{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_6669/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_6669","id":"gutenberg_6669","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/6669","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Salvation Army -- Sermons","Sermons, English"],"text":"Produced by Avinash Kothare, Juliet Sutherland, Charles\nFranks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGODLINESS.\n\nBEING\n\nREPORTS OF A SERIES OF ADDRESSES DELIVERED AT\nJAMES'S HALL, LONDON, W., During 1881,\n\nBY\n\nMRS. CATHERINE BOOTH.\n\n_INTRODUCTION BY DANIEL STEELE, D.D._\n\n\n\n\nPUBLISHERS' PREFACE.\n\n\nIn giving this volume to our American readers, we are assured that\nwe are doing a special favor to all the lovers of \"Christianity in\nearnest.\" \"Aggressive Christianity,\" from the same talented author,\nhas met with unusual favor, and has been the means of much good. We\nare confident that the present volume is in all respects equal to the\nformer, and that no one can read it without great spiritual profit.\n\nThe Introduction, by Dr. Daniel Steele, is a forcible presentation\nof the main doctrines of the book, and is creditable to the head and\nheart of the writer, and a commendation which all intelligent readers\nwill highly esteem.\n\nOur object in publishing these sermons, is, that their perusal may\nkindle a flame of revival in the hearts of believers, which may\nresult in many turning unto the Lord.\n\nMCDONALD & GILL\n\nBOSTON, MASS.\n\n\n\n\nAUTHOR'S PREFACE.\n\n\nIn presenting another volume of reports of my Addresses, I have only\nto repeat what I have said with respect to similar books before--\nRead, for the sake of getting more light and more blessing to your\nsoul, and you will, I trust, partake of the good which many have\nprofessed to receive at the West-End services, wherein most of these\nwords were first spoken.\n\nI am well aware that, in such imperfect reports of, for the most\npart, extemporaneous utterances, often most hurriedly corrected,\nthere may be found abundant ground for criticism; but, if this book\nmay be the means of leading only a few souls to devote themselves\nmore fully to God and to the salvation of men, I shall be more than\ncompensated for any unfriendly criticism with which it may meet.\n\nI have not sought to please any but the Lord, and to His fatherly\nloving-kindness I commend both the book and its readers.\n\nCATHERINE BOOTH.\n\n_London, Nov._ 10, 1881.\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\n\nThe sermons of Mrs. Booth already re-published under the title of\n\"_Aggressive Christianity_,\" came to American Christians as a tonic to\ntheir weakness, and a stimulant to their inertness.\n\nThe sermons in the present volume are a much-needed prophylactic, a\nsafeguard against several practical errors in dealing with souls;\nerrors which lead them into Egyptian darkness, instead of the\nmarvelous light.\n\nThe sermon on _Repentance_ is a most faithful showing up of spurious\nrepentance, the vain substitute for a downright abandonment of every\nform of sin, and right-about facing towards the Lord. In directness and\npoint, it is a model for earnest revival preaching,--rather, for all\npreaching to unsaved souls, outside the church, or within it. All of\nthese will be found in some subterfuge, which must be ruthlessly torn\ndown, before it will be abandoned for the cleft Rock.\n\nThe sermon on _Saving Faith_ is next in order. The disastrous\nconsequences of what, for the want of a better description, maybe\nstyled an Antinomian faith, an unrepentant assent of the intellect to\nthe historic facts of the Gospel, which too many evangelists and\nother religious teachers are calling saving faith, are clearly set\nforth and plainly labeled, POISON. This spurious trust in Christ\nfollowing a superficial repentance, which has never felt the\ndesperate sinfulness and real misery of sin, has furnished our\nchurches with a numerous class of members, aptly described by the\nprophet Micah: \"The sin of Israel is great and unrepented of, yet\nthey will lean on the Lord, and say, Is not the Lord among us?\" We\nare convinced that much of the work of the faithful and pungent\npreacher, who preaches with his eye fixed on the great white throne\nand the descending Judge, is to dislodge professors from their\nimaginary trust in a Saviour who does not save them, and probe deeply\ntheir hearts festering with sin, which have been hastily pronounced\nhealed, \"slightly healed.\" Many of us have incautiously said to\nawakened souls, \"Only believe,\" before we have thrust the heart\nthrough and through with the sword of God's law. We have dismissed\nGod's schoolmaster. The law, like the slave charged with the task of\nleading the boy to school, and of committing him to the teacher, we\nhave thought to be too harsh and severe for our sentimental age, and\nhave unwisely discharged, and have assumed its office of a\n_paidagogos_ to Christ, and we have missed the way, and misled a\npriceless soul. God have mercy on us, and give us humility, as He\ngave Apollos, to be set right by an anointed woman!\n\nAfter her timely correction of erroneous teachings on faith, Mrs.\nBooth proceeds, pruning-knife in hand, to cut away from the tree of\nmodern Christianity the poisonous fungus of a \"spurious charity.\" Her\nfour sermons on _Charity_ are four beacons set on the rocks of\ncounterfeit Christian love. She sets forth several infallible tests\nby which genuine love may be distinguished from the devil's base\nimitation. Like the Epistles of St. John, these sermons are full of\ntouchstones for testing love, that golden principle of the Christian\nlife. It would be very profitable for all professors of that perfect\nlove which casteth out all tormenting fear, to apply unflinchingly\nthese touch-stones to themselves. They may find the word \"perfection\"\ntaking on a meaning deeper, broader and higher than they had ever\nbefore conceived. Why should not our conception of Christian\nperfection steadily grow with the increase of our knowledge of God\nand of His holy law?\n\nThe sermon on _The Conditions of Effectual Prayer_, we commend\nto all Christians and to all seekers of Christ, who are mourning\nbecause their prayers do not prevail with God. In the clear light of\nthis sermon they will find that the difficulty lies, either in the\nlack of fellowship with Jesus Christ, or of obedience to His\ncommands, or in the absence from their hearts of the interceding\nSpirit, or in defective faith. In the discussion of these hindrances\nto prayer, the preacher lays open the heart, and with a skilful\nspiritual surgery, searches it to the very bottom. The incisiveness\nof her style, her courage and plain dealing with her hearers, tearing\noff the masks of sin and selfishness, the various guises in which\nthese masquerade in many Christian hearts and obstruct their access\nto a throne of grace, remind us of Dr. Finney's unsparing exposure\nand condemnation of these foes to Christian holiness, and of John\nWesley's cutting up by the roots \"Sin in Believers.\"\n\nIn this sermon Mrs. Booth turns her attention to another phase of\nfaith and of practical error in the guidance of souls to Christ. Her\nviews on this vexed question are not extreme but philosophical and\nscriptural. She teaches that God has made the bestowment of salvation\nsimultaneous with the exercise of faith, and that \"telling a person\nto believe he is saved, before he is saved, is telling him to believe\na lie.\" But she insists that the act of faith is put forth with the\nspecial aid of the Holy Spirit giving an assurance that the blessing\nsought will be granted. This assurance, or earnest, given by the\nSpirit, becomes the basis on which the final act of faith rests,\nnamely, \"I believe that I receive.\" This corresponds with William\nTaylor's Divine \"ascertainment of the fact of the sinner's surrender\nto God, and his acceptance of Christ,\" before justification.\n[Footnote: Election of Grace, pp. 38-42.] Both teachers agree with\nWesley's analysis of faith which teaches that the fourth and last\nstep, \"He doth it,\" can be taken only by the special enabling power\nof the Holy Spirit, [Footnote: Sermons. Patience, Section 13; Scripture\nWay of Salvation, Section 17; and Whedon on Mark xi. 24.] All three\nlocate the Divine efficiency before the declaration, \"I believe that I\nreceive,\" or \"have received\" (R. V.), making that declaration rest upon\nthe perception of a Divine change within the consciousness. They all\ninsist that saving faith is not a mere humanly moral exercise, but\nthat power to believe with the heart descends from God, and that it\nmust be waited for in prayer, and that it becomes in the believer a\nseries of supernatural and spiritual acts, a habit of soul, at once\nthe seed and fruit of the Divine life-stirring, uniting in itself the\ncharacters of penitent humility, self-renunciation, simple trust, and\nabsolute obedience grounded in love. These teachers magnify the\nDivine element in faith. We look in vain in their writings for any\nsuch direction to a penitent as this, \"Believe that you are saved,\nbecause, God says so in His Word,\" but rather believe that you are\nsaved when you hear His Spirit crying, Abba, Father, in your heart.\n\nMany modern teachers fall into the error of treating saving faith as\nan unaided intellectual act to be performed, at will, at any time. It\nis rather a spiritual act possible only when prompted by the Holy\nSpirit, who incites to faith only when He sees true repentance and a\nhearty surrender to God. Then the Spirit reveals Christ and assists\nto grasp Him. In the refutation of the high predestinarian doctrine\nthat faith is an irresistible grace sovereignly bestowed upon the\nelect, there is great danger of falling into the opposite error,\ncalled Pelagianism, which makes saving faith an exercise which the\nnatural man is competent to put forth without the help of the Holy\nSpirit. The real guilt of unbelief lies in that voluntary\nindifference toward Christ, and impenitence of heart, in which the\nHoly Spirit cannot inspire saving faith.\n\nIn our introduction to \"_Aggressive Christianity_,\" we advertised, in\nbehalf of the American churches, a universal want--Enthusiasm. In her\nbrief Exeter-Hall address, Mrs. Booth discloses the source of the\nsupply. Holiness is the well-spring of enthusiasm. Hence it is not a\nspring freshet, but an overflowing river of power in all its possessors,\nand, notably in the Salvation Army, bearing the unchurched masses of\nEngland on its bosom. A holy enthusiasm is contagious and conquering. We\ncannot touch the people with the icicle of logic; but they will not fail\nto bow to the scepter of glowing and joyful love. Few men can reason;\nall can feel. Enthusiasm and full salvation, like the Siamese twins,\ncannot be separated and live. The error of the modern pulpit is that of\nthe blacksmith hammering cold steel--a faint impression and huge labor.\nThe baptism of fire softening our assemblies would lighten the\npreacher's toil and multiply its productiveness.\n\nThe four addresses on _Holiness_ are hortatory rather than\nargumentative or exegetical. They are spiritual cyclones. It is\ndifficult to see how any Christian could withstand these impassioned\nappeals to make what Joseph Cook calls \"an affectionate, total,\nirreversible, eternal, self-surrender to Jesus Christ, as both\nSaviour and Lord,\" in order to attain that \"perfect similarity of\nfeeling with God,\" wherein evangelical perfection consists.\n\nIt gives me great pleasure to have some humble part in echoing\nacross the American continent these glowing utterances from the lips\nof this modern Deborah, the Christian prophetess raised up by God for\nthe deliverance of His people from captivity to worldliness and\nreligious apathy. \"Would God that all the Lord's people,\" men and\nwomen, \"were prophets, and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon\nthem!\"\n\n  \"Shall we the Spirit's course restrain,\n    Or quench the heavenly fire?\n  Let God His messengers ordain,\n    And whom He will inspire!\n  Blow as He list, the Spirit's choice\n    Of instruments we bless:\n  We will, if Christ be preached, rejoice,\n    And wish the word success.\"\n\nDANIEL STEELE.\n\n_Reading, Mass., Nov._ 23, 1883.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nREPENTANCE\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nSAVING FAITH\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nCHARITY\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nCHARITY AND REBUKE\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nCHARITY AND CONFLICT\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nCHARITY AND LONELINESS\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nCONDITIONS OF EFFECTUAL PRAYER\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nTHE PERFECT HEART\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nHOW TO WORK FOR GOD WITH SUCCESS\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nENTHUSIASM AND FULL SALVATION\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nHINDRANCES TO HOLINESS\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\nADDRESSES ON HOLINESS\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nREPENTANCE,\n\n\n  And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of Heaven is at band.--MATT.\n  iii. 2.\n\n  From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the\n  Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.--MATT. iv. 17.\n\n  \"Whereupon, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly\n  vision: but shewed first unto them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem, and\n  throughout all the coasts of Judaea, and then to the Gentiles, that\n  they should repent and torn to God, and do works meet for\n  repentance.\"--ACTS xxvi. 19,20.\n\nIn the mouths of three witnesses--John the Baptist, Jesus Christ,\nand the Apostle Paul--this word shall be established, namely, that\nrepentance is an _indispensable_ condition of entering the kingdom of\nGod.\n\nPeople generally are all at sea oh this subject, as though insisting\nthat repentance were an arbitrary arrangement on the part of God. I\nbelieve God has made human salvation as easy as the Almighty,\nInfinite mind could make it. But there is a necessity in the case,\nthat we should \"repent and turn to God.\" It is just as necessary that\nmy feelings be changed and brought to repentance towards God, as it\nis that the wicked, disobedient boy, should have his feelings brought\nback into harmony with his father before he can be forgiven.\nPrecisely the same laws of mind are brought into action in both\ncases, and there is the same necessity in both.\n\nIf there is any father here who has a prodigal son, I ask, How is it\nthat you are not reconciled to your son? You love him--love him\nintensely. Probably you are more conscious of your love for him than\nfor any other of your children. Your heart yearns over him every day;\nyou pray for him night and day; you dream of him by night; your\nbowels yearn over your son, and you say, with David, \"Absalom,\nAbsalom, my son, my son.\" Why are you not reconciled? Why not pat him\non the head, or stroke his face, and say, \"My dear lad, I am well\npleased with you. I love you complacently; I give you my\napprobation?\" Why are you always reproving him? Why are you obliged\nto hold him at arm's length? Why can you not live on amicable terms\nwith him? Why can you not have him come in and out, and live with you\non the same terms as the affectionate, obedient daughter? \"Oh!\" you\nsay, \"the case is different; I cannot. It is not, 'I would not;' but,\n'_I cannot_.' Before that can possibly be, the boy's feelings\nmust be changed towards me. He is at war with me; he has mistaken\nnotions of me; he thinks I am hard, and cruel, and exacting, and\nsevere. I have done all a father could do, but he sees things\ndifferently, to what they are, and has harbored these hard feelings\nagainst me until he hates me, and will go on in defiance of my will.\"\nYou say, \"It is a necessity that, as a wise and righteous father, I\nmust insist on a change in him. I cannot receive him as a son, till\nhe comes to my feet. He must confess his sin, and ask me to forgive\nhim. Then, oh! how gladly will my fatherly affection gush out! How I\nshould run to meet him, and put my arms around his neck! but there is\na 'cannot' in the case.\" Just so. It is not that He does not love\nyou, sinner; it is not that the great, benevolent heart of God has\nnot, as it were, wept tears of blood over you; it is not that He\nwould not put His loving arms around you this moment, if you would\nonly come to His feet, and confess you were wrong, and seek His\npardon; but, otherwise, He may not--He _cannot_. The laws of His\nuniverse are against Him doing so. The good, it may be, of millions\nof immortal beings, is involved. He dare not, and He _cannot,_ until\nthere is a change of mind _in you._ You must repent. \"Except ye repent,\nye shall all likewise perish.\"\n\nWell, if repentance be an indispensable condition of salvation, let\nus glance at it for a moment, and try to find out what repentance\nreally is; and, oh! how full of confusion the world and the church\nare upon this subject! I say it, because I know it by converse with\nhundreds of people. May the Holy Spirit help us!\n\nWell, first, repentance is not merely conviction of sin. Oh! if it\nonly were, what a different world we should have to-night, for there\nare tens of thousands on whose hearts God's Spirit has done His\noffice by convincing them of sin. I am afraid we should be perfectly\nalarmed, astounded, confounded, if we had any conception of the\nmultitudes whom God has convinced of sin, as He did Agrippa and\nFestus. Oh! I could not tell you the numbers of people, who, in our\nanxious meetings, have grasped my hand, and said, \"Oh! what would I\ngive to feel as I once felt! There was a time, fifteen, or seventeen,\nor twenty years ago,\" and so on, \"when I was so deeply convinced of\nsin that I could scarcely sleep, or eat--that I could find no rest;\nbut, instead of going on till I found peace, I got diverted, cooled\ndown, and now, I feel as hard as a stone.\" I am afraid there are tens\nof thousands in this condition--once convinced of sin.\n\nThere are thousands of others, who are convinced _now_. They say, \"Yes,\nit is true what the minister says. I know I ought to lay down the\nweapons of my warfare against God; I know I ought to cut off this right\nhand, and pluck out this right eye.\" They are convinced of sin, but they\ngo no further. That is not repentance. They live this week as they did\nlast. There is no response to the Spirit; they resist the Holy Ghost.\n\nNeither is repentance mere sorrow for sin. I have seen people weep\nbitterly, and writhe and struggle, but yet hug on to their idols, and\nin vain you try to shake them from them. Oh! if Jesus Christ would\nhave saved them with those idols, they would have no objection at\nall. If they could have got through the strait gate with this one\nparticular idol, they would have gone through long since; but to part\nwith that--that is another thing. Such people will weep like your\nstubborn child, when you want him to do something which he does not\nwant to do. He will cry, and when you apply the rod he will cry\nharder, but he will not yield. When he yields, he becomes a penitent;\nbut, until he does, he is merely a convicted sinner. When God applies\nthe rod of His Spirit, the rod of His providence, the rod of His\nWord, sinners will cry, and wince, and whine, and make you believe\nthey are praying, and want to be saved, but all the while they are\nholding their necks as stiff as iron. They will not _submit_.\nThe moment they submit, they become true penitents, and get saved.\nThere is no mistake more common than for people to suppose they are\npenitents when they are not. There are some of you in this condition,\nI know. I am afraid you are quite mistaken--you are not penitents.\nGod is true though every man should be a liar; and, if you had\nsought, as you say you have, and perhaps, think you have; if you had\nbeen sincere and honest with God, you would have been saved years\nago. Oh! may God, the Holy Spirit, help you to come out and be\nHONEST. That is what God wants--that you be honest. \"Oh,\" says He,\n\"why cover ye my altar with tears, and bring your vain oblations?\nJust be honest, and I will be honest with you and bless you; but\nwhile you come before Me and weep and profess, and bring the halt,\nand the maimed, and the blind, a curse be upon you.\" He looks at you\nafar off. Be honest. Repentance is not mere sorrow for sin. You may\nbe ever so sorry, and all the way down to death be hugging on to some\nforbidden possession, as was the young ruler. _That_ is not repentance.\n\nNeither is repentance a promise that you will forsake sin in the\nfuture. Oh! if it were, there would be many penitents here to-night.\nThere is scarcely a poor drunkard that does not promise, in his own\nmind, or to his poor wife, or somebody, that he will forsake his\ncups. There is scarcely any kind of a sinner that does not\ncontinually promise that he will give up his sin, and serve God, but\nhe does _not do it_.\n\nThen what is _repentance_? _Repentance is simply renouncing\nsin_--turning round from darkness to light--from the power of Satan\nunto God. This is giving up sin in your heart, in purpose, in\nintention, in desire, resolving that you will give up every evil\nthing, and DO IT NOW. Of course, this involves sorrow, for how will\nany sane man turn himself round from a given course into another, if\nhe does not repent having taken that course? It implies, also, hatred\nof, sin. He hates the course he formerly took, and turns round from\nit. He is like the prodigal, when he sat in the swine-yard amongst\nthe husks and the filth, he fully resolved, and at last he acts. He\nwent, and that was the test of his penitence! He might have sat\nresolving and promising till now, if he had lived as long, and he\nwould never have got the father's kiss, the father's welcome, if he\nhad not started; but he went. He left the filth, the swine-yard, the\nhusks--he trampled them under his feet; he left the citizen of that\ncountry, and gave up all his subterfuges and excuses, and went to his\nfather honestly, and said, \"I have sinned!\" which implied a great\ndeal more in his language then than it does in ours now. \"I have\nsinned against Heaven, and before thee;\" and then comes the proof of\nhis submission, \"and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me\nas one of thy hired servants\"--put me in a stable, or set me to clean\nthe boots, so that I can be in thy family and have thy smile. That is\nrepentance--Jesus Christ's own beautiful illustration of true\npenitence. Have you done that? Have you forsaken the accursed thing?\nHave you cut off that particular thing which the Holy Spirit has\nrevealed to you? Is the _\"but\"_ the hindrance that keeps you out\nof the Kingdom? You know what it is, and you will never get saved\nuntil you renounce it. Submission is the test of penitence. My child\nmay be willing to do a hundred and fifty other things, but, if he is\nnot willing to submit on the one point of controversy, he is a rebel,\nand remains one until he yields.\n\nNow, here is just the difference between a spurious and a real\nrepentance. I am afraid we have thousands in our churches who had a\nspurious repentance: they were convinced of sin--they were sorry for\nit; they wanted to live a better life, to love God in a sort of\ngeneral way; but they skipped over the real point of controversy with\nGod; they hid it from their pastor, perhaps, and from the deacons,\nand from the people who talked with them.\n\nNow, I say, Abraham might have been willing to have given up every\nother thing that he possessed; but, if he had not been willing to\ngive up Isaac, all else would have been useless. It is your Isaac God\nwants.  You have got an Isaac, just as the young ruler had his\npossessions.  You have got something that you are holding on to, that\nthe Holy Spirit says you must let go, and you say, \"I can't.\" Very\nwell; then you must stop outside the kingdom. I beseech you, do not\ndeceive yourselves by supposing that you repent, for you do not; but,\noh! my dear friends, let me beseech you to repent. The apostle says,\n\"Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men;\" and this\nis, I believe, the greatest work of the ministry.  To do what?  To\npersuade men to submit. We are constantly talking to thousands of\npeople who know just what God wants of them.  We cannot bring many of\nthem any new light or new Gospel. They know all about it. They used\nto tell me that so often, that I longed for a congregation of\nheathen, which I have found since then. Consequently, when they hear\nthe Gospel, like the publicans and sinners of old, they go into the\nkingdom, while such as some of you who are the natural children of\nthe kingdom, are shut out, because when they hear they receive, and\nsubmit, and obey, while you stand outside and hold on to your idols,\nand reason, and quibble, and reject!  My dear friends, let me\npersuade you to trample under foot that idol, to tear down that\nrefuge of lies, and to come to God honestly, and say, \"Lord, here I\nam, to be a servant, to be nothing, to do anything, to suffer\nanything. I know I shall be happier with Thy smile and Thy blessing\nthan all these evil things now make me without Thee.\"  When you come\nto a full surrender, my friends, you will get what you have been\nseeking, some of you, for years.\n\nBut then another difficulty comes in, and people say, \"I have not\nthe power to repent.\" Oh! yes, you have. That is a grand mistake. You\nhave the power, or God would not command it. You can repent. You can\nthis moment lift up your eyes to Heaven, and say, with the prodigal,\n\"Father, I have sinned, and I renounce my sin.\" You may not be able\nto weep--God nowhere requires or commands that; but you are able,\nthis very moment, to renounce sin, in purpose, in resolution, in\nintention. Mind, don't confound the renouncing of the sin, with the\npower of saving yourself from it. If you renounce it, Jesus will come\nand save you from it. Like the man with the withered hand--Jesus\nintended to heal that man. Where was the power to come from to heal\nhim? From Jesus, of course. The benevolence, the love, that prompted\nthat healing, all came from Jesus; but Jesus wanted a condition. What\nwas it? The response of the man's will; and so He said, \"Stretch\nforth thy hand.\" If he had been like some of you, he would have said,\n\"What an unreasonable command! You know I cannot do it--I cannot.\"\nSome of you say that; but I say you can, and you will have to do it,\nor you will be lost. What did Jesus want? He wanted that, \"I will,\nLord,\" inside the man--the response of his will. He wanted him to\nsay, \"Yes, Lord;\" and, the moment he said that, Jesus supplied\nstrength, and he stretched it forth, and you know what happened.\n\nDon't look forward, and say, \"I shall not have strength;\" that is\nnot your matter--that is His. He will hold you up;--He is able, when\nyou once commit yourself to Him. Now then, say, \"_I will._\" Never mind\nwhat you suffer--it shall be done. He will pour in the oil and balm. His\nglorious, blessed presence will do more for you in one hour, than all\nyour struggling, praying, and wrestling have done all these weary years.\nHe will lift you up out of the pit. You are in the mire now, and the\nmore you struggle the more you sink; but He will lift you out of it, and\nput your feet on the rock, and then you will stand firm. Stretch out\nyour withered hand, whatever it may be;--say, \"I will, Lord.\" You have\nthe power, and mind, you have the obligation, which is universal and\nimmediate. God \"now commandeth all men everywhere to repent,\" and to\nbelieve the Gospel. What a tyrant He must be if He commands that, and\nyet He knows you have not the power!\n\nNow, do you repent? Mind the old snare. Not, do you weep? The\nfeeling will come after the surrender.\n\nNow, do not say, \"I do not feel enough.\" Do you feel enough to be\nwilling to forsake your sin? that is the point. Any soul who does not\nrepent enough to forsake his sin, is _not a penitent at all!_\nWhen you repent enough to forsake your sin, that moment your\nrepentance is sincere, and you may take hold of Jesus with a firm\ngrasp. You have a right to appropriate the promise, then it is \"look\nand live.\" \"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be\nsaved.\"\n\nWill you come to that point now? Don't begin making an excuse.\n_Now!--all men! everywhere!_--NOW! Oh! my friend, if you had done that\nten years ago! You have been accumulating sin, condemnation, and wrath\never since. God commanded you these ten years to repent, and believe the\nGospel, and here you are yet. How many sermons have you\nheard?--invitations rejected? How much blessed persuasion and reasoning\nof the Holy Spirit have you resisted?--how much of the grace of God have\nyou received in vain? I tremble to think what an accumulated load of\nabused privilege, lost opportunity, and wasted influence, such people\nwill have to give an account of. Talk about hell!--the weight of this\nwill be hell enough.  You don't seem to think anything of the way you\ntreat God. Oh! people are very much awake to any evil they do to their\nfellow-men. They can much more easily see the sin of ruining or injuring\ntheir neighbors than injuring the great God; but He says, \"Will a man\nrob God? Yet ye have robbed me.\" Do you not see; the awful weight of\ncondemnation that comes upon you for putting off, rejecting, resisting,\nvascilating, halting, while He says, _Now--now?_  He has had a right to\nevery breath you have drawn, to all your influence, every hour, of every\nday of all your years. Is it not time you ended that controversy?  He\nmay do with you as He did with such people once before--swear in His\nwrath that you shall not enter into His rest. Are you not provoking\nHim as they provoked Him? Oh! my friend, be persuaded now to repent.\nLet your sin go away, and come to the feet of Jesus. For your own\nsake be persuaded. For the peace, the joy, the power, the glory, the\ngladness of living a life of consecration to God, and service to your\nfellow-men, yield; but most of all, for the love He bears you, submit.\n\nA great, rough man (stricken down), said to my husband, a few weeks\nago, when he looked up to the place where other people were being\nsaved, \"Mr. Booth, I would not go there for a hundred pounds!\"  My\nhusband whispered, \"Will you go there for love?\" and, after a\nminute's hesitation, the man, brushing the great tears away, rose up,\nand followed him.\n\nWill you go there for love--the love of Jesus!--the great love\nwherewith He loved you and gave Himself for you? Will you, for the\ngreat yearning with which your Father has been following you all\nthese years--for His love's sake, will you come? Go down at His feet\nand submit. The Lord help you! Amen.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nSAVING FAITH.\n\n\n  And brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?\n  And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be\n  saved, and thy house.--ACTS xvi. 30,31.\n\nThis is one of the most abused texts in the Bible, and one which,\nperhaps, has been made to do quite as much work for the devil as for\nGod. Let every saint present, ask in faith for the light of the Holy\nGhost, while we try rightly to apply it. Let us enquire:--\n\n1. _Who are to believe_? 2. _When are they to believe_? 3. _How are they\nto believe_?