While speaking in meeting Sunday afternoon, I could scarcely refrain from calling your names and relating some things which had been shown me. I saw that Brother D did not occupy that position in his family which God would have him. Sister D takes the lead; she possesses a strong will, which has not been subdued as God requires; and in order to please his wife and keep her from despondency, Brother D has yielded to her. Her judgment has swayed him, and he has not been a free man for years.
(1T 707.1)
MC
VC
When Brother D first engaged in the work of teaching the truth, he was little in his own eyes, and God used him as His instrument. But I saw that for some time in the past he has not humbled himself under the hand of God. He has trusted to his own wisdom and weak judgment, and Satan has been obtaining an advantage over him. Instead of relying solely upon God, and staying himself upon His strength, he has had his judgment perverted by the influence of his wife. She has stood in a position to see, to hear, to understand, all that was going on around her. Did she possess a sanctified judgment and heavenly wisdom, then would she see through sanctified eyes, and hear through sanctified ears. She would make a right use of her eyes and ears. She has not done this. “Who is blind, but My servant? or deaf, as My messenger that I sent?”Isaiah 42:19. God does not wish us to hear all that is to be heard, or to see all that is to be seen. It is a great blessing to close the ears, that we hear not, and the eyes, that we see not. The greatest anxiety should be to have clear eyesight to discern our own shortcomings, and a quick ear to catch all needed reproof and instruction, lest by our inattention and carelessness we let them slip and become forgetful hearers and not doers of the work.
(1T 707.2)
MC
VC