Bible Believing Fundamentalist

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THE CHRISTIAN’S SECRET

OF A HAPPY LIFE

BY HANNAH WHITALL SMITH

Quaker, rebel, realist—faced life as she found it, and she found it

good. She took her Bible promises literally, tested them, and found

them true as tested steel. She stepped out of conjecture into certainty,

and the shadows disappeared. Here she reveals the secret—how to

make unhappiness and uncertainty give way to serenity and

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CONTENTS

Psalm

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PREFACE

This is not a theological book. I frankly confess I have not been trained in

theological schools, and do not understand their methods nor their terms.

But the Lord has taught me experimentally and practically certain lessons

out of his Word, which have greatly helped me in my Christian life, and

have made it a very happy one. And I want to tell my secret, in the best way

I can, in order that some others may be helped into a happy life also.

I do not seek to change the theological views of a single individual. I dare

say most of my readers know far more about theology than I do myself,

and perhaps may discover abundance of what will seem to be theological

mistakes. But let me ask that these may be overlooked, and that my reader

will try, instead, to get at the experimental point of that which I have tried to

say, and if that is practical and helpful, forgive the blundering way in which

it is expressed. I have tried to reach the absolute truth which lies at the

foundation of all “creeds” and “views,” and to bring the soul into those

personal relations with God which must exist alike in every form of

religion, let the expression of them differ as they may.

I have committed my book to the Lord, and have asked Him to counteract

all in it that is wrong, and to let only that which is true find entrance into any

heart. It is sent out in tender sympathy and yearning love for all the

struggling, weary ones in the Church of Christ, and its message goes right

from my heart to theirs. I have given the best I have, and could do no more.

May the blessed Holy Spirit use it to teach some of my readers the true

secret of a happy life!

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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTORY

GOD’S SIDE AND MAN’S SIDE

In introducing this subject of the life and walk of faith, I desire, at the very

outset, to clear away one misunderstanding which very commonly arises in

reference to the teaching of it, and which effectually hinders a clear

apprehension of such teaching. This misunderstanding comes from the fact

that the two sides of the subject are rarely kept in view at the same time.

People see distinctly the way in which one side is presented, and, dwelling

exclusively upon this, without even a thought of any other, it is no wonder

that distorted views of the whole matter are the legitimate consequence.

Now there are two very decided and distinct sides to this subject, and, like

all other subjects, it cannot be fully understood unless both of these sides

are kept constantly in view. I refer, of course, to God’s side and man’s side;

or, in other words, to God’s part in the work of sanctification, and man’s

part. These are very distinct and even contrastive, but are not contradictory;

though, to a cursory observer, they sometimes look so.

This was very strikingly illustrated to me not long ago. There were two

teachers of this higher Christian life holding meetings in the same place, at

alternate hours. One spoke only of God’s part in the work, and the other

dwelt exclusively upon man’s part. They were both in perfect sympathy

with one another, and realized fully that they were each teaching different

sides of the same great truth; and this also was understood by a large

proportion of their hearers. But with some of the hearers it was different,

and one lady said to me, in the greatest perplexity, “I cannot understand it at

all. Here are two preachers undertaking to teach just the same truth, and yet

to me they seem flatly to contradict one another.” And I felt at the time that

she expressed a puzzle which really causes a great deal of difficulty in the

minds of many honest inquirers after this truth.

Suppose two friends go to see some celebrated building, and return home to

describe it. One has seen only the north side, and the other only the south.

The first says, “The building was built in such a manner, and has such and

such stories and ornaments.” “Oh, no!” says the other, interrupting him,

“you are altogether mistaken; I saw the building, and it was built in quite a

different manner, and its ornaments and stories were so and so.” A lively

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dispute would probably follow upon the truth of the respective descriptions,

until the two friends discover that they have been describing different sides

of the building, and then all is reconciled at once.

I would like to state as clearly as I can what I judge to be the two distinct

sides in this matter; and to show how the looking at one without seeing the

other, will be sure to create wrong impressions and views of the truth.

To state it in brief, I would just say that man’s part is to trust and God’s part

is to work; and it can be seen at a glance how contrastive these two parts

are, and yet not necessarily contradictory. I mean this. There is a certain

work to be accomplished. We are to be delivered from the power of sin,

and are to be made perfect in every good work to do the will of God.

“Beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord,” we are to be actually

“changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of

the Lord.” We are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds, that we

may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. A real

work is to be wrought in us and upon us. Besetting sins are to be

conquered. Evil habits are to be overcome. Wrong dispositions and feelings

are to be rooted out, and holy tempers and emotions are to be begotten. A

positive transformation is to take place. So at least the Bible teaches. Now

somebody must do this. Either we must do it for ourselves, or another

must do it for us. We have most of us tried to do it for ourselves at first,

and have grievously failed; then we discover from the Scriptures and from

our own experience that it is a work we are utterly unable to do for

ourselves, but that the Lord Jesus Christ has come on purpose to do it, and

that He will do it for all who put themselves wholly into His hand, and trust

Him to do it. Now under these circumstances, what is the part of the

believer, and what is the part of the Lord? Plainly the believer can do

nothing but trust; while the Lord, in whom he trusts, actually does the work

intrusted to Him. Trusting and doing are certainly contrastive things, and

often contradictory; but are they contradictory in this case? Manifestly not,

because it is two different parties that are concerned. If we should say of

one party in a transaction that he trusted his case to another, and yet attended

to it himself, we should state a contradiction and an impossibility. But when

we say of two parties in a transaction that one trusts the other to do

something, and that that other goes to work and does it, we are making a

statement that is perfectly simple and harmonious. When we say, therefore,

that in this higher life, man’s part is to trust, and that God does the thing

intrusted to Him, we do not surely present any very difficult or puzzling

problem.

The preacher who is speaking on man’s part in this matter cannot speak of

anything but surrender and trust, because this is positively all the man can

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do. We all agree about this. And yet such preachers are constantly criticised

as though, in saying this, they had meant to imply there was no other part,

and that therefore nothing but trusting is done. And the cry goes out that this

doctrine of faith does away with all realities, that souls are just told to trust,

and that is the end of it, and they sit down thenceforward in a sort of

religious easy-chair, dreaming away a life fruitless of any actual results. All

this misapprehension arises, of course, from the fact that either the preacher

has neglected to state, or the hearer has failed to hear, the other side of the

matter; which is, that when we trust, the Lord works, and that a great deal is

done, not by us, but by Him. Actual results are reached by our trusting,

because our Lord undertakes the thing trusted to Him, and accomplishes it.

We do not do anything, but He does it; and it is all the more effectually

done because of this. The puzzle as to the preaching of faith disappears

entirely as soon as this is clearly seen.

On the other hand, the preacher who dwells on God’s side of the question is

criticised on a totally different ground. He does not speak of trust, for the

Lord’s part is not to trust, but to work. The Lord does the thing intrusted to

Him. He disciplines and trains the soul by inward exercises and outward

providences. He brings to bear all the resources of His wisdom and love

upon the refining and purifying of that soul. He makes everything in the life

and circumstances of such a one subservient to the one great purpose of

making him grow in grace, and of conforming him, day by day and hour

by hour, to the image of Christ. He carries him through a process of

transformation, longer or shorter, as his peculiar case may require, making

actual and experimental the results for which the soul has trusted. We have

to reckon ourselves “dead unto sin.” The Lord makes this a reality, and

leads us to victory over self, by the daily and hourly discipline of His

providences. Our reckoning is available only because God thus makes it

real. And yet the preacher who dwells upon this practical side of the matter,

and tells of God’s processes for making faith’s reckonings experimental

realities, is accused of contradicting the preaching of faith altogether, and of

declaring only a process of gradual sanctification by works, and of setting

before the soul an impossible and hopeless task.

Now, sanctification is both a sudden step of faith, and also a gradual

process of works. It is a step as far as we are concerned; it is a process as to

God’s part. By a step of faith we get into Christ; by a process we are made

to grow up unto Him in all things. By a step of faith we put ourselves into

the hands of the Divine Potter; by a gradual process He makes us into a

vessel unto His own honor, meet for His use, and prepared to every good

work.

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To illustrate all this: suppose I were to be describing to a person, who was

entirely ignorant of the subject, the way in which a lump of clay is made

into a beautiful vessel. I tell him first the part of the clay in the matter, and

all I can say about this is, that the clay is put into the potter’s hands, and

then lies passive there, submitting itself to all the turnings and overturnings

of the potter’s hands upon it. There is really nothing else to be said about the

clay’s part. But could my hearer argue from this that nothing else is done,

because I say that this is all the clay can do? If he is an intelligent hearer, he

will not dream of doing so, but will say, “I understand. This is what the

clay must do; but what must the potter do?” “Ah,” I answer, “now we

come to the important part. The potter takes the clay thus abandoned to his

working, and begins to mould and fashion it according to his own will. He

kneads and works it, he tears it apart and presses it together again, he wets it

and then suffers it to dry. Sometimes he works at it for hours together,

sometimes he lays it aside for days and does not touch it. And then, when

by all these processes he has made it perfectly pliable in his hands, he

proceeds to make it up into the vessel he has purposed. He turns it upon the

wheel, planes it and smooths it, and dries it in the sun, bakes it in the oven,

and finally turns it out of his workshop, a vessel to his honor and fit for his

use.”

Will my hearer be likely now to say that I am contradicting myself; that a

little while ago I had said the clay had nothing to do but lie passive in the

potter’s hands, and that now I am putting upon it a great work which it is

not able to perform; and that to make itself into such a vessel is an

impossible and hopeless undertaking? Surely not. For he will see that, while

before I was speaking of the clay’s part in the matter, I am now speaking of

the potter’s part, and that these two are necessarily contrastive, but not in the

least contradictory, and that the clay is not expected to do the potter’s work,

but only to yield itself up to his working.

Nothing, it seems to me, could be clearer than the perfect harmony between

these two apparently contradictory sorts of teaching on this subject. What

can be said about man’s part in this great work, but that he must continually

surrender himself and continually trust?

But when we come to God’s side of the question, what is there that may not

be said as to the manifold and wonderful ways in which He accomplishes

the work intrusted to Him? It is here that the growing comes in. The lump

of clay would never grow into a beautiful vessel if it stayed in the clay-pit

for thousands of years. But once put into the hands of a skillful potter, and,

under his fashioning, it grows rapidly into a vessel to his honor. And so the

soul, abandoned to the working of the Heavenly Potter, is changed rapidly

from glory to glory into the image of the Lord by His Spirit.

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Having, therefore, taken the step of faith by which you have put yourself

wholly and absolutely into His hands, you must now expect Him to begin

to work. His way of accomplishing that which you have intrusted to Him

may be different from your way. But He knows, and you must be satisfied.

I knew a lady who had entered into this life of faith with a great outpouring

of the Spirit, and a wonderful flood of light and joy. She supposed, of

course, this was a preparation for some great service, and expected to be put

forth immediately into the Lord’s harvest field. Instead of this, almost at

once her husband lost all his money, and she was shut up in her own house,

to attend to all sorts of domestic duties, with no time or strength left for any

Gospel work at all. She accepted the discipline, and yielded herself up as

heartily to sweep, and dust, and bake, and sew, as she would have done to

preach, or pray or write for the Lord. And the result was that through this

very training He made her into a vessel “meet for the Master’s use, and

prepared unto every good work.”

Another lady, who had entered this life of faith under similar circumstances

of wondrous blessing, and who also expected to be sent out to do some

great work, was shut up with two peevish invalid nieces, to nurse, and

humor, and amuse them all day long. Unlike the first lady, this one did not

accept the training, but chafed and fretted, and finally rebelled, lost all her

blessing, and went back into a state of sad coldness and misery. She had

understood her part of trusting to begin with, but not understanding the

divine process of accomplishing that for which she had trusted, she took

herself out of the hands of the Heavenly Potter, and the vessel was marred

on the wheel.

I believe many a vessel has been similarly marred by a want of

understanding these things. The maturity of Christian experience cannot be

reached in a moment, but is the result of the work of God’s Holy Spirit,

who, by His energizing and transforming power, causes us to grow up into

Christ in all things. And we cannot hope to reach this maturity in any other

way than by yielding ourselves up utterly and willingly to His mighty

working. But the sanctification the Scriptures urge as a present experience

upon all believers does not consist in maturity of growth, but in purity of

heart, and this may be as complete in the babe in Christ as in the veteran

believer.

The lump of clay, from the moment it comes under the transforming hand

of the potter, is, during each day and each hour of the process, just what the

potter wants it to be at that hour or on that day, and therefore pleases him.

But it is very far from being matured into the vessel he intends in the future

to make it.

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The little babe may be all that a babe could be, or ought to be, and may

therefore perfectly please its mother, and yet it is very far from being what

that mother would wish it to be when the years of maturity shall come.

The apple in June is a perfect apple for June. It is the best apple that June

can produce. But it is very different from the apple in October, which is a

perfected apple.

God’s works are perfect in every stage of their growth. Man’s works are

never perfect until they are in every respect complete.

All that we claim then in this life of sanctification is, that by a step of faith

we put ourselves into the hands of the Lord, for Him to work in us all the

good pleasure of His will; and that by a continuous exercise of faith we

keep ourselves there. This is our part in the matter. And when we do it, and

while we do it, we are, in the Scripture sense, truly pleasing to God,

although it may require years of training and discipline to mature us into a

vessel that shall be in all respects to His honor, and fitted to every good

work.

Our part is the trusting, it is His to accomplish the results. And when we do

our part, He never fails to do His, for no one ever trusted in the Lord and

was confounded. Do not be afraid, then, that if you trust, or tell others to

trust, the matter will end there. Trust is only the beginning and the continual

foundation; when we trust, the Lord works, and His work is the important

part of the whole matter. And this explains that apparent paradox which

puzzles so many. They say, “In one breath you tell us to do nothing but

trust, and in the next you tell us to do impossible things. How can you

reconcile such contradictory statements?” They are to be reconciled just as

we reconcile the statements concerning a saw in a carpenter’s shop, when

we say at one moment that the saw has sawn asunder a log, and the next

moment declare that the carpenter has done it. The saw is the instrument

used, the power that uses it is the carpenter’s. And so we, yielding

ourselves unto God, and our members as instruments of righteousness unto

Him, find that He works in us to will and to do of His good pleasure; and

we can say with Paul, “I labored; yet not I, but the grace of God which was

2:10.) And in fact, when we come to look at it, only God, who created us at

first, can re-create us, for He alone understands the “work of His own

hands.” All efforts after self-creating, result in the marring of the vessel,

and no soul can ever reach its highest fulfillment except through the

working of Him who “worketh all things after the counsel of His own

will.”

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In this book I shall of course dwell mostly upon man’s side in the matter,

as I am writing for man, and in the hope of teaching believers how to fulfill

their part of the great work. But I wish it to be distinctly understood all

through, that unless I believed with all my heart in God’s effectual working

on His side, not one word of this book would ever have been written.

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CHAPTER 2

THE SCRIPTURALNESS OF THIS LIFE

When I approach this subject of the true Christian life, that life which is hid

with Christ in God, so many thoughts struggle for utterance that I am

almost speechless. Where shall I begin? What is the most important thing

to say? How shall I make people read and believe? The subject is so

glorious, and human words seem so powerless!

But something I am impelled to say. The secret must be told. For it is one

concerning that victory which overcometh the world, that promised

deliverance from all our enemies, for which every child of God longs and

prays, but which seems so often and so generally to elude their grasp. May

God grant me so to tell it, that every believer to whom this book shall come,

may have his eyes opened to see the truth as it is in Jesus, and may be

enabled to enter into possession of this glorious life for himself.

For sure I am that every converted soul longs for victory and rest, and

nearly every one feels instinctively, at times, that they are his birthright. Can

you not remember, some of you, the shout of triumph your souls gave

when you first became acquainted with the Lord Jesus, and had a glimpse

of His mighty saving power? How sure you were of victory then! How

easy it seemed, to be more than conquerors, through Him that loved you.

Under the leadership of a Captain who had never been foiled in battle, how

could you dream of defeat? And yet, to many of you, how different has

been your real experience. The victories have been but few and fleeting, the

defeats many and disastrous. You have not lived as you feel children of

God ought to live. There has been a resting in a clear understanding of

doctrinal truth, without pressing after the power and life thereof. There has

been a rejoicing in the knowledge of things testified of in the Scriptures,

without a living realization of the things themselves, consciously felt in the

soul. Christ is believed in, talked about, and served, but He is not known as

the soul’s actual and very life, abiding there forever, and revealing Himself

there continually in His beauty. You have found Jesus as your Savior and

your Master, and you have tried to serve Him and advance the cause of His

kingdom. You have carefully studied the Holy Scriptures and have gathered

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much precious truth therefrom, which you have endeavored faithfully to

practice.

But notwithstanding all your knowledge and all your activities in the service

of the Lord, your souls are secretly starving, and you cry out again and

again for that bread and water of life which you saw promised in the

Scriptures to all believers. In the very depths of your hearts you know that

your experience is not a Scriptural experience; that, as an old writer says,

your religion is “but a talk to what the early Christians enjoyed, possessed,

and lived in.” And your souls have sunk within you, as day after day, and

year after year, your early visions of triumph have seemed to grow more

and more dim, and you have been forced to settle down to the conviction

that the best you can expect from your religion is a life of alternate failure

and victory; one hour sinning, and the next repenting; and beginning again,

only to fail again, and again to repent.

But is this all? Had the Lord Jesus only this in His mind when He laid

down His precious life to deliver you from your sore and cruel bondage to

sin? Did He propose to Himself only this partial deliverance? Did He intend

to leave you thus struggling along under a weary consciousness of defeat

and discouragement? Did He fear that a continuous victory would dishonor

Him, and bring reproach on His name? When all those declarations were

made concerning His coming, and the work He was to accomplish, did they

mean only this that you have experienced? Was there a hidden reserve in

each promise that was meant to deprive it of its complete fulfillment? Did

“delivering us out of the hands of our enemies” mean only a few of them?

Did “enabling us always to triumph” mean only sometimes; or being

“more than conquerors through Him that love us” mean constant defeat and

failure? No, no, a thousand times no! God is able to save unto the

uttermost, and He means to do it. His promise, confirmed by His oath, was

that “He would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of the hand of

our enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness

before Him, all the days of our life.” It is a mighty work to do, but our

Deliverer is able to do it. He came to destroy the works of the devil, and

dare we dream for a moment that He is not able or not willing to

accomplish His own purposes?

In the very outset, then, settle down on this one thing, that the Lord is able

to save you fully, now, in this life, from the power and dominion of sin,

and to deliver you altogether out of the hands of your enemies. If you do

not think He is, search your Bible, and collect together every announcement

or declaration concerning the purposes and object of His death on the cross.

You will be astonished to find how full they are. Everywhere and always

His work is said to be, to deliver us from our sins, from our bondage, from

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our defilement; and not a hint is given anywhere, that this deliverance was

to be only the limited and partial one with which the Church so continually

tries to be satisfied.

Let me give you a few texts on this subject. When the angel of the Lord

appeared unto Joseph in a dream, and announced the coming birth of the

Savior, he said, “And thou shalt call His name Jesus, for He shall save His

people from their sins.”

When Zacharias was “filled with the Holy Ghost” at the birth of his son,

and “prophesied,” he declared that God had visited His people in order to

fulfill the promise and the oath He had made them, which promise was,

“That He would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of the hands of

our enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness

before Him, all the days of our life.”

When Peter was preaching in the porch of the Temple to the wondering

Jews, he said, “Unto you first, God, having raised up His Son Jesus, sent

Him to bless you in turning away every one of you from his iniquities.”

When Paul was telling out to the Ephesian church the wondrous truth that

Christ had loved them so much as to give Himself for them, he went on to

declare, that His purpose in thus doing was, “that He might sanctify and

cleanse it by the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to

Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing;

but that it should be holy and without blemish.”

When Paul was seeking to instruct Titus, his own son after the common

faith, concerning the grace of God, he declared that the object of that grace

was to teach us “that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live

soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world”; and adds, as the

reason of this, that Christ “gave Himself for us that He might redeem us

from all iniquity, and purify us unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of

good works.”

When Peter was urging upon the Christian, to whom he was writing, a holy

and Christ-like walk, he tells them that “even hereunto were ye called

because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that ye should

follow His steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth”;

and adds, “who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree,

that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness; by whose

stripes ye were healed.”

When Paul was contrasting in the Ephesians the walk suitable for a

Christian, with the walk of an unbeliever, he sets before them the truth in

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Jesus as being this, “that ye put off concerning the former conversation the

old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and be renewed in

the spirit of your mind; and that ye put on the new man, which after God is

created in righteousness and true holiness.”

continuing in sin, and showing how utterly foreign it was to the whole spirit

and aim of the salvation of Jesus, he brings up the fact of our judicial death

and resurrection with Christ as an unanswerable argument for our practical

deliverance from it, and says, “God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to

sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not that so many of us as were

baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Therefore we are

buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up

from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in

newness of life.” And adds, “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified

with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we

should not serve sin.”

Dear Christians, will you receive the testimony of Scripture on this matter?

The same questions that troubled the Church in Paul’s day are troubling it

now: first, “Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?” And second,

“Do we then make void the law through faith?” Shall not our answer to

these be Paul’s emphatic “God forbid”; and his triumphant assertions that

instead of making it void “we establish the law”; and that “what the law

could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own

Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:

that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after

the flesh, but after the Spirit”?

Can we suppose for a moment that the holy God, who hates sin in the

sinner, is willing to tolerate it in the Christian, and that He has even arranged

the plan of salvation in such a way as to make it impossible for those who

are saved from the guilt of sin to find deliverance from its power?

As Dr. Chalmers well says,

“Sin is that scandal which must be rooted out from the great

spiritual household over which the Divinity rejoices . . . Strange

administration, indeed, for sin to be so hateful to God as to lay all

who had incurred it under death, and yet when readmitted into life

that sin should be permitted; and that what was before the object of

destroying vengeance, should now become the object of an upheld

and protected toleration. Now that the penalty is taken off, think you

that it is possible the unchangeable God has so given up His

antipathy to sin, as that man, ruined and redeemed man, may now

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perseveringly indulge under the new arrangement in that which

under the old destroyed him? Does not the God who loved

righteousness and hated iniquity six thousand years ago, bear the

same love to righteousness and hatred to iniquity still? . . . I now

breathe the air of loving-kindness from Heaven, and can walk

before God in peace and graciousness; shall I again attempt the

incompatible alliance of two principles so adverse as that of an

approving God and a persevering sinner? How shall we, recovered

from so awful a catastrophe, continue that which first involved us in

it? The cross of Christ, by the same mighty and decisive stroke

wherewith it moved the curse of sin away from us, also surely

moves away the power and the love of it from over us.”

And not Dr. Chalmers only, but many other holy men of his generation and

of our own, as well as of generations long past, have united in declaring that

the redemption accomplished for us by our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross

at Calvary is a redemption from the power of sin as well as from its guilt,

and that He is able to save to the uttermost all who come unto God by Him.

A quaint old divine of the seventeenth century says:

“There is nothing so contrary to God as sin, and God will not suffer

sin always to rule his masterpiece, man. When we consider the

infiniteness of God’s power for destroying that which is contrary to

Him, who can believe that the devil must always stand and prevail?

I believe it is inconsistent and disagreeable with true faith for people

to be Christians, and yet to believe that Christ, the eternal Son of

God, to whom all power in heaven and earth is given, will suffer sin

and the devil to have dominion over them.

“But you will say no man by all the power he hath can redeem

himself, and no man can live without sin. We will say, Amen, to it.

But if men tell us, that when God’s power comes to help us and to

redeem us out of sin, that it cannot be effected, then this doctrine we

cannot away with; nor I hope you neither.

“Would you approve of it, if I should tell you that God puts forth

His power to do such a thing, but the devil hinders Him? That it is

impossible for God to do it because the devil does not like it? That it

is impossible that any one should be free from sin because the devil

hath got such a power in them that God cannot cast him out? This is

lamentable doctrine, yet hath not this been preached? It doth in plain

terms say, though God doth interpose His power, it is impossible,

because the devil hath so rooted sin in the nature of man. Is not man

God’s creature, and cannot He new make him, and cast sin out of

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him? If you say sin is deeply rooted in man, I say so, too, yet not so

deeply rooted but Christ Jesus hath entered so deeply into the root of

the nature of man that He hath received power to destroy the devil

and his works, and to recover and redeem man into righteousness

and holiness. Or else it is false that ‘He is able to save to the

uttermost all that come unto God by Him.’ We must throw away

the Bible, if we say that it is impossible for God to deliver man out

of sin.

“We know,” he continues, “when our friends are in captivity, as in

Turkey, or elsewhere, we pay our money for their redemption; but

we will not pay our money if they be kept in their fetters still.

Would not any one think himself cheated to pay so much money for

their redemption, and the bargain be made so that he shall be said to

be redeemed, and be called a redeemed captive, but he must wear

his fetters still? How long? As long as he hath a day to live.

“This is for bodies, but now I am speaking of souls. Christ must be

made to me redemption, and rescue me from captivity. Am I a

prisoner any where? Yes, verily, verily, he that committeth sin, saith

Christ, he is a servant of sin, he is a slave of sin. If thou hast sinned,

thou art a slave, a captive that must be redeemed out of captivity.

Who will pay a price for me? I am poor; I have nothing; I cannot

redeem myself; who will pay a price for me? There is One come

who hath paid a price for me. That is well; that is good news, then I

hope I shall come out of my captivity. What is His name, is He

called a Redeemer? So, then, I do expect the benefit of my

redemption, and that I shall go out of my captivity. No, say they,

you must abide in sin as long as you live. What! must we never be

delivered? Must this crooked heart and perverse will always remain?

Must I be a believer, and yet have no faith that reacheth to

sanctification and holy living? Is there no mastery to be had, no

getting victory over sin? Must it prevail over me as long as I live?

What sort of a Redeemer, then, is this, or what benefit have I in this

life, of my redemption?”

Similar extracts might be quoted from Marshall, Romaine, and many

others, to show that this doctrine is no new one in the Church, however

much it may have been lost sight of by the present generation of believers.

It is the same old story that has filled with songs of triumph the daily lives

of many saints of God throughout all ages; and is now afresh being

sounded forth to the unspeakable joy of weary and burdened souls.

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Do not reject it, then, dear reader, until you have prayerfully searched the

Scriptures to see whether these things be indeed so. Ask God to open the

eyes of your understanding by His Spirit, that you may “know what is the

exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe, according to the

working of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ, when He

raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the

heavenly places.” And when you have begun to have some faint glimpses

of this power, learn to look away utterly from your own weakness, and,

putting your case into His hands, trust Him to deliver you.

Corinthians 2, where the apostle cries, “Thanks be unto God which always

causeth us to triumph in Christ.” If the maker of a machine should declare

that he had made it to accomplish a certain purpose, and if upon trial it

should be found incapable of accomplishing that purpose, we would all say

of that maker that he was a fraud.

Surely then we will not dare to think that it is impossible for the creature

whom God has made, to accomplish the declared object for which he was

created. Especially when the Scriptures are so full of the assertions that

Christ has made it possible.

The only thing that can hinder is the creature’s own failure to work in

harmony with the plans of his Creator, and if this want of harmony can be

removed, then God can work. Christ came to bring about an atonement

between God and man, which should make it possible for God thus to

work in man to will and to do of His good pleasure. Therefore we may be

of good courage; for the work Christ has undertaken He is surely able and

willing to perform. Let us then “walk in the steps of that faith of our father

Abraham,” who “staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but

was strong in faith, giving glory to God; being fully persuaded that what He

had promised, He was able also to perform.”

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CHAPTER 3

THE LIFE DEFINED

In my last chapter I tried to settle the question as to the scripturalness of the

experience sometimes called the Higher Christian Life, but which to my

own mind is best described in the words, the “life hid with Christ in God.”

I shall now, therefore, consider it as a settled point that the Scriptures do set

before the believer in the Lord Jesus a life of abiding rest and of continual

victory, which is very far beyond the ordinary line of Christian experience;

and that in the Bible we have presented to us a Savior able to save us from

the power of our sins, as really as He saves us from their guilt.

The point to be next considered is, as to what this hidden life consists in,

and how it differs from every other sort of Christian experience.

And as to this, it is simply letting the Lord carry our burdens and manage

our affairs for us, instead of trying to do it ourselves.

Most Christians are like a man who was toiling along the road, bending

under a heavy burden, when a wagon overtook him, and the driver kindly

offered to help him on his journey. He joyfully accepted the offer, but when

seated, continued to bend beneath his burden, which he still kept on his

shoulders. “Why do you not lay down your burden?” asked the kindhearted

driver. “Oh!” replied the man, “I feel that it is almost too much to

ask you to carry me, and I could not think of letting you carry my burden

too.” And so Christians, who have given themselves into the care and

keeping of the Lord Jesus, still continue to bend beneath the weight of their

burden, and often go weary and heavy-laden throughout the whole length of

their journey.

When I speak of burdens, I mean everything that troubles us, whether

spiritual or temporal.

I mean, first of all, ourselves. The greatest burden we have to carry in life is

self. The most difficult thing we have to manage is self. Our own daily

living, our frames and feelings, our especial weaknesses and temptations,

and our peculiar temperaments, our inward affairs of every kind, these are

the things that perplex and worry us more than anything else, and that bring

us oftenest into bondage and darkness. In laying off your burdens,

therefore, the first one you must get rid of is yourself. You must hand

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yourself and all your inward experiences, your temptations, your

temperament, your frames and feelings, all over into the care and keeping of

your God, and leave them there. He made you, and therefore He

understands you and knows how to manage you, and you must trust Him

to do it. Say to Him, “Here, Lord, I abandon myself to thee. I have tried in

every way I could think of to manage myself, and to make myself what I

know I ought to be, but have always failed. Now I give it up to thee. Do

thou take entire possession of me. Work in me all the good pleasure of thy

will. Mould and fashion me into such a vessel as seemeth good to thee. I

leave myself in thy hands, and I believe thou wilt, according to thy promise,

make me into a vessel unto thine honor, ‘sanctified, and meet for the

Master’s use, and prepared unto every good work.’” And here you must

rest, trusting yourself thus to Him continually and absolutely.

Next, you must lay off every other burden, — your health, your reputation,

your Christian work, your houses, your children, your business, your

servants; everything, in short, that concerns you, whether inward or

outward.

Christians always commit the keeping of their souls for eternity to the Lord,

because they know, without a shadow of a doubt, that they cannot keep

these themselves. But the things of this present life they take into their own

keeping, and try to carry on their own shoulders, with the perhaps

unconfessed feeling that it is a great deal to ask of the Lord to carry them,

and that they cannot think of asking Him to carry their burdens too.

I knew a Christian lady who had a very heavy temporal burden. It took

away her sleep and her appetite, and there was danger of her health breaking

down under it. One day, when it seemed especially heavy, she noticed lying

on the table near her a little tract called “Hannah’s Faith.” Attracted by the

title, she picked it up and began to read it, little knowing, however, that it

was to create a revolution in her whole experience. The story was of a poor

woman who had been carried triumphantly through a life of unusual

sorrow. She was giving the history of her life to a kind visitor on one

occasion, and at the close the visitor said, feelingly, “O Hannah, I do not see

how you could bear so much sorrow!” “I did not bear it,” was the quick

reply; “the Lord bore it for me.” “Yes,” said the visitor “that is the right

way. You must take your troubles to the Lord.” “Yes,” replied Hannah,

“but we must do more than that; we must leave them there. Most people,”

she continued, “take their burdens to Him, but they bring them away with

them again, and are just as worried and unhappy as ever. But I take mine,

and I leave them with Him, and come away and forget them. And if the

worry comes back, I take it to Him again; I do this over and over, until at

last I just forget that I have any worries, and am at perfect rest.”

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My friend was very much struck with this plan and resolved to try it. The

circumstances of her life she could not alter, but she took them to the Lord,

and handed them over into His management; and then she believed that He

took it, and she left all the responsibility and the worry and anxiety with

Him. As often as the anxieties returned she took them back; and the result

was that, although the circumstances remained unchanged, her soul was

kept in perfect peace in the midst of them. She felt that she had found out a

blessed secret, and from that time she tried never again to carry he own

burdens, nor to manage anything for herself.

And the secret she found so effectual in her outward affairs, she found to be

still more effectual in her inward ones, which were in truth even more

utterly unmanageable. She abandoned her whole self to the Lord, with all

that she was and all that she had, and, believing that He took that which she

had committed to Him, she ceased to fret and worry, and her life became all

sunshine in the gladness of belonging to Him. And this was the Higher

Christian Life! It was a very simple secret she found out. Only this, that it

was possible to obey God’s commandment contained in those words, “Be

careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with

thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God”; and that, in

obeying it, the result would inevitably be, according to the promise, that the

“peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and

minds through Christ Jesus.”

There are many other things to be said about this life hid with Christ in

God, many details as to what the Lord Jesus does for those who thus

abandon themselves to Him. But the gist of the whole matter is here stated,

and the soul that has got hold of this secret has found the key that will

unlock the whole treasure-house of God.

And now I do trust that I have made you hunger for this blessed life.

Would you not like to get rid of your burdens? Do you not long to hand

over the management of your unmanageable self into the hands of One who

is able to manage you? Are you not tired and weary, and does not the rest I

speak of look sweet to you?

Do you recollect the delicious sense of rest with which you have sometimes

gone to bed at night, after a day of great exertion and weariness? How

delightful was the sensation of relaxing every muscle, and letting your body

go in a perfect abandonment of ease and comfort. The strain of the day had

ceased for a few hours at least, and the work of the day had been thrown

off. You no longer had to hold up an aching head or a weary back. You

trusted yourself to the bed in an absolute confidence, and it held you up,

without effort, or strain, or even thought on your part. You rested.

22

But suppose you had doubted the strength or the stability of your bed, and

had dreaded each moment to find it giving away beneath you and landing

you on the floor; could you have rested then? Would not every muscle have

been strained in a fruitless effort to hold yourself up, and would not the

weariness have been greater than not to have gone to bed at all?