\n\nI. Who are to believe? To whom does the Holy Spirit say, \"Believe on\nthe Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved?\" Now mark, I answer,\n_not_ to all sinners indiscriminately. And here is a grand\nmistake in a great deal of the teaching of this age--that these words\nare wrested from their explanatory connexion, and from numbers of\nother texts bearing on the same subject, and held up independently of\nall the conditions which must ever, and did ever, in the mind and\npractice of the Apostles, accompany them; indeed, it has only been\nwithin the last sixty or seventy years that this new gospel has\nsprung into existence, preaching indiscriminately to unawakened,\nunconverted, unrepentant sinners--\"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.\"\nIt seems to me, that great injury has been done to the cause of\nChrist by thus wrongly dividing the Word of truth, to say nothing of\nthe unphilosophical character of such a course, for how can an\nunawakened, unconvicted, unrepentant sinner, believe? As soon might\nSatan believe. It is an utter impossibility. Thousands of these\npeople say, \"I do believe.\" My dear son, only a little time ago, on\nthe top of an omnibus, was speaking to a man who was the worse for\nliquor, and using very improper language; trying to show him the\ndanger of his evil, wicked course, as a transgressor of the law of\nGod. \"Oh!\" said the man, \"it is not by works, it is by faith, and I\nbelieve as much as you do.\" \"Yes,\" said my son, \"but what do you\nbelieve?\" \"Oh,\" he said, \"I believe in Jesus Christ, and of course I\nshall be saved.\" That is a sample of thousands. I am meeting with\nthem daily. They believe there was such a man as Jesus, and that He\ndied for sinners, and for them, but as to the exercise of saving\nfaith, they know no more about it than Agrippa or Felix, as is\nmanifest when they come to die, for then, these very people are\nwringing their hands, tearing their hair, and sending for Christians\nto come and pray with them. If they had believed, why all this alarm\nand concern on the approach of death? They were only believers of the\nhead, and not of the heart; that is, they were but theoretical\nbelievers in the facts recorded in this book, but not believers in\nthe Scriptural sense, or their faith would have saved them. Now, we\nmaintain that it is useless, and as unphilosophical as it is\nunscriptural, to preach \"only believe\" to such characters; and\nChristians have not done their duty, and have not discharged their\nresponsibility to these souls, when they have told them that Jesus\ndied for them, and that they are to believe in Him! They have a much\nharder work to do, and that is, \"to open their eyes\" to a sense of\ntheir danger, and make them, by the power of the Spirit, realize the\ndreadful truth that they are sinners, that they are sick, and then\nthey will run to the Physician.\n\nThe eyes of the soul must be opened to such a realization of sin,\nand such an apprehension of the consequences of sin, as shall lead to\nan earnest desire to be saved from sin. God's great means of doing\nthis is the law, as the schoolmaster, to drive sinners to receive\nChrist as their salvation.\n\nThere is not one case in the New Testament in which the apostles\nurged souls to believe, or in which a soul is narrated as believing,\nin which we have not good grounds to believe that these preparatory\nsteps of conviction and repentance, had been taken. The only one was\nthat of Simon the sorcerer. He was, as numbers of people are, in\ngreat religious movements, carried away by the influence of the\nmeeting, and the example of those around him, and professed to\nbelieve. Doubtless, he did credit the fact that Jesus died on the\ncross. He received the facts of Christianity into his mind, and, in\nthat sense, he became a believer--in the same sense that tens of\nthousands are in these days--and he was baptized. But when the\ntesting point came, as to whose interests were paramount with him,\nhis own or God's, then he manifested the true state of the case, as\nthe apostle said, \"I see thy heart is not right with God.\" And nobody\nis converted whose heart is not right with God! That is the test. If\nSimon had been converted, his heart would have been right with God\nand he would not have supposed the Holy Ghost could have been bought\nfor money. And Paul added, \"For I perceive that thou art still in the\ngall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity.\" And what further\ndid he say to him? \"Therefore, at once believe\"? No; he did not.\n\"Therefore, repent, and pray God, if, perhaps, the thought of thine\nheart may be forgiven thee.\" Repent first! and then believe, and get\nthis wickedness forgiven, and so we get a double lesson in the same\npassage. This Simon was the only person we have any record of, as\nbelieving, where there is not in the passage itself, taken with the\ncontext, a reasonable and rational evidence, that these preparatory\nsteps of conviction and repentance, were taken before the teaching of\nfaith, or the exercise and confession of faith. Simon had this faith\nof the head, but not of the heart, and, therefore, it ended in defeat\nand despair.\n\nSome have written me this week that they had believed. They had been\npersuaded into a profession of faith, but no fruits followed. Ah! it\nwas not the faith of the heart: it was the faith of the head--like\nthat of Simon's--and it left you worse than it found you, and you\nhave been groping and grovelling, ever since. But do not think that\nwas real faith, and that therefore real faith has failed, but be\nencouraged to begin again, and _repent_. Try the real thing, for\nSatan always gets up a counterfeit. Therefore, don't go down in\ndespair because the wrong kind of faith did not succeed. That shall\nnot make the real faith of God of none effect--God forbid!\n\nLook at one or two other cases--the three thousand in a day. Surely\nthis is a scriptural illustration. Surely no one will call that\nanti-Gospel or legal. What was the first work Peter did? He drove the\nknife of God's convincing truth into their hearts, and made them\n_cry out_. He awoke them to the truth of their almost lost and\ndamned condition, till they said, \"What must we do to be saved?\" They\nwere so concerned, they were so pricked in their hearts, their eyes\nwere so opened to the terrible consequences of their sin, that they\ncried aloud before the vast multitude, \"Men and brethren, what must\nwe do to be saved?\" He convinced them of sin, and thus followed the\norder of God.\n\nAgain, the eunuch is often quoted as an illustration of faith; but\nwhat state of mind was he in? Was he a careless, unconvicted sinner?\nThere he was--an Ethiopian, a heathen; but where had he been? To\nJerusalem, to worship the true and living God, in the best way he\nknew, and as far as he understood; and then, what was he doing when\nPhilip found him? He was not content with the mere worship of the\ntemple, whistling a worldly tune on his way back. He was searching\nthe Scriptures. He was honestly seeking after God, and the Holy Ghost\nalways knows where such souls are; and He said to Philip, \"Go, join\nthyself to that chariot: there is a man seeking after Me; there is a\nman whose heart is honestly set on finding Me. Go and preach Christ,\nand tell him to believe.\" That man would have sacrificed, or done, or\nlost anything, for salvation, and, as soon as Philip expounded the\nway of faith, he received it, of course, as all such souls will.\n\nSaul, on his way to Damascus, is another instance. Jesus Christ was\nthe preacher there, and surely, He could not be mistaken. His\nphilosophy was sound. Where did He begin? What did He say to Saul? He\nsaw there an honest-hearted man. Saul was sincere, so far as he\nunderstood, and if, in any case, there needed to be the immediate\nreception of Christ by faith, it was in his. But the Lord Jesus\nChrist did not say one word about faith. \"Saul, Saul, why\n_persecutest_ thou Me?\"--tearing the bandages of deception off\nhis eyes, and letting him see the wickedness of his conduct. When\nSaul said, \"Who art Thou, Lord?\" He repeated the accusation. He did\nnot come in with the oil of comfort; He did not plaster the wound up,\nand make it whole in a moment; but He said, \"I am Jesus of Nazareth,\nwhom thou persecutest.\" He ran the knife in again, and opened Paul's\neyes wider, and his wounds wider, too, and sent him bleeding on to\nDamascus, where he was three days before he got the healing. He had\nto send for a poor human instrument, and he had to hear and obey his\nwords, before the scales fell from his eyes, and before the pardon of\nhis sins was pronounced, and the Holy Ghost came into his soul. I\nwonder what Paul was doing those three days! Not singing songs of\nthanksgiving and praise. That had to come. Oh! what do you think he\nwas doing? He neither ate nor drank, and he was in the dark. What was\nhe doing? No doubt he was praying. No doubt he was seeking after this\nChrist, who had spoken to him in the way. No doubt he was looking\nwith horror upon his past life, and abjuring forever his accursed\nantagonism to Jesus Christ, and to His Gospel. Of course, he was\nbringing forth fruits meet for repentance, according to the Divine\norder--Acts xxvi.: And then came Ananias, and preached Christ unto\nhim, and he believed unto salvation, and the scales fell off, and his\nmouth was filled with praise and thanksgiving to God.\n\nCornelius, is another instance, but what was the state of his mind\nand heart? We know that he feared God and wrought righteousness, as\nfar as he was able. He gave alms to the people, and prayed day and\nnight. That is more than some of you ever did, who live in the Gospel\ntimes. You never prayed all night about your souls. No wonder if you\nshould lose them--not half a night, some of you. But Cornelius\ndid--he was seeking _God_. He honestly wanted to know Him. He was\nwilling, at all costs, to do His will: consequently, the Lord sent\nhim the glorious message of the revelation of Jesus Christ.\n\nI might go on multiplying instances, but I must stop. We have said\nenough to show who are to believe. Truly penitent sinners, and they\nonly.\n\nThis text is to a repenting, enlightened, convicted sinner. Now,\nsome of you are enlightened, convinced, and so wretched that you\ncannot sleep. You _do_ repent. You are the very people, then, to\nwhom this text comes--Believe. You are just in the condition of the\ngaoler.\n\n\"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved,\" and now\nlet us look what state of mind the gaoler was in. We see, from the\nwhole narrative, how his eyes had been opened. The earthquake had\ndone that. Some people need an earthquake before they get their eyes\nopened, and it has to be a loud one, too. The gaoler's eyes were\nopened, and he made the best use of his time. He was lashing their\nbacks a little while before! Talk about a change--here was a change.\n\"Sirs, what must I do to be saved? I am ready to do anything, only\ntell me what.\" And when a soul comes to that state of mind, he has\nnothing more to do but to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And he\ncame in, trembling, and went down on his knees, and washed their\nstripes. When you get to that state of mind, you will soon get saved.\nYou will have nothing more to do but to believe. You will find it\neasy work, then.\n\nII. When is a sinner to believe? When he repents? Here again I am\ngoing to answer some of your letters. One writes: \"I am afraid I do\nnot realize my sin sufficiently. I have no particular agony on\naccount of sin, but I do see my whole life to have been one huge\nerror and sin.\" There is nothing more common than for souls to delude\nthemselves on this point of feeling. That gentleman confounds feeling\nwith conviction. He thinks because he has not this extreme agony\nwhich some have, therefore he is not sufficiently convinced, while\nthe Holy Ghost has opened his eyes to see that his whole life has\nbeen one huge error and sin. He is convinced that it has been\n_all_ sin--not one isolated sin here and there abstracted from\nhis life, but such a perception of his true character that he sees\nhis whole life to have been sin. Surely, my friend, you are convinced.\nWhat else but the Holy Ghost could have shown you _that_? Now, the truly\nrepentant soul first sees sin; secondly, he _hates_ sin; thirdly, he\n_renounces_ sin. Now, let me try you by each of these tests. Don't let\nSatan deceive you, and make you belie the exercises of your own mind.\nFace the facts, and when you have come to a conclusion, don't allow him\nto raise a controversy, but stick to your facts, and go on from them, or\nyou will never get saved. Satan is an accuser of the brethren, and, I\nsuppose, of the sisters too. I will be as honest and as searching\nwith you as I possibly can. I will not spare the probe, but when we\nhave probed and found the truth, stand on it, for Christ's sake, and\ndon't let it go from under your feet, because Satan will try to cheat\nyou out of your common sense, conscience, and convictions.\n\nYou _see_ sin. An entirely unawakened soul does not see sin;\nthat is, in its true character, in its heinousness, in its\nconsequences. He admits that all people are sinners. Oh! yes; but he\ndoes not see the deadly, damning character of sin. He does not see\nwhat an evil and bitter thing sin is in itself. Now, the Holy Ghost\nalone can open the soul's eyes to see this. Without Him, all my\npreaching, or any other preaching, even the preaching of the angels,\nif they were permitted to preach, might go on to all eternity, and it\nwould never convince of sin. If you see sin, it is the Holy Ghost who\nhas opened your eyes. Praise Him, and take encouragement, my friend.\nIf God has thus far dealt with you, and opened your eyes to see the\ncharacter and consequences of sin, does it not augur well that He\ndesires also to save you from it? He has opened your eyes in order\nthat He may anoint them with eye-salve, and cause you to see light in\nHis light.\n\nNow, have you got thus far? You have told me that your life has been\none great sin; others say, one particular form of sin. Whatever it\nis, if you are convinced of sin, it is the Holy Ghost who has\nconvinced you; therefore, thank God, and take courage thus far.\n\nFurther, the true penitent _hates_ sin; that is, his feelings\ntowards sin are quite different to what they were in the past. There\nwas a time when you could commit sin, almost without notice, without\nconcern. People do not realize the great change that has taken place\nin them in this respect. They are brought gradually to it. Translate\nyourself back into your unawakened state. How did you live then? The\nvery things that now cause you such distress, you practised every\nday, and they gave you no concern. The things that horrify you now,\nin the very thought or temptation to them, you then were daily\npractising without compunction. You had no hatred to, no dread of\nsin. You were willing bondslaves of Satan. Now, you are his unwilling\nslave. Then, you _ran_ towards sin, now, he has to drive you,\nand when you fall, it is against your will. You hate sin. Now, mind,\nthis is not being saved from it. This is not saying you have power to\nsave yourself from it. In fact, this is the very difficulty\npersonified by the apostle, when representing the ineffectual\nstruggles of a convicted sinner. The things you would not, those you\ndo, and the things you would, those you have not the power to do.\nNevertheless, you _desire_ to do them. There is the difference.\nOnce you did not desire to do them, and, perhaps, those who did, were\na pack of hypocrites, in your estimation. Now, you feel quite\ndifferently, and you struggle, and strive, and pray, and watch. Some\nof you have told me so, and yet you say, \"I am again and again\novercome.\" Of course you are, because you are not _saved yet_!\nBut don't you see, you _desire_ to be. You hate the sin which\nenthrals you. You struggle against it. You watch against it and you\nare not overcome half so frequently, perhaps, as you were before.\nPeople do not see what a great deal they owe to the convincing and\npreventing power of the Holy Spirit helping their infirmity, even\nnow, to cut off and pluck out the right hand and the right eye, and\nbringing them up in a waiting attitude before God, like Cornelius and\nthe eunuch. You, my hearers, some of you, are following after God.\nYou are longing for deliverance, are striving against sin.\n\nTake an another illustration. I don't mean that the soul has power\nto save itself from its internal maladies. That you will get when\nJesus Christ saves you. But, I mean this: here is a soul convinced of\nsin. Here is a man who is daily addicted to drink. He is a drunkard.\nHe becomes convinced of sin. Now, then, the Spirit of God says, \"Will\nyou give up the cup?\" Then commences the struggle. Now, the question\nis, are you to teach that man that he is to go on drinking, and\nexpect God to save him? Are you to keep putting before him faith, and\ntelling him, \"Oh! never mind your cup, but believe on the Lord Jesus\nChrist and you shall be saved\"--or, are you to tell him, \"you must\nput away your sin, cut off that right hand, pluck out that right eye,\nrenounce that drink forever in your heart, in your purpose, in your\nwill, and until you do, you cannot exercise faith on the Lord Jesus?\"\n\nHere is another person addicted to lying. He, when he is convinced\nof sin, sets a watch over his lips, that he may not offend with his\nmouth, and he does succeed in so guarding himself, or the Holy Spirit\nso helps him to guard himself, that he does not lie as he used. He is\novercome now and then, because he has not yet found the power, but he\nis resolutely, and as far as his will is concerned, cutting off this\noutward sin, and waiting in the way of obedience for full deliverance\nand salvation.\n\nThere is a servant systematically robs his master's till. He goes to\na religious meeting and is convinced. \"Now,\" the Spirit of God says,\n\"you must cut off that dishonesty. You cannot come to this meeting\nnight after night pretending to want to be saved, while you are going\non every day robbing your master! You must cut off that right hand,\nand give up that pilfering, and resolve that you will make\nrestitution, and wait for Me in the way of bringing forth fruits meet\nfor repentance.\" You see what I mean. Now, you are just here, some of\nyou--you know you are. If you are addicted to any evil habit, it is\njust the same. Jesus Christ wants you to forswear that habit in your\nwill, determination, and purpose. You have not the power to deliver\nyourself from it. You may struggle, as some of you tell me you are\ndoing, but it overcomes you, and down you go. He knows all about\nthat, but He approves of the struggle, and the effort, and the\nwatchfulness, and the determination, and when He saves you, He will\ngive you the power, and then you will stand and not fall, for He will\nhold you up.\n\nNow you know that you go thus far, and you know that at this moment,\nif you had the power in yourself to extinguish the force of that evil\nhabit over you forever, you would do it without another moment's\nhesitation. You say, \"Oh yes, I would indeed. Would to God I had the\npower.\" That is repentance; that is _genuine_ repentance. Now,\nwhat you cannot do for yourself, He meets you just where you stand,\nand says, \"I will do it for you; I will break the power of that\nhabit; I will deliver you out of the hands of the enemy; I will save\nyou out of that bondage. Only throw your arm of faith around me, and\nI will lift you up; and I will inspire you with my Spirit; you shall\nstand in Me and by Me; and what you are now struggling to do for\nyourself, I will do for you.\"\n\nThen you have got thus far that you hate sin? \"Yes, I have.\" You\nhave said it in your letters to me, and there are others saying it\nwho have not written to me. \"Yes,\" you are saying, \"I desire to be\nsaved from it. I would save myself this very instant if I could, and\nnever sin again.\" Would you? Is not that repentance? What else is it,\nthink you?\n\nSuppose you had a disobedient and rebellious son, and he had been\nliving irrespective of your law and will, wasting your money and\ntrampling under foot your commandments. Suppose he comes back, he\nsees the error of his course. His eyes are opened, perhaps, by\naffliction, perhaps by want, or ten thousand other things. At any\nrate he sees it, and he comes home and says, \"Oh! father, what a fool\nI have been; how wicked I have been. I see it all now--I did not see\nit when I was doing it. I see my evil course, my sins that made you\nmourn, and turned your hair grey. Oh! how I hate it all. I repent in\ndust and ashes. Father! I forsake it all! I come home to you!\"  What\nwould you say? Would you say, \"My son, you have not repented enough.\nGo! begone! Wait till you feel it more!\"  No, your paternal heart\nwould go out in love and forgiveness, and you would put the kiss of\nyour reconciling love upon his cheek. \"Even so there is joy in the\npresence of the angels of God over one sinner that _repenteth!_\"\nas there would be joy in that family circle over the return of that\nwandering child.\n\nBut suppose that lad were to come and say, \"Father, I do thus\nrepent; I do thus forsake my sins; but there are some companions who\nwill follow me so closely that I am afraid I shall again fall under\ntheir power, and there are some habits so terrible that I am afraid\nthey will again conquer. Let me, then, be always by your side. You\nmust strengthen me.\" What would you say? Would you not say, \"Then,\ncome in, my son; sit by me, live with me, and I will shield you--I\nwill deliver you? Thou shalt never cross this threshhold without me.\nI will live with you; I will hold you up.\" And, as far as a human\nbeing could shield another, you would shield your son; he would never\nlack your sympathy or your strength day or night. Your Heavenly\nFather lacks neither sympathy or strength. His eye never sleeps. His\narm never tires, and you have only to go and lay your helpless\nweakness on His Almighty strength by this one desperate leap of\nfaith, and He will hold you up, even though there were a legion of\ndevils around you.\n\nLastly, you _renounce_ your sins, that is, in will, purpose, and\ndetermination. You say, \"I never wish to grieve Him again.\" You\nsing it, and you feel it. \"I never want to grieve Him any more;\" and\nif you could only live without grieving Him, you would not much mind,\neven if it were in hell itself. Is not that penitence? You know it\nis. You renounce sin. You do not say, \"Lord Jesus, save me with this\nright hand, with this right eye; Lord Jesus, save me with these\nforbidden things hanging about my skirts.\" No; you say, \"Lord Jesus,\nsave me out of them. Make me clean.\" That is penitence. You see it.\nYou hate it. You renounce it. Now then, believe on the Lord Jesus\nChrist. Oh, Holy Spirit, reveal the simple way of faith.\n\nIII. You say, \"How am I to believe?\" Some despairing soul asked me\nthis in large letters, \"How am I to believe?\" How does a bride\nbelieve in her husband when she gives herself to him at the altar?\nShe trusts him with herself. She believes in him. She makes a\ncontract, and goes home, and lives as if it were true. That is\n_faith_. How do you trust your physician when you are sick, as\nyou lay in repose or anguish upon your bed? You trust him with your\ncase. You commit yourself to him. You believe in his skill, and obey\nhis orders. Have faith like this in Jesus Christ.\n\nTrust and obey, and expect that it is going to be with you according\nto His Word.\n\nInstead of this, the faith of many people is like that of a person\nafflicted with some grievous malady. A friend tells him of a\nwonderful physician who has cured hundreds of such cases, and gives\nhim abundant evidence that this doctor is able and willing to cure\nhim, if he will only commit himself to his treatment. The sick man\nmay thoroughly believe in the testimony of his friend about this\nphysician, and yet, for some secret reason, he may refuse to put\nhimself into his hands. Now, there are numbers like that with Jesus\nChrist. They believe He could cure the malady of sin on certain\nconditions. They believe He is no respecter of persons. They believe\nHe has done it for hundreds as bad as they, and yet there is some\nreason why they do not _trust Him_. They hold back.\n\nNow, what you want is to give your case into His hands, and say,\n\"Lord Jesus, I come as Thou hast bid me, confessing and forsaking\nsin. If I could, I would jump out of it now and forever. Thou knowest\nI come renouncing it, but not having power to save myself from it;\nand now, Lord Jesus, Thou hast said, \"Him that cometh unto Me, I will\nin no wise cast out.\" I do come; Thou dost not cast me out; Thou dost\ntake me; Thou dost receive me. Blessed, Holy Father, I give myself to\nThee. I put my sins upon the glorious sacrifice of Thy Son. Thou hast\nsaid Thou wilt receive me, and pardon me for His sake. Now, I roll\nthe guilty burden on His bleeding body, and I believe Thy promise, I\ntrust Thee to be as good as Thy word.\" _That is faith_. \"Oh!\" said a\ndear lady, \"I do not feel it.\"  No: you must trust first. Mark, not\nbelieve you are saved, but believe that He does now save you.\n\n\"What things soever ye desire when ye pray, believe that ye receive\nthem, and ye shall have them.\" That is the law of faith. Believe that\nye receive it before you feel it; when you receive it then you shall\nfeel it. God shall be true, and every man or devil who contradicts\nHim, a liar. Throw your arms around the Crucified. Take fast hold of\nthe hand of the Son of God. Put your poor, guilty soul right at the\nfoot of His cross, and say, \"Thou dost receive; Thou dost pardon;\nThou dost cleanse; Thou dost save;\" and keep using the language of\nfaith. I have seen numbers of souls step into liberty repeating these\nprecious words in the first person, \"He was wounded for _my_\ntransgressions, He was bruised for _my_ iniquities, the chastisement of\n_my_ peace was laid upon Him, and by His stripes _I am_ healed.\" Keep\nusing the language of faith all the way home to-night. Go into your\ncloset and say, \"I am determined to be saved, if there is any such thing\nas salvation.\" Resolve that if you perish, you will perish in that room,\nat the foot of the cross, suing for pardon, and you will get it. I have\nnever known a soul come to this who did not soon get saved. Get into the\nlifeboat. Put off from the old stranded wreck of your own righteousness\nor your own efforts; step right into the lifeboat of His broken,\nbleeding body. Take fast hold, and resolve that you will never let go\nuntil the answering Spirit comes into your soul, crying, \"Abba, Father,\"\nand you shall know of a truth that you have passed from death unto life.\nThe Lord help you. Amen.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nCHARITY.\n\n\n  And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest\n  of these is charity.--1 COR. xiii. 13.\n\nIt must be a precious thing to be greater than _faith_, and\ngreater than _hope_--it must, indeed, be precious!--and, just in\nproportion as things are valuable and precious amongst men, so much\ntrouble and risk will human speculators take to counterfeit them. I\nsuppose that in no department of roguery in this roguish world, has\nthere been more time and ingenuity expended, than in making\ncounterfeit money, especially bank notes. Just as wicked men have\ntried to imitate the most valuable of human productions for their own\nprofit, so the devil has been trying to counterfeit God's most\nprecious things from the beginning, and to produce something so like\nthem that mankind at large should not see the difference, and,\nperhaps, in no direction has he been so successful as in producing a\n_Spurious Charity_.--I almost think he has got it to perfection\nin these days. I don't think he can very well improve on the present\ncopy. This Charity--this love--is God's most precious treasure; it is\ndearer to His heart than all the vast domains of His universe--dearer\nthan all the glorious beings He has created. So much so, that when\nsome of the highest spirits amongst the angelic bands violated this\nlove, He hurled them from the highest Heaven to the nethermost hell!\nWhy? Not because He did not value those wonderful beings, but because\nHe valued this _love more_. Because He saw that it was more\nimportant to the well-being of His universe to maintain the harmony\nof love in Heaven than to save those spirits who had allowed\nselfishness to interfere with it. So our Lord says, \"I beheld Satan\nas lightning fall from Heaven.\"\n\nThe day is coming when He will behold all the dire progeny of this\nfirst rebellion fall also. Haste, happy day!\n\nBut, let us look for a few minutes at this precious, beautiful\nCharity. Let us try, first, to define it. What is it?\n\n_First_.--_It is Divine_. It must be shed abroad in the heart by the\nHoly Ghost.\n\nIn vain do we look for this heavenly plant amongst the unrenewed\nchildren of men--it grows not on the corrupt soil of human nature; it\nsprings only where the ploughshare of true repentance has broken up\nthe fallow ground of the heart, and where faith in a crucified\nSaviour has purified it, and where the blessed Holy Spirit has taken\npermanent possession. It is the love _of_ God--not only love _to_ God,\nbut _like_ God, _from_ God, and fixed on the same objects and ends which\nHe loves. It is a Divine implantation by the Holy Ghost. Perhaps some of\nyou are saying, \"Then it is useless for me to try to cultivate it,\nbecause I have not got it,--exactly!\" You may cut and prune and water\nforever, but you can never cultivate that which is not planted. Your\nfirst work is to get this love shed abroad in your heart. It is one of\nthe delusions of this age that human nature only wants pruning,\nimproving, developing, and it come out right. No, no! Every plant which\nmy Heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up. If you want this\nDivine love, you must break up the fallow ground of your hearts, and\ninvite the Heavenly Husbandman to come and sow it--shed it abroad in\nyour soul.\n\n_Secondly_, I want you to note that this love is a Divine principle, in\ncontradistinction to the mere love of instinct. All men have love as an\ninstinct; mere natural love towards those whom they like, or who do well\nfor them. \"If ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not\neven publicans the same?\" Wicked men love one another from mere natural\naffinity, as the tiger loves its cubs. There is great confusion amongst\nprofessors of religion on this subject. They feel sentiments of pity and\ngenerosity towards their fellow-men, and they may even give their goods\nto feed the poor, and yet not have a spark of Divine Charity in their\nhearts. Saul, after God departed from him, was not wholly destitute of\ngenerous feeling respecting his family and kingdom. Dives in hell had\nsome pity for his brethren! But neither of them had a spark of this\nDivine Charity. Mind you are not deceived; millions are!\n\nLet us note one or two points wherein a spurious and Divine Charity\nutterly and forever diverge--disagree in nature.\n\n_First._--Spurious Charity is selfish--is never exercised but\nto gratify some selfish principle in human nature. Thousands of\nmotives inspire it--too many to enumerate; but we will glance at two\nor three. We read in the context that a man might give his goods to\nfeed the poor, and his body to be burned, and yet be destitute of\ntrue Charity.