Less expensively furnished rooms than you desire will be in accordance with the work God has given us to do in these last days. Your ideas are not molded and fashioned by a true practical idea of what it means to walk humbly with God. You look upon appearance as the great means of lifting you up to success. This is a delusion. You seek to make an appearance that is not in any way appropriate to the work God has given you to do, an appearance which it would require a large sum of money to keep up. We cannot consent to have the rooms of the sanitarium furnished in accordance with the idolatry of the age, even if this will bring an increase of patronage. Christian influence is of more value than this. MM 167.2
A desire for outside appearance is like a canker which is ever eating into the vitals. Appearance is a merciless tyrant. You need to guard against your inclination for show and entertainment. It is a mistake to suppose that by keeping up an appearance you will obtain more patients and therefore more means. The evils resulting from such a course have not yet appeared to you, but they will appear if you are not guarded.... MM 167.3
God looks not upon outward display, but upon the heart. Well-advised movements must be made. Nothing must be invested extravagantly. It is not because we desire to exalt ourselves that we are seeking to build up a sanitarium, but because we desire to honor God and properly represent the truth, which has been misrepresented. In this institution our peculiar religious principles are to be magnified and exalted. Never are they to be hidden. MM 168.1
The Lord's way is always the best way. We are safe while we follow Him who says, “Learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart.” If Christ, the Majesty of heaven, is meek and lowly, how much more ought we to be, who are under sentence of death for disobedience. The influence of our physicians in the sanitarium should be such as to encourage meekness and lowliness. Men are not be exalted as great and wonderful. It is God who is to be magnified.—Letter 51, 1900. MM 168.2