Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 12 (1897)

Lt 15, 1897

Wessels, Peter

Sunnyside, Cooranbong, New South Wales, Australia

February 8, 1897

Previously unpublished.

Dear Brother:

I feel a deep interest that you shall abide the day of God. [Read] Revelation 20:15. Your greatest sorrow has not been because you have had a true sense of your sins, but you have been very much annoyed because the sin has caused you much humiliation because it was known. If there is nothing which you have done that is so wrong, why should you feel so greatly annoyed to have this matter revealed. The aggravated character of your sin you have not realized, and felt a real sorrow and disgust of your own course of action. My brother, in your present state of mind, with your present conceptions of this matter, when placed in similar circumstances as you have been, temptations would come to you, and habit and practice would lead you to pursue the same course of action if you thought it would not be made known to others. But if no eye could see or know of these polluting actions, which you have taken so much pleasure in, you would continue their practice because you have no true conception of their results. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 1

I hope you will not feel as did Cain against Abel. Because your brethren know these things, they cannot but feel that you are not a safe man to be entrusted with the flock of God and they take the responsibility of giving you credentials as a safe teacher. You have led souls astray. One soul is precious in the sight of God, and you have created temptations for them which they have not power to resist. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 2

You have created a condition of thoughts, an appetite for practicing shameful things, which the Lord abominates. A compassionate Saviour will forgive your course of action if you humble your heart in contrition before God, and hang your helpless soul upon Jesus Christ. He alone can save you from the result of your own educating practice. Please read 1 John 1:5. Read the entire chapter. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 3

Now, your mind is not at rest. Your impulsive character will under temptation say and do strange things. You will be tempted to make rash moves which will cause the loss of your own soul and endanger the souls of others. But you are not at present the man that can be entrusted with the sacred responsibilities as a minister of God, a shepherd of the flock. I cannot express to you how earnest I feel for you. I see your peril. You are represented to me as a man standing on the very brink of a precipice, tempted to throw yourself over. Go back, go back! Cut off not the last hope for yourself of that life which will, if you are a faithful overcomer, measure with the life of God. Your soul costs too much to be rashly thrown away. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 4

If you humble your heart before God, He will pardon your transgression and forgive your sins. You may make it necessary by your own course of action for explanations to be made. But if you will move guardedly it is not essential that these matters shall become extended, but your wife should know. She is the one that could help you. But I beg of you for Christ’s sake to not imperil your soul. When you see yourself in your true light, you will seek earnestly for a transformation of character. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 5

I was reading in the night season, from the Word of God to you. You seemed to be very restless, and I was trying to quiet your mind. I said to you, Peter Wessels, Whosoever abideth in Him, sinneth not; whosoever sinneth hath not seen Him neither knoweth Him. If you really knew God and Jesus Christ by an experimental knowledge, you would never have done the things which you have done. Your course in these things have polluted the minds and bodies of inexperienced youth. Could you only see these things as they are, but you do not sense them yet. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 6

What can be worse than the crime of educating young girls in the habits of desecrating and polluting their bodies by exposing them to the view and the touch of man, and that man an ordained minister? Cannot you see that you have enfeebled and confused your moral conceptions of right and wrong, so that you would be in constant temptation to practice the same sin? These things in the sight of God are as grievous a crime as adultery. You will make your sin tenfold greater by giving the impression that you are not treated with proper respect. This matter has been laid open before me, and I laid it open before you, and asked you to consider this matter of greater consequence than you have hitherto done. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 7

I want you to read and heed the instruction God has given you. I want you to consider it a great mercy and kindness of God to open these matters to your mind, that you should break off your sins by repentance and thorough reformation. Do not, I beseech of you, leave the impression upon your mother’s mind that your brethren have misused you and have treated you ill because they withheld credentials from you. You need to see that you have entered into a series of temptations which have become a strong infatuation, and if you will only humble your heart before God, and never cease until you know that the transformation of character has taken place in you, then you may have an experience [so] that you are better prepared to teach the truth to others than you ever have been. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 8

You have a God-fearing wife. You have very nice children. God loves the family, and He wants to save you as a family. I know your brethren would help you if they could. They must be true and faithful sentinels for God. They must do judgment and justice mingled with mercy. But it is their work to keep the danger signal uplifted against any influence that shall, through you or any other man, lead a soul into sin by polluting their own body and thus defiling the temple of God, that He has made, by the sight or touch of man. 12LtMs, Lt 15, 1897, par. 9