\n\nNow what an anomaly. But we have wonderful illustrations that such a\nthing is possible. First, a man may do this to support and carry out\na favorite system of intellectual belief of which he has become\nenamored, just as men become absorbed, in politics, or in what they\nconsider the good of their nation, so that they will even go to the\ncannon's mouth to promote it.\n\nFurther, a man may do it in order to merit eternal life. Paul did\nthis when he went about to establish his own righteousness. He tells\nus afterwards that self was the mainspring of all his zeal. It was\nall his own exaltation; there was no Divine love; he was an utterly\nunrenewed, Christless, and selfish man, at the very time he was doing\nthis.\n\nOr, it may be, in the third place, to gratify a naturally generous\ndisposition. I used to say to a generous friend of mine, when he was\ntalking in a confidential way about his giving, and the delight it\ngave him, attributing it to Divine grace--I used to put my hand on\nhis, and say, \"Hold! my friend; I am not so sure it is all grace. You\nlike giving better than other people do receiving. Look out that you\ndo not lose your reward through not taking the trouble to see what\nyou give to; don't give your money to every scheme that comes across\nyou. Remember that you are answerable to God for your wealth, and\nthat God will demand of you HOW you have bestowed your goods.\" That\nis true Charity that takes the trouble to investigate relative\nclaims, and tries to find out the best channels in which to give for\nGod's glory and the salvation of men. Don't you put down your\ngenerosity to the Holy Ghost if it is not of that kind, for you will\nnever receive a bit of interest for it, here or hereafter--not a\nfraction!\n\nA false Charity begins in self and ends on earth. Here is a mark for\nyou to distinguish between it and God's Charity. The devil's Charity\nalways contemplates the earthy part of man in a superior degree to\nthe spiritual part; and here it exactly crosses and contradicts the\nDivine Charity, which always contemplates man in the entirety of his\nbeing, and always gives the first importance to the soul.\n\nWe have plenty of spurious Charity in these days. The other day when\nI took up a so-called \"religious print,\" and saw some fulsome things\nit had been saying about a certain individual, lately dead, I\nthought, really, would one ever imagine this were a Christian paper,\nin a Christian country? There is not the slightest recognition of a\nsoul, no reference to the man's spiritual condition or his future\nstate. Here are one or two of the most ordinary human qualifications\nseized on, and made the most of, to make it out that he was something\nbeyond his fellows, but, as to any recognition of a soul, or of a God\nwho will judge him, of a Heaven or hell, nothing!\n\nOh, people say, when speaking of Godless, and even wicked men, \"You\nmust be _charitable,_ you must not judge.\" Satan does not care\nhow much of this one-sided Charity there is; the more the better for\nhis purpose; it will make people all the more comfortable in their\nsins, and get them all the more easily down to hell.\n\nMy friends, are you more concerned about relieving temporal distress\nthan you are about feeding famished souls? If you are, you may know\nwhere your charity comes from! Don't misrepresent me, and say that I\nteach all of one, and none of the other. God forbid, for, if any man\n\"hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and\nshutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love\nof God in him?\" But, on the other side, if he sees him spiritually\nfamishing--dying for want of the bread of life--how dwelleth the love\nof Christ in him, if he does not minister to this spiritual\ndestitution? I know that real Christianity cares for body and soul.\nBless God, it does; but, always mind that it sets the soul FIRST. I\nknow the Master fed the multitude; but, before that, He had them with\nHim three days, trying to save their souls, and when they got hungry\nin the process, then He made them sit down, and fed their bodies. He\nalways looked after the soul first, and so does everyone possessed of\nDivine Charity.\n\nWhy? Because Divine Charity has opened his eyes. He realizes the\nvalue of souls. He sees them famishing. He sees them being damned,\nand he cannot help himself. His desire to save them rushes out of him\nlike a torrent; he beholds them, and has compassion on them. Try your\nCharity by this mark: Do you contemplate the dying, famishing,\nhalf-damned souls of your fellow-men? Do you look abroad on the state of\nthe world, and the state of the church? Do you think about it? Do you\ngo into your closet, and spread it before the Lord, as Hezekiah and\nJeremiah and Hosea did? Do you look at it, and turn it over, and weep\nover it, and pray and cry, as Daniel and Paul did? Try yourselves, my\nbrethren, my sisters, by this mark.\n\nDivine Charity is always revolving round that great problem of\ninfinite love. \"What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole\nworld, and lose his own soul?\" Oh, I can never get it out of my ears\nor away from my heart! Oh, how I see the emptiness and vanity of\neverything compared with the salvation of the soul! What does it\nmatter, if a man dies in the work-house--if he dies on a door-step,\ncovered with wounds, like Lazarus--what does it matter, if his soul\nis saved? It is your creed as much as mine, that the soul is\nimmortal, and that the death of the body is only its introduction, if\nit be saved, to a glorious future of everlasting felicity, progress,\nand holiness. Does the child remember how he used to cry over his\nlessons, when he becomes a man? Does he remember all the little\ndifficulties of his school days, when he is inheriting the fruits of\nthem? Just so; ten thousand times less important will be all our\nsufferings, trials, and griefs here, if we save our souls, and the\nsouls of others.\n\nThis Divine Charity makes everything else subservient to the\nsalvation of souls; it uses everything else to save and bless the\ninner and spiritual man. Do you remember, on one occasion, when the\nMaster had fed the multitudes, and when they came to Him again to be\nfed, He said, \"Ye seek Me, not because ye saw the miracles, but\nbecause ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled.\" You would have\nsaid, \"Quite right; the people want to be fed; they are hungry.\" But\ndo you hear the Divine lament that comes out in these words, that\nthey were so spiritually obtuse, that they valued the earthly bread\nmore than the heavenly! Give them as much temporal bread as you like,\nbut mind you give them the spiritual bread first, for this is\ncharacteristic of true Charity.\n\nHave you got this Charity? Every soul knows whether it has or not.\nPeople are so unphilosophical in religion; they talk about not\nknowing; but you can find out in two minutes whether you love God or\nyourself best. Tell me that woman does not know whether she loves her\nhusband or herself best! Nonsense! What is the proof?--she seeks to\nplease him, and is willing to sacrifice herself for him--in fact,\nmerges her interests altogether in his. Do you love God best? Are you\nwilling to forego your interests, and to seek His? Have you this\nDivine Charity, born of Heaven, tending to Heaven? If not, my friend,\nresolve you will have it now. Begin to cry mightily to God, for the\nHoly Spirit to shed it abroad in your heart; give up your quibblings\nand reasonings, and go down at the foot of the cross and ask\nHim,--\"Come, Lord, and break up this poor, wicked heart of mine, and shed\nthis beautiful, pure, Divine Charity abroad in it,\" and then you will\nnot, henceforth, seek your own, but the things that are Jesus Christ's.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nCHARITY AND REBUKE.\n\n\n  And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest\n  of these is charity.--1 COR. xiii. 13.\n\nThe second main point of difference between a true and a false\nCharity, we want to remark, is, _Divine Charity is not only\nconsistent with, but it very often necessitates, reproof and rebuke\nby its possessor_. It renders it incumbent on those who possess it\nto reprove and rebuke whatever is evil--whatever does not tend to\nthe highest interests of its object.\n\nThis Charity conforms in this, as in everything else, to its Divine\nmodel--\"As many as I love I rebuke and chasten\"--when necessary for\nthe good of its object, for He doth not _willingly_ afflict or\ngrieve the children of men, any more than a father willingly\nchastises a disobedient child; but, if he be a wise father, he will\ndo it because he loves it. Just so the possessor of this Divine\nCharity can afford to rebuke and reprove sin wherever he finds it. He\nwill not suffer sin upon his neighbor, but will in any wise reprove\nhim, and strive to win him to the right. We will just turn to a\nbeautiful illustration (there are many, if we had time to go into\nthem) of the working of this Divine Charity in the heart and life of\nthe very apostle who wrote this 13th of Corinthians. We cannot get\nwrong, because it is Paul himself. (Gal. ii. 11-15.)\n\n\"But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face,\nbecause he was to be blamed. For before that certain came from James,\nhe did eat with the Gentiles; but when they were come, he withdrew\nand separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision.\nAnd the other Jews dissembled likewise with him; insomuch that\nBarnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation. But when I\nsaw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the\nGospel, I said unto Peter before _them_ all\"--\n\nWell done, Paul,--noble, gloriously courageous Charity that! He did\nnot go and mutter behind Peter's back and stab him in the dark--\n\n\"I said unto Peter _before them all_, If thou, being a Jew, livest after\nthe manner of the Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou\nthe Gentiles to live as do the Jews? We _who are_ Jews by nature, and\nnot sinners of the Gentiles.\"\n\nYou want a characteristic of true Charity. Now, listen to it. It\nwould be exceedingly painful to Paul thus publicly to rebuke Peter.\nThey loved one another, for we find Peter, long after this, in one of\nhis Epistles, calling Paul \"our beloved brother, Paul.\" They loved\none another. Paul understood the claims of true Charity, for he wrote\nthis thirteenth of Corinthians. If he loved Peter, and if he\nunderstood the claims of true Charity, why did he thus openly rebuke\nPeter, why did he inflict upon himself the pain of doing it?\nFaithfulness to Peter himself, faithfulness to the truth,\nfaithfulness to Jesus Christ demanded it; therefore, he sacrificed\nhis own personal feelings, and inflicted this pain upon himself,\nrather than allow Peter to go wrong, the Romans to be misled, and the\nJews to be carried away with worldly policy. Paul set himself to\nrebuke Peter in the presence of all, for truth lay, as it very often\ndoes, with the minority; nearly all the influence was on the side of\nthe circumcision. _They_ were the most influential of the\nbrethren, and Paul set himself against all this influence in his\nrebuke of Peter. Why? Because faithfulness to the truth demanded it,\nand Divine Charity is FIRST PURE.\n\nThere is a greater example still in our Lord Himself, in the Master\nwhose whole soul was love, whose life was one sacrifice for the good\nof His creatures; and yet how faithfully He reproved His own when\nthey erred from the truth, and how fearlessly He exposed and\ndenounced the shallowness and hypocrisy of those who professed to\nlove God, and yet contradicted this profession in their lives. How\nfearlessly He reproved sin everywhere. He said to his disciples on\none occasion, \"Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the\nSon of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them.\" As\nif He had said, you ought to have learned this before now.\n\nOn another occasion, He said, \"Are ye also yet without\nunderstanding?\" And again, \"Get thee behind me, Satan, for thou\nsavourest not the things that be of God;\" that was Divine Charity,\nthat was faithful love, that dared to rebuke, rather than let the\nobject of it do wrong, and sin against God. And again, when He goes\nto the hypocrites and Pharisees, He says, \"Ye say ye are the children\nof Abraham\"--(it was as difficult for Jesus Christ to confute the\nprofessors of His day, as it is for His ambassadors to confute the\nprofessors of this day, who are living inconsistently with their\nprofessions)--He said, \"Ye say that ye are the children of Abraham;\nif ye were the children of Abraham, ye would listen to me; or, if ye\nwere the children of God, ye would believe in me, for I came out from\nGod. No! ye are the children of your father, the devil, and his works\nye do.\" And yet His Divine heart was full, to breaking, of love, and\nbroke itself on the cross for them, and prayed, \"Father, forgive\nthem; for they know not what they do.\" Oh, that your Charity and mine\nmight not lack this lineament of the Divine likeness! Would to God\nthere were more of this faithful, loving Charity, that dares to\nreprove sin, and to rebuke its brother, instead of the false Charity\nthat fawns on a man to his face, and goes behind him and stabs him in\nthe back.\n\nDo you suppose that the great mass of the professors of this\ngeneration think one another to be right? Take almost any given\nchurch. Do you suppose that the great mass of the members of that\nchurch suppose in their hearts that their fellow members, brothers\nand sisters in church communion, are living consistently--I don't\nmean in _things_ only, but in heart--that they are living really\ngodly lives? Alas! witness what they say behind each other's backs.\nThey believe no such thing; they know perfectly well it is not so,\nand they take care to tell other people so; and yet there is not one\nin a thousand of them ever went privately to his brother, and took\nlovingly hold of his hand, and reproved him for his sinful and\nbacksliding conduct.\n\nWhat would be thought of any woman who were to go, after being to\nchurch the day before, and ask for a private interview with Mrs. ----,\nand, when alone with her, with tears in her eyes, and deep\nearnestness in her voice, were to say, \"Dear Mrs. ----, I have come to\nsee you on a very painful errand, but will you suffer a word of\nexhortation from one so unworthy and weak as I feel myself to be, and\nyet, I trust, one who has the Spirit of God, which urges me to come\nto you? Will you allow me to say that I was much pained with your\nattitude at church, yesterday. It seemed to me that your mind was not\nat all occupied with the solemnity of the service, but seemed to be\noccupied in criticising the person's dress in the seat opposite to\nyou, and I could not help noticing that when you got outside the\ndoors you began to laugh and talk in a way quite incompatible with\nthe service you had been attending?\" If she were to say, \"Dear Mrs. ----,\nI have not mentioned this to a soul, not even to my husband, but I\nhave come to tell it to you; let us go down before the Lord and ask\nHim for the Holy Spirit, that He may show you how wrong you are, and\nhow you are sliding away from the love of God\"--what would be the\nthought, what would be said, of such conduct?\n\nIf everybody who sees sin upon his neighbor would do that--if he\nwould take the Lord's counsel and go and see his brother alone, and\ntell him his fault--how many would be saved from backsliding, and how\nmany a disgraceful split and controversy in churches might be saved!\n\nBut where are the people who will do it? I don't mean there are not\nany--God forbid--I know there are; but I am speaking comparatively.\nWhere is the man who will inflict pain upon himself?--for that is the\npoint. If it were a pleasant duty, he would do it easily enough; but\nit is a painful duty, he does not like to screw himself up to it.\nWhere is the man that will do it, rather than suffer his brother to\ngo to sleep in his sin, and rather than the precious cause of Christ\nshall be disgraced and injured? Where are the saints who will go in\nmeekness and in love to try to reclaim the one who has erred? I hope\nyou know a great many. I am sorry to say I know only a few. If you\nknow many, I am very glad, and the more you know the better I am\npleased. If you are one of these, that is one, at all events. If\nevery Christian would have this sort of Charity, what a change would\nsoon come about. That is what the church wants--people who can afford\nto rebuke and reprove, because they don't care what men think of THEM\n--who are set only on pleasing their Lord and Master, and doing His\nwill.\n\nHave you got this Charity that seeketh not her own? What a contrast\nbetween Saul and Paul. Did you ever think about it? What does he say?\n\"I went about to establish my own righteousness.\" That was his\ninspiring motive; that was the spring of his action, before he got\ntrue Charity; not that he cared for the kingdom of God, but he cared\nfor his own honor, glory, and exaltation, and wanted to stand well\nwith his nation. Then contrast him when he becomes Paul. What does he\nsay? \"For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my\nbrethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh.\" _There_ is\nCharity, if you like. These were the very people with whom he had\nbeen so anxious to stand well, and whose good word he wanted; but,\nwhen the Holy Ghost had come, and Paul had got the Divine Charity,\nand got his eyes opened to see their devilish and lost condition, he\nso weeps over them that he says, \"I have great heaviness and\ncontinual sorrow in my heart. For I could wish that myself were\naccursed from Christ, for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the\nflesh.\"\n\n_There is a contrast_. He does not care now, what they think of\nHIM; he is going about, trying to open their eyes and make them see\nthat they are not the children of Abraham, but the children of the\ndevil, that they are going to the bottomless pit, and that, unless\nthey turn round and seek the God of their fathers, they must perish.\nSelf is lost sight of altogether, now; Paul's heart and soul and\nefforts are set on the salvation of men. If they choose to; praise\nhim, he takes it as a matter of course; if they choose to condemn\nhim, he takes that as a matter of course, too. He is seeking the\nkingdom, and, however men treat him, the kingdom he seeks, right on\nto martyrdom. He runs the gauntlet of their direst hate and malice,\nthat he may open their eyes and turn them from Satan to God, and from\nsin to righteousness. Self is lost sight of; it is not Paul now--it\nis Christ and His kingdom.\n\nFalse Charity is the opposite of this. Its possessor is most\nconcerned about what people think of HIM; not how they treat his\nprofessed Lord. The possessor of false Charity cannot afford to\nreprove anybody. Oh, dear, no! he would faint at the very idea; and\nhe calls people hard and legal and censorious who dare to do it--poor,\nsneaking coward! but he will not be afraid to stab a man behind\nhis back. The speech of this false Charity betrayeth it, it\nflattereth with its lips; honey is on its tongue, but the poison of\nasps is underneath; beware of it! Even when it professes to commend a\nbrother, or neighbor, it rolls up its sanctimonious eyes, and always\nputs a \"but\" in--one of the devil's \"buts.\" \"Oh, he is a good man,\nbut--.\" \"Yes, I have a great esteem for him, only there is such and\nsuch a thing.\" Oh, it is very Divine. The devil can put on a garb of\nlight when it answers his purpose. Oh, the fair reputations that this\nslime of the serpent has trailed over! Oh, the influence for good\nthat this venom of the devil has poisoned and ruined, for it has\nbeen, truly said, \"There is no virtue so white that back-wounding\ncalumny will not strike\"--even in God's perfect man, those who are\nwatching and seeking to betray can find something on which to ground\ntheir accusations.\n\nI say, mind which Charity you have got True Charity, rejoiceth not\nin iniquity. Are you conscious in your soul of a feeling of triumph\nwhen anybody that you don't like happens to fall on some evil thing?\nIf you have, look out--the devil has got hold of you. Do you rejoice\nin iniquity when it happens to an enemy? If so, woe be to you, unless\nyou get that venom out. God won't have it in Heaven. _One man with\nthat venom in him would damn Paradise_, \"Love your enemies\"--love\nthem; \"bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and\npray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; that ye\nmay be the children of your Father which is in Heaven.\" Now, my\nbrother, my sister, try yourself. \"We shall meet again, and you will\nfind that these are no imaginary vagaries that I have been talking\nof; they are realities--though these great realities of our Christianity\nare seldom preached in these days; but they are _here_, and there is no\ntruth in you if you have not got the Charity which hates evil as evil,\nand which will reprove it, and root it out, and have it _cured_!\"\n\nHere, again, false Charity is the very antipodes of the Divine. It\ndoes not care much about righteousness. Quietness is its beau ideal\nof all that is lovely and excellent. It says, \"Let us be quiet; you\nmust not disturb the peace of the church.\" It cries, \"Peace, peace!\"\nwhen there is no peace. It says, \"We cannot help these evils. Every\nman must look after himself; we are not responsible for our\nneighbor.\" It knows very often that there are continents of dirt\nunderneath--\"things,\" and \"systems,\" and men--which it chooses to\npatronize; but then, it is covered up, and so it says, \"Let it alone;\nwe cannot have a smudge. Let it alone. Peace! Peace! Never mind\nrighteousness--the church must be supported, if the money does come\nout of the dried-up vitals of drunkards and harlots; never mind, we\nmust have it. Never mind if our songs are mixed with the shrieks of\nwidows and orphans, of the dying and damned! Sing away, sing away,\nand drown their voices. Never mind; we cannot have it looked into,\nand rooted out, and pulled up. Peace; we must have peace!\" And they\ncall you, as Ahab did Elijah, the disturber of Israel, if you dare to\ntouch the sore place and exhibit their putrifying wounds and bruises;\nand when you say to them, \"The law of life is, 'Do unto others as you\nwould they should do unto you,'\" they impudently turn upon you and\nsay, \"But we are not expected to be perfect in this life,\" and so\nthey throw a thicker covering over the filth, and on it goes.\n\nThis is the devil's Charity; and the more the better for his\npurpose. But the Charity and the wisdom which is from above, is first\npure, and then peaceable! I would rather be in everlasting warfare in\ncompany with that which is fair, and true, and good, than I would\nwalk in harmony with that which is hollow, and rotten, and vile, and\ndestined for the bottomless pit. The Lord help you to make the same\nchoice!\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nCHARITY AND CONFLICT.\n\n\n  And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest\n  of these is charity.--1 COR. xiii. 13.\n\nAnother characteristic of this Divine Charity is, that it OFTEN\nINVOLVES CONFLICT.\n\nIt was so with our Lord. He was the very personification of it. He\nwas love itself, and grace and truth poured from His lips\nincessantly. His blessed feet went about doing good, and His hands\nministering to the necessities and happiness of His creatures, yet\nHis whole course through this degenerate world was one of conflict,\nopposition, and persecution. His proper mission was to bring peace on\nearth; but the result of it was a sword! Why? That was not His fault.\nHe would, doubtless, have enjoyed being at peace with all men, as His\nambassador exhorts us--\"as much as lieth in us to be.\" More, He was\nthe Prince of Peace! Then, how was it that wherever He went, there\nwas sword, opposition, and conflict to the death? Because men\n_resisted_ and _rejected_ His Divine and Heavenly ministrations. They\nwould not hear His rebukes and His teaching, because they condemned\nthem. They would not listen to His voice, because they were of their\nfather the devil, and the works of their father they would do; and,\ntherefore, they went about to persecute Him, and to kill Him.\n\nThis was the reason--not that _He_ wanted it to be so, but it\nwas the consequence of their resistance to the beautiful, heavenly,\nand Divine truths which He taught; and it is just so now, with the\nsame truth, and the living embodiments of such truth. JESUS CHRIST\nCOME IN THE FLESH AGAIN IN HIS PEOPLE, living out before the world\nHis principles, acting upon His precepts, living for the same objects\nfor which He lived, will produce, exactly and everywhere, the same\nresult. It must be so while men are divided into two classes--the\nrighteous and the wicked--those who are born of the flesh, and those\nwho are born of the Spirit. One must either give in, or there must be\nperpetual conflict and warfare. It was so with the Saviour, and so,\nperhaps, with some of us.\n\nI think this is often a snare to God's really sincere people. I\nthink some of God's people are afraid; they don't like the feeling\nthat their hand is against every man, and every man's hand against\nthem, or nearly so. They do not like the feeling of isolation; they\ndo not like being compelled to take a course which nearly all the\nChristian professors round about them condemn, and make out to be\nuncharitable, and they often examine themselves to see whether it is\npossible that they may be going wrong in following the Divine Spirit.\nThey say with Jeremiah, and with the Jeremiahs of every age, \"Woe is\nme, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man of strife and a man of\ncontention to the whole earth!\" They are as \"speckled birds, against\nwhom all the birds round about are gathered.\" They feel this\nopposition and conflict deeply, but what are they to do? Very often,\nin following the leadings of the Divine Spirit, it is impossible for\nus to avoid such consequences. We have to march through troops of\nopposing forces. We have to become the subjects of almost universal\nsuspicion. But what then? Must we give in? Must we decline to tread\nin the bloodstained footsteps of the Captain of our salvation? Must\nwe decline the honor of being in the advance guard of the Lamb's army\nbecause of the conflict, because of the pain, because of the\npersecution? Nay, nay; let us hold on, those here, who are thus led\nby the Divine Spirit into paths which involve conflict with\neverybody. Follow on, brother! follow on, sister!\n\nThere is no point on which those who want to come out thoroughly for\nGod, suffer more than oh this. They continually say, \"You see, my\nfriends\"--they are Christian, friends--\"my friends object.\" People\ncome, to see me, or they write that the Spirit of God has been urging\nthem into a certain course, for months or years, and they are held\nback by the opinions and wishes, perhaps, of parents, or of brothers\nand sisters, or uncles, or aunts, or Christian friends.\n\n_I believe it will be found, in the great day of account, that\nthere have been more blessed enterprises crushed, more leadings of\nthe Holy Ghost disobeyed, more urgings of the Spirit quenched,\nthrough the influence of what are called Christian friends, than all\nother influences put together. \"Suffer me first to go and bury my\nfather,\" is an everlasting standing excuse for those whom, the Lord\ncalls on in advance paths of Christian service! Oh, my friends, I am\nsure of it. Look out, you fathers and mothers, you brothers and\nsisters, and aunts!_\n\nDo not misunderstand me. Carefully weigh, probe, and examine, before\nGod, your impressions and desires. Go into your closet, spread them\nthere before the Lord. Lay them out, examine your own heart. Be sure\nthere is no self-interest, no vain glory, no desire to be great, or\nto do some out-of-the-way thing. Be as clear as you like; be\nsatisfied, in your own mind, that it is God's call, and then let\nfathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, husbands, or wives complain--but\ngo forward, my brother, and God will justify you. If, twenty years\nago, I had stopped for Christian friends to sanction and to open the\ndoor, I should have waited till today, and the number of souls God,\nin His infinite mercy, has given me, I should not have gathered. But\nI did not wait for anybody's sanction to my Lord and Master's call;\nbut said, \"Lord, if I die in attempting it, I will do it.\" He seldom\nlets people die in attempting His will. He stands by them, and gives\nthem abundant fruit.\n\nA lady said to me the other day, \"You know my father is a Christian,\nand I am so afraid of going opposite to him.\" \"Yes,\" I said, \"that is\nquite a right feeling; I respect that feeling in you.\" But she was a\nwoman of considerably matured age, and I added, \"But is your father\nawake to the interests of God's kingdom as he ought to be?\" She\nreplied, \"I dare not say he is.\" \"I suppose,\" I said \"he is\ncomparatively old--a sort of dried-up Christian, who has lost the\nvigor and enterprise of his youthful days, when he wanted to go out\nand make everybody Christian?\" \"Yes,\" she said, \"he has gone sadly\nbehind in his zeal for the kingdom of Jesus Christ.\" \"Now,\" I said,\n\"God holds you responsible, just as He holds any other being. _He\nhas not two codes-one for men and one for women._ There will be no\ntwo judgment seats, whatever men do here. God will hold you\nresponsible for obedience to the teaching of His Spirit, and the\nleading of His providence, as much as your brother. What shall you\nsay? You will be in the position of the man who said, 'Suffer me\nfirst to go and bury my father.'\" She said, \"I am afraid I shall.\"\n\nNow, I say, let us settle this, you Protestant Christians here.\nBecause Catholicism has abused this principle, that a man is to leave\nhis father and mother, and houses and lands, if needs be, is that any\nreason that we Protestants are to give it up? And has it come to\nthis, that a man has only to follow Christ when everybody approves it\n--cries \"Amen\"--and when his own interests appear to him to be\nsecured by so doing? Then, if it were so, I would give up religion\naltogether, and go and enjoy myself. I said to a lady, \"When you\nmarried yourself to the Lord Jesus Christ, you put yourself in the\nsame position as you would to an earthly husband.\" What woman in the\nworld would feel that she ought to obey father and mother, rather\nthan her husband? Ridiculous! Much less is she to obey her father, if\nher father's wishes are exactly contrary to the Divine teaching. She\nis only to obey IN THE LORD, and yet thousands of fathers and mothers\nare preventing their children working for God. Oh! what will you say\nto God when your precious children stand at His bar, without the\nsheaves they might have gathered, and the souls they might have won?\nWhat will you say to Him? And why do you hold them back? Oh, the\nmean, paltry considerations that you would be ashamed to own before\nthis congregation! Is it for fear of suffering? Not in many\ninstances; but, even if it were, did you bargain with Jesus Christ\nwhen you gave yourself and children to Him, that they were not to\nsuffer for Him? Is it because of your pride?--because you want for\nthem this world's applause and favor? Look out! God has wonderful\nways of chastising His people in those very things in which they sell\nHis interest. But you say that \"everybody will be against you!