Section 12—Problems in Adjustment
Chapter 60—Conflict and Conformity (Part 3)
Custom Is at War With Nature—Our artificial civilization is encouraging evils destructive of sound principles. Custom and fashion are at war with nature. The practices they enjoin and the indulgences they foster are steadily lessening both physical and mental strength and bringing upon the race an intolerable burden. Intemperance and crime, disease and wretchedness, are everywhere.—The Ministry of Healing, 125, 126 (1905).
When Principle Is Not Violated, Follow Custom—When the practices of the people do not come in conflict with the law of God, you may conform to them. If the workers fail to do this, they will not only hinder their own work, but they will place stumbling blocks in the way of those for whom they labor and hinder them from accepting the truth.—The Review and Herald, April 6, 1911.
I beg of our people to walk carefully and circumspectly before God. Follow the customs in dress as far as they conform to health principles. Let our sisters dress plainly, as many do, having the dress of good, durable material, appropriate for this age, and let not the dress question fill the mind. Our sisters should dress with simplicity. They should clothe themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety. Give the world a living illustration of the inward adorning of the grace of God.—Manuscript 167, 1897. (Child Guidance, 414.)
Separate From Worldly Customs—As God made known His will to the Hebrew captives, to those who were most separate from the customs and practices of a world lying in wickedness, so will the Lord communicate light from heaven to all who will appreciate a “Thus saith the Lord.” To them He will express His mind. Those who are least bound up with worldly ideas, are the most separate from display and vanity and pride and love of promotion, who stand forth as His peculiar people, zealous of good works—to these He will reveal the meaning of His word.—Letter 60, 1898. (Counsels to Writers and Editors, 101, 102.)
Reason for Nonconformity (a message to believers)—Why, as professing Christians, are we so mixed and mingled with the world till we lose sight of eternity, till we lose sight of Jesus Christ, and till we lose sight of the Father? Why, I ask you, are there so many families destitute of the Spirit of God? Why are there so many families that have so little of the life and love and likeness of Jesus Christ? It is because they do not know God. If they knew God, and if they would behold Him by faith in Jesus Christ, who came to our world to die for man, they would see such matchless charms in the Son that they by beholding would become changed to the same image. Now you see the wrong of conforming to the world.—Manuscript 12, 1894.
True Principles Circulating Through Entire System—Conformity to the world can be prevented by the truth, by feeding on the Word of God, by its principles circulating through the entire life current and working out that word in the character. Christ exhorts us by the apostle John to “love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). This is plain language, but it is God’s measure of every man’s character.—Manuscript 37, 1896.
https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/78.951#980
Dear Heavenly Father, Thank You for the divine privilege to be transformed into your image. Please bless us with discernment and determination to be guided by You alone. Please bless us to overcome all hereditary and cultivated tendecies to sin and to trust You, regardless of circumstances. Please grant to us that strength of abiding faith. Teach us how to submit to and trust Your Holy Spirit to work within us to love and show mercy and compassion toward others, according to Your divine purpose. Through the power of Your Holy Spirit, please bless us to be all You would have us be, and grant to us the mind and love and faith of Jesus that others might be drawn to You through how we live and what we say, especially in the most trying of circumstances. Because we ask all these in the Awesome name of Your Son, Almighty Jesus the Christ, our Savior, we say Thank You and Amen.
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DID YOU KNOW THIS…?
And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.— Romans 12:2 KJV —The WORD OF GOD—It’s the only flesh that is safe to eat (meditate on) to live forever!]
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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.
TThursday, October 15: “Dealing with Tinnitus (Ringing in the Ear)”
*Exception: $10 for any cooking class
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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.