Let this analogy teach you what it means to rest in the Lord. Let your souls

lie down upon His sweet will, as your bodies lie down in your beds at

night. Relax every strain and lay off every burden. Let yourselves go in

perfect abandonment of ease and comfort, sure that when He holds you up

you are perfectly safe.

Your part is simply to rest. His part is to sustain you, and He cannot fail.

Or take another analogy, which our Lord Himself has abundantly

sanctioned, that of the child-life. For “Jesus called a little child unto Him,

and set him in the midst of them, and said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye

be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter the kingdom of

Heaven.”

Now, what are the characteristics of a little child and how does he live? He

lives by faith, and his chiefest characteristic is thoughtlessness. His life is

one long trust from year’s end to year’s end. He trusts his parents, he trusts

his caretakers, he trusts his teachers, he even trusts people often who are

utterly unworthy of trust, because of the confidingness of his nature. And

his trust is abundantly answered. He provides nothing for himself, and yet

everything is provided. He takes no thought for the morrow, and forms no

plans, and yet all his life is planned out for him, and he finds his paths made

ready, opening out to him as he comes to them day by day, and hour by

hour. He goes in and out of his father’s house with an unspeakable ease and

abandonment, enjoying all the good things it contains, without having spent

a penny in procuring them. Pestilence may walk through the streets of his

city, but he regards it not. Famine and fire and war may rage around him,

but under his father’s tender care he abides in utter unconcern and perfect

rest. He lives in the present moment, and receives his life without question

as it comes to him day by day from his father’s hands.

I was visiting once in a wealthy house, where there was one only adopted

child, upon whom was lavished all the love and tenderness and care that

human hearts could bestow or human means procure. And as I watched

that child running in and out day by day, free and light-hearted, with the

happy carelessness of childhood, I thought what a picture it was of our

wonderful position as children in the house of our Heavenly Father. And I

said to myself, “If nothing could so grieve and wound the loving hearts

around her, as to see this little child beginning to be worried or anxious

23

about herself in any way, about whether her food and clothes would be

provided for her, or how she was to get her education or her future support,

how much more must the great, loving heart of our God and Father be

grieved and wounded at seeing His children taking so much anxious care

and thought!” And I understood why it was that our Lord had said to us so

emphatically, “Take no thought for yourselves.”

Who is the best cared for in every household? Is it not the little children?

And does not the least of all, the helpless baby, receive the largest share? As

a late writer has said, the baby “toils not, neither does he spin; and yet he is

fed, and clothed, and loved, and rejoiced in,” and none so much as he.

This life of faith, then, about which I am writing, consists in just this; being

a child in the Father’s house. And when this is said, enough is said to

transform every weary, burdened life into one of blessedness and rest.

Let the ways of childish confidence and freedom from care, which so please

you and win your hearts in your own little ones, teach you what should be

your ways with God; and leaving yourselves in His hands, learn to be

literally “careful for nothing”; and you shall find it to be a fact that “the

peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep (as in a garrison)

your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” Notice the word “nothing” in

the above passage, as covering all possible grounds for anxiety, both inward

and outward. We are continually tempted to think it is our duty to be

anxious about some things. Perhaps our thought will be, “Oh, yes, it is

quite right to give up all anxiety in a general way; and in spiritual matters of

course anxiety is wrong; but there are things about which it would be a sin

not to be anxious; about our children, for instance, or those we love, or

about our church affairs and the cause of truth, or about our business

matters. It would show a great want of right feeling not to be anxious about

such things as these.” Or else our thoughts take the other tack, and we say

to ourselves, “Yes, it is quite right to commit our loved ones and all our

outward affairs to the Lord, but when it comes to our inward lives, our

religious experiences, our temptations, our besetting sins, our growth in

grace, and all such things, these we ought to be anxious about; for if we are

not, they will be sure to be neglected.”

To such suggestions, and to all similar ones, the answer is found in our text,

—

telling us to behold the fowls of the air and the lilies of the field, as

examples of the sort of life He would have us live. As the birds rejoice in

24

the care of their God and are fed, and as the lilies grow in His sunlight, so

must we, without anxiety, and without fear. Let the sparrows speak to us:

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CHAPTER 4

HOW TO ENTER IN

Having tried to settle the question as to the scripturalness of the experience

of this life of full trust, and having also shown a little of what it is; the next

point is as to how it is to be reached and realized.

And first, I would say that this blessed life must not be looked upon in any

sense as an attainment but as an obtainment. We cannot earn it, we cannot

climb up to it, we cannot win it; we can do nothing but ask for it and receive

it. It is the gift of God in Christ Jesus. And where a thing is a gift, the only

course left for the receiver is to take it and thank the giver. We never say of

a gift, “See to what I have attained,” and boast of our skill and wisdom in

having attained it; but we say, “See what has been given me,” and boast of

the love and wealth and generosity of the giver. And everything in our

salvation is a gift. From beginning to end, God is the giver and we are the

receivers; and it is not to those who do great things, but to those who

“receive abundance of grace, and of the gift of righteousness,” that the

richest promises are made.

In order, therefore, to enter into a realized experience of this interior life, the

soul must be in a receptive attitude, fully recognizing the fact that it is to be

God’s gift in Christ Jesus, and that it cannot be gained by any efforts or

works of our own. This will simplify the matter exceedingly; and the only

thing left to be considered then will be to discover upon whom God

bestows this gift, and how they are to receive it. And to this I would answer

in short, that He bestows it only upon the fully consecrated soul, and that it

is to be received by faith.

Consecration is the first thing. Not in any legal sense, not in order to

purchase or deserve the blessing, but to remove the difficulties out of the

way and make it possible for God to bestow it. In order for a lump of clay

to be made into a beautiful vessel, it must be entirely abandoned to the

potter, and must lie passive in his hands. And in order for a soul to be made

into a vessel unto God’s honor, “sanctified and meet for the Master’s use,

and prepared unto every good work,” it must be entirely abandoned to Him,

and must lie passive in His hands. This is manifest at the first glance.

I was once trying to explain to a physician, who had charge of a large

hospital, what consecration meant, and its necessity, but he seemed unable

26

to understand. At last I said to him, “Suppose, in going your rounds among

your patients, you should meet with one man who entreated you earnestly

to take his case under your especial care in order to cure him, but who

should at the same time refuse to tell you all the symptoms, or to take all

your prescribed remedies; and should say to you, ‘I am quite willing to

follow your directions as to certain things, because they commend

themselves to my mind as good, but in other matters I prefer judging for

myself and following my own directions.’ What would you do in such a

case?” I asked. “Do!” he replied with indignation, — “do! I would soon

leave such a man as that to his own care. For of course,” he added, “I could

do nothing for him, unless he would put his whole case into my hands

without any reserves, and would obey my directions implicitly.” “It is

necessary then,” I said, “for doctors to be obeyed, if they are to have any

chance to cure their patients?” “Implicitly obeyed!” was his emphatic reply.

“And that is consecration,” I continued. “God must have the whole case put

into His hands without any reserves, and His directions must be implicitly

followed.” “I see it,” he exclaimed, — “I see it! And I will do it. God shall

have His own way with me from henceforth.”

Perhaps to some minds the word “abandonment” might express this idea

better. But whatever word we use, we mean an entire surrender of the

whole being to God; spirit, soul, and body placed under His absolute

control, for Him to do with us just what He pleases. We mean that the

language of our soul, under all circumstances, and in view of every act, is to

be, “Thy will be done.” We mean the giving up of all liberty of choice. We

mean a life of inevitable obedience.

To a soul ignorant of God, this may look hard. But to those who know

Him, it is the happiest and most restful of lives. He is our Father, and He

loves us, and He knows just what is best, and therefore, of course, His will

is the very most blessed thing that can come to us under all circumstances. I

do not understand how it is that Satan has succeeded in blinding the eyes of

the Church to this fact. But it really would seem as if God’s own children

were more afraid of His will than of anything else in life; His lovely,

lovable will, which only means loving-kindnesses and tender mercies, and

blessings unspeakable to their souls. I wish I could only show to every one

the unfathomable sweetness of the will of God. Heaven is a place of infinite

bliss because His will is perfectly done there, and our lives share in this

bliss just in proportion as His will is perfectly done in them. He loves us,

loves us, and the will of love is always blessing for its loved one. Some of

us know what it is to love, and we know that could we only have our way,

our beloved ones would be overwhelmed with blessings. All that is good,

and sweet, and lovely in life would be poured out upon them from our

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lavish hands, had we but the power to carry out our will for them. And if

this is the way of love with us, how much more must it be so with our

God, who is love itself. Could we but for one moment get a glimpse into

the mighty depths of His love, our hearts would spring out to meet His will,

and embrace it as our richest treasure; and we would abandon ourselves to it

with an enthusiasm of gratitude and joy, that such a wondrous privilege

could be ours.

A great many Christians actually seem to think that all their Father in

heaven wants is a chance to make them miserable, and to take away all their

blessings, and they imagine, poor souls, that if they hold on to things in

their own will, they can hinder Him from doing this. I am ashamed to write

the words, and yet we must face a fact which is making wretched hundreds

of lives.

A Christian lady who had this feeling, was once expressing to a friend how

impossible she found it to say, “Thy will be done,” and how afraid she

should be to do it. She was the mother of one only little boy, who was the

heir to a great fortune, and the idol of her heart. After she had stated her

difficulties fully, her friend said, “Suppose your little Charley should come

running to you tomorrow and say, ‘Mother, I have made up my mind to let

you have your own way with me from this time forward. I am always

going to obey you, and I want you to do just whatever you think best with

me. I know you love me, and I am going to trust myself to your love.’

How would you feel towards him? Would you say to yourself, ‘Ah, now I

shall have a chance to make Charley miserable. I will take away all his

pleasures, and fill his life with every hard and disagreeable thing I can find.

I will compel him to do just the things that are the most difficult for him to

do, and will give him all sorts of impossible commands.” “Oh, no, no,

no!” exclaimed the indignant mother. “You know I would not. You know I

would hug him to my heart and cover him with kisses, and would hasten to

fill his life with all that was sweetest and best.” “And are you more tender

and more loving than God?” asked her friend. “Ah, no,” was the reply, “I

see my mistake, and I will not be afraid of saying ‘Thy will be done,’ to my

Heavenly Father, any more than I would want my Charley to be afraid of

saying it to me.”

Better and sweeter than health, or friends, or money, or fame, or ease, or

prosperity, is the adorable will of our God. It gilds the darkest hours with a

divine halo, and sheds brightest sunshine on the gloomiest paths. He always

reigns who has made it his kingdom; and nothing can go amiss to him.

Surely, then, it is nothing but a glorious privilege that is opening before you

when I tell you that the first step you must take in order to enter into the life

hid with Christ in God, is that of entire consecration. I cannot have you look

28

at it as a hard and stern demand. You must do it gladly, thankfully,

enthusiastically. You must go in on what I call the privilege side of

consecration; and I can assure you, from a blessed experience, that you will

find it the happiest place you have ever entered yet.

Faith is the next thing. Faith is an absolutely necessary element in the

reception of any gift; for let our friends give a thing to us ever so fully, it is

not really ours until we believe it has been given and claim it as our own.

Above all, this is true in gifts which are purely mental or spiritual. Love

may be lavished upon us by another without stint or measure, but until we

believe that we are loved, it never really becomes ours.

I suppose most Christians understand this principle in reference to the

matter of their forgiveness. They know that the forgiveness of sins through

Jesus might have been preached to them forever, but it would never have

become theirs consciously until they believed this preaching, and claimed

the forgiveness as their own. But when it comes to living the Christian life,

they lose sight of this principle, and think that, having been saved by faith,

they are now to live by works and efforts; and instead of continuing to

receive, they are now to begin to do. This makes our declaration that the life

hid with Christ in God is to be entered by faith, seem perfectly unintelligible

to them. And yet it is plainly declared, that “as we have received Christ

Jesus the Lord, so we are to walk in Him.” We received Him by faith, and

by faith alone; therefore we are to walk in Him by faith, and by faith alone.

And the faith by which we enter into this hidden life is just the same as the

faith by which we were translated out of the kingdom of darkness into the

kingdom of God’s dear Son, only it lays hold of a different thing. Then we

believed that Jesus was our Savior from the guilt of sin, and according to

our faith it was unto us. Now we must believe that He is our Savior from

the power of sin, and according to our faith it shall be unto us. Then we

trusted Him for our justification, and it became ours; now we must trust

Him for our sanctification, and it shall become ours also. Then we took

Him as a Savior in the future from the penalties of our sins; now we must

take Him as a Savior in the present from the bondage of our sins. Then He

was our Redeemer, now He is to be our Life. Then He lifted us out of the

pit, now He is to seat us in heavenly places with Himself.

I mean all this of course experimentally and practically. Theologically and

judicially I know that every believer has everything the minute he is

converted. But experimentally nothing is his until by faith he claims it.

“Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given

unto you.” God “hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly

places in Christ,” but until we set the foot of faith upon them they do not

29

practically become ours. “According to our faith,” is always the limit and

the rule.

But this faith of which I am speaking must be a present faith. No faith that

is exercised in the future tense amounts to anything. A man may believe

forever that his sins will be forgiven at some future time, and he will never

find peace. He has to come to the now belief, and say by faith, “My sins are

now forgiven,” before he can live the new life. And, similarly, no faith

which looks for a future deliverance from the power of sin, will ever lead a

soul into the life we are describing. The enemy delights in this future faith,

for he knows it is powerless to accomplish any practical results. But he

trembles and flees when the soul of the believer dares to claim a present

deliverance, and to reckon itself now to be free from his power.

To sum up, then: in order to enter into this blessed interior life of rest and

triumph, you have two steps to take: first, entire abandonment; and second,

absolute faith. No matter what may be the complications of your peculiar

experience, no matter what your difficulties or your surroundings or your

associations, these two steps, definitely taken and unwaveringly persevered

in, will certainly bring you out sooner or later into the green pastures and

still waters of this higher Christian life. You may be sure of this. And if you

will let every other consideration go, and simply devote your attention to

these two points, and be very clear and definite about them, your progress

will be rapid and your soul will reach its desired haven far sooner than now

you can think possible.

Shall I repeat the steps, that there may be no mistake? You are a child of

God, and long to please Him. You love your precious Savior, and are sick

and weary of the sin that grieves Him. You long to be delivered from its

power. Everything you have hitherto tried has failed to deliver you, and

now in your despair you are asking if it can indeed be, as these happy

people say, that the Lord is able and willing to deliver you. Surely you

know in your very soul that He is; that to save you out of the hand of all

your enemies is in fact just the very thing He came to do. Then trust Him.

Commit your case to Him in an absolute abandonment, and believe that He

undertakes it; and at once, knowing what He is and what He has said, claim

that He does even now fully save. Just as you believed at first that He

delivered you from the guilt of sin because He said so, believe now that He

delivers you from the power of sin because He says so. Let your faith now

lay hold of a new power in Christ. You have trusted Him as your dying

Savior, now trust Him as your living Savior. Just as much as He came to

deliver you from future punishment, did He also come to deliver you from

present bondage. Just as truly as He came to bear your sins for you, has He

come to live His life in you. You are as utterly powerless in the one case as

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in the other. You could as easily have got yourself rid of your own sins, as

you could now accomplish for yourself practical righteousness. Christ, and

Christ only, must do both for you, and your part in both cases is simply to

give the thing to Him to do, and then believe that He does it.

A lady, now very eminent in this life of trust, when she was seeking in

great darkness and perplexity to enter in, said to the friend who was trying

to help her, “You all say, ‘Abandon yourself, and trust, abandon yourself,

and trust,’ but I do not know how. I wish you would just do it out loud, so

that I may see how you do it.”

Shall I do it out loud for you?

“Lord Jesus, I believe that Thou art able and willing to deliver me

from all the care, and unrest and bondage of my Christian life. I

believe thou didst die to set me free, not only in the future, but now

and here. I believe thou art stronger than Satan, and that thou canst

keep me, even me, in my extreme of weakness, from falling into his

snares or yielding obedience to his commands. And, Lord, I am

going to trust thee to keep me. I have tried keeping myself, and have

failed, and failed most grievously. I am absolutely helpless; so now

I will trust thee. I will give myself to thee; I keep back no reserves.

Body, soul, and spirit, I present myself to thee, a worthless lump of

clay, to be made into anything thy love and thy wisdom shall

choose. And now, I am thine. I believe thou dost accept that which I

present to thee; I believe that this poor, weak, foolish heart has been

taken possession of by thee, and thou hast even at this very moment

begun to work in me to will and to do of thy good pleasure. I trust

thee utterly, and I trust thee now!”

Are you afraid to take this step? Does it seem too sudden, too much like a

leap in the dark? Do you not know that the steps of faith always “fall on the

seeming void, but find the rock beneath”? A man, having to descend a well

by a rope, found, to his horror, when he was a great way down, that it was

too short. He had reached the end, and yet was, he estimated, about thirty

feet from the bottom of the well. He knew not what to do. He had not the

strength or skill to climb up the rope, and to let go was to be dashed to

pieces. His arms began to fail, and at last he decided that as he could not

hold on much longer, he might as well let go and meet his fate at once. He

resigned himself to destruction, and loosened his grasp. He fell! To the

bottom of the well it was — just three inches!

If ever your feet are to touch the “rock beneath,” you must let go of every

holding-place and drop into God; for there is no other way. And to do it

now may save you months and even years of strain and weariness.

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In all the old castles of England there used to be a place called the keep. It

was always the strongest and best protected place in the castle, and in it

were hidden all who were weak and helpless and unable to defend

themselves in times of danger. Had you been a timid, helpless woman in

such a castle during a time of siege, would it have seemed to you a leap in

the dark to have hidden yourself there? Would you have been afraid to do

it? And shall we be afraid to hide ourselves in the keeping power of our

Divine Keeper, who neither slumbers nor sleeps, and who has promised to

preserve our going out and our coming in, from this time forth and even

forever more?

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CHAPTER 5

DIFFICULTIES CONCERNING CONSECRATION

It is very important that Christians should not be ignorant of the devices of

the enemy; for he stands ready to oppose every onward step of the soul’s

progress. And especially is he busy when he sees a believer awakened to a

hunger and thirst after righteousness, and seeking to reach out to apprehend

all the fullness that is in the Lord Jesus Christ for him.

One of the first difficulties he throws in the way of such a one is concerning

consecration. The seeker after holiness is told that he must consecrate

himself; and he endeavors to do so. But at once he meets with a difficulty.

He has done it, as he thinks, and yet does not feel differently from before;

nothing seems changed, as he has been led to expect it would be, and he is

completely baffled, and asks the question almost despairingly, “How am I

to know when I am consecrated?”

The one grand temptation which has met such a soul at this juncture is the

temptation which never fails to assert itself on every possible occasion, and

generally with marked success, and that is in reference to feeling. The soul

cannot believe it is consecrated until it feels that it is; and because it does not

feel that God has taken it in hand, it cannot believe that He has. As usual, it

puts feeling first and faith second. Now, God’s invariable rule is faith first

and feeling second, in everything; and it is striving against the inevitable

when we seek to make it different.

The way to meet this temptation, then, in reference to consecration, is

simply to take God’s side in the matter, and to put faith before feeling. Give

yourself to the Lord definitely and fully, according to your present light,

asking the Holy Spirit to show you all that is contrary to God, either in your

heart or life. If He shows you anything, give it to the Lord immediately, and

say in reference to it, “Thy will be done.” If He shows you nothing, then

you must believe that there is nothing, and must conclude that you have

given Him all. Then you must believe that He takes you. You positively

must not wait to feel either that you have given yourself or that He has taken

you. You must simply believe it, and reckon it to be the case.

If you were to give an estate to a friend, you would have to give it, and he

would have to receive it by faith. An estate is not a thing that can be picked

up and handed over to another; the gift of it and its reception are altogether a

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mental transaction and therefore one of faith. Now, if you should give an

estate one day to a friend, and then should go away and wonder whether

you really had given it, and whether he had actually taken it and considered

it his own, and should feel it necessary to go the next day and renew the

gift; and if on the third day you should still feel a similar uncertainty about

it, and should again go and renew the gift, and on the fourth day go through

a like process, and so on, day after day for months and years, what would

your friend think, and what at last would be the condition of your own mind

in reference to it? Your friend certainly would begin to doubt whether you

ever had intended to give it to him at all; and you yourself would be in such

hopeless perplexity about it , that you would not know whether the estate

was yours, or his, or whose it was.

Now, is not this very much the way in which you have been acting towards

God in this matter of consecration? You have given yourself to Him over

and over daily, perhaps for months, but you have invariably come away

from your seasons of consecration wondering whether you really have

given yourself after all, and whether He has taken you; and because you

have not felt any differently, you have concluded at last, after many painful

tossings, that the thing has not been done. Do you know, dear believer, that

this sort of perplexity will last forever, unless you cut it short by faith? You

must come to the point of reckoning the matter to be an accomplished and

settled thing, and leaving it there, before you can possibly expect any change

of feeling what ever.

The very law of offerings to the Lord settles this as a primary fact, that

everything which is given to Him becomes by that very act something holy,

set apart from all other things, and cannot without sacrilege be put to any

other uses. “Notwithstanding, no devoted thing that a man shall devote unto

the Lord of all that he hath, both of man and beast, and of the field of his

possession, shall be sold or redeemed: every devoted thing is most holy

unto the Lord.” Having once given it to the Lord, the devoted thing

henceforth was reckoned by all Israel as being the Lord’s, and no one dared

to stretch forth a hand to retake it. The giver might have made his offering

very grudgingly and half-heartedly, but having made it, the matter was

taken out of his hands altogether, and the devoted thing by God’s own law

became “most holy unto the Lord.”

It was not the intention of the giver that made it holy, but the holiness of the

receiver. “The altar sanctifies the gift.” And an offering once laid upon the

altar, from that moment belonged to the Lord. I can imagine an offerer who

had deposited a gift, beginning to search his heart as to his sincerity and

honesty in doing it, and coming back to the priest to say that he was afraid

after all he had not given it right, or had not been perfectly sincere in giving

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it. I feel sure that the priest would have silenced him at once with saying,

“As to how you gave your offering, or what were your motives in giving it,

I do not know. The facts are that you did give it, and that it is the Lord’s, for

every devoted thing is most holy unto Him. It is too late to recall the

transaction now.” And not only the priest but all Israel would have been

aghast at the man who, having once given his offering, should have reached

out his hand to take it back. And yet, day after day, earnest-hearted

Christians, who would have shuddered at such an act of sacrilege on the

part of a Jew, are guilty in their own experience of a similar act, by giving

themselves to the Lord in solemn consecration, and then through unbelief

taking back that which they have given.

Because God is not visibly present to the eye, it is difficult to feel that a

transaction with Him is real. I suppose if, when we made our acts of

consecration, we could actually see Him present with us, we should feel it

to be a very real thing, and would realize that we had given our word to

Him and could not dare to take it back, no matter how much we might wish

to do so. Such a transaction would have to us the binding power that a

spoken promise to an earthly friend always has to a man of honor. And

what we need is to see that God’s presence is a certain fact always, and that

every act of our soul is done right before Him, and that a word spoken in

prayer is as really spoken to Him, as if our eyes could see Him and our

hands could touch Him. Then we shall cease to have such vague

conceptions of our relations with Him, and shall feel the binding force of

every word we say in His presence.

I know some will say here, “Ah, yes; but if He would only speak to me,

and say that He took me when I gave myself to Him, I would have no

trouble then in believing it.” No, of course you would not; but He does not

generally say this until the soul has first proved its loyalty by believing what

He has already said. It is he that believeth who has the witness, not he that

doubteth. And by His very command to us to present ourselves to Him a

living sacrifice, He has pledged Himself to receive us. I cannot conceive of

an honorable man asking another to give him a thing which, after all, he

was doubtful about taking; still less can I conceive of a loving parent acting

so towards a darling child. “My son, give me thy heart,” is a sure warrant

for knowing that the moment the heart is given, it will be taken by the One

who has commanded the gift. We may, nay we must, feel the utmost

confidence then that when we surrender ourselves to the Lord, according to

His own command, He does then and there receive us, and from that

moment we are His. A real transaction has taken place, which cannot be

violated without dishonor on our part, and which we know will not be

violated by Him.

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these circumstances: —

“Thou hast avouched the Lord this day to be thy God, and to walk

in His ways and to keep His statutes, and His commandments, and

His judgments, and to hearken unto His voice; and the Lord hath

avouched thee this day to be His peculiar people, as He hath

promised thee, and that thou shouldst keep all His commandments;

. . . and that thou mayest be an holy people unto the Lord, as He

hath spoken.”

When we avouch the Lord to be our God, and that we will walk in His

ways and keep His commandments, He avouches us to be His, and that we

shall keep all His commandments. And from that moment He takes

possession of us. This has always been His principle of working, and it

continues to be so. “Every devoted thing is most holy to the Lord.” This

seems to me so plain as scarcely to admit of a question.

But if the soul still feels in doubt or difficulty, let me refer you to a New

Testament declaration which approaches the subject from a different side,

and reads: “And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask

anything according to His will, He heareth us; and if we know that He hear

us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired

of Him.” Is it according to His will that you should be entirely consecrated

to Him? There can be, of course, but one answer to this, for He has

commanded it. Is it not also according to His will that He should work in

you to will and to do of His good pleasure? This question also can have but

one answer, for He has declared it to be His purpose. You know, then, that

these things are according to His will, therefore on God’s own word you

are obliged to know that He hears you; and knowing this much, you are

compelled to go further and know that you have the petitions that you have

desired of Him. That you have, I say, not will have, or may have, but have

now in actual possession. It is thus that we “obtain promises” by faith. It is

thus that we have “access by faith” into the grace that is given us in our

Lord Jesus Christ. It is thus, and thus only, that we come to know our

hearts are “purified by faith,” and are enabled to live by faith, to stand by

faith, to walk by faith.

I desire to make this subject so plain and practical that no one need have any

further difficulty about it, and therefore I will repeat again just what must be

the acts of your soul in order to bring you out of this difficulty about

consecration.

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I suppose that you have trusted the Lord Jesus for the forgiveness of your

sins, and know something of what it is to belong to the family of God, and

to be made an heir of God through faith in Christ. And now you feel

springing up in your soul the longing to be conformed to the image of your

Lord. In order for this, you know there must be an entire surrender of

yourself to Him, that He may work in you all the good pleasure of His will;

and you have tried over and over to do it, but hitherto without any apparent

success.

At this point it is that I desire to help you. What you must do now is to

come once more to Him in a surrender of your whole self to His will, as

complete as you know how to make it. You must ask Him to reveal to you

by His Spirit any hidden rebellion; and if He reveals nothing, then you must

believe that there is nothing, and that the surrender is complete. This must,

then, be considered a settled matter. You have abandoned yourself to the

Lord, and from henceforth you do not in any sense belong to yourself; you

must never even so much as listen to a suggestion to the contrary. If the

temptation comes to wonder whether you really have completely

surrendered yourself, meet it with an assertion that you have. Do not even

argue the matter. Repel any such idea instantly and with decision. You

meant it then, you mean it now, you have really done it. Your emotions

may clamor against the surrender, but your will must hold firm. It is your

purpose God looks at, not your feelings about that purpose, and your

purpose, or will, is therefore the only thing you need attend to.

The surrender, then, having been made, never to be questioned or recalled,

the next point is to believe that God takes that which you have surrendered,

and to reckon that it is His. Not that it will be at some future time, but is

now; and that He has begun to work in you to will, and to do, of His good

pleasure. And here you must rest. There is nothing more for you to do, for

you are the Lord’s now, absolutely and entirely in His hands, and He has

undertaken the whole care and management and forming of you; and will,

according to His word, “work in you that which is well-pleasing in His

sight through Jesus Christ.” But you must hold steadily here. If you begin

to question your surrender, or God’s acceptance of it, then your wavering

faith will produce a wavering experience, and He cannot work. But while

you trust He works, and the result of His working always is to change you

into the image of Christ, from glory to glory, by His mighty Spirit.

Do you, then, now at this moment surrender yourself wholly to Him? You

answer, Yes. Then, my dear friend, begin at once to reckon that you are

His; that He has taken you, and that He is working in you to will and to do

of His good pleasure. And keep on reckoning this. You will find it a great

help to put your reckoning into words, and to say over and over to yourself

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and to your God, “Lord, I am thine; I do yield myself up to thee entirely,

and I believe that thou dost take me. I leave myself with thee. Work in me

all the good pleasure of thy will, and I will only lie still in thy hands, and

trust thee.”

Make this a daily definite act of your will, and many times a day recur to it,

as being your continual attitude before Him. Confess it to yourself. Confess

it to your God. Confess it to your friends. Avouch the Lord to be your God

continually and unwaveringly, and declare your purpose of walking in His

ways and keeping His statutes; and you will find in practical experience that

He has avouched you to be His peculiar people and that you shall keep all

His commandments, and that you will be “an holy people unto the Lord, as

He hath spoken.”

A few simple rules may be found helpful here. I would advise the use of

them in daily times of devotion, making them the definite test and attitude

of the soul, until the light shines clearly on this matter.

acknowledge definitely that you believe He has reconciled you to God;

spirit; and to obey Him in everything where His will is made known;

possession of that which you thus abandon to Him, and that He will

henceforth work in you to will and to do of His good pleasure, unless

but simply attend to the state of your will and of your faith. And count

all these steps you are now taking as settled, though the enemy may

to doubt or discouragement. Remember, that all discouragement is from

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repeat often, “I am all the Lord’s and He is working in me now to will

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CHAPTER 6

DIFFICULTIES CONCERNING FAITH

The next step after consecration, in the soul’s progress out of the wilderness

of Christian experience, into the land that floweth with milk and honey, is

that of faith. And here, as in the first step, the enemy is very skillful in

making difficulties and interposing obstacles.

The child of God, having had his eyes opened to see the fullness there is in

Jesus for him, and having been made to long to appropriate that fullness to

himself, is met with the assertion on the part of every teacher to whom he

applies, that this fullness is only to be received by faith. But the subject of

faith is involved in such a hopeless mystery in his mind, that this assertion,

instead of throwing light upon the way of entrance, only seems to make it

more difficult and involved than ever.

“Of course it is to be by faith,” he says, “for I know that everything in the

Christian life is by faith. But then, that is just what makes it so hard, for I

have no faith, and I do not even know what it is, nor how to get it.” And,

baffled at the very outset by this insuperable difficulty, he is plunged into

darkness, and almost despair.

This trouble all arises from the fact that the subject of faith is very generally

misunderstood; for in reality faith is the plainest and most simple thing in

the world, and the most easy of attainment.

Your idea of faith, I suppose, has been something like this. You have

looked upon it as in some way a sort of thing, either a religious exercise of

soul, or an inward gracious disposition of heart; something tangible, in fact,

which, when you have got, you can look at and rejoice over, and use as a

passport to God’s favor, or a coin with which to purchase His gifts. And

you have been praying for faith, expecting all the while to get something

like this, and never having received any such thing, you are insisting upon it

that you have no faith. Now faith, in fact, is not in the least this sort of thing.

It is nothing at all tangible. It is simply believing God, and, like sight, it is

nothing apart from its object. You might as well shut your eyes and look

inside to see whether you have sight, as to look inside to discover whether

you have faith. You see something, and thus know that you have sight; you

believe something, and thus know that you have faith. For, as sight is only

seeing, so faith is only believing. And as the only necessary thing about

seeing is, that you see the thing as it is, so the only necessary thing about

believing is, at you believe the thing as it is. The virtue does not lie in your

believing, but in the thing you believe. If you believe the truth you are

saved; if you believe a lie you are lost. The believing in both cases is the

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same; the things believed in are exactly opposite, and it is this which makes

the mighty difference. Your salvation comes, not because your faith saves

you, but because it links you on to the Savior who saves; and your believing

is really nothing but the link.

I do beg of you to recognize, then, the extreme simplicity of faith; that it is

nothing more nor less than just believing God when He says He either has

done something for us, or will do it; and then trusting Him to do it. It is so

simple that it is hard to explain. If any one asks me what it means to trust

another to do a piece of work for me, I can only answer that it means letting

that other one do it, and feeling it perfectly unnecessary for me to do it

myself. Every one of us has trusted very important pieces of work to others

in this way, and has felt perfect rest in thus trusting, because of the

confidence we have had in those who have undertaken to do it. How

constantly do mothers trust their most precious infants to the care of nurses,

and feel no shadow of anxiety? How continually we are all of us trusting

our health and our lives, without a thought of fear, to cooks and coachmen,

engine drivers, railway conductors, and all sorts of paid servants, who have

us completely at their mercy, and could plunge us into misery or death in a

moment, if they chose to do so, or even if they failed in the necessary

carefulness? All this we do, and make no fuss about it. Upon the slightest

acquaintance, often, we thus put our trust in people, requiring only the

general knowledge of human nature, and the common rules of human

intercourse; and we never feel as if we were doing anything in the least

remarkable.

You have done all this yourself, dear reader, and are doing it continually.

You would not be able to live in this world and go through the customary

routine of life a single day, if you could not trust your fellow-men. And it

never enters into your head to say you cannot.

But yet you do not hesitate to say, continually, that you cannot trust your

God!

I wish you would just now try to imagine yourself acting in your human

relations as you do in your spiritual relations. Suppose you should begin

tomorrow with the notion in your head that you could not trust anybody,

because you had no faith. When you sat down to breakfast you would say,

“I cannot eat anything on this table, for I have no faith, and I cannot believe

the cook has not put poison in the coffee, or that the butcher has not sent

home diseased meat.” So you would go starving away. Then when you

went out to your daily avocations, you would say, “I cannot ride in the

railway train, for I have no faith, and therefore I cannot trust the engineer,

nor the conductor, nor the builders of the carriages, nor the managers of the

road.” So you would be compelled to walk everywhere, and grow

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unutterably weary in the effort, besides being actually unable to reach many

of the places you could have reached in the train. Then, when your friends

met you with any statements, or your business agent with any accounts,

you would say, “I am very sorry that I cannot believe you, but I have no

faith, and never can believe anybody.” If you opened a newspaper you

would be forced to lay it down again, saying, “I really cannot believe a

word this paper says, for I have no faith; I do not believe there is any such

person as the queen, for I never saw her; nor any such country as Ireland,

for I was never there. And I have no faith, so of course I cannot believe

anything that I have not actually felt and touched myself. It is a great trial,

but I cannot help it, for I have no faith.”

