Counsels on Health

To Promulgate Health Principles

In the preparation of a people for the Lord's second coming, a great work is to be accomplished through the promulgation of health principles. The people are to be instructed in regard to the needs of the physical organism and the value of healthful living as taught in the Scriptures, that the bodies which God has created may be presented to Him a living sacrifice, fitted to render Him acceptable service. There is a great work to be done for suffering humanity in relieving their sufferings by the use of the natural agencies that God has provided, and in teaching them how to prevent sickness by the regulation of the appetites and passions. The people should be taught that transgression of the laws of nature is transgression of the laws of God. They should be taught the truth in physical as well as in spiritual lines, that “the fear of the Lord tendeth to life.” Proverbs 19:23. “If thou wilt enter into life,” Christ says, “keep the commandments.” Matthew 19:17. Live out My law “as the apple of thine eye.” God's commandments, obeyed, are “life unto those that find them, and health to all their flesh.” Proverbs 4:22. CH 206.3

Our sanitariums are an educating power to teach the people in these lines. Those who are taught can in turn impart to others a knowledge of health-restoring and health-preserving principles. Thus our sanitariums are to be an instrumentality for reaching the people, an agency for showing them the evil of disregarding the laws of life and health, and for teaching them how to preserve the body in the best condition. Sanitariums are to be established in different countries that are entered by our missionaries, and are to be centers from which a work of healing, restoring, and educating shall be carried on. CH 207.1

We are to labor both for the health of the body and for the saving of the soul. Our mission is the same as that of our Master, of whom it is written that He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by Satan. Acts 10:38. Of His own work He says: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me; because the Lord hath anointed Me to preach good tidings unto the meek.” “He hath sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised.” Isaiah 61:1; Luke 4:18. As we follow Christ's example of labor for the good of others, we shall awaken their interest in the God whom we love and serve. CH 207.2