The Church: Its Organization, Order and Discipline

God Requires Rules and Regulations

“Never allow any one’s ideas to unsettle your faith in regard to the order and harmony which should exist in the church. Many of you do not see all things clearly.... The God of heaven is a God of order, and he requires all his followers to have rules and regulations, to preserve order.”-“Testimonies for the Church,” No. 32, page 30. COOD 118.3

“There is order in heaven; and there should be system and order upon the earth, that the work may move forward without confusion, and fanaticism. Our brethren have been working to this end; but while some of our ministers continually bear the burden of souls, and ever seek to bring the people in spiritual attainments, those who are not so conscientious and who have not carried the cross of Christ nor felt the value of souls as reflected from Calvary, will in teaching and educating others in the mechanical working, become formal and powerless themselves, and bring no Saviour to the people.”-Testimonies for the Church 4:601, 602. COOD 118.4

While these Testimonies teach the necessity of order and organization in the advancement of the cause, they as distinctly show that these forms, separated from a body of living members of Christ, avail nothing. COOD 119.1