PH031 p.

6
God provided fruit in its natural state for our first parents. He gave Adam charge of the garden to dress it
and to care for it, saying, "To you it shall be for meat;" one animal shall not destroy another animal for
food. After the fall, the eating of flesh was suffered in order to shorten the period of the existence of the
long-lived race. It was allowed because of the hardness of the hearts of men. One of the great errors that
many insist upon is, that muscular strength is dependent upon animal food. But the simple grains, fruits of
the trees, and vegetables have all the nutritive properties necessary to make good blood. This a flesh diet
cannot do.

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An idea

Beware of making a work of Christ sinful. The one who does has consumed his Savior in the fires of his
own fanaticism. The laws of health are a sacred as the law of God, but they are written differently. The Law
of God may be summarized in two phrases, love to God first, and love to neighbors second. Man may never
be brought to a place where these maxims, explained by apostles and prophets, contradict themselves. The
Laws of Health state that love to God and love to man must control even the administration of our own
body temple.

It may be generally wrong to hit someone, because it is a violation of the second love principle. But there is
no commandment that says “do not hit a man” because it is not always true that hitting a man is not best.
The child requires correction that would be unkind if there was no correction involved. The laws of health,
if taken as a list of do’s and don’ts, may be well illustrated by the injunction “do not hit a man.” They are
truth generally, for most people in most places.

But stand back with head bowed before you make it a sin to walk across a lake in the middle of the night
when those hours should be spent sleeping. Do not lend an ear to one that would make an eleventh
commandment out of the principle that God originally gave Adam and Eve a diet with no flesh. You may
have reason to reevaluate your own self if you grow irritated when reminded that Jesus ate flesh. Do not
embroil yourself in an idea that would make a tempter of someone that fed thousands of people their
biggest meal, a protein meal at that, as the sun was setting. “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am
tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:” James 1:13. Jesus,
my Savior, obeyed ever and always the laws of His being. The question he asked, we should ask. Not “what
is generally best in most places so I can evade thinking about what is best here and now?” but “what is best
for these people and for my service for God, here, and best now?”

The laws of our being apply cause-and-effect reasoning and can never be stated as absolutes on issues
where different causes lead to effects that differ in their moral nature. Our fear of rationalizing away the
clearest counsel is merited, but no more so than a fear would be of making Jesus erring. He, the Light of the
World, was not just living up to all the light that He knew.