Men are seeking to bring those engaged in the different trades under bondage to certain unions. This is not God’s planning, but the planning of a power that we should in no wise acknowledge. God’s Word is fulfilling; the wicked are binding themselves up in bundles ready to be burned.
We are now to use all our entrusted capabilities in giving the last warning message to the world. In this work we are to preserve our individuality. We are not to unite with secret societies or with trade unions. We are to stand free in God, looking constantly to Christ for instruction. All our movements are to be made with a realization of the importance of the work to be accomplished for God. Lt 157, 1902
The work of the people of God is to prepare for the events of the future, which will soon come upon them with blinding force. In the world gigantic monopolies will be formed. Men will bind themselves together in unions that will wrap them in the folds of the enemy. A few men will combine to grasp all the means to be obtained in certain lines of business. Trades unions will be formed, and those who refuse to join these unions will be marked men....
The principles governing the forming of these unions seem innocent, but men have to pledge themselves to serve the interests of these unions, or else they may have to pay the penalty of refusal with their lives.
These unions are one of the signs of the last days. Men are binding up in bundles ready to be burned. They may be church members, but while they belong to these unions, they cannot possibly keep the commandments of God; for to belong to these unions means to disregard the entire decalogue.
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself” [Luke 10:27]. These words sum up the whole duty of man. They mean the consecration of the whole being, body, soul, and spirit, to God’s service. How can men obey these words, and at the same time pledge themselves to support that which deprives their neighbors of freedom of action? And how can men obey these words, and form combinations that rob the poorer classes of the advantages which justly belong to them, preventing them from buying or selling, except under certain conditions! How plainly the words of God have predicted this condition of things. John writes, “I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.... and he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name” [Revelation 13:11, 16, 17].
The forming of these unions is one of Satan’s last efforts. God calls upon His people to get out of the cities, isolating themselves from the world. The time will come when they will have to do this. God will care for those who love Him and keep His commandments. Lt 26, 1903, 2SM 142,143.
Those who claim to be the children of God are in no case to bind up with the labor unions that are formed or that shall be formed. This the Lord forbids. Cannot those who study the
prophecies see and understand what is before us? The transgressors of the law of God have taken sides with their leader, the general of rebellion. He understands how to devise his satanic schemes and through whom to work for the carrying out of them. He is striving to lead every soul to take sides with him, and under the influence of his temptations, thousands are binding themselves up in bundles, ready to be consumed by the fires of the last day. Those who yield to his temptation become in their turn tempters, standing among the ablest of his helpers.
In the time of the harvest the Lord will say to His reapers, “Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn” (Matthew 13:30). God has a people on the earth who will see the evil of every phase of oppression, and will refuse to unite with the enemy in carrying out his plans. Lt 201, 1902
The trades unions and confederacies of the world are a snare. Keep out of them and away from them, brethren. Have nothing to do with them... It is time, brethren, that we heeded the testimonies sent us in mercy and love from the Lord of heaven. GCB April 6, 1903
Cast out of heaven, Satan set up his kingdom in this world, and ever since, he has been untiringly striving to seduce human beings from their allegiance to God. He uses the same power that he used in heaven,—the influence of mind on mind. Men become tempters of their fellowmen. The strong, corrupting sentiments of Satan are cherished, and they exert a masterly, compelling power. Under the influence of these sentiments, men bind up with one another in confederacies, in trades unions, and in secret societies. There are at work in the world agencies that God will not much longer tolerate. Lt 114, 1903
The wicked are being bound up in bundles, bound up in trusts, in unions, in confederacies. Let us have nothing to do with these organizations. God is our Ruler, our Governor, and He calls us to come out from the world and be separate. “Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing” [2 Corinthians 6:17]. If we refuse to do this, if we continue to link up with the world, and to look at every matter from a worldly standpoint, we shall become like the world. When worldly policy and worldly ideas govern our transactions, we cannot stand on the high and holy platform of eternal truth.
God promises that if we will separate ourselves from the world, He will receive us, and will be a Father unto us, and we shall be His sons and daughters, Shall we not separate ourselves from the world, and claim this sacred relationship now, that when our Father comes He may acknowledge us as His children? Ms 71, 1903
And the trades unions will be one of the agencies that will bring upon this earth a time of trouble such as has not been since the world began. Lt 200, 1903.
The time is fast coming when the controlling power of the labor unions will be very
oppressive. Again and again the Lord has instructed that our people are to take their families away from the cities, into the country, where they can raise their own provisions; for in the future the problem of buying and selling will be a very serious one. We should now begin to heed the instruction given us over and over again: Get out of the cities into rural districts, where the houses are not crowded closely together, and where you will be free from the interference of enemies. 2SM 141.
Satanic agencies are becoming more determined in their rebellion against God. The trades unions will be the cause of the most terrible violence that has ever been seen among human beings. . CSPLUC 10
The wickedness that is being revealed in the cities ...shows that the world is fast becoming as it was before the flood. The union men who have struck for higher wages, by their destruction of property, and their attempts to destroy life, are plainly showing to what a pass men will come who are determined to carry out their own plans regardless of others. CSPLUC 12
Through the working of trusts and the results of labor unions and strikes, the conditions of life in the city are constantly becoming more and more difficult. Serious troubles are before us, and for many families removal from the cities will become a necessity. MH 364
Those who claim to be the children of God are in no case to bind up with the labor unions that are formed or that shall be formed. This the Lord forbids. Cannot those who study the prophecies see and understand what is before us? CL 12
