Health, Philanthropic, and Medical Missionary Work

Medical Students

Let the students who go to obtain a medical education at the medical institutions of our land learn all they possibly can of the principles of life, but let them discard error, and not become bigots. PH066 34.1

1888.

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Medical students, by studying the word of God diligently, are far better prepared for all other studies; for enlightenment always comes with an earnest study of the word of God. Let it be understood by medical missionaries that the better acquainted they become with the Bible history, the better qualified they will be to do their work. The students in the college at Battle Creek need to aspire to higher knowledge; and nothing can give them a knowledge of all lessons and a retentive memory like the searching of the Scriptures. Let there be genuine discipline in study. There should be a most humble, prayerful longing of the soul to know the truth. There should be faithful teachers, who will strive to make the students understand their lessons, not alone by explaining everything themselves, but by letting the students explain thoroughly every passage which they read. Let the inquiring minds of the students be respected. PH066 34.2

December 1, 1895.

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Students may receive their diplomas, and yet their education has but just begun. But generally the student who knows nothing of what it is to bear responsibility anywhere, that has not taken the burden of thinking, the burden of caretaking, of studying complicated cases, feels that he is a ripe scholar. It is because such know so little that they think they know so much. If they knew considerable more, they would sense their inability. The one who best knows himself will work in all humility, He feels like making no proud boasts; he bears a weight of responsibility as he sees the woes of suffering humanity, and he will not take human life into his hands to deal with even the bodies of men, without connecting with the experienced physician, regarding him as a father and himself as a child to be instructed and nourished and corrected, if in error. Our medical students should get an experience by beginning at the lower round of the ladder, and by careful, earnest, thoughtful exertion, climbing round after round, religion—Bible religion—being the mainspring of action. PH066 35.1

Is the soon coming of Christ a reality to us? Let every student seek to reach the highest point of education, and be fitted for an inheritance with the saints in light. If he is educated in such a way as to reach this, he will learn that which is to continue through eternal ages. The banner of the third angel has inscribed upon it, “The commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.” Our institutions have taken a name which sets forth the character of our faith, and of this name we are never to be ashamed. I have been shown that this name means much, and in adopting it we have followed the light given from heaven. PH066 35.2

1895.