Just picture such a day as this, and see how disastrous it would be to

yourself, and what utter folly it would appear to any one who should watch

you through the whole of it. Realize how your friends would feel insulted,

and how your servants would refuse to serve you another day. And then

ask yourself the question, if this want of faith in your fellow-men would be

so dreadful, and such utter folly, what must it be when you tell God that

you have no power to trust Him nor to believe His word; that “it is a great

trial, but you cannot help it, for you have no faith”?

Is it possible that you can trust your fellow-men and cannot trust your God?

That you can receive the “witness of men,” and cannot receive the “witness

of God”? That you can believe man’s records, and cannot believe God’s

record? That you can commit your dearest earthly interests to your weak,

failing fellow-creatures without a fear, and are afraid to commit your

spiritual interests to the blessed Savior who shed His blood for the very

purpose of saving you, and who is declared to be “able to save you to the

uttermost”?

Surely, surely, dear believer, you, whose very name of believer implies that

you can believe, will never again dare to excuse yourself on the plea of

having no faith. For when you say this, you mean of course that you have

no faith in God, since you are not asked to have faith in yourself, and you

would be in a very wrong condition of soul if you had. Let me beg of you

then, when you think or say these things, always to complete the sentence

and say, “I have no faith in God, I cannot believe God”; and this I am sure

will soon become so dreadful to you, that you will not dare to continue it.

But you say, I cannot believe without the Holy Spirit. Very well; will you

conclude that your want of faith is because of the failure of the blessed

Spirit to do His work? For if it is, then surely you are not to blame, and

need feel no condemnation; and all exhortations to you to believe are

useless.

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But, no! Do you not see that, in taking up this position, that you have no

faith and cannot believe, you are not only “making God a liar,” but you are

also manifesting an utter want of confidence in the Holy Spirit? For He is

always ready to help our infirmities. We never have to wait for Him, He is

always waiting for us. And I for my part have such absolute confidence in

the blessed Holy Ghost, and in His being always ready to do his work, that

I dare to say to every one of you, that you can believe now, at this very

moment, and that if you do not, it is not the Spirit’s fault, but your own.

Put your will then over on to the believing side. Say, “Lord I will believe, I

do believe,” and continue to say it. Insist upon believing, in the face of

every suggestion of doubt with which you may be tempted. Out of your

very unbelief, throw yourself headlong on to the word and promises of

God, and dare to abandon yourself to the keeping and saving power of the

Lord Jesus. If you have ever trusted a precious interest in the hands of any

earthly friend, I conjure you, trust yourself now and all your spiritual

interests in the hands of your Heavenly Friend, and never, never, NEVER

allow yourself to doubt again.

And remember, there are two things which are more utterly incompatible

than even oil and water, and these two are trust and worry. Would you call

it trust, if you should give something into the hands of a friend to attend to

for you, and then should spend your nights and days in anxious thought and

worry as to whether it would be rightly and successfully done? And can

you call it trust, when you have given the saving and keeping of your soul

into the hands of the Lord, if day after day and night after night you are

spending hours of anxious thought and questionings about the matter?

When a believer really trusts anything, he ceases to worry about that thing

which he has trusted. And when he worries, it is a plain proof that he does

not trust. Tested by this rule how little real trust there is in the Church of

Christ! No wonder our Lord asked the pathetic question, “When the Son of

Man cometh shall he find faith on the earth?” He will find plenty of activity,

a great deal of earnestness, and doubtless many consecrated hearts; but shall

he find faith, the one thing He values more than all the rest? It is a solemn

question, and I would that every Christian heart would ponder it well. But

may the time past of our lives suffice us to have shared in the unbelief of

the world; and let us every one, who know our blessed Lord and His

unspeakable trustworthiness, set to our seal that He is true, by our generous

abandonment of trust in Him.

I remember, very early in my Christian life, having every tender and loyal

impulse within me stirred to its depths by an appeal I met with in a volume

of old sermons to all who loved the Lord Jesus, that they should show to

others how worthy He was of being trusted, by the steadfastness of their

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own faith in Him. And I remember my soul cried out with an eager longing

that I might be called to walk in paths so dark, that an utter abandonment of

trust might be my blessed and glorious privilege.

“Ye have not passed this way heretofore,” it may be; but today it is your

happy privilege to prove, as never before, your loyal confidence in the Lord

by starting out with Him on a life and walk of faith, lived moment by

moment in absolute and childlike trust in Him.

You have trusted Him in a few things, and He has not failed you. Trust

Him now for everything, and see if He does not do for you exceeding

abundantly above all that you could ever have asked or thought; not

according to your power or capacity, but according to His own mighty

power, that will work in you all the good pleasure of His most blessed will.

You find no difficulty in trusting the Lord with the management of the

universe and all the outward creation, and can your case be any more

complex or difficult than these, that you need to be anxious or troubled

about his management of it. Away with such unworthy doubtings! Take

your stand on the power and trustworthiness of your God, and see how

quickly all difficulties will vanish before a steadfast determination to

believe. Trust in the dark, trust in the light, trust at night, and trust in the

morning, and you will find that the faith, which may begin by a mighty

effort, will end sooner or later by becoming the easy and natural habit of the

soul.

All things are possible to God, and “all things are possible to him that

believeth.” Faith has, in times past, “subdued kingdoms, wrought

righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched

the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, waxed valiant in fight,

turned to flight the armies of the aliens”; and faith can do it again. For our

Lord Himself says unto us, “If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye

shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place, and it shall

remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.”

If you are a child of God at all, you must have at least as much faith as a

grain of mustard seed, and therefore you dare not say again that you cannot

trust because you have no faith. Say rather, “I can trust my Lord, and I will

trust Him, and not all the powers of earth or hell shall be able to make me

doubt my wonderful, glorious, faithful Redeemer!”

In that greatest event of this century, the emancipation of our slaves, there is

a wonderful illustration of the way of faith. The slaves received their

freedom by faith, just as we must receive ours. The good news was carried

to them that the government had proclaimed their freedom. As a matter of

fact they were free the moment the Proclamation was issued, but as a matter

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of experience they did not come into actual possession of their freedom

until they had heard the good news and had believed it. The fact had to

come first, but the believing was necessary before the fact became available,

and the feeling would follow last of all. This is the divine order always, and

the order of common-sense as well.

But man reverses this order and says,

Had the slaves followed man’s order in regard to their emancipation, and

refused to believe in it until they had first felt it, they might have remained

in slavery a long while. I have heard of one instance where this was the

case. In a little out-of-the-way Southern town a Northern lady found, about

two or three years after the war was over, some slaves who had not yet

taken possession of their freedom. An assertion of hers, that the North had

set them free, aroused the attention of an old colored auntie, who interrupted

her with the eager question, —

“O missus, is we free?”

“Of course you are,” replied the lady.

“O missus, is you sure?” urged the woman, with intensest

eagerness.

“Certainly, I am sure,” answered the lady. “Why, is it possible you

did not know it?”

“Well,” said the woman, “we heered tell as how we was free, and

we asked master, and he ‘lowed we wasn’t, and so we was afraid to

go. And then we heered tell again, and we went to the cunnel, and he

‘lowed we’d better stay with ole massa. And so we’s just been off

and on. Sometimes we’d hope we was free, and then again we’d

think we wasn’t. But now, missus, if you is sure we is free, won’t

you tell me all about it?”

Seeing that this was a case of real need, the lady took the pains to explain

the whole thing to the poor woman; all about the war, and the Northern

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army, and Abraham Lincoln, and his Proclamation of Emancipation, and

the present freedom.

The poor slave listened with the most intense eagerness. She heard the good

news. She believed it. And when the story was ended, she walked out of the

room with an air of the utmost independence, saying as she went, — “I’s

free! I’s ain’t agoing to stay with ol massa any longer!”

She had at last received her freedom, and she had received it by faith. The

government had declared her to be free long before, but this had not availed

her, because she had never yet believed in this declaration. The good news

had not profited her, not being “mixed with faith” in the one who heard it.

But now she believed, and believing, she dared to reckon herself to be free.

And this, not because of any change in herself or her surroundings, not

because of any feelings of emotions of her own heart, but because she had

confidence in the word of another, who had come to her proclaiming the

good news of her freedom.

Need I make the application? In a hundred different messages God has

declared to us our freedom, and over and over He urges us to reckon

ourselves free. Let your faith then lay hold of His proclamation, and assert it

to be true. Declare to yourself, to your friends, and in the secret of your soul

to God, that you are free. Refuse to listen for a moment to the lying

assertions of your old master, that you are still his slave. Let nothing

discourage you, no inward feelings nor outward signs. Hold on to your

reckoning in the face of all opposition, and I can promise you, on the

authority of our Lord, that according to your faith it shall be unto you.

Of all the worships we can bring our God, none is so sweet to Him as this

utter self-abandoning trust, and none brings Him so much glory. Therefore

in every dark hour remember that “though now for a season, if need be, ye

are in heaviness through manifold temptations,” it is in order that “the trial

of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though

it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise, and honor, and glory, at the

appearing of Jesus Christ.”

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CHAPTER 7

DIFFICULTIES CONCERNING THE WILL

When the child of God has, by the way of entire abandonment and absolute

trust, stepped out of himself into Christ, and has begun to know something

of the blessedness of the life hid with Christ in God, there is one form of

difficulty which is very likely to start up in his path. After the first emotions

of peace and rest have somewhat subsided, or if, as is sometimes the case,

they have never seemed to come at all, he begins to feel such an utter

unreality in the things he has been passing through, that he seems to himself

like a hypocrite, when he says or even thinks they are real. It seems to him

that his belief does not go below the surface, that it is a mere lip-belief, and

therefore of no account, and that his surrender is not a surrender of the

heart, and therefore cannot be acceptable to God. He is afraid to say he is

altogether the Lord’s, for fear he will be telling an untruth, and yet he cannot

bring himself to say he is not, because he longs for it so intensely. The

difficulty is real and very disheartening.

But there is nothing here which will not be very easily overcome, when the

Christian once thoroughly understands the principles of the new life, and

has learned how to live in it. The common thought is, that this life hid with

Christ in God is to be lived in the emotions, and consequently all the

attention of the soul is directed towards them, and as they are satisfactory or

otherwise, the soul rests or is troubled. Now the truth is that this life is not

to be lived in the emotions at all, but in the will, and therefore the varying

states of emotion do not in the least disturb or affect the reality of the life, if

only the will is kept steadfastly abiding in its center, God’s will.

To make this plain, I must enlarge a little. Fenelon says somewhere, that

“pure religion resides in the will alone.” By this he means that as the will is

the governing power in the man’s nature, if the will is set straight, all the

rest of the nature must come into harmony. By the will I do not mean the

wish of the man, nor even his purpose, but the choice, the deciding power,

the king, to which all that is in the man must yield obedience. It is the man,

in short, the “Ego,” that which we feel to be ourselves.

It is sometimes thought that the emotions are the governing power in our

nature. But, as a matter of practical experience, I think we all of us know

that there is something within us, behind our emotions, and behind our

wishes, — an independent self, — that after all decides everything and

controls everything. Our emotions belong to us, and are suffered and

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enjoyed by us, but they are not ourselves; and if God is to take possession

of us, it must be into this central will or personality that He shall enter. If,

then, He is reigning there by the power of His Spirit, all the rest of our

nature must come under His sway; and as the will is, so is the man.

The practical bearing of this truth upon the difficulty I am considering is

very great. For the decisions of our will are often so directly opposed to the

decisions of our emotions, that, if we are in the habit of considering our

emotions as the test, we shall be very apt to feel like hypocrites in declaring

those things to be real which our will alone has decided. But the moment

we see that the will is king, we shall utterly disregard anything that clamors

against it, and shall claim as real its decisions, let the emotions rebel as they

may.

I am aware that this is a difficult subject to deal with, but it is so exceedingly

practical in its bearing upon the life of faith, that I beg of you, dear reader,

not to turn from it until you have mastered it.

Perhaps an illustration will help you. A young man of great intelligence,

seeking to enter into this new life, was utterly discouraged at finding

himself the slave to an inveterate habit of doubting. To his emotions nothing

seemed true, nothing seemed real; and the more he struggled the more

unreal did it all become. He was told this secret concerning the will, that if

he would only put his will over on to the believing side; if he would choose

to believe; if, in short, he would, in the Ego of his nature, say, “I will

believe! I do believe!” he need not trouble about his emotions, for they

would find themselves compelled, sooner or later, to come into harmony.

“What!” he said,” do you mean to tell me that I can choose to believe in

that way, when nothing seems true to me; and will that kind of believing be

real?” “Yes,” was the answer, “your part is only this, — to put your will

over on God’s side in this matter of believing; and when you do this, God

immediately takes possession of it, and works in you to will of His good

pleasure, and you will soon find that He has brought all the rest of your

nature into subjection to Himself.” “Well,” was the answer, “I can do this.

I cannot control my emotions, but I can control my will, and the new life

begins to look possible to me, if it is only my will that needs to be set

straight in the matter. I can give my will to God, and I do!”

From that moment, disregarding all the pitiful clamoring of his emotions,

which continually accused him of being a wretched hypocrite, this young

man held on steadily to the decision of his will, answering every accusation

with the continued assertion that he chose to believe, he meant to believe, he

did believe; until at the end of a few days he found himself triumphant, with

every emotion and every thought brought into captivity to the mighty power

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of the blessed Spirit of God, who had taken possession of the will thus put

into His hands. He had held fast the profession of his faith without

wavering, although it had seemed to him that, as to real faith itself, he had

none to hold fast. At times it had drained all the will power he possessed to

his lips, to say that he believed, so contrary was it to all the evidence of his

senses or of his emotions. But he had caught the idea that his will was, after

all, himself, and that if he kept that on God’s side, he was doing all he could

do, and that God alone could change his emotions or control his being. The

result has been one of the grandest Christian lives I know of, in its

marvellous simplicity, directness, and power over sin.

The secret lies just here. That our will, which is the spring of all our actions,

is in our natural state under the control of self, and self has been working it

in us to our utter ruin and misery. Now God says, “Yield yourselves up

unto Me, as those that are alive from the dead, and I will work in you to will

and to do of my good pleasure.” And the moment we yield ourselves, He

of course takes possession of us, and does work in us “that which is well

pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ,” giving us the mind that was in

Let us take another illustration. A lady, who had entered into this life hid

with Christ, was confronted by a great prospective trial. Every emotion she

had within her rose up in rebellion against it, and had she considered her

emotions to be her king, she would have been in utter despair. But she had

learned this secret of the will, and knowing that, at the bottom, she herself

did really choose the will of God for her portion, she did not pay the

slightest attention to her emotions, but persisted in meeting every thought

concerning the trial, with the words, repeated over and over, “Thy will be

done! Thy will be done!” asserting in the face of all her rebelling feelings,

that she did submit her will to God’s, that she chose to submit, and that His

will should be and was her delight! The result was, that in an incredibly

short space of time every thought was brought into captivity; and she began

to find even her very emotions rejoicing in the will of God.

Again, there was a lady who had a besetting sin, which in her emotions she

dearly loved, but which in her will she hated. Having believed herself to be

necessarily under the control of her emotions, she had therefore thought she

was unable to conquer it, unless her emotions should first be changed. But

she learned this secret concerning the will, and going to her knees she said,

“Lord, Thou seest that with one part of my nature I love this sin, but in my

real central self I hate it. And now I put my will over on thy side in the

matter. I will not do it any more. Do thou deliver me.” Immediately God

took possession of the will thus surrendered to Himself, and began to work

in her, so that His will in the matter gained the mastery over her emotions,

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and she found herself delivered, not by the power of an outward

commandment, but by the inward power of the Spirit of God working in

her that which was well pleasing in His sight.

And now, dear Christian, let me show you how to apply this principle to

your difficulties. Cease to consider your emotions, for they are only the

servants; and regard simply your will, which is the real king in your being.

Is that given up to God? Is that put into His hands? Does your will decide to

believe? Does your will choose to obey? If this is the case, then you are in

the Lord’s hands, and you decide to believe, and you choose to obey; for

your will is yourself. And the thing is done. The transaction with God is as

real, where only your will acts, as when every emotion coincides. It does

not seem as real to you; but in God’s sight it is as real. And when you have

got hold of this secret, and have discovered that you need not attend to your

emotions, but simply to the state of your will, all the Scripture commands,

to yield yourself to God, to present yourself a living sacrifice to Him, to

abide in Christ, to walk in the light, to die to self, become possible to you;

for you are conscious that, in all these, your will can act, and can take God’s

side: whereas, if it had been your emotions that must do it, you would sink

down in despair, knowing them to be utterly uncontrollable.

When, then, this feeling of unreality or hypocrisy comes, do not be troubled

by it. It is only in your emotions, and is not worth a moment’s thought.

Only see to it that your will is in God’s hands; that your inward self is

abandoned to His working; that your choice, your decision, is on His side;

and there leave it. Your surging emotions, like a tossing vessel, which, by

degrees, yields to the steady pull of the cable, finding themselves attached to

the mighty power of God by the choice of your will, must inevitably come

into captivity, and give in their allegiance to Him; and you will verify the

truth of the saying that, “If any man will do His will, he shall know of the

doctrine.”

The will is like a wise mother in a nursery; the feelings are like a set of

clamoring, crying children. The mother decides upon a certain course of

action, which she believes to be right and best. The children clamor against

it, and declare it shall not be. But the mother, knowing that she is mistress

and not they, pursues her course calmly, unmoved by their clamors, and

takes no notice of them except in trying to soothe and quiet them. The result

is that the children are sooner or later compelled to yield, and fall in with the

decision of the mother. Thus order and harmony are preserved. But if that

mother should for a moment let in the thought that the children were the

mistresses instead of herself, confusion would reign unchecked. Such

instances have been known in family life! And in how many souls at this

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very moment is there nothing but confusion, simply because the feelings

are allowed to govern, instead of the will!

Remember, then, that the real thing in your experience is what your will

decides, and not the verdict of your emotions; and that you are far more in

danger of hypocrisy and untruth in yielding to the assertions of your

feelings, than in holding fast to the decision of your will. So that, if your

will is on God’s side, you are no hypocrite at this moment in claiming as

your own the blessed reality of belonging altogether to Him, even though

your emotions may all declare the contrary.

I am convinced that, throughout the Bible, the expressions concerning the

“heart” do not mean the emotions, that which we now understand by the

word “heart”; but they mean the will, the personality of the man, the man’s

own central self; and that the object of God’s dealings with man is, that this

“I” may be yielded up to Him, and this central life abandoned to His entire

control. It is not the feelings of the man God wants, but the man himself.

Have you given Him yourself, dear reader? Have you abandoned your will

to His working? Do you consent to surrender the very center of your being

into His hands? Then, let the outposts of your nature clamor as they may, it

is your right to say, even now, with the apostle, “I am crucified with Christ;

nevertheless, I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I

now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me,

and gave Himself for me.”

After this chapter had been enclosed to the printer, the following remarkable

practical illustration of its teaching was presented by Pasteur T. Monod, of

Paris. It is the experience of a Presbyterian minister, which this pasteur had

carefully kept for many years.

Dear Brother, — I take a few moments of that time which I have

devoted to the Lord, in writing a short epistle to you, His servant. It

is sweet to feel we are wholly the Lord’s, that He has received us

and called us His. This is religion, — a relinquishment of the

principle of self-ownership, and the adoption in full of the abiding

sentiment, “I am not my own, I am bought with a price.” Since I

last saw you, I have been pressing forward, and yet there has been

nothing remarkable in my experience of which I can speak; indeed I

do not know that it is best to look for remarkable things; but strive

to be holy, as God is holy, pressing right on toward the mark of the

prize.

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I do not feel myself qualified to instruct you; I can only tell you the

way in which I was led. The Lord deals differently with different

souls, and we ought not to attempt to copy the experience of others,

yet there are certain things which must be attended to by every one

who is seeking after a clean heart.

There must be a personal consecration of all to God, a covenant

made with God, that we will be wholly and forever His. This I

made intellectually without any change in my feeling, with a heart

full of hardness and darkness, unbelief and sin and insensibility.

I covenanted to be the Lord’s, and laid all upon the altar, a living

sacrifice, to the best of my ability. And after I rose from my knees, I

was conscious of no change in my feeling. I was painfully

conscious that there was no change. But yet I was sure that I did,

with all the sincerity and honesty of purpose of which I was capable,

make an entire and eternal consecration of myself to God. I did not

then consider the work done by any means, but I engaged to abide

in a state of entire devotion to God, a living perpetual sacrifice. And

now came the effort to do this.

I knew that I must believe that God did accept me, and had come in

to dwell in my heart. I was conscious I did not believe this, and yet I

desired to do so. I read with much prayer John’s First Epistle, and

endeavored to assure my heart of God’s love to me as an individual.

I was sensible that my heart was full of evil. I seemed to have no

power to overcome pride, or to repel evil thoughts, which I

abhorred. But Christ was manifested to destroy the works of the

devil, and it was clear that the sin in my heart was the work of the

devil. I was enabled, therefore, to believe that God was working in

me, to will and to do, while I was working out my own salvation

with fear and trembling.

I was convinced of unbelief, that it was voluntary and criminal. I

clearly saw that unbelief was an awful sin, it made the faithful God a

liar. The Lord brought before me my besetting sins which had

dominion over me, especially preaching myself instead of Christ,

and indulging self-complacent thoughts after preaching. I was

enabled to make myself of no reputation, and to seek the honor

which cometh from God only. Satan struggled hard to beat me back

from the Rock of Ages but thanks to God I finally hit upon the

method of living by the moment, and then I found rest.

I trusted in the blood of Jesus already shed, as a sufficient

atonement for all my past sins, and the future I committed wholly to

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the Lord, agreeing to do His will under all circumstances as He

should make it known, and I saw that all I had to do was to look to

Jesus for a present supply of grace, and to trust Him to cleanse my

heart and keep me from sin at the present moment.

I felt shut up to a momentary dependence upon the grace of Christ. I

would not permit the adversary to trouble me about the past or

future, for I each moment looked for the supply for that moment. I

agreed that I would be a child of Abraham, and walk by naked faith

in the Word of God, and not by inward feelings and emotions: I

would seek to be a Bible Christian. Since that time the Lord has

given me a steady victory over sins which before enslaved me. I

delight in the Lord, and in His Word. I delight in my work as a

minister: my fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus

Christ. I am a babe in Christ; I know my progress has been small

compared with that made by many. My feelings vary, but when I

have feelings, I praise God, and I trust in His word; and when I am

empty and my feelings are gone, I do the same. I have covenanted

to walk by faith and not by feelings.

The Lord, I think, is beginning to revive His work among my

people. “Praise the Lord.” May the Lord fill you with all His

fullness and give you all the mind of Christ. Oh, be faithful! Walk

before God and be perfect. Preach the Word. Be instant in season

and out of season. The Lord loves you. He works with you. Rest

your soul fully upon that promise, “Lo, I am with you alway, even

unto the end of the world.”

There may be some who will object to this teaching, that it ignores the work

of the blessed Holy Spirit. But I must refer such to the introductory chapter

of this book, in which I have fully explained myself. I am not writing upon

that side of the subject; I am considering man’s part in the matter, and not

the part of the Spirit. I realize intensely that all a man can do or try to do

would be utterly useless, if the Holy Spirit did not work in that man

continually. And it is only because I believe in the Spirit as a mighty power,

ever present and always ready to do his work, that I can write as I do. But,

like the wind that bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound

thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth, the

operations of the Spirit are beyond our control, and also beyond our

comprehension.

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The results we know, and the steps on our part which lead to those results,

but we know nothing more. And yet, like a workman in a great

manufactory, who does not question the commands of his employer, and is

not afraid to undertake apparent impossibilities, because he knows there is a

mighty unseen power, called steam, behind his machinery, which can

accomplish it all, so we dare to urge upon men that they shall simply and

courageously set themselves to do that which they are commanded to do,

because we know that the mighty Spirit will never fail to supply at each

moment the necessary power for that moment’s act. And we boldly claim

that we who thus write can say from our very hearts, as earnestly and as

solemnly as any other Christians, We believe in the Holy Ghost.

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CHAPTER 8

IS GOD IN EVERYTHING?

One of the greatest obstacles to living unwaveringly this life of entire

surrender is the difficulty of seeing God in everything. People say, “I can

easily submit to things which come from God; but I cannot submit to man,

and most of my trials and crosses come through human instrumentality.”

Or they say, “It is all well enough to talk of trusting; but when I commit a

matter to God, man is sure to come in and disarrange it all; and while I have

no difficulty in trusting God, I do see serious difficulties in the way of

trusting men.”

This is no imaginary trouble, but it is of vital importance, and if it cannot be

met, does really make the life of faith an impossible and visionary theory.

For nearly everything in life comes to us through human instrumentalities,

and most of our trials are the result of somebody’s failure, or ignorance, or

carelessness, or sin. We know God cannot be the author of these things,

and yet unless He is the agent in the matter, how can we say to Him about

it, “Thy will be done”?

Besides, what good is there in trusting our affairs to God, if, after all, man

is to be allowed to come in and disarrange them; and how is it possible to

live by faith, if human agencies, in whom it would be wrong and foolish to

trust, are to have a predominant influence in moulding our lives?

Moreover, things in which we can see God’s hand always have a sweetness

in them which consoles while it wounds. But the trials inflicted by man are

full of bitterness.

What is needed, then, is to see God in everything, and to receive everything

directly from His hands, with no intervention of second causes. And it is

just to this that we must be brought, before we can know an abiding

experience of entire abandonment and perfect trust. Our abandonment must

be to God, not to man, and our trust must be in Him, not in any arm of

flesh, or we shall fail at the first trial.

The question here confronts us at once, “But is God in everything, and have

we any warrant from the Scripture for receiving everything from His hands,

without regarding the second causes which may have been instrumental in

bringing it about?” I answer to this, unhesitatingly, Yes. To the children of

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God everything comes directly from their Father’s hand, no matter who or

what may have been the apparent agents. There are no “second causes” for

them.

The whole teaching of the Bible asserts and implies this. “Not a sparrow

falls to the ground without our Father.” The very hairs of our head are all

numbered. We are not to be careful about anything, because our Father

cares for us. We are not to avenge ourselves, because our Father has

charged Himself with our defense. We are not to fear, for the Lord is on our

side. No one can be against us, because He is for us. We shall not want, for

He is our Shepherd. When we pass through the rivers they shall not

overflow us, and when we walk through the fire we shall not be burned,

because He will be with us. He shuts the mouths of lions, that they cannot

hurt us. “He delivereth and rescueth.” “He changeth the times and the

seasons; He removeth kings and setteth up kings.” A man’s heart is in His

hand, and, “as the river of water, He turneth it whithersoever He will.” He

ruleth over all the kingdoms of the heathen; and in His hand there is power

and might,” so that none is able to withstand” Him. “He ruleth the raging

of the sea; when the waves thereof arise, He stilleth them.” He “bringeth the

counsel of the heathen to nought; He maketh the devices of the people of

none effect.” “Whatsoever the Lord pleaseth, that does He in heaven, and in

earth, in the seas, and all deep places.”

“If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of

judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter; for He

that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than

they.”

“Lo, these are a part of His ways; but how little a portion is heard of

Him? But the thunder of His power who can understand?” “Hast

thou not known, hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the

Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is

weary? There is no searching of His understanding.”

And this “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the

mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof

roar and be troubled; though the mountains shake with the swelling

thereof.” “I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my

God, in Him will I trust. Surely He shall deliver thee from the snare of the

fowler, and from the noisesome pestilence. He shall cover thee with His

feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust. His truth shall be thy shield

and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the

arrow that flieth by day, nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor

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for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side,

and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.”

“Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most

High, thy habitation, there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague

come nigh thy dwelling. For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to

keep thee in all thy ways.”

To my own mind, these Scriptures, and many others like them, settle

forever the question as to the power of second causes in the life of the

children of God. They are all under the control of our Father, and nothing

can touch us except with His knowledge and by His permission. It may be

the sin of man that originates the action, and therefore the thing itself cannot

be said to be the will of God but by the time it reaches us, it has become

God’s will for us, and must be accepted as directly from His hands. No

man or company of men, no power in earth or heaven, can touch that soul

which is abiding in Christ, without first passing through Him, and receiving

the seal of His permission. If God be for us, it matters not who may be

against us; nothing can disturb or harm us, except He shall see that it is best

for us, and shall stand aside to let it pass.

An earthly parent’s care for his helpless child is a feeble illustration of this.

If the child is in its father’s arms, nothing can touch it without that father’s

consent, unless he is too weak to prevent it. And even if this should be the

case, he suffers the harm first in his own person, before he allows it to

reach his child. And if an earthly parent would thus care for his little

helpless one, how much more will our Heavenly Father, whose love is

infinitely greater, and whose strength and wisdom can never be baffled! I

am afraid there are some, even of God’s own children, who scarcely think

that He is equal to themselves in tenderness, and love, and thoughtful care;

and who in their secret thoughts, charge Him with a neglect and indifference

of which they would feel themselves incapable. The truth really is, that His

care is infinitely superior to any possibilities of human care; and that He

who counts the very hairs of our head, and suffers not a sparrow to fall

without Him, takes note of the minutest matters that can affect the lives of

His children, and regulates them all according to His own sweet will, let

their origin be what they may.

The instances of this are numberless. Take Joseph. What could have

seemed more apparently on the face of it to be the result of sin, and utterly

contrary to the will of God, than his being sold into slavery? And yet

Joseph, in speaking of it, said, “As for you, ye thought evil against me: but

God meant it unto good.” “Now, therefore, be not grieved nor angry with

yourselves, that ye sold me hither, for God did send me before you to

preserve life.” To the eye of sense it was surely Joseph’s wicked brethren

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who had sent him into Egypt; and yet Joseph, looking at it with the eye of

faith, could say, “God sent me.” It had been undoubtedly a grievous sin in

his brethren, but, by the time it had reached Joseph, it had become God’s

will for him, and was in truth, though at first it did not look so, the greatest

blessing of his whole life. And thus we see how the Lord can make even

the wrath of man to praise Him, and how all things, even the sins of others,

shall work together for good to them that love Him.

I learned this lesson practically and experimentally long years before I knew

the scriptural truth concerning it. I was attending a prayer-meeting held for

the promotion of scriptural holiness, when a strange lady rose to speak, and

I looked at her, wondering who she could be, little thinking she was to bring

a message to my soul which would teach me such a grand lesson. She said

she had had great difficulty in living the life of faith, on account of the

second causes that seemed to her to control nearly everything that concerned

her. Her perplexity became so great, that at last she began to ask God to

teach her the truth about it, whether He really was in everything or not.

After praying this for a few days, she had what she described as a vision.

She thought she was in a perfectly dark place, and that there advanced

towards her from a distance a body of light, which gradually surrounded

and enveloped her and everything around her. As it approached, a voice

seemed to say, “This is the presence of God; this is the presence of God.”

While surrounded with this presence, all the great and awful things in life

seemed to pass before her, — fighting armies, wicked men, raging beasts,

storms and pestilences, sin and suffering of every kind.

She shrank back at first in terror, but she soon saw that the presence of God

so surrounded and enveloped each one of these, that not a lion could reach

out its paw, nor a bullet fly through the air, except as His presence moved

out of the way to permit it. And she saw that, let there be ever so thin a

sheet, as it were, of this glorious presence between herself and the most

terrible violence, not a hair of her head could be ruffled, nor anything touch

her, unless the presence divided to let the evil through. Then all the small

and annoying things of life passed before her, and equally she saw that

these all were so enveloped in this presence of God that not a cross look,

not a harsh word, nor petty trial of any kind, could reach her unless His

presence moved out of the way to let them through.

Her difficulty vanished. Her question was answered forever. God was in

everything; and to her henceforth there were no second causes. She saw that

her life came to her day by day and hour by hour directly from His hand, let

the agencies which should seem to control it be what they might. And never

again had she found any difficulty in an abiding consent to His will and an

unwavering trust in His care.

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If we look at the seen things, we shall not be able to understand the secret of

this. But the children of God are called to look, “not at the things which are

seen: for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are

not seen are eternal.” Could we but see with our bodily eyes His unseen

forces surrounding us on every side, we would walk through this world in

an impregnable fortress, which nothing could ever overthrow or penetrate,

for “the angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him, and

delivereth them.”

We have a striking illustration of this in the history of Elisha. The king of

Syria was warring against Israel, but his evil designs were continually

frustrated by the prophet; and at last he sent his army to the prophet’s own

city for the express purpose of taking him captive. We read, “He sent

thither horses and chariots and a great host; and they came by night and

compassed the city about.” This was the seen thing. And the servant of the

prophet, whose eyes had not yet been opened to see the unseen things, was

alarmed. And we read, “And when the servant of the man of God was risen

early and gone forth, behold an host compassed the city, both with horses

and chariots. And his servant said unto him, Alas, my master, how shall we

do?” But his master could see the unseen things, and he replied, “Fear not;

for they that be with us are more than they that be with them.” And then he

prayed, saying, “Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes that he may see. And the

Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw; and behold, the

mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha.”

The presence of God is the fortress of His people. Nothing can withstand it.

At His presence the wicked perish; the earth trembles; the hills melt like

wax; the cities are broken down; “the heavens also dropped, and Sinai itself

was moved at the presence of God.” And in the secret of this presence He

has promised to hide His people from the pride of man, and from the strife

of tongues. “My presence shall go with thee,” He says, “and I will give

thee rest.”

I wish it were only possible to make every Christian see this truth as plainly

as I see it; for I am convinced it is the only clue to a completely restful life.

