Adventist Home - Chapter 79 -83/84 READ IN OWN TIME FOR FULL PICTURE

Chapter 79 – Recreation is Essential

To Refresh the Spirits and Invigorate the Body. -- It is the privilege and duty of Christians to seek to
refresh their spirits and invigorate their bodies by innocent recreation, with the purpose of using their
physical and mental powers to the glory of God. Our recreations should not be scenes of senseless
mirth, taking the form of the nonsensical. We can conduct them in such a manner as will benefit and
elevate those with whom we associate, and better qualify us and them to more successfully attend to
the duties devolving upon us as Christians.

Care needs to be exercised in regard to the regulation of hours for sleeping and laboring. We must
take periods of rest, periods of recreation, periods for contemplation. . . . The principles of temperance
have a wider range than many think. {AH 494.4}

Chap. Eighty - What Shall We Play?

While we restrain our children from worldly pleasures that have a tendency to corrupt and mislead,
we ought to provide them innocent recreation, to lead them in pleasant paths where there is no danger.
No child of God need have a sad or mournful experience. Divine commands, divine promises, show that
this is so. Wisdom's ways "are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace."

{AH 498.3}

While we shun the false and artificial, discarding horse racing, card playing, lotteries, prize fights,
liquor drinking, and tobacco using, we must supply sources of pleasure that are pure and noble and
elevating. {AH 499.1}

Yellow Highlights one complete thought, avoid taking input if possible

The Useful Place of the Gymnasium.--Gymnastic exercises fill a useful place in many schools, but
without careful supervision they are often carried to excess. In the gymnasium many youth, by their
attempted feats of strength, have done themselves lifelong injury. {AH 499.2}

Exercise in a gymnasium, however well conducted, cannot supply the place of recreation in the open
air, and for this our schools should afford better opportunity. {AH 499.3}

Games With a Ball--Basic Guiding Principles.--I do not condemn the simple exercise of playing ball;
but this, even in its simplicity, may be overdone. {AH 499.4}

I shrink always from the almost sure result which follows in the wake of these amusements. It leads
to an outlay of means that should be expended in bringing the light of truth to souls that are perishing
out of Christ. The amusements and expenditures of means for self-pleasing, which lead on step by step
to self-glorifying, and the educating in these games for pleasure produce a love and passion for such
things that is not favorable to the perfection of Christian character. {AH 499.5}

Some of the most popular amusements, such as football(possibly American) and boxing, have become
schools of brutality. They are developing the same characteristics as did the games of ancient Rome. The
love of domination, the pride in mere brute force, the reckless disregard of life, are exerting upon the
youth a power to demoralize that is appalling. {AH 500.3}

Other athletic games, though not so brutalizing, are scarcely less objectionable because of the excess
to which they are carried. They stimulate the love of pleasure and excitement, thus fostering a distaste
for useful labor, a disposition to shun practical duties and responsibilities. They tend to destroy a relish
for life's sober realities and its tranquil enjoyments. Thus the door is opened to dissipation and
lawlessness with their terrible results. {AH 500.4}

Family Outings.--Let several families living in a city or village unite and leave the occupations which have
taxed them physically and mentally, and make an excursion into the country, to the side of a fine lake, or
to a nice grove where the scenery of nature is beautiful. They should provide themselves with plain,
hygienic food, the very best fruits and grains, and spread their table under the shade of some tree or
under the canopy of heaven. The ride, the exercise, and the scenery will quicken the appetite, and they
can enjoy a repast which kings might envy. On such occasions parents and children should feel free
from care, labor, and perplexity. Parents should become children with their children, making everything
as pleasant for them as possible. Let the whole day be given to recreation. Exercise in the open air for
those whose employment has been within doors and sedentary will be beneficial to health. All who can
should feel it a duty to pursue this course. Nothing will be lost, but much gained. They can return to
their occupations with new life and new courage to engage in their labor with zeal, and they are better
prepared to resist disease. {AH 502.1}

Chap. Eighty-One - Recreation that Yields Enduring Satisfactions

Exercise That Develops Hand, Mind, and Character.--The greatest benefit is not gained from exercise
that is taken as play or exercise merely. There is some benefit derived from being in the fresh air and
also from the exercise of the muscles; but let the same amount of energy be given to the performance
of helpful duties, and the benefit will be greater, and a feeling of satisfaction will be realized; for such
exercise carries with it the sense of helpfulness and the approval of conscience for duty well done.
{AH 506.1}

