Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 20 (1905)

Lt 319, 1905

Kellogg, J. H.

Takoma Park, Maryland

June 2, 1905

This letter is published in entirety in BCL 118-121. +^Note

Dr. J. H. Kellogg

Dear Brother,—

A scene has been presented before me of actions performed by you, similar to the actions of Satan in the heavenly courts. From time to time I have given warnings to different ones who were being blinded by your sophistries and misrepresentations. Your power of misrepresentation is so continuously exerted that many have been deceived. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 1

In some things you act like a man bereft of his reason. It is a marvel to me how one who has had the light in so many ways, who has received so many warnings and reproofs, can yet go on blindfolding himself and others. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 2

You wrote me that you had surrendered. But wherein have you surrendered? When I received this word from you, I forbore to open before you some things that I shall now have to tell you. I hoped that you would seek to reform. Many times you have been entreated to change your course. You certainly need to do so; for you have been the greatest hindrance to the work that God would have advance in straight lines. Other men have acted a part in some respects similar to the part that you have been acting, but they have not been so regardless of justice, honesty, and truth. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 3

You have not been given occasion to do the things that you have done. For years I have striven to give you every word of encouragement that I dared give you, hoping that you might take hold of the encouragement and make thorough work for eternity. At the General Conference held in Battle Creek in 1901, I treated you as a man who would make every effort to set things right. When your long, drawn-out documents were presented to me to commend and approve, I was shown clearly by the heavenly agencies the sure results of receiving such documents. I was shown the oppression that would be exercised by you and by others linked up with you, who were spiritually blind. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 4

You have made persistent efforts to try to center everything in Battle Creek, after clear light had been given that this should not be done. For years messages have been coming to you, distinctly pointing out the fact that plants should be made in many places, and that so much should not be gathered into Battle Creek. I was surprised that you took so little heed to messages regarding this that the Lord has repeatedly sent you. You were professedly believing the testimonies, and yet walking and working contrary to them, following your own impulses, turning from the plain, Thus saith the Lord, to carry out your own plans and devisings. You have had little use for those whom you thought would obstruct your way. You would not harmonize with them and refuse to recognize in them any virtue or righteousness. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 5

In the long history presented before me, I can see the dangerous path that you have been traveling. You have boasted of your study of science. But from the light that God has given me, I know that you might better, far better, have become a fool in the eyes of the world than to accept such science as you cherish and use it as you have done to blind the mind and the judgment of those who were connected with you. Your scientific knowledge has been used by you to help you in acting a part similar to the part that Satan acted in the heavenly courts. Step by step you have been wandering away from God, working out plans instigated by the archdeceiver. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 6

The results of your devising regarding the bonds has been presented to me. I was shown at the time that the plan was so made that many who would be led to take these bonds would be disappointed and would feel that they had made a mistake. The position that you took at Oakland led you to do that which a Christian would be afraid to do. You have leaned on the arm of lawyers for so long, to make your own ways and works a strength, that the Lord regards you as a man liable to make any presumptuous movement that might come to his mind. You have made movements that have been directly opposed to the holy law of God. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 7

The words have been spoken of you, “Is it because there is not a God in Israel that ye go to the god of Ekron to inquire?” [2 Kings 1:3.] You have turned from and despised the law of God, given in awful grandeur from Sinai, until you now follow the way of transgression of these laws, whenever your will and way is opposed, without realizing the seriousness of your course. Truly truth and righteousness have fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. You have become linked up with the tempter, and your mind has been led by the one who tried in the wilderness of temptation to gain control of the mind of Christ. The Saviour would not enter into controversy with the tempter, but quoted His Father’s words, “It is written.” Not one word did He speak of which Satan could take the least advantage. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 8

Men have linked up with you to do a work, the consequences of which they did not understand. You have been the spokesman repeating the words of accusation and condemnation of the archdeceiver. Your science has been used to benumb the sensibilities and confuse the judgment of others. In long night talks you have presented your misrepresentations to your associates until your mind and plans and works have become their mind and plans and works. In listening to your words, these men have imbibed the very science of the tempter. You have twisted and manipulated and misstated and misrepresented the testimonies that God has given, making them of no effect. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 9