\" Yes,\nvery likely. Let us settle that at once. Count all things dung and\ndross. Let none of these things move you. You say, \"It will be a life\nof conflict to the end.\" Very likely, so was His. \"I am so weak,\" you\nsay. He knows all about that. You say, \"It will be so cutting to have\npeople saying this, and saying the other.\" I know it is cutting, but\nthat is the path He calls you to tread, and He will give you grace to\nbear the cutting. \"Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and\npersecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you, falsely,\nfor my sake;\" and, \"If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy\nare ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you.\"\n\nHe does not show where He is leading us, so we can only go a step at\na time. The future may look dark, but let us be fully persuaded in\nour own minds that the step in advance is the step the Lord wants us\nto take--then take it, and leave the future with Him. Come out, as\nAbraham did, not knowing whither you go; and, as sure as He sits upon\nthe throne, He will vindicate your course, and, perhaps, the very\nthings that you sacrifice, or that you think you sacrifice, for Him,\nHe will give you, as the reward of your faithfulness.\n\nOh, have I not known many such instances. I have known daughters who\nhave been turned out of their father's houses for following the\nleadings of the Spirit of God, and who have endured all sorts of\npersecution, and trial, and suffering, and those fathers, when they\nwere dying, would have nobody else to pray with them but that\nindividual daughter. The way to win the souls of parents is by a\nconsistent, steadfast, holy consecration to the Lord Jesus; whereas,\nif you pander, and trim, and hesitate, you will miss the reward. Do\nyou think people do not know when we are inconsistent? Oh, yes, they\nknow quite well, and they say, \"That is not the right sort of\nreligion;\" but you be consistent and thorough, and God will honor\nthese very means to the winning of the souls about whom you are so\nconcerned.\n\nFurther, a false Charity shrinks from opposition. It cannot bear\npersecution. Now, here is one unfailing characteristic of a false\nCharity: _it is always on the winning side_--that is, apparently, down\nhere; not what will be, ultimately, the winning side. When Truth sits\nenthroned, with a crown on her head, this false Charity is most\nvociferous in her support and devotion; but when her garments trail in\nthe dust, and her followers are few, feeble, and poor, then Jesus Christ\nmay look after Himself. I sometimes think respecting this hue and cry\nabout the glory of God and the sanctity of religion, I would like to see\nsome of these saints put into the common hall with Jesus again, amongst\na band of ribald, mocking, soldiers. I would like to see, then, their\nzeal for the glory of God, when it touched their own glory. They are\nwonderfully zealous when their glory and His glory go together; but,\nwhen the mob is at His heels, crying, \"Away with Him!--crucify\nHim!--crucify Him!\"--then He may look after His own glory, and they will\ntake care of theirs.\n\nTrue Charity sticks to the LORD JESUS IN THE MUD, when He is\nfainting under His cross, as well as when the people are cutting down\nthe boughs and crying \"Hosanna!\" I fear many people make the Lord\nJesus Christ a stalking-horse on which to secure their ends. God\ngrant us not to be of that number, for, if we are, He will topple us\nfrom the very gates of Heaven down to the nethermost hell. This false\nCharity cannot go to the dungeon--you never find it at the stake. It\nalways manages to shift its sides, and change its face, before it\ngoes as far as that. Never in disgrace; never with Jesus Christ in\nthe minority, at Golgotha--on the cross. Always with Him when He is\nriding triumphant!\n\nOh, I often think if times of persecution were to come again how\nmany of us would be faithful? How many would go to the dungeon? How\nmany would stand by the truth, with hooting, howling mobs at our\nheels, such as followed Him on the way to the cross--such as stood\nround His cross and spat upon Him, and cast lots for His vesture, and\nparted His garments among them, and wagged their heads and cried, \"He\nsaved others; Himself He cannot save\"? How many of us would stick to\nHim then? But, as your soul and mine liveth, that is the only kind of\nlove that will stand the test of the Judgment Day.\n\nOh, have you got this Charity? Love in the darkness; Love in the\nGarden; Love in sorrow; Love in suffering; Love in isolation; Love in\npersecution; Love to the death!--Have we got this love? Examine\nyourselves, beloved, and see whether you are in the faith or not, for\nthere is much need of it in this day, when there are so many false\ngospels and so much false doctrine;--when we hear so much about being\n\"complete in Him\" by people who never were in Him at all, and no more\nunderstand what it means than the very kitten that lies on their\nhearth. I say, examine yourself, whether you be in the faith or not,\nand whether you are in Him; for, verily, it is no easier now to be\nHis real followers than ever it was.\n\nFurther, a false Charity _refuses to call things by their proper\nnames!_ Oh! what endless ways it has of putting lying! lying that\nis done on this day by professing Christians! Oh, the nice,\ncomfortable, self-indulgent ways it has of looking at ungodly trades\nand practices! What do I mean? I mean trades that cannot be made\nsubservient to the interest of the kingdom of Christ; trades that\nthrive by ministering either to the vile passions of human nature, or\nto the ungodliness of human nature. By what nice names it calls\nSatanic traffics in the bodies, hearts, and souls of men! And, when\nDivine Charity remonstrates with it, it turns round and says, \"Well,\nyou know, but we must have regard to our own interests; we have large\ninterests at stake.\" I sometimes say, \"God knows you have! and, when\nthe Judge riseth up to avenge those who have been oppressed and\ndestroyed by your iniquitous traffics, you will find them sadly TOO\nLARGE, TOO BIG FOR THE HELL ITSELF TO CONTAIN.\"\n\nThe Lord have mercy on any of you who are living on the follies or\nwickedness of your fellow-men. Make haste to get out of such trades.\nWash your hands of them, for, depend upon it, that is the devil's\nCharity that would try to make you comfortable in them! It has\nnothing to do with Divine Charity.\n\n\"Oh, my soul, come not into their secret; unto their assembly, mine\nhonor, be not thou united,\" but stand aloof from all such alliances\nof light with darkness, of truth with falsehood; \"have no fellowship\nwith the unfruitful works of darkness,\" \"For behold the day cometh\nthat shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do\nwickedly, shall be stubble; and the day that cometh shall burn them\nup, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root\nnor branch.\" He is the same God; He changes not! Let us call things\nby their right names. Let us face the evil. Let us chase it out of\nthe world--or, at any rate, chase it out of the church. Depend upon\nit, the Lord is going to prove all things. I can hear, as it were,\nthe rumbling of the earthquake of the Divine indignation underground,\nI can see the gathering of the Divine wrath overhead; and, IF THIS\nNATION DOES NOT REPENT, AND IF THE CHURCHES OF THIS LAND DO NOT COME\nOUT AND WASH THEIR HANDS OF THESE THINGS, GOD WILL SEND US SUCH A\nBAPTISM OF BLOOD AS WE HAVE NEVER CONCEIVED OF, AND HE WILL PUT US\nOUT, and put some other nation in our place, or else He will act\ncontrary to all His former dealings with nations! Do you suppose that\nJerusalem was more guilty than we are? Have we not been exalted much\nhigher than Jerusalem ever was? And have we not sinned against\ngreater light and privilege than ever she did? Are not our professed\nChristians exactly the same in character as her Pharisees? Do they\nnot make fine and long prayers, and, at the same time, devour the\nwidow and fatherless? Yea, for hellish gain, do they not make widows\nand orphans wholesale? Might not God truly say of us, \"Ah, sinful\nnation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children\nthat are corrupters: they have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked\nthe Holy One of Israel unto anger: they are gone away backward.\" Even\nthe prophets prophesy falsely, and the people love to have it so!\n\nDo you say, \"No, we are not so _bad?\"_ I answer, look abroad\nover the land, open your eyes, observe and see. Has it not become\nproverbial--have you not heard it until your ears have tingled, and\nyour face burned with shame--\"Better go and deal with anybody than a\nChristian\"? and, alas! has there not been much ground for it? Have we\nany need to wonder that infidels wag their heads? Can you go into a\nshop where you are sure you will not be extortioned? Do you know\nanybody who keeps a conscience with respect to the profits he makes?\nIs there anybody scarcely who won't charge his neighbor more than the\narticle is worth, if he has a chance, and call it lawful? _That_\nis extortion. It may be only asking twopence for an article worth a\npenny, or a 1,000  pounds for what 700 pounds should buy; it does not\nmatter the amount--it is EXTORTION!\n\nGod puts extortioners amongst the blackest of sinners. The Lord help\nme to \"Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on\nthe things of others,\" and have the Charity that will not take a mean\nadvantage of my neighbor because I have the chance, and thus traduce\nthe precious name of the Holy Jesus by calling myself one of His\nfollowers. It is time this satanic Charity was swept out! The very\nfirst law, the very vital principle of true Charity, is _righteousness._\nThere is no Charity apart from righteousness. If your Charity is\nincompatible with righteousness, it is born of the devil and leads to\nhell!\n\nIf you have had anything revealed to you, in your heart or life,\nthat you see to be wrong, say, \"Here Lord, pour the light in; I am so\nglad You have shown this thing to me while there is time to alter it.\nNow bring your dissecting knife, and cut it away, even if the roots\ngo deep down into my very heart's core. I will have it out.\" Will\nyou? Will you be made true, straight, clean? Will you be made Divine?\nWill you be filled with the pure, holy love of God towards God, and\ntowards men, and all beings? That is what the Lord wants you to have.\nThis is what He has sent His Son to do. No subterfuge; no make-believe\nwork to get you into Heaven as you are; but He wants to make\nyou as He wants you to be, and _He can do it._ The Great\nPhysician is able, He is willing, He has got love enough, and power\nenough and grace enough to do it for you. Confide all your heart to\nHim. Will you have this Divine Charity wrought in you? It will make\nyou willing to suffer, to endure hardness, and shame, and contempt,\nand persecution. It will make you willing to do anything that human\nnature can do, and endure anything that human nature can suffer, that\nyou may accomplish the same purposes that He came to accomplish, that\nyou may help onward the progress of His glorious kingdom.\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nCHARITY AND LONELINESS.\n\n\n  And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest\n  of these is charity.-I COR. xiii. 13.\n\n_The possession of this Divine Charity often necessitates walking\nin a lonely path._\n\nNot merely in opposition and persecution, but _alone_ in it,\nand here, again, Jesus, who was the personification of Divine lore,\nstands out as our great example. He was emphatically alone, and of\nthe people there was none with Him. Even the disciples whom He had\ndrawn nearest to Him, and to whom He had tried to communicate most of\nHis thought and spirit, were so behind that He often had to reprove\nthem, and lament their obtuseness and want of sympathy. In the\ngreatness of His love He had to go forward into the darkness of\nGethsemane. He was alone while they slept, and then through ribaldry,\nscorn, and sarcasm, to the cross. Alas! alas! almost alone, except a\nfew--to their everlasting honor--poor faithful women--_alone!_\n\nAnd, as it was with the Master, so it has been with all those whom\nGod has called to go in advance of their race. It was so with John,\nand with Paul, and with most of the apostles, and with all those whom\nGod has called to extraordinary paths since. Must John have a\nrevelation of things shortly to come to pass? He must go alone into\nthe Isle of Patmos! Must Paul hear unspeakable words, not, at that\ntime, lawful for a man to utter? He must go alone into the third\nheaven, and not be allowed even to communicate what he saw and heard\nwhen he came down; alone, he must necessarily go in advance.\n\nAnd just so, when God has called some of His followers to an\nout-of-the-way path, they have had to go alone in an untrodden way.\nSuperior love necessitates a lonely walk. You shrink, and say, \"That\nseems so hard.\" Yes, I know; I wish I could make it easier, but I cannot\nhelp it. I simply state the fact, that superior love necessitates, in\nsome measure, a lonely walk, because you see it is only they who--thus\nlove, to whom the Lord tells His secrets. If you want to ask a\nconfidential question and get a confidential answer, you must be on\nthe bosom of your Master. You won't be able to do it at a distance.\nThen, you see, when He gives to any soul superior light to its\nfellows, and that soul _follows_ the light, it necessarily entails a\npath in advance of its fellows. Unless he can inspire and encourage them\n(which, alas! is hard work) to follow, he must go on alone.\n\nThat was a beautiful illustration we read in the lesson (Acts x.).\nHere is Peter called to go in advance of the whole Church! Now, the\nLord wants a man to do this, and whom does He choose? He chooses\nimpulsive, energetic, head-first Peter. But then, there is something\nto be done first God lets down the sheet with all its unclean contents,\nand Peter fastens his eyes upon it. (I wish you had studied all the\nsheets the Lord has let down before _your eyes_, you would have come out\nvery differently to what you have.) Peter studies them, and soon the\nDivine vision has absorbed Peter's attention. When the Lord has fairly\ngot his attention, then comes the voice, \"Now, Peter, rise, slay and\neat.\" Then, when the Lord had taught him his lesson effectually, and\nwhen Peter saw that he had not yet explored all the ideas of the Divine\nmind about the extension of His kingdom, and that his business was to\nfollow his Lord's directions, and not to have his own \"ifs\" and \"buts,\"\nbut go ahead and do as God bade him, then Peter goes on to carry out the\nDivine direction. Then the church, aghast, as usual, at anything\nnew--always down upon a measure, whether good or bad, if it has the _awful\nquality of being new_--was down upon it. This new church, which had only\njust itself been brought to God by a set of _new measures_, is down\nupon Peter, and they call him to the council to answer for his conduct.\n\nHe tells them all about it in the truthful simplicity of a man of\nGod, and, thank God, they had sense enough--yes, and love enough,\ncharity enough, to accept his explanations, and to glorify God. Would\nto God we could get as much sense and charity in these days!\n\nA lady writes to me, only the other day, of her husband, saying that\nhe sympathises with outside work, but contends that there is\neverything one wants in the church; and another contends that there\nis everything everybody wants somewhere else, and so they are down\nupon all the Peters that dare to do anything out of the jog-trot\nline. You may reason ever so urgently, and show them that all these\nold measures are not enough for everybody, that there is a great mass\nof outlying population which they do not reach--the Gentiles of this\ngeneration; you may show them that these Gentiles are without the\nHoly Ghost, that they are not cleansed, that they are yet common and\nunclean; you may show them that these new measures of yours are quite\nas lawful as their old measures, and that, probably, they would be a\ngreat deal more useful, and, moreover, that they have been borne in\nupon you by the Holy Ghost, and that you feel as if there were a fire\nin your bones urging you to go and try them, but they will not hold\ntheir peace and glorify God, but will loose their tongues and villify\nyou.\n\nFalse Charity looks more at the means than at the end. Its possessor\nis more concerned about what men will think of _him_, than what\nwill exalt the Redeemer. You can know it by this mark. Are you more\nconcerned about what your neighbor, Mr. So-and-So, or your minister,\nRev. Mr. So-and-So, or even your bishop, thinks about you, than you\nare about the extension of the kingdom of Christ? Look out, my\nfriend, yours is the wrong sort of Charity. True Charity looks at the\nend--the spread of righteousness in the earth--_the reign of the\nKing_--and it is not very fastidious about the measures, so that\nthey are lawful.\n\nI do not advocate anything unlawful, to do good--God forbid. Divine\nCharity says, \"Anywhere with Jesus\"--in the temple or outside of\nit--at the seaside or in Cheapside--on the mountain top or in the market\nplace--in the streets--anywhere, Lord Jesus, if Thou wilt only come\nand take Thine inheritance and reign over the hearts and souls of\nmen. True Charity is only too glad to become a Jew to the Jews, as\nweak to the weak, if it can only pick them up;--only too glad to\ndescend to men of low estate, and put its arms round their necks, if\nit can only bring them to the cross and bring them back to the heart\nand Heaven of God; and it does not care what the Pharisee on the\nother side says; it is set on saving the poor sinner; it is pouring\nin oil and wine, and putting him on its own beast; _it is intent on\nsaving him_, and does not care what anybody thinks. Have you got\nit? It is so good. It makes you feel so warm and comfortable inside.\nIt is beautiful, and it proves better and better every day, and it\nwill be better still when you are dying--Faith and Hope will be done\naway, but this love will last _forever!_\n\nBut this necessitates somebody leading the way--going on in advance.\nWill _you_ be content to go in advance? Will _you_ endure the hardness\nof a pioneer? Can you bear the ridicule and gibes of your fellow-men?\nDare _you_ go where the Holy Ghost leads, and leave Him to look _after\nthe consequences?_ If so, happy are you, and you shall have a harvest of\nprecious souls; you shall shine as the stars forever; but, if you draw\nback, His soul shall have no pleasure in you. Step out on to the Divine\nlove, that is able, alone amongst the breakers, to bear your little\nbark--able to make you _more_ than a conqueror. Oh, step out--follow,\nfollow, follow--do not be afraid!\n\n_Spurious Charity_ is the opposite of this. It must have human\nnotice. Ostentation is its very essence. Cease to notice it, and it\nwill soon die. \"I went about to establish mine own righteousness,\"\nsays Paul, before he got the true Charity. Here was a grand\nopportunity for Pharisaic Saul. These Nazarenes, were they not\neverywhere spoken against? Was not this a grand opportunity for\n_him_ to be everywhere spoken for?--and so he takes advantage of\npublic opinion, and becomes \"exceedingly mad\" against them; and, not\nsatisfied with persecuting them in his own city, he goes after them\ninto strange cities, but he reveals, afterwards, when he got the\nDivine Charity, that the mainspring of his zeal was SELF-GLORY.\n\nFalse Charity hates to be in a minority--you never find it in an\nunrespectable minority,--it wants company, and that of a respectable,\ngenteel kind. Its possessors are always sticklers for the traditions\nof the elders; their horizon is bounded very largely by the opinions\nof men and the attitude of the _rulers_. They are always asking,\n\"Have any of the rulers believed on Him?\"\n\nNow, my friends, let this teach you wisdom and love. Prove all\nthings before you condemn. I have no doubt Saul was an honest man, in\nthe world's acceptation of the term, for he says he persecuted the\nNazarenes ignorantly, thinking he was doing God service; but what a\ngrand mistake he was making, and how effectually he was doing the\n_work of the devil!_ Of course, if he had _seen_, he was mistaken, he\nwould have ceased to _be mistaken_.\n\nI wish people would stop and think that the path they are now\nstanding in the well-beaten track on which they are now walking with\nsuch slow dignity--was one quite as new and unconventional and\noutrageous to the coadjutors of their forefathers, as the path which\nany new departure by the Holy Ghost may set before them _now_. I\nwish such people would read history. I suppose they do not, or, if\nthey do, they read it as they do the Bible--they fail to draw any\npractical principle from it. Such people should read \"Neale's History\nof the Puritans,\" and see in what a hurricane of excitement,\nopposition, contempt, and persecution, their forefathers fought for\nthe very paths they are now _standing still in_, and holding so\nsacred that they cannot have them disturbed. Do you see how\nunphilosophically they are acting? If their forefathers had acted on\nthe principles they are acting on, they would have stood still in old\npaths, and we would never have been in the new ones. These people\nstand in these paths of traditionalism and routinism, just where\ntheir forefathers left them, occupying all their time in admiring the\nwisdom and benevolence and devotion of their forefathers, instead of\nimitating _their aggressive faith_ and MARCHING ON TO THE CONQUEST OF\nTHE WORLD.\n\nWhich is the most God-honoring? Which has the most common sense in\nit? Which will please your forefathers the most? But it is now as it\nwas in the days of the Son of Man--for, \"ye build the tombs of the\nprophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous, and say, 'If\nwe had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been\npartakers with them in the blood of the prophets.' Wherefore ye be\nwitnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which\nkilled the prophets.\"\n\nAlas! what a deal of this is going on to-day, only there is one\ndifference--it is going on \"under a Christian creed, instead of a\nJewish.\" It is only the _creed_ that differs--the character, the\nspring of action, is the same.\n\nNow, my friends, try yourselves--which Charity _have you got?_\nDo you rejoice in the extension of the kingdom of Jesus Christ by any\nlawful means, or are you more concerned _about the color of a man's\ncoat than the state of his heart?_ Would you rather the poor\ndrunkard were left to rot and seethe in his misery, than that a man\nshould put on a blue jacket with an S.[Footnote: Badge of the\nSalvation Army.] on his collar, and go and fetch him out? Would you\nrather have men damned conventionally, than saved unconventionally?\nIf you would, you are a Pharisee at heart--I care not what you call\nyourselves. Go home and read for your instruction Matt, xxiii. 23-28.\n\nFurther, how bitterly this false Charity often comes out in\nindividual cases. We will just take an illustration. We will suppose\nhere is a family of decent, respectable, professedly Christian\npeople, who have been to church or chapel most of their lives. Or\nhere is a Church, we will suppose, of the same character--nothing\nparticular has happened; they fear the Lord, and go comfortably\nalong, and are just where they were ten or fifteen years ago, making\nup for _deaths_ and _removals_. We will suppose that a member of that\nfamily or that church, as the case may be, gets converted. He reads a\nbook, goes to a special meeting, or some providential utterance is the\nmeans of sending the light of God's Spirit upon his soul, and he is\nquickened and woke up to see the miserable, half-dead, guilty condition\nin which he is; he is praying and groaning, and feeling after God; he\ngets the sense of his transgressions and unfaithfulness being taken\naway, and the joy of God's salvation restored to his soul. Now, in a\nmoment, almost immediately, as in the case of Peter, as soon as the\ninternal work is done, comes the external path opened up. The Spirit of\nGod lays before him some new work, something strikes him which has been\nlong forgotten, or which never seems to have been recognised in his\nfamily or church. He sees what a grand thing that would be for the\nconversion of souls, and the extension of the kingdom of Jesus\nChrist, and he feels it beginning to burn like a fire in his bones to\nenter this path of usefulness. He prays much over it, and he waits\nuntil he is fully satisfied that it is not a vain impulse, but that\nit is of the Spirit of God. Full of love, and faith, and zeal, he\ngoes to tell his minister, or some Christian friend; he expects that\nthey will sympathise with his feelings, and enter into his project;\nbut, alas! alas! they begin by raising objections--they start\ndifficulties:--\"Well, but you see that would be a little out of our\norder: that is not exactly our way of doing things. I am afraid the\ndeacons would object, or I am afraid something would happen;\" and if\nhe has the misfortune to be young (anybody would think it was a sin\nto be young), they will \"crush\" him out; they put the extinguisher\non, and say, \"Wait, my brother, until you have more experience,\" or,\n\"my sister,\" especially, \"_you_ must never presume to do\nanything of which we cannot approve!\"\n\nOh! friends, you smile because you _know_ how true it is! Oh,\nalas! the thousands of urgings of the Holy Ghost; the thousands of\nheavenly voices that have been as clear to human souls as ever\nPeter's sheet was to him; the thousands of glorious aspirations and\nschemes for the spread of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ that\nhave been thus crushed by this spurious, false, selfish, devilish\nCharity! The Lord put it out.\n\nOh! I would not care what the Lord called my child to do that would\nbe for the extension of His kingdom and the glory of His name; I\nwould not restrain her or keep her back. I might say, \"My child, it\nmay be a painful thing for me to consent. I might have chosen another\npath for you; but if you are satisfied the Spirit leads you, go\nforward, and I will do all I can to help you.\" Why? Because I want\nthe King to have His own, and I do not care how it is, so that He gets\nHis own, and I will have Him to use _mine_ as well as me to get it.\n\nFathers and mothers, look out! If you grudge your children to God,\nHe will be even with you. \"They that honor Me, I will honor, but they\nwho do not, shall be lightly esteemed.\" They shall get light weight\nall round, and be whipped with their own rods. Mind how you withhold\nthat which is most precious from God! Mind you do not receive the\ngrace of God in vain; _some people do_.\n\nThe fifth point in which this Divine and spurious Charity contradict\neach other, is, that Divine Charity--the pure love of God--is _law\nabiding_.\n\nThat is, it always manifests itself in harmony with the great moral\nlaw of the universe--it never does evil that good may come! You never\nhear it saying--\"I cannot say that this is exactly square; I know\nthis is not exactly the right course, but then I can accomplish such\nand such objects by adopting it.\" Never! that is of the devil! You\nmay always know that the law of righteousness is entwined round the\nvery heart of Divine Charity, and as justice and judgment are the\nhabitation of the throne of its Divine Author, so righteousness is in\nthe very core of its soul. It will never sacrifice righteousness for\npeace, or anything else.\n\nNow, what is the whole duty of man? To love mercy, to do justly, and\nwalk humbly with God; and, when the Holy Spirit has brought about\nthat result in your soul, God will look on you with a beneficent eye,\nwith a smile of approbation, and its genial influence will sun your\nwhole being, and you will walk in the light of it, even as the angels\ndo in Heaven. \"Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God;\"\nthat is the whole duty of man--everything is included in that.\n\nDo you hear it, oh! ye temporizers with Divine law? Do you hear it,\nye who say that we must come down partly, and be a little like the\nworld in order to win it? that you must come on to the level of the\nungodly in order that you may win them to God?--I tell you that\n_all unrighteousness is sin!_ Do you hear this, you who contend\nfor covering up by a false Charity certain sins which are sending men\nto perdition wholesale, and make laws and acts of parliament to\nprotect men in these crimes? I know your specious arguments that come\nfrom the devil; but I ask, is it justice to take one part of the human\nrace, and that the weaker, and, therefore, according to the law of\nDivine Charity, demanding the greater protection from cruelty and wrong,\nand offer that part up for the _supposed_ good of the other, because\nthe latter is stronger? Is that justice? Is that mercy? and, mind, I say\nemphatically _supposed good_; for, do you think one part of God's\ncreation can be trodden down without reacting with terrible moral force\nupon the other? Do you think it can? Was it ever done? Will it ever be\ndone? _No! not while He sits on His throne_. Yes, _supposed_ good, for\nfacts mock your arguments. It is not for their good; you know it is not.\nYou cannot accomplish your purpose when you have done all; and think you\nthat you will escape, by your satanic inventions, the Divine\nExecutioner? Think you that your specious arguments will avail with Him\nwho hath sworn in His holy habitation that He will avenge the oppressed\nand down-trodden of the earth? No, no! I see written between the lines,\nand I hear muttering between your speeches. \"Be not deceived; God is not\nmocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.\" You\ncannot escape the penalty!\n\nThe last characteristic of true Charity which I shall name is, that\n_it holds out_, in spite of ingratitude, opposition, and persecution!\nIts possessor seeks the good of all men, not because he ought, merely,\nbut because he cannot help it. His _heart_ is on the side of God and\ntruth. He _loves_ righteousness, and, therefore, cannot desist from\nseeking to bring all beings to love it, too, although they hate and\ndespise him for so doing. Jesus held out in this glorious love, even in\nthe agonies of crucifixion. \"Father, forgive them; they know not what\nthey do.\" His heart was set on bringing man back to God, and He went\nthrough with it. His soul did not draw back, and His Divine love\nconstrained Him, even onto death.\n\nPaul followed his Master in this respect; and though the more he\nloved some of his converts, the less he was loved, he went on,\nseeking their highest good, not being hindered for a moment by their\ningratitude. He loved _them_--not their good opinion or applause! A\nspurious Charity soon tires when the objects of it prove unworthy. Its\npossessor says: \"I have had enough of this; the kinder I am, the worse\npeople treat me. I shall button up my pocket, and take my ease, till I\nam better appreciated.\" _Self_-glory is the very life of spurious\nCharity: it dies right out under ingratitude and contempt.\n\nWhich have you got, my brother?--my sister?\n\nDoes somebody say, as a man who had been to a service at Scarborough\nthe other, day, and had been hearing some straight truth, said, when\nasked, \"How did you like it?\" The man, a young, prosperous tradesman\nin the town, shuffled about, and said: \"Well, it was awful; if that\nis true, I am on my way to hell.