Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 20 (1905)

Lt 221, 1905

Place, O. G.

“Elmshaven,” St. Helena, California

July 12, 1905

Previously unpublished. +^Note

Dr. O. G. Place

Dear Brother,—

I meant to have seen you and talked with you again before you left Takoma Park, but it will be as well to write, because then I shall have a copy of what I send you. 20LtMs, Lt 221, 1905, par. 1

In His work as a healer, Christ was thronged day after day. He accomplished a great work in the cities to which He went. We have not Christ with us now as a visible leader, but He is with us by the Holy Spirit. 20LtMs, Lt 221, 1905, par. 2

I have a most earnest desire that you shall be led to understand that your movement in establishing a medical institution so near the Colorado Sanitarium was neither consistent nor righteous, but an offense to God. You have not made God your trust. You have need to be converted. Unless your heart is changed by the Holy Spirit’s power, I could not sanction your standing in the responsible position of a physician in one of our sanitariums. You are not serving the Lord with singleness of heart, and the counsel of God is not with you. For a long time you have not made the Lord your counsellor. You have not moved forward ignorantly, but as a man who has taken himself into his own hands, to do as he pleased. 20LtMs, Lt 221, 1905, par. 3

I do not sustain Dr. Kellogg or any one else in unjust accusations. To criticize and condemn has become a science with many. 20LtMs, Lt 221, 1905, par. 4

I wish, my brother, to treat you as one of the Lord’s sons, who believes in Him; but this I cannot do, because you are not obedient to the requirements of God. If you do not seek the Lord with all your heart, then you are among the number who are worked by another spirit. You are not in harmony with God, and to increase your influence would not be in accordance with the will of God. If you refuse to walk in the light as Christ is in the light, the Holy Spirit will not co-operate with you, and you will gradually become an atheist. You will work according to your own impulses. Unless you submit yourself, heart and mind and soul and strength, to God’s will, and trust in Him with full faith, you cannot possibly give perishing souls leaves from the tree of life. You are following your own leadership; and while you continue to do this, you will become more and more unskilled in the knowledge of how to lead souls to God. 20LtMs, Lt 221, 1905, par. 5

Upon our people has been laid the responsibility of setting in operation and maintaining sanitariums that will bear the highest stamp of excellence. They are to be managed by men who acknowledge God as the supreme wisdom. The physicians in our institutions should be men who are sound in the faith, led by supreme wisdom, able to bring to sin-sick souls the healing balm of the Word of God. They should be able to co-operate with Christ, carrying forward the work that He left for them to do, breaking the power of evil over souls and, as one with Christ, bringing health to soul and body. 20LtMs, Lt 221, 1905, par. 6