How to Live | Lesson 8, Part 2

Greetings MOL Family!

Welcome back to our study! We’ve been looking at some things in the chapter “True Education A Missionary Training” (in Ministry of Healing). I thought you would be interested in the introduction to it. This is really one of the most wonderful chapters in this book, one of the most wonderful chapters in all the Spirit of Prophecy writings. It grows on you. I invite you to study it.

A Life of Service

The children and youth, with their fresh talent, energy, and courage, their quick susceptibilities, are loved of God, and He desires to bring them into harmony with divine agencies. They are to obtain an education that will help them to stand by the side of Christ in unselfish service. – Ministry of Healing, pg. 395 {The Wisdom of the Great Physician, pg. 129}

Will you stand by Jesus’ side? Will you? Ah, this is what we were born for. Well, the chapter goes on to extol this glorious destiny and tell us how we can carry it out.

Now, let’s go over to page 399, we were looking at it in our previous lessons, how Jesus came to show us how to do this. He secured His education in the home. He acted his part in bearing the household burdens and working in the shop with Joseph. And you remember at the top of 400, we were noting how He got from home to the His work and from the shop back to His home. How did he get there? He walked. Now comes the paragraph that we haven’t looked at yet:

With the people of that age, the value of things was estimated by outward show. As religion had declined in power, it had increased in pomp. – Ibid., pg. 400 {The Wisdom of the Great Physician, pg. 130}

The less there was inside, the more they put on outside.

The educators of the time sought to command respect by display and ostentation. To all this the life of Jesus presented a marked contrast. – Ibid

What is contrast? It’s how things are different. How things are alike, that’s comparison, perhaps. But contrast is how they are what? — Different. Into all of this, in the religious, and educational, and political, and social, and business world of His time, the life of Jesus presented what? — A contrast. It was what then? — Different.

His life demonstrated the worthlessness of those things that men regarded as life’s great essentials. The schools of His time, with their magnifying of things small and their belittling of things great, He did not seek. – Ibid

You mean He didn’t go to school? He didn’t go to their schools, did He? Remember the page before says Jesus secured His education where? — In the home.

His education was gained from Heaven-appointed sources, from useful work, from the study of the Scriptures, from nature, and from the experiences of life, – God’s lesson books, full of instruction to all who bring to them the willing hand, the seeing eye, and the understanding heart. – Ibid

Then it tells about how, prepared in this wonderful way, studying these four great textbooks, He went forth on His mission to bless others. Now, where is the training for loving service to begin?

The home is the child’s first school, and it is here that the foundation should be laid for the life of service. – Ibid

I want to ask you something. You don’t remember, so you can’t answer me. But I want to ask it anyway. When you were a baby and cried, did you get your own way? If you did, the foundations weren’t laid for a life of service. You were learning not to minister, but to be ministered unto.

Don’t misunderstand me. There are things a baby has to have done for it. I understand that. But if a baby gets everything it thinks it wants, when it wants it, it’s not learning this lesson. Self-denial is one of the first great lessons of life.

Now there is good news. If we didn’t learn it when we were 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, or 10 years old, we can learn it now. But we’ll never learn it by having our own way and living to please ourselves. We never will.

Now, I’ll tell you a little secret. If you need to learn any of these lessons, and it would be possible to find a home situation, and a work situation, and a class situation, and an evangelistic district situation that are just what pleases you all the time, do you know what God would do? He’d kick you out of that. Not that He’s trying to make things hard for you. Oh, no. He’s trying to help you to learn this lesson.

So, any time you find yourself in a situation where the work is not what you would choose, or the roommate is not what you would choose, or the group for class discussion is not what you would choose, or the missionary program is not what you would choose, remember, my dear friends, this is Jesus’ hand beckoning you to live not to what? Not to please yourself. See now, He won’t force you. Oh, no. But He’ll give you an opportunity.

The Real Joy of Living

Very early the lesson of helpfulness should be taught the child. As soon as strength and reasoning power are sufficiently developed, he should be given duties to perform in the home. He should be encouraged in trying to help father and mother, encouraged to deny and to control himself, to put other’s happiness and convenience before his own… – Ibid., pg. 401 {The Wisdom of the Great Physician, pg. 130}

Do you see? Here’s the heart of it. The little child is to learn where? — In the home; to do what? — To put other’s happiness and convenience before his own. Did you learn that? Had you mastered that when you were 4, 6, 8, 10 years old? Well, if you didn’t, thank God, you can learn it now.

All right, let’s read on:

…to watch for opportunities to cheer and assist brothers and sisters and playmates and to show kindness to the aged, the sick, and the unfortunate. – Ibid

If you didn’t learn it before, is there a chance to learn it? Thank the Lord. And oh, we should be watching for those opportunities. All right, read on:

The more fully the spirit of true ministry pervades the home, the more fully it will be developed in the lives of the children. They will learn to find joy in service and sacrifice for the good of others. – Ibid

Well, what kind of a tranquilizer pill do you have to give a child so that he’ll find happiness in living for others? Is that what it takes, some kind of a medicine? Why, no. This is the normal condition of life. The other is abnormal. Yes, there’ll be many opportunities to do it.

At the end of the year, by and by there will be Thanksgiving and then there will be Christmas. Do you know what 99 out of 100 people in this country are going to think of at Christmas time? “What would I like?” What’s Santa Claus going to bring me? Where can I go to have a good time? What can I do?” But maybe one percent are going to be thinking, “What can I do to make Jesus happy?” It’s supposed to be His birthday, isn’t it? — Poor Jesus. Did you ever go to a birthday party and everybody get birthday presents but the one whose birthday it was? Well, that’s Christmas.

But, my subject isn’t what to do during Christmas. My subject is what to live for 365 days in the year. That’s the thing. Jesus came to teach us what? — How to live. And He said the way to live was to live to what? — Minister instead of being ministered unto, to live to please others instead of living to please ourselves.

Now, really folks, that’s what this program is all about. This is it. And once you get that key, you’ll understand a lot of things that otherwise will be mysteries. You wonder why this is here and why that and why something else isn’t here. This is the key to the whole adventure. The dear Lord has planned this way of life to help you and me to learn what the real joy of living is. It’s to live to please Him and please others.

And somebody put it this way: Jesus first; others next; yourself last. What is that capital letter in the first word? – J; and the capital letter in the next word? — O and the capital letter in that last word? — Y, now the only way you can make it spell joy is to put yourself where? Last. That’s it. J-O-Y. Jesus first; others next; yourself last. That is what this chapter is talking about. That’s what Jesus is talking about.

Ah friends, a hundred times a day we have the opportunity of choosing one way or the other. In the sanitarium, on the farm, in the home, in the class, when we’re alone, all the time, day and night, we choose. Ah, what a wonderful program to live the life of unselfish service.

Now, do you know what I’d do if I were the devil? Shall I tell you what I’d do? I’d be right here now whispering in somebody’s ear, “That’s pretty slick. They’re trying to get you into a trap.”

Well, were you ever in jail? Well, I’ve been locked in jail. Not as a prisoner, but I was in there talking with a person. I’ve been locked in jail. But I had to have three different guards let me out through three different locked gates.

But I want to ask you something. If you just saw a picture of a man with some bars in front of him, like there are in jail, if all you saw where the man’s face and the bars, could you tell whether he was outside the bars or inside the bars? No, no, you couldn’t.

And these things that I’ve studied with you today are bars. They separate the selfish from the unselfish; those who live for self and those who live for others. And each side, bless your dear hearts, thinks the other is in jail. That’s right. Both sides, each side thinks the other is in jail. And you can tell which side you’re on by which side you think is the jail.

It’s that simple…

Until next week – Invite a friend, and we’ll see you then… Maranatha!

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*This study has been adapted from classes taken by Elder W.D. Frazee.