Nothing else will enable a soul to live only in the present moment, as we are

commanded to do, and to take no thought for the morrow. Nothing else will

take all the risks and “supposes” out of a Christian’s heart, and enable him

to say, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my

life.” Abiding in God’s presence, we run no risks; and such a soul can

triumphantly say, —

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I once heard of a colored woman who earned a precarious living by daily

labor, but who was a joyous, triumphant Christian. “Ah! Nancy,” said a

gloomy Christian lady to her one day, who almost disapproved of her

constant cheerfulness, and yet envied it, — “ah! Nancy, it is all well enough

to be happy now; but I should think the thoughts of your future would

sober you. Only suppose, for instance, that you should have a spell of

sickness and be unable to work; or suppose your present employers should

move away, and no one else should give you anything to do; or suppose —

“ “Stop!” cried Nancy, “I never supposes. De Lord is my shepherd, and I

knows I shall not want. And, honey,” she added to her gloomy friend, “it’s

all dem supposes as is makin’ you so misable. You’d better give dem all

up, and just trust de Lord.”

There is one text that will take all the “suppose” out of a believer’s life, if

6: “Be content, therefore, with such things as ye have; for He hath said I

the malice or foolishness or ignorance of men shall combine to do you

harm? You may face every possible contingency with these triumphant

words, “The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto

me.” If the Lord is your helper, how can you fear what man may do unto

you? There is no man in this world, nor company of men, that can touch

you, unless your God, in whom you trust, shall please to let them. “He will

not suffer thy foot to be moved: He that keepeth thee will not slumber.

Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is

thy keeper; the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not

smite thee by day nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee from

all evil: He shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going out,

and thy coming in, from this time forth, and even for evermore.”

Nothing else but this seeing God in everything will make us loving and

patient with those who annoy and trouble us. They will be to us then only

the instruments for accomplishing His tender and wise purposes towards

us, and we shall even find ourselves at last inwardly thanking them for the

blessings they bring us.

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Nothing else will completely put an end to all murmuring or rebelling

thoughts. Christians often feel a liberty to murmur against man, when they

would not dare to murmur against God. But this way of receiving things

would make it impossible ever to murmur. If our Father permits a trial to

come, it must be because that trial is the sweetest and best thing that could

happen to us, and we must accept it with thanks from His dear hand. The

trial itself may be hard to flesh and blood, and I do not mean that we can

like or enjoy the suffering of it. But we can and must love the will of God in

the trial, for His will is always sweet, whether it be in joy or in sorrow.

Our trials may be our chariots. We long for some victory over sin and self,

and we ask God to grant it to us. His answer comes in the form of a trial

which He means shall be the chariot to bear us to the longed-for triumph.

We may either let it roll over us and crush us as a Juggernaut car, or we

may mount into it and ride triumphantly onward. Joseph’s chariots, which

bore him on to the place of his exaltation, were the trials of being sold into

slavery, and being cast unjustly into prison. Our chariots may be much

more insignificant things than these; they may be nothing but irritating

people or uncomfortable circumstances. But whatever they are, God means

them to be our cars of triumph, which shall bear us onward to the victories

we have prayed for. If we are impatient in our dispositions and long to be

made patient, our chariot will probably be a trying person to live in the

house with us, whose ways or words will rasp our very souls. If we accept

the trial as from God, and bow our necks to the yoke, we shall find it just

the discipline that will most effectually produce in us the very grace of

patience for which we have asked.

God does not order the wrong thing, but He uses it for our blessing; just as

He used the cruelty of Joseph’s wicked brethren, and the false accusations

of Pharaoh’s wife. In short, this way of seeing our Father in everything

makes life one long thanksgiving, and gives a rest of heart, and more than

that, a gayety of spirit, that is unspeakable. Someone says, “God’s will on

earth is always joy, always tranquillity.” And since He must have His own

way concerning His children, into what wonderful green pastures of inward

rest, and beside what blessedly still waters of inward refreshment, is the

soul led that learns this secret.

If the will of God is our will, and if He always has His way, then we

always have our way also, and we reign in a perpetual kingdom. He who

sides with God cannot fail to win in every encounter; and whether the result

shall be joy or sorrow, failure or success, death or life, we may, under all

circumstances, join in the apostle’s shout of victory, “Thanks be unto God,

which always causeth us to triumph in Christ!”

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CHAPTER 9

GROWTH

When the believer has been brought to the point of entire surrender and

perfect trust, and finds himself dwelling and walking in a life of happy

communion and perfect peace, the question naturally arises, “Is this the

end?” I answer emphatically “No, it is only the beginning.”

And yet this is so little understood, that one of the greatest objections made

against the advocates of this life of faith, is, that they do not believe in

growth in grace. They are supposed to teach that the soul arrives at a state of

perfection beyond which there is no advance, and that all the exhortations in

the Scripture which point towards growth and development are rendered

void by this teaching.

As exactly the opposite of this is true, I have thought it important next to

consider this subject carefully, that I may, if possible, fully answer such

objections, and may also show what is the scriptural place to grow in, and

how the soul is to grow.

grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Now

this text exactly expresses what we believe to be God’s will for us, and

what also we believe He has made it possible for us to experience. We

accept, in their very fullest meaning, all the commands and promises

concerning our being no more children, and our growing up into Christ in

all things, until we come unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature

of the fullness of Christ. We rejoice that we need not continue always to be

babes, needing milk; but that we may, by reason of use and development

become such as have need of strong meat, skillful in the word of

righteousness, and able to discern both good and evil. And none would

grieve more than we at the thought of any finality in the Christian life

beyond which there could be no advance.

But then we believe in a growing that does really produce maturity, and in a

development that, as a fact, does bring forth ripe fruit. We expect to reach

the aim set before us, and if we do not, we feel sure there must be some

fault in our growing. No parent would be satisfied with the growth of his

child, if, day after day, and year after year, it remained the same helpless

babe it was in the first months of its life; and no farmer would feel

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comfortable under such growing of his grain as should stop short at the

blade, and never produce the ear, nor the full corn in the ear. Growth, to be

real, must be progressive, and the days and weeks and months must see a

development and increase of maturity in the thing growing. But is this the

case with a large part of that which is called growth in grace? Does not the

very Christian who is the most strenuous in his longings and in his efforts

after it, too often find that at the end of the year he is not as far on in his

Christian experience as at the beginning, and that his zeal, and his

devotedness, and his separation from the world are not as whole-souled or

complete as when his Christian life first began?

I was once urging upon a company of Christians the privileges and rest of

an immediate and definite step into the land of promise, when a lady of

great intelligence interrupted me, with what she evidently felt to be a

complete rebuttal of all I had been saying, exclaiming, “Ah! but, my dear

friend, I believe in growing in grace.” “How long have you been growing?”

I asked. “About twenty-five years,” was her answer. “And how much

more unworldly and devoted to the Lord are you now than when you began

your Christian life?” I continued. “Alas!” was the answer, “I fear I am not

nearly so much so”; and with this answer her eyes were opened to see that

at all events her way of growing had not been successful, but quite the

reverse.

The trouble with her, and every other such case, is simply this, they are

trying to grow into grace, instead of in it. They are like a rosebush which the

gardener should plant in the hard, stony path, with a view to its growing

into the flower-bed, and which would of course dwindle and wither in

consequence, instead of flourishing and maturing. The children of Israel

wandering in the wilderness are a perfect picture of this sort of growing.

They were travelling about for forty years, taking many weary steps, and

finding but little rest from their wanderings, and yet, at the end of it all, were

no nearer the promised land than they were at the beginning. When they

started on their wanderings at Kadesh Barnea, they were at the borders of

the land, and a few steps would have taken them into it.

When they ended their wanderings in the plains of Moab, they were also at

its borders; only with this great difference, that now there was a river to

cross, which at first there would not have been. All their wanderings and

fightings in the wilderness had not put them in possession of one inch of

the promised land. In order to get possession of this land it was necessary

first to be in it; and in order to grow in grace, it is necessary first to be

planted in grace. But when once in the land, their conquest was very rapid;

and when once planted in grace, the growth of the soul in one month will

exceed that of years in any other soil. For grace is a most fruitful soil, and

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the plants that grow therein are plants of a marvellous growth. They are

tended by a Divine Husbandman, and are warmed by the Sun of

Righteousness, and watered by the dew from Heaven. Surely it is no

wonder that they bring forth fruit, “some an hundred-fold, some sixty-fold,

some thity-fold.”

But, it will be asked, what is meant by growing in grace? It is difficult to

answer this question because so few people have any conception of what

the grace of God really is. To say that it is free, unmerited favor, only

expresses a little of its meaning. It is the wondrous, boundless love of God,

poured out upon us without stint or measure, not according to our

deserving, but according to His infinite heart of love, which passeth

knowledge, so unfathomable are its heights and depths. I sometimes think

we give a totally different meaning to the word “love” when it is associated

with God, from that we so well understand in its human application. But if

ever human love was tender and self-sacrificing and devoted; if ever it could

bear and forbear; if ever it could suffer gladly for its loved ones; if ever it

was willing to pour itself out in a lavish abandonment for the comfort or

pleasure of its objects, — then infinitely more is Divine love tender and

self-sacrificing and devoted, and glad to bear and forbear, and to suffer, and

to lavish its best of gifts and blessings upon the objects of its love. Put

together all the tenderest love you know of, dear reader, the deepest you

have ever felt, and the strongest that has ever been poured out upon you,

and heap upon it all the love of all the loving human hearts in the world, and

then multiply it by infinity, and you will begin perhaps to have some faint

glimpses of what the love of God in Christ Jesus is. And this is grace. And

to be planted in grace is to live in the very heart of this love, to be enveloped

by it, to be steeped in it, to revel in it, to know nothing else but love only

and love always, to grow day by day in the knowledge of it, and in faith in

it, to intrust everything to its care, and to have no shadow of a doubt but that

it will surely order all things well.

To grow in grace is opposed to all self-dependence, to all self-effort, to all

legality of every kind. It is to put our growing, as well as everything else,

into the hands of the Lord, and leave it with Him. It is to be so satisfied with

our Husbandman, and with His skill and wisdom, that not a question will

cross our minds as to His modes of treatment or His plan of cultivation. It

is to grow as the lilies grow, or as the babes grow, without a care and

without anxiety; to grow by the power of an inward life principle that cannot

help but grow; to grow because we live and therefore must grow; to grow

because He who has planted us has planted a growing thing, and has made

us to grow.

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Surely this is what our Lord meant when He said “Consider the lilies, how

they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, that

even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.” Or, when

He says again, “Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his

stature?” There is no effort in the growing of a child or of a lily. They do

not toil nor spin, they do not stretch nor strain, they do not make any effort

of any kind to grow; they are not conscious even that they are growing; but

by an inward life principle, and through the nurturing care of God’s

providence, and the fostering of caretaker or gardener, by the heat of the sun

and the falling of the rain, they grow and grow.

And the result is sure. Even Solomon, our Lord says, in all his glory, was

not arrayed like one of these. Solomon’s array cost much toiling and

spinning, and gold and silver in abundance, but the lily’s array costs none of

these. And though we may toil and spin to make for ourselves beautiful

spiritual garments, and may strain and stretch in our efforts after spiritual

growth, we shall accomplish nothing; for no man by taking thought can add

one cubit to his stature; and no array of ours can ever equal the beautiful

dress with which the great Husbandman clothes the plants that grow in His

garden of grace and under His fostering care.

If I could but make each one of my readers realize how utterly helpless we

are in this matter of growing, I am convinced a large part of the strain

would be taken out of many lives at once. Imagine a child possessed of the

monomania that he would not grow unless he made some personal effort

after it, and who should insist upon a combination of rope and pulleys

whereby to stretch himself up to the desired height. He might, it is true,

spend his days and years in a weary strain, but after all there would be no

change in the inexorable fact, “No man by taking thought can add one cubit

unto his stature”; and his years of labor would be only wasted, if they did

not really hinder the longed-for end.

Imagine a lily trying to clothe itself in beautiful colors and graceful lines,

stretching its leaves and stems to make them grow, and seeking to manage

the clouds and the sunshine, that its needs might be all judiciously supplied!

And yet in these two pictures we have, I conceive, only too true a picture of

what many Christians are trying to do; who, knowing they ought to grow,

and feeling within them an instinct that longs for growth, yet think to

accomplish it by toiling, and spinning, and stretching, and straining, and

pass their lives in such a round of self-effort as is a weariness to

contemplate.

Grow, dear friends, but grow, I beseech you, in God’s way, which is the

only effectual way. See to it that you are planted in grace, and then let the

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Divine Husbandman cultivate you in His own way and by His own means.

Put yourselves out in the sunshine of His presence, and let the dew of

heaven come down upon you, and see what will come of it. Leaves and

flowers and fruit must surely come in their season, for your Husbandman

is a skillful one, and He never fails in His harvesting. Only see to it that you

interpose no hindrance to the shining of the Sun of Righteousness or the

falling of the dew from Heaven. A very thin covering may serve to keep off

the heat or the moisture, and the plant may wither even in their midst; and

the slightest barrier between your soul and Christ may cause you to dwindle

and fade as a plant in a cellar or under a bushel. Keep the sky clear. Open

wide every avenue of your being to receive the blessed influences our

Divine Husbandman may bring to bear upon you. Bask in the sunshine of

His love. Drink in of the waters of His goodness. Keep your face up-turned

to Him. Look, and your soul shall live.

You need make no efforts to grow; but let your efforts instead be all

concentrated on this, that you abide in the Vine. The Husbandman who has

the care of the vine, will care for its branches also, and will so prune and

purge and water and tend them that they will grow and bring forth fruit, and

their fruit shall remain; and, like the lily, they shall find themselves arrayed

in apparel so glorious that that of Solomon will be as nothing to it.

What if you seem to yourselves to be planted at this moment in a desert soil

where nothing can grow! Put yourself absolutely into the hands of the great

Husbandman, and He will at once make that desert blossom as the rose,

and will cause springs and fountains of water to start up out of its sandy

wastes; for the promise is sure, that the man who trusts in the Lord “shall

be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the

river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and

shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding

fruit.” It is the great prerogative of our Divine Husbandman that He is able

to turn any soil, whatever it may be like, into the soil of grace, the moment

we put our growing into His hands. He does not need to transplant us into a

different field, but right where we are, with just the circumstances that

surround us, He makes His sun to shine and His dew to fall upon us, and

transforms the very things that were before our greatest hindrances into the

chiefest and most blessed means of our growth. I care not what the

circumstances may be, His wonder-working power can accomplish this.

And we must trust Him with it all. Surely He is a Husbandman we can

trust. And if He sends storms, or winds, or rains, or sunshine, all must be

accepted at His hands with the most unwavering confidence that He who

has undertaken to cultivate us, and to bring us to maturity, knows the very

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best way of accomplishing His end, and regulates the elements, which are

all at His disposal, expressly with a view to our most rapid growth.

Let me entreat of you, then, to give up all your efforts after growing, and

simply to let yourselves grow. Leave it all to the Husbandman, whose care

it is, and who alone is able to manage it. No difficulties in your case can

baffle Him. No dwarfing of your growth in years that are past, no apparent

dryness of your inward springs of life, no crookedness or deformity in any

of your past development, can in the least mar the perfect work that He will

accomplish, if you will only put yourselves absolutely into His hands, and

let Him have His own way with you. His own gracious promise to His

backsliding children assures you of this. “I will heal their backslidings,” He

says: “I will love them freely, for mine anger is turned away from him. I

will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his

roots as Lebanon. His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the

olive-tree, and his smell as Lebanon. They that dwell under His shadow

shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and grow as the vine; the scent

thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon.” And again He says, “Be not

afraid, for the pastures of the wilderness do spring, for the tree beareth her

fruit, the fig-tree and the vine do yield their strength. And the floors shall be

full of wheat, and the fats shall overflow with wine and oil. And I will

restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten; and ye shall eat in plenty

and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who hath dealt

wondrously with you; and my people shall never be ashamed.”

Oh! that you could but know just what your Lord meant when He said,

“Consider the lilies, how they grow; for they toil not, neither do they spin.”

Surely these words give us a picture of a life and of a growth far different

from the ordinary life and growth of Christians; a life of rest, and a growth

without effort; and yet a life and a growth crowned with glorious results.

And to every soul that will thus become a lily in the garden of the Lord, and

will grow as the lilies grow, the same glorious array will be surely given as

is given them; and they will know the fulfillment of that wonderful mystical

passage concerning their Beloved, that “He feedeth among the lilies.”

This is the sort of growth in grace in which we who have entered into the

life of full trust believe: a growth which brings the desired results, which

blossoms out into flower and fruit, and becomes a tree planted by the rivers

of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; whose leaf also does not

wither, and who prospers in whatsoever he doeth. And we rejoice to know

that there are growing up now in the Lord’s heritage many such plants,

who, as the lilies behold the face of the sun and grow thereby, are, by

beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, being changed into the same

image from glory to glory, even as by the spirit of the Lord.

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Should you ask such, how it is that they grow so rapidly and with such

success, their answer would be that they are not concerned about their

growing, and are hardly conscious that they do grow; that their Lord has

told them to abide in Him, and has promised that if they do thus abide, they

shall certainly bring forth much fruit; and that they are concerned only about

the abiding, which is their part, and leave the cultivating and the growing

and the training and pruning to their good Husbandman, who alone is able

to manage these things or bring them about. You will find that such souls

are not engaged in watching self, but in looking unto Jesus. They do not toil

nor spin for their spiritual garments, but leave themselves in the hands of

the Lord to be arrayed as it may please Him. Self-effort and selfdependence

are at an end with them. Their interest in self is gone,

transferred over into the hands of another. Self has become really nothing,

and Christ alone is all in all to such as these. And the blessed result is, that

not even Solomon, in all his glory, was arrayed like these shall be.

Let us look at this subject practically. We all know that growing is not a

thing of effort, but is the result of an inward life, a principle of growth. All

the stretching and pulling in the world could not make a dead oak grow. But

a live oak grows without stretching. It is plain, therefore, that the essential

thing is to get within you the growing life, and then you cannot help but

grow. And this life is the life hid with Christ in God, the wonderful divine

life of an indwelling Holy Ghost. Be filled with this, dear believer, and,

whether you are conscious of it or not, you must grow, you cannot help

growing. Do not trouble about your growing, but see to it that you have the

growing life. Abide in the Vine. Let the life from Him flow through all your

spiritual veins. Interpose no barrier to His mighty life-giving power,

working in you all the good pleasure of His will. Yield yourself up utterly

to His sweet control. Put your growing into His hands, as completely as

you have put all your other affairs. Suffer Him to manage it as He will. Do

not concern yourself about it, nor even think of it. Trust Him absolutely,

and always. Accept each moment’s dispensation as it comes to you, from

His dear hands, as being the needed sunshine or dew for that moment’s

growth. Say a continual “Yes” to your Father’s will.

Heretofore you have perhaps tried, as so many do, to be both the lily and

the gardener, both the vineyard and the husbandman. You have taken upon

your shoulders the burdens and responsibilities that belong only to the

Divine Husbandman, and which He alone is able to bear. Henceforth

consent to take your rightful place and to be only what you really are. Say to

yourself, If I am the garden only, and not the gardener, if I am the vine

only, and not the husbandman, it is surely essential to my right growth and

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well being that I should keep the place and act the part of the garden, and

should not usurp the gardener’s place, nor try to act the gardener’s part.

Do not seek then to choose your own soil, nor the laying out of your

borders; do not plant your own seeds, nor dig about, nor prune, nor watch

over your own vines. Be content with what the Divine Husbandman

arranges for you, and with the care He gives. Let Him choose the sort of

plants and fruits He sees best to cultivate, and grow a potato as gladly as a

rose, if such be His will, and homely everyday virtues as willingly as

exalted fervors. Be satisfied with the seasons He sends, with the sunshine

and rain He gives, with the rapidity or slowness of your growth, in short,

with all His dealings and processes, no matter how little we may

comprehend them.

There is infinite repose in this. As the viole rests in its little nook, receiving

contentedly its daily portion satisfied to let rains fall, and suns rise, and the

earth to whirl, without one anxious pang, so must we repose in the present

as God gives it to us, accepting contentedly our daily portion, and with no

anxiety as to all that may be whirling around us, in His great creative and

redemptive plan.

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CHAPTER 10

SERVICE

There is, perhaps, no part of Christian experience where a greater change is

known upon entering into the life hid with Christ in God, than in the matter

of service.

In all the lower forms of Christian life, service is apt to have more or less of

bondage in it; that is, it is one purely as a matter of duty, and often as a trial

and a cross. Certain things, which at the first may have been a joy and

delight, become weary tasks, performed faithfully, perhaps, but with much

secret disinclination, and many confessed or unconfessed wishes that they

need not be done at all, or at least that they need not be done so often. The

soul finds itself saying, instead of the “May I” of love, the “Must I” of

duty. The yoke, which was at first easy, begins to gall, and the burden feels

heavy instead of light.

One dear Christian expressed it once to me in this way. “When I was first

converted,” she said, “I was so full of joy and love that I was only too glad

and thankful to be allowed to do anything for my Lord, and I eagerly

entered every open door. But after a while, as my early joy faded away, and

my love burned less fervently, I began to wish I had not been quite so

eager; for I found myself involved in lines of service which were gradually

becoming very distasteful and burdensome to me. I could not very well

give them up, since I had begun them, without exciting great remark, and

yet I longed to do so increasingly. I was expected to visit the sick, and pray

beside their beds. I was expected to attend prayer-meetings, and speak at

them. I was expected to be always ready for every effort in Christian work,

and the sense of these expectations bowed me down continually. At last it

became so unspeakably burdensome to me to live the sort of Christian life I

had entered upon, and was expected by all around me to live, that I felt as if

any kind of manual labor would have been easier, and I would have

preferred, infinitely, scrubbing all day on my hands and knees, to being

compelled to go through the treadmill of my daily Christian work. I

envied,” she said, “the servants in the kitchen, and the women at the washtubs.”

This may seem to some like a strong statement: but does it not present a

vivid picture of some of your own experiences, dear Christian? Have you

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never gone to your work as a slave to his daily task, knowing it to be your

duty, and that therefore you must do it, but rebounding like an india-rubber

ball back into your real interests and pleasures the moment your work was

over?

Of course you have known this was the wrong way to feel, and have been

ashamed of it from the bottom of your heart, but still you have seen no way

to help it. You have not loved your work, and, could you have done so with

an easy conscience, you would have been glad to have given it up

altogether.

Or, if this does not describe your case, perhaps another picture will. You do

love your work in the abstract; but, in the doing of it, you find so many

cares and responsibilities connected with it, so many misgivings and doubts

as to your own capacity or fitness, that it becomes a very heavy burden, and

you go to it bowed down and weary, before the labor has even begun. Then

also you are continually distressing yourself about the results of your work,

and greatly troubled if they are not just what you would like, and this of

itself is a constant burden.

Now from all these forms of bondage the soul is entirely delivered that

enters fully into the blessed life of faith. In the first place, service of any sort

becomes delightful to it, because, having surrendered its will into the

keeping of the Lord, He works in it to will and to do of His good pleasure,

and the soul finds itself really wanting to do the things God wants it to do. It

is always very pleasant to do the things we want to do, let them be ever so

difficult of accomplishment, or involve ever so much of bodily weariness.

If a man’s will is really set on a thing, he regards with a sublime

indifference the obstacles that lie in the way of his reaching it, and laughs to

himself at the idea of any opposition or difficulties hindering him. How

many men have gone gladly and thankfully to the ends of the world in

search of worldly fortunes, or to fulfill worldly ambitions, and have scorned

the thoughts of any cross connected with it! How many mothers have

congratulated themselves and rejoiced over the honor done their sons in

being promoted to some place of power and usefulness in their country’s

service, although it has involved perhaps years of separation, and a life of

hardship for their dear ones? And yet these same men and these very

mothers would have felt and said that they were taking up crosses too heavy

almost to be borne, had the service of Christ required the same sacrifice of

home, and friends, and worldly ease. It is altogether the way we look at

things, whether we think they are crosses or not. And I am ashamed to

think that any Christian should ever put on a long face and shed tears over

doing a thing for Christ, which a worldly man would be only too glad to do

for money.

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What we need in the Christian life is to get believers to want to do God’s

will, as much as other people want to do their own will. And this is the idea

of the Gospel. It is what God intended for us; and it is what He has

shall no more be the old covenant made on Sinai, that is, a law given from

the outside, controlling a man by force, but it shall be a law written within

constraining a man by love. “I will put my laws,” He says, “in their mind,

and write them in their hearts.” This can mean nothing but that we shall

love His law, for anything written on our hearts we must love. And putting

it into our minds is surely the same as God working in us to “will and to do

of His good pleasure,” and means that we shall will what God wills, and

shall obey His sweet commands, not because it is our duty to do so, but

because we ourselves want to do what He wants us to do. Nothing could

possibly be conceived more effectual than this. How often have we thought

when dealing with our children, “Oh, if I could only get inside of them and

make them want to do just what I want, how easy it would be to manage

them then!” And how often practically in experience we have found that, to

deal with cross-grained people, we must carefully avoid suggesting our

wishes to them, but must in some way induce them to suggest them

themselves, sure that then there will be no opposition to contend with. And

we, who are by nature a stiff-necked people, always rebel more or less

against a law from outside of us, while we joyfully embrace the same law

springing up within.

God’s plan for us therefore is to get possession of the inside of a man, to

take the control and management of his will, and to work it for him; and

then obedience is easy and a delight, and service becomes perfect freedom,

until the Christian is forced to exclaim, “This happy service! Who could

dream earth had such liberty?”

What you need to do then, dear Christian, if you are in bondage, is to put

your will over completely into the hands of your Lord, surrendering to Him

so to work in you to will, as to bring your whole wishes and affections into

conformity with His own sweet and lovable and most lovely will. I have

seen this done over and over, in cases where it looked beforehand an utterly

impossible thing. In one case, where a lady had been for years rebelling

fearfully against a thing which she knew was right, but which she hated, I

saw her, out of the depths of despair and without any feeling, give her will

in that matter up into the hands of her Lord, and begin to say to Him, “Thy

will be done; thy will be done!” And in one short hour that very thing began

to look sweet and precious to her. It is wonderful what miracles God works

in wills that are utterly surrendered to Him. He turns hard things into easy,

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and bitter things into sweet. It is not that He puts easy things in the place of

the hard, but He actually changes the hard thing into an easy one. And this

is salvation. It is grand. Do try it, you who are going about your daily

Christian living as to a hard and weary task, and see if your divine Master

will not transform the very life you live now as a bondage, into the most

delicious liberty!

Or again, if you do love His will in the abstract, but find the doing of it hard

and burdensome, from this also there is deliverance in the wonderful life of

faith. For in this life no burdens are carried, nor anxieties felt. The Lord is

our burden-bearer, and upon Him we must lay off every care. He says, in

effect, Be careful for nothing, but just make your requests known to Me,

and I will attend to them all. Be careful for nothing, He says, not even your

service. Above all, I should think, our service, because we know ourselves

to be so utterly helpless in this, that even if we were careful, it would not

amount to anything. What have we to do with thinking whether we are fit or

not! The Master-workman surely has a right to use any tool He pleases for

His own work, and it is plainly not the business of the tool to decide

whether it is the right one to be used or not. He knows; and if He chooses to

use us, of course we must be fit. And in truth, if we only knew it, our

chiefest fitness is in our utter helplessness. His strength can only be made

perfect in our weakness. I can give you a convincing illustration of this.

I was once visiting an idiot asylum and looking at the children going

through dumb-bell exercises. Now we all know that it is a very difficult

thing for idiots to manage their movements. They have strength enough,

generally, but no skill to use this strength, and as a consequence cannot do

much. And in these dumb-bell exercises this deficiency was very apparent.

They made all sorts of awkward movements. Now and then, by a happy

chance, they would make a movement in harmony with the music and the

teacher’s directions, but for the most part all was out of harmony. One little

girl, however, I noticed, who made perfect movements. Not a jar nor a

break disturbed the harmony of her exercises. And the reason was, not that

she had more strength than the others, but that she had no strength at all.

She could not so much as close her hands over the dumb-bells, nor lift her

arms, and the master had to stand behind her and do it all. She yielded up

her members as instruments to him, and his strength was made perfect in

her weakness. He knew how to go through those exercises, for he himself

had planned them, and therefore when he did it, it was done right. She did

nothing but yield herself up utterly into his hands, and he did it all. The

yielding was her part, the responsibility was all his. It was not her skill that

was needed to make harmonious movements, but only his. The question

was not of her capacity, but of his. Her utter weakness was her greatest

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strength. And if this is a picture of our Christian life, it is no wonder that

Paul could say, “Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities,

that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” Who would not glory in being

so utterly weak and helpless, that the Lord Jesus Christ should find no

hindrance to the perfect working of His mighty power through us and in

us?

Then, too, if the work is His, the responsibility is His, and we have no

room left for worrying about it. Everything in reference to it is known to

Him, and He can manage it all. Why not leave it all with Him then, and

consent to be treated like a child and guided where to go. It is a fact that the

most effectual workers I know are those who do not feel the least care or

anxiety about their work, but who commit it all to their dear Master, and,

asking Him to guide them moment by moment in reference to it, trust Him

implicitly for each moment’s needed supplies of wisdom and of strength.

To see such, you would almost think perhaps that they were too free from

care, where such mighty interests are at stake. But when you have learned

God’s secret of trusting, and see the beauty and the power of that life which

is yielded up to His working, you will cease to condemn, and will begin to

wonder how any of God’s workers can dare to carry burdens, or assume

responsibilities which He alone is able to bear.

There are one or two other bonds of service from which this life of trust

delivers us. We find out that we are not responsible for all the work in the

world. The commands cease to be general, and become personal and

individual. The Master does not map out a general course of action for us

and leave us to get along through it by our own wisdom and skill as best we

may, but He leads us step by step, giving us each hour the special guidance

needed for that hour. His blessed Spirit dwelling in us, brings to our

remembrance at the time the necessary command; so that we do not need to

take any thought ahead but simply to take each step as it is made known to

us, following our Lord whithersoever He leads us. “The steps of a good

man are ordered of the Lord” not his way only, but each separate step in

that way. Many Christians make the mistake of expecting to receive God’s

commands all in a lump, as it were. They think because He tells them to

give a tract to one person in a railway train, for instance, that He means

them always to give tracts to everybody, and they burden themselves with

an impossible command.

There was a young Christian once, who, because the Lord had sent her to

speak a message to one soul whom she met in a walk, took it as a general

command for always, and thought she must speak to every one she met

about their souls. This was, of course, impossible, and as a consequence

she was soon in hopeless bondage about it. She became absolutely afraid to

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go outside of her own door, and lived in perpetual condemnation. At last

she disclosed her distress to a friend who was instructed in the ways of God

with His servants, and this friend told her she was making a great mistake;

that the Lord had His own especial work for each especial workman, and

that the servants in a well-regulated household might as well each one take it

upon himself to try and do the work of all the rest, as for the Lord’s

servants to think they were each one under obligation to do everything. He

told her just to put herself under the Lord’s personal guidance as to her

work, and trust Him to point out to her each particular person to whom He

would have her speak, assuring her that He never puts forth His own sheep

without going before them, and making a way for them Himself. She

followed this advice, and laid the burden of her work on the Lord, and the

result was a happy pathway of daily guidance, in which she was led into

much blessed work for her Master, but was able to do it all without a care

or a burden, because He led her out and prepared the way before her.

Putting ourselves into God’s hands in this way, seems to me just like

making the junction between the machinery and the steam engine. The

power is not in the machinery, but in the steam; disconnected from the

engine, the machinery is perfectly useless; but let the connection be made,

and the machinery goes easily and without effort, because of the mighty

power there is behind it. Thus the Christian life becomes an easy, natural

life when it is the development of the divine working within. Most

Christians live on a strain, because their wills are not fully in harmony with

the will of God, the connection is not perfectly made at every point, and it

requires an effort to move the machinery. But when once the connection is

fully made, and the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus can work in us

with all its mighty power, we are then indeed made free from the law of sin

and death, and shall know the glorious liberty of the children of God. We

shall lead frictionless lives.

Another form of bondage as to service, from which the life of faith delivers

the soul, is in reference to the after-reflections which always follow any

Christian work. These self-reflections are of two sorts. Either the soul

congratulates itself upon its success, and is lifted up; or it is distressed over

its failure, and is utterly cast down. One of these is sure to come, and of the

two I think the first is the more to be dreaded, although the last causes at the

time the greater suffering. But in the life of trust, neither will trouble us; for,

having committed ourselves and our work to the Lord, we will be satisfied

to leave it to Him, and will not think about ourselves in the matter at all.

Years ago I came across this sentence in an old book: “Never indulge, at the

close of an action, in any self-reflective acts of any kind, whether of selfcongratulation

or of self-despair. Forget the things that are behind, the

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moment they are past, leaving them with God.” It has been of unspeakable

value to me. When the temptation comes, as it always does, to indulge in

these reflections, either of one sort or the other, I turn from them at once,

and positively refuse to think about my work at all, leaving it with the Lord

to overrule the mistakes, and to, bless it as He chooses.

To sum it all up then, what is needed for happy and effectual service is

simply to put your work into the Lord’s hands, and leave it there. Do not

take it to Him in prayer, saying, “Lord, guide me; Lord, give me wisdom;

Lord, arrange for me,” and then arise from your knees, and take the burden

all back, and try to guide and arrange for yourself. Leave it with the Lord,

and remember that what you trust to Him, you must not worry over nor

feel anxious about. Trust and worry cannot go together. If your work is a

burden, it is because you are not trusting it to Him. But if you do trust it to

Him, you will surely find that the yoke He puts upon you is easy, and the

burden He gives you to carry is light, and even in the midst of a life of

ceaseless activity you shall find rest to your soul.