\" Thank God he had found it out. Now,\nhave you got this Divine Charity? I told you, at the beginning, it\ndid not grow on unregenerate human nature, so if you are an\nunregenerate man, and have not the Holy Spirit, I want you to find it\nout. You have to begin at the beginning, and get the plant planted.\nNo matter what spurious imitations you have got, if you have not got\n_the love of God_. Have you got it, brother?--sister? If you\nhave not, you can have it this afternoon. Will you seek it? We were\nall once without it, even as it is said, \"We were the children of\nwrath, even as others;\" we hated those who hated us; we hated things,\nnot because they were wicked, and against God, but because they were\nopposed to us personally; our love and hate were influenced by\nselfishness, the same as others, but now the Lord has renewed our\nhearts, and made us in some little measure, like Him who \"loved\nrighteousness, and hated iniquity; and, therefore, God anointed Him\nwith the oil of gladness above His fellows.\" Oh! yes; the more you\nlove righteousness and hate iniquity, the more of gladness you will\nhave, and the more glorious the testimony you will give for God. You\nwill be able to say, with David, \"I have not hid Thy righteousness\nwithin my heart; I have declared Thy faithfulness and Thy salvation:\nI have not concealed Thy loving kindness and Thy truth from the great\ncongregation.\" There will be no difficulty about declaring it. We\nfind it easy to declare it when people get it. We cannot keep them\nquiet; they are like the early converts--they are up two or three\ntogether; and, like Paul, we have to say, \"One at a time; you shall\nall prophecy, if you do it one at a time.\" When people get it, it\nbubbles up, and runs over; \"it springs up,\" as out great Master said,\n\"as a well of water, unto everlasting life.\" Many floods cannot\nquench it; it abideth forever.\n\nHave you got it? Have you got enough of it to lift you above your\npetty, selfish interests, or are you guided by the Charity that first\nlooks inside to see how any proposition will affect _self_,\ninstead of seeing how it will affect the kingdom of God? And you,\npoor sinner, who know you have not got it--I have more hope of you\nthan some who profess to have it. His great bowels of compassion move\ntowards you; He is waiting to shed abroad this love in your heart.\nThe feast is spread; all things are now ready. Oh! come into His\nbanqueting house, and sit under His banner of love for ever and ever.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nCONDITIONS OF EFFECTUAL PRAYER.\n\n\n  If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what you\n  will, and it shall be done unto you.--JOHN xv. 7.\n\n  Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye\n  pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.--MARK\n  xi. 24.\n\n  If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all\n  men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let\n  him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a\n  wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that\n  man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.--JAMES i.5-7.\n\n  Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not\n  what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh\n  intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And He\n  that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit,\n  because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will\n  of God.--ROMANS viii. 26,27.\n\nI have not taken the texts in the order in which they stand, but in\nthe order in which they logically follow one another, and in which\nthey elucidate the subject.\n\nAnd now, in the few remarks I wish to make, I shall try to embody\nanswers to the letters I have received on this subject. There is no\nexperience, perhaps, more common in these days than this, nothing\nmore constantly said to me by professing Christians: \"Well, I have\nprayed a long time for certain things, but I don't seem to get any\nanswers to my prayers.\" I often wonder such people don't give up\npraying altogether I think I should if I never got answers.\n\nNow I say, this is a very God-dishonoring experience, and there must\nbe something wrong somewhere when this is the case. There must be\nsomething wrong either with the suppliants or the Giver. Oh! I feel\noften what a deeply God-dishonoring thing it is when Christians meet,\nas they frequently do, up and down the country, to pray for a\nrevival, to pray for a specific thing in their Churches and in their\nfamilies, and it never comes.\n\nSome years ago, when the wave of revival was sweeping over Ireland\nand America, you know the Churches in this country held united\nprayer-meetings to pray that it might come to England; but it did not\ncome, and the infidels wagged their heads, and wrote in their newspapers:\n\"See, the Christians' God is either deaf or gone a-hunting, for they\nhave had prayer-meetings all over the land for a revival, and it has\nnot come.\" Oh! how my cheeks burned with shame as I thought of it;\nhow I mourned over it! I knew it was not because our God was asleep\n--not because His arm was shortened--not because His bowels of\ncompassion did not yearn over sinners--not because he could not have\npoured out His Spirit and have given us the same glorious times of\nrefreshing they had in other places. _That was not the reason_.\nThere was only one reason, and that was, that His people asked amiss.\n\nThey did not understand the conditions of prevailing prayer. They\ndid not fulfil them. If they had prayed till now, and maintained the\nsame attitude, they would not have got the answer, because there are\nconditions to these promises, as to all other promises; and we may\npray ourselves black and blue in the face if we do not comply with\nthe conditions. God will never move an inch to meet us, and never\nfulfil the promises in our experience. May you, who are awake to\nperceive your responsibilities and obligations in respect to the\nperishing world, take heed to my words, and take home what I\nsay--think about it, pray over it, try to realize it is the Lord's\nmessage to you. These are only a tithe of the glorious promises with\nrespect to prayer. There are plenty of them in the Book, in which God\nhas bound Himself to answer the faithful prayers of His people.\n\n\"The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.\"\n\nNow, why is it that the great mass of professing Christians do not\nget answers to their prayers? In the first place, they are not the\nCHARACTERS to whom God has made the promises. These promises are made\nto God's saints--to those who keep His commandments, who walk in the\nlight and have fellowship with Him through the Holy Spirit, and,\ntherefore, the Spirit can make intercession for them. How can the\nSpirit make intercession for a man when He is not in him? Those who\nare walking in the light can see what sort of requests to put up,\nwhen to put them up, and how to put them up; they see it all, because\nthey are _in the light_. Such people do ask, and receive. But,\nalas! it is because there are so few of these that God's character is\ntraduced every day, and that infidels laugh at us and at our God, too.\n\nNow, do not go round about, and try to put this off you. Who are\nthese promises made to? I challenge anybody to find me promises in\nthis Book, taken with the context (except in the case of repenting\nsinners, who are a special class, and met with special promises),\nexcept to saints. There are no promises of answer to prayer, except\nto this class of character. These promises are not made to everybody,\nare they? The prayer of the wicked is an abomination to God, except\nit be his prayer when he is forsaking his wickedness. Then that\nprayer is not an abomination; but all other prayers of the wicked\nare. These promises are made to righteous people--to people who are:\n\nFirst, _in fellowship with God_. \"If ye abide in Me, and My\nwords abide in you;\"--having been brought into living fellowship by a\nliving faith, the promises are made to those people who MAINTAIN that\nunion--who walk in it, who live in it, and who avail themselves of\nthe opportunities and privileges which Jesus has bestowed upon them\nby virtue of that union.\n\nNow, you see, friends, it is not enough that you were _once_ in\nunion with Jesus, in order to get answers to your prayers. I am\nafraid there are thousands in a backslidden state. They have let go\nthe grasp of faith; they are not abiding in Christ; they are abiding\n_out of Him_, and yet they are constantly praying and wondering\nwhy God does not answer their prayers. Don't you see, the first\ncondition is wanting. There is no possible way of approach to the\nFather but through the Son. All prayers are an abomination to God\nwhich do not go up to Him through His Son, and in His Son, except\nsuch as those of Cornelius, who never heard of Christ; but to people\nwho have ever had the light and known His Son, no prayers while out\nof living union with His Son are accepted. And that does not mean\nsaying, \"For the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ.\" It does not matter\nmuch what people _say_. God never pays any attention to people's\nwords; it is what they mean and feel that He pays attention to; and\nHe knows when people really offer their prayers in union with His\nSon. They are not in union, and, therefore, their prayers never rise\nany higher than the room in which they offer them. They hardly get\nout of their mouths; God never hears them. They are drowned and\nburied in their own throats.\n\nOh! you young converts, never drop out of living union with Jesus.\nKeep in it--hold it fast--walk in it, and you will get answers to\nyour prayers every day. You will be as sure of it as if you saw God\ndoing what you ask, and heard Him speaking to you. You will be able\nto say, \"I know that Thou hearest me always.\" Bless His name! Those\nwho abide in Him can say that in their measure.\n\nThe next condition of prevailing prayer, is--_obedience to the\nlight_. Now, what does it mean to walk in obedience? Well, it does\n_not_ mean, searching this New Testament to find out how little\nof God's grace will get you into Heaven! It does not mean, running\nround to see what this person says and the other person says about\nsuch and such a text, in order that you may escape from the real,\npractical meaning of the text! Such people are hypocrites at heart,\nwhoever they are; or at least, insincere. They don't want to know\nGod's will; they would much rather not know it. They want to get away\nfrom the plain, practical, common-sense meaning of the text, and then\nthey say, \"It doesn't mean exactly what it says,\" and \"It should be\ninterpreted so-and-so;\" and they stroke themselves down, and try to\nmake themselves feel comfortable when they are traitors at heart.\n_That is not walking in the light_.\n\nWalking in the light is like walking in the sun--not running behind\na pillar there, and a tree yonder, to get away from the light. It is\ncoming right out, and saying, \"Now, Lord Jesus; I want to know Thy\nwill. Lord, pour Thy light upon me. I am prepared to follow it, even\nthough it is to the block and to the stake.\"\n\nFirst, desire to have the light. Oh! it makes my heart ache--I was\ngoing to say boil--with righteous indignation, in jealousy for God's\nhonor, to think that He should be so traduced and blasphemed by those\nwho profess to love Him--who try to make out that they get wrong for\nwant of light. Nothing of the kind. Here is plenty of light; but you\nmust say, \"Yes, Lord, I am willing to have it, even if it condemns\nme. If it condemns my heart, my head, Lord, pour it on me. If it\ncondemns my life, pour it on me. If it condemns those companions,\nthose indulgences, pour it on me: I will give them up. If it condemns\nmy business, pour it on me: I will abandon such business, and sooner\ndie in the workhouse than continue in it. If it condemns my family\nrelations, I will come out from them, and follow Thee.\" The Lord will\nalways answer such a soul as that. He will put His finger down on\nthis sore spot and the other, and He will tell you what to do, and\nyou will be as sure of it as if you heard His audible voice. What\ndoes it mean to walk in the light? Obey His voice. Don't stop to\nconfer with flesh and blood, but, as Paul did, get up, and set off to\ncommence the career which your Master commands. Paul did not stop to\nconfer with flesh and blood. He did not stop to reckon what it would\ncost him, but on he went, and never stops, until he reaches the\nblock. _That_ is walking in the light--obeying--not standing,\nquibbling with the Lord about it; not saying, \"Oh! but,\"--but\n_doing_ it.\n\nOh! friends, no matter who preaches another Gospel to you; no matter\nwho comes with the doctrine that you can be accepted of God--be a\nsaint on any other conditions. For Christ's sake and your soul's\nsake, don't believe them. As the apostle John says: \"If there come\nany unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into\n_your_ house, neither bid him God speed.\" You say, \"But then it\nis such a costly sacrifice.\" It is, in one sense; but when you have\npaid the price, when you have made the sacrifice, when you have\nentered upon the road, the joy, the light, the power, and the glory\nare worth a hundred times as much. Did any man that ever got the\nPearl of great price feel that he had given too much for it, even if\nhe had given all that he had? _Never!_ Martyrs and confessors\nhave gloried in the possession of it while they have writhed on the\nrack and in the flames, and you never heard one solitary testimony\nthat any man or woman of God ever thought that they had paid too\nhighly for it. Never! Do you want to have your prayers answered? That\nis the way. Walk so that your own heart condemns you not. The\nobedient child that lives in complacent affection with its parent has\nno fear in coming up to ask for favors. It knows it will get them.\nIts own heart does not condemn it. \"If our own heart condemn us not,\n_then_ have we confidence toward God.\" I defy any man to\nseparate confidence and obedience. If you will not be obedient, you\ncannot have confidence. I challenge any Christian here to tell me\nthat he can go up to the throne of God in faith for any blessing,\nwhen his own heart condemns him. He knows he cannot. HE HAS FIRST TO\nGET THAT STATE OF CONDEMNATION TAKEN AWAY before he can exercise\nfaith for any blessing. Walk in the light, and then you shall have\nfellowship with Him, and His blood will cleanse you from all sin, and\nthe Spirit will teach you how to pray, and what to pray for, which\nthe great mass of professors know nothing about.\n\nFurther, the _leading, teaching, and urging of the Holy Ghost_\nis the next condition of effectual prayer. We might call these\nconditions a four-linked chain, connecting our souls with the very\nheart of God. First, fellowship with Jesus; second, obedience to His\ncommands, walking in the light; third, the intercession of the\nindwelling Spirit; and fourth, the exercise of faith; and if you miss\nany one of these links, your prayers are done for. You may have all\nthe other three, but if you miss one, you will not get answers. It\nwill cut communion, and there will be no response.\n\nI am afraid a good many professors do not know what the Spirit of\nintercession means. They do not know anything about the Spirit making\nintercession for them with groanings that cannot be uttered. When we\nget more of this Spirit of intercessory prayer in parents, we shall\nsee more spiritual children born. Now, the Holy Spirit says, here we\nknow not what to pray for as we ought, unless the Spirit teaches;\nhence people are constantly, as James says, asking and not receiving,\nbecause they ask amiss. \"Ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon\nyour lusts\"--that means, your earthly desires, affections, purposes,\nbound by the horizon of earth.\n\nNow, I believe that this is the great reason why thousands of\nChristians pray and never, get answers. They ARE SELFISH IN THEIR\nPRAYERS; they are earthy; they ask amiss, that they may consume it\nupon their earthly desires, affections, and propensities. Mothers\ntell me that they have prayed for their children for years, and not\ngot one of them converted. I say, \"More the pity; more the shame on\nyou.\" Why? Because they prayed merely selfish, instinctive prayers,\nbecause they were _their_ children, or because they wanted them\nto be religions, so that they would not go into sin, or bring\ndisgrace or misery upon the family, or it would be so nice to have\nthem religious; but they don't want them to be righteous over much;\nthey don't want them to be so given up to God as to cut off the\nvanities and fooleries of this world, and to give themselves up\nwholly to Christ--that is too much; but just religion enough to make\nthem a comfort to themselves. Would _you_ answer such prayers\n_if you were God?_ Hundreds and thousands of prayers are put up\nevery day that go no deeper and no higher than that, if the motives\nwere analyzed--and the Holy Ghost _does analyze_. I am afraid\nmany wives pray for their husbands on the same tack. They are not\ntroubled that their husbands are living in disobedience to God,\nsquandering their time, talents, and money, and robbing the kingdom\nof Jesus Christ of what they might be doing for it;--the agonizing\nconsideration is, that, if religious, they would spend so much more\ntime at home; that they are wasting the money, instead of laying it\nup for the children; and that, if they were religious, all this would\nbe right. Now, I say, God will never answer that wife's prayer for\nher husband! You must think of what your husband could be for\nGod--what he could do for God's kingdom--how Jesus Christ has shed His\nblood for him--how dishonoring a life of sin is to God; and you must\ndwell on this until your heart is ready to break, and you will soon\nget your husband converted, if you act wisely along with your\nprayers. God hates selfishness--selfishness is the devil, the very\nembodiment of him. You must get out of self; you must look at your\nchild always as God's, as having a precious soul redeemed with the\nprecious blood of Jesus, and having talents and capacities to\n_glorify Him_ and spread His kingdom; and you must ground your\nprayers on that, and say, \"I would rather lay them in the grave, a\nthousand times--rather they were poor and despised--than they should\ngrow up to _dishonor Thee_.\" Then you will get your prayers answered!\n\nPeople pray about their business. God sees that the way to destroy\nthat man is to let him get on. He does not want money in order to\nroll the old chariot along. God sees that prosperity would eat his\nsoul like a canker, and so He won't let him get on. The Spirit of God\nnever leads the soul to a selfish prayer. No; it leads the soul to\nweep because men keep not His law, to cry more about His interests\nthan its own. It is willing for its own house to lie desolate, if\nthat will promote the spread of God's kingdom. It is willing for the\nsparrow to find a nest on its own altar, if by that it can replenish\nand glorify the altar of Jehovah.\n\nThen comes the last link--_faith_. Here is another secret. No\nbeliever can exercise faith for anything that the Holy Ghost does not\nlead him up to. You may pray, and pray, but you will never exercise\nfaith until you have the Spirit making intercession in you. There is\nvery little difficulty about believing with people who have taken the\nthree preceding steps. Those who are in fellowship with Jesus, those\nwho are walking in the light, those who have the Holy Ghost as an\ninterceding Spirit--they know what to pray for; they know what the\nmind of the Spirit is; they know how the Spirit is leading them, and\nthey can march up to the throne and \"ask and receive.\" They know\ntheir request is according to the mind of God, and they can wrestle,\nif need be, like the Syrophenician woman, if He sees fit to try their\nfaith. He does not always answer at once. He lets them wrestle with\ngroans that cannot be uttered; but they know the Spirit is making\nintercession for them, and they hold on sometimes amidst great\ndiscouragement and temptation till the answer comes. They get the\nassurance of faith, which says, \"Yes, it shall be done.\" People look\nat them with wonder. Christian friends know the thing they are\npraying for has not come, and say, \"You look as glad as if yon had\nit;\" \"I have got the earnest: I know it is coming: I have the\nassurance that it shall be done.\" Now, every praying parent ought to\nwrestle till that is got for every child. You never ought to leave\noff till then, and then train as well as pray--co-work with God: that\nis the law of the kingdom, all the way through. Believe that ye\nreceive it, and ye _shall_ have it. Oh! the confusion, the\njumbling there is, in dealing with poor souls at that point. People\nsay, \"Believe you are saved, and you are saved.\" I have heard\nChristians give that advice to souls many a time. \"Believe you are\nsaved, and you are saved.\" Believe a lie, and it will come true. Is\nthat God's philosophy? What is the use of telling a person to believe\nhe is saved _before_ he is saved? That is telling him to believe\na lie. People say, \"Believe you are sanctified, and you are\nsanctified.\" Indeed! When were you sanctified? God never tells a\nperson to believe a thing until it happens. He has made the\nbestowment of the gift to be simultaneous with the exercise of the\nfaith. Believe that ye receive, and ye shall have--not that ye did\nreceive an hour ago, for that would not be true; not that ye will\nreceive an hour hence, for that would be presumption. There is no\nsuch promise, but believe that ye do now receive, and ye shall have.\n\"I will never disappoint the man who dares trust me to that extent.\"\nHe shall have it. You say the age of miracles is past. Yes, because\nthe age of that sort of faith is past. You will get miracles back\nwhen that sort of faith returns. God has bound Himself over to the\nfaith of His real people, and He would sooner break all the laws of\nnature, than He would break the laws of grace. He can easily set\naside a law of nature; but He will never set aside a law of grace. He\nhas bound Himself to faith--the only power in the universe to which\nHe has bound Himself--and nobody ever rose up in this world yet, and\nsaid, \"I trusted God, and He deceived me.\" Faith means TRUST--faith\nmeans ABANDONMENT--as if you were dying, and you had nothing left but\nthe naked promise of God. You say, \"I am dying: I must trust now,\"\nand that man jumps on to the promise. He gives up experimenting, and\nreally trusts; and you have seen the light come into his eyes; you\nhave heard the song of praise burst from his lips, because he\nbelieved he received, and he did receive.\n\nNow, then, some of you who have written to me, know you are living\nin fellowship with Jesus. Some of you have lately commenced to walk\nin the light. You have cut off and put away the idols; you have\nabandoned yourself to the will of God, and sworn, by His grace, that\nyou will follow Him all the way. You _do_ feel the Holy Ghost is\nin you. Oh! I entreat you to obey fully, to let the Spirit have His\nway. Do not restrain Him. Don't think it will hurt your bodies: don't\nthink it is too much; don't think you are getting fanatical; don't\nthink that, after all, God does not require this kind of thing--follow\nthe Spirit. Let the Spirit lead you, and groan through you;\nlet the Spirit wrestle with God through you--follow Him. If we had\nmore of this in these services, we should have more fruit; and if the\nchurch had more of this, there would be more souls born into the\nkingdom.\n\nIt was one of the things in which I grieved the Spirit of God in my\nearly days that I would not let Him, to the extent He would have\ndone, make me a woman of prayer; and yet, in comparison with many,\nperhaps, I was one. He used to lay particular people and subjects on\nmy heart, so that I could not help praying; but oh! how bitterly I\nhave regretted and wept before the Lord that I did not let Him have\nall His way with me in this respect. Take warning! and you whom He is\nbeginning to lead, let Him lead you. Pour out your souls for others\nand with others. I believe that more souls are convinced in real\nprayer, than in speaking. I have noticed this many a time. I have\nseen at the bottom of a great hall or theatre, or in the gallery, a\nlot of the roughest men conceivable, behaving in the most unseemly\nmanner, arrested by the influence of prayer. Perhaps, when the\nrowdyism has been ready to break into open tumult, a little woman has\nstretched out her hands over the congregation, and said, \"Now, let us\npray;\" and I have seen the whole mass of men assume an attitude of\nquietness and reverence. I have watched the aspect of the\ncongregation, and seen great, rough, black-faced fellows get their\nheads down, and sometimes wipe their eyes; and when we have got up to\nsing, there has been no more disorderly conduct, but they have\nsettled down with the solemnity of death, to listen. Hundreds of them\nwere convinced of sin while under that prayer. It was the Holy Ghost\nwrestling for those souls in the heart of that woman, that struck\nthem with conviction.\n\nPrayer is agony of soul--wrestling of the Spirit. You know how men\nand women deal with one another when they are in desperate\nearnestness for something to be done. That is prayer, whether it be\nto man or God; and when you get your heart influenced, and melted,\nand wrought up, and burdened by the Holy Ghost for souls, you will\nhave power, and you will never pray but somebody will be\nconvinced,--some poor soul's dark eyes will be opened, and spiritual\nlife will commence.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nTHE PERFECT HEART.\n\n\n  For the eyes of the Lord ran to and fro throughout the whole earth,\n  to shew Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect\n  toward Him--2 CHRON. xvi. 9.\n\nThis passage occurs in the history of Asa, one of the most godly and\ndevoted kings that ever sat upon the throne of Judah. We are told in\nthe fourteenth chapter that he commenced his reign by setting himself\nto destroy the idolatry into which the whole nation had been betrayed\nby its former ruler, and to restore the worship and service of the\nGod of Israel. He set himself to bring back the nation to its\nallegiance and obedience to God; and his success is a great\nencouragement to any who shall set themselves, single-handed and with\na perfect heart, towards God, to do this in any circle, under any\ncircumstances.\n\n_He succeeded_. God blessed him in his efforts to purge his kingdom\ninside, and God also delivered him from his enemies outside, and enabled\nhim by His power to defeat the king of Ethiopia, who came against him\nwith an exceeding great army, because King Asa was perfect in his heart\ntowards God.\n\nWhen this king came up against him, Asa went and cried unto the\nLord, and cast himself upon his God, trusting Him to deliver him, and\nGod never disappointed any man, either before or since Asa's day, who\ndid that. God delivered his enemies into his hand and made him a\nsuccessful and happy king, over a prosperous and increasing people.\n\nBut by-and-bye, after many years, for Asa was perfect in his heart\ntowards the Lord for many years of his long reign; but whether it\nwere, as, alas! too often happens, that a life of ease and prosperity\nbrought forth in Asa the results of partial backsliding, we know not;\nbut as years went on, another war was declared, and this time it was\nthe king of Israel who came up against the king of Judah. What did\nAsa do? Did he go, as formerly, and cry unto the Lord, and put his\nbattle into His hands? No, he did not. He had left His first love; he\nhad become, in a measure, untrue to the Lord God of Israel. He forgot\nwhere his strength lay; his spiritual perceptions had become dim; he\nhad lost his realization of God's ability to help and deliver him out\nof the hands of his enemies, and so he fell back upon worldly policy.\nHe went down to Assyria and courted Ben-hadad, the king of Assyria,\nand said, \"Come and help me, that my enemies may depart, for I am\nsore pressed.\" Ah! what a picture of backsliders. On another\noccasion, when Jehosophat made an ungodly alliance, a prophet met him\nand said, \"Should'st thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate\nthe Lord?\" No man ever did this without being sorely whipped, as poor\nAsa was. He succeeded, indeed, in the battle, and won the victory. It\nwas a lawful end, but he accomplished it by unlawful means. He won\nthe victory, and, I dare say, he was congratulating himself, and\nstroking his beard in self-complacency, when, lo! the prophet comes\nto deliver God's message to him, and he says:--\n\n\"Because thou hast relied on the king of Syria, and not relied on\nthe Lord thy God, therefore is the host of the king of Syria escaped\nout of thine hand.\n\n\"Were not the Ethiopians and the Lubims a huge host, with very many\nchariots and horsemen? yet because thou didst rely on the Lord He\ndelivered them into thine hand.\n\n\"For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the earth, to\nshow Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect\ntowards Him. Herein thou hast done foolishly; therefore from\nhenceforth thou shalt have wars\"--the very thing he went to Assyria\nto seek to avoid. He wanted _peace_, not war, and he went down\nto Assyria to enable him to spend the remainder of his days in peace,\nwhen, lo! the Word of God goes forth, \"Thou shalt have wars.\" He\nwas chastised in the very thing for which he sold himself and his\nGod. \"Be sure thy sin will find thee out.\" It is God's way to\nchastise His children by those very things in which they sell His\ninterests. \"Thou shalt have wars.\"\n\nBut we want to deal specially with the lesson which the prophet\ndraws from this event; for he says, \"Wherefore didst thou go to\nAssyria? Wherefore hast thou sinned against God? Hast thou forgotten\nwho the God of Israel was? Didst thou not know that the eyes of the\nLord run throughout the whole earth?\" He would have helped thee now,\nAsa, as much as in the past. He will help any man who is whole-hearted\ntowards Him--that trusts in Him. Now, I say, this is the\nlesson which the prophet draws, not only for Asa, but for all the\nAsas since his day, and those who are yet to come, for every man and\nwoman who professes to be a servant of God, the prophet sounds down\nto the ages that \"the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the\nwhole earth, to show Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart\nis perfect towards Him.\"\n\nNow, what is this perfect heart? \"Ah!\" you say, \"that is the point.\"\nYes, that is the point, and we will try to show what kind of a heart\nthis is. It must be A DIFFERENT KIND OF HEART TO HEARTS IN GENERAL;\nall hearts are not perfect towards God, or else His eyes would not\nhave to be running to and fro throughout the earth to find them. They\nwould be plentiful enough if they were the common sort of hearts, but\nevidently they are a different kind of hearts to ordinary hearts; and\nanother thing is evident on the face of the text, that these kind of\nhearts are very precious in the sight of God. He delights in them; He\nmakes greater store by one such than He does by thousands of the\nother kinds of hearts, of which there are so many. I say, these two\nlessons everybody with common sense will admit at once--that these\nhearts are not the common hearts, and that they are very precious in\nthe sight of God.