True are the words that "a thoroughgoing Christian draws his motives of action from his deep heart love for his Master."—"Ministry of Healing," p. 490. And, upspringing from the roots of this affection for Christ will come the fruitage of all unselfish service for one's fellows. Upon the worker for Christ then,—whether minister, teacher, physician, nurse, or of whatever calling,—there rests the necessity of exalting Jesus, else, instead of contemplating His love and lofty ideals, we shall fix' our ambitions on the "things of this life."
"Without Me ye can do nothing," admonished Jesus. If, therefore, we are hoping to do something worthwhile for Him, it will be only as He abides within—when His light, His love, and His characteristics, illuminate our own hearts and radiate to all who come into contact with us.
All too often the temptation comes to those engaged in the Master's service to fix their eyes upon financial earnings and show of affluence—the externals which are accepted as a badge or mark of the worldling. But whenever the badge of our distinction and separation from the world is hidden under these things, we lose the power of our real authority. It is not the power of oratory, the garb of the wealthy, or the degrees bestowed by men—not the popularity of position, prestige, or money, or the acclamation of our associates—that is to be our distinction, but "My spirit, saith the Lord of hosts."
"Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches ; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord which exercise loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth : for in these things I delight, saith the Lord." Jer. 9 :23, 24.
The Invisible Uniform
I like the following statement by Dr. Arthur T. McCormack, expressed in his presidential address delivered before the American Public Health Association at their sixty-sixth annual meeting, New York City, October 7, 1937:
"I invite you, one and all, to join me in a reconsecration of ourselves in that spirit of service which the Great Master so nobly exemplified, remembering always that the Great Physician was also the Great Teacher, the Great Social Worker, the Great Laborer, and the Great Humanitarian—one who considered nothing foreign to Him which affected in any regard the welfare and happiness of mankind. I invite you to wear with me an invisible uniform, yet one which, whether worn by us or by those engaged in the great allied services, will be universally recognized as the uniform of an army battling for humanity—that men may have sounder minds in sounder bodies and thus be enabled to labor, to reason, to live, and to produce, more happily, more effectively, and more abundantly."
I think that this statement regarding the "invisible uniform" should be kept uppermost in the mind of every Seventh-day Adventist physician and health worker. It is that unseen badge of distinction, that identification which should mark all our activities, and not those present ambitions which so frequently motivate not alone the medical profession, but other professions as well. I believe that these are the principles that Heaven would have us utilize in developing and promulgating the great principles of health reform—the representation and the direction of the great Master Teacher.
"It is not by inherent power that year by year the earth yields its bounties and continues its march around the sun. The hand of the Infinite One is perpetually at work in guiding this planet." In God "we live, and move, and have our being." "It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps."
These statements indicate how necessary it is that God should guide, and that His power should control. Then by this means we may be qualified to wear that "invisible uniform" to which the doctor refers, which truly identifies the thoroughgoing Christian.