But some may say that this teaching would make us into mere puppets. I

answer, No, it would simply make us into servants. It is required of a

servant, not that he shall plan, or arrange, or decide, or supply the necessary

material, but simply and only that he shall obey. It is for the Master to do all

the rest. The servant is not responsible, either, for results. The Master alone

knows what results he wished to have produced, and therefore he alone can

judge of them. Intelligent service will, of course, include some degree of

intelligent sympathy with the thoughts and plans of the Master, but after all

there cannot be a full comprehension, and the responsibility cannot be

transferred from the Master’s shoulders to the servant’s. And in our case,

where our outlook is so limited and our ignorance so great, we can do very

little more than be in harmony with the will of our Divine Master, without

expecting to comprehend it very fully, and we must leave all the results with

Him. What looks to us like failure on the seen side, is often, on the unseen

side, the most glorious success; and if we allow ourselves to lament and

worry, we shall often be doing the foolish and useless thing of weeping

where we ought to be singing and rejoicing.

Far better is it to refuse utterly to indulge in any self-reflective acts at all; to

refuse, in fact, to think about self in any way, whether for good or evil. We

are not our own property, nor our own business. We belong to God, and

are His instruments and His business; and since He always attends to His

own business, He will of course attend to us.

I heard once of a slave who was on board a vessel in a violent storm, and

who was whistling contentedly while every one else was in an agony of

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terror. At last someone asked him if he was not afraid he would be

drowned. He replied with a broad grin, “Well, missus, s’pose I is. I don’t

b’long to myself, and it will only be massa’s loss any how.”

Something of this spirit would deliver us from many of our perplexities and

sufferings in service. And with a band of servants thus abandoned to our

Master’s use and to His care, what might He not accomplish? Truly one

such would “chase a thousand, and two would put ten thousand to flight”;

and nothing would be impossible to them. For it is nothing with the Lord

“to help, whether with many or with them that have no power.”

May God raise up such an army speedily!

And may you, my dear reader enroll your name in this army today and,

yielding yourself unto God as one who is alive from the dead, may every

one of your members be also yielded unto Him as instruments of

righteousness, to be used by Him as He pleases.

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CHAPTER 11

DIFFICULTIES CONCERNING GUIDANCE

You have now begun, dear reader, the life of faith. You have given yourself

to the Lord to be His wholly and altogether, and He has taken you and has

begun to mould and fashion you into a vessel unto His honor. Your one

most earnest desire is to be very pliable in His hands, and to follow Him

whithersoever He may lead you, and you are trusting Him to work in you

to will and to do of His good pleasure. But you find a great difficulty here.

You have not learned yet to know the voice of the Good Shepherd, and are

therefore in great doubt and perplexity as to what really is His will

concerning you.

Perhaps there are certain paths into which God seems to be calling you, of

which your friends utterly disapprove. And these friends, it may be, are

older than yourself in the Christian life, and seem to you also to be much

further advanced. You can scarcely bear to differ from them or distress

them; and you feel also very diffident of yielding to any seeming

impressions of duty of which they do not approve. And yet you cannot get

rid of these impressions, and you are plunged into great doubt and

uneasiness.

There is a way out of all these difficulties, to the fully surrendered soul. I

would repeat, fully surrendered, because if there is any reserve of will upon

any point, it becomes almost impossible to find out the mind of God in

reference to that point; and therefore the first thing is to be sure that you

really do purpose to obey the Lord in every respect. If however this is the

case, and your soul only needs to know the will of God in order to consent

to it, then you surely cannot doubt His willingness to make His will known,

and to guide you in the right paths. There are many very clear promises in

sheep by name, and leadeth them out. And when He putteth forth His own

sheep He goeth before them, and the sheep follow Him, for they know His

whom the Father will send in my name, He shall teach you all things, and

bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.”

giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.”

With such passages as these, and many more like them, we must believe

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that Divine guidance is promised to us, and our faith must confidently look

him ask in faith nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the

sea, driven with the wind and tossed. For let not such a man think that he

shall receive anything of the Lord.”

Settle this point then first of all, that Divine guidance has been promised,

and that you are sure to have it, if you ask for it; and let no suggestion of

doubt turn you from this.

Next, you must remember that our God has all knowledge and all wisdom,

and that therefore it is very possible He may guide you into paths wherein

He knows great blessings are awaiting you, but which to the short-sighted

human eyes around you seem sure to result in confusion and loss. You

must recognize the fact that God’s thoughts are not as man’s thoughts, nor

His ways as man’s ways; and that He who knows the end of things from

the beginning, alone can judge of what the results of any course of action

may be. You must therefore realize that His very love for you may perhaps

lead you to run counter to the loving wishes of even your dearest friends.

not to be saved only, but to be a disciple or follower of your Lord, you may

perhaps be called upon to forsake all that you have, and to turn your backs

on even father or mother, or brother or sister, or husband or wife, or it may

be your own life also. Unless the possibility of this is clearly recognized, the

soul would be very likely to get into difficulty, because it often happens that

the child of God who enters upon this life of obedience is sooner or later led

into paths which meet with the disapproval of those he best loves; and

unless he is prepared for this, and can trust the Lord through it all, he will

scarcely know what to do.

All this, it will of course be understood, is perfectly in harmony with those

duties of honor and love which we owe to one another in the various

relations of life. The nearer we are to Christ, the more shall we be enabled to

exemplify the meekness and gentleness of our Lord, and the more tender

will be our consideration for those who are our natural guardians and

counsellors. The Master’s guidance will always manifest itself by the

Master’s Spirit, and where, in obedience to Him, we are led to act contrary

to the advice or wishes of our friends, we shall prove that this is our motive,

by the love and patience which will mark our conduct.

But this point having been settled, we come now to the question as to how

God’s guidance is to come to us, and how we shall be able to know His

voice.

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There are four especial ways in which God speaks: by the voice of

Scripture, the voice of the inward impressions of the Holy Spirit, the voice

of our own higher judgment, and the voice of providential circumstances.

Where these four harmonize, it is safe to say that God speaks. For I lay it

down as a foundation principle, which no one can gainsay, that of course

His voice will always be in harmony with itself, no matter in how many

different ways He may speak. The voices may be many, the message can

be but one. If God tells me in one voice to do or to leave undone anything,

He cannot possibly tell me the opposite in another voice. If there is a

contradiction in the voices, the speaker cannot be the same. Therefore, my

rule for distinguishing the voice of God would be to bring it to the test of

this harmony.

If I have an impression, therefore, I must see if it is in accordance with

Scripture, and whether it commends itself to my own higher judgment, and

also whether, as we Quakers say, “way opens” for its carrying out. If either

one of these tests fail, it is not safe to proceed; but I must wait in quiet trust

until the Lord shows me the point of harmony, which He surely will,

sooner or later, if it is His voice that has spoken.

For we must not overlook the fact that there are other voices that speak to

the soul. There is the loud and clamoring voice of self, that is always

seeking to be heard. And there are the voices, too, of evil and deceiving

spirits, who lie in wait to entrap every traveler entering these higher regions

of the spiritual life. In the same epistle which tells us that we are seated in

spiritual enemies, whoever or whatever they may be, must necessarily

communicate with us by means of our spiritual faculties, and their voices,

therefore, will be, as the voice of God is, an inward impression made upon

our spirits.

Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit may tell us, by impressions, what is the

will of God concerning us, so also will these spiritual enemies tell us, by

impressions, what is their will concerning us, though not of course giving it

their name. It is very plain, therefore, that we must have some test or

standard by which to try these inward impressions, in order that we may

know whose voice it is that is speaking. And that test will always be the

harmony to which I have referred. Sometimes, under a mistaken idea of

exalting the Divine Spirit, earnest and honest Christians have ignored and

even violated the teachings of Scripture, have disregarded the plain

pointings of Providence, and have outraged their own higher judgment.

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God, who sees the sincerity of their hearts, can and does pity and forgive,

but the consequences as to this life are often very sad.

Our first test, therefore, of the Divine authority of any voice which may

seem to speak to us, must be its harmony in moral character with the mind

and will of God, as revealed to us in the Gospel of Christ. Whatever is

contrary to this, cannot be Divine, because God cannot contradict Himself.

Until we have found and obeyed God’s will in reference to any subject, as it

is revealed in the Bible, we cannot expect a separate direct personal

revelation. A great many fatal mistakes are made in this matter of guidance,

by the overlooking of this simple rule. Where our Father has written out for

us plain directions about anything, He will not, of course, make an especial

revelation to us concerning it. No man, for instance, needs or could expect

any direct revelation to tell him not to steal, because God has already in the

Scriptures plainly declared His will about it. This seems such an obvious

thing that I would not speak of it, but that I have frequently met with

Christians who have altogether overlooked it, and have gone off into

fanaticism as the result. For the Scriptures are far more explicit even about

details than most people think. And there are not many important affairs in

life for which a clear direction may not be found in God’s book. Take the

Take the matter of avenging injuries and standing up for your rights, and we

2:19-21. Take the matter of forgiving one another, and we have

I only give these as examples to show how very full and practical the Bible

guidance is. If, therefore, you find yourself in perplexity, first of all search

and see whether the Bible speaks on the point in question, asking God to

make plain to you by the power of His Spirit, through the Scripture, what is

His mind. And whatever shall seem to you to be plainly taught there, that

you must obey.

When we read and meditate upon this record of God’s mind and will, with

our understandings thus illuminated by the inspiring Spirit, our obedience

will be as truly an obedience to a present, living word, as though it were

afresh spoken to us today by our Lord from Heaven. The Bible is not only

an ancient message from God sent to us many ages ago, but it is a present

message sent to us now each time we read it. “The words that I speak unto

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you, they are spirit, and they are life,” and obedience to these words now is

a living obedience to a present and personal command.

But it is essential in this connection to remember that the Bible is a book of

principles, and not a book of disjointed aphorisms. Isolated texts may often

be made to sanction things, to which the principles of Scripture are totally

opposed. I heard not long ago of a Christian woman in a Western meeting,

who, having had the text, “For we walk by faith, and not by sight,” brought

very vividly before her mind, felt a strong impression that it was a

command to be literally obeyed in the outward; and, blindfolding her eyes,

insisted on walking up and down the aisle of the meeting-house, as an

illustration of the walk of faith. She very soon stumbled and fell against the

stove, burning herself seriously, and then wondered at the mysterious

dispensation. The principles of Scripture, and her own sanctified commonsense,

if applied to this case, would have saved her from the delusion.

The second test, therefore, to which our impressions must be brought, is

that of our own higher judgment, or common-sense.

It is as true now as in the days when Solomon wrote, that a “man of

understanding shall attain unto wise counsels”; and his exhortation still

continues binding upon us: “Wisdom is the principal thing, therefore get

wisdom; and with all thy getting, get understanding.”

As far as I can see, the Scriptures everywhere make it an essential thing for

the children of God to use all the faculties which have been given them, in

their journey through this world. They are to use their outward faculties for

their outward walk, and their inward faculties for their inward walk. And

they might as well expect to be “kept” from dashing their feet against a

stone in the outward, if they walk blindfold, as to be “kept” from spiritual

stumbling, if they put aside their judgment and common-sense in their

interior life.

I asked a Christian of “sound mind” lately how she distinguished between

the voice of false spirits and the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and she replied

promptly, “I rap them over the head, and see if they have any commonsense.”

Some, however, may say here, “But I thought we were not to depend on

our human understanding in Divine things.” I answer to this, that we are

not to depend on our unenlightened human understanding, but upon our

human judgment and common-sense, enlightened by the Spirit of God.

That is, God will speak to us through the faculties He has Himself given us,

and not independently of them. That is, just as we are to use our eyes when

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we walk, no matter how full of faith we may be, so also we are to use our

mental faculties in our inward life.

The third and last test to which our impressions must be brought is that of

providential circumstances. If a “leading” is of God, way will always open

when He putteth forth His own sheep he goeth before them, and the sheep

follow Him, for they know his voice.” Notice here the expression “goeth

before,” and “follow.” He goes before to open a way, and we are to follow

in the way thus opened. It is never a sign of a Divine leading when the

Christian insists on opening his own way, and riding rough-shod over all

opposing things. If the Lord “goes before” us, He will open all doors for

us, and we shall not need ourselves to hammer them down.

The fourth point I would make is this: that, just as our impressions must be

tested, as I have shown, by the other three voices, so must these other

voices be tested by our inward impressions; and if we feel a “stop in our

minds” about anything, we must wait until that is removed before acting. A

Christian who had advanced with unusual rapidity in the Divine life, gave

me as her secret this simple receipt: “I always mind the checks.” We must

not ignore the voice of our inward impressions, nor ride rough-shod over

them, any more than we must the other three voices of which I have

spoken.

These four voices, then, will always be found to agree in any truly Divine

leading, i.e., the voice of our impressions, the voice of Scripture, the voice

of our own sanctified judgment, and the voice of providential

circumstances; and where these four do not all agree at first, we must wait

until they do.

A divine sense of “oughtness,” derived from the harmony of all God’s

various voices, is the only safe foundation for any action.

And now I have guarded the points of danger, do permit me to let myself

out for a little to the blessedness and joy of this direct communication of

God’s will to us. It seems to me to be the grandest of privileges. In the first

place, that God should love me enough to care about the details of my life is

perfectly wonderful. And then that He should be willing to tell me all about

it, and to let me know just now to live and walk so as to perfectly please

Him, seems almost too good to be true. We never care about the little

details of people’s lives unless we love them. It is a matter of indifference to

us with the majority of people we meet, as to what they do or how they

spend their time; but as soon as we begin to love any one, we begin at once

to care. That God cares, therefore, is just a precious proof of His love; and it

is most blessed to have Him speak to us about everything in our lives,

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about our duties, about our pleasures, about our friendships, about our

occupations, about all that we do, or think, or say. You must know this in

your own experience, dear reader, if you would come into the full joy and

privilege of this life hid with Christ in God, for it is one of it most precious

gifts!

God’s promise is, that He will work in us to will as well as to do of His

good pleasure. This, of course, means that He will take possession of our

will, and work it for us, and that His suggestions will come to us, not so

much commands from the outside, as desires springing up within. They

will originate in our will; we shall feel as though we wanted to do so and so,

not as though we must. And this makes it a service of perfect liberty; for it

is always easy to do what we desire to do, let the accompanying

circumstances be as difficult as they may. Every mother knows that she

could secure perfect and easy obedience in her child, if she could only get

into that child’s will and work it for him, making him want himself to do

the things she willed he should. And this is what our Father does for His

children in the new dispensation; He writes His laws on our hearts and on

our minds, and we love them, and are drawn to our obedience by our

affections and judgment, not driven by our fears.

The way in which the Holy Spirit, therefore, usually works in His direct

guidance is to impress upon the mind a wish or desire to do or leave

undone certain things.

The soul when engaged, perhaps, in prayer, feels a sudden suggestion made

to its inmost consciousness in reference to a certain point of duty. “I would

like to do this or the other,” it thinks, “I wish I could.” Or perhaps the

suggestion may come as question, “I wonder whether I had not better do so

and so?” Or it may be only at first in the way of a conviction that such is the

right and best thing to be done.

At once the matter should be committed to the Lord, with an instant consent

of the will to obey Him; and if the suggestion is in accordance with the

Scriptures, and a sanctified judgment, and with Providential circumstances,

an immediate obedience is the safest and easiest course. At the moment

when the Spirit speaks, it is always easy to obey; if the soul hesitates and

begins to reason, it becomes more and more difficult continually. As a

general rule, the first convictions are the right ones in a fully surrendered

heart; for God is faithful in His dealings with us, and will cause His voice to

be heard before any other voices. Such convictions, therefore, should never

be met by reasoning. Prayer and trust are the only safe attitudes of the soul;

and even these should be but momentary, as it were, lest the time for action

should pass and the blessing be missed.

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If, however, the suggestion does not seem quite clear enough to act upon,

and doubt and perplexity ensue, especially if it is something about which

one’s friends hold a different opinion, then we shall need to wait for further

light. The Scripture rule is, “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin”; which

means plainly that we must never act in doubt. A clear conviction of right is

the only safe guide. But we must wait in faith, and in an attitude of entire

surrender, saying, “Yes,” continually to the will of our Lord, whatever it

may be. I believe the lack of a will thus surrendered lies at the root of many

of our difficulties; and next to this lies the want of faith in any real Divine

guidance. God’s children are amazingly skeptical here. They read the

promises and they feel the need, but somehow they cannot seem to believe

the guidance will be given to them; as if God should want us to obey His

voice, but did not know how to make us hear and understand Him. It is,

therefore, very possible for God to speak, but for the soul not to hear,

because it does not believe He is speaking. No earthly parent or master

could possibly guide his children or servants, if they should refuse to

believe he was speaking, and should not accept his voice as being really the

expression of his will.

Every moment of our lives our Father is seeking to reveal Himself to us. “I

that speak unto thee am He. I that speak in thy heart, I that speak in thy

outward circumstances, I that speak in thy losses, I that speak in thy gains, I

that speak in thy sorrows or in thy joys, I that speak everywhere and in

everything, am He.”

We must, therefore, have perfect confidence that the Lord’s voice is

speaking to us to teach and lead us, and that He will give us the wisdom

needed for our right guidance; and when we have asked for light, we must

accept our strongest conviction of “oughtness” as being the guidance we

have sought.

A few rules will help us here.

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CHAPTER 12

CONCERNING TEMPTATION

Certain very great mistakes are made concerning this matter of temptation,

in the practical working out of this life of faith.

First of all, people seem to expect that, after the soul has entered into its rest

in God, temptations will cease; and to think that the promised deliverance is

not only to be from yielding to temptation, but even also from being

tempted. Consequently, when they find the Canaanite still in the land, and

see the cities great and walled up to Heaven, they are utterly discouraged,

and think they must have gone wrong in some way, and that this cannot be

the true land after all.

Then, next they make the mistake of looking upon temptation as sin, and of

blaming themselves for what in reality is the fault of the enemy only. This

brings them into condemnation and discouragement; and discouragement, if

continued in, always ends at last in actual sin. The enemy makes an easy

prey of a discouraged soul; so that we fall often from the very fear of

having fallen.

To meet the first of these difficulties it is only necessary to refer to the

Scripture declarations, that the Christian life is to be throughout a warfare;

and that, especially when seated in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, we are

to wrestle against spiritual enemies there, whose power and skill to tempt us

must doubtless be far superior to any we have ever heretofore encountered.

As a fact, temptations generally increase in strength tenfold after we have

entered into the interior life, rather than decrease; and no amount or sort of

them must ever for a moment lead us to suppose we have not really found

the true abiding place. Strong temptations are generally a sign of great grace,

rather than of little grace. When the children of Israel had first left Egypt,

the Lord did not lead them through the country of the Philistines, although

that was the nearest way; for God said, “lest peradventure the people repent

when they see war, and they return to Egypt.” But afterwards, when they

learned better how to trust Him, He permitted their enemies to attack them.

Then also in their wilderness journey they met with but few enemies and

fought but few battles, compared to those in the land, where they found

seven great nations and thirty-one kings to be conquered, besides walled

cities to be taken, and giants to be overcome.

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They could not have fought with the Canaanites, or the Hittites, and the

Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, until they

had gone into the land where these enemies were. And the very power of

your temptations, dear Christian, therefore, may perhaps be one of the

strongest proofs that you really are in the land you have been seeking to

enter, because they are temptations peculiar to that land. You must never

allow your temptations to cause you to question the fact of your having

entered the promised “heavenly places.”

The second mistake is not quite so easy to deal with. It seems hardly worth

while to say that temptation is not sin, and yet most of the distress about it

arises from not understanding this fact. The very suggestion of wrong

seems to bring pollution with it, and the evil agency not being recognized,

the poor tempted soul begins to feel as if it must be very bad indeed, and

very far off from God to have had such thoughts and suggestions. It is as

though a burglar should break into a man’s house to steal, and, when the

master of the house began to resist him and to drive him out, should turn

round and accuse the owner of being himself the thief. It is the enemy’s

grand ruse for entrapping us. He comes and whispers suggestions of evil to

us, doubts, blasphemies, jealousies, envyings, and pride; and then turns

round and says, “Oh, how wicked you must be to think of such things! It is

very plain that you are not trusting the Lord; for if you were, it would have

been impossible for these things to have entered your heart.” This reasoning

sounds so very plausible that the soul often accepts it as true, and at once

comes under condemnation, and is filled with discouragement; then it is

easy for it to be led on into actual sin. One of the most fatal things in the life

of faith is discouragement. One of the most helpful is cheerfulness. A very

wise man once said that in overcoming temptations, cheerfulness was the

first thing, cheerfulness the second, and cheerfulness the third. We must

expect to conquer. That is why the Lord said so often to Joshua, “Be strong

and of a good courage”; “Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed”; “Only

be thou strong and very courageous.” And it is also the reason He says to

us, “Let not your heart he troubled neither let it be afraid.” The power of

temptation is in the fainting of our own hearts. The enemy knows this well,

and always begins his assaults by discouraging us, if it can in any way be

accomplished.

Sometimes this discouragement arises from what we think is a righteous

grief and disgust at ourselves that such things could be any temptation to us;

but which is really a mortification arising from the fact that we have been

indulging in a secret self-congratulation that our tastes were too pure, or our

separation from the world was too complete for such things to tempt us.

We have expected something from ourselves, and have been sorely

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disappointed not to find that something there, and are discouraged in

consequence. This mortification and discouragement are really a far worse

condition than the temptation itself, though they present an appearance of

true humility, for they are nothing but the results of wounded self-love.

True humility can bear to see its own utter weakness and foolishness

revealed, because it never expected anything from itself, and knows that its

only hope and expectation must be in God. Therefore, instead of

discouraging the soul from trusting, it drives it to a deeper and more utter

trust. But the counterfeit humility which springs from self, plunges the soul

into the depths of a faithless discouragement, and drives it into the very sin

at which it is so distressed.

I remember once hearing an allegory that illustrated this to me wonderfully.

Satan called together a council of his servants to consult how they might

make a good man sin. One evil spirit started up and said, “I will make him

sin.” “How will you do it?” asked Satan. “I will set before him the

pleasures of sin,” was the reply; “I will tell him of its delights and the rich

rewards it brings.” “Ah,” said Satan, “that will not do; he has tried, it, and

knows better than that.” Then another spirit started up and said, “I will

make him sin.” “What will you do?” asked Satan. “I will tell him of the

pains and sorrows of virtue. I will show him that virtue has no delights, and

brings no rewards.” “Ah, no!” exclaimed Satan, “that will not do at all; for

he has tried it, and knows that ‘wisdom’s ways are ways of pleasantness

and all her paths are peace.’” “Well,” said another imp, starting up, “I will

undertake to make him sin.” “And what will you do?” asked Satan, again.

“I will discourage his soul,” was the short reply. “Ah, that will do,” cried

Satan, — “that will do! We shall conquer him now.” And they did.

An old writer says, “All discouragement is from the devil”; and I wish

every Christian would just take this as a pocket-piece, and never forget it.

We must fly from discouragement as we would from sin.

But this is impossible if we fail to recognize the true agency in temptation.

For if the temptations are our own fault, we cannot help being discouraged.

But they are not. The Bible says, “Blessed is the man that endureth

temptation”; and we are exhorted to “count it all joy when we fall into

divers temptations.” Temptation, therefore, cannot be sin; and the truth is, it

is no more a sin to hear these whispers and suggestions of evil in our souls,

than it is for us to hear the swearing or wicked talk of bad men as we pass

along the street. The sin only comes in either case by our stopping and

joining in with them. If, when the wicked suggestions come, we turn from

them at once, as we would from wicked talk, and pay no more attention to

them, we do not sin. But if we carry them on in our minds, and roll them

under our tongues, and dwell on them with a half-consent of our will to

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them as true, then we sin. We may be enticed by evil a thousand times a

day without sin, and we cannot help these enticings. But if the enemy can

succeed in making us think that his enticings are our sin, he has

accomplished half the battle, and can hardly fail to gain a complete victory.

A dear lady once came to me under great darkness, simply from not

understanding this. She had been living very happily in the life of faith for

some time, and had been so free from temptation as almost to begin to

think she would never be tempted any more. But suddenly a very peculiar

form of temptation had assailed her, which had horrified her. She found that

the moment she began to pray, dreadful thoughts of all kinds would rush

into her mind. She had lived a very sheltered, innocent life, and these

thoughts seemed so awful to her, that she felt she must be one of the most

wicked of sinners to be capable of having them. She began by thinking she

could not possibly have entered into the rest of faith, and ended by

concluding that she had never even been born again. Her soul was in an

agony of distress. I told her that these dreadful thoughts were altogether the

suggestions of the enemy, who came to her the moment she kneeled in

prayer, and poured them into her mind, and that she herself was not to

blame for them at all; that she could not help them any more than she could

help hearing if a wicked man should pour out his blasphemies in her

presence. And I urged her to recognize and treat them as from the enemy;

not to blame herself or be discouraged, but to turn at once to Jesus and

commit them to Him. I showed her how great an advantage the enemy had

gained by making her think these thoughts were originated by herself, and

plunging her into condemnation and discouragement on account of them.

And I assured her she would find a speedy victory if she would pay no

attention to them; but, ignoring their presence, would simply turn her back

on them and look to the Lord.

She grasped the truth, and the next time these thoughts came she said to the

enemy, “I have found you out now. It is you who are suggesting these

dreadful thoughts to me, and I hate them, and will have nothing to do with

them. The Lord is my Savior; take them to Him, and settle them in His

presence.” Immediately the baffled enemy, finding himself discovered, fled

in confusion, and her soul was perfectly delivered.

Another thing also. The enemy knows that if a Christian recognizes a

suggestion of evil as coming from him, he will recoil from it far more

quickly than if it seems to be the suggestion of his own mind. If Satan

prefaced each temptation with the words, “I am Satan, your relentless

enemy; I have come to make you sin,” I suppose we would hardly feel any

desire at all to yield to his suggestions. He has to hide himself in order to

make his baits attractive. And our victory will be far more easily gained if

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we are not ignorant of his devices, but recognize him at his very first

approach.

We also make another great mistake about temptations in thinking that all

time spent in combating them is lost. Hours pass, and we seem to have

made no progress, because we have been so beset with temptations. But it

often happens that we have been serving God far more truly during these

hours, than in our times of comparative freedom from temptation.

Temptation is really more the devil’s wrath against God, than against us. He

cannot touch our Savior, but he can wound our Savior by conquering us,

and our ruin is important to him only as it accomplishes this. We are,

therefore, really fighting our Lord’s battles when we are fighting temptation,

and hours are often worth days to us under these circumstances. We read,

“Blessed is the man that endureth temptation”; and I am sure this means

enduring the continuance of it and its frequent recurrence. Nothing so

cultivates the grace of patience as the endurance of temptation, and nothing

so drives the soul to an utter dependence upon the Lord Jesus as its

continuance. And finally, nothing brings more praise and honor and glory

to our dearest Lord Himself, than the trial of our faith which comes through

manifold temptations. We are told that it is more precious than gold, though

it be tried with fire, and that we, who patiently endure the trial, shall receive

for our reward “the crown of life which the Lord hath promised to them

that love Him.”

We cannot wonder, therefore, any longer at the exhortation with which the

Holy Ghost opens the Book of James: “Count it all joy when ye fall into

divers temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh

patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and

entire, wanting nothing.”

Temptation is plainly to be the blessed instrument used by God to complete

our perfection, and thus the enemy’s own weapons are turned against

himself, and we see how it is that all things, even temptations, can work

together for good to them that love God.

As to the way of victory over temptations, it seems hardly necessary to say

to those whom I am at this time especially addressing, that it is to be by

faith. For this is, of course, the foundation upon which the whole interior

life rests. Our one great motto is throughout, “We are nothing, Christ is

all.” And always and everywhere we have started out to stand, and walk,

and overcome, and live by faith. We have discovered our own utter

helplessness, and know that we cannot do anything for ourselves. Our only

way, therefore, is to hand the temptation over to our Lord, and trust Him to

conquer it for us. But when we put it into His hands we must leave it there.

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It must be as real a committing of ourselves to Him for victory, as it was at

first a committing of ourselves to Him for salvation. He must do all for us

in the one case, as completely as in the other. It was faith only then, and it

must be faith only now.

And the victories which the Lord works in conquering the temptations of

those who thus trust Him are nothing short of miracles, as thousands can

testify.

But into this part of the subject I cannot go at present, as my object has been

rather to present temptation in its true light, than to develop the way of

victory over it. I want to deliver conscientious, faithful souls from the

bondage into which they are sure to be brought, if they fail to understand the

true nature and use of temptation, and confound it with sin. I want that they

should not be ignorant of the fact that temptations are, after all, an invaluable

part of our soul’s development; and that, whatever may be their original

source, they are used by God to work out in us many blessed graces of

character which would otherwise be lacking. Wherever temptation is, there

is God also, superintending and controlling its power. “Where wert thou,

Lord I while I was being tempted?” cried the saint of the desert. “Close

beside thee, my son, all the while,” was the tender reply.

Temptations try us; and we are worth nothing if we are not tried. They

develop our spiritual strength and courage and knowledge; and our

development is the one thing God cries for. How shallow would all our

spirituality be if it were not for temptations. “Blessed is the man that

endureth temptation: for when he is tried he shall receive the crown of life,

which the Lord hath promised to them that love Him.” This “crown of life”

will be worth all that it has cost of trial and endurance to obtain it; and

without these it could not be attained.

An invalid lady procured once the cocoon of a very beautiful butterfly with

unusually magnificent wings hoping to have the pleasure of seeing it

emerge from its cocoon in her sick-chamber. She watched it eagerly as

spring drew on, and finally was delighted to see the butterfly beginning to

emerge. But it seemed to have great difficulty. It pushed, and strained, and

struggled, and seemed to make so little headway, that she concluded it must

need some help, and with a pair of delicate scissors she finally clipped the

tight cord that seemed to bind in the opening of the cocoon. Immediately the

cocoon opened wide, and the butterfly escaped without any further struggle.

She congratulated herself on the success of her experiment, but found in a

moment that something was the matter with the butterfly. It was all out of

the cocoon it is true, but its great wings were lifeless and colorless, and

dragged after it as a useless burden. For a few days it lived a miserable

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sickly life, and then died, without having once lifted its powerless wings.

The lady was sorely disappointed and could not understand it. But when she

related the circumstance to a naturalist, he told her that it had all been her

own fault. That it required just that pushing and struggling to send the life

fluid into the veins of the wings, and that her mistaken kindness in

shortening the struggle, had left the wings lifeless and colorless.

Just so do our spiritual wings need the struggle and effort of our conflict

with temptation and trial; and to grant us an escape from it would be to

weaken the power of our soul to “mount up with wings as eagles,” and

would deprive us of the “crown of life” which is promised to those who

endure.

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CHAPTER 13

FAILURES

The very title of this chapter may perhaps startle some. “Failures,” they will

say; “we thought there were no failures in this life of faith!”

To this I would answer that there ought not to be, and need not be; but, as a

fact, there sometimes are. And we have got to deal with facts, and not with

theories. No teacher of this interior life ever says that it becomes impossible

to sin; they only insist that sin ceases to be a necessity, and that a possibility

of uniform victory is opened before us. And there are very few who do not

confess that, as to their own actual experience, they have at times been

overcome by momentary temptation.

Of course, in speaking of sin here, I mean conscious, known sin. I do not

touch on the subject of sins of ignorance, or what is called the inevitable sin

of our nature, which are all covered by the atonement, and do not disturb

our fellowship with God. I have no desire nor ability to treat of the doctrines

concerning sin; these I will leave with the theologians to discuss and settle,

while I speak only of the believer’s experience in the matter. And I wish it

to be fully understood that in all I shall say, I have reference simply to that

which comes within the range of our consciousness.

Misunderstanding, then, on this point of known or conscious sin, opens the

way for great dangers in the higher Christian life. When a believer, who

has, as he trusts, entered upon the highway of holiness, finds himself

surprised into sin, he is tempted either to be utterly discouraged, and to give

everything up as lost; or else, in order to preserve the doctrine untouched, he

feels it necessary to cover his sin up, calling it infirmity, and refusing to be

honest and above-board about it. Either of these courses is equally fatal to

any real growth and progress in the life of holiness. The only way is to face

the sad fact at once, call the thing by its right name, and discover, if

possible, the reason and the remedy. This life of union with God requires

the utmost honesty with Him and with ourselves. The communion which

the sin itself would only momentarily disturb, is sure to be lost by any

dishonest dealing with it. A sudden failure is no reason for being

discouraged and giving up all as lost. Neither is the integrity of our doctrine

touched by it. We are not preaching a state, but a walk. The highway of

holiness is not a place, but a way. Sanctification is not a thing to be picked

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up at a certain stage of our experience, and forever after possessed, but it is

a life to be lived day by day, and hour by hour. We may for a moment turn

aside from a path, but the path is not obliterated by our wandering, and can

be instantly regained. And in this life and walk of faith, there may be

momentary failures, which, although very sad and greatly to be deplored,

need not, if rightly met, disturb the attitude of the soul as to entire

consecration and perfect trust, nor interrupt, for more than the passing

moment, its happy communion with its Lord.

The great point is an instant return to God. Our sin is no reason for ceasing

to trust, but only an unanswerable argument why we must trust more fully

than ever. From whatever cause we have been betrayed into failure, it is

very certain that there is no remedy to be found for it in discouragement. As

well might a child who is learning to walk, lie down in despair when he has

fallen, and refuse to take another step; as a believer, who is seeking to learn

how to live and walk by faith, give up in despair because of having fallen

into sin. The only way in both cases is to get right up and try again. When

the children of Israel had met with that disastrous defeat, soon after their

entrance into the land, before the little city of Ai, they were all so utterly

discouraged that we read:

“Wherefore the hearts of the people melted, and became as water.

And Joshua rent his clothes, and fell to the earth upon his face

before the ark of the Lord until the eventide, he and the elders of

Israel, and put dust upon their heads. And Joshua said, Alas! O

Lord God, wherefore hast Thou at all brought this people over

Jordan to deliver us into the hands of the Amorites to destroy us?

