Chapter 6—The Consequence of Violating Natural Law
72. Proportionately as nature's laws are transgressed, mind and soul become enfeebled.... Physical suffering of every type is seen.... Suffering must follow this course of action. The vital force of the system cannot bear up under the tax placed upon it, and it finally breaks down.—Unpublished Testimonies, August 30, 1896.HL 24.1
Cause of Sickness
73. Every misuse of any part of our organism is a violation of the law which God designs shall govern us in these matters; and by violating this law, human beings corrupt themselves. Sickness, disease of every kind, ruined constitutions, premature decay, untimely deaths,—these are a result of a violation of nature's laws.—Unpublished Testimonies, August 30, 1896.HL 24.2
74. Sickness is caused by violating the laws of health; it is the result of violating nature's laws.—Testimonies for the Church 3:164.HL 24.3
75. The gloom and despondency supposed to be the result of obedience to God's moral law are often attributable to disregard of physical laws.—The Signs of the Times, June 15, 1882.HL 24.4
Diseased Souls
76. Everything that conflicts with natural law creates a diseased condition of the soul.—The Review and Herald, January 25, 1881.HL 24.5
77. The moral powers are weakened because men and women will not live in obedience to the laws of health, and make this great subject a personal duty.—Testimonies for the Church 3:140.HL 25.1
We Reap What We Sow
78. The Lord has made it a part of his plan that man's reaping shall be according to his sowing. And this is the explanation of the misery and suffering in our world, which is charged back upon God. The man who serves himself, and makes a god of his stomach, will reap that which is the sure result of the violation of nature's laws. He who abuses any organ of the body to gratify lustful appetites and debased passions will bear testimony to the same in his countenance. He has sown to fleshly lusts, and he will just as surely realize the consequence. He is like a hunted being; he is a slave to passion, the chains of which he is unwilling to break. And at last he is left of God, without conviction, without mercy, without hope, to destroy himself. He is left to the natural processes of corrupting practises which degrade him beneath the brute creation. His sinfulness has ruined the mechanism of the living machinery, and nature's laws, transgressed, become his tormentors.—Unpublished Testimonies, May 19, 1897.HL 25.2
Control of Will
79. Satan knows that he cannot overcome man unless he can control his will. He can do this by deceiving men so they will co-operate with him in transgressing the laws of nature, which is transgression of the law of God.—Unpublished Testimonies, January 11, 1897.HL 25.3
Satan Taunting God
80. The results which Satan has, through his specious temptations, brought about, he uses to taunt God with. He presents before God the appearance of the human being whom Christ has purchased as his property. And what an unsightly representation of his Maker! God is dishonored, because man has corrupted his ways before the Lord.—Unpublished Testimonies, January 11, 1897.HL 25.4
81. One human being becomes Satan's copartner to tempt, allure, and deceive his fellow men to vicious practises; and the sure result is diseased bodies, because of the violation of moral law. “Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” It is Satan's determined purpose to deceive the human family so that he can bring them as a mass on his side, to work with him in making void the law of God. Thus he finds agencies which multiply his efficiency. And as they do this, he rules them with a rod of iron. And not only the human race, but the brute creation also are made to suffer through Satan's attributes wrought out through the human agent.—Unpublished Testimonies, January 11, 1897.HL 26.1