have listened to remarks made, to secrets poured into each other’s ears. There has been a confederacy of evil, and suspicions have become so common that scarcely a word can be spoken in perfect innocence but it is misconstrued by Sister Rousseau as something evil against her. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 7

Be it understood, the Lord has read the secrets of your hearts far more accurately than you have read the secrets of the heart of your sister. As you have leagued with each other, envious, jealous feelings have burned in your hearts against Sister Starr, and have extended to me because I was in counsel with Elder Starr and his wife. Truth has been distorted into falsehood, good works into evil, innocence into crime. But you have taken it for granted that you are truthfulness itself. 9LtMs, Lt 75, 1894, par. 8