Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 22 (1907)

Ms 157, 1907

Fairness in Wage-Setting and Dealing with Workers

St. Helena, California

August 14, 1907

Previously unpublished.

Night before last was a night of great interest to me and to all our people. None are to lose their bearings. Call after call has been made to draw upon our people for means, and it had to be thus to meet the emergencies of buildings in various places. As laborers together with God, we are to study how we can carry the work after the Christlike order. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 1

We should not, as workers, physicians, and ministers, set the wage at a high figure. The Lord will not consent to have His laborers favored, as physicians in the sanitarium drawing much higher wages than hardworking teachers who are gospel ministers. Men fitted as gospel teachers are told by local conferences that all they can allow is five dollars per week, and some with families of children to support only ten dollars per week when in continual labor, not always of the pleasant order, but hard, trying work. They cannot make ends meet. Some ministers of the gospel, having embraced the truth, gave up their work because they felt that they must open the Word of God to the people who are in darkness. As capable workers, they were receiving five dollars a day. Some have had this experience. Men who could represent the truth, men of capability have been told that eight dollars per week is all that they can have. Some are allowed as high as ten dollars. Are our ministers of the gospel to become discouraged and be driven out of the field? This is a subject of intense interest to me. And we would have every man who ministers in word and doctrine a capable man, encouraged and not discouraged. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 2

Now this question is a problem to be settled. There must be more equality. The ministers of the gospel have a variety of experiences that are not the most agreeable, and in every sanitarium there are great burdens to be borne. All things are to be done with reference to the work; and as the sanitarium is represented to me, there is a straightforward work to be carried. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 3

All should maintain a high appreciation of their work and be understandingly capable of meeting the people. Simplicity and piety and adaptability and a true Christian revelation in character and understanding are making their mark that is recognized as being genuine in our sanitariums. It is not the costly fittings that make the impression, but the gospel simplicity that is making its impression upon men and women of judgment who shall patronize the sanitarium. It is the divine order in a sanitarium. Christ is to be revealed in His simplicity in words, in tenderness of manner, in quick discernment, in self-control, in patience. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 4

There need not be ornamental exhibitions in expensive articles of dress, in trimmings. All this in a sanitarium does not hold a blessed influence, but the following out of the gospel, whose adorning is not “of plaiting of the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price. For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection to their own husbands.” [1 Peter 3:3-5.] 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 5

Let all who serve God be an example. Ministers and people are to show in everything in their life the superiority of serving God in all things. Talk of God’s love, tell of His power, and manifest increasing faith. The Lord’s eye is over His work, and He oft brings His people into strait places that their faith shall be tried and then they seek unto the Lord, and He loves to surprise and cheer His trusting ones and even astonish them by the proficiency of His working. He has done this over and over again in the past. He has never left us in despair. The Lord calls upon us to prove Him by the increase of our faith. Christians are to be ever trustful in God. Men may disappoint us, for they are only human, but the Lord God, who so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son to redeem the sinful race, gives them a full opportunity of choice to accept such a sacrifice. He will convince us in future emergencies that He is able to save all who will come to Him in faith, and He will do exceeding abundantly above all we can ask or think. Continue to make God your dependence, and at eventime it shall be light with His own presence. We are to move intelligently, for all our works are to be wrought in faith. Magnify the Lord. Trust in Him, after doing all things that He requires of you to do. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 6

August 15, 1907

I greatly desire to do my duty in every respect. I have the Lord as my helper, my front guard and my rereward, and He will hear prayer. He will answer prayer. I awoke at twelve o’clock and I was greatly burdened. The sanitarium at Washington, D.C., troubles me. If the plans laid are to be carried out, I shall not hold my peace. I have had clear light upon this question, for it has been upon this subject that a large share of the evils that we had to meet in Battle Creek came in, and we had to express the light given of the Lord. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 7

I have written at all times, in the night season and in the day, to set before our people the mistakes the Lord had presented to me in regard to the wages that were urged upon the managers that they would have brought into the publishing interest. I had to present these things before them. The true state of things has never been understood. Selfish personal interest was the main burden. After the cause of God was nearly wrecked, a new administration came in. And now the same thing has been brought in at the Washington Sanitarium. But if I should not live to bear my testimony of the word of the Lord, there will be found in this, my diary, the message that God has given me that our physicians and our sanitariums and our men in the printing office are never to go over the ground that has nearly wrecked the work of God in Battle Creek. Leading men now in our sanitarium, who have just come from Australia, and who spoiled its record, are not to consider that they are to require large wages, as is proposed. These plans are not the Lord’s plans. The physicians in the sanitarium at Washington must move guardedly and must not suppose that it rests with them to require or set the wages they shall have in this new field. There is to be an understanding and a clear defining of the work. Economy needs to be maintained in all things, and yet there is not to be a poverty diet or a deprivation of food that will surely witness against the managers. As represented to me in the visions of the night, we were in conversation in council meetings. Letters were read, and there were missionary calls for helpers and for means from various places in far-off countries. Christ’s laborers are to be sent. The message is to be given. “Look unto Me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” [Isaiah 45:22.] Who is comprehended in all the ends of the earth? The Lord calls for those who understand Bible truth to carry the same message relating to the present time to heaven nations. Some understand, for they are beginning to see the necessity of carrying the message to other countries. The teacher becomes a learner of the language of foreign nations, and the people become learners of the gospel message. Means must be sent to sustain the workers in these heathen countries. Missionaries are raised up in those dark quarters of the earth, and they teach their own people the gospel of Christ. Light begins to shine in all parts of our globe. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 8