Would to God we had been content, and dwelt on the other side

Jordan! O Lord, what shall I say, when Israel turneth their backs

before their enemies? For the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of

the land shall hear of it, and shall environ us round and cut off our

name from the earth: and what wilt Thou do unto Thy great name?”

What a wail of despair this was! And how exactly it is repeated by many a

child of God in the present day, whose heart, because of a defeat, melts and

becomes as water, and who cries out, “Would to God we had been content

and dwelt on the other side Jordan!” and predicts for itself further failures

and even utter discomfiture before its enemies. No doubt Joshua thought

then, as we are apt to think now, that discouragement and despair were the

only proper and safe condition after such a failure. But God thought

otherwise. “And the Lord said unto Joshua, Get thee up; wherefore liest

thou upon thy face?”

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The proper thing to do was not to abandon themselves thus to utter

discouragement, humble as it might look, but at once to face the evil and get

rid of it, and afresh and immediately to “sanctify themselves.” “Up,

sanctify the people,” is always God’s command. “Lie down and be

discouraged,” is always the enemy’s temptation. Our feeling is that it is

presumptuous, and even almost impertinent, to go at once to the Lord, after

having sinned against Him. It seems as if we ought to suffer the

consequences our sin first for a little while, and endure the accusings of our

conscience. And we can hardly believe that the Lord can be willing at once

to receive us back into loving fellowship with Himself.

A little girl once expressed the feeling to me, with a child’s outspoken

candor. She had asked whether the Lord Jesus always forgave us for our

sins as soon as we asked Him, and I had said, “Yes, of course He does.”

“Just as soon” she repeated, doubtingly. “Yes,” I replied, “the very minute

we ask, He forgives us.” “Well,” she said deliberately, “I cannot believe

that. I should think He would make us feel sorry for two or three days first.

And then I should think He would make us ask Him a great many times,

and in a very pretty way too, not just in common talk. And I believe that is

the way He does, and you need not try to make me think He forgives me

right at once, no matter what the Bible says.” She only said what most

Christians think, and, what is worse, what most Christians act on, making

their discouragement and their very remorse separate them infinitely further

off from God than their sin would have done. Yet it is so totally contrary to

the way we like our children to act towards us, that I wonder how we ever

could have conceived such an idea of God. How a mother grieves when a

naughty child goes off alone in despairing remorse, and doubts her

willingness to forgive; and how, on the other hand, her whole heart goes out

in welcoming love to the darling who runs to her at once and begs her

forgiveness! Surely our God knew this yearning love when He said to us,

“Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings.”

The fact is, that the same moment which brings the consciousness of

having sinned, ought to bring also the consciousness of being forgiven.

This is especially essential to an unwavering walk in the highway of

holiness, for no separation from God can be tolerated here for an instant.

We can only walk in this path by looking continually unto Jesus, moment

by moment; and if our eyes are taken off of Him to look upon our own sin

and our own weakness, we shall leave the path at once. The believer,

therefore, who has, as he trusts, entered upon this highway, if he finds

himself overcome by sin, must flee with it instantly to the Lord. He must

forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” He must

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not hide his sin and seek to salve it over with excuses, or to push it out of

his memory by the lapse of time. But he must do as the children of Israel

did, rise up “early in the morning,” and “run” to the place where the evil

thing is hidden, and take it out of its hiding-place, and lay it “out before the

Lord.” He must confess his sin. And then he must stone it with stones, and

burn it with fire, and utterly put it away from him, and raise over it a great

heap of stones, that it may be forever hidden from his sight. And he must

believe, then and there, that God is, according to His word, faithful and just

to forgive him his sin, and that He does do it; and further, that He also

cleanses him from all unrighteousness. He must claim an immediate

forgiveness and an immediate cleansing by faith, and must go on trusting

harder and more absolutely than ever.

As soon as Israel’s sin had been brought to light and put away, at once

God’s word came again in a message of glorious encouragement, “Fear

not, neither be thou dismayed . . . See, I have given into thy hand the king

of Ai, and his people, and his city, and his land.” Our courage must rise

higher than ever, and we must abandon ourselves more completely to the

Lord, that His mighty power may the more perfectly work in us all the

good pleasure of His will. Moreover, we must forget our sin as soon as it is

thus confessed and forgiven. We must not dwell on it, and examine it, and

indulge in a luxury of distress and remorse. We must not put it on a

pedestal, and then walk around it and view it on every side, and so magnify

it into a mountain that hides our God from our eyes. We must follow the

example of Paul, and “forgetting those things which are behind, and

reaching forth unto those things which are before,” we must “press toward

the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”

I would like to bring up two contrastive illustrations of these things. One

was an earnest Christian man, an active worker in the Church, who had

been living for several months in the enjoyment of full salvation. He was

suddenly overcome by a temptation to treat a brother unkindly. Not having

supposed it possible that he could ever sin again, he was at once plunged

into the deepest discouragement, and concluded he had been altogether

mistaken, and had never entered into the life of full trust at all. Day by day

his discouragement increased, until it became despair, and he concluded he

had never even been born again, and gave himself up for lost. He spent

three years of utter misery, going further and further away from God, and

being gradually drawn off into one sin after another, until his life was a

curse to himself and to all around him. His health failed under the terrible

burden, and fears were entertained for his reason.

At the end of three years he met a Christian lady, who understood the truth

about sin that I have been trying to explain. In a few moments’ conversation

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she found out his trouble, and at once said, “You sinned in that act, there is

no doubt about it, and I do not want you to try and excuse it. But have you

never confessed it to the Lord and asked Him to forgive you?” “Confessed

it!” he exclaimed, “why it seems to me I have done nothing but confess it,

and entreat God to forgive me night and day for all these three dreadful

years.” “And you have never believed He did forgive you?” asked the lady.

“No,” said the poor man, “how could I, for I never felt as if He did?” “But

suppose He had said He forgave you, would not that have done as well as

for you to feel it?” “Oh, yes,” replied the man, “if God said it, of course I

would believe it.” “Very well, He does say so,” was the lady’s answer, and

aloud. “Now,” she continued, “you have been all these three years

confessing and confessing your sin, and all the while God’s record has been

declaring that He was faithful and just to forgive it and to cleanse you, and

yet you have never once believed it. You have been ‘making God a liar’ all

this while by refusing to believe His record.”

The poor man saw the whole thing, and was dumb with amazement and

consternation; and when the lady proposed they should kneel down, and

that he should confess his past unbelief and sin, and should claim, then and

there, a present forgiveness and a present cleansing, he obeyed like one in a

maze. But the result was glorious. In a few moments the light broke in, and

he burst out into praise at the wonderful deliverance. In three minutes his

soul was enabled to traverse back by faith the whole long weary journey

that he had been three years in making, and he found himself once more

resting in Jesus, and rejoicing in the fullness of His salvation.

The other illustration was the case of a Christian lady who had been living

in the land of promise about two weeks, and who had had a very bright and

victorious experience. Suddenly, at the end of that time, she was overcome

by a violent burst of anger. For a moment a flood of discouragement swept

over her soul. The enemy said, “There, now, that shows it was all a

mistake. Of course you have been deceived about the whole thing, and have

never entered into the life of full trust at all. And now you may as well give

up altogether, for you never can consecrate yourself any more entirely, nor

trust any more fully, than you did this time; so it is very plain this life of

holiness is not for you!” These thoughts flashed through her mind in a

moment, but she was well taught in the ways of God, and she said at once,

“Yes, I have sinned, and it is very sad. But the Bible says that if we confess

our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us

from all unrighteousness, and I believe He will do it.”

She did not delay a moment, but while still boiling over with anger, she ran,

she could not walk, into a room where she could be alone, and kneeling

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down beside the bed, she said, “Lord, I confess my sin. I have sinned, I am

even at this very moment sinning. I hate it, but I cannot get rid of it. I

confess it with shame and confusion of face to Thee. And now I believe

that, according to Thy word, Thou dost forgive and Thou dost cleanse.” She

said it out loud, for the inward turmoil was too great for it to be said inside.

As the words “Thou dost forgive and Thou dost cleanse” passed her lips,

the deliverance came. The Lord said, “Peace, be still,” and there was a great

calm. A flood of light and joy burst on her soul, the enemy fled, and she

was more than conqueror through Him that loved her. The whole thing, the

sin and the recovery from it, had occupied not five minutes, and her feet

trod on more firmly than ever in the blessed highway of holiness. Thus the

valley of Achor became to her a door of hope, and she sang afresh and with

deeper meaning her song of deliverance, “I will sing unto the Lord, for He

hath triumphed gloriously.”

The truth is, the only remedy, after all in every emergency, is to trust in the

Lord. And if this is all we ought to do, and all we can do, is it not better to

do it at once? I have often been brought up short by the question, “Well,

what can I do but trust?” And I have realized at once the folly of seeking for

deliverance in any other way, by saying to myself, “I shall have to come to

simple trusting in the end, and why not come to it at once now in the

beginning?” It is a life and walk of faith we have entered upon, and if we

fail in it our only recovery must lie in an increase of faith, not in a lessening

of it.

Let every failure, then, if any occur, drive you instantly to the Lord, with a

more complete abandonment and a more perfect trust; and you will find

that, sad as they are, they will not take you out of the land of rest, nor

permanently interrupt your sweet communion with Him.

And now, having shown the way of deliverance from failure, I want to say

a little as to the causes of failure in this life of full salvation. The causes do

not lie in the strength of the temptation nor in our own weakness, nor,

above all, in any lack in the power or willingness of our Savior to save us.

The promise to Israel was positive, “There shall not any man be able to

stand before thee all the days of thy life.” And the promise to us is equally

positive. “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that

ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way of escape that ye

may be able to bear it.”

The men of Ai were “but few,” and yet the people who had conquered the

mighty Jericho “fled before the men of Ai.” It was not the strength of their

enemy, neither had God failed them. The cause of their defeat lay

somewhere else, and the Lord Himself declares it, “Israel hath sinned, and

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they have also transgressed my covenant which I commanded them; for

they have even taken of the accursed thing, and have also stolen and

dissembled also, and they have put it even among their own stuff. Therefore

the children of Israel could not stand before their enemies, but turned their

backs upon their enemies.” It was a hidden evil that conquered them. Deep

down under the earth, in an obscure tent in that vast army, was hidden

something against which God had a controversy, and this little hidden thing

made the whole army helpless before their enemies. “There is an accursed

thing in the midst of thee, O Israel; thou canst not stand before thine

enemies until ye take away the accursed thing from among you.”

The teaching here is simply this, that anything allowed in the heart which is

contrary to the will of God, let it seem ever so insignificant, or be ever so

deeply hidden, will cause us to fall before our enemies. Any root of

bitterness cherished towards another, any self-seeking and harsh judgments

indulged in, any slackness in obeying the voice of the Lord, any doubtful

habits or surroundings, any one of these things will effectually cripple and

paralyze our spiritual life. We may have hidden the evil in the most remote

corner of our hearts, and may have covered it over from our sight, refusing

even to recognize its existence, of which, however, we cannot help being all

the time secretly aware. We may steadily ignore it, and persist in

declarations of consecration and full trust, we may be more earnest than

ever in our religious duties, and have the eyes of our understanding opened

more and more to the truth and the beauty of the life and walk of faith. We

may seem to ourselves and to others to have reached an almost impregnable

position of victory, and yet we may find ourselves suffering bitter defeats.

We may wonder, and question, and despair, and pray; nothing will do any

good until the accursed thing is dug up from its hiding-place, brought out to

the light, and laid before God. And the moment a believer who is walking

in this interior life meets with a defeat, he must at once seek for the cause

not in the strength of that particular enemy, but in something behind, some

hidden want of consecration lying at the very center of his being. Just as a

headache is not the disease itself, but only a symptom of a disease situated

in some other part of the body, so the sin in such a Christian is only the

symptom of an evil hidden probably in a very different part of his being.

Sometimes the evil may be hidden even in that, which at a cursory glance,

would look like good. Beneath apparent zeal for the truth, may be hidden a

judging spirit, or a subtle leaning to our own understanding. Beneath

apparent Christian faithfulness, may be hidden an absence of Christian love.

Beneath an apparently rightful care for our affairs, may be hidden a great

want of trust in God. I believe our blessed Guide, the indwelling Holy

Spirit, is always secretly discovering these things to us by continual little

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twinges and pangs of conscience, so that we are left without excuse. But it

is very easy to disregard His gentle voice, and insist upon it to ourselves

that all is right; and thus the fatal evil will continue hidden in our midst

causing defeat in most unexpected quarters.

A capital illustration of this occurred to me once in my housekeeping. I had

moved into a new house and, in looking over it to see if it was all ready for

occupancy, I noticed in the cellar a very clean-looking cider-cask headed up

at both ends. I debated with myself whether I should have it taken out of the

cellar and opened to see what was in it, but concluded, as it seemed empty

and looked nice, to leave it undisturbed, especially as it would have been

quite a piece of work to get it up the stairs. I did not feel quite easy, but

reasoned away my scruples and left it. Every spring and fall, when housecleaning

time came on, I would remember that cask, with a little twinge of

my housewifely conscience, feeling that I could not quite rest in the thought

of a perfectly cleaned house, while it remained unopened, for how did I

know but under its fair exterior it contained some hidden evil. Still I

managed to quiet my scruples on the subject, thinking always of the trouble

it would involve to investigate it; and for two or three years the innocentlooking

cask stood quietly in my cellar.

Then, most unaccountably, moths began to fill my house. I used every

possible precaution against them, and made every effort to eradicate them,

but in vain. They increased rapidly and threatened to ruin everything I had. I

suspected my carpets as being the cause, and subjected them to a thorough

cleaning. I suspected my furniture, and had it newly upholstered. I

suspected all sorts of impossible things. At last the thought of the cask

flashed on me. At once I had it brought up out of the cellar and the head

knocked in, and I think it is safe to say that thousands of moths poured out.

The previous occupant of the house must have headed it up with something

in it which bred moths, and this was the cause of all my trouble.

Now I believe that, in the same way, some innocent-looking habit or

indulgence, some apparently unimportant and safe thing, about which we

yet have now and then little twinges of conscience, something which is not

brought out fairly into the light, and investigated under the searching eye of

God, lies at the root of most of the failure in this higher life. All is not given

up. Some secret corner is kept locked against the entrance of the Lord. And

therefore we cannot stand before our enemies, but find ourselves smitten

down in their presence.

In order to prevent failure, or to discover its cause if we have failed, it is

necessary that we should keep continually before us this prayer, “Search

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me, O God, and know my heart; try me and know my thoughts; and see if

there be any evil way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”

There may be something very deceptive in our sufferings over our failures.

We may seem to ourselves to be wholly occupied with the glory of God,

and yet in our inmost souls it may be self alone that occasions all our

trouble. Our self-love is touched in a tender spot by the discovery that we

are not so saintly as we thought we were; and this chagrin is often a greater

sin than the original fault itself.

The only safe way to treat our failures is neither to justify nor condemn

ourselves on account of them, but to lay them quietly and in simplicity

before the Lord, looking at them in peace and in the spirit of love.

All the old mystic writers tell us that our progress is aided far more by a

simple, peaceful turning to God, than by all our chagrin and remorse over

our lapses from Him. Only be faithful, they say, in turning quietly to Him

alone, the moment you perceive what you have done, and His presence will

deliver you from the snares which have entrapped you. To look at self

plunges you deeper into the slough, for this very slough is after all nothing

but self; while the gentlest look towards God will calm and deliver your

heart.

Finally, let us never forget for one moment, no matter how often we may

fail, that the Lord Jesus able, according to the declaration concerning Him,

to deliver us out of the hands of our enemies, that we may “serve Him

without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our

life.”

Let us then pray, every one of us, day and night, “Lord, keep us from

sinning, and make us living witnesses of Thy mighty power to save to the

uttermost”; and let us never be satisfied until we are so pliable in His hands,

and have learned so to trust Him, that He will be able to “make us perfect,

in every good work to do His will, working in us that which is wellpleasing

in His sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory for ever and

ever. Amen.”

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CHAPTER 14

DOUBTS

A great many Christians are slaves to the habit of doubting. No drunkard

was ever more utterly bound by the chains of his fatal habit than they are by

theirs. Every step of their whole Christian life is taken against the fearful

odds of an army of doubts, that are forever lying in wait to assail them at

each favorable moment. Their lives are made wretched, their usefulness is

effectually hindered, and their communion with God is continually broken

by their doubts. And although the entrance of the soul upon the life of faith,

of which this book treats, does in many cases take it altogether out of the

region where these doubts live and flourish; yet even here it sometimes

happens that the old tyrant will rise up and reassert his sway, and will cause

the feet to stumble and the heart to fail, even when he cannot succeed in

utterly turning the believer back into the dreary wilderness again.

We all of us remember, doubtless, the childish fascination, and yet horror,

of that story of Christian’s imprisonment in Doubting Castle by the wicked

giant Despair, and our exultant sympathy in his escape through those

massive gates and from that cruel tyrant. Little did we suspect then that we

should ever find ourselves taken prisoner by the same giant, and

imprisoned in the same castle. And yet I fear to every member of the

Church of Christ there has been at least one such experience. Turn to the

account again, if it is not fresh in your minds, and see if you do not see

pictured there experiences of your own that have been very grievous to bear

at the time, and very sorrowful to look back upon afterwards.

It seems strange that people, whose very name of Believers implies that

their one chiefest characteristic is that they believe, should have to confess to

such experiences. And yet it is such a universal habit that I feel if the

majority of the Church were to be named over again, the only fitting and

descriptive name that could be given them would be that of Doubters. In

fact, most Christians have settled down under their doubts, as to a sort of

inevitable malady, from which they suffer acutely, but to which they must

try to be resigned as a part of the necessary discipline of this earthly life.

And they lament over their doubts as a man might lament over his

rheumatism, making themselves out as an “interesting case” of especial and

peculiar trial, which requires the tenderest sympathy and the utmost

consideration.

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And this is too often true of believers, who are earnestly longing to enter

upon the life and walk of faith, and who have made perhaps many steps

towards it. They have got rid, it may be, of the old doubts that once

tormented them, as to whether their sins are really forgiven, and whether

they shall, after all, get safe to Heaven; but they have not got rid of

doubting. They have simply shifted the habit to a higher platform. They are

saying, perhaps, “Yes, I believe my sins are forgiven, and I am a child of

God through faith in Jesus Christ. I dare not doubt this any more. But

then—” And this “but then” includes an interminable array of doubts

concerning every declaration and every promise our Father has made to His

children. One after another they fight with them and refuse to believe them,

until they can have some more reliable proof of their being true, than the

simple word of their God. And then they wonder why they are permitted to

walk in such darkness, and look upon themselves almost in the light of

martyrs, and groan under the peculiar spiritual conflicts they are compelled

to endure.

Spiritual conflicts! Far better would they be named did we call them

spiritual rebellions! Our fight is to be a fight of faith, and the moment we

doubt, our fight ceases and our rebellion begins.

I desire to put forth, if possible, one vigorous protest against this whole

thing. Just as well might I join in with the lament of a drunkard and unite

with him in prayer for grace to endure the discipline of his fatal indulgence,

as to give way for one instant to the weak complaints of these enslaved

souls, and try to console them under their slavery. To one and to the other I

would dare to do nothing else but proclaim the perfect deliverance the Lord

Jesus Christ has in store or them, and beseech, entreat, command them,

with all the force of my whole nature, to avail themselves of it and be free.

Not for one moment would I listen to their despairing excuses. You ought

Will you undertake to tell me that it is an inevitable necessity for God to be

doubted by His children? Is it an inevitable necessity for your children to

doubt you? Would you tolerate their doubts a single hour? Would you pity

your son and condole with him, and feel that he was an interesting case, if

he should come to you and say, “Father, I cannot believe your word, I

cannot trust your love”?

I remember once seeing the indignation of a mother I knew, stirred to its

very depths by a little doubting on the part of one of her children. She had

brought two little girls to my house to leave them while she did some

errands. One of them, with the happy confidence of childhood, abandoned

herself to all the pleasures she could find in my nursery, and sang and

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played until her mother’s return. The other one, with the wretched caution

and mistrust of maturity, sat down alone in a corner to wonder whether her

mother would remember to come back for her, and to fear she would be

forgotten, and to imagine her mother would be glad of the chance to get rid

of her anyhow, because she was such a naughty girl, and ended with

working herself up into a perfect frenzy of despair. The look on that

mother’s face, when upon her return the weeping little girl told what was

the matter with her, I shall not easily forget. Grief, wounded love,

indignation, and pity, all strove together for mastery. But indignation gained

the day, and I doubt if that little girl was ever so vigorously dealt with

before. A hundred times in my life since has that scene come up before me

with deepest teaching, and has compelled me, peremptorily, to refuse

admittance to the doubts about my Heavenly Father’s love, and care, and

remembrance of me, that have clamored at the door of my heart for

entrance.

I am convinced that to many people doubting is a real luxury, and to deny

themselves from indulging in it would be to exercise the hardest piece of

self-denial they have ever known. It is a luxury that, like the indulgence in

all other luxuries, brings very sorrowful results; and, perhaps, looking at the

sadness and misery it has brought into your own Christian experience, you

may be tempted to say, “Alas! This is no luxury to me, but only a fearful

trial.” But pause for a moment. Try giving it up, and you will soon find out

whether it is a luxury or not. Do not your doubts come trooping to your

door as a company of sympathizing friends, who appreciate your hard case,

and have come to condole with you? And is it no luxury to sit down with

them and entertain them, and listen to their arguments, and join in with their

condolences? Would it be no self-denial to turn resolutely from them, and

refuse to hear a word they have to say? If you do not know, try it and see.

Have you never tasted the luxury of indulging in hard thoughts against

those who have, as you think, injured you? Have you never known what a

positive fascination it is to brood over their unkindnesses, and to pry into

their malice, and to imagine all sorts of wrong and uncomfortable things

about them? It has made you wretched, of course, but it has been a

fascinating sort of wretchedness that you could not easily give up.

And just like this is the luxury of doubting. Things have gone wrong with

you in your experience. Dispensations have been mysterious, temptations

have been peculiar, your case has seemed different from that of any one’s

around you. What more natural than to conclude that for some reason God

has forsaken you, and does not love you, and is indifferent to your welfare?

And how irresistible is the conviction that you are too wicked for Him to

care for, or too difficult for Him to manage.

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You do not mean to blame Him, or accuse Him of injustice, for you feel

that His indifference and rejection of you are fully deserved because of your

unworthiness. And this very subterfuge leaves you at liberty to indulge in

your doubts under the guise of a just and true appreciation of your own

shortcomings. But all the while you are as really indulging in hard and

wrong thoughts of your Lord as ever you did of a human enemy; for He

says He came not to save the righteous, but sinners; and your very

sinfulness and unworthiness is your chiefest claim upon His love and His

care.

As well might the poor little lamb that has wandered from the flock and got

lost in the wilderness say, “The shepherd does not love me, nor care for

me, nor remember me, because I am lost. He only loves and cares for the

lambs that never wander.” As well might the ill man say, “The doctor will

not come to see me, nor give me any medicines, because I am ill. He only

cares for and visits well people.” Jesus says, “They that are whole need not

a physician, but they that are sick.” And again He says, “What man of you,

having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety

and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it?”

Any thoughts of Him, therefore, which are different from what He says of

Himself, are hard thoughts; and to indulge in them is far worse than to

indulge in hard thoughts of any earthly friend or foe. From the beginning to

the end of your Christian life it is always sinful to indulge in doubts. Doubts

are all from the devil, and are always untrue. And the only way to meet

them is by a direct and emphatic denial.

And this brings me to the practical part of the whole subject, as to how to

get deliverance from this fatal habit. My answer would be that the

deliverance from this can be by no other means than the deliverance from

any other sin. It is to be found in the Lord and in Him only. You must hand

your doubting over to Him, as you have learned to hand your other

temptations. You must do just what you do with your temper, or your

pride. You must give it up to the Lord. I believe myself the only effectual

remedy is to take a pledge against it as you would urge a drunkard to do

against drink, trusting in the Lord alone to keep you steadfast.

Like any other sin, the stronghold is in the will and the will to doubt must

be surrendered exactly as you surrender the will to yield to any other

temptation. God always takes possession of a surrendered will. And if we

come to the point of saying that we will not doubt, and surrender this central

fortress of our nature to Him, His blessed Spirit will begin at once to work

in us all the good pleasure of His will, and we shall find ourselves kept

from doubting by His mighty and overcoming power.

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The trouble is that in this matter of doubting the soul does not always make

a full surrender, but is apt to reserve to itself a little secret liberty to doubt,

looking upon it as being sometimes a necessity. “I do not want to doubt any

more,” we will say, or, “I hope I shall not”; but it is hard to come to the

point of saying, “I will not doubt again.” But no surrender is effectual until

it reaches the point of saying, “I will not”. The liberty to doubt must be

given up forever. And the soul must consent to a continuous life of

inevitable trust. It is often necessary, I think, to make a definite transaction

of this surrender of doubting, and to come to a point about it. I believe it is

quite as necessary in the case of a doubter as in the case of a drunkard. It

will not do to give it up by degrees. The total abstinence principle is the only

effectual one here.

Then, the surrender once made, the soul must rest absolutely upon the Lord

for deliverance in each time of temptation. It must lift up the shield of faith

the moment the assault comes. It must hand the very first suggestion of

doubt over to the Lord, and must tell the enemy to settle the matter with

Him. It must refuse to listen to the doubt a single moment. Let it come ever

so plausibly, or under whatever guise of humility, the soul must simply

me. Jesus saves me; He saves me now.” Those three little words, repeated

over and over, — “Jesus saves me, Jesus saves me,” — will put to flight

the greatest army of doubts that ever assaulted any soul. I have tried it times

without number, and have never known it to fail. Do not stop to argue the

matter out with your doubts, nor try to prove that they are wrong. Pay no

attention to them whatever; treat them with the utmost contempt. Shut your

door in their faces, and emphatically deny every word they say to you.

Bring up some “It is written,” and hurl it after them. Look right at Jesus,

and tell Him you trust Him, and you mean to trust Him. Let the doubts

clamor as they may, they cannot hurt you if you will not let them in.

I know it will look to you sometimes as though you were shutting the door

against your best friends, and your heart will long after your doubts more

than ever the Israelites longed after the flesh-pots of Egypt. But deny

yourself; take up your cross in this matter, and unmercifully refuse ever to

listen to a single word.

This very day a perfect army of doubts stood awaiting my awaking, and

clamored at my door for admittance. Nothing seemed real, nothing seemed

true; and least of all did it seem possible that I — miserable, wretched —

could be the object of the Lord’s love, or care, or notice. If I only had been

at liberty to let these doubts in, and invite them to take seats and make

themselves at home, what a luxury I should have felt it to be! But years ago

I made a pledge against doubting; and I would as soon think of violating

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admit the first doubt. I therefore lifted up my shield of faith the moment I

was conscious of these suggestions, and handing the whole army over to

my Lord to conquer, I began to say, over and over, “The Lord does love

me. He is my present and my perfect Savior; Jesus saves me, Jesus saves

me now!” The victory was complete. The enemy had come in like a flood,

but the Lord lifted up a standard against him, and he was routed and put to

flight; and my soul is singing the song of Moses and the children of Israel,

saying, “I will sing unto the Lord, for He hath triumphed gloriously: the

horse and his rider hath He thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength

and my song, and He is become my salvation. The Lord is a man of war;

the Lord is His name.”

It will help you to resist the assaults of this temptation to doubt, to see

clearly that doubting is sin. It is certainly a direct disobedience to our Lord,

who commands us, “Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”

And all through the Bible everywhere the commands to trust are imperative,

and admit of no exceptions. Time and room would fail me to refer to one

hundredth part of these, but no one can read the Psalms without being

convinced that the man who trusts without a question, is the only man who

pleases God and is accepted of Him. The “provocation” of Israel was that

they did not trust; “anger also came up against Israel, because they believed

contrast, we read in Isaiah concerning those who trust, “Thou wilt keep him

in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, because he trusteth in

Thee.” Nothing grieves or wounds our hearts like doubting on the part of a

friend, and nothing, I am convinced, grieves the heart of God more than

doubting from us.

One of my children, who is now with the Lord, said to me one evening as I

was tucking her up in bed, “Well, mother, I have had my first doubt.” “Oh,

Ray,” I said, “what was it?” “Why,” she replied, “Satan came to me and

told me not to believe the Bible, for it was not a word of it true.” “And what

did thee say to him?” I asked. “Oh,” she replied, triumphantly, “I just said

to him, Satan, I will believe it. So there!” I was delighted with the child’s

spiritual intelligence in knowing so well how to meet doubts, and

encouraged her with all my heart, explaining to her how all doubts and

discouragements are from the enemy, and how he is always a liar and must

not be listened to for a moment. The next night, I had forgotten all about it,

however, and was surprised and startled when she said, as I was tucking

her in bed, “Well, mother, Satan has been at it again.” “Oh, Ray darling!” I

exclaimed in dismay, “what did he say this time?” “Well,” she replied, “he

just told me that I was such a naughty little girl that Jesus could not love

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me, and I was foolish to think He did.” “And what did thee say this time?”

I asked. “Oh!” she replied, “I just looked at him cross and said, Satan, shut

thy mouth!” And then she added, with a smile, “He can’t make me

unhappy one bit.” A grander battle no soul ever fought than this little child

had done, and no greater victory was ever won!

Dear, doubting soul, go and do likewise; and a similar victory shall be thine.

As you lay down this book take up your pen and write out your

determination never to doubt again. Make it a real transaction between your

soul and the Lord. Give up your liberty to doubt forever. Put your will in

this matter over on the Lord’s side, and trust Him to keep you from falling.

Tell him all about your utter weakness and your long-encouraged habits of

doubt, and how helpless you are before your enemy, and commit the whole

battle to Him. Tell Him you will not doubt again; and then henceforward

keep your face steadfastly looking unto Jesus, away from yourself and

away from your doubts, holding fast the profession of your faith without

wavering, because He is faithful who has promised. And as surely as you

do thus hold the beginning of your confidence steadfast unto the end, just so

surely shall you find yourself in this matter made more than conqueror,

through Him who loves you.

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CHAPTER 15

PRACTICAL RESULTS IN THE DAILY WALK

AND CONVERSATION

If all that has been said concerning the life hid with Christ in God be true, its

results in the practical daily walk and conversation ought to be very marked,

and the people who have entered into the enjoyment of it ought to be, in

very truth, a “peculiar people, zealous of good works.”

My son at college once wrote to a friend to this effect: that Christians are

God’s witnesses necessarily, because the world will not read the Bible, but

they will read our lives; and that upon the report these give will very much

depend their belief in the Divine nature of the religion we profess. As we all

know, this is an age of facts, and inquiries are being increasingly turned

from theories to realities. If our religion is to make any headway now, it

must be proved to be more than a theory, and we must present, to the

investigation of the critical minds of our age, the grand facts of lives which

have been actually and manifestly transformed by the mighty power of God

working in us all the good pleasure of His will. Give us “forms of life,” say

the scientists, and we will be convinced. And when the Church is able to

present to them in all its members, the form of a holy life, their last

stronghold will be conquered.

I desire, therefore, before closing my book, to speak very solemnly of what

I conceive to be the necessary fruits of a life of faith, such as I have been

describing, and to press home to the hearts of every one of my readers their

responsibility to walk worthy of the high calling wherewith they have been

called.

And I would speak to some of you, at least, as personal friends, for I feel

sure we have not gone this far together through this book without there

having grown in your hearts, as there has in mine, a tender personal interest

and longing for one another, that we may in everything show forth the

praises of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvellous light.

As a friend, then, to friends, I am sure I may speak very plainly, and will be

pardoned if I go into some particulars of life and character which are vital to

all true Christian development.

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The standard of practical holy living has been so low among Christians that

any good degree of real devotedness of life and walk is looked upon with

surprise, and even often with disapprobation, by a large portion of the

Church. And, for the most part, the professed followers of the Lord Jesus

Christ are so little like Him in character or in action, that to an outside

observer there would not seem to be much harmony between them.

But we, who have heard the call of our God to a life of entire consecration

and perfect trust, must do differently from all this. We must come out from

the world and be separate, and must not be conformed to it in our characters

nor in our purposes. We must no longer share in its spirit or its ways. Our

conversation must be in Heaven, and we must seek those things that are

above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. We must walk

through the world as Christ walked. We must have the mind that was in

Him. As pilgrims and strangers we must abstain from fleshly lusts that war

against the soul. As good soldiers of Jesus Christ, we must disentangle

ourselves from the affairs of this life as far as possible, that we may please

Him who hath chosen us to be soldiers. We must abstain from all

appearance of evil. We must be kind one to another, tenderhearted,

forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ’s sake, hath forgiven us. We

must not resent injuries or unkindness, but must return good for evil, and

turn the other cheek to the hand that smites us. We must take always the

lowest place among our fellowmen; and seek not our own honor, but the

honor of others. We must be gentle, and meek, and yielding; not standing

up for our own rights, but for the rights of others. All that we do must be

done for the glory of God. And, to sum it all up, since He which hath called

us is holy, so we must be holy in a manner of conversation; because it is

written, “Be ye holy, for I am holy.”

Now, dear friends, this is all exceedingly practical and means, surely, a life

very different from the lives of most professors around us. It means that we

do really and absolutely turn our backs on self, and on self’s motives and

self’s aims. It means that we are a peculiar people, not only in the eyes of

God, but in the eyes of the world around us; and that, wherever we go, it

will be known from our Christlike lives and conversation that we are

followers of the Lord Jesus Christ; and are not of the world, even as He

was not of the world. We shall no longer feel that our money is our own,

but the Lord’s, to be used in His service. We shall not feel at liberty to use

our energies exclusively in the pursuit of worldly means, but, seeking first

the kingdom of God and His righteousness, shall have all needful things

added unto us. We shall find ourselves forbidden to seek the highest places,

or to strain after worldly advantages. We shall not be permitted to be

conformed to the world in our ways of thinking or of living. We shall feel

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no desire to indulge in the world’s frivolous pursuits. We shall find our

affections set upon heavenly things, rather than upon earthly things. Our

days will be spent not in serving ourselves, but in serving our Lord; and all

our rightful duties will be more perfectly performed than ever, because

whatever we do will be done “not with eye-service as men-pleasers, but as

the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart.”

