Individual Responsibility of Fathers and Mothers
St. Helena, California
October 15, 1911
Portions of this manuscript are published in UL 302.
I am intensely interested that our churches shall become fully aroused to their individual home responsibilities to become thoroughly converted. Many need to seek the Lord earnestly. Do fathers and mothers understand the necessity of their being truly converted? Do they realize their responsibilities to God in their own homes and their own families? Parents are to realize their own individual responsibility. I am instructed there are families that are not converted. Are your families being trained from their childhood to correct habits of speech, to respect their parents, and to behave as becometh their belief in the grand truth you bear? Will you live the truth? 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 1
If you are converted daily let not an unseemly word or action be revealed in your home, because you are responsible to God for the impression you make in the family and in the church. When you correct your children—for this will be your duty—have perfect control of your own spirit in mind and actions. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 2
Parents, you are educators. “For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord.” 2 Corinthians 4:5. Ministers of the gospel have a sacred responsibility to represent the character of Christ in their home government. Read 2 Corinthians 4. Read—and understand this chapter. Fathers and mothers are to realize that they are under rule to God. We have no excuse if we neglect to obey the Word. The Word of God is our educator. This entire chapter is to be studied and practiced. Chapters 5 and 6 are also to be cherished. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 3
“We then as workers together with Him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain. (For He saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succored thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.)” 2 Corinthians 6:1, 2. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 4
I am charged with a most positive message to give to all parents to study the Bible. The Word of God is your educator. Wake up, fathers and mothers, for the end draws near. In the Word of God are the lessons all should learn who desire the truth in the heart. Those who are sanctified through the belief of the truth will form characters after the divine similitude. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 5
“Giving no offence in anything, that the ministry be not blamed: but in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses.” 2 Corinthians 6:3, 4. Every word of this chapter is to be carried into life action. What encouragement is this whole chapter, and of what great consequence to all who have a genuine sense of this gospel message! If every family would practice these precious instructions, they would be a safeguard against falling into the errors against which our churches are warned. The Lord would have these precious warnings given. Let them be heeded. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 6
Let all take special heed to the instruction given in the whole of Galatians. We feel intensely the necessity of these things. We are especially to bear the message to all fathers and mothers who are neglecting home duties. Study your Bibles. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 7
In the night season I am charged with a most sacred message to fathers and mothers. This message is often repeated. Great light has been given fathers and mothers in the Word. Review all your works. I am instructed to give you light that the Lord has given me, for many fathers and mothers are asleep and must repent before God of their present and past neglect of their children. Much time has passed into eternity without the work’s being done in your own family to co-operate with God. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 8
“I will love Thee, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower. I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised; so shall I be saved from mine enemies.” Psalm 18:1-3. The Lord is full of mercy and love and compassion. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 9
I am charged to bear the straight message to our people. I am distressed so that I can sleep nights but a few hours. I am charged to say there is a widespread work to be done to awaken your children. This message is for the whole church who need to be aroused, who need to exercise sound judgment to sense [the needs] of their whole family. Fathers and mothers are to consider that they have neglected the most sacred responsibilities. There is a great work to be carried out in families, in home life, in education. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 10
Christians must give an appropriation of their goods, as the Lord has prospered them. “Honor the Lord with thy substance, and with the firstfruits of all thine increase.” Proverbs 3:9. You have had this subject brought before you. We desire to bring these things before you now. Our people must not neglect to carry out the Lord’s plans for advancing His work. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 11
I address fathers and mothers: You have this matter presented before your family, that economy must be practiced in the expenditure of means. Fathers and mothers need to be wide-awake in this matter. Satan is working diligently, for there is a great work that has been neglected that ought to be done and must be done without failure. There is a world to be warned, and every family may understand from the Scriptures that the work is to be sustained as it enters new fields. We must never become lax. The great work is before us. There are new places to be entered. The gospel message must be brought to the world. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 12
I address fathers and mothers. Act your part nobly. Repent of your neglect, and may the Lord forgive. This question has been treated nobly, and therefore my burden is to impress fathers and mothers to show that they are following the directions the Lord has given. Let the message awaken our churches. The Lord calls for faithful believers to be in earnest now, without delay. Fathers and mothers, you are to be converted to be laborers together with God. The grand truths we claim to believe have not made you laborers together with God in your families at home. God calls for decided reform. Satanic agents have been encouraged. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 13