Once get the eye of the ignorant, superstitious idolaters upon the Son of God who gave His life a sacrifice to the world, there is not, cannot be any stumbling when the minds of the heathen are enlightened to see Jesus the Gift, the wonderful Gift to our world. Fear not, for we are laborers together with Christ to bind souls through the enlightenment of the Word to a living Saviour who is sending His heavenly messengers with the word, “Look unto Me and be ye saved all the ends of the earth.” [Verse 22.] The ends of the earth embrace all heathen lands as much as all intelligent nationalities. The forbidding peculiarities will change when Christ is brought to view, for we are all laborers together with Christ. “Look unto Me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” Christians, look and live. And the last words of Christ, as He was drawn heavenward to meet the angel throng that was waiting for Him, were, “And, lo, I am with you alway, even until the end of the world.” [Matthew 28:20.] Two angels of the heavenly throng were standing beside the disciples and asked them, “Why stand ye gazing up into the heavens? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.” [Acts 1:11.] 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 9

I have been carrying a heavy burden. I must now write distinctly, that if I should be taken away suddenly, my testimony shall be left in behalf of those who shall be alive to meet the troublous times before us, for the time of trouble hath commenced. All who live godly in Christ Jesus are safe and will have their life hid with Christ in God. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 10

We need now the Holy Spirit of God. The promise to His disciples was distinct and positive. “Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” [Verse 8.] 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 11

There is a necessity for a personal self-denial and a binding about of all your necessities for temporal advantages. Calls will come and must be responded to for means to sustain laborers in all missionary fields. We need now a true sense of what the Lord requires of us. It is to do the work as Christ has represented. Every man placed in a position of responsibility in the work and cause of God, as president of a conference, is to be a man of consideration. This position of presidency is not that the one man is to rule the conference, but be a helper with others who, as wise men, bear a position of trust. Christ has appointed ministers to stand as His mouthpiece to the people, to see and sense what the people need in spiritual lines, and they are conversant by long experience with the necessities of the work of a conference president. The work of a president of the conference is to be defined. There has often been a mistake in placing a man as president of a conference, unless he has a company of men appointed to be responsible for that man’s workings in the conference. One man’s mind and one man’s judgment is not to control any conference, for it would spoil the man. One who is young and inexperienced is not to stand forth in self-sufficiency. He must have as many as seven men to consult, men of experience to advise and counsel with. To be placed as president of a conference for the first time does not make a man efficient. Unless he has the advice and counsel of wise men, who have been entrusted with responsibilities and are proved men to counsel with, he will be liable to make erratic moves in self-confidence. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 12

Righteousness is absolute conformity to God’s mind. Righteousness is a wonderful acquirement. Matthew 6:19-23. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 13

“Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name? and in Thy name cast out devils? and in Thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work iniquity. Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of Mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, that built his house upon a rock: and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.” Matthew 7:21-25. Verses 26-29, Matthew 5. Let all study these words in this chapter for their individual benefit. Verses 12-20. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 14

The light given me is decided that a president of a conference should have less confidence in his own judgment than your president you have chosen has in his experience. He cannot serve you correctly until he has a deeper experience in dealing with human minds. He must learn lessons of the great Teacher. When he understands himself better as a man, he will be surprised that he should be chosen as president of a conference. To every man God has given his work. It is the work of the Lord entrusted to man. Our brother has not the qualifications essential to carry through the work intelligently. He will be master over men of long experience, but he will not suppose but that all suggestions he may make are to be carried out after his devisings. He needs himself to be under discipline to God. There are lessons to be learned as to what constitutes the work of a president of a conference. The traits of character, the self-sufficiency in the man, is of such breadth that he would not be satisfied unless every man carried out his ideas and plans. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation. 1 Corinthians, chapters 1 and 2. Every teacher in every line of work needs to understand these chapters. The president of your conference has expressed in his character a domineering capability that would interfere with the various positions of the Lord’s appointed workers as though he were enough to teach the whole conference in their various positions to follow his suggestions. Brother Cottrell will act in position of president a far more essential part with one to act with him; but it cannot be Brother Reaser, for he would take everything out of his hands to do after his ideas. Let a man be chosen to stand with Elder Cottrell. 22LtMs, Ms 157, 1907, par. 15