Into all these things we shall undoubtedly be led by the blessed Spirit of

God, if we give ourselves up to His guidance. But unless we have the right

standard of Christian life set before us, we shall be hindered by our

ignorance from recognizing His voice; and it is for this reason I desire to be

very plain and definite in my statements.

I have noticed that wherever there has been a faithful following of the Lord

in a consecrated soul, several things have inevitably followed, sooner or

later.

Meekness and quietness of spirit become in time the characteristics of the

daily life; a submissive acceptance of the will of God, as it comes in the

hourly events of each day; pliability in the hands of God to do or to suffer

all the good pleasure of His will; sweetness under provocation; calmness in

the midst of turmoil and bustle; yieldingness to the wishes of others, and an

insensibility to slights and affronts, absence of worry or anxiety; deliverance

from care and fear: all these, and many other similar graces are invariably

found to be the natural outward development of that inward life which is hid

with Christ in God. Then as to the habits of life: we always see such

Christians sooner or later giving themselves up to some work for God and

their fellowmen, willing to spend and be spent in the Master’s service. They

become indifferent to outward show in the furniture of their houses and the

style of their living, and make all personal adornment secondary to the

things of God. The voice is dedicated to God, to talk and sing for Him. The

purse is placed at His disposal. The pen is dedicated to write for Him, the

lips to speak for Him, the hands and the feet to do His bidding. Year after

year such Christians are seen to grow more unworldly, more heavenlyminded,

more transformed, more like Christ, until even their very faces

express so much of the beautiful inward Divine life, that all who look at

them cannot but take knowledge of them that they live with God, and are

abiding in Him.

I feel sure that to each one of you have come at least some Divine

intimations or foreshadowings of the life I here describe. Have you not

begun to feel dimly conscious of the voice of God speaking to you in the

depths of your soul about these things? Has it not been a pain and a distress

to you of late to discover how much there is wrong in your life? Has not

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your soul been plunged into inward trouble and doubt about certain

dispositions and ways, in which you have been formerly accustomed to

indulge? Have you not begun to feel uneasy with some of your habits of

life, and to wish that you could do differently in these respects? Have not

paths of devotedness and of service begun to open out before you, with the

longing thought, “Oh, that I could walk in them”?

All these longings and doubts, and this inward distress, are the voice of the

Good Shepherd in your heart seeking to call you out of all that is contrary to

His will. Oh! let me entreat of you not to turn away from His gentle

pleadings. You little know the secret paths into which He means to lead you

by these very steps, nor the wonderful stores of blessedness that lie at their

end, or you would spring forward with an eager joy to yield to every one of

His requirements. The heights of Christian perfection can only be reached

by faithfully following the Guide who is to lead you there, and He reveals

your way to you one step at a time in the teachings and providences of your

daily lives, asking only on your part that you yield yourselves up to His

guidance. If, then, in anything you are convinced of sin, be sure that it is the

voice of your Lord, and surrender it at once to His bidding, rejoicing with a

great joy that He has begun thus to lead and guide you. Be perfectly pliable

in His wise hands, go where He entices you, turn away from all from

which He makes you shrink, obey Him perfectly; and He will lead you out

swiftly and easily into a wonderful life of conformity to Himself, that will

be a testimony to all around you, beyond what you yourself will ever know.

I knew a soul thus given up to follow the Lord whithersoever He might lead

her, who in three short months traveled from the depths of darkness and

despair into the realization and conscious experience of the most blessed

union with the Lord Jesus Christ. Out of the midst of her darkness, she

consecrated herself to the Lord, surrendering her will up altogether to Him,

that He might work in her to will and to do of His own good pleasure.

Immediately He began to speak to her by His Spirit in her heart, suggesting

to her some little acts of service for Him, and calling her out of all un-

Christlike dispositions and ways. She recognized His voice, and yielded to

Him each thing He asked for, following Him whithersoever He might lead

her, with no fear but the one fear of disobeying Him. He led her rapidly on,

day by day conforming her more and more to His will, and making her life

such a testimony to those around her, that even some who had begun by

opposing and disbelieving, were forced to acknowledge that it was of God,

and were won to a similar surrender. And, finally, after three short months

of this faithful following, it came to pass, so swiftly had she gone, that her

Lord was able to reveal to her wondering soul some of the deepest secrets

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baptizing her with the Holy Ghost. Think you she has ever regretted her

wholehearted following of Him? Or that aught but thankfulness and joy can

ever fill her soul when she reviews the steps by which her feet had been led

to this place of wondrous blessedness, even though some of them may

have seemed at the time hard to take? Ah! dear soul, if thou wouldst know a

like blessing, abandon thyself, like her, to the guidance of the Divine

Master, and shrink from no surrender for which He may call.

Surely thou canst trust Him! And if some things may be called for which

look to thee of but little moment, and not worthy thy Lord’s attention,

remember that He sees not as man seeth, and that things small to thee may

be in His eyes the key and the clue to the deepest springs of thy being. In

order to mould thee into entire conformity to His will, He must have thee

pliable in his hands, and this pliability is more quickly reached by yielding

in the little things than even by the greater. Thy one great desire is to follow

Him fully; canst thou not say then a continual “Yes, Lord!” to all His sweet

commands, whether small or great, and trust Him to lead thee by the

shortest road to thy fullest blessedness?

My dear friend, this, and nothing less than this, is what thy consecration

meant, whether thou knew it or not. It meant inevitable obedience. It meant

that the will of thy God was henceforth to be thy will under all

circumstances and at all times. It meant that from that moment thou

surrendered thy liberty of choice, and gave thyself up utterly into the control

of thy Lord. It meant an hourly following of Him whithersoever He might

lead thee, without any dream of turning back.

And now I appeal to thee to make good thy word. Let everything else go,

that thou mayest live out, in a practical daily walk and conversation, the

Divine life thou hast dwelling within thee. Thou art united to thy Lord by a

wondrous tie; walk, then, as He walked, and show to the unbelieving world

the blessed reality of His mighty power to save, by letting Him save thee to

the very uttermost. Thou needst not fear to consent to this, for He is thy

Savior; and His power is to do it all. He is not asking thee, in thy poor

weakness, to do it thyself; He only asks thee to yield thyself to Him, that He

may work in thee to will and to do by His own mighty power. Thy part is

to yield thyself, His part is to work; and never, never will He give thee any

command which is not accompanied by ample power to obey it. Take no

thought for the morrow in this matter; but abandon thyself with a generous

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trust to thy loving Lord, who has promised never to call His own sheep out

into any path, without Himself going before them to make the way easy and

safe. Take each onward step as He makes it plain to thee. Bring all thy life

in each of its details to Him to regulate and guide. Follow gladly and

quickly the sweet suggestions of His Spirit in thy soul. And day by day

thou wilt find Him bringing thee more and more into conformity with His

will in all things; moulding thee and fashioning thee, as thou art able to bear

it, into a vessel unto His honor, sanctified and meet for His use, and fitted to

every good work. So shall be given to thee the sweet joy of being an epistle

of Christ known and read of all men; and thy light shall shine so brightly

that men seeing, not thee, but thy good works, shall glorify, not thee, but

thy Father which is in Heaven.

We are predestined to be “conformed to the image” of God’s Son. This

means, of course, not a likeness of bodily presence, but a likeness of

character and nature. It means a similarity of thought, of feeling, of desire,

of loves, of hates. It means, that we are to think and act, according to our

measure, as Christ would have thought and acted under our circumstances.

A little girl was once questioned what it meant to be a Christian. She

replied, “It means to be just what Christ would be, if He was a little girl and

lived in my house.”

The secret of Christ’s life was the pouring out of Himself for others; and if

we are like Him, this will be the secret of our lives also. He saved others,

but Himself He could not save. He “pleased not Himself,” and therefore we

are “not to please ourselves,” but rather our neighbor, when it is for his

good.

A thoughtful Hindoo religionist, who visited England and America lately to

examine into Christianity, said, as the result of his observations, “What

Christians need is a little more of Christ’s Christianity, and a little less of

man’s.”

Man’s Christianity teaches sacrifice to save ourselves; Christ’s Christianity

teaches sacrifice to save others. Man’s Christianity produces the fruitless

selfishness of too much of our religion. Christ’s Christianity produces the

blessed unselfishness of lives that are poured out for others, as was His.

In short, then, the one practical outcome of all that our book has been

teaching us, is simply this, that we are to be Christlike Christians. And all

our experiences amount to nothing if they do not produce this result. For

“not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom

of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.”

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CHAPTER 16

THE JOY OF OBEDIENCE

I remember reading once somewhere this sentence, “Perfect obedience

would be perfect happiness, if only we had perfect confidence in the power

we were obeying.” I remember being struck with the saying, as the

revelation of a possible, although hitherto undreamed-of way of happiness;

and often afterwards, through all the lawlessness and wilfulness of my life,

did that saying recur to me as the vision of a rest, and yet of a possible

development, that would soothe and at the same time satisfy all my

yearnings.

Need I say that this rest has been revealed to me now, not as a vision, but as

a reality; and that I have seen in the Lord Jesus, the Master to whom we

may all yield up our implicit obedience, and, taking His yoke upon us, may

find our perfect rest?

You little know, dear hesitating soul, of the joy you are missing. The

Master has revealed Himself to you, and is calling for your complete

surrender, and you shrink and hesitate. A measure of surrender you are

willing to make, and think indeed it is fit and proper you should. But an

utter abandonment, without any reserves, seems to you too much to be

asked for. You are afraid of it. It involves too much, you think, and is too

great a task. To be measurably obedient you desire; to be perfectly obedient

appalls you.

And then, too, you see other souls who seem able to walk with easy

consciences, in a far wider path than that which appears to be marked out

for you, and you ask yourself why this need be. It seems strange, and

perhaps hard to you, that you must do what they need not, and must leave

undone what they have liberty to do.

Ah! dear Christian, this very difference between you is your privilege,

though you do not yet know it. Your Lord says, “He that hath my

commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me; and he that

loveth Me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will

manifest Myself to him.” You have His commandments; those you envy,

have them not. You know the mind of your Lord about many things, in

which, as yet, they are walking in darkness. Is not this a privilege? Is it a

cause for regret that your soul is brought into such near and intimate

relations with your Master, that He is able to tell you things which those

who are further off may not know? Do you not realize what a tender degree

of intimacy is implied in this?

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There are many relations in life which require from the different parties only

very moderate degrees of devotion. We may have really pleasant

friendships with one another, and yet spend a large part of our lives in

separate interests, and widely differing pursuits. When together, we may

greatly enjoy one another’s society, and find many congenial points; but

separation is not any especial distress to us, and other and more intimate

friendships do not interfere. There is not enough love between us, to give us

either the right or the desire to enter into and share one another’s most

private affairs. A certain degree of reserve and distance is the suitable thing,

we feel. But there are other relations in life where all this is changed. The

friendship becomes love. The two hearts give themselves to one another, to

be no longer two but one. A union of souls takes place, which makes all

that belongs to one the property of the other. Separate interests and separate

paths in life are no longer possible. Things which were lawful before

become unlawful now, because of the nearness of the tie that binds. The

reserve and distance suitable to mere friendship becomes fatal in love. Love

gives all, and must have all in return. The wishes of one become binding

obligations to the other, and the deepest desire of each heart is, that it may

know every secret wish or longing of the other, in order that it may fly on

the wings of the wind to gratify it.

Do such as these chafe under this yoke which love imposes? Do they envy

the cool, calm, reasonable friendships they see around them, and regret the

nearness into which their souls are brought to their beloved one, because of

the obligations it creates? Do they not rather glory in these very obligations,

and inwardly pity, with a tender yet exulting joy, the poor far-off ones who

dare not come so near? Is not every fresh revelation of the mind of one

another a fresh delight and privilege, and is any path found hard which their

love compels them to travel?

Ah! dear souls, if you have ever known this even for a few hours in any

earthly relation; if you have ever loved a fellow human being enough to find

sacrifice and service on their behalf a joy; if a whole-souled abandonment of

your will to the will of another has ever gleamed across you as a blessed

and longed-for privilege, or as a sweet and precious reality, then, by all the

tender longing love of your heavenly Master, would I entreat you to let it be

so towards God!

He loves you with more than the love of friendship. As a bridegroom

rejoices over his bride, so does He rejoice over you, and nothing but a full

surrender will satisfy Him. He has given you all, and He asks for all in

return. The slightest reserve will grieve Him to the heart. He spared not

Himself, and how can you spare yourself? For your sake He poured out in

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a lavish abandonment all that He had, and for His sake you must pour out

all that you have without stint or measure.

Oh, be generous in your self-surrender! Meet His measureless devotion for

you, with a measureless devotion to Him. Be glad and eager to throw

yourself headlong into His dear arms, and to hand over the reins of

government to Him. Whatever there is of you, let Him have it all. Give up

forever everything that is separate from Him. Consent to resign from this

time forward all liberty of choice; and glory in the blessed nearness of union

which makes this enthusiasm of devotedness not only possible but

necessary. Have you never longed to lavish your love and attentions upon

someone far off from you in position or circumstances, with whom you

were not intimate enough for any closer approach? Have you not felt a

capacity for self-surrender and devotedness, that has seemed to burn within

you like a fire, and yet had no object upon which it dared to lavish itself?

Have not your hands been full of alabaster boxes of ointment, very

precious, which you have never been near enough to any heart to pour out?

If, then, you are hearing the sweet voice of your Lord calling you into a

place of nearness to Himself, which will require a separation from all else,

and which will make this enthusiasm of devotedness not only possible, but

necessary will you shrink or hesitate? Will you think it hard that He reveals

to you more of His mind than He does to others, and that He will not allow

you to be happy in anything which separates you from Himself? Do you

want to go where He cannot go with you, or to have pursuits which He

cannot share?

No! no, a thousand times, no! You will spring out to meet His dear will

with an eager joy. Even His slightest wish will become a binding law to

you, which it would fairly break your heart to disobey. You will glory in the

very narrowness of the path He marks out for you, and will pity with an

infinite pity the poor far-off ones who have missed this precious joy. The

obligations of love will be to you its sweetest privileges; and the right you

have acquired to lavish the uttermost abandonment of all that you have upon

your Lord, will seem to lift you into a region of unspeakable glory. The

perfect happiness of perfect obedience will dawn upon your soul, and you

will begin to know something of what Jesus meant when He said, “I

delight to do thy will, O my God.”

And do you think the joy in this will be all on your side? Has the Lord no

joy in those who have thus surrendered themselves to Him, and who love

to obey Him? Ah, my friends, we are not fit to speak of this but surely the

Scriptures reveal to us glimpses of the delight, the satisfaction, the joy our

Lord has in us, that ravish the soul with their marvellous suggestions of

blessedness. That we should need Him, is easy to comprehend; that He

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should need us, seems incomprehensible. That our desire should be

towards Him, is a matter of course; but that His desire should be towards

us, passes the bounds of human belief. And yet, over and over He says it,

and what can we do but believe Him? He has made our hearts capable of

this supreme, overmastering affection, and has offered Himself as the

object of it. It is infinitely precious to Him, and He says, “He that loveth me

shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself

to him.” Continually at every heart He is knocking, and asking to be taken

in as the supreme object of love. “Wilt thou have me,” He says to the

believer, “to be thy Beloved? Wilt thou follow me into suffering and

loneliness, and endure hardness for my sake, and ask for no reward but my

smile of approval, and my word of praise? Wilt thou throw thyself with an

utter abandonment into my will? Wilt thou give up to me the absolute

control of thyself and all that thou art? Wilt thou be content with pleasing

me and me only? May I have my way with thee in all things? Wilt thou

come into so close a union with me as to make a separation from the world

necessary? Wilt thou accept me for thy only Lord, and leave all others, to

cleave only unto Me?”

In a thousand ways He makes this offer of oneness with Himself to every

believer. But all do not say “Yes,” to Him. Other loves and other interests

seem to them too precious to be cast aside. They do not miss of Heaven

because of this. But they miss an unspeakable joy.

You, however, are not one of these. From the very first your soul has cried

out eagerly and gladly to all His offers, “Yes, Lord; yes!” You are more

than ready to pour out upon Him all your richest treasures of love and

devotedness. You have brought to Him an enthusiasm of self-surrender that

perhaps may disturb and distress the more prudent and moderate Christians

around you. Your love makes necessary a separation from the world, which

a lower love cannot even conceive of. Sacrifices and services are possible

and sweet to you, which could not come into the grasp of a more halfhearted

devotedness. The life upon which you have entered gives you the

right to a lavish outpouring of your all upon your beloved One. Services, of

which more distant souls know nothing, become now your sweetest

privilege. Your Lord claims from you, because of your union with Him, far

more than He claims of them. What to them is lawful, love has made

unlawful for you. To you He can make known His secrets, and to you He

looks for an instant response to every requirement of His love.

Oh, it is wonderful! the glorious, unspeakable privilege upon which you

have entered! How little it will matter to you if men shall hate you, or shall

separate you from their company, and shall reproach you and cast out your

name as evil for His dear sake! You may well “rejoice in that day and leap

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for joy”; for behold your reward is great in Heaven, and if you are a

partaker of His suffering, you shall be also of His glory.

In you He is seeing of the travail of His soul, and is satisfied. Your love and

devotedness are His precious reward for all He has done for you. It is

unspeakably sweet to Him. Do not be afraid then to let yourself go in a

heart-whole devotedness to your Lord, that can brook no reserves. Others

may not approve, but He will, and that is enough. Do not stint or measure

your obedience or your service. Let your heart and your hand be as free to

serve Him, as His heart and His hand were to serve you. Let Him have all

there is of you, body, soul, and spirit, time, talents, voice, everything. Lay

your whole life open before Him that He may control it. Say to Him each

day, “Lord, how shall I regulate this day so as to please Thee? Where shall I

go? what shall I do? whom shall I visit? what shall I say?” Give your

intellect up into His control and say, “Lord, tell me how to think so as to

please Thee?” Give Him your reading, your pursuits, your friendships, and

say, “Lord, give me the insight to judge concerning all these things with

Thy wisdom.” Do not let there be a day nor an hour in which you are not

intelligently doing His will, and following Him wholly. And this personal

service to Him will give a halo to your life, and gild the most monotonous

existence with a heavenly glow.

Have you ever grieved that the romance of youth is so soon lost in the hard

realities of the world? Bring God thus into your life and into all its details,

and a far grander enthusiasm will thrill your soul than the brightest days of

youth could ever know, and nothing will seem hard or stern again. The

meanest life will be glorified by this. Often, as I have watched a poor

woman at her wash-tub, and have thought of all the disheartening

accessories of such a life, and have been tempted to wonder why such lives

need to be, there has come over me, with a thrill of joy, the recollection of

this possible glorification of it, and I have said to myself, Even this life,

lived in Christ, and with Christ, following Him whithersoever He may lead,

would be filled with an enthusiasm that would make every hour of it

glorious. And I have gone on my way comforted to know that God’s most

wondrous blessings thus lie in the way of the poorest and the meanest lives.

“For,” says our Lord Himself, “whosoever,” whether they be rich or poor,

old or young, bond or free, “whosoever shall do the will of God, the same

is my brother, and my sister, and my mother.”

Pause a moment over these simple yet amazing words. His brother, and

sister, and mother! What would we not have given to have been one of

these! Oh, let me entreat of you, beloved Christian, to come, taste and see

for yourself how good the Lord is, and what wonderful things He has in

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store for those who “keep His commandments, and who do those things

that are pleasing in His sight.”

“And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the

voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and to do all His

commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy

God will set thee on high, above all nations of the earth; and all these

blessings shall come on thee, and overtake thee, if thou shalt

hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God.

“Blessed shalt thou be in the city, and blessed shalt thou be in the

field.

“Blessed shall be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy ground,

and the fruit of thy cattle, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of

thy sheep.

“Blessed shall be thy basket and thy store.

“Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt thou

be when thou goest out.

“The Lord shall cause thine enemies that shall rise up against thee to

be smitten before thy face; they shall come out against thee one way,

and flee before thee seven ways.

“The Lord shall command the blessing upon thee in thy

storehouses, and in all that thou settest thine hand unto; and He shall

bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.

“The Lord shall establish thee an holy people unto Himself, as He

hath sworn unto thee, if thou shalt keep the commandments of the

Lord thy God, and walk in His ways.

“And all people of the earth shall see that thou art called by the name

of the Lord, and they shall be afraid of thee.

“And the Lord shall make thee plenteous in goods, in the fruit of thy

body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, in the fruit of thy ground, in the

land which the Lord sware unto thy fathers to give thee.

“And the Lord shall make thee the head, and not the tail; and thou

shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath; if that thou

hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I

command thee this day, to observe and to do them.”

For the Israelites this was outward and temporal, for us it is inward and

spiritual; and, as such, infinitely more glorious. May our surrendered wills

leap out to embrace it in all its fullness!

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CHAPTER 17

ONENESS WITH CHRIST

All the dealings of God with the soul of the believer are in order to bring

him into oneness with Himself, that the prayer of our Lord may be fulfilled:

“That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they

also may be one in us.” . . . “I in them, and thou in me, that they may be

made perfect in one, and that the world may know that thou hast sent me,

and hast loved them as thou hast loved me.”

This soul-union was the glorious purpose in the heart of God for His people

before the foundation of the world. It was the mystery hid from ages and

generations. It was accomplished in the incarnation of Christ. It has been

made known by the Scriptures. And it is realized as an actual experience by

many of God’s dear children.

But not by all. It is true of all, and God has not hidden it or made it hard, but

the eyes of many are too dim and their hearts too unbelieving, and they fail

to grasp it. And it is for the very purpose of bringing them into the personal

and actual realization of this, that the Lord is stirring up believers

everywhere at the present time to abandon themselves to Him, that He may

work in them all the good pleasure of His will.

All the previous steps in the Christian life lead up to this. The Lord has

made us for it; and until we have intelligently apprehended it, and have

voluntarily consented to embrace it, the travail of His soul for us is not

satisfied, nor have our hearts found their destined and final rest.

The usual course of Christian experience is pictured in the history of the

disciples. First they were awakened to see their condition and their need,

and they came to Christ and gave in their allegiance to Him. Then they

followed Him, worked for Him, believed in Him; and yet, how unlike

Him! seeking to be set up one above the other; running away from the

cross; misunderstanding His mission and His words; forsaking their Lord

in time of danger; but still sent out to preach, recognized by Him as His

disciples, possessing power to work for Him. They knew Christ only “after

the flesh,” as outside of them, their Lord and Master, but not yet their Life.

Then came Pentecost, and these disciples came to know Him as inwardly

revealed; as one with them in actual union, their very indwelling Life.

Henceforth He was to them Christ within, working in them to will and to

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do of His good pleasure; delivering them by the law of the Spirit of His life

from the bondage to the law of sin and death, under which they had been

held. No longer was it between themselves and Him, a war of wills and a

clashing of interest. One will alone animated them, and that was His will.

One interest alone was dear to them, and that was His. They were made

And surely all can recognize this picture, though perhaps as yet the final

stage of it has not been fully reached. You may have left much to follow

Christ, dear reader; you may have believed on him, and worked for Him,

and loved Him, and yet may not be like Him. Allegiance you know, and

confidence you know, but not yet union. There are two wills, two interests,

two lives. You have not yet lost your own life that you may live only in

His. Once it was I and not Christ; then it was I and Christ; perhaps now it is

even Christ and I. But has it come yet to be Christ only, and not I at all?

Perhaps you do not understand what this oneness means. Some people

think it consists in a great emotion or a wonderful feeling of oneness, and

they turn inward to examine their emotions, thinking to decide by the state

of these, what is the state of their interior union with God. But nowhere is

the mistake of trusting to feelings greater than here.

Oneness with Christ must, in the very nature of things, consists in a Christlike

life and character. It is not what we feel, but what we are that settles the

question. No matter how exalted or intense our emotions on the subject

may be, if there is not a likeness of character with Christ, a unity of aim and

purpose, a similarity of thought and of action, there can be no real oneness.

This is plain common-sense, and it is Scriptural as well.

We speak of two people being one, and we mean that their purposes, and

actions, and thoughts, and desires are alike. A friend may pour out upon us

enthusiastic expressions of love, and unity and oneness, but if that friend’s

aims, and actions, and ways of looking at things are exactly opposite to

ours, we cannot feel there is any real oneness between us, notwithstanding

all our affection for one another. To be truly one with another, we must

have the same likes and dislikes, the same joys and sorrows, the same

hopes and fears. As someone says, we must look through one another’s

eyes, and think with one another’s brains. This is, as I said above, only

plain common-sense.

And oneness with Christ can be judged by no other rule. It is out of the

question to be one with Him in any other way than in the way of nature, and

character, and life. Unless we are Christ-like in our thoughts and our ways,

we are not one with Him, no matter how we feel.

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I have seen Christians, with hardly one Christ-like attribute in their whole

characters, who yet were so emotional and had such ecstatic feelings of love

for Christ, as to think themselves justified in claiming the closest oneness

with Him. I scarcely know a sadder sight. Surely our Lord meant to reach

me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth

the will of my Father which is in heaven.” He was not making here any

arbitrary statement of God’s will, but a simple announcement of the nature

of things. Of course it must be so. It is like saying, “No man can enter the

ranks of astronomers who is not an astronomer.” Emotions will not make a

man an astronomer, but life and action. He must be one, not merely feel that

he is one.

There is no escape from this inexorable nature of things, and especially

here. Unless we are one with Christ as to character and life and action, we

cannot be one with Him in any other way, for there is no other way. We

must be “partakers of His nature” or we cannot be partakers of His life, for

His life and His nature are one.

But emotional souls do not always recognize this. They feel so near Christ

and so united to Him, that they think it must be real; and overlooking the

absolute necessity of Christ-likeness of character and walk, they are

building their hopes and their confidence on their delightful emotions and

exalted feelings, and think they must be one with Him, or they could not

have such rich and holy experiences.

Now it is a psychological fact that these or similar emotions can be

produced by other causes than a purely divine influence, and that they are

largely dependent upon temperament and physical conditions. It is most

dangerous, therefore, to make them a test of our spiritual union with Christ.

It may result in just such a grievous self-deception as our Lord warns

the things which I say?” Our soul delights perhaps in calling Him, Lord,

Lord, but are we doing the things which He said; for this, He tells us, is the

important point, after all.

If, therefore, led by our feelings, we are saying in meetings, or among our

friends, or even in our own heart before the Lord, that we are abiding in

Him, let us take home to ourselves in solemn consideration these words of

the Holy Ghost, “He that saith he abideth in Him, ought himself so to walk,

even as He walked.”

Unless we are thus walking, we cannot possibly be abiding in Him, no

matter how much we may feel as if we were.

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If you are really one with Christ you will be sweet to those who are cross to

you; you will bear everything and make no complaints; when you are

reviled you will not revile again; you will consent to be trampled on, as

Christ was, and feel nothing but love in return; you will seek the honor of

others rather than your own; you will take the lowest place, and be the

servant of all, as Christ was; you will literally and truly love your enemies

and do good to them that despitefully use you; you will, in short, live a

Christ-like life, and manifest outwardly as well as feel inwardly a Christlike

spirit, and will walk among men as He walked among them. This, dear

friends, is what it is to be one with Christ. And if all this is not your life

according to your measure, then you are not one with Him, no matter how

ecstatic or exalted your feelings may be.

To be one with Christ is too wonderful and solemn and mighty an

experience to be reached by any overflow or exaltation of mere feeling. He

was holy, and those who are one with Him will be holy also. There is no

escape from this simple and obvious fact.

When our Lord tried to make us understand His oneness with God, He

expressed it in such words as these, “I do always the things that please

Him.” “Whatsoever He saith unto me that I do.” “The Son can do nothing

of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do; for what things soever He

doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.” “I can of mine own self do

nothing; as I hear I judge, and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine

own will, but the will of Him that sent me.” “If I do not the works of my

Father, believe me not. But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the

works; that ye may know and believe that the Father is in me and I in

Him.”

The test of oneness then, was the doing of the same works, and it is the test

of oneness now. And if our Lord could say of Himself that if He did not the

works of his Father, He did not ask to be believed, no matter what

professions or claims He might make, surely His disciples must do no less.

It is forever true in the nature of things that “a good tree cannot bring forth

evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.” It is not that they

will not, but they cannot. And a soul that is one with Christ will just as

surely bring forth a Christ-like life, as a grapevine will bring forth grapes

and not thistles.

Not that I would be understood to object to emotions. On the contrary, I

believe they are very precious gifts, when they are from God, and are to be

greatly rejoiced in. But what I do object to is the making them a test or

proof of spiritual states, either in ourselves or others, and depending on

them as the foundation of our faith. Let them come or let them go, just as

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God pleases, and make no account of them either way. But always see to it

that the really vital marks of oneness with Christ, the marks of likeness in

character, and life, and walk, are ours, and all will be well. For “he that saith

I know Him, and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is

not in Him. But whoso keepeth His word, in him verily is the love of God

perfected: hereby know we that we are in Him.”

It may be, my dear reader, that the grief of your life has been the fact that

you have so few good feelings. You try your hardest to get up the feelings

which you hear others talking about, but they will not come. You pray for

them fervently, and are often tempted to upbraid God because He does not

grant them to you. And you are filled with an almost unbearable anguish

because you think your want of emotion is a sign that there is not any

interior union of your soul with Christ. You judge altogether by your

feelings, and think there is no other way to judge.

Now my advice to you is to let your feelings go, and pay no regard to them

whatever. They really have nothing to do with the matter. They are not the

indicators of your spiritual state, but are merely the indicators of your

temperament, or of your present physical condition. People in very low

states of grace are often the subjects of very powerful emotional

experiences. We all know this from the scenes we have heard of or

witnessed at camp-meetings and revivals. I myself had a colored servant

once who would become unconscious under the power of her wonderful

experiences, whenever there was a revival meeting at their church, who yet

had hardly a token of any spiritual life about her at other times, and who

was, in fact, not even moral. Now surely, if the Bible teaches nothing else, it

does teach this, that a Christ-like life and walk must accompany any

experience which is really born of His spirit. It could not be otherwise in the

very nature of things. But I fear some Christians have separated the two

things so entirely in their conceptions, as to have exalted their experiences at

the expense of their walk, and have come to care far more about their

emotions than about their character.

A certain colored congregation in one of the Southern States was a plague to

the whole neighborhood by their open disregard of even the ordinary rules

of morality; stealing, and lying, and cheating, without apparently a single

prick of conscience on the subject. And yet their nightly meetings were

times of the greatest emotion and “power.” Someone finally spoke to the

preacher about it, and begged him to preach a sermon on morality, which

would lead his people to see their sins. “Ah, missus,” he replied, “I knows

dey’s bad, but den it always brings a coldness like over de meetings when I

preaches about dem things.”

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You are helpless as to your emotions, but character you can have if you

will. You can be so filled with Christ as to be Christ-like, and if you are

Christ-like, then you are one with Him in the only vital and essential way,

even though your feelings may tell you that it is an impossibility.

Having thus settled what oneness with Christ really is, the next point for us

to consider is how to reach it for ourselves.

We must first of all find out what are the facts in the case, and what is our

own relation to these facts.

are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” and then

look at the opening of the chapter to see to whom these wonderful words

are spoken, even to “babes in Christ,” who were “yet carnal,” and walked

according to man, you will see that this soul-union of which I speak, this

unspeakably glorious mystery of an indwelling God is the possession of

even the weakest and most failing believer in Christ. So that it is not a new

thing you are to ask for, but only to realize that which you already have. Of

every believer in the Lord Jesus it is absolutely true, that his “body is the

temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in him, which he has of God.”

It seems to me just in this way; as though Christ were living in a house,

shut up in a far-off closet, unknown and unnoticed by the dwellers in the

house, longing to make Himself known to them and be one with them in all

their daily lives, and share in all their interests, but unwilling to force

Himself upon their notice; as nothing but a voluntary companionship could

meet or satisfy the needs of His love. The days pass by over that favored

household, and they remain in ignorance of their marvellous privilege. They

come and go about all their daily affairs with no thought of their wonderful

Guest. Their plans are laid without reference to Him. His wisdom to guide,

and His strength to protect, are all lost to them. Lonely days and weeks are

spent in sadness, which might have been full of the sweetness of His

presence.

But suddenly the announcement is made, “The Lord is in the house!”

How will its owner receive the intelligence? Will he call out an eager

thanksgiving, and throw wide open every door for the entrance of his

glorious Guest; Or will he shrink and hesitate, afraid of His presence and

seek to reserve some private corner for a refuge from His all-seeing eye?

Dear friend, I make the glad announcement to thee that the Lord is in thy

heart. Since the day of thy conversion He has been dwelling there, but thou

hast lived on in ignorance of it. Every moment during all that time might

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have been passed in the sunshine of His sweet presence, and every step

have been taken under His advice. But because thou knew it not, and hast

never looked for Him there, thy life has been lonely and full of failure. But

now that I make the announcement to thee, how wilt thou receive it? Art

thou glad to have Him? Wilt thou throw wide open every door to welcome

Him in? Wilt thou joyfully and thankfully give up the government of thy

life into His hands? Wilt thou consult Him about everything, and let Him

decide each step for thee, and mark out every path? Wilt thou invite Him to

thy innermost chambers, and make Him the sharer in thy most hidden life?

Wilt thou say, “YES!” to all His longing for union with thee, and with a

glad and eager abandonment, hand thyself and all that concerns thee over

into His hands? If thou wilt, then shall thy soul begin to know something of

the joy of union with Christ.

And yet, after all, this is but a faint picture of the blessed reality. For far

more glorious than it would be to have Christ a dweller in the house or in

the heart, is it to be brought into such a real and actual union with Him as to

be one with Him, one will, one purpose, one interest, one life. Human

words cannot express such glory as this. And yet I want to express it. I

want to make your souls so unutterably hungry to realize it, that day or

night you cannot rest without it. Do you understand the words, one with

Christ? Do you catch the slightest glimpse of their marvellous meaning?