I have a special message to parents. I am charged to bring to parents the strict requirements of God in each family. Fathers and mothers need to be daily reconverted in the line of bringing light into their own families. Cultivate Christian politeness in your training of your children. Guard yourselves. Never allow your hand to strike a child in anger. Your children are the Lord’s property, and they must be treated kindly, but not vindicated in their disrespect of righteousness and truth by your own careless irreverence. Give them righteousness. Christ is truth, the complete, perfect sample of what every soul must be if he enters the heavenly courts. All the great facts are set forth. You can never cure an evil spirit by doing irreligious work. Christ is your sample of character. This we are to know: In God we live and move and have our being. Oh, that the work in our schools shall train the students to understand what God requires of them! I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life, Christ says. [John 14:6.] Study the Word and be converted. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 14
Fathers and mothers, a most solemn responsibility is resting upon you daily to be yourselves daily converted and consecrated to God in your homes. Be kind in your speech to your children. No loud, tempestuous scolding will cure your children of any evil action. No taking your children in a passion and shaking them will convert them from the error of their ways to do God’s will. They are God’s property. As a people professing to be reformers, the very best lessons that you can give your children in this age of corruption is not to indulge them to become fashionable after the worldly style. Sons and daughters are to be instructed as to what it means to be obedient to God’s requirements, what will fit you and them for a position in the heavenly kingdom. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 15
Watch and pray, fathers and mothers, lest ye enter into temptation. Give your hearts and minds and souls to God’s service. You are not to be severe, but kneel before the Lord with your own hearts softened by the grace of God. Be converted that you may have the earnest of the Holy Spirit. What a comfort to know that the Lord will help you in every emergency, for you are laborers together with God. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 16
“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.” 2 Corinthians 5:10. Read this whole chapter. Read (chapter 6), and pray over your children. “We then, as workers together with Him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.” Verse 1. Father and mothers, you take the responsibility of bringing children into the world. Will you consider it is not for you to work in vain? “We then, as workers together with Him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.” Read the whole chapter. Now this takes in Christian experience. Here is large encouragement. Here are the graces we are to receive if we comply with the conditions. Fathers, mothers, if you are not converted, will you measure your advantages if you will comply with the conditions? 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 17
Read the whole of chapter 7. Will you lay hold on these promises? Kneel before God and make your covenant with the Lord by sacrifice. You have your directions all laid out in plain words. Take your Bibles and make an agreement with your families to serve the Lord. I feel intense interest in this matter. From the light given me of the Lord, you need to be reconverted—fathers and mothers and children. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 18
I am feeling intensely. All day yesterday I was in an agony over the scenes presented to me. I was burdened, and I know not how to find relief. I may visit you in some of our churches if the Lord will strengthen me, but this is my message to all families: Do not delay. As the matter was presented to me, I feared I could not endure the burden. Let all the weakness and frivolities be put out of your houses. The Lord is coming. I am charged to tell you, fathers and mothers, many of you have lost a rich experience through your neglect and your lax, loose way of training your children. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 19
I thought, I will act my part, for there is a great neglect of bringing yourself into line to realize your work. I did not think I could pass another such night and feared I could not hold my pen in my hand. But the Lord has given me decided courage in this message. You have no time to lose. Seek the Lord, fathers and mothers. I may have to write still more, but I shall send this, for the Lord has strengthened me. I did not suppose when I took my pen in hand I could hold my pen in my hand, but I will send this that I have written without delay, and I hope I have not gone too far in presuming to write because of my suffering so much yesterday. But I said, I will write a little now, and I found my strength come as I ventured. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 20
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I will now present to you these things that I have not yet done. I cannot leave the matter, as it is presented to me. Your children are the Lord’s property with which you have been entrusted to bring up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. The children are not to be left to pursue any wrong course, because they are the Lord’s property. The Lord requires every mother to be a faithful servant of the Lord in the training of the children. When the household duties are misdirected and the children do not receive the due attention they should have, that mother and father are responsible to the Lord for the neglect of their duty. When the children are educated and trained properly, it is because they have been guided wisely. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of true, valuable wisdom in discipline. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 21
What is the work of the parents? It is to direct their children aright. The fear of the Lord is to be their study. It is the beginning of wisdom, of correct behavior, of virtuous character. The Lord calls upon all fathers and mothers to seek the Lord most earnestly to understand how to treat their children. The converted mother is guided by virtue. Your whole married life is to be fitting your children to be patterns after the divine similitude. Do not increase your family [so much] that you cannot give them the attention they ought to have to prepare them for the future life. 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 22
Your responsibilities are resting upon you, fathers and mothers. Let mothers consider they must see the outcome of their children. A most sacred work rests upon fathers and mothers to so conduct their home life that heaven is not lost to them. In this age of corruption, when our adversary the devil as a roaring lion walketh about seeking whom he may devour, I am charged to keep the message of warning before you, by voice and by practice, calling upon all in our houses of worship to watch and to pray lest ye enter into temptation. There are many who possess the light, but do not use the light to save themselves and their families. Is it not time for you to trim your lamp and let it shine truly and brightly? 25LtMs, Ms 61, 1911, par. 23