Section 4—The Growing Personality
Chapter 16—Prenatal Influences (Part 3)
Fathers as Well as Mothers Involved—Fathers as well as mothers are involved in this responsibility, and they too should seek earnestly for divine grace that their influence may be such as God can approve. The inquiry of every father and mother should be, “What shall we do unto the child that shall be born?” By many the effect of prenatal influence has been lightly regarded; but the instruction sent from heaven to those Hebrew parents, and twice repeated in the most explicit and solemn manner, shows how the matter is looked upon by the Creator.—The Signs of the Times, February 26, 1902.
Parents’ Own Stamp Given to Children—Parents … by indulgence have strengthened their animal passions. And as these have strengthened, the moral and intellectual faculties have become weak. The spiritual has been overborne by the brutish. Children are born with the animal propensities largely developed, the parents’ own stamp of character having been given to them…. The brain force is weakened, and memory becomes deficient…. The sins of the parents will be visited upon their children because the parents have given them the stamp of their own lustful propensities.—Testimonies for the Church 2:391 (1870).
Satan Seeks to Debase Minds—I have been shown that Satan seeks to debase the minds of those who unite in marriage, that he may stamp his own hateful image upon their children….
He can mold their posterity much more readily than he could the parents, for he can so control the minds of the parents that through them he may give his own stamp of character to their children. Thus many children are born with the animal passions largely in the ascendancy while the moral faculties are but feebly developed.—Testimonies for the Church 2:480 (1870).
Reason Should Control Number of Children—Those who increase their number of children, when if they consulted reason, they must know that physical and mental weakness must be their inheritance, are transgressors of the last six precepts of God’s law…. They do their part in increasing the degeneracy of the race and in sinking society lower, thus injuring their neighbor. If God thus regards the rights of neighbors, has He no care in regard to closer and more sacred relationship? If not a sparrow falls to the ground without His notice, will He be unmindful of the children born into the world, diseased physically and mentally, suffering in a greater or less degree, all their lives? Will He not call parents to an account, to whom He has given reasoning powers, for putting these higher faculties in the background and becoming slaves to passion, when, as the result, generations must bear the mark of their physical, mental, and moral deficiencies?—Healthful Living, 30, 1865 (Part 2). (Selected Messages 2:424.)
Diminished Energy Transmitted—Men and women who have become sickly and diseased have often in their marriage connections selfishly thought only of their own happiness. They have not seriously considered the matter from the standpoint of noble, elevated principles, reasoning in regard to what they could expect of their posterity, but diminished energy of body and mind, which would not elevate society but sink it still lower.—Healthful Living, 28, 1865 (Part 2). (Selected Messages 2:423.)
Disease Passed From Generation to Generation—Sickly men have often won the affections of women apparently healthy, and because they loved each other, they felt themselves at perfect liberty to marry…. If those who thus enter the marriage relation were alone concerned, the sin would not be so great. Their offspring are compelled to be sufferers by disease transmitted to them. Thus disease has been perpetuated from generation to generation…. They have thrown upon society an enfeebled race, and done their part to deteriorate the race, by rendering disease hereditary, and thus accumulating human suffering.—Healthful Living, 28, 1865 (Part 2). (Selected Messages 2:423.)
Age Difference a Factor—Another cause of the deficiency of the present generation in physical strength and moral worth is men and women uniting in marriage whose ages widely differ…. The offspring of such unions in many cases, where ages widely differ, have not well-balanced minds. They have been deficient also in physical strength. In such families have frequently been manifested varied, peculiar, and often painful traits of character. They often die prematurely, and those who reach maturity, in many cases, are deficient in physical and mental strength and moral worth.
Thus a class of beings have been thrown upon the world as a burden to society. Their parents were accountable in a great degree for the characters developed by their children, which are transmitted from generation to generation.—Healthful Living, 29, 30, 1865 (Part 2). (Selected Messages 2:423, 424.)
God Will Hold Us Responsible for Prenatal Neglect—Women have not always followed the dictates of reason instead of impulse. They have not felt in a high degree the responsibilities resting upon them to form such life connections as would not enstamp upon their offspring a low degree of morals and a passion to gratify debased appetites at the expense of health, and even life. God will hold them accountable in a large degree for the physical health and moral characters thus transmitted to future generations….
Very many of this class have married and left for an inheritance to their offspring the taints of their own physical debility and depraved morals. The gratification of animal passions and gross sensuality have been the marked characters of their posterity, which have descended from generation to generation, increasing human misery to a fearful degree and hastening the depreciation of the race.—How to Live 2:27, 28 (1865). (Selected Messages 2:422, 423.)
https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/77.668#696
Dear Heavenly Father, Thank You for the privilege of daily dying to self and placing our will in Your power that we may be divinely guided by Your eye every day, especially when bringing another life and generation into the world. Thank You for Your Word and biblical advice, which encourages us in the total, true and right development of character and mind culture, resulting in whole-body vibrant health. Please bless us truly to contemplate the life of Jesus and to allow Your Word to develop within us that true religion, which ennobles the mind, refines the taste, sanctifies the judgment, and makes us partakers of the vibrant health, purity, and the holiness of Heaven. Because we ask all these in the Awesome name of Almighty Jesus the Christ, our Savior, we say Thank You and Amen.
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DID YOU KNOW THIS…? But the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the LORD exceedingly. —Genesis 13:13 KJV. [The WORD OF GOD—It’s the only flesh that is safe to eat (meditate on) to live forever!]
Do you feel sorrowful, disconnected—without a place to feel at home or useful? I pray this might show you the way forward. Watch…
https://www.youtube.com/live/2QB6fcwVuws?si=fsEvZU-rkI-BngfD
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FREE HEALTH TALK* open to the public Thursdays at 5pm at Country Life Natural Foods Store and Vegan/Vegetarian Restaurant, 1217 Eberhart Avenue, Columbus, GA. The topic for Thursday, May 28, “Natural Tips for High Blood Pressure” with Dr. Marvin Randall.
*Exception: $10 for cooking classes
WHGR 91.5 FM went LIVE noon on Thanksgiving Day 2025, for Hurtsboro (my childhood home town) and surrounding areas, including Tuskegee, Alabama.
If you want to support Christian radio programming for these final days, please visit
https://www.ucheepines.org/radio
Thank you!!!
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I coordinate wonderful health and worship events and conferences online and onsite as a gospel medical missionary at Uchee Pines, a total plant-based health retreat, where doctors and practitioners specialize in lifestyle medicine. For event details, visit https://www.ucheepines.org/events
Therefore, if at any time you fail to receive this post as a text, please visit
https://baiom.org/author/audreystovall/
where devotionals are first posted daily (almost without fail). From there devotionals are publicly shared to my page on FB, LinkedIn, and Signal (in My Story), and to a response-restricted group on WhatsApp (once again when I am able to find the time to successfully rebuild it).
NOTE: These began as daily texts to encourage my academy roommate and dear friend of nearly 50 years, until she suddenly passed March 2023. Now I continue to compile and send them to anyone who will receive them and to her family in honor of their mom. Lately, I have begun featuring consecutive chapter portions of a select Bible-based book.
If you agree to continue receiving them, then this is my personal gift to you; and in this way, I not only honor God but the memory of a very dear friend whom I desperately miss.
My personal prayer is that God will bless me to find ways to multiply this gift, so that we all may be encouraged to be found faithful in the sight of a Holy God, whenever Christ returns or our eyes are shut in the sleep of death.
It is a prayerful process that leads me to share from my personal study.
So please feel free to forward to your loved ones or to anyone, as God leads you. I’m calling them Barb’s Devotionals.