Counsels on Stewardship

Chapter 5—Beneficence Where Christ Abides

When the perfect love of God is in the heart, wonderful things will be done. Christ will be in the heart of the believer as a well of water springing up unto everlasting life. But those who manifest indifference to the suffering ones of humanity will be charged with indifference to Jesus Christ in the person of His suffering saints. Nothing saps spirituality from the soul more quickly than to enclose it in selfishness and self-caring. CS 27.1

Those who indulge self and neglect to care for the souls and bodies of those for whom Christ has given His life, are not eating of the bread of life, nor drinking of the water of the well of salvation. They are dry and sapless, like a tree that bears no fruit. They are spiritual dwarfs, who consume their means on self; but “whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” CS 27.2

Christian principles will always be made visible. In a thousand ways the inward principles will be made manifest. Christ abiding in the soul is as a well that never runs dry.—The Review and Herald, January 15, 1895. CS 27.3