Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 4 (1883 - 1886)
Ms 32, 1885
God’s Purpose for Israel
NP
1885
Portions of this manuscript are published in CTr 111.
[First part missing.] ... “I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am the Lord that healeth thee.” [Exodus 15:26.] 4LtMs, Ms 32, 1885, par. 1
God designed to bestow great blessings upon His people. He purposed to bring them to a good land, which for its richness and fertility was called a land flowing with milk and honey. God designed to establish them there as a healthful, strong, and mighty people, if they would submit to His requirements. The people of Israel had lived upon rich and luxurious food in Egypt, not the most healthful for them, and God would bring them through the wilderness to the good land He had promised them. In their travels [He] would remove from them flesh meats and give them a simple yet healthful quality of food and establish them in the good land of Canaan, a powerful people with not a feeble man, woman, or child in all their tribes. 4LtMs, Ms 32, 1885, par. 2
God did not bring them through by the nearest and most direct route to Canaan, for they would meet opposition in their passage, and a merciful and good God directed their route in the course where they would receive the least opposition from opposing armies. The Israelites, while in Egypt, had not been permitted to learn the art of warfare. The Egyptians would not allow them to go out with their armies to battle, for they were jealous of them and in constant fear lest they would turn against the Egyptians to the side of their enemies, and thus deliver themselves out of their hands. The Egyptians knew that they had no right to thus keep this powerful people as slaves. They knew that there was no justice in it, hence they were in continual fear of insurrection and revolt, and they therefore kept them guarded and strove by oppression to crush them into submission. They hated the people who were of so much profit to them and shamefully entreated them. The course of Southern slave-masters has been marked with the same spirit, and they have acted over the same cruel oppression and have acted out the same hatred which the Egyptians manifested to the Hebrew, which savors not of the divine, but of the satanic. 4LtMs, Ms 32, 1885, par. 3
Since the fall of Eve in Eden through intemperate desire to gratify the taste, this has been the prevailing sin of the human family. Eve, after her transgression, prevailed upon her husband to eat also. Adam was not deceived as was Eve, but he was influenced by her to do as she had done—eat and risk the consequences, as no harm, she said, had come to her. Adam yielded to the temptations of his wife. He could not endure to be separated from her. He ate and fell from his integrity. Since this lamentable occurrence, which has introduced sin into our world, intemperate, lustful appetite and the power of influence which one in wrong exerts over another have brought an accumulation of misery which it is not possible for language to describe. In no other way has Satan come to fallen man with his temptations as successfully as through the appetite. 4LtMs, Ms 32, 1885, par. 4
Rebellion and insurrection were continually arising in the armies of Israel in their journeyings through the wilderness because their depraved appetites could not be indulged. Moses was brought into the greatest perplexity and his heart made sad through the continual murmurings of the children of Israel because God for their own good withheld from them flesh meats. 4LtMs, Ms 32, 1885, par. 5
They were continually imagining trouble and anticipating evil. They were jealous of Moses, thinking that he might have selfish motives in leading them from Egypt, that it might be his desire to lead them into the wilderness that they might perish there, and he enrich himself with their possessions. They had witnessed the miraculous power of God in their deliverance. They had seen the Red Sea parted and the waters standing as walls on either side. They passed through on dry land, while their enemies daring to venture in ... [The remainder of the manuscript is missing.] 4LtMs, Ms 32, 1885, par. 6