\n\nNow, what is the meaning of this term \"perfect heart,\" referring to\nthe hearts of God's children, all the way through the Bible? As you\nknow, I like to establish my points in the mouths of two or three\nwitnesses, I will give you two or three texts, that we may find out\nGod's meaning of this term, and then we will give you the very lowest\nrendering, where all schools are agreed, for I don't want\ncontroversy. We will just look at Psalm xxxvii. 37: \"Mark the perfect\nman, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace.\" There\n_are_ such people as God means in that verse. Psalm lxiv. 4:\n\"That they may shoot in secret at the perfect,\" who have always been\na favorite target of the devil. He does not shoot much at people\nwhose hearts are perfect towards the Lord. It is at those perfect\npeople he shoots. \"Suddenly do they shoot at him,\" perhaps while he\nis thinking they are his friends. \"Suddenly they shoot, and fear not.\"\n\n\"Be ye perfect,\" says the Saviour, \"even as your Father which is in\nHeaven is perfect.\" That means something. We will try to find out\nwhat it does mean (Matt. xix. 21)--\n\n\"Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou\nhast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in Heaven:\nand come _and_ follow Me.\"\n\nAnd, again, at 1 Cor. ii. 6--\n\n\"Howbeit, we speak wisdom among them that are perfect.\"\n\nAnd (2 Timothy iii. 17)--\n\n\"That the man of God may he perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all\ngood works.\"\n\nThere are numbers of others, but these are samples, and I suppose\nall Christians attach _some_ meaning to these terms. They must\nbe terms signifying a great difference between the persons who are\nspoken of and ordinary men and women. Now, what do they mean? Well,\nthe very lowest rendering of all divines and all schools is this,\nthat it means _sincerity_ and _thoroughness_. Well, that is all I want.\nGive me a man sincere and thorough in his love, and that is all I want;\nthat will stretch through all the ramifications of his existence; it\nwill go to the ends of his fingers and his toes, through his eyes, and\nthrough his tongue, to his wife, and to his family, to his shop, and to\nhis business, and to his circle in the world. That is what I mean by\n_holiness_! Then, taking the lowest translation, it means that a man is\nwhole-hearted in love, and thorough out-and-out in service! Amen. For\nthat man who is thus perfect towards God, God will indeed show Himself\nstrong in more ways than one!\n\nThis cannot mean a merely natural heart, it must mean a renewed\nheart, because there are no perfect hearts by nature. There is no one\nin this sense that doeth good and sinneth not, for every child of\nAdam has gone astray like a lost sheep, has done the things he ought\nnot, and left undone the things he ought to have done, and the whole\nworld has become guilty before God. There are no naturally perfect\nhearts. It must mean, then, a heart renewed by the Holy Ghost, put\nright with God, and then kept right. A heart cannot be kept right\nuntil it has been _put right_, and that is the secret of the\nfailure with some of you. You are trying to bring forth fruits before\nthe tree is planted. You are looking for the fruits of a perfect\nheart before you have got one. You may well be disappointed. You must\nget your heart renewed, and then kept right by the power of the Holy\nGhost.\n\nThen, what does this perfect heart imply?\n\n1. _A heart perfect in its loyalty to God_, thoroughly given over to\nGod's side, irrespective of consequences,--_loyal_. These are the hearts\nthat God wants. This was the difference between David and Saul. There\nwas not so much difference in the greater part of Saul's outward life,\nwhen compared with the life of David. It was only the prophet Samuel,\nperhaps, who knew the difference, and a few close observers; but the\ndifference was, that David was loyal to God, and God calls him, for this\nreason, a man after His own heart.\n\nFrom the first calling of David from the sheepfolds, right to the\nend, with one or two exceptions, during the whole of his life, he was\nloyal to God, and, if you will carefully search his history, you will\nfind that in all his wars, and all his dealings with the nations\nround about, and with the leaders of affairs in his own kingdom--in\neverything,\n\nDavid was loyal to God. It was the interests of God's kingdom that\nlay at David's heart--not his own honor, ease, or aggrandizement--not\nhis own fame or riches, or building himself a house--it was the house\nof his God that was dear to his heart. He was loyal; whereas Saul was\nloyal only as far as it served his own purposes and interests. Oh!\nhow many such Sauls there are in these days. When God's commandments\nwent counter with his notions, he openly set God at naught, and did\nas he liked. He sacrificed God's interests to his own. He was unloyal\nat heart, hence he was a traitor, and never could learn the way of\nthe Lord. He was never perfect towards the Lord his God, and, at\nlast, God cast him off, and Samuel did also, and you know what his\nend was. Just the difference between the two--loyal and unloyal.\n\nA heart perfect towards God! What does it mean? It means--\n\n2. Perfect in its _obedience_. That man or woman who has this\nkind of a heart, ceases to pick and choose amongst the commandments\nof God, which he shall obey, and which he shall not--he ceases to\nhave his own will, though sometimes he may have a struggle with his\nown will, and the way that God may call him to take may look to him\nas if it were a dangerous or risky way, and he may wait a little bit,\nto be thoroughly satisfied; but when once satisfied that it is God's\nway, the true child will not hesitate. He confers not with flesh and\nblood, but on he goes, irrespective of consequences. This was Paul's\nkind of obedience. He conferred not with flesh and blood; he counted\nall things dung and dross, and he went on doing so to the end--thorough\nin his obedience.\n\nPeople come to us and want to know what they are to do; they feel\nthat they are only half-hearted in God's service; they have neither\njoy nor power, and say, \"What must I do?\" and we take, as God helps\nus, the dissecting knife, and try to find out the difficulty. We get\nthem down under the blaze of the Holy Spirit's light, and try to\nprobe them and find where they are wrong. Perhaps the Lord leads us\nto the sore spot, and we point out the difficulty, but, instead of\nobeying, they shrink away. They look ahead, and they see that to obey\nthe light will involve loss of some kind--perhaps reputation, wealth,\nfamily associations, ease, or loss of friends, loss of temporal\ncomforts, loss of good business. Loss is in the background, and they\nsee it. They know where we are leading them to, and they slip back;\nthey do not want to see, and yet they do not want to consider\nthemselves dishonest, so they turn their heads away, and will not\nlook in the direction of the light, smoothing it all over and\nsinging--\n\n  \"Were the whole realm of nature mine,\n    That were an off'ring far too small,\" &c.\n\nThat is not a perfect heart, but a partial heart towards the Lord God.\n\nThe partial heart, so common, alas, now-a-days, wants to serve God a\nlittle. It is willing to go a little way with God, but not all the\nway; so that, taking the lowest interpretation, that is not a perfect\nheart towards the Lord. Can it be expected that the Lord should shew\nHimself strong in behalf of such people? Do you think you would if\nyou were God?\n\nSuppose you were a king, and had a prince or statesman who was\nserving you very valiantly and devotedly while it served himself;\nbut, suppose the tables were turned, and you were dethroned and cast\naway into exile, your name being bandied about the nation where you\nonce reigned as king, in disgrace and dishonor; suppose this\nstatesman gave you up, and said, \"Oh! I am going to be on the side of\nthe reigning monarch. I was very devoted to this man while he\nreigned, but I cannot afford to be devoted to him now his interests\ndraggle in the dust; I must be on the winning side.\" What would you\nthink of such a man? And if you were restored to your kingdom and\npower, would you show yourself strong on behalf of such a man? No;\nyou would remember, as David did, the man who cursed you. But if you\nhad a prince or statesman who followed you into exile, who ministered\nto you in secret, who tried to hold up your interests, who contended\nfor your righteousness and justice, and held up your name and tried\nto make the people see that you were a good and true man, who held on\nto you, when all the nation was calling you traitor--if you came back\nto your throne, would you not show yourself strong in behalf of that\nman? Of course you would. The Lord says He will show Himself strong\nin behalf of those of such a heart towards Him.\n\nYou masters here have a servant--a clever, smart man; you know how\nwell he can serve you, and how valuable he can be, and would be if he\nwere true; but you have reason to believe that he will only go with\nyou as far as it will be for his own interests; he will serve you as\nfar as he can serve himself, too, but, if he can get up by putting\nyou down, you may lie there. What would you say to such a man? You\nwould say, \"I shall never show myself strong for him.\" So God is not\nlikely to show Himself strong for people who are not of a perfect\nheart. A lady said to me, \"I have been doing this and doing that for\nyears, but I have no power; why don't I have it?\" I said, \"Because\nyou are not true to God. He will give it to anybody who is true to\nHim, and He can see into your heart, and knows you are not.\" Why will\nHe not show Himself strong in your behalf? _Because you do not show\nyourself thorough in His behalf._ The moment you show yourself\nthorough, that moment will He show Himself strong for you. If you had\nbeen in Daniel's place you would not have done as he did. Daniel was\none of the perfect-hearted men; he served his God when he was in\nprosperity. He set his window open every day. Then his enemies\npersuaded the king to make a decree that no man should pray but to\nthis king for so many days. \"Now,\" they said, \"we shall have him.\"\nBut Daniel just did as he was wont, he went and prayed with his\nwindow open. You say, \"That was demonstrative religion, that was\ncourting opposition. What need was there for him to make this\ndisplay; could he not have shut the window and gone into an inner\nroom? That was just like you Salvation-Army people, you always make a\ndemonstration. Why could he not have gone into an inner chamber and\nprayed?\" Because he would be thorough for his God in adversity, in\nthe face of his enemies, as he was in prosperity. So he went and\nprayed with open window to the God of Heaven, and because _He\nis_ the God of Heaven, He is able to take care of His own. His\nheart was perfect towards the Lord his God.\n\n3. _This perfect heart is perfect in its trust_:--and, perhaps,\nthat ought to have come first, for it is the very root of all.\n\nOh, how beautiful Abraham was in the eyes of God; how God gloried\nover him. How do I know that Abraham had a perfect heart towards God?\nBecause he trusted Him. No other proof--no less proof--would have\nbeen of any use. I dare say he was compassed with infirmities, had\nmany erroneous views, manward and earthward, but his heart was\nperfect towards God. Do you think God would have failed in His\npromise to Abraham? Abraham trusted Him almost to the blood of Isaac,\nand God showed Himself strong in his behalf, and delivered him, and\nmade him the father of the faithful; crowned him with everlasting\nhonor, so that his name, from generation to generation, has been a\npillar of strength to the Lord's people, and a crown of glory to his\nGod.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nHOW TO WORK FOR GOD WITH SUCCESS.\n\n\n  Son, go work to-day in my vineyard.--MATT. xxi. 28.\n\n  Compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.--LUKE xiv. 23.\n\nI am to speak of some needful qualifications for successful labor;\nand I say:--\n\nFirst, that there are certain laws which govern success in the\nkingdom of grace as well as in the kingdom of nature, and you must\nstudy these laws, and adapt yourself to them. It would be in vain for\nthe husbandman to scatter his seed over the unbroken ground or on\npre-occupied soil. You must plough and harrow and put your seed in\ncarefully, and in proper proportion, and at the right time, and then\nyou must water and weed and wait for the harvest. And just so in\nDivine things. Oh! we shall find out, by-and-by, that the laws of the\nspiritual kingdom are quite as certain and unerring in their\noperation as the laws of the natural kingdom, and, perhaps, a great\ndeal more so; but, through the blindness and obtuseness and unbelief\nof our hearts, we could not, or would not find them out. People get\nup and fluster about, and expect to be able to work for God without\nany thought or care or trouble. For the learning of earthly\nprofessions they will give years of labor and thought, but in work\nfor God they do not seem to think it worth while to take the trouble\nto think and ponder, to plan and experiment, to try means, to pray\nand wrestle with God for wisdom. Oh! no: they will not be at the\n_trouble_. Then they fail, grow discouraged, and give up.\n\nNow, my friends, this is not the way to begin work for God. Begin as\nsoon as you like--begin at once--but begin in the right way. Begin by\npraying much for Him to show you how, and to equip you for the work,\nand begin in a humble, submissive, teachable spirit.\n\nStudy the New Testament with special reference to this, and you will\nbe surprised how every page of it will give you increased light. You\nwill see that God holds you absolutely responsible for every iota of\ncapacity and influence He has given you, that He expects you to\nimprove every moment of your time, every faculty of your being, every\nparticle of your influence, and every penny of your money _for Him_.\nWhen you once get _this_ light, it will be a marvelous guide in all the\nother particulars and ramifications of your life. Study your plans. How\nmen in earthly warfare study plans of stratagem, and adopt all manner of\nmeasures in order that they may take the enemy by surprise! But, alas!\nhow little care and attention God's people give to taking souls; and yet\nit is _far harder work to take souls than it is to take cities_.\n\nHow surprised I have often been at the assumption of people who,\nperhaps, never gave one hour's consecutive thought in their lives to\nthe best means of doing certain work, and yet they will pronounce an\nopinion right off as to certain modes and measures which have been\ntried and proved successful in the lives of some of the most\nsuccessful laborers for God. They will say, \"Oh! I don't believe in\nit.\" \"Oh! it is all nonsense, ridiculous, wrong!\" while, perhaps,\nthose people whom they condemn have been pleading, and weeping, and\nstudying, and experimenting, and almost sacrificing their heart's\nblood to try to find out the best means of winning souls for Christ.\n\nI shall never forget the shock that came over me once in a large\ngathering of Christian people, when a gentleman, who occupied a\nsomewhat prominent position, was giving out a hymn which contained a\nverse something about spending one hour in watching with Jesus. He\nstopped in the middle of this hymn, and said words to this effect: \"I\nam afraid we are verily guilty here. I do not know that I dare say I\never watched one consecutive hour with Jesus in my life.\" I shall\nnever forget it. My cheeks burned with shame. I said, \"Oh! my God, if\nthese are the leaders, we need not wonder at the people.\" A man\noccupying such a position to dare to say it! The Lord have mercy on\nhim. No wonder the Lord's work is done in such a bungling way! I say\nthose who want to be successful in winning souls require to watch not\nonly days but nights. They want much of the Holy Ghost, for it is\ntrue still, \"This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and\nfasting.\" We have grown wiser than our Lord now-a-days; but, I tell\nyou, it is the same old-fashioned way, and if you want to pour out\nliving waters upon souls, either publicly or privately, you will have\nto drink largely at the fountain yourself, and have them very ready\nto let out! If you have not, your talk will be as sounding brass or\ntinkling cymbal. Oh! it makes my soul weep tears of blood to think of\nthe misdirected effort that will be put forth this very Christian\nSabbath. Plenty of labor, but how little comes of it?--all because it\nis cramped, and ruined, and misdirected, for want of thought, and\nprayer, and a single eye for the salvation of souls. May God rouse us\nup to this, and make us willing to think, and labor, and learn, and\nwrestle, and sacrifice, in order that we may do it.\n\nThen, further, the second qualification for successful labor is\npower to get the truth _home_ to the _heart_.\n\nNot to _deliver_ it! I wish the word had never been coined in connection\nwith Christian work. \"Deliver\" it, indeed--_that_ is not in the Bible!\nNo, no; not deliver it; but drive it home--send it in--make it _felt_.\nThat is your work;--not merely to say it--not quietly and gently to put\nit before the people. Here is just the difference between a\nself-consuming, soul-burdened, Holy Ghost, successful ministry, and a\ncareless, happy-go-lucky, easy sort of thing, that just rolls it out\nlike a lesson, and goes home, holding itself in no way responsible for\nthe consequences. Here is _all_ the difference, either in public or\nindividual labor. God has made you responsible, not for delivering the\ntruth, but for GETTING IT IN--getting it home, fixing it in the\nconscience as a red-hot iron, as a bolt, straight from His throne; and\nHe has placed at your disposal the power to do it, and if you do not do\nit, _blood_ will be on your skirts! Oh! this genteel way of putting the\ntruth! How God hates it! \"If you please, dear friends, will you listen?\nIf you please, will you be converted? Will you come to Jesus? or shall\nwe read just this, that, and the other?\"--no more like apostolic\npreaching than darkness is like light.\n\nGod says, \"GO AND DO IT: compel them to come in. That is your work.\nI have nothing to do with the measures by which you do it providing\nthey are lawful.\"\n\n\"Use just the same diligence, earnestness, and determination that\nyou would if you were resolutely set on any human project, and always\nbe sure that I will be with you to the end of the world. Never doubt\nMy presence when you are set on My business. I will be with you, and\nI will succeed you.\" Do it--the Lord help us to get the truth home!\n\nThis was the way with Paul, and this was the way with Jesus. Paul\nsays: \"Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men.\"\nOh! what a beautiful insight this gives us into the ministry. Why do\nyou persuade men, Paul? \"Because I know the terror of the Lord that\nis coming on, and because we thus judge that, if One died for all,\nthen were all dead. Therefore, I persuade men.\" He did not give up\nwhen he had put it before them. He carried them on his heart, and he\nsays, \"That by the space of three years I ceased not to warn every\none night and day with tears.\" He wept it in, as well as drove it in,\nwith his logic, and his eloquence, and with the power of the Holy\nGhost in him. Make it go in--make your words felt; don't talk to them\nin that sickly, languid way that makes no impression--make them know\nit. If you have not enough of the Holy Ghost for this, go to your\ncloset till you have, and then come and drive the Word home to their\nconscience as a two-edged sword, dividing asunder soul and spirit.\n\nThe second thing indispensible to success is _simplicity_:--naturalness\nin putting the truth.\n\nYou have not only to get it home, but, in order to do this, give it\nthem simply and naturally. If I were asked to put into one word what\nI consider the greatest obstacle to the success of Divine Truth, even\nwhen uttered by sincere and real people, I should say, _stiffness_.\nIt seems as if people, the moment they come to religion, assume a\ndifferent tone, a different look, and manner--short, become unnatural.\n\nPeople sometimes come to me and say, \"Oh! I would give the world to\nbe natural, but I have got into this way of talking to people. It\nseems as though I cannot be natural. Can you help me?\" I say, \"Yes, I\ncan help you, by this advice--Determine, by the help of God, that you\nwill break the neck of this bondage. I will tell you how to begin.\nBegin with your family. Break off right in the middle of conversation\non earthly matters, and begin to talk about their souls, or your own\nexperience, or drop down on your knees, and begin to pray.\" \"Oh! but\nit would be such a break.\" It should not be a break to talk to your\nFather. If you are in the spirit of it there will be no break. This\nwill help you, more than anything else. Determine that you will\novercome this sanctimoniousness, which is the curse of a great deal\nof the religion of this day. We want SANCTIFIED HUMANITY, not\nsanctimoniousness. You want to talk to your friends in the same way\nabout religion, as you talk about earthly things. If a friend is in\ndifficulties, and he comes to you, you do not begin talking in a\ncircumlocutory manner about the general principles on which men can\nsecure prosperity, and the sad mistakes of those who have not secured\nit; you come straight to the point, and, if you feel for him, you\ntake him by the button-hole, or put your hand in his, and say, \"My\ndear fellow, I am very sorry for you; is there any way in which I can\nhelp you?\" If you have a friend afflicted with a fatal malady, and\nyou see it, and he does not, you don't begin to descant on the power\nof disease and the way people may secure health, but you say, \"My\ndear fellow, I am afraid this hacking cough is more serious than you\nthink, and that flush on your cheek is a bad sign. I am afraid you\nare ill--let me counsel you to seek advice.\" That is the way people\ntalk about earthly things. Now, do exactly so about spiritual things.\nIf your friend is a spiritual bankrupt, tell him so. Tell him where\nhe is going, and that the reckoning day is coming, and that he will\nbe in God's prison-house very soon, and that, if the creditor once\ngets hold of him, and shuts him up, he will never get out till he has\npaid the uttermost farthing. If your friend has a spiritual disease,\ntell him so, and deal just as straight and earnestly with him as you\nwould about his body. Tell him you are praying for him, and the very\nconcern that he reads in your eyes, will wake him up, and he will\nbegin to think it is time he was concerned about himself. Try to\nattain this simple, easy, natural way of appealing to people about\ntheir souls. I believe if all real Christians would attain this, and\nact upon it, this country would be shaken from end to end!\n\nThirdly, you must be in _earnest--desperate_, I would like to say.\n\nAnd, indeed, friends, settle this as a truth, that you will never\nmake any other soul realize the verities of eternal things, any\nfurther than you realize them yourself. You will beget in the soul of\nyour hearer, exactly the degree of realization which the Spirit of\nGod gives to you, and no more; therefore, if you are in a dreamy,\ncosy, half-asleep condition, you will only beget the same kind of\nrealization in the souls who hear you. You must be wide awake, quick,\nalive, feeling deeply in sympathy with the truth you utter, or it\nwill produce no result.\n\nHere is the reason why we have such a host of stillborn, sinewless,\nricketty, powerless spiritual children. They are born of half-dead\nparents, a sort of sentimental religion, which does not take hold of\nthe soul, which has no depth of earth, no grasp, no power in it, and\nthe result is, a sickly crop of sentimental converts. Oh! the Lord give\nus a real robust, living, hardy Christianity, full of zeal and faith,\nwhich shall bring into the kingdom of God, lively, well-developed\nchildren, full of life and energy, instead of these poor, sentimental\nghosts that are hopping around us. Oh! friends, we want this vivid\nrealization ourselves. If we have it we shall beget it in others.\nOh! get hold of God. Ask Him to baptize you with His Spirit \"till\nthe zeal of His house eats you up.\" This Spirit will burn His way\nthrough all obstacles of flesh and blood, of forms, proprieties,\nand respectabilities--of death, and rottenness of all descriptions!\nHe will burn His way through, and produce living and telling results\nin the hearts of those to whom you speak. Earnestness--such\nearnestness that it comes to desperation--like that of Paul, who\ncounted all things but dross; yea, and who counted not his life dear\nunto him. That was the secret. He counted not his life, nor anything\nthat constitutes life--liberty, pleasure, enjoyment, friends,\nreputation, ease, &c.,--all on the altar, all was in the scale. He\ncounted none of those dear unto him, so that he might win the\nperfection, the fulness of Christ in his own soul, and the salvation\nof the souls around him.\n\nOh! what a LAUGHING-STOCK TO HELL is a light, frivolous, easy,\nlukewarm professor. Oh! what a shame and puzzle to the angels in\nHeaven, and what a supreme disgust to God. \"I would thou wert cold or\nhot. So, then, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I\nwill spue thee out of My mouth.\" Oh! what will that be? Talk about\nshame! Think of that! Shame! Some of you feel it going into the\nstreets for God. You feel it when a few people see you kneel down\nhere! Think of being spewed out of the mouth of God before an\nassembled universe. What will that be? God helping me, I will avoid\nthat I will sooner hang with Jesus on the cross, between two thieves,\nthan I will bear that shame. \"_I would thou wert cold or hot!_\"\n\nSome of you say, in your letters, that you will have this\nwhole-heartedness. You say that you have given up all, and that you\nare consecrating yourself to a life of labor. Now, be _hot_. I know\nyou will burn the fingers of the Pharisees. Never mind that. I know\nyou will fire their consciences, like Samson's foxes did the corn.\nNever mind that. _Be hot._ God likes hot saints. Be determined\nthat you will be hot. They will call you a fool: they did Paul. They\nwill call you a fanatic, and say, \"This fellow is a troubler of\nIsrael\"; but you must reply, \"It is not I, but ye and your father's\nhouse, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord.\" Turn\nthe charge upon them. Hot people are never a trouble to hot people.\nThe hotter we are the nearer we get, and the more we love one\nanother. It is the cold people that are troubled by the hot ones. The\nLord help you to be HOT.\n\nThen another indispensable condition is the surrendering of _all\nour powers_.\n\nThere must be no holding back. \"Cursed be he that holdeth back his\nsword from blood.\" That curse is resting on Christendom to-day. Oh!\nthey will thrust the sword a little way in, but they will not go in\nto the core. They dare not draw blood--the soldiers of this age--for\ntheir lives. They dare not touch a man to the quick, because, alas!\nthey are looking to themselves, and thinking what people will say of\nTHEM, instead of what God will say of them. You must not be afraid of\nblood if you are to be a true warrior of the Lord Jesus Christ. You\nmust not be afraid to say, if need be, \"Oh! generation of vipers, who\nhath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? \"You must not be\nafraid to say, if need be, \"You have made my Father's house a den of\nthieves,\" if you save some of them by doing it.\n\nOh! this accursed sycophancy; I was going to say, this accursed fear\nto brave the censure of the world--this accursed making good evil and\nevil good, as if God were altogether such an one as ourselves. Don't\nyou think He sees through the vile sham? Oh! my friends, if we don't\nmend in this respect, He will come in judgment before long, and we\nshall find out then the difference between the precious and the vile,\nif we do not find out before. If you want to be a successful worker,\nyou must make up your minds to begin with, that you will be CRUCIFIED.\n\nAs a dear minister once said to somebody, when he was arguing with\nhim about being so hard in the pulpit, \"I don't care.\" \"Oh!\" said the\nother, \"Don't you know what became of 'Don't care?'\" \"Yes,\" he said,\n\"He was crucified, and I am ready to be crucified alongside of him.\"\nWhen you are in the right, don't care. You can but be crucified, and\nit will soon be over; and then the Book says, \"They that suffer with\nHim will also reign with Him, and they shall be glorified together.\"\nIt would be a wonderful thing to be glorified alone, but, oh, think\nof being glorified together!\n\nA gentleman said lately, \"I have been thinking a great deal about\nthe glory. It is a wonderful thing--that glory that is to follow.\nThis would be worth a man sitting on the dunghill all his life to\nobtain.\" I looked at him, and thought, perhaps you are nearer to it\nthan you think, and perhaps I am, too. Ah! it _is_ a wonderful thing,\nthat glory that is to follow. Then let us be willing to suffer with Him\nand for Him. Make up your mind to be crucified at the start, and then it\nwill be easy.\n\nFurther, _complete abandonment_ is a condition of successful labor.\n\nIt is so in anything. What would you think of a soldier who was\nalways reckoning how much it was to cost, and when he should get\nback, or whether it was worth the sacrifice? You would say, \"He is of\nno use to the British Army. We want men who will go in to win at all\ncosts.\" Now, God wants men and women who will go in to win, who\nbelieve in winning, who know they have the power to win, and who\ncount _all things_ loss in comparison to winning. Do you want\nsuccess? If you do not come to that first, you will never get it.\n\nFourthly--_You must give up, kick out of the way, trample underfoot, all\nthat hinders._\n\n_Reputation_. Perhaps there are some ministers here. There were\nsome last Sunday, and there were some the Sunday before. Some of you\nhave written and others have talked to me. You say, \"It would be such\nan entire breaking from one's circle.\" Exactly. Some say, \"You see,\nthe inevitable consequences of setting up this high standard would be\na constant running of the sword into some of your best hearers and\nyour best friends.\" Exactly; that is giving your sword to blood. You\nwould not think much of drawing the blood of an enemy--it is the\nblood of your _friends_ that is the test! I know all about it; I\nhave been there. I was there a long while once. It was my own sore\nspot. The devil said, \"If you begin preaching they will call you an\nimpudent woman,\" and I felt it would be better almost to go to hell\nthan have that said about me. He said, \"They will put you in the\nnewspapers, and say all manner of coarse and vulgar things about\nyou;\" and God only knows what that was to my soul; but I battled and\nstruggled with it for a long while, until I said, at last, \"Lord, I\ndon't care what they call me--I give myself to Thee to win souls.\"\nHave I ever regretted it? Shall I ever regret it? No; He will take\ncare of your reputation. Give it up to Him, my brother. The Scribes\nand the Pharisees never had anything good to say of Jesus coming in\nthe flesh. Give up your reputation--follow Him. If it must be, decide\nto go after Him to Gethsemane, to Golgotha and the cross. Never\nmind--follow Him. Give up your reputation.