Does not your whole soul begin to exult over such a wondrous destiny? For

it is a reality. It means to have no life but His life, to have no will but His

will, to have no interests but His interests, to share His riches, to enter into

His joys, to partake of His sorrows, to manifest His life, to have the same

mind as He had, to think, and feel, and act, and walk as He did. Oh, who

could have dreamed that such a destiny could have been ours!

Wilt thou have it, dear soul? Thy Lord will not force it on thee, for He

wants thee as His companion and His friend, and a forced union would be

incompatible with this. It must be voluntary on thy part.

The bride must say a willing “Yes,” to her bridegroom, or the joy of their

union is utterly wanting. Canst thou say a willing “Yes,” to thy Lord?

It is such a simple transaction, and yet so real! The steps are but three. First,

be convinced that the Scriptures teach this glorious indwelling of thy God;

then surrender thy whole being to Him to be possessed by Him; and finally

believe that He has taken possession, and is dwelling in thee. Begin to

reckon thyself dead, and to reckon Christ as thy only life. Maintain this

attitude of soul unwaveringly. Say, “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless

I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,” over and over day and night, until

it becomes the habitual breathing of thy soul. Put off thy self-life by faith

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and in fact continually, and put on practically the life of Christ. Let this act

become, by its constant repetition, the attitude of thy whole being. And as

surely as thou dost this day by day, thou shalt find thyself continually

bearing about in thy body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of

Jesus may be made manifest in thy mortal flesh. Thou shalt learn to know

what salvation means; and shalt have opened out to thy astonished gaze

secrets of the Lord, of which thou hast hitherto hardly dreamed.

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CHAPTER 18

“ALTHOUGH” AND “YET,”

A LESSON IN THE INTERIOR LIFE

In many of our store windows at Christmas time there stands a most

significant picture. It is a dreary, desolate winter scene. There is a dark,

stormy, wintry sky, bare trees, and brown grass and dead weeds, with

patches of snow over them. On a leafless tree at one side of the picture is an

empty and snow-covered nest, and on a branch near sits a little bird. All is

cold, and dark, and desolate enough to daunt any bird, and drive it to some

fairer clime, but this bird is sitting there in an attitude of perfect

contentment, and has its little head bravely lifted up towards the sky, while a

winter song is evidently about to burst forth from its tiny throat.

This picture, which always stands on my shelf, has preached me many a

sermon. And the test is always the same, and finds its expression in the two

words that stand at the head of this article, “Although” and “Yet.”

the vines: the labor of the olive shall fail, and the field shall yield no

meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no

of my salvation.”

There come times in many lives, when, like this bird in the winter, the soul

finds itself bereft of every comfort both outward and inward; when all

seems dark, and all seems wrong, even; when everything in which we have

trusted seems to fail us; when the promises are apparently unfulfilled, and

our prayers gain no response; when there seems nothing left to rest on in

earth or Heaven. And it is at such times as these that the brave little bird

with its message is needed. “Although” all is wrong everywhere, “yet”

there is still one thing left to rejoice in, and that is God; the “God of our

salvation,” who changes not, but is the same good, loving, tender God

yesterday, today, and forever. We can joy in Him always, whether we have

anything else to rejoice in or not.

By rejoicing in Him, however, I do not mean rejoicing in ourselves,

although I fear most people think this is really what is meant. It is their

feelings or their revelations or their experiences that constitute the

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groundwork of their joy, and if none of these are satisfactory, they see no

possibility of joy at all.

But the lesson the Lord is trying to teach us all the time is the lesson of selfeffacement.

He commands us to look away from self and all self’s

experiences, to crucify self and count it dead, to cease to be interested in

self, and to know nothing and be interested in nothing but God.

The reason for this is that God has destined us for a higher life than the selflife.

That just as He has destined the caterpillar to become the butterfly, and

therefore has appointed the caterpillar life to die, in order that the butterfly

life may take its place, so He has appointed our self-life to die in order that

the divine life may become ours instead. The caterpillar effaces itself in its

grub form, that it may evolve or develop into its butterfly form. It dies that

it may live. And just so must we.

Therefore, the one most essential thing in this stage of our existence must

be the death to self and the resurrection to a life only in God. And it is for

this reason that the lesson of joy in the Lord, and not in self, must be

learned. Every advancing soul must come sooner or later to the place where

it can trust God, the bare God, if I may be allowed the expression, simply

and only because of what He is in Himself, and not because of His

promises or His gifts. It must learn to have its joy in Him alone, and to

rejoice in Him when all else in Heaven and earth shall seem to fail.

The only way in which this place can be reached I believe, is by the soul

being compelled to face in its own experience the loss of all things both

inward and outward. I do not mean necessarily that all one’s friends must

die, or all one’s money be lost: but I do mean that the soul shall find itself,

from either inward or outward causes, desolate, and bereft, and empty of all

consolation. It must come to the end of everything that is not God; and

must have nothing else left to rest on within or without. It must experience

just what the prophet meant when he wrote that “Although.”

It must wade through the slough, and fall off of the precipice, and be

swamped by the ocean, and at last find in the midst of them, and at the

bottom of them, and behind them, the present, living, loving, omnipotent

God! And then, and not until then, will it understand the prophet’s exulting

shout of triumph, and be able to join it: “YET I will rejoice in the Lord; I

will joy in the God of my salvation.”

And then, also, and not until then, will it know the full meaning of the verse

that follows: “The Lord God is my strength, and He will make my feet like

hind’s feet, and He will make me to walk upon mine high places.”

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The soul often walks on what seem high places, which are, however,

largely self-evolved and emotional, and have but little of God in them; and

in moments of loss and failure and darkness, these high places become

precipices of failure. But the high places to which the Lord brings the soul

that rejoices only in Him, can be touched by no darkness or loss, for their

very foundations are laid in the midst of an utter loss and death of all that is

not God.

If we want an unwavering experience, therefore, we can find it only in the

Lord, apart from all else; apart from His gifts, apart from His blessings,

apart from all that can change or be affected by the changing conditions of

our earthly life.

The prayer which is answered today, may seem to be unanswered

tomorrow; the promises once so gloriously fulfilled, may cease to be a

reality to us; the spiritual blessing which was at one time such a joy, may be

utterly lost; and nothing of all we once trusted to and rested on may be left

us, but the hungry and longing memory of it all. But when all else is gone,

God is still left. Nothing changes Him. He is the same yesterday, today, and

forever, and in Him is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. And the

soul that finds its joy in Him alone, can suffer no wavering.

It is grand to trust in the promises, but it is grander still to trust in the

Promiser. The promises may be misunderstood or misapplied, and at the

moment when we are leaning all our weight upon them, they may seem

utterly to fail us. But no one ever trusted in the Promiser and was

confounded.

The God who is behind His promises and is infinitely greater than His

promises, can never fail us in any emergency, and the soul that is stayed on

Him cannot know anything but perfect peace.

The little child does not always understand its mother’s promises, but it

knows its mother, and its childlike trust is founded not on her word, but

upon herself. And just so it is with those of us who have learned the lesson

of this “Although” and “Yet.” There may not be a prayer answered or a

promise fulfilled to our own consciousness, but what of that? Behind the

prayers and behind the promises, there is God, and He is enough. And to

every doubt.

To the little trusting child the simple fact of the mother’s existence is the

answer to all its need. The mother may not make one single promise, or

detail any plan, but she is, and that is enough for the child. The child rejoices

in the mother; not in her promises, but in herself. And to the child, as to us,

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there is behind all that changes and can change, the one unchangeable joy of

the mother’s existence. While the mother lives, the child must be cared for,

and the child knows this, instinctively if not intelligently, and rejoices in

knowing it. And while God lives, His children must be cared for as well,

and His children ought to know this, and rejoice in it as instinctively and far

more intelligently than the child of human parents. For what else can God

do, being what He is? Neglect, indifference, forgetfulness, ignorance, are all

impossible to Him. He knows everything, He cares about everything, He

can manage everything; and He loves us; and what more could we ask?

Therefore, come what may, we will lift our faces to our God, like our brave

little bird teacher, and, in the midst of our darkest “Althoughs,” will sing

our glad and triumphant “Yet.”

All of God’s saints in all ages have done this. Job said, out of the depths of

sorrow and trial which few can equal, “Though He slay me yet will I trust

in Him.”

David could say in the moment of his keenest anguish, “Yea, though I walk

through the valley of the shadow of death,” yet “I will fear no evil; for Thou

art with me.” And again he could say, “God is our refuge and strength, a

very present help in trouble. Therefore, will not we fear, though the earth be

removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea;

though the waters thereof roar and be troubled; though the mountains shake

with the swelling thereof . . . God is in the midst of her; she shall not be

moved; God shall help her, and that right early.”

Paul could say in the midst of his sorrows, “We are troubled on every side,

yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not

forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed . . . for which cause we faint not; but

though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far

more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; while we look, not at the things

which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are

seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.”

All this and more can the soul say that learned this lesson of rejoicing in

God alone.

Spiritual joy is not a thing, not a lump of joy, so to speak, stored away in

one’s heart to be looked at and rejoiced over. Joy is only the gladness that

comes from the possession of something good, or the knowledge of

something pleasant. And the Christian’s joy is simply his gladness in

knowing Christ, and in his possession of such a God and Savior. We do

not on an earthly plane rejoice in our joy, but in the thing that causes our

joy. And on the heavenly plane it is the same. We are to “rejoice in the

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Lord, and joy in the God of our salvation”; and this joy no man nor devil

can take from us, and no earthly sorrows can touch.

A writer on the interior life says, in effect, that our spiritual pathway is

divided into three regions, very different from one another, and yet each one

a necessary stage in the onward progress. First, there is the region of

beginnings, which is a time full of sensible joys and delights, of fervent

aspirations, of emotional experiences, and of many secret manifestations of

God. Then comes a vast extent of wilderness, full of temptation, and trial,

and conflict, of the loss of sensible manifestations, of dryness, and of

inward and outward darkness and distress. And then, finally, if this desert

period is faithfully traversed, there comes on the further side of it a region

of mountain heights of uninterrupted union and communion with God, of

superhuman detachment from everything earthly, of infinite contentment

with the Divine will, and of marvellous transformation into the image of

Christ.

Whether this order is true or not, I cannot here discuss, but of one thing I

am very sure, that to many souls who have tasted the joy of the “region of

beginnings” here set forth, there has come afterwards a period of desert

experience at which they have been sorely amazed and perplexed. And I

cannot but think such might, perhaps, in this explanation, find the answer to

their trouble. They are being taught the lesson of detachment from all that is

not God, in order that their souls may at last be brought into that interior

union and oneness with Him which is set forth in the picture given of the

third and last region of mountain heights of blessedness.

The soul’s pathway is always through death to life. The caterpillar cannot in

the nature of things become the butterfly in any other way than by dying to

the one life in order to live in the other. And neither can we. Therefore, it

may well be that this region of death and desolation must needs be passed

through, if we would reach the calm mountain heights beyond. And if we

know this, we can walk triumphantly through the darkest experience, sure

that all is well, since God is God.

In the lives of many who read this paper there is, I feel sure, at least one of

these desert “Althoughs,” and in some lives there are many.

Dear friends, is the “Yet” there also? Have you learned the prophet’s

lesson? Is God enough for you? Can you sing and mean it,

“Thou, O Christ, art all I want,

More than all in thee I find”?

If not, you need the little bird to speak to you.

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And the song that he sings, as he sits on that bare and leafless tree, with the

winter storm howling around him, must become your song also.

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CHAPTER 19

KINGS AND THEIR KINGDOMS; OR, HOW TO

REIGN IN THE INTERIOR LIFE

“And when he was demanded of the Pharisees when the kingdom

of God should come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of

God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say, lo here! or,

lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”

The expressions “kingdom of God” and “kingdom of Heaven” are used in

Scripture concerning the divine life in the soul. They mean simply the place

or condition where God rules, and where His will is done. It is an interior

kingdom, not an exterior one. Its thrones are not outward thrones of human

pomp and glory, but inward thrones of dominion and supremacy over the

things of time and sense. Its kings are not clothed in royal robes of purple

and fine linen, but with the interior garments of purity and truth. And its

reign is not in outward show, but in inward power. Neither is it in one place

rather than another, nor in one form of things above another. It is not, lo

here, nor lo there, not in this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem, that we are to

find Christ, and enter into His kingdom. It is not a matter of place at all, but

one of condition. And in every place and under every name, and through

every form, all who seek God and work righteousness shall find His

kingdom within them.

But this is very little understood. In our childish fashion of literalism we

have too much imbibed the idea that a kingdom must necessarily be in a

particular place and with outward observation; and have therefore expected

that the kingdom of heaven would mean for us an outward victory of

heaven over earth in some particular place, or under some especial form;

and that to sit on a throne with Christ, would be to have an outward

uplifting in power and glory before the face of all around us.

But as the inner sense of Scripture unfolds to us, we see that this would be

but a poor and superficial fulfilling of the real meaning of these wonderful

symbols. And the vision of their true significance grows and strengthens

before the “eyes that see,” until at last we know that our Lord’s words were

truer than ever we had dreamed before, that the “kingdom of God cometh

not with observation; neither shall they say, lo here! or, lo there! for, behold,

the kingdom of God is within you.”

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“The God of heaven shall set up a kingdom which shall never be

destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it

shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall

stand forever.”

“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the

government shall be upon His shoulder; and His name shall be

called Wonderful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting

Father, the Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and

peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon His

kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with

justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts

will perform this.”

This kingdom is to break in pieces and consume all other kingdoms by

right of the law by which the inward always rules the outward. If there is

peace within, no outward turmoil can affect the soul; but outward peace can

never quiet an inward tempest. A happy heart can walk in triumphant

indifference through a sea of external trouble; while internal anguish cannot

find happiness in the most favorable surroundings. What a man is within

himself, makes or unmakes his joy, and not what he possesses outside of

himself.

Someone said to Diogenes, “The king has degraded you.” “Yes” replied

Diogenes, triumphantly, “but I am not degraded!” No act of kings or

emperors can degrade a soul that retains its own dignity; no tyrant can

enslave a man who is inwardly free.

Therefore to have this divine kingdom set up within, means that all other

powers to conquer or enslave are broken, and the soul reigns triumphant

over them all. Men and devils may try to hold such a one in bondage, but

they are powerless before the might of this interior kingdom. No longer will

fashion, or conventionality, or the fear of man, or the love of ease, or any

other of the many tyrants to which Christians cringe and bow, rule a soul

that has been raised to a throne in this inward kingdom. No sin or

temptation can overcome, no sorrow can crush, no discouragement can

hinder. Let a man or woman have been bound in ever so tyrannical chains

of sinful habits, this kingdom will set them free. Circumstances make men

kings in the outward life, but in this hidden life men become kings over

circumstances. And the soul that has aforetime been the slave of a thousand

outward things, finds itself here utterly independent of them, every one.

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For the King in this kingdom is One whom no circumstances can affect or

baffle. He it is indeed who makes circumstances. And since the government

is upon His shoulders, we cannot doubt that He will order the kingdom

with a judgment and justice that will leave nothing for any subject in His

kingdom to desire.

In the expression “the government shall be upon His shoulder,” we have

the whole secret of this wonderful kingdom. Upon His shoulder, not upon

ours. The care is His, the burdens are His, the responsibility belongs to

Him, the protection rests upon Him, the planning, and providing, and

controlling, and guiding, all are in His hands. No one can question as to His

perfect fulfillment of every requirement of His kingship. Therefore those

who are in His kingdom, are utterly delivered from any need to be anxious,

or burdened, or perplexed, or troubled. And by this deliverance they

become kings. The government is not upon their shoulders, and they have

no business to interfere with it. Their King has assumed the whole

responsibility, and if He can but see His subjects happy and prosperous, He

is content Himself to bear all the weight and care of kingship. How often

we speak of the responsibilities of earthly kings, and pity them for the

burdens that kingship imposes. We recognize, even on an earthly plane, that

to be a king means, or ought to mean, the bearing of the burdens of even the

meanest of his subject. And even now, as I write, many hearts are aching

with sympathy for the new Czar, who has assumed the grievous burden of

the mighty Russian Empire.

From this instinctive sense of every human heart as to the rightful duties

and responsibilities of kingship, we may learn what it means to be in a

kingdom over which God is King, and where He has himself declared all

things shall be ordered with judgment and justice from henceforth and even

forever. Surely no care or anxiety can ever enter here, if the heart but knows

its kingdom and its King!

answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this

world then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the

Jews; but now is my kingdom not from hence.”

Earthly kings and earthly kingdoms gain and keep their supremacy by

outward conflict; God’s kingdom conquers by inward power. Earthly kings

subdue enemies; God subdues enmity. His victories must be interior before

they can be exterior. He does not subjugate, but he conquers. Even we, on

our earthly plane, know something of this principle, and do not value any

victory over another which only reaches the body and has not subdued the

heart. No true mother cares for an outward obedience merely; nothing will

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satisfy her but the inward surrender. Unless the citadel of the heart is

conquered, the conquest seem worthless. And with God how much more

will this be the case, since we are told that “He seeth not as man seeth; for

man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.”

We speak of “subduing hearts,” and we mean, not that they are

overpowered or forced into an unwilling and compulsory surrender, but that

they are conquered by being won, and are willingly yielded up to another’s

control. And it is after this fashion and no other that God subdues. So that

to read that “His kingdom ruleth over all,” means that all hearts are won to

His service in a glad and willing surrender.

For again I repeat, His reign must be inward before it can be outward. And

in truth it is no reign at all, unless it is within. If we think of it a moment we

shall see that this must be so in the very nature of things, and that it is

impossible to conceive of God reigning in a kingdom where the subduing

reaches no further than the outside actions of His subjects. His kingdom is

not of this world, but is in a spiritual sphere, where its power is over the

souls and not the bodies of men; and therefore only when the soul is

conquered, can it be set up.

Understood in this light, how full of love and blessing do all those

declarations and prophecies become, which tell us that God is to subdue His

enemies under His feet, and is to rule them in righteousness and power!

And how glorious with hope does the voice of that great multitude heard by

John sound out, saying, “Alleluia! for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth!”

In confirmation of all this we have two passages descriptive of this

kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy

in the Holy Ghost.” “For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in

power.”

Not outward things, but inward. Not what a man eats and drinks, not where

he lives, nor what is his nationality, nor the customs of his race, not even

what he thinks nor what he says; but what are the inward characteristics of

his nature, and the inward power of his spiritual life. For these alone

constitute this kingdom of God. Not what I do, but what I am, is to decide

whether I belong to it or not. And only as inward righteousness, and inward

peace, and inward joy, and inward power are bestowed and experienced,

can this kingdom be set up. Therefore no outward subjugation can

accomplish results like these, but only the interior work of the all-subduing

spirit of God.

I have been greatly instructed by the story of Ulysses, when he was sailing

past the islands of the sirens. These sirens had the power of charming by

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their songs all who listened to them, and of inducing them to leap into the

sea. To avert this danger, Ulysses filled the ears of his crew with wax, that

they might not hear the fatal music, and bound himself to the mast with

knotted cords; and thus they passed the isle in safety. But when Orpheus

was obliged to sail by the same island, he gained a better victory, for he

himself made sweeter music than that of the sirens, and enchanted his crew

with more alluring songs; so that they passed the dangerous charmers not

only with safety, but with disdain. Wax and knotted cords kept Ulysses and

his crew from making the fatal leap; but inward delights enabled Orpheus

and his crew to reign triumphant over the very source of temptation itself.

And just so is it with the kingdom of which we speak. It needs no outward

law to bind it, but reigns by right of its inward life. So that it is said of those

who have entered it, “Against such there is no law.”

For it is a kingdom of kings. The song we shall one day sing, nay, that we

ought to be singing even now and here in this life, declare this: “Unto Him

that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath

made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and

We who have entered this kingdom, or, rather, in whom this kingdom is set

up, sit upon the throne with our King and share His dominion. The world

was His footstool, and it becomes our footstool also. Over the things of

time and sense He reigned triumphant by the power of a life lived in a plane

above them and superior to them, and so may we. We are all of us familiar

with the expression that such or such a person “rises superior to his

surroundings,” and we mean that there is in that soul a hidden power that

controls its surroundings, instead of being controlled by them. Our King

essentially rose superior to His surroundings; and it is given to us who are

reigning with Him to do the same.

But, just as He was not a king in outward appearance, but only in inward

power, so shall we be. He reigned, not in this, that He had all the treasures

and riches of the world at His command, but that He had none of them, and

could do without them. And so shall our reigning be. We shall not have all

men bowing down to us, and all things bending to our will; but with all

men opposing and all things adverse, we shall walk in a royal triumph of

soul through the midst of them. We shall suffer the loss of all things, and

by that loss be set forever free from their power to bind. We shall hide

ourselves in the impregnable fortress of the will of our King, and shall reign

there in a perpetual kingdom.

All this is contrary to man’s thought of kingship. The only idea the human

heart can compass, is, that outward circumstances must bend and bow to

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the soul that is seated on a throne with Christ. Friends must approve,

enemies must be silenced, obstacles must be overcome, affairs must

prosper, or there can be no reigning. If man had had the ordering of

Daniel’s business, or of that matter of the three Hebrew children in the

burning fiery furnace, he would have said the only way of victory would be

for the minds of the kings to have been so changed that Daniel should not

have been cast into the den of lions, and the Hebrew children should have

been kept out of the furnace. But God’s way was infinitely grander. He

suffered Daniel to be cast among the lions, in order that he might reign

triumphant over them when in their very midst, and He allowed Shadrach,

Meshach, and Abednego to be cast into the burning, fiery furnace, in order

that they might walk through it without so much as the smell of fire upon

them. He tells us, not that we shall walk in paths where there are no dragons

and adders, but that we shall walk through the midst of dragons and adders,

and shall “tread them under our feet.”

And how much more glorious a kingdom is this than any outward rule or

control could be! To be inwardly a king, while outwardly a slave, is one of

the grandest heights of triumph of which our hearts can conceive. To be

destitute, afflicted, tormented, to be stoned and torn asunder, and slain with

the sword; to wander in sheepskins and goatskins, and in deserts and

mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth, and yet to be through it all,

kings in interior kingdoms of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy

Ghost, is surely a kingdom that none but God could give, and none but

God-like souls receive.

A few such kings we have at some time or other seen or heard of in this

world of ours, and all hearts have acknowledged their unconscious sway.

One I read of among the brethren of the monastery of St. Cyr. Because of

their piety, these brethren incurred the hatred of the monasteries around

them, and the anger of their superiors, and were cast out as evil from their

community. One of them was sent as prisoner to a monastery where his

chief enemies dwelt, and was there subjected to the most cruel and

degrading treatment. Although he was of gentle birth, and had been an

abbot in the community he had left, he was compelled to do the most

menial work, was forced to carry a noisome burden on his back, and was

driven out to beg with a placard on his bosom declaring him to be the vilest

of the vile. But through it all the spirit of the saint reigned triumphant, and

nothing disturbed his calm, or soured for a moment his Christ-like

sweetness. For his persecutors he never had anything but words of

kindness and smiles of love. And at last by the mighty power of the divine

kingdom in which he lived, he subdued all hearts around him to himself,

and became the trusted friend and adviser, and the beloved ruler over the

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very enemies who had once so delighted to persecute and revile him.

“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” By his meekness he

conquered and became king.

At one time a dangerous criminal was sent to the monastery for

imprisonment. He was so violent that no bonds sufficed to bind him, and

no strength could control him. At last he was taken to the cell of this brother

from St. Cyr, and they were shut up together; even the stolid monks

themselves recognizing in that divine meekness a power to conquer that

surpassed all the powers with which they were acquainted. The saint

received the violent man as a beloved brother, and smiled upon him with

heavenly kindness. But the criminal returned it with abuse and violence. He

broke the monk’s furniture and destroyed his bed, he kicked him, and beat

him, and tore his hair, and spat upon him. He exhausted himself in his

violence against him. Through it all the monk made no resistance, and said

no word but words of love; and when at length the criminal, worn out with

his fury, paused to take breath, the beaten and outraged man looked upon

his persecutor with a smile of ineffable love and tender compassion, as

though he would gather him to his bosom and comfort him for his misery.

It was more than the criminal could bear. Hatred, and revenge, and anger he

could repay in kind, but against love and meekness like this he had no

weapons, and his heart was conquered. He fell at the feet of the saint and

washed them with his tears, as he entreated forgiveness for his cruelty, and

vowed a lifelong loyalty to his service. And from that moment all trouble

with that criminal was over. He followed the saint about like a loving and

faithful dog, eager to do or to be anything the other might desire. And when

the time of his imprisonment was over, and the gates of his prison were

opened for his release, he could not be induced to go, because he could not

bear to leave the man who had saved him by love.

Of such a nature is kingship in this kingdom of heaven.

Each soul can make the application for itself, without need of comment

from me.

In Matthew 5, 6, and 7, we have the King of this kingdom describing the

characteristics of His kingdom and giving the laws for His subjects.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,” He says, “for theirs is the kingdom of

heaven.” Not the rich, or great, or wise, or learned, but the poor in spirit, the

meek, the merciful, the pure in heart, those who mourn, and those who

hunger and thirst, those who are persecuted, and reviled, and spoken evil

against, all such belong to this kingdom. Gentleness, yieldingness,

meekness, charity, are the characteristics of these kings, and they reign in

the power of them.

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One Christian asked another, “How can I make people respect me?” “I

would command their respect,” was the reply. And this meant, not that he

should stand up and say in tones of authority, “Now I command you all to

respect me,” but that he should so act, and live, and be, that no one could

help respecting him. Men sometimes win an outward show of respect and

submission by an over-bearing tyranny, but he who would rule the heart of

his subjects must try other methods.

Our Lord developed this thought to some who wished to share His throne.

He called them to Him, and said, “Ye know that they which are accounted

to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and their great ones

exercise authority upon them. But so shall it not be among you: but

whosoever will be great among you, shall be your minister: and whosoever

of you will be the chiefest shall be servant of all. For even the Son of man

came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a

ransom for many.”

From the human standpoint, that man alone reigns who is able to exercise

lordship over those around him. From the divine standpoint the soul that

serves is the soul that reigns. Not he who demands most, receives this

inward crowning, but he who gives up most.

What grander kingship can be conceived of than that which Christ sets forth

in the sermon on the mount, “But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil; but

whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

And if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy coat, let him have

thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him

twain”?

Surely only a soul that is in harmony with God can mount such a throne of

dominion as this!

But this is our destiny. We are made for this purpose. We are born of a

kingly race, and are heirs to this ineffable kingdom; “heirs of God and joint

heirs with Christ.”

Would that we could realize this; and could see in every act of service or

surrender to which we might find ourselves called, an upward step in the

pathway that leads us to our kingdom and our throne!

I mean this in a very practical sense. I mean that the homely services of our

daily lives, and the little sacrifices which each day demands, will be, if

faithfully fulfilled, actual rounds in the ladder by which we are mounting to

our thrones. I mean that if we are faithful over the “few things” of our

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earthly kingdom, we shall be made ruler over the “many things” of the

heavenly kingdom.

He that follows Christ in this ministry of service and of suffering, will reign

with Him in the glory of supreme self-sacrifice, and will be the “chiefest”

in His divine kingdom of love. Knowing this, who would hesitate to “turn

the other cheek,” since by the turning a kingdom is to be won and a throne

is to be gained?

Joseph was a type of all this. In slavery and in prison he reigned a king, as

truly as when seated on Pharaoh’s throne or riding in Pharaoh’s chariot.

chiefest by being servant of all.

Dear reader, art thou reigning after this fashion, and in this sort of a

kingdom? Art thou the greatest in thy little world of home, or church, or

social circle by being the least, and chiefest by being the servant of all? If

not, thy kingdom is not Christ’s kingdom, and thy throne is not one shared

by Him.

To enter into the secrets of this interior kingdom and to partake of its

heavenly power, is no notional victory, no fancied supremacy. It is a real

and actual reigning, which will cause thee as a matter of fact to “rise

superior” to the world and the things of it, and to walk through it

independent of its smiles or frowns, dwelling in a region of heavenly peace

and heavenly triumph which earth can neither give nor take away. “For the

kingdom of God is not in word but in power.” It is not a talk but a fact; and

those who are in it recognize their kingship and prove it by reigning.

But perhaps thou wilt say, “How can I enter into this kingdom, if I am not

already in?” Let our Lord himself answer thee: “At the same time came the

disciples unto Jesus, saying, Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?

And Jesus called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of them,

and said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as

little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever

therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the

kingdom of heaven.”

It is a kingdom of childlike hearts, and only such can enter it.

To be a “little child” means simply to be one. I cannot describe it better than

this. We all have known little children in our lives, and have delighted

ourselves in their simplicity and their trustfulness, their light-hearted

carelessness, and their unquestioning obedience to those in authority over

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them. And to be the greatest in this divine kingdom means to have the most

of this guileless, tender, trustful, self-forgetting, obedient heart of the child.

“Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the

Kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which

is in heaven.”

It is not saying, but doing, that will avail us here. We must be a child, or we

cannot sit on the child’s throne. And to be a child means to do the Father’s

will, since the very essence of true childhood is the spirit of obedience

united to the spirit of trust.

Become a little child, then, by laying aside all thy greatness, all thy selfassertion,

all thy self-dependence, all thy wisdom, and all thy strength, and

consenting to die to thy own self-life, be born again into the kingdom of

God. The only way out of one life into another is by a death to one and a

new birth into the other. It is the old story, therefore, reiterated so often and

in so many different ways, of through death to life. Die, then, that you my

live. Lose your own life that you may find Christ’s life. The caterpillar can

only enter into the butterfly’s kingdom by dying to its caterpillar life, and

emerging into the resurrection life of the butterfly; and just so can we also

only enter into the kingdom of God by the way of a death out of the

kingdom of self, and an emergence into the resurrection life of Christ. Let

everything go, then, that belongs to the natural; all your own notions, and

plans, and ways, and thoughts; and accept in their stead God’s plans, and

ways, and thoughts. Do this faithfully and do it persistently, and you shall

come at last to sit on His throne, and to reign with Him in an interior

kingdom which shall break in pieces and consume all other kingdoms, and

shall stand for ever and ever.

There is no other way. This kingdom cannot be entered by pomp, and

show, and greatness, and strength; but by littleness, and helplessness, and

childlikeness, and babyhood, and death. He that humbleth himself, and he

only, shall be exalted here; and to mount the throne with Christ requires that

we shall first have followed Him in the suffering, and loss, and crucifixion.

If we suffer with him, we shall also reign with Him. Not as an arbitrary

reward for our suffering, but as the result that will follow in the very nature

of things. Christ’s loss must necessarily bring Christ’s gain, Christ’s death

must bring Christ’s resurrection, and to follow Him in the regeneration, will

surely and inevitably bring the soul that follows to His crown and His

throne.

In a volume of sermons for children I have found a vivid illustration of this

royal kingdom: —

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“A little fellow from one of the Refuges in England had risked his

life to save one of his comrades, and England’s Queen had sent him

a medal by the hand of one of England’s earls. The little fellow was

held forward by his comrades to receive it, for he was shy and

nervous and tried to sidle away.

“Look at the noble chairman; he had driven down from his proper

place in the House of Lords, where were gathered earls and dukes,

and the men who had done well as lawyers, and judges, and

statesmen, and warriors, and the Princes of the royal blood. Yet, all

peer though he was, he was moved to the sincerest depths of his

being as he murmured, ‘I have the honor,’ and pinned the lifesaving

medal on the child’s jacket. His heart was full. He paused to

swallow down something that would rise in his throat before he

could go on.

“There is the ‘glory and honor’ of successful statesmen, and

warriors, and lawyers, but the glory of self-forgetful saving of life is

a glory that excelleth, and that was the wondrous glory won by this

boy. He had plunged into the stream and shared a drowning boy’s

risk, and that little hand, look at it there, steadying him by holding

the table, had come out holding the saved.

“Why has self-forgetfulness such mighty power? How was it that a

twelve-year-old boy could bow down an audience of grown men

before him? What gave to that brow, that its stubby crown of

carroty hair, a glory and honor more than the lustre of gold and

jewels? Why was it that that small body in its little breeches and

jacket, wiping its tears on the rough little sleeve, could grip

thousands of hearts and hold them all, and make them for the time

loyal members of his kingdom?

“Why was all this so?

“It was so because that little boy in his measure had been like

Christ, in the self-forgetful spirit of sacrifice for others. He had a bit

of the same beauty we are all made on purpose to worship; the glory

before which angels give a great shout, and all the company of

heaven fall down and adore, saying with a loud voice, ‘Worthy is

the Lamb that was slain!’”

The “Lamb that was slain” is the mightiest King the world has ever known,

and all who partake of His spirit share in His kingdom.

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And since this kingdom is not a place, but is character, those who have not

the character cannot by any possibility be in it.

We pray daily, “Thy kingdom come.” Do we know what we are praying

for? Do we comprehend the change it will make in us if it comes in us? Are

we willing to be so changed?

What is the kingdom of God but the rule of God? And what is the rule of

God but the will of God? Therefore when we pray, “Thy will be done on

earth as it is in heaven,” we have touched the secret of it all.

A horde of savages might conquer a civilized kingdom by sheer brute force;

but if they would conquer the civilization of that kingdom, they could only

do so by submitting to its control. And just so is it with the kingdom of

heaven. It yields its scepter to none but those who render obedience to its

laws.

“To him that overcometh will I give to sit with me in my throne,

even as I also overcame and am set down with my Father in his

throne.”

“He always reigns who sides with God,” says an old writer. And

again, “He who perfectly accepts the will of God, dwells in a

perpetual kingdom.”

Art thou reigning after this fashion and in this sort of a kingdom?

Art thou the “chiefest” by being the “servant of all”?

Art thou a king over thy circumstances, or do thy circumstances reign over

thee?