No recreation helpful only to themselves will prove so great a blessing to the children and youth as
that which makes them helpful to others. Naturally enthusiastic and impressible, the young are quick to
respond to suggestion. {AH 506.3}

A change from physical labor that has taxed the strength severely may be very necessary for a time,
that they may again engage in labor, putting forth exertion with greater success. But entire rest may not
be necessary or even be attended with the best results so far as their physical strength is concerned.
They need not, even when weary with one kind of labor, trifle away their precious moments. They may
then seek to do something not so exhausting but which will be a blessing to their mother and sisters. In
lightening their cares by taking upon themselves the roughest burdens they have to bear, they can find
that amusement which springs from principle and which will yield them true happiness, and their time
will not be spent in trifling or in selfish indulgence. Their time may be ever employed to advantage, and
they be constantly refreshed with variation, and yet be redeeming the time so that every moment will
tell with good account to someone. {AH 507.4}

……………..
 Part of each day was spent in useful work, the students learning how to clear the land, how to
cultivate the soil and to build houses in time that would otherwise have been spent in playing games
and seeking amusement. And the Lord blessed the students who thus devoted their time to learning
lessons of usefulness. {AH 508.4}

Missionary Activity Is an Ideal Exercise. --There are plenty of necessary, useful things to do in our
world that would make the pleasure amusement exercise almost wholly unnecessary. Brain, bone, and
muscle will acquire solidity and strength in using them to a purpose, doing good, hard thinking, and
devising plans which shall train them to develop powers of intellect and strength of the physical organs,
which will be putting into practical use their God-given talents with which they may glorify God. {AH
509.3} (K.C. insert farming is a good exercise but we might not be able to do within the confines of
University ,so the GYM may play its role, though possibility exists we could try to think other forms of
useful exercise)

………………..

The same power of exercise of mind and muscle might invent ways and means of altogether a higher
class of exercise, in doing missionary work which would make them laborers together with God, and
would be educating for higher usefulness in the present life, in doing useful work, which is a most
essential branch in education. . . . {AH 509.5}

Chap. Eighty-Two - How the Christian Chooses His Recreation

Any amusement in which you can engage asking the blessing of God upon it in faith will not be
dangerous. But any amusement which disqualifies you for secret prayer, for devotion at the altar of
prayer, or for taking part in the prayer meeting is not safe, but dangerous. {AH 513.3}

… There has been a class of social gatherings in -----, . . . parties of pleasure that have been a disgrace
to our institutions and to the church. They encourage pride of dress, pride of appearance, self-
gratification, hilarity, and trifling. Satan is entertained as an honored guest, and he takes possession of
those who patronize these gatherings. {AH 514.3}

A view of one such company was presented to me, where were assembled those who profess to
believe the truth. One was seated at the instrument of music, and such songs were poured forth as
made the watching angels weep. There was mirth, there was coarse laughter, there was abundance of
enthusiasm and a kind of inspiration; but the joy was such as Satan only is able to create. This is an
enthusiasm and infatuation of which all who love God will be ashamed. It prepares the participants for
unholy thought and action.

Many such gatherings have been presented to me. I have seen the gaiety, the display in dress, the
personal adornment. All want to be thought brilliant, and give themselves up to hilarity, foolish jesting,
cheap, coarse flattery, and uproarious laughter. The eyes sparkle, the cheek is flushed, conscience
sleeps. With eating and drinking and merrymaking, they do their best to forget God. The scene of
pleasure is their paradise. {AH 515.1}

Gatherings for amusement confuse faith and make the motive mixed and uncertain. The Lord accepts
no divided heart. He wants the whole man. {AH 515.2}
 A Clear Declaration of Christian Principles.--If you truly belong to Christ, you will have opportunities
for witnessing for Him. You will be invited to attend places of amusement, and then it will be that you
will have an opportunity to testify to your Lord. If you are true to Christ then, you will not try to form
excuses for your nonattendance, but will plainly and modestly declare that you are a child of God, and
your principles would not allow you to be in a place, even for one occasion, where you could not
invite the presence of your Lord. {AH 519.2}

Chap. Eighty-Three - The Lure of Pleasure

Satan, a Skillful Charmer.--The young generally conduct themselves as though the precious hours of
probation, while mercy lingers, were one grand holiday and they were placed in this world merely for
their own amusement, to be gratified with a continued round of excitement. Satan has been making
special efforts to lead them to find happiness in worldly amusements and to justify themselves by
endeavoring to show that these amusements are harmless, innocent, and even important for health.
{AH 523.1}