\n\nThen, your habits. How ashamed some of you will be who have made the\nmere Paris-born frivolities of society stand in the way of your\nconsecration to Christ; and yet people who do this say they are\nChristians. I don't know; I cannot believe it. There is drinking;\nthey will have a glass of wine. Very well, you can have it; but you\nshall not have the wine of the kingdom. Professors will dress like\nthe prostitute of Paris. Very well; but they shall not be the bride\nof the Lamb. He will not walk in the streets with them, nor sit at\nthe same table. You can go to parties where it is said there are only\nreligious people, but where you know all manner of gossip and\nChristless chit-chat is going on, which you would be awfully ashamed\nthe Master should hear, and from which you retire with no appetite\nfor prayer. You can go to all this, but I defy you to have the Holy\nGhost at the same time. I won't stop to argue it; I ONLY KNOW YOU\nCANNOT DO IT. All that will have to be put aside and given up. You\nsay, \"That is a sore point.\" Yes; I know that is driving the sword to\nblood.\n\nFifthly.--You must consecrate your money to be used for God.\n\nI once heard an old veteran saint say, and I thought it was\nextravagant at the time, \"I consider the use of money the surest test\nof a man's character.\" I thought, no, surely his use of his wife and\nchildren is a surer test than that; but I have lived to believe his\nsentiment. Hence, you see how human experience justifies Divine\nwisdom--\"the love of money is the root of all evil\". So it is, in one\nform or other. God never uses anybody largely until they have given\nup their money. I simply state a fact. We know it is so by experience\nand the history of God's people. You must give up your money as an\nend: saving it for its own sake, or the gratification of your selfish\npurposes or those of your children--it must be all given to God, to\nwhom it belongs, being entirely used in His service. If you want to\nbe a successful laborer for souls, you will have to do that at the\nthreshhold. Give up your money to the Lord. If you think it right to\nkeep some of it, keep it to use it for Him as you go; and be as\nstrict with yourself, to your Heavenly Father, as you would be with\nyour secretary or clerk to yourself, and then you will be all right.\n\nIt is a narrow and difficult path. I tremble for you who have got\nit, and I am glad I have not; but as you have got it, I give you the\nbest advice I know. It is an awful thing to have it, but the next\nbest thing is to consecrate it and use it to His glory; and if you do\nnot, it will eat into your soul as doth a canker. To your spiritual\nnature it will be as a cancer is to your physical nature. They are\nPaul's words, not mine.\n\nI must say a word about _the reward_.\n\nYou think I am always driving you _to do_. Yes, because you\nneed it. The Lord knows I do not find you do any too much. Some of\nyou I am heartily ashamed of. Some of you need driving so that you\nought to thank God for the rod. Paul says, \"Shall I come unto you\nwith the rod?\" He was obliged to do it with some people. It is not an\nenviable thing to have to do; but we dare not, when God sets us work\nto do, shirk it; but there is a bright side--there is the reward.\n\"What!\" you say, \"does He pay you?\" Yes, good wages--pressed\ndown--heaped together! He says, \"The man who remembereth the poor (do\nyou think He means only their bodies?), I will remember him; I will make\nhis bed (what a tender allusion!) in his sickness.\" He will shake it\nup; spread His feathers on the pillows as no earthly nurse, not even\nthe tenderest wife, can do. \"I will make his bed in his sickness.\"\nYou will want Him then, brother! You are very independent, some of\nyou, now, but you will want Him then. \"I will make his bed in\nsickness. I will put underneath Him my everlasting arms.\" He will\ncause you to triumph in the swellings of Jordan. That will be grand,\nwill it not? He will give you a triumphant entrance into His kingdom,\nthose of you who have gone out in loving solicitude and anxious\nsympathy to labor for the souls of your fellow-men. He will\nadminister unto you an abundant entrance, and then--what? He will\ngive you CHILDREN; and the barren woman shall have more children than\nshe that hath a husband.\n\nOh! the whole world is akin here. Every man and woman wants\nchildren. They are especially a heritage from the Lord. Nothing can\nmake up for the want of children. The poorest parents, living in the\nhumblest hut, would not sell you their children, and the rich man,\nwho has twenty thousand a year, would give it for a son or for a\ndaughter, when he cannot have one. All human beings want children.\nNow, then, the Lord will give you children. A mother--even a\nsanctified mother--I suppose, cannot help feeling proud, or, rather,\nglad and thankful, when she shows good, obedient, and godly children\nto her friends. I do not believe that God wants to grind this out of\nus. I believe He delights in it Himself, just as He delighted to show\nHis servant Job to the devil. \"Hast thou considered My servant Job?\"\nAh! was He not proud of him?--and He has been proud of him ever\nsince. God has put this feeling in us, and it is a right feeling when\nit is sanctified. We cannot help but be proud of godly and obedient\nchildren; but what will it be to show your spiritual children, to the\nangels? How shall you feel when you gather the spiritual family which\nGod has given you round the throne of your Saviour, and say, \"Here am\nI and the children whom Thou hast given me\"?--the children won\nthrough conflict, and trial, and strife, such as only God knew;\n\"Children begotten in bonds,\" as Paul says--chains--children born in\nthe midst of the hurricane of spiritual conflict, travail, and\nsuffering, and cradled, rocked, fed, nurtured, and brought up at\ninfinite cost and rack of brain, and heart, and soul; but now, here\nwe are, Lord. We are here through it all. \"Here am I and the children\nwhom Thou hast given me.\" How shall you feel? Shall you be sorry for\nthe trouble? Shall you regret the sacrifice? Shall you murmur at the\nway He has led you? Shall you think He might have made it a little\neasier, as you are sometimes tempted to do now? Oh! no, no!--THE\nCHILDREN! THE CHILDREN! you shall have children! Won't that be reward\nenough?\n\nOh! sometimes, when I am passing through conflict, and trial, in\nconnection with a work which brings plenty of it behind the scenes, I\nencourage myself in the Lord, and remember those who have gone home\nsending me their salutations, from the verge of the river, telling me\nthey will wait and look out for me, and be the first to hand me to\nthe Saviour when I get there. Will not this be reward enough? Even\nso, Lord. Amen.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nENTHUSIASM AND FULL SALVATION.\n\nAN ADDRESS DELIVERED IN EXETER HALL.\n\n\nWhy should we be enthusiastic in everything but religion? Can you\ngive me any reason for that? If there is any subject calculated to\nmove our souls to their very centres, and to call out the enthusiasm\nof our nature, surely it is religion, if it be the real thing. Why\nshould we not be enthusiastic? I have never seen a good reason yet.\nWhy should we not shout and sing the praises of our King, as we\nexpect to do it in glory? Why should not a man cry out, and groan,\nand be in anguish of soul, as the Psalmist says, as if he were crying\nout of the belly of hell, when he is convinced of sin, and realizes\nhis danger, and is expecting, unless God have mercy, to be damned?\nWhy should he not roar for the disquietude of his spirit as much as\nDavid did? Is there anything unphilosophical in it? Is there anything\ncontrary to the laws of mind in it? Is there anything that you would\nnot allow under any great pressure of calamity, or realization of\ndanger, or grief? Why should we not have this demonstration in soul\nmatters? They had it under the old dispensation. We read, again and\nagain, that when the people came together after a time of relapse,\nand backsliding, and infidelity, when God sent some flaming, burning\nprophet amongst them, and they were gathered on the sides of Carmel\nor elsewhere, that, on some occasions, the weeping, and, on other\noccasions, the rejoicing, was so great that they made the very ground\ntremble, and almost rent the heavens with the sound of their crying\nand rejoicing.\n\nWe are told, on one occasion, that the noise was heard afar off,\nand, on another, that it was as the sound of many waters. Would to\nGod we could get men, now-a-days, so concerned about their sins and\ntheir souls, that they should thus cry out. It would be a happy day\nfor religion and for the world if it were so. If these things are\nrealities, I contend that this is the most sane, rational, and\nphilosophical way of dealing with them; and I say that the ordinary,\ncold, heartless, formal way (and, if it is not so, it has that\nappearance) is unscriptural.\n\nSomebody was talking to me about having so much feeling in religion.\nI said, \"My dear friend, what do you think God gave you feeling for?\"\nSome people seem to think it a mistake that we _have_ feelings.\nOur feelings play a very important part in all our social relations.\nWhy would you exclude them from religion? David expressed his\nfeelings, and was so carried away by them that he called on all\ncreation to praise the Lord, the hills and the trees to clap their\nhands and be glad. Get the right kind of religion, and it will make\nyou glad. If you have not the right kind of feeling, I am afraid you.\nhave not the right kind of religion. We have some enthusiasm, and\nwhen our enthusiasm dies, I am afraid we shall die, too. Nevertheless,\nour power is not in our enthusiasm; neither does it consist in certain\nviews of truth, or in certain feelings _about_ truth. But it consists in\nwhole-hearted, thorough, out-and-out surrender to God; and that, with or\nwithout feeling, is the right thing, and _that_ is the secret of our\npower. We have glorious feelings as the outcome; but the feeling is not\nthe religion--the feeling is not the holiness. Holiness is the spring\nand source of the enthusiasm. Hence our power with the masses of the\npeople.\n\nHow is it that wherever we go, as an organization, these signs and\nwonders are wrought? Somebody said, \"It is a strange thing; see what\nhas been done at So-and-so, and So-and-so, and So-and-so. They had\nall tried, and you send a couple of lads or lasses, and you have the\ntown in an uproar at once. What is it? What is the secret? Will you\nanswer the question?\" Well, it is the whole-hearted, determined\nabandonment of everything for the King's sake. That is it. It is\ngoing in, as the Apostles went in, determined to win souls,\ndetermined to set up the kingdom of Jesus Christ, at all costs. That\nis the source of our power, and if you get that, you will have power,\nand if you don't get that, it matters not what else you have. I want\nyou reasonably and calmly to see that this holiness is a real,\ndefinite blessing; that it is a level on to which the great mass of\nthe professing Christians of this generation have not come, or even\nscarcely looked up. It is a high level, but it is a level on to which\nevery one of you can come, if you will. You have heard enough about\nit. You are convinced you may have it. Will you have it? The Lord is\nsitting there; He is looking at you, and He is saying, \"What is all\nthis stir about? What is all this talk, this singing, and this\npraying about? Here I am. What do you want Me to do? I am ready to do\nit.\" And you say, \"Lord, I want Thee to cleanse my heart from sin,\nand to fill me with the Holy Ghost, and to enable me to be\nwhole-hearted and thorough in Thy service, and to go and win souls\nfor Thee.\" \"Very well,\" the Lord says, \"I am ready to come into the\ntemple, if you will clear out the rubbish. Are you willing for Me to\ncome in? I am waiting to come in as a Refiner; but you must make a\nstraight way for my feet. You must pick out the stones, and throw out\nthe rubbish, and make Me a straight path.\"\n\nWill you make Him a straight path? Will you trample under foot that\naccursed thing which has so long kept the fulness of the blessing\nfrom you? Will you give up arguing about it and trying to make out\nthat it is not a stumbling-block, when you know it is? How many will?\nI wish we had room to have a form. I am sorry we have not. With all\nthe light you have on the subject, with what I am sure the Holy Ghost\nhas revealed and is revealing to your souls, with all the glory that\nHe is putting before you, and the power for usefulness and happiness,\nwill you make this full consecration? The light of the Spirit is on\nyou: _will you, act? Will you act?_ Every spark of light you get\nwithout obeying it, leaves your soul darker. Every time you come up\nto the verge of the kingdom and don't go over, the less the\nprobability that you ever will. I know people who have been going up\nand down for more than forty years, like the Israelites, and it is a\nquestion if they ever go in. You have come near again. Will you go\nover? You can tell the Lord without telling us, though we would like\nto know, and see you put your foot over the border, into this Canaan\nof peace and power. Will you put your foot over? Who will? who will?\nWill you stand up and raise your voices to the Lord and ask Him?\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nHINDRANCES TO HOLINESS.\n\n\nI shall try, in the short time I may occupy, to go straight to the\npoint--to some of the difficulties and hindrances which I know are\nkeeping not a few here to-day out of the enjoyment of the blessing. I\nknow there are some here who are satisfied that this blessing is\nattainable, who are satisfied that God can thus keep them, as we have\nbeen singing, if they were to lean the whole weight of their\nneed--their soul, and body, and spirit--upon Him, and trust Him. They\nbelieve He could, and they believe He would. They have come to\nperceive that it is not at all a question of human strength, or human\nweakness, or human knowledge, but that it is simply a matter of\nDivine strength, fully recognized and fully trusted by human\nweakness. Therefore, there is no more a stumbling-block in their way\nabout reckoning themselves holier than other people, or stronger than\nother people, for they recognize themselves as the very weakest and\nmost sinful of _all_ people: but they have come to understand\nthis blessing to be human weakness, leaning with all its weight upon\nDivine power; and they believe God does thus save and keep those\npeople who do thus lean. Then, what hinders? There they stand, just\nwhere the Israelites stood, when they might have gone in and\npossessed the good land. \"They entered not in because of unbelief,\"\nand for that unbelief there is a reason--a cause. They dare not\nventure their souls on this Divine power, because there is back in\ntheir consciousness some difficulty, some obstacle, something which\nis only known to themselves and the Holy Ghost, which prevents them\nfrom doing this.\n\nWhen they try to jump on to the Divine strength there is something\nthat holds them back, and they cannot make the spring. They try to\nforget it--they sing, and pray, and seek, to make themselves believe\nthere is nothing, and they come up again and again right to the\nentrance of the goodly land, and then they try to spring in. Some of\nyou will today, but you will not be able to spring, because there is\nsomething holding you back; and you are conscious of it, but will not\nallow yourselves to realize it. Now this is the point, when my dear\nhusband read that passage, \"When they had prayed, the place was\nshaken,\" I thought, Oh! what was involved in that prayer--what does\nthat mean? _Why_ did the glory come? Why did the Holy Ghost\novershadow them? Why were they filled with God--so filled that they\nhad to go down and could not help themselves, but went into the\nstreets and poured it out upon the godless multitudes around them?\n_Why, why_ did it come? Why do hundreds of assemblies of God's\npeople meet and pray, but nothing comes? They hold long meetings, and\nmake long prayers, and sing,\n\n  \"We are waiting for the fire;\"\n\nbut nothing comes! Why did it come on that particular occasion?\nBecause in that prayer was thorough, entire, everlasting\nself-abandonment. They came up caring for nothing but pleasing God\nand doing as He bade them; and the Holy Ghost alone knows when a soul\narrives at that point. He will never come till the soul _does_\narrive at that point. This is the deficiency, I am satisfied, with\nhundreds. There they stand, right on the borders of the glory-land,\nbut there is some wedge of gold, or Babylonish garment that they\nburied years ago.\n\nThey won't think about it. They say, \"Oh, it is nought, nought! That\nlittle thing would not hinder, it is so long ago.\" They would not,\nwhen they knew they ought, dig it up and burn it before the Lord. If\nthis is so with any here, you _must_ dig it up, or the Holy Ghost will\nnever come. A lady, a short time ago, was brought up to the very edge of\nthis blessing, but there was something she felt she ought to do. She had\na sum of money which she felt ought to be given up to a certain object.\nShe prayed and struggled, and attended prayer-meetings, and prayed long\ninto the night; but, no, she would not face the difficulty. She said,\n\"Oh! no; I am not satisfied in my own mind. How do I know God wants it\nfor that purpose?\" She might have struggled till now if she had not made\nup her mind to obey; but, the moment she did--alone, up in her bedroom,\nthe blessing came. A gentleman came up to the penitent-form, after one\nof my West-end services, last season, and told me: \"I am a preacher. I\nhave been laboring in the Gospel for eight years, but I know I am\nutterly destitute of this power.\" \"Do you want it?\" \"Oh!\" he said, \"I\ndo;\" and he looked as though he were sincere. \"Then,\" I said, \"what is\nit? There is a hindrance. It is not God's fault. He wants you to have it\nHe is as willing to give you the Spirit as He was Peter or Paul, and\nyou want to have it. Now, _will you have it?_ Have you understood the\nconditions?\" \"Ah!\" he said, \"_that_ is the point.\" Now, you know I\nshould be a false comforter if I were to try to make you believe you\nwere right when you had not yielded that point. \"Well,\" he said, \"you\nsee it would be cutting loose from one's entire circle.\" Ah! he was led,\nyou see, by \"Christian friends.\" I said, \"Did not the Lord Jesus cut\nloose from His circle to save you? and, if your Christian friends are\nsuch that to live a holy life you must cut loose from them, what are you\ngoing to do--stop in that circle, ruin your own soul, and help to ruin\nthem, or cut loose and help to save them?\" Oh! there is no profounder\nphilosophy in any text in the Bible than that--\"How can ye believe who\nreceive honor one of another, and seek not the honor that cometh from\nGod only?\" You will have to come to God not caring what anybody thinks.\n\nAs a dear lady, who is going through floods of persecution for\nJesus, said, \"I don't care if they turn their backs on me, and never\nspeak to me any more, and cast me out, and my children, too. I don't\ncare if I can only have His presence and follow Him.\" When you come\nto that you will get this pearl.\n\nI know a father and mother who want this blessing,--especially the\nmother. They have a family of beautiful little children, but the\nfather says, \"What are we going to do for our children? It is a very\nserious matter cutting loose from our circle.\" A gentleman said to\nme, \"I have to do _something_ for my sons. What am I to do?\"\n\"No,\" I said, \"you have got to do nothing for your sons. You have to\ntrain them for God, and leave GOD _to do for them_, and He is\nwell able to look after His own. That is your business; train them\nfor God, and leave God to find a niche for them, and if He can't on\nearth, I warrant you He will in Heaven.\" People have things wrong way\nup now-a-days. They have the notion that they have to do this, that,\nand the other, for themselves and their children, instead of\naccepting it as their great commission that they have to propagate\nand push along and extend the kingdom of Jesus Christ, to seek His\nkingdom and His righteousness, and leave Him to look after their\ninterests. When you come to this it will soon be done.\n\n\n  A FRAGMENT.\n\n  Love Him, trust Him,\n    Him alone;\n  Father, Keeper,\n    Three in One.\n\n  Saviour, Master,\n    Leader, too;\n  Lover, Brother,\n    ALL to you.\n\n  Fear not, care not,\n    Only follow\n  His way, this day,\n    And to-morrow.\n\n  Waiting, working,\n    For His sake;\n  Watching, hoping,\n    Till daybreak.\n\n  Peaceful, joyful,\n    In His peace;\n  Filled full, kept full,\n    By His grace.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\nADDRESSES ON HOLINESS,\n\nIN EXETER HALL.\n\nFIRST ADDRESS.\n\n\nI think it must be self-evident to everyone present that it is\n_the most important question_ that can possibly occupy the mind\nof man--how much like God we can be--how near to God we can come on\nearth preparatory to our being perfectly like Him, and living, as it\nwere, in His very heart for ever and ever in Heaven. Anyone who has\nany measure of the Spirit of God, must perceive that this is the most\nimportant question on which we can concentrate our thoughts; and the\nmystery of mysteries to me is, how anyone, with any measure of the\nSpirit of God, can help looking at this blessing of holiness, and\nsaying, \"Well, even if it does seem too great for attainment on\nearth, it is very beautiful and very blessed. I wish I could attain\nit.\" That, it seems to me, must be the attitude of every person who\nhas the Spirit of God--that he should hunger and thirst after it, and\nfeel that he shall never be satisfied till he wakes up in the lovely\nlikeness of his Saviour. And yet, alas! we do not find it so. In a\ngreat many instances, the very first thing professing Christians do,\nis to resist and reject this doctrine of holiness as if it were the\nmost foul thing on earth.\n\nI heard a gentleman saying, a few days ago--a leader in one circle\nof religion--that for anybody to talk about being holy, showed that\nthey knew nothing of themselves, and nothing of Jesus Christ. I said,\n\"Oh, my God! it has come to something if holiness and Jesus Christ\nare at the antipodes of each other. I thought He was the centre and\nfountain of holiness. I thought it was in Him only we could get any\nholiness, and through Him that holiness could be wrought in us.\" But\nthis poor man thought this idea to be absurd.\n\nMay God speak for Himself! Ever since I heard that sentiment I have\nbeen crying from the depths of my soul, \"Lord, speak for Thyself;\npowerfully work on the hearts of Thy people and awake them. Take the\nveil from their eyes, and show them what Thy purpose in Christ Jesus\nconcerning them _is_. Do not let them be bewildered and miss the\nmark; do not leave them, but Lord, reveal it in their hearts.\" There\nis no other way by which it can be revealed, and, if you will let\nHim, He will reveal it in your heart.\n\nIt occurred to me that I might say a word or two on what my husband\nsaid about infirmities, because I am so continually meeting people\nwho _will make infirmities sins_. They insist upon it that the\nrequirements of the Adamic law have never been abated; that we are\nnot under the evangelical law of love, or the law of Christ, as the\nApostle puts it, but that we are still under the Adamic law, and that\nthese imperfections and infirmities, to which my husband has\nreferred, are sins. I wonder that such people do not think of a\ncertain passage, which must forever explode such a theory, where the\nApostle says, \"Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my\ninfirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.\" If these\ninfirmities had been sins, we should have the outrageous anomaly of\nan apostle of Jesus Christ glorying in his sins! You see, his\ninfirmities were only those defects of mind and body which were\ncapable of being overcome and overruled by grace, to the glory of\nChrist and to the furtherance of His kingdom.\n\nI glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me\n--that, in consequence of these very infirmities, the power of Christ\nshall so rest upon me as to lift me above them, make me independent\nof them, master of them, so that, through these very infirmities, I\nshall more glorify His strength and grace than if I were a perfect\nman, in mind and body. In another place he says, \"And lest I should\nbe exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations,\nthere was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan,\nto buffet me.\" Some people think this was _sin_; but surely, the\nwords, \"messenger of Satan,\" show that this thorn was no act or\ndisposition of Paul's, but some external temptation or affliction,\ninflicted by Satan. Besides, the Divine assurance, \"My grace is\nsufficient for thee,\" _ought_ to forbid the idea of sin. Paul\nsought the Lord thrice to have this thorn removed; surely if it had\nbeen _sin_, the Lord would, have been as anxious to have it\nremoved as His servant was! This thorn was, doubtless, some physical\ntrial--as the words, \"in the flesh,\" indicate--some tribulation or\nsorrow, through the patient endurance of which the strength of Christ\ncould be magnified in Paul's weakness--one of those things which he\ncould bear \"through Christ who strengthened him.\"\n\nBut mark, this was a Divinely-permitted discipline to _prevent\nPaul_ from falling into sin; quite a different thing to sin\nitself. \"God tempteth no man with evil.\" The Lord sent this to Paul\nfor the purpose _not of making_ him humble, for he was humbled\nbefore, but of keeping him humble. And does He not send something to\nus all? Do we not need trials and tribulations in the flesh in order\nto keep us humble? But is this evidence that, because we require\nthese things to keep us humble, therefore pride is dwelling in us and\nreigning over us? It is an evidence just to the contrary.\n\nOh, that people, in their enquiries about this blessing of holiness,\nwould keep this one thing before their minds, that it is _being\nsaved from sin_!--sin in act, in purpose, in thought!\n\nI have a beautiful letter, received a short time ago from a young\nlady, who wrote me soon after my former services in the West End. She\ntold me that she had been the bondslave, I think, for four or five\nyears, of a certain besetting sin, and her first letter was the very\nutterance of despair. She had struggled and wrestled and prayed, and\ntried to overcome the sin that had been reigning over her. Now and\nthen she would get the victory, and then down she went again, and she\nsaid, \"It is such a subtle thing, connected with my thoughts and\nimagination, so that I do not think I ever can be saved.\" I answered\nthe letter, and tried to encourage her faith and hope in Jesus\nChrist. I showed her how dishonoring this unbelief was, and that, if\nshe would only trust Him to come in and reign in her heart, He could\npurify and cleanse the very thoughts and imagination. She made a\nlittle advance, and wrote me another letter. I wrote her again, and\nencouraged her to trust further. She said she could not come so far\nas to think that He could purify her thoughts. She had got as far as\nto believe that He could save her from putting them into practice,\nbut she could not believe that He could purify _them_. I wrote\nher back once more, and tried, the Lord helping me, to show her how\nJesus, by the inspiration of His Holy Spirit, could purify the very\nthoughts of our hearts, and, thank God, she did go another step. I\nhave had two letters from her since. She said in the first of them,\n\"I rejoice with trembling, for fear it should be only temporary, but\nI have trusted Him to purify the source, and I must say HE HAS DONE\nIT, and, instead of thinking these thoughts, I have holy thoughts,\nand if Satan presents anything to my mind, it is so repulsive to me\nthat I cannot tell you the grief and horror with which it fills me.\"\nI wrote her again, encouraging her, and I got another letter, in\nwhich she said, \"It is a fact that He has cleansed the thoughts of my\nheart, and now I am conscious that my thoughts are pleasing to Him,\nthat He has saved me from this sin which has been the trouble and\ntorment of my life for all these years gone by.\"\n\nNow, what I want to say to you, is, that what He can do for one, He\ncan do for another. If I am wrong here, I give up the whole question.\nI am perfectly mistaken in the purpose and aim and command of the\nGospel dispensation, if God does not want His people to be pure. Not\nto count themselves pure when they _are not_. Oh, no! We are\ntold, over and over again, that God wants His people to be pure, and\nTHAT PURITY IN THEIR HEARTS IS THE VERY CENTRAL IDEA AND END AND\nPURPOSE OF THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST; if it is not so, I give up the\nwhole question--I am utterly deceived.\n\nIn justification of this, I have selected two or three texts which\nseem to put it all in one; summing-up texts, so to speak. I will take\nfirst, as a specimen, what my husband has been trying to enforce--\"The\nwill of God is your sanctification.\" There is, however, a sense,\nand an important sense, in which sanctification must be the will of\nman. It must be _my_ will, too, and if it is not my will, the\nDivine will can never be accomplished in me. I must _will_ to be\nsanctified, as God is willing that I should be sanctified. There are\nas many, and more, exhortations in the Bible to sanctify yourselves\nthan there are promises of God to sanctify you.\n\nThe next text is James iv. 8: \"Draw nigh to God, and He will draw\nnigh to you. Cleanse _your_ hands, _ye_ sinners; and purify _your_\nhearts _ye_ double-minded.\" This was to backsliders, to people who had\nbeen professing to believe, but who had gone back under the dominion of\ntheir fleshly appetites and passions. There are two or three other texts\nwhere we seem to get the whole matter summed up, as, for instance, \"He\ngave Himself for us (that is, for us Christians, the whole Church of\nGod) that He might redeem us from _all iniquity_, and purify unto\nHimself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.\"--That is, purify\n_us_. And then 1 Timothy i. 5 shows God's purpose and aim in the whole\nmethod of redemption. \"Now the end of the commandment is charity out of\na _pure heart_, and of a _good conscience_, and of faith\nunfeigned\"--cleansed and kept clean, for if it had been cleaned and\nbecome dirty again, it would not be a good but a bad conscience. And\nagain, in I John iii. 3: \"And every man that hath this hope in Him,\npurifieth himself, even as He is pure.\" Now, I say, these are summing-up\ntexts, and there are numbers of others to the same effect, to show\nthat the whole end and purpose of redemption is this--that He will\nrestore us to purity; that He will bring us back to righteousness;\nthat He will purge your consciences from dead works to serve the\nliving God--not only purge you from the past, but keep you purged to\nserve the LIVING GOD; that it shall be done by the application of the\nblood to the conscience, and then it shall be maintained by the power\nof the Holy Ghost keeping us in a state of purity and obedience to\nrighteousness.\n\nNow, I say, if this be not the central idea of Christianity, I do\nnot understand it. If God cannot do this for me--if Jesus Christ\ncannot do this for me, what is my advantage at all by His coming?