Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 16 (1901)

Ms 189, 1901

Diary/Regarding St. Helena Sanitarium

[St. Helena, California]

Circa September 22, 1901

Previously unpublished.

I am so thankful to the Lord for His great goodness and compassion and love for His children. What would we do without a Saviour! I know that the Lord will receive every soul who repents. He will strengthen and bless His medical missionaries in our sanitariums if they will be worked by His Holy Spirit. I am so anxious for them to accomplish the very work appointed them of God. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 1

Not one of you need fail nor be discouraged. I hope the time will come when in these important sanitariums a fully competent man and his wife will be appointed to stand as managers. Then the care and burden of responsibility would be lessened, because they would carry a large portion of the perplexities that physicians should not be compelled to bear. [The physician] has all in his professional line that he ought to carry. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 2

We certainly ought to have this class of woman to help, to be as a mother in an institution. Why cannot we find them? You so much need competent women who understand, and by experience understand still more and more, because the Lord is giving wisdom and knowledge as she walks in the way of the Lord as God's helping hand to carry out His purposes. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 3

I have wished so much that you had a good physician to stand by your side and less burden came upon you. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 4

We have been carrying a great burden here. This sanitarium [St. Helena Sanitarium] is not that which it should be. We have been laboring to have changes take place, and Dr. Sanderson is no longer connected with the sanitarium. We know the doctor has excellent qualities. If he had an eye single to the glory of God, he could see and sense the things needed to be done and [could] take right hold in a firm, manly way, and do these things. Then he would have courage in the Lord to not only see the changes [needed] in reformatory lines but do them. I am glad Dr. Place is in the institution in Boulder. They need him, and Dr. Place needs the keeping, sanctifying power of God. Only consider that you are all physicians and helpers working under the supervision of the greatest Medical Missionary Teacher the world has ever known. He is by the side of every one in service and will hold your hand under His own hand in your operations. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 5

It is evening now. I spoke in the chapel at the sanitarium. [See Ms 102, 1901.] The house is always full, and as I tried to bear my testimony in regard to what we could do in cooperating with God, I hoped they would understand all [that is involved in] Satan's plan in throwing off the restraint of God's law and the Lord's plan of testing the character of His blood-bought heritage, giving them another trial. The sanitarium physicians and workers are to prove God's method of discipline, order, and obedience to the law of God and [not] Satan's new order of doing away with the law of Jehovah. Look at the showing of the two orders. See what a state our world is in because they do not keep the law of God! All this lawless work started with Satan. What did God give His law to all created intelligences for? To preserve them alive in practicing the laws God has instituted to prevent all this war and sin and strife, all this oppression, all this murder and thefts, and robbery and crime. I have no question as to whose side I would be on. The side of Christ is my choice. To stand under His bloodstained banner is the greatest honor that any human being can obtain. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 6

I consider that our sanitariums should be model institutions of medical missionary work. When we shall consider what Christ has done for us, we should praise Him with heart and soul and voice. The Christian medical missionary is God's helping hand, and all in the sanitarium need to be men who feel their need of the power of the Great Physician to stand by their side and guide their hand. The great compassion of Christ is drawn out to His obedient, commandment-keeping people of God. 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 7

At what price shall we estimate His infinite love and rich grace? As we take in the subject, we realize there can be no measurement of the service He has given the guilty, fallen human race. And yet He says, “Come unto Me all ye that are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find,” by your experience, the rest you desire. “For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” [Matthew 11:28-30.] 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 8

The Lord would have every sanitarium to be an expression of the character of Jesus Christ. He would have the sick educated how to find Christ and how to depend on Him—the Lifegiver, the great Healer. Make the Lord your dependence, your Alpha and Omega. Oh, we must be so much one with Christ that the blessedness of implicit obedience will be our joy under all circumstances. The first duty for each is to learn the will of God and next to do it. What are our marching orders? Go ye forth into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature. Those who are helpers, nurses, and physicians in our sanitarium [are to] obey the orders of God. The blessedness we may learn of consecrating all our God-given abilities to Jesus Christ! 16LtMs, Ms 189, 1901, par. 9