This whole matter has been presented to me. You have worked as Lucifer worked in the heavenly courts to persuade his associates to unite with him. The enemy has used his arts upon your mind. Your boasted study of science and your assertion that you had obtained something excellent have deceived the men connected with you, and they have refused to listen to the warnings sent to keep them from listening to your false representations. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 10

The Lord now calls upon me to make plain to others that which has been made plain to me. If men refuse to receive the words of warning, the guilt will be upon their own souls. I am bidden to say, Your soul is in an unsaved state. You are not in harmony with truth and righteousness. What remains for you at the end of your commercial enterprises? What at the end of your strife for supremacy? Can you institute a war against God and His angels to get the supreme place in the heavenly courts? Would you succeed in this effort? And if you should succeed, would heaven be a place in which you would want to live? What kind of a character would you have formed amid your commercial enterprises and your ambition for the highest place? Would you be happy if you could gain even that? No. No. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 11

It is appointed unto men once to die, and after that the judgment. There is no exemption from this. All the reputation gained in this life, all the wealth that can be secured by undercurrent working will not purchase one moment’s peace, one ray of joy. All the medical skill you have obtained from the hand of God, you could not use to cure yourself. Unless you repent, the moment must come when the word will be spoken, He is joined to his idols, let him alone. The advantages that Satan holds before you, he held before Christ. But the word, “It is written,” turned back the tempter. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 12

Why did the apostle Paul reason with Felix upon this all-important subject—the judgment to come? In order to turn him from his evil ways to repentance, to conversion. He would arouse his slumbering senses to the danger of his losing the life to come, that he might lay hold on the hope set before him. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 13

I am instructed to bring these things before you, pressing them upon your attention, that, if possible, you may be led to lay hold upon the hope set before you in the gospel. By your schemes and your consultations with lawyers, you are divorcing yourself from your only hope. What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Heaven and earth shall pass away, but God’s Word will never pass away. Not one jot or tittle of His holy law will ever pass away. Not all the power on earth, of men in the highest positions, or of devils, can make void the words of our Lord Jesus Christ. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 14

“What shall I do,” asked the lawyer, “that I may have eternal life?” Said Christ, “What saith the Scripture? how readest thou? And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.” Christ said to him, “Thou hast answered right; this do, and thou shalt live.” [Luke 10:25-28.] 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 15

Two things are set before us—the conversion here in this life of body, soul, and spirit, or the eternal loss of the soul hereafter. When you come to understand that as you are today, there is not the slightest hope for you to secure that life that measures with the life of God, will you then dare to say, I do not confess, I do not repent?—No; you do not, you have not repented. Neither did Satan repent of all the evil that he had done. But it is for your present and eternal interest to fall on the Rock and be broken. If you do not do this, the Rock will fall on you and grind you to powder. In the invitation that Christ Himself gives you He declares, Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out. [John 6:37.] Those who have helped to hold you in your blindness and exalted infatuation are guilty with you. To the lawyers who have encouraged you in your purpose to do the unrighteous work that you have been inspired to do, the word is spoken, Woe unto you lawyers. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 16

“Then answered one of the lawyers, and said unto Him, Master, thus saying, Thou reproachest us also. And He said, Woe unto you, lawyers; for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.” [Luke 11:45, 46.] 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 17

I have no liberty to withhold any longer the matters that I have written. There is much that must be brought out. And yet I say to you, as I have said many times before, I have an intense desire that you shall show by your words of confession and by your actions that you will now make thorough work for repentance. Let the plowshare of truth go deep and thorough into your heart. Do no surface work; for God will not accept superficial promises. The Lord Jesus reaches out His hand once more to you, and He will not be trifled with. You have a work to do. Cease your underhand work, which shows that you would spoil the work of God. If you will repent, and be converted, the Lord will have mercy upon you. 20LtMs, Lt 319, 1905, par. 18