\n\nThere is a great deal more in these epistles directed to the individual\nChristian to _be_ this, that, and the other, and to _do_ this, that, and\nthe other, than there is about what God will do for him after all! This\nis not an objective Christianity--this is not sitting down and\nsentimentalizing and thinking of Christ in the Heavens, in these\nepistles; it brings Him down, to all intents and purposes, INTO OUR\nHEARTS AND LIVES HERE, and it is one of the continual exhortations, _be_\nye this, and _do_ ye this and the other.\n\nThese epistles represent a real, practical transformation to be\naccomplished IN US, and this is the only thing that will do to die\nwith. If it is not accomplished in you, I tell you, you will not be\nable to die in peace. You will want to be cleansed, as my dear\nhusband told you, before you can venture into the presence of the\nKing of kings. You will want a sense of beautiful, moral rectitude\nand righteousness spreading over your whole nature, which will enable\nyou to look up into the face of God and say, \"Yes, I love Thee, I\nknow Thee, and Thou knowest me, and lovest me, and we are one. I love\nthe things Thou lovest, and desire the things Thou desirest. We are\nof one spirit, 'joined in one spirit unto the Lord.'\" You will want\nthat, and nothing less will do to die with. And why not have it? Will\nyou have it? Why not let God work it in us? Will you try it? People\nare constantly saying, \"They long for it, and they wish they could\nget it.\" Will you let God do it? Will you put away the depths of\nunbelief which are at the bottom of all your difficulty? People\nreally do not believe that God _can_ do it for them, and that is\nat the bottom of their difficulties. But He can do it, and He\npromises to do it. Will you go down, and say, \"Be it unto me\naccording to Thy word\"?\n\n\n  \"BORN--A SAVIOUR.\"\n    Luke ii. 11.\n\n  Jesus a Saviour born,\n    Without:\n  Without the inn, refused with scorn.\n    Cast out:\n  Cast out for me, my Saviour, King,\n  Cast out to bring this lost one in.\n\n  Jesus a Saviour born,\n    A man:\n  A man of sorrows, smitten, torn by stripes:\n  By stripes, O Lord, my soul is healed,\n  By stripes, Thy stripes, my pardon sealed.\n\n  Jesus a Saviour born,\n    The Lamb:\n  The Lamb of God hath bled and borne\n    My sins:\n  My sins the Sacrifice did slay,\n  My sins the Lamb doth take away.\n\n  Jesus a Saviour born\n    To save:\n  To save at night, at noon, at morn.\n    To keep:\n  To keep from sin, from doubt, from fear;\n  To keep, for lo! the Keeper's here.\n\n  Jesus a Saviour born,\n    A King:\n  A King! exalt His glorious horn,\n    And sing:\n  O sing, ye heavens! He burst His grave,\n  And sing, O earth! He lives to save!\n\n\n\n\nSECOND ADDRESS.\n\n\n  I beseech yon therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye\n  present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God,\n  which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world:\n  but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove\n  what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.--ROM.\n  xii. 1,2.\n\nI have been thinking about the word in the text, \"_that_\"--\"that\nye may prove what is that good and acceptable, and perfect will\nof God.\" This advance in the Divine life, as well as every other,\nright to the end, till we advance into glory, has its _conditions_.\nThe condition of the advance from an absolutely unawakened worldly\ncondition, to that of a convinced sinner, _is the reception of\nthe light_. God awakens and enlightens tens of thousands, and\nthousands reject the light--instantly put it away--shut their eyes\n--will not have the light. These go back into greater darkness,\nand sin with more alacrity than ever they did before;--those who\nreceive the light advance into the condition of awakened, enlightened\nsouls.\n\nThe next condition of advance from the state of a struggling sinner,\nwilling to part with his sins and to follow Christ, _is faith_,\nto believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, that he may receive the\nforgiveness of sins. And at every advance onwards, if the believer is\never to get beyond the first principles, if he is ever to grow a\nsingle inch, so to speak, there is a condition involved in that\nadvance! For instance, if, after conversion, the Holy Spirit reveals\nto him something which is inconsistent--which he did not before\nsee--the condition of his advance another step is the _renunciation_\nof that thing!--the reception of the light, and _obedience to\nit;_ and, if he shrinks from and does not receive and obey the\nlight, he will never advance _any more_ until he does. There are\nthousands of Christians, who, instead of advancing, have gone back\nsince their conversion, because they would not comply with the\ncondition, \"THAT\" they might prove the good, and acceptable, and\nperfect will of God.\n\nThere was a condition. They would have proved the will of God if\nthere had been no condition; but there was a condition they would not\ncomply with; so there they stick, just where they were--or, rather,\nthey have gone backward.\n\nWell, now, then, here is a condition to _this_ grand and glorious\nadvance from the state of justification, where, while the believer is\ngiven power over sin, so that it does not rule over him, yet he\nsometimes, through its inward workings, falls under its power--the\nadvance from this comparatively sinning and repenting condition\non to that platform where the believer so abides in Christ that he\nsins not, that he loves God with all his heart, and soul, and mind,\nand strength--so united to Christ that, walking in the power of the\nHoly Ghost, he fulfils the law of love under which he is placed--the\nadvance, I say, from that up and down, in and out, falling and rising\nstate, to this higher platform, also has its _conditions_.\n\nYou would go up to it to-day if it were not for the conditions; most\nof you would go up in a body, as the Israelites would have gone into\nCanaan, if there had been no condition. I never knew anyone so\nfoolish as not to want to be in the good land; they want to be in, of\ncourse, and they would go in and get the honey and the milk, but\nthere are the _conditions!_ Now then, here you have it plain,\nand you have it in numbers of other passages equally plain.\n\nThere is nothing upon which the Holy Ghost has been more particular\nthan in laying down the conditions. And what are they? \"I beseech\nyou, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your\nbodies a living sacrifice\"--the living man--you, all of you; not\n_it_--not something in you.\n\nThe latter term is never used by the Holy Ghost when speaking to\nChristians, but always _you, ye, your_ bodies, _your_ souls, _your_\nmind, the whole man--YOU, \"a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto\nGod, _which is_ your reasonable service.\" And is it not? Is it too much?\nIs it more than He bargained for when He bought you? Is it more than He\npaid for? It is \"your reasonable service.\"\n\nAnd now, then, comes the conditions: \"And be _not conformed to this\nworld: but be ye transformed_ by the renewing of your mind, _that_ ye\nmay prove.\"\n\nOh! if you could be transformed to Him and conformed to this world\nat the same time, all the difficulty would be over. I know plenty of\npeople who would be transformed directly; but, to be not conformed to\nthis world--how they stand and wince at that! They cannot have it at\nthat price. As dear Finney once said, \"My brother, if you want to\nfind God, you will not find Him up there, amongst all the starch and\nflattery of hell; you will have to come down for Him.\" That is\nit--\"Be not conformed to this world.\"\n\nNothing wounds me more, after being at meetings for dealing with\nsouls, where I have tried to speak in a most pointed and thorough way\nto make everybody know what I meant, when I go to the dinner or\nsupper-table, people have not known a bit, or, if they have, they\nwon't accept it. Oh! this is the secret--they will not come down from\ntheir pride and high-mightiness. But God will not be revealed to such\nsouls, though they cry and pray themselves to skeletons, and go\nmourning all their days. They will not fulfil the condition--\"Be not\nconformed to this world;\" they will not forego their conformity even\nto the extent of a dinner party. A great many that I know will not\nforego their conformity to the shape of their head-dress. They won't\nforego their conformity to the extent of giving up visiting and\nreceiving visits from ungodly, worldly, hollow, and superficial\npeople. They will not forego their conformity to the tune of having\ntheir domestic arrangements upset--no, not if the salvation of their\nchildren, and servants, and friends depends upon it. The _sine qua\nnon_ is their own comfort, and then take what you can get, on God's\nside. \"We _must_ have this, and we _must_ have the other; and then, if\nthe Lord Jesus Christ will come in at the tail end and sanctify it all,\nwe shall be very much obliged to Him; but we cannot forego these\nthings.\"\n\nOh! friends, I tell you, this will never do. God helping me, I will,\nI must tell you, because it is driven in upon my soul by what I am\nseeing and hearing every day. People come to these meetings, and they\ngroan and cry and come to us for help, and we exhaust our poor brains\nand bodies in talking to them and giving them advice, telling them\nwhat to do, and, when it comes to the point, we find, \"Oh! no; don't\nyou be mistaken: we are not going to sacrifice these things. We\ncannot have the Lord if He will not come into our temples and take\nthem as He finds them. We could not forego these things.\"\n\nYou remember the text that was read at the opening of the meeting--\"And\nthe world hath hated them, because they are not of the world.\"\nIt means something! and there are a hundred other texts teaching the\nsame truth. Now, _what does it mean_? The Lord help us to see\nit! Does it not mean that we are not to be like the rest of the\nworld?--that we are not to be guided by the same maxims, or act upon\nthe same principles as the world?--that we are not to attach the\nsame importance to mere earthly and worldly things that worldly\npeople do? Have you ever thought of those awful words in the parable\nof the sower?--\"And the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of\nriches, and the lusts of other things, entering in, _choke_ the\nword, and it becometh unfruitful,\"--not abominable things, not\nimmoral things, not shameful things, but the _desire of other_\nthings. And, in another text: \"_Who mind earthly things_.\" They\nattach more importance to worldly things and other things than they\ndo to the things of His kingdom. They practically make these things\n_first_, though they sing about His kingdom and profess to make\nHim first: they make the earthly things first, and, therefore, they\nwill not have their earthly things upset for His things; and do you\nsuppose He is cheated? Do you suppose He is deceived? Do you think it\nlikely that the great God of Heaven, who has millions of angels and\narchangels to worship and serve Him, is going to pour His glory on\nsuch people, and reveal Himself to them, and use them? Not likely! \"I\nwill be first in your love,\" He says.\n\nYou women here, if you knew that you were not the first and only one\nin the affections of your husband, what would you say? And you\nhusbands, would you dwell with a wife if you knew you were not the\nonly one in her affections, but that they were divided between you\nand someone else? \"Not likely!\" you would say; \"I am not going to\nlavish my affections, and my society, and my gifts, and everything I\npossess, on one whose heart is divided with another. If she will have\nher heart divided, then she must go to that other.\"\n\nNow you know God is a jealous God, and He knows who do mock Him, and\nHe knows who will not sacrifice this conformity to the world that\nthey may walk with Him in white. He knows, also, who do not care what\nanybody thinks of them, or what people say of them; who are willing\nto be counted fools and fanatics that they may walk with Him and\npromote the interests of His kingdom, and who only regard their\nbodies as His instruments and their homes as His temples; who are\nwilling that their breakfast hours, or dinner hours, or luncheon\nhours, or any other hours may be upset, and, in fact, everything made\nsubservient to the interests of His kingdom. We must place everything\nat His service--our children, business, homes, and everything. If I\nunderstand it, this is nonconformity to the world.\n\nBefore I close, let me say a word to help those who are desiring to\nattain this blessing. There is no other way. It is of no use beating\nabout. BE NOT CONFORMED, BUT BE YE TRANSFORMED. These two are in\njuxtaposition. If you will be conformed, then you cannot be\ntransformed; if you will not be transformed, then you must be\nconformed. Now, will you give up conformity to the world? If so, you\nmay, everyone of you, be transformed this morning--go up into the\nland. You may all be saved to-day, and make your abiding-place in\nChrist, and have all the power and glory which comes to those who\npossess Him; you may advance from the miserable condition of a poor\nup-and-down, in-and-out, wretched man, on to the glorious vantage\nground of a saved man--a saved woman--a triumphant saint of God!\n\n\n  FAITH.\n\n  My faith _looks up_ to Thee--\n   My faith, so small, so slow;\n  It lifts its drooping eyes to see\n   And claim the blessing now.\n      Thy wondrous gift\n       It sees afar;\n      Thy perfect love\n       It claims to share,\n      And doth not, cannot fear.\n\n  My faith _takes hold_ on Thee--\n   My faith, so weak, so faint;\n  It lifts its trembling hands to be,\n   Trembling, but violent.\n      The kingdom now\n       It takes by force,\n      And waits till Thou,\n       Its last resource,\n      Shall seal and sanctify.\n\n  My faith _holds fast_ on Thee,\n   My faith, still small, but sure,\n  Its anchor holds _alone_ to Thee,\n   Whose presence keeps me pure.\n      And Thou alway,\n       To see and hear,\n      By night, by day,\n       Art very near--\n      Art very near to me.\n\n\n\n\nTHIRD ADDRESS.\n\n\nWhat a deal there is of going to meetings and getting blessed, and\nthen going away and living just the same, until sometimes we, who are\nconstantly engaged in trying to bring people nearer to God, go away\nso discouraged that our hearts are almost broken.\n\nWe feel that people go back again from the place where we have led\nthem, instead of stepping up to the place to which God is calling\nthem. They come and come, and we are, as the Prophet says, unto them\na very pleasant instrument, or a very unpleasant one, as the case may\nbe; and so they go away, and do not _get anything_. They do not\nmake any _definite advance_. We have not communicated unto them\nany spiritual gift. They merely have their feelings stirred, and,\nconsequently, they live the next week exactly as they lived the last,\nand go down under the temptation just as they did before.\n\nWould you dream for a moment from reading the New Testament that\nthis was the kind of thing God intended in His provisions of grace\nand salvation? Is there not a definite end in every promise,\nexhortation, and command? God is most _definite_ in His requirements and\npromises, and in the provision which He has made; and yet many of the\nLord's people are perpetually and persistently _indefinite_. They go to\nand fro, like a door on its hinges, and never get anything from the\nLord. We want you absolutely to get something from the Lord, and we are\nquite sure you may and _will_, if you comply with the condition. The\nLord is ready to give you that particular measure of grace, strength,\nand salvation which you need. Now that you have come up to the\nthreshhold of the goodly land, there is only one thing which can keep\nyou out, provided you have made the needed consecration. Of course, if\nyou are holding anything back, then you can never come in until you give\nthat up. If yon are cleaving to some doubtful thing, and don't give God\nthe benefit of the doubt, you can never come in; but, if you see this,\nand make the necessary consecration, if you _really_ desire this\nblessing, there is only one thing which can possibly keep you out of\nits enjoyment, and that is--_unbelief_.\n\nIt will be said of you, in years to come, as it was said of some in\nolden times, \"They entered not in because of unbelief.\" You have come\nright up to the threshhold, and some of you have been there many a\ntime. Oh! what gracious influences you have been the subject of. You\nhave seen through the veil! You have felt His hand! You have had your\nfeet on the threshhold! You have been almost in, and then you have\ndrawn back through unbelief. Shall it be so again to-night? God\nforbid! Will yon step over? Will you venture? Will you trust? Will\nyon leap on to His faithfulness? Will you spring into the arms of\nOmnipotent Love, and trust Him with consequences? Never mind if you\n_do_ die, or something happens to you that never happened to\nanyone else in the world's history; God will take care of you. Never\nmind if the devil does come round and \"consider\" you, as he did Job,\nand afflict you with boils, and put you upon the dunghill--you will\nbe happier there with Jesus than in a palace without Him. Oh! this\ncaring for consequences! The devil knows the grand _possibilities_\nopen to many of you; he knows not only what you might receive and\nenjoy in yourselves, but what you might accomplish for God if you\nwould only come in and possess this blessing; and so he frightens\nyou with consequences. He knows what you might do, and whom you\nmight be instrumental in saving!\n\nWho knows how many of these precious ones that cluster round you,\nyou may be instrumental in leading on to this higher platform--this\nglorious vantage ground of Christian experience? and, through them,\nhow many more? and how, in this way, the glorious blessing would\nspread? Remember, also, that every time you come near and go back,\nthere is less _probability that you will ever come in at all_;\nand the nearer you come and go back, the less probability there is\nthat you will ever come as near again.\n\nYou _are grieving the Spirit_. There are some people who have been\ncoming near for years, and now they have gone back altogether, and I am\nafraid they will never come up again. _What will you do?_ The law of the\nkingdom, from beginning to end, is, \"According to your faith be it unto\nyou,\" and, \"What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye\nreceive _them_, and ye shall have _them_.\" _Eternal truth has uttered\nit_--\"ye shall have them.\" Now then, will you? Have you let go all? Are\nyour skirts free? Are you leaving all behind you? Are you resolved from\nto-night to cut from the past, and no more make any provision for the\nflesh to fulfil its lusts, but that you will bid the things that are\nbehind a final adieu, close your eyes on them, and fix your eyes on the\nmark of the prize of your high calling, and press on every succeeding\nhour of your life until you reach it? Will you? If you will, God will\ngive you this blessing. He waits to do it; He is here. The Holy Ghost is\nhere: He is leading many of you up; He is beseeching you; He is\nseconding what I am saying, in your hearts; He is saying, \"Come,\nbeloved; come into the banqueting house;\" He wants to bless you and\nfill you with His Spirit. Now then, will you come? Oh! the Lord help\nyou not to draw back, but to press on, _press on, press on_, never\nminding the consequences.\n\n\n\n\nFOURTH ADDRESS.\n\n\nI think, dear friends, that I have only a very few words to say to\nyou now. I am, as it were, holding on to God for power by which to\nsay them, so that they shall sink into your hearts and produce some\nimmediate and permanent results in your lives. I believe the Lord is\nnot only grieved and disappointed, but I believe He is angry, when\nHis people meet, and talk, and sing, and pray, and then go away\nwithout any definite result having been reached--without ever having\ngiven anything to Him, or received anything from Him. I believe He\nfeels with respect to us, just as He felt with respect to His people\nof old, when He said, \"Why come ye and cover my altar with tears?\" As\nthough He said, \"You know what I want you to do; come and do it; and,\nwhen you do it, I will open the windows of Heaven and pour out a\nblessing.\"\n\nMy heart ached at what a lady told me this morning, before I came\ninto this hall. She said, \"A friend of mine remarked, 'You don't mean\nto say that you are going to call four thousand people together to\ncry for the Holy Ghost?' She said, 'Yes, I do.' 'Well, it makes me\nfrightened. What if anything should happen; if something should be\ndone?'\" Would to God something would happen; would to God something\nmight be done that should frighten somebody. But oh! what did that\nreveal? Depths of infidelity and unbelief; and yet people wonder that\ninfidelity is increasing. Is it any wonder that infidels are laughing\nus to scorn? Is it any wonder that at Christian Evidence Societies\nmen get up and say that the Christian system has become effete? No\nwonder, when that is the state of heart of the Lord's people.\n\nPeople meet together, and pray, and talk, and sing \"Whiter than\nsnow,\" and they don't believe it any more than do the heathen. They\npray for the Holy Ghost, and do not so much as believe there is a\nHoly Ghost. They ask God to do something, when they never knew Him to\ndo anything, and don't expect He ever will. The world is dying\nbecause of this unreality, and being damned by it.\n\nJosephine Butler says, about France, \"France is waiting for a\n_reality_:\" and so is England, and so is the world waiting for a\n_reality_. God help us to make some _real people_. You believe, some of\nyou, that nothing is going to happen. You don't believe that God is\ngoing to do anything--so He won't in your experience. If you had lived\nat Nazareth, do you think Jesus Christ would have done anything for you?\nIf you had been deaf and dumb, you would have remained so, for He could\nnot have done any mighty works in you, because of your unbelief! He is\nthe same now; and if you don't expect Him to do anything, brother, He\nwill not. But some of us do _expect_ Him to do _something_. Some of us\n_believe_ He is going to do _something_, and that by this little stone,\ncut out of a mountain, without hands, He intends to raise a great\nkingdom. Jesus Christ is not going to be disappointed, and allow the\ndevil to chuckle in His face forever, and say, \"I have cheated You out\nof Your inheritance.\" We will do something, or die in attempting it.\n\nAfter all, what does God want with us? He wants us just _to be_ and _to\ndo_. He wants us to be like His Son, and then to do as His Son did; and\nwhen we come to that, He will shake the world through us. People say,\n\"You can't be like His Son.\" Very well, then, you will never get any\nmore than you believe for. If I did not think Jesus Christ strong enough\nto destroy the works of the devil, and to bring us back to God's\noriginal pattern, I would throw the whole thing up for ever. What! He\nhas given, us a religion we cannot practice? I say, No, He has not come\nto mock us. What? He has given us a Saviour who cannot save? Then I\ndecline to have anything to do with Him. What! does He profess to do for\nme what He cannot? No, no. He \"is not a man, that He should lie: neither\nthe Son of man, that He should repent:\" and I tell you that His scheme\nof salvation is two-sided--it is God-ward and man-ward. It contemplates\nme as well as it contemplates the great God. It is not a scheme of\nsalvation, merely--it is a scheme of _restoration_. If He cannot restore\nme, He must damn me. If He cannot heal me, and make me over again, and\nrestore me to the pattern He intended me to be, He has left Himself\nno choice.\n\nI challenge anybody to disprove by the Bible that He proposes to\n_restore_ me--brain, heart, soul, spirit, body, every fibre of\nmy nature--to restore me perfectly, to conform me wholly to the image\nof His Son. If He could have saved me without restoring me, then He\ncould have saved me without a Saviour at all. How do you read your\nBibles? How do you read the history of the miracles--the stories of\nHis opening the eyes, unstopping the ears, cleansing the leper, and\nraising the dead? He will heal you if you will let Him. These are the\nsort of words the world wants--the living words, living embodiments\nof Christianity, walking embodiments of the Spirit, and life and\npower of Jesus Christ. You may scatter Bibles, as you have done, all\nover the world. You may preach, and sing, and talk, and do what you\nwill; but, if you don't exhibit to the people _living epistles_,\nshow them the transformation of character and life in yourself which\nis brought about by the power and grace of God--if you don't go to\nthem and do the works of Jesus Christ, you may go on preaching, and\nthe world will get worse and worse, and the church, too. We want a\nliving embodiment of Christianity. We want JESUS TO COME IN THE FLESH\nAGAIN.\n\nDid you ever notice the tense in that passage--\"He that believeth that\nJesus is come in the flesh\"--not that He _did_ come, or _was_ come, but\nthat He _is_ come now. Oh! how people hate Jesus Christ in the flesh.\nYou may be ever so devout, ever so Pharisaic, till you come to Jesus in\nthe flesh, and then they will gnash on you with their teeth as they\ngnashed on Christ. They can't resist such people. This is what the world\nwants--holy people; and nothing else will do. We have tried everything\nelse. You Christian people from other divisions of the Lord's forces,\nyou have tried Bibles, and preaching, and singing, and services, and\nSunday-schools. I have been lately to a part of the country where they\ntold me that nearly every member of the population had passed through\ntheir Sunday-schools, and yet there are men there who will drag a young\ngirl down a flight of stone stairs and kick her till she is black and\nblue. The great mass of the people who took part in the Lancashire Riots\nhave passed through your Sunday-schools.\n\nNow, I say, God is speaking to you in these things, if only you will\nhear Him, and He is saying that the letter killeth, that\ncircumcision, and baptism, and forms, and ceremonies, and going to\nchapel, and Bible reading, is all nothing, when there is no Holy\nGhost in it. You want a real, living embodiment of Christianity over\nagain, and if the Salvation Army is not going to be that, may God put\nit out! I would be willing to pronounce the funeral oration of the\nArmy if I did not believe it was going to be that. The world is dying\nfor this.\n\nI was so touched, yesterday, by hearing a story from Paris, told by\na young woman who has just returned, and was telling me about my\nprecious child. The story was this: A woman came, one morning, and\nasked for the lady. They tried to put her off, and asked, \"Will not\nsomeone else do?\" \"No,\" said the woman; \"I do want to see the lady\nherself.\" They said, \"You can't see her to-day--she is too ill!\"\n\"Then,\" she said, \"When can I see her?\" They appointed a time the\nnext afternoon, and then this poor woman came, and she told this\nstory: \"I did hear, six years ago, that there was somebody could take\nthe devil out. Now, see, I have got a devil in, and he do make me\nwicked and miserable, and I do want him taken out, and I have been\nrunning about these six years to find somebody who could pull him\nout. I've been to lots of priests, but they could not pull him out\nbecause they had a devil in _them_; and, you see when there's a\ndevil in me and a devil in them, we got to fighting, and they could\nnot pull him out.\" What a comment on \"Jesus I know, and Paul I know;\nbut who are ye?\" Of course, nobody can put a devil out who has a\ndevil in them. The poor old woman's sense told her this.\n\n\"And,\" she continued, \"a gentleman told me that this lady who has\ncome here is able to pull him out, and I have come to her to do it,\nfor I want him pulled out.\" Oh, yes! I thought, that is what poor\nhumanity wants all the world over. THEY WANT PEOPLE WHO CAN CAST THE\nDEVIL OUT--people who have in them Holy Ghost power to do it. Oh!\nwill you be such an one?\n\n\"Where is God?\" someone said to me the other day, in agony--\"Where\nis God?\" Where, indeed! \"Why does He not show Himself? Why does He\nnot do something?\" That lady was afraid something would happen when\n4,000 met together to beseech the Holy Ghost! Why not? You say He has\nnot changed. Your creed says so. You say He is the same yesterday,\nto-day and forever. You say the needs of the world are as great. You say\nHis great, benevolent heart beats for His fallen, sinful, erring\nhuman family. You say He loves us. You are always telling about His\nlove. What is the reason He does not do something for us, and come\ndown in the same plentitude of spiritual power as He did at\nPentecost? Why? Only because you are not as given up to Him and as\nwilling to do it as the people were in former times. You have not\naccounted all things dung and dross. You have not thrown everything\ninto the scale, and, therefore, He will not thus baptize you with the\nHoly Ghost. These are the people that the world wants--people of one\nidea--Christ, and Him crucified. For Christ's sake, give up quibbling.\n\nI said to a lady who had got this blessing when somebody got at her\nand began with this verse and that verse, and this translation and\nthat translation--\"Mind you don't begin to reason; you will lose your\nblessing\"--and she did lose it. You can't know it by understanding.\nOh! if the world could have known it by understanding, what a deal\nthey would have known. But He despises all your philosophy. It is not\nby understanding, but _by faith_! If ever you know God it will\nbe by faith, becoming as a little child--opening your mouth, and\nsaying, \"Lord, pour in;\" and then your quibbles and difficulties will\nbe gone, and you will see holiness, sanctification, purity, perfect\nlove, burning out on every page of God's Word. I weep before God, I\nfeel almost more than I can bear, over this awful knack that some\npeople seem to have of plucking the bread out of the children's\nmouths when they are just getting an appetite for it. The Lord have\nmercy upon them! If you don't come in yourselves, for Christ's sake\ndon't keep other people out.\n\nA minister--a devoted, good man--was trying to show me that this\nsanctification was too big to be got and kept. I said, \"My dear sir,\nhow do you know? If another man has faith to march up to Jesus Christ\nand say, 'Here, I see this in your Book; You have promised this to\nme; now then, Lord, I have faith to take it:' mind you don't measure\nHis privilege by your faith. Do you think the church has come up to\nHis standard of privilege and obligation? I don't. It has many\nmarches to make yet. Mind you don't hinder anybody.\" The law of the\nkingdom all the way through will be--\"According to your faith.\" If\nyou want this blessing, put down your quibbles, put your feet on your\narguments, march up to the throne and ask for it, and kill, and\ncrucify, and cast from you, the accursed thing which hinders it, and\nthen you shall have it, and the Lord will fill you with His power and\nglory now, and something _will_ happen. The Lord grant it.","title":"Godliness : being reports of a series of addresses delivered at James's Hall, London, W. during 1881","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":46203}