FE 248, 261
(Fundamentals of Christian Education 248, 261)
Those interested in your behalf have flattering hopes for you, that you will become useful men, who will be filled with moral worth and unswerving integrity. For the youth who have gone from New Zealand to America, much has been ventured; and I will say to these students, Set your aim high, and then step by step ascend to reach the standard, even though it may be by painful effort, through self-denial and self-sacrifice. Christ will be to you a present help in every time of need, if you call upon Him, that you may be like Daniel, whom no temptation could corrupt. Do not disappoint your parents and your friends; but above all, do not disappoint Him who so loved you that He gave His own life in order to cancel your sins and become your personal Saviour. Jesus said, “Without Me ye can do nothing.” Bear this in mind. If you have made mistakes, you may gain a victory by discerning these mistakes, and by regarding them as beacons of warning, to enable you to shun their repetition. I need not tell you that this will be turning your defeat into victory, disappointing the enemy, and honoring your Redeemer, whose property you are. (FE 248.1) MC VC
If a teacher cannot be made to feel the responsibility and the carefulness he should ever reveal in dealing with human minds, his education has in some cases been very defective. In the home life the training has been harmful to the character, and it is a sad thing to reproduce this defective character and management in the children brought under his control. We are standing before God on test and trial to see if we can individually be trusted to be of the number of the family who shall compose the redeemed in heaven. “And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” (FE 261.1) MC VC
Here are represented the great white throne and He that sat on it, from whose face the earth and heaven fled away. Let every teacher consider that he is doing his work in the sight of the universe of heaven. Every child with whom the teacher is brought in contact has been purchased by the blood of God’s only-begotten Son, and He who has died for these children would have them treated as His property. Be sure that your contact, teachers, with every one of these children shall be of that character that will not make you ashamed when you meet them in that great day when every word and action is brought in review before God, and with its burden of results laid open before you individually. “Bought with a price,”—O what a price, eternity alone will reveal! (FE 261.2) MC VC
The Lord Jesus Christ has infinite tenderness for those whom He has purchased at the cost of His own sufferings in the flesh, that they should not perish with the devil and his angels, but that He may claim them as His chosen ones. They are the claim of His love, of His own property; and He looks upon them with unutterable affection, and the fragrance of His own righteousness He gives to His loved ones who believe in Him. It requires tact and wisdom and human love, and sanctified affection for the precious lambs of the flock, to lead them to see and appreciate their privilege in yielding themselves up to the tender guidance of the faithful shepherds. The children of God will exercise the gentleness of Jesus Christ. (